Without directly naming China and Pakistan, Army Chief General MM Naravane on Thursday said the disputed borders with the nuclear-armed neighbours have stretched India’s resources.
Making this point, he said India is witnessing trailers of future conflicts and its adversaries will continue with efforts to achieve their strategic aims.
The Army chief said India is facing "unique, substantial and multi-domain" security challenges and that developments on the northern borders have adequately underscored the requirement of ready and capable forces with an optimal component of boots on the ground backed by modern technology to preserve the country's sovereignty and integrity.
Naravane said the disputed borders with nuclear-capable neighbours coupled with state-sponsored proxy war were stretching the security apparatus and the resources.
In order to meet the new challenge, he said the Army is focusing on "restructuring, rebalancing and reorienting" its forces and the process has already been initiated and that the force is committed to the theaterisation initiative to ensure tri-services integration.
"We are witnessing trailers of future conflicts. These are being enacted daily on the information battlefield, in the networks and in cyberspace. They are also being played along unsettled and active borders," Naravane said.
Highlighting these efforts in a seminar organised by Centre for Land Warfare Studies(CLAWS), he said, "It is for us now to visualise the battlefield contours of tomorrow based on these trailers. If you look around, you will realise the reality of today."
The seminar was attended by Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari, Navy Chief Admiral R Hari Kumar and defence attaches of several countries.
Naravane said the developments in Afghanistan have again brought to focus the use of proxies and non-state actors to decisive effect.
"These actors thrive on local conditions, innovatively exploit low-cost options to devastating impact and create conditions that limit the full use of sophisticated capabilities which are available to state," he said.
The Army Chief said India's adversaries will continue to make efforts to achieve their goals against the country.
"The events of 2020 have been testimony to the diversity of security threats in all domains and this has brought the spotlight towards non-contact and grey zone warfare. We need to augment capabilities in both non-contact and contact modes of warfare," the Army Chief said referring to the eastern Ladakh face-off.
Underlining the changing nature of conflicts, Naravane said the ancient Indian wisdom on statecraft and application of force propounded many centuries ago remained "timeless and pertinent" even today.
He said the armed forces have initiated an exploratory project of examining the ancient Indian wisdom and knowledge for contemporary security challenges.
In an oblique reference to China, he also said some nations are challenging the globally accepted norms and the rules-based order. This has manifested in various forms that included aggression and opportunistic actions to change the "status quo" keeping the threshold below all-out war, he said.