By: Lt Col JS Sodhi (Retd), Editor, GSDN

As India completes over 77 years of Independence, though every policy and plan including the most important of all ie the Constitution has been formulated for every important facet that is needed to administer the nation, but an important aspect of the National Security Strategy (NSS) has not been formulated since 1947 for India, which will clearly spell out the external and internal security threats that confront India.

What is of grave importance of the need of NSS for India is a two-front war that is on the horizon on India which is slated in 2035. With exactly a decade to go, the NSS needs to be spelt out in public domain so that there is whole-of-nation approach in dealing with external threats.

In probably what was the earliest indication of a two-front war threat on India jointly from China and Pakistan, India’s first Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Bipin Rawat on March 04, 2021 stated the need to study transformational concepts and to be prepared for threats for military primarily arising from China and Pakistan. The CDS further went on to remark in his address in the College of Defence Management, Secunderabad that India is facing complex security and a challenging environment and included defining the NSS amongst other important steps that India needs to take.

According to the 2024 Annual Threat Assessment released on February 05, 2024 by the Director of National Intelligence, USA, since the relations of India with both China and Pakistan are fragile, it is likely to result in a war between these three nations.

The Presidential tenure of Xi Jinping of China will see the Chinese waging three wars in the next one decade with the war for Taiwan in the near horizon in 2027, the war for Spratly Islands in the middle distance in 2029 and a joint two-front war with Pakistan on India after a decade in 2035.

A nation going to war, whether in offense or defense is a whole-of-the-nation approach and not singularly the responsibility of a nation’s military.  And to prepare a nation for an impending war requires one document that will act as a beacon for the whole-of-the-nation approach and it is here that the importance of NSS needs no over-emphasis.

The India-China trade too has been increasing YoY. In 2020 the India-China trade was worth US$ 87.65 billion. The Galwan Valley Clash happen on June 15, 2020 in which 20 soldiers of the Indian Army were killed in action fighting the PLA. Despite this, India’s trade with China soared to US$ 125 billion in 2021 and US$ 135.98 billion in 2022. In 2023 the India-China trade stood at an all-time high of US$ 136.2 billion. In 2024 the trade between India and China decreased slightly to US$ 118.4 billion.

Part of every dollar traded with China is helping in strengthening the PLA. With such enormous global trade figures of China, it is no surprise that China has increased its defence budget by 7.2% in 2024 for the tenth consecutive time and doubling it since 2015.

On the other hand, India’s defence budget has reduced from 2.5% of GDP in 2019 to 1.9% of GDP in 2025.

China as a credible military threat is rarely discussed in public discussions and debates organised by most Indian mainstream electronic media channels and leading think-tanks and academia of the country. Rather, the only military threat discussed vastly in India is Pakistan.

The real threat to India is China and Pakistan is only a subset of this main threat.

The NSS framed should spell out clearly what are the external and internal threats of India. This would greatly help in the whole-of-the-nation to deal with the adversarial situation that is just a decade away.  After all, fighting a war isn’t the sole responsibility of a nation’s military only. Every ministry, organisation and individual have to contribute in war preparedness according to its capacity and capability.

Gen MM Naravane (Retd), the 28^th Chief of Staff of the Indian Army who retired in 2022, in an article in The Print a well-known Indian publication, on August 07, 2023 has written that a two-front war would mean disaster for India.

US Undersecretary of Defence for Policy nominee Elbridge Colby during a hearing with the US Senate Armed Service Committee on March 04, 2025 stated that China is using its economic and military power to tear down the US. Elbridge Colby in his previous stint in the US Government in 2018 played a pivotal role in the formulation of the 2018 National Defence Strategy, admitted that the US military was unprepared to take on China’s military might.

The danger of China is now being admitted by the US officials publicly. Till how long can India afford to not discuss and deliberate the Chinese threats publicly. And there can no better start than the formulation of the National Security Strategy for India so as to put every Indian citizen and organisation on an even keel about the threat that is just a decade away and China’s aggressive and assertive military posturing that is troubling a superpower USA too.

The closest that India has come in the formulation of the National Security Strategy was in 2007 when the Integrated Defence Staff of the Indian Armed Forces prepared a draft National Security Strategy, but it was not approved by the Cabinet Committee of Security.

On March 04, 2021 India’s first Chief of Defence Staff, General Bipin Rawat while speaking at the College of Defence Management, Secunderabad stated the need of defining the national security strategy.

The Russia-Ukraine War and the Israel-Hamas War have clearly brought to fore that conventional war threats will always remain. The next big war on the horizon is China’s war for Taiwan in 2027 and thereafter the two-front war on India in 2035.

The global geopolitical scenario has vastly changed in the last three years and is only set to get more turbulent in the decade ahead. The words of the Greek philosopher Thucydides in 481 BC “The strong do what they have to do and the weak accept what they have to accept” is as relevant today as it was centuries ago, with the ever-increasing China’s economic and military might.

The China challenge can no longer be ignored by India, despite all diplomacy and discussions with China. For, China has very clear economic and military aims which are enshrined in its national security strategy termed as “Comprehensive National Security”, which was first used by the Chinese President Xi Jinping on April 15, 2014 at the founding session of the National Security Commission of the Communist Party of China.

Though China is yet to make the Comprehensive National Security document public, the methodical manner in which China has risen as an economic and military power, clearly points to a well-written document whose access is only with a miniscule few, though parts of it are often released as policy and plans to various ministries and organisations of China.

No success of the magnitude that China has witnessed in all possible realms of national power is possible without a document existing in the hands of the miniscule few Chinese government officials who are implementing every plan and policy with blitzkrieg speed. On October 28, 2024, Admiral Samuel Paparo, the head of the US Indo-Pacific Command said that China is conducting the largest military buildup in world’s history.

On January 14, 2022, Pakistan released its first National Security Policy (2022-2026), which is also the nation’s first national security policy document.

On March 17, 2025, General Upendra Dwivedi, the Chief of the Army Staff, Indian Army, while delivering the fourth General Bipin Rawat Memorial Lecture in New Delhi remarked that two-front war was no longer a possibility-it’s a reality.

Clearly, the war clouds have started darkening on India.

The future wars of China will be waged in all the six domains ie land, sea, air, cyber, electromagnetic spectrum and space, with China being the sole nation in the world to have declared in its PLA military doctrine in 2014 that it is ready to fight any nation in any part of the world in all the six domains of war. Such a statement has not been given by any other nation’s military including USA which ironically formulated the Full Spectrum Operations Doctrine in 2001 after its success in the 1991 Gulf War.

The future war to be waged by China will have to be met by enhanced technological, economic and of course military power, for which one document has to clearly spell out the path ahead so that all public and private sectors contribute with total clarity.

Notwithstanding the past, the best time for India to formulate the National Security Strategy is in 2025, as the two-front war to be waged on India is exactly a decade away.

A famous Chinese proverb says “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now”.