India, Nov. 11 -- Recent conflicts have delivered a blunt correction to conventional defence planning: Advanced platforms matter, but long-drawn wars are decided by the capacity to sustain the rate at which ammunition is being consumed, through commensurate industrial ability to replenish the arsenal. Russia's artillery expenditure in Ukraine, Europe's scramble to expand shell production, and the US's depletion of interceptor stocks in the Iran campaign, all point to one conclusion: Stockpiles built for peacetime evaporate in weeks, and production lines calibrated for commercial demand of peacetime cannot be scaled up at will during wars.

For India, this crisis presents an opening - and is a test of whether India can convert export deman...