The fearsome foursome who comprise Modi’s security dream-team in second term

The national security team that PM Modi has selected not only enjoys his trust and confidence, but also has the experience to deliver.

Amit Shah and S. Jaishankar (R) | ANI Photos

With the reappointment of National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval for the next five years and his elevation to cabinet rank, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has got a fearsome foursome to handle the entire spectrum of national security and foreign policy. The team comprising of Home Minister Amit Shah, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and the NSA Ajit Doval is something of a security dream-team, actually more team than dream. The speculation doing the rounds about how Modi was either going to cut someone to size or play one against the other really had no firm basis. If anything, it stemmed from lack of access to the corridors of power, and even more, the sheer lack of knowledge of how the Modi-led dispensation functions, and the inter-personal relations between the various team members.

The thing is that in this dispensation, Modi is the undisputed boss. The entire team he selects has to work towards a purpose which is laid down and defined by him. Modi is a hands-on Prime Minister, always wanting to be in the loop and always keeping a watch. And yet, he empowers his colleagues enough to take decisions that deliver the goods. There are debates and discussions, even disagreements about what policy approach to adopt. But to construe from this that there are huge personality clashes, ego problems and cut-throat competition between team members who are constantly trying to undercut each other to curry favour with the boss is incorrect. From what one has learnt about the functioning of the Modi government, it is anything but a durbar where getting the ear or attention of the top boss is the ticket to power. Officials trying to flaunt their proximity to the PM to increase their importance have learnt the hard way that this is strongly discouraged. Modi values the work, not visage, of his colleagues and officials. Performance and probity matter more to Modi than proximity. And loyalty scores over obsequiousness and sycophancy.

The national security team that Modi has selected not only enjoys his complete trust and confidence, but also has the experience, gravitas and commitment to deliver. Together, they will bring to bear the intellectual heft, the operational experience and the political savvy in taking decisions and making policy. With Modi as boss, this is a team that will be working in conjunction, and not at cross purposes. Instead of conflict and pulling things in their direction, there will be cooperation and coordination of action. There will be no empire building by members of this team. The fearsome foursome might have their own styles and preferences for achieving the objectives before them, but they will work in a way that they complement each other. They will be perfect foils for each other, and will be able to play the good-cop-bad-cop routine to a fault.

Those wondering about how Jaishankar and Doval will work together, need to only see how they worked together as a team in Modi Season 1 and all the outcomes they achieved together. Of course, they would have disagreed on some issues of policy, but they would have never disagreed on the fundamental objective of whatever policy was adopted – to advance and maximise India’s interests. There will be areas in which responsibilities will overlap. Kashmir comes to mind immediately because it falls under the ambit of each of the fearsome foursome. Pakistan is another issue where inputs of all four will be required, as will coordinated action. Similarly, there will be other issues in which Doval and Shah, or Doval, Jaishankar and Singh will have to work together.

In all the euphoria over the election results, it is important to not forget that both internally and externally, there are huge challenges that the Modi government will have to confront in its Season 2. Domestically, Kashmir is going to require a lot of attention bandwidth. Anyone who thinks Amit Shah will wave a magic wand and Kashmir will normalise is living in the alternate reality of New York Times. The best that can be hoped for is that the government takes a 20 year view of Kashmir and starts to put in place the necessary building blocks which will ultimately normalise the situation in the troubled state. To be able to do this he will need all the help, assistance, advice he can get from the other three of the fearsome foursome. Similarly, the Naxal problem remains to be tackled. There will be other manufactured crisis and controversies that the fourth and fifth columns of the Left-Liberal groups will try to incite, inflame and ignite – the language issue is an example. These will need to be handled with deftness.

The terrorism problem is also not going to disappear. If anything, it will only grow. The government has handled it fairly well in the last five years, but the next five years could see a big uptick in terrorist violence, including the growing footprint of international terror groups. And there is always the neighbour from hell exporting terrorist wares into India. The quad of national security will need to build upon the successes of Season 1 to meet the terrorism challenges in Season 2.

This will require all the cooperation and coordination between them. Again, on the other big ticket items – relations with the P5, for instance – working in silos will not help. India’s foreign policy will be designed to maximise her economic and security requirements. Here again, the entire team will need to work as one, each according to his own areas of strength. With China, if the NSA will be the point-man in border talks, the EAM will bring in the soft touch of diplomacy and RM will add the military heft and political wisdom. For defence modernisation and restructuring the framework for higher defence management, the diverse opinions on the table could result in some out of the box policy solutions.

Despite the onerous task that awaits the national security team, their appointment instills confidence that India’s national security is in solid hands, especially with the top boss having demonstrated decisiveness and resolve to defend India. The fearsome foursome will certainly send shivers across India’s western border. It will also cause immense heart-burn, and perhaps nightmares for op-ed writers in India. But it is a team that will serve India well.

The author is Senior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation. Views are personal.

This article was first published on ORF.