What’s in a name?

A decision taken in the recent Combined Commanders’ Conference — a formal occasion when Lt Generals equivalents from the three services confer on strategic and doctrinal matters along with their political superiors — was to indigenise military practices of the armed forces. A step towards that direction was to promote quotes from Indian leaders and thinkers in conference rooms and indigenisation of exercise names and call signs. The former are nicknames or codenames given to exercises or operations. Call signs are radio nomenclature to identify certain appointments and, in some instances, hide their identity.

This news led to predicted mirth in various armed forces groups, with humourists transforming contemporary call signs to Hindi, uncorking wit inherent in transliteration. A popular one doing the rounds is a radio call of a commanding officer, calling his second in command. For reasons lost in posterity and inheritance of the commonwealth armies, the formers’ call sign is always Tiger and the latter’s — sheep. ‘Sher calling bakri’ is definitely funnier than its English version.

But the idea has its merits. There is some reasoning behind nicknaming or codenaming operations and exercises.

The first is to give a sense of purpose as a rallying call to the troops. For example, Op (Operation) Rakshak (protector), which has been used in Punjab and now in J&K to proclaim intent of safeguarding the local population. Op Surya Hope, Op Mehar (kindness) and Op Maitri (friendship) were the names of the Uttarakhand disaster relief, Cyclone Hudhud relief and the post-earthquake assistance in Nepal.

Military commanders are also fond of assertive nicknames, like Op Parakram (loosely translated to offensive courage) which was muscle flexing against Pakistan after the parliament attack or Op Vijay (Victory) which has been used more than once by the army and navy. Other operational names refer to the confluence of elements used in the battle for instance Op Trishakti or Trident or its Indian version Trishul. These usually symbolise the presence of all the three arms, land, water and air in the operation.

Of course just giving a historical or a grandiose name to an operation is no guarantee of victory as Ayyub Khan discovered at the end of Pakistan’s much vaunted plans Op Gibraltar — which was to infiltrate into Kashmir in 1965 and incite rebellion. This codename was inspired by the Muslim conquest of Spain that was launched from the port of Gibraltar. Op Grand slam, Ayyub’s plan to cut off Akhnur met with the same fate.

Another category are names that either hide the purpose of the operation, or give it a neutral antiseptic label. For example Op Polo was to subdue the Nizam’s army, Op Steeplechase was combined operations against Naxalites in 1971. The army operations in Punjab were named Bluestar and Woodrose, both innocuous sounding names but ones scarred with bitter memories.

Then there are names which have an oblique reference to either the troops taking part in it or the environment of the mission. Some are nuanced, others even romantic. Op Black Thunder and Black Tornado were the codenames of operations conducted by the NSG in the Golden Temple, and Mumbai attacks respectively, clearly depicting the ethos of NSG also known as ‘Black Cats’ because of their heavily armed appearance in complete black.

Op Pawan (Wind, but also a reference to the monkey god Hanuman who leaped to Lanka) and Op Meghdoot (Cloud Messenger) nuancedly referred to their operations. The first was the Indian Peacekeeping Force dispatched to Sri Lanka and the latter was the race to dominate Siachen against Pakistani troops. The air force operations during Kargil was codenamed Safed Sagar (White Ocean), firepower exercises are named Agni Varsha (Rains of Fire) and mobilization exercise are named Yudh Shringhar (Getting decorated for battle). Formations lace exercise names with their insignia. So a formation whose insignia is Arjun’s legendary bow, names its exercises Ghandiv Tankaar in a reference to Arjun plucking the drawstring of his bow creating fearful reverberations on the battlefield before he notches his arrow. Another formation names its exercises as Bhawani Khadga referring to Goddess Durga’s battle-axe.

Some names leave no doubt in the adversaries mind about the intention or determination of the operation. Examples are Op Checkmate, Op Sarp Vinash (destruction of snakes) and Op All Out. The first was IPKF operations against LTTE in Lanka and the latter two were military operations focussed on flushing out terrorists in Kashmir.

Call signs don’t have much leeway to be creative. These are hardcoded into the lexicon of communication across armies of the world much like international aviation has a universally standardised code name for every city. All appointments in the army have a call sign usually an animal’s name or a cryptic mixture of alphabets and numbers that only makes sense to soldiers. So its in every officer’s destiny to be called Tiger, Lion or sheep at various points of their career. However, second in command’s can take solace in the fact that every tiger was a sheep once and will become a sheep again to some other tiger!

The author is a former soldier.