Let the soldiers fight the real war

Our soldiers face the enemy at dawn, in snow that cracks bones and in deserts that burn flesh. They patrol minefields, scale ridges, and carry their dead on their shoulders. They defend India with blood, grit, and silence. And back home, from air-conditioned rooms and glowing screens, the selective outrage brigade tears them apart with hashtags and half-baked information.

Welcome to the era where our soldiers no longer battle just across borders. They battle perception, distortion, and a new breed of enemy, the keyboard warrior. Those who have never worn boots now critique those who live and die in them. They sit in comfort and judge strategy, ridicule generals, and twist every word spoken by the very men who carry the weight of national security on their backs.

Recently, even statements by the top officers of the Indian Armed Forces were dragged through the mud of social-media misinterpretation, because, apparently, context doesn’t fit the narrative of the keyboard warriors. What was meant as a professional, measured briefing was turned into clickbait by self-appointed patriots who confuse sarcasm for intellect and insult for activism.

The CDS makes a nuanced statement on preparedness or modernization, and it’s spun as political. The Air Chief speaks about operational readiness or manpower challenges, and he’s accused of arrogance or detachment. What these warriors of Wi-Fi fail to grasp is that military leadership doesn’t speak for applause. They speak from decades of command, of loss, of lives carried on their conscience.

From their couches, the social-media commandos wage imaginary wars, passing judgments on rules of engagement, calling out “failures,” mocking strategies, and ridiculing sacrifices. They have opinions on every airstrike, every skirmish, every photograph of a jawan at the border. What we forget in our hunger for viral content is that the armed forces operate on discipline, not drama. A soldier does not get to explain his actions in a comment section. A general cannot counter-tweet his critics. Their duty is to the tricolour, not to public perception.

So when the Chief speaks, it is the culmination of intelligence briefings, operational realities, and policy foresight, not fodder for meme-makers or headline hunters. He speaks for the men who can no longer speak for themselves. And when a soldier fires, it’s not rage, it’s restraint, precision, and the unshakable command of duty.

It’s easy to be patriotic from your phone. It’s easier still to be cynical. Real courage lies in standing guard at minus 20 degrees, not in trending hashtags. A serving soldier can’t defend himself on social media. His discipline is his dignity, and it forbids him from descending to the level of those who mistake criticism for courage. Every time a soldier is martyred, the same brigade appears: questioning, doubting, and mocking. Yet they sleep peacefully because the man they mock stood guard for them.

The selective outrage of those who know nothing of service, sacrifice, or silence is an insult to every soldier’s blood. The outrage brigade faces nothing, yet complains about everything. So the next time you feel the urge to type from your moral high ground, remember, you sleep because they don’t. You scroll because they stand guard. And you live free because somewhere, a soldier stays awake through the night, guarding us all.

While they fight the enemy across the border, it’s time we fight the enemy within, our arrogance, our ignorance, and our ungratefulness.

Jai Hind. 

END OF ARTICLE