In recent decades, a popular narrative has emerged in public debate and some policy circles: warfare has become fundamentally technology-based, rendering large standing armies increasingly obsolete.
Precision-guided munitions, unmanned systems, cyber operations and space-based assets, the argument goes, allow states to achieve strategic effects with fewer people in harm's way.
This line of thought is especially attractive to advanced industrial democracies facing fiscal constraints and political fatigue with large-scale deployments.
This has also been a longstanding argument among a section of Indian commentators, who argue that the limited defence budget is skewed allocation towards the pay and pension of soldiers. The latest in this series is Chetan Bhagat, who has argued that 70% of the defence budget is being spent on soldiers, while only 25% goes towards modernisation.
He argues for reducing the human component in the military, since modern warfare is increasingly technology-based. This seems to have been the logic behind the Modi government bringing the short-term contractual recruitment scheme of Agniveer and in bringing down the actual strength of soldiers in the army by nearly 2,00,000 since the pandemic.
This narrative is deeply misleading, whenever war has a territorial aim. When the objective is not just to punish, deter or disrupt, but to conquer, annex or durably control territory and populations, soldiers remains indispensable. Technology profoundly shapes how wars are fought and can substantially reduce some categories of troop requirements. It cannot, however, replace the need for human beings to seize, hold and govern physical space.
The first step in clarifying the role of human beings is to distinguish between types of military objectives. Not all wars are, or need to be, wars of occupation. Many contemporary operations are better characterised as wars of disruption. Wars of disruption aim to weaken an opponent's abilities, impose costs or force policy changes without changing who controls a specific territory. In these situations, technology can replace some manpower.
Advanced ISR (intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance), long-range precision strikes, cyber tools and special operations enable states to reach strategic goals with relatively small, highly trained forces. The political goal doesn't require holding territory, so success is measured by damage caused or behavior changed, not land controlled.
By contrast, wars of occupation are those in which the political objective extends to altering, enforcing, or replacing the governing authority over territory and population. This includes classic territorial conquest, regime change followed by attempted stabilisation, and long-term peace enforcement in contested spaces. In such wars, three requirements - defeating organised resistance, occupying and securing physical space and administering populations - create demand for large numbers of people that technology can only partially reduce.
Even on highly digitised battlefields, control of land ultimately depends on putting enemy forces out of action and physically compelling withdrawal or surrender. Precision strike and unmanned systems can attrit, disorganise and demoralise formations, but they are not, by themselves, capable of occupying a trench line, clearing a building or securing an urban block.
Iraq and Afghanistan
The US-led interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan offer valuable case studies because they combined overwhelming technological superiority with extensive experience in joint operations and advanced doctrine. They also demonstrate how a successful regime-toppling campaign driven by technology can quickly encounter manpower limitations as the mission expands to include territorial control.
In both Iraq (2003) and Afghanistan (2001), initial operations indicated that small, highly mobile forces utilising air power, precision munitions and special operations units could defeat enemy regimes at relatively low cost. These successes contributed to an optimistic view that the United States and its allies had developed a new model of technology-enabled warfare.cHowever, the subsequent occupation and stabilisation phases exposed severe limitations of this model. As insurgencies and sectarian violence intensified, coalition forces were forced into exactly the manpower-intensive roles outlined above.
The lesson is not that technology was irrelevant, but that it was insufficient. Precision strike, ISR and networked command-and-control enabled spectacular tactical and operational successes. They did not, and could not, resolve the structural manpower demands created by the decision to undertake expansive territorial and political projects in large and complex societies.
Russia-Ukraine war
The ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine is often called the first large-scale "drone war." Both sides have fielded large numbers of unmanned aerial systems for reconnaissance and attack, integrated with artillery, electronic warfare and extensive digital targeting processes. The battlefield is under constant aerial observation; movement is rapidly detected and can be struck at depth. On the surface, this seems to support claims that technology is transforming war into something less dependent on massed manpower. In reality, the opposite is happening. The war has underlined the continued importance of mass in at least three ways.
First, attrition has been severe. High casualty rates and protracted combat have forced both Russia and Ukraine into sustained mobilisation and recruitment efforts. Maintaining front lines that extend hundreds of kilometres, rotating units to limit exhaustion, and generating offensive forces for relatively modest territorial gains all require large pools of personnel.
Second, drones primarily serve as force multipliers rather than substitutes. They enhance the lethality and visibility on the battlefield, increasing the importance of dispersion, cover, and small-unit tactics. However, they do not eliminate the need for infantry to occupy trenches, storm fortified positions, or hold captured villages. In fact, the more advanced and lethal surveillance environment has often increased the manpower required: units must spread out further, improve redundancy, and assign personnel to counter-drone, camouflage, and deception tasks.
Third, political objectives remain territorial. Both sides fight over specific regions, cities, and infrastructure. As in previous conflicts, control of these areas is determined not just by drone coverage but by who can sustain an effective ground presence once fighting shifts. Reports consistently highlight that logistics, engineering units, and infantry are crucial for consolidating gains. Technology supports these forces; it does not replace them.
US-Israel war on Iran
The war is still underway, but a clear lesson is that Iran appears confident in defending its country with a military of over a million troops of various types. Meanwhile, US forces are in a dilemma about what to do next because the quantum of soldiers needed to invade Iran is impossible to assemble within a reasonable timeframe, and without coalition support from NATO. This lesson must never be forgotten if India ever has to defend Ladakh, Arunachal Pradesh, or Assam.
Technology as Multiplier, Not Substitute
Recognising the enduring role of manpower in territorial warfare carries several implications for defence policy and strategy, particularly for a big country like India surrounded by two powerful adversaries in China and Pakistan.
First, states that retain territorial ambitions - whether offensive (conquest, regime change) or defensive (holding threatened areas against a major adversary) - must maintain robust land forces. These forces can and should be equipped with advanced technology, but they cannot be allowed to atrophy under the illusion that drones and precision fires can do their job for them.
Second, planners should be honest about the scale of manpower required for stabilisation and occupation missions. Underestimating these requirements leads to strategies that can topple regimes but cannot secure the peace that follows. This miscalculation characterised both Iraq and Afghanistan and has contributed to broader skepticism about the feasibility of large expeditionary operations.
Third, investment decisions should treat technology as a force multiplier rather than a substitute. The question is not whether a given system can replace soldiers, but how it can enable a given number of soldiers to control more ground, respond more quickly, or operate with greater survivability.
In sum, the belief that modern warfare has become so technology-centric that standing armies are no longer required rests on a wrong assumption. It confuses what is possible in wars of disruption with what is required in wars of occupation. For as long as states seek to control land and the people who live on it, war will continue to demand large numbers of human beings willing and able to fight, stand guard, and govern. Technology will shape the character of that requirement, but it will not erase it.
Of course, Indian armed forces must not become an employment generator, as Bhagat avers, recommendations for restructuring the armed forces need to be tailored to the country's geostrategic scenario, especially if it could face a two- or three-front war. If Arunachal Pradesh is to be defended against China, alongside an attack on the Siliguri chicken's neck from the east, territory must be held physically. It cannot just be through cyber warfare. If someday the Indian government wants to retake Pakistan Occupied Kashmir, it must be captured and held physically.
A precise figure for the Army's strength in a complex scenario like India's should be left to the professionals. Combating insurgency and countering Pakistan's proxy war in J&K alone requires 150,000-200,000 personnel during peacetime, based on open-source estimates. If India has to go on the offensive, imagine the numbers required.
Given the geopolitical situation of the subcontinent, it cannot simply eliminate its army and rely solely on drones. The Agniveer scheme was introduced to lower the pension expenses. It has not yet been battle-tested. Let us see if a recruit develops the same level of loyalty to his 'naam aur nishaan' in four years as a soldier does over a lifetime. Wars are not won by equipment; they require the spirit of a braveheart willing to fight until their last breath. The country cannot induct, train, and deploy troops once hostilities are imminent; it must maintain a sufficient force to ensure hostilities never become imminent.
Yes, there is a cost. But that is the price Indians pay for sleeping peacefully. If that makes the Indian Army an 'employment generator', then so be it.
T.K. Chatterjee is an Indian Air Force veteran.