New Delhi: The Indian Army chief, General Upendra Dwivedi speaking in IIT Madras in Chennai on August 4 spoke on his counterpart in Pakistan being promoted as Field Marshal. “If you ask a Pakistani whether you lost or won, he'd say my chief has become a field marshal. We must have won only, that's why he's become a field marshal…” the general, speaking during the inauguration of the Indian Army Research Cell, said.

Dwivedi, as per The Telegraph, said this in the context of underlining the importance of the narrative management system. "Narrative management system is something which we realise in a big way because victory is in mind. It's always in the mind.”

On Operation Sindoor which began on May 7, with India attacking Pakistan terror infrastructure, and ended with a ceasefire on May 10, Dwivedi said, "In Operation Sindoor, we played chess. It means that we did not know the next move the enemy is going to take and what we were going to do. This is what we call a grey zone," 

"Grey zone means that we are not going for the conventional operations. But we are doing something just short of a conventional operation," he added.

Dwivedi went on to say, "Conventional operation means, go with everything, take everything you have. And, if you are able to come back, otherwise, stay there. That is called the conventional approach. Here, the grey zone means any activity that is taking place in all domains, that is something we are talking about and Operation Sindoor taught us that this is the grey zone," he said.

The Hindu reports that the Army Chief did not name any other country, but underlined the threat perception when he said, "next time, it may be much more, and whether that country will do it alone, or supported by some other country, we do not know. But I have a strong hunch, feeling, that country will not be alone. That is where we have to be careful".

He spoke of two fronts that India needs to be careful about. "As far as we are concerned, we share two borders, and both borders, you can call it live, semi-live, in whichever terminology you can look at, but these potential adversaries have the capabilities to orchestrate a kind of war, which we have to face together or one by one, that we cannot say for sure, as of today, but capability-wise, we have to stand up to both the fronts.”

The Financial Express reported how Gen. Dwivedi spoke of the “non-kinetic” war to be fought by a “whole of the nation approach”., he warned that technology, civil readiness and public participation will be as decisive as military might.

“The next war which we are looking at, it may happen soon. We have to prepare accordingly, and this time we will have to fight this battle together,” General Dwivedi said.

The Indian Express reports that much of his speech was focused on the technological backbone of Operation Sindoor. India’s forces, Dwivedi said, are moving from “muddy trenches to the internet of military things,” where data, sensors, and autonomous systems shape battlefield decisions in real time.

On the intelligence side, he said, the Army sought to unify its picture with the Navy and Air Force. The operation, employed manned platforms, commercial satellite imagery, as well as “pseudo-satellites” — high-altitude platforms capable of loitering over target areas — to track activity before and during the strikes.

Times of India highlights a key point. Recounting the days following the April 22 terror attack, he said that the army brass and defence minister Rajnath Singh sat down on April 23. "The free hand was given — ‘you decide what is to be done’. That is the kind of confidence, political direction and political clarity we saw for the first time," he said.

On the weekend itself, the Indian Air Force chief made fresh revelations on India having shot down six Pakistani jets. Air Marshal AP Singh, while listing out “takeaways” from the success of Operation Sindoor, said on Saturday, “There was political will…I am saying that because I hear all sorts of versions. There was a very clear political will, very clear directions, there were no kind of restrictions that were put on us.” 

Singh did not speak of Indian air losses but claimed in his speech that the IAF had downed at least five fighter jets of Pakistan, apart from disabling many of its military hubs. 

He also spoke of there being no political pressure on the armed forces. A controversy had arisen after the Indian Defence Attache to Indonesia had remarked in a seminar that the Indian Air Force lost fighter jets in the initial phase of Operation Sindoor because of political constraints. 

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