India’s New Doctrine of War Against Terror

Prelims: Current events of national and international importance| Security Issues

Why in news?

Prime Minister recently unveiled a new military doctrine against terrorism following Operation Sindoor.

• New military doctrine – It includes three principles that will guide the nation’s response against terror.

Three Principles of Doctrine of War Against Terror

• Decisive retaliation - Response will be on India's terms where India will determine the timing, scale, and nature of its response to terrorist attacks.
• No Nuclear blackmail - No tolerance for terror that hides under nuclear blackmail rather India will act decisively on the terrorist hideouts.
• No distinction between terrorists and sponsor - It removes previous distinctions between terrorist organizations and state sponsors, that India will not differentiate between the government sponsoring terrorism and the masterminds of terrorism.
• It aims to dismantle state sponsored terrorism by discouraging funding to terrorism.
• India's approach to terrorism, will be new normal that retaliation against terrorism is India's policy against terrorism.
• The doctrine represents a qualitatively higher level of aggression and lowers the threshold for future responses to terrorist attacks.
• PM has placed this doctrine within the framework of the global war on terror.

The framework of the Global War on Terror (GWOT) refers to the strategic, legal, military and diplomatic structures established primarily by the United States and its allies after the September 11, 2001 attacks to combat terrorism worldwide.

• The doctrine maintains India's long-standing position that "terror and talks cannot go together" regarding relations with Pakistan.
• This new approach follows and escalates from two previous major responses to terrorism such that,
  • The surgical strike after the Uri terror attack (September 2016) and the Balakot strike after the Pulwama terror attack (February 2019).

Reference

The Indian Express| PM unveils new doctrine