Faced with sub optimal existential security challenges, discover how the Indian defence and security establishment is coping (or not) with myriad threats from mass terror in Mumbai to Pakistani nuclear weapons, to the Lashkar E Taiyyaba to the PREPAK and KYKL, to China's string of pearls to delayed Gorshkov and failed helicopter deals. And the prognosis of RMA or modernisation or even worse still, mere replacements based on hard facts culled from Parliamentary proceedings and reports of the Parliamentary Committee on Defence. By one of the foremost contemporary defence analysts in India and author most lately of, "Mumbai 26/11: Security Imperatives for the Future" and Editor of, "India's Comprehensive National Power: Synergy Through Joint Decision Making ". This book is a modest attempt to fill this gap by placing in perspective the policy on defence and security by the security establishment and its manifestation into capabilities to meet the current and emerging challenges. The Book is divided into four parts. In Part I the key defence and security policies, their translation into Armed Forces and security doctrines, the budgetary support provided and the technology environment for implementation has been covered in separate chapters. In Part 2 manifestation of policies into capacities in terms of strategic systems, integration and jointness, army, navy and air force capability and counter terrorism infra structure has been examined. Part 3 covers the defence industrial base and in the concluding Part 4 a summary of assessment of national security readiness has been provided.

This book is dedicated to the Mumbaikars, whose voices of protests have shaken the conscience of the power elites in New Delhi. We hope and pray that they display a similar resolve as the citizen of Mumbai for a terror free Mumbai and India. Multiple terror attacks struck Mumbai, India s financial capital on the night of 26 November. A shocked nation was paralysed by a series of simultaneous assaults in South Mumbai, traditional hub of the metropolis at a time when revellers were out on the streets and the common man was preparing to go to bed. Many realized that Mumbai had been struck only when they got up in the wee hours of 27 November to learn that schools and offices were closed for the day. These attacks in the heart of Mumbai in the proximity of the Gateway of India were seen by the nation as an assault on Indian sovereignty much in the same vein of the parliamentary strike in December 2001. The book covers the events that shook Mumbai and the nation for over 60 hours, the terror groups possibly involved, the diplomatic power play with the help of the world and the possible way ahead for the counter terror response at the national level."

This book is an attempt to analyse the political, security and terrorism trends in South Asia and propose prognostications in the short term. It is third in the series of such trend analysis on the region based on the building blocks of reviews in 2006 and 2007 and has the backing of legacy. Each chapter of the book covers the countries of the region including China arranged in alphabetical order with India in the end with its many segments, such as terrorism law and order, Naxalism, Kashmir and North East separately. The trends are based on a prognosis of scenarios based on trajectory of events in the past and structural biases of each state including Impact of regional and global influences both benevolent and malign. While the technique may not be perfect, it is simple and hopefully accurate enough to provide the pitfalls in the Years ahead.