The relationship between the Armed Forces and the media has always been an uneasy one due to the contrasting needs of the 2 groups. The Armed Forces are always prone to secrecy while the media is generally trying to pry open secrets. Yet, since WWII, all indications have been that these 2 organizations need to coexist to achieve the ultimate goals of the nation. As General Eisenhower wrote in 'Crusade in Europe’,"The commander in the field must never forget that it is his duty to cooperate with the heads of his government in the task of maintaining civilian morale that will be equal to every purpose. The main agency to accomplish this task is the press."

In India, we have a poor history of media relations. The Armed Forces closed themselves off and were content with the odd archaic newsreel on the forces. The most glaring example of this early on is the case of the 65 Indo Pak war, which even after a sound thrashing, the Pakistanis got themselves accolades by wining and dining the Western media. However, it is in the arena of internal security operations that poor media relations have really hurt the armed forces, the Government and the country at large.

Internal Security operations or low Intensity Conflicts or Counter Insurgency operations by nature demand winning the information war rather than killing the militants. Granted that this is not the sole responsibility of the security forces, the Government, whether State or Central has to play its role. However, when the Government arm represented by the Department of Information is paralyzed, the security forces have to rely on their own media management skills. We look here at major instances throughout the past two decades where opportunities existed for a coordinated media strategy but were used only on an ad hoc basis.

The Punjab Problem

The principal strategy of the terrorist i.e. random violence against key personnel like policemen, judges, administrators and politicians resulting in total paralysis of the Government had almost worked. Furthermore, the local private media capitulated completely to the terrorist diktat leaving government media as the only source of information. The only private group, which stood up to the terrorists, was the Punjab Kesari Group. For this, the group paid a very high price in blood. The media here carried terrorist imposed "panthic codes", glowing interviews with the terrorists, reports of "bhog " ceremonies while turning a blind eye to the daily carnage. To make it worse, they carried a daily haranguement of the security forces highlighting the occasional lapses, further demoralizing and obstructing them. Luckily, the writ of the terrorists only extended to the Punjab and the media in the rest of the country did highlight the issue. Still, at its peak in 1990, no captured terrorist was ever brought to trial. In response, the security forces (Punjab police, para militaries and army) did not make any effort to bring the media around. Operation Blue Star was conducted amidst a media blackout. It was only in Operation Black Thunder 2 that the media was present right at the beginning of the operation and it fed a ringside view of the operation to the public. It is telling that the terrorist and their handlers realized the value of the images being sent around and capitulated.

Charar-e-Sharif incident

Charar-e-Sharif, due to its location on the slopes of the Pir Panjal range, was mostly bypassed by the insurgency. Occasional militant groups took shelter there. In the winter of 1994, a lashkar led by 'Major' Mast Gul who was a Pakistani fanatic, sought refuge here. As soon as the administration and security forces heard of his arrival, a bureaucratic wrangle took place as to what action to take. When the army established a cordon around and began 'Psy Ops', the militants likewise strengthened their defenses. The militia had romanticized Mast Gul. An illiterate ans low IQ terrorist was depicted all across as a valiant Islamic mujahid, invincible, ruthless and the savior of Islam. The Army and Administration in panic banned the media from Charar-e-Sharif. As a result, there was no third/neutral party to record the events that followed. The militants after a prolonged psychological battle started the explosions in the shrine. As the walnut wood shrine exploded in flames, the militants escaped in the confusion and panic. The result was an explosion of Kashmiri anger at what they perceived was Army destruction of the shrine.

Kargil and the future

The recent Kargil war again highlighted this problem. While the media reported the war in detail, rekindling the sense of Indianess in the country, the proceedings were still bland. The spokespersons were not fluent communicators with the halting, terse and cryptic descriptions being a put-off. In addition, the words used to describe certain aspects were contradicted at times. One spokesman described the area occupied as "hillocks" while the Air Force emphasized that these were real mountains compared to the hillocks in Kosovo which negated the point that the eviction would take time because of the terrain and other severe constraints. Furthermore, a lack of fluency of the English Language led to severe miscommunications. The Army websites, which initially came up, continued to be staid and had never caught up with the speed of the Internet world. It was some weeks after the Kargil war that some of the information came up. Even then, the sites continue to be uninspiring and look little more than a collection of wire news. However, the latest site "VijayinKargil" is slick and well put together which indicates the benefit of tying up with a private firm to maintain the website. It must also be mentioned that the Air Force section of the Official site is good and has articulated the strategy in a very fine manner.

The media for its part initially swarmed all over. With the war initially not going well for the Indian Army there were not too many seniors officers concerned with questions from the media, logistics for transmitting the news etc. Some army officials started complaining about the photographs of the landscape and reports indicating how many metres the artillery rounds missed the target by. In time the media learnt to only take close up shots of artillery and troops. Moreover the daily coverage of the troubles of the soldiers, the funerals led to an outpouring of support from the Indian population. India came together as never before a fact noticed by the Pakistanis. The Pakistanis bitterly criticized the media for war mongering and raising passions. One wonders what the effect would be on the CI operations if the soldiers sacrificing their lives in Kashmir got the same coverage as those who fought in Kashmir.

The importance of the media in India’s first television war can be gauged by the fact the Kargil Committee report devoted a separate section to this issue. The report noted that while the coverage was satisfactory, it was apparent that the media lacked training in military matters and the Armed Forces lacked the training to facilititate the task of the media. Since the MOD information cadre was not up to the task of handling the media, the briefing functions were taken up by a group of senior civil and military spokesmen. Army HQ set up an Informational and Psychological Warfare Cell with direct access to the Army Chief to monitor and disseminate information in a calibrated manner. While this was in the capital there were no corresponding arrangements at the Corps, Division and Brigade levels. This resulted in wildly inaccurate and speculative reports of intruders capturing a number of Indian Army bunkers, building three storied bunkers with cable TV and buying cement from the Dras – Kargil market. (A similar characteristic observed in reports of the recent arms depot fire at Bharatpur) The lack of knowledge about military matters resulted in umpteen reports questioning the absence of the army chief away in Poland as well as the Northern Army Commander away in Pune at the same time. These operations were limited to Corps level and were handled as such.

The Army officer's proclivity to speak bluntly has also caused trouble. Gen. Rodrigues came under fire for quite innocuous remarks, which were completely taken out of context by the press. Lt. Gen. R.K.Sawhney's honest attempts to defend his junior officers for filing charges against a minister in the Assam Govt. based on the confessions of an ULFA activist were greeted with scathing headlines by the North Eastern press. This is why Gen. Malik in his first Press briefing on Kargil cautiously remarked "I am not going into semantics. You are going to misquote me tomorrow." It is this apprehension of being misquoted, or being punished for occasional slip-ups, which percolates the Armed Forces leading to mundane and dull briefings.

The Army to be fair has made some moves over the last few years to address the problem. A number of seminars have been held on Army- Media Interaction at various Corps Headquarters. It encouraged junior and middle level officers to engage more openly with the media. It has organized regular courses for defense correspondents to familiarize themselves with the complexities of military operations. The army needs to take a leaf out of the US army week long "charm school" for all officers selected for the rank of

Brigadier General (Brigadiers in the Indian Army) at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. As a Major General who taught the course said, "If we don't tell our side of the story, shame on us. Reporters are like alligators. You don't have to love them, you don't have to like them but you do have to feed them'.

The military also needs to understand the factors that go into making news like media deadlines, competition etc. The top echelons should learn not to address mediaperson's like NCC cadets. Most importantly, it needs to find the right balance between local and foreign media. Depending on the situation, one may be more important than the other.