 Early Times Report
NEW DELHI, May 19: Under Operation Sindoor, Indian forces dismantled terror infrastructure, punctured a long-standing strategic assumption, and then stopped “deliberately and purposefully”, and it reflected “smart power” in its most complete expression, Army Chief Gen Upendra Dwivedi said on Tuesday.
In his address at a seminar hosted at the Manekshaw Centre here, he also said that twelve months ago, India offered the world a “partial answer” to the so-called smart power question. “On the intervening night of May 6-7 in 2025, Bharat acted. In a precisely defined 22-minute operation window, Operation Sindoor delivered military precision, information control, diplomatic signalling and economic resolve, as one coherent national act. We struck deep, dismantled terror infrastructure, punctured a long standing strategic assumption, and then stopped, deliberately and purposefully,” the Army chief said.
“The deliberate thought after 88 hours, was smart power in its most complete expression, knowing exactly which instrument to apply, at what intensity, and precisely when to convert a military moment into a strategic one,” he asserted.
The seminar, titled, ‘Security to Prosperity: Smart Power for Sustained National Growth’, hosted by defence think-tank Centre for Land Warfare Studies (CLAWS), was attended by senior military officials, various retired Army officers and representatives from several countries.
Gen Dwivedi said today, the “world around us is sending a more complex signal — disorder, distrust, and dichotomy in alliances”.
“We were promised a world where prosperity would make power politics obsolete… instead, we have a world where power politics is being used to reorganise prosperity,” he argued.
In his address, he asked the audience if smart power is the “defining currency” of sustained national growth, or has the “raw calculus of hard power”, once again reclaimed the centrestage of the global order.
But to answer it, one must first read the world as it is, not as one wishes it to be, the general officer cautioned. |
