UPHESC Assistant Professor Military Science 2025 PYQs

Concept: Primary effects of an earthquake are caused directly by the fault movement and seismic waves; secondary effects are triggered by them.

1. Primary: seismic waves, ground shaking, surface (fault) rupture.
2. Secondary: tsunami, landslides, liquefaction, fires, flooding from dam failure, disease.

Short trick: Tsunami comes after the quake – secondary.

Concept: US President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivered the "Atoms for Peace" speech at the UN General Assembly on 8 December 1953.

1. He proposed sharing nuclear technology for peaceful uses under international control.
2. This led to the creation of the IAEA in 1957.

Short trick: Atoms for Peace (1953) → IAEA (1957), Eisenhower.

Concept: Peace research (Kenneth Boulding, Anatol Rapoport, Johan Galtung) emerged in the 1950s–60s as the scientific study of the causes of war and the conditions of peace.

1. (R) true: it arose from applying social-science theory and methods to problems of war and peace (Journal of Conflict Resolution 1957, PRIO 1959).
2. (A) true: applying that theory, it studies how conflict turns into violence and the link between violence (direct, structural) and conflict (Galtung's conflict–violence–peace triangle).
3. Because it is a social science of war and peace, it seeks this connection – (R) explains (A).

Short trick: Social science of war → studies how conflict becomes violence.

Concept: DDR = Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration of ex-combatants – a core post-conflict peacebuilding task of UN missions.

1. Disarmament – collection of weapons; Demobilization – discharge from armed groups; Reintegration – return to civilian life and livelihood.

Short trick: DDR: take the gun, disband the unit, rebuild the life.

Concept: Match each missile system with its country.

1. Khordad-15 – Iranian surface-to-air missile system (2019) → a-III.
2. David's Sling – Israeli medium-range air defence (Rafael/Raytheon) → b-I.
3. FOG-MPM – Brazilian fibre-optic guided multipurpose missile (Avibras) → c-II.
4. Mathogo – Argentine wire-guided anti-tank missile (CITEFA) → d-IV.

Short trick: Khordad (Persian month) = Iran; David = Israel.

Concept: New START was signed by Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev at Prague on 8 April 2010.

1. It entered into force on 5 February 2011 (distractor A).
2. Limits: 1,550 deployed strategic warheads, 700 deployed launchers; extended to Feb 2026; Russia suspended participation in 2023.

Short trick: Signed Prague 8-4-2010; in force 5-2-2011.

Concept: The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) regulates international trade in conventional arms.

1. Adopted by the UN General Assembly on 2 April 2013.
2. Entered into force on 24 December 2014.
3. India has not signed it.

Short trick: ATT: adopted 2013, in force 2014.

Concept: Full title: "Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare".

1. So it bans the use of both chemical (gases) and biological (bacteriological) weapons.
2. It banned use only, not production/stockpiling – later covered by BWC (1972) and CWC (1993).
3. Land mines – Ottawa Treaty 1997.

Short trick: 1925 Geneva = gas + germs (use only).

Concept: On 2 April 1954, PM Jawaharlal Nehru called in the Lok Sabha for a "standstill agreement" on nuclear testing – the first such proposal by any state.

1. India then took it to the UN Disarmament Commission.
2. It paved the way for the Partial Test Ban Treaty (1963).
3. 1978 – Morarji Desai government at UNSSOD-I; 1988 – Rajiv Gandhi Action Plan.

Short trick: Nehru 1954 "standstill" → PTBT 1963.

Concept: Disarmament = reduction or total elimination of weapons; arms control = regulating/limiting weapons and their use to curb the arms race and reduce the risk of war.

1. (A) is wrong: "maintaining control of weapons" describes arms control, not disarmament.
2. (R) is right: arms control (SALT, START, PTBT) restrains the arms race without abolishing weapons.

Short trick: Disarmament = remove; arms control = restrain.

Concept: Phosgene (COCl₂) is a choking toxic gas used in WWI – so d-II, which only option D has.

1. Submachine gun – a small arm (individual weapon) → b-I.
2. Anti-tank rifle – a crew-portable light weapon (UN SALW category) → c-IV.
3. Grenade launcher (rifle/under-barrel type) – fired from the shoulder, a shoulder arm → a-III.

Short trick: Fix the sure pair first: Phosgene = toxic gas → only option D fits.

Concept: Oceans by area: Pacific (~165 million km²) > Atlantic (~106) > Indian (~70.5) > Southern (~21) > Arctic (~14).

1. So the Indian Ocean is the third largest; Arctic is the smallest.

Short trick: P-A-I-S-A: Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Southern, Arctic.

Concept: The 1951 UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (Geneva, 28 July 1951) gave the formal legal definition of a refugee (Art. 1A).

1. A refugee is a person outside his country owing to a well-founded fear of persecution for race, religion, nationality, membership of a social group or political opinion.
2. The 1967 Protocol removed its time and geographic limits. India is not a party.

Short trick: Refugee Convention 1951 + Protocol 1967 (UNHCR 1950).

Concept: After the Cold War, critics called NAM irrelevant. Indian ministers of the UPA government (2004 onward) answered by turning the question on NATO, and this retort – ‘If NAM is irrelevant, is NATO relevant? What is it doing in Afghanistan?’ – is attributed in Indian texts to External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh (2004–05).

1. The reference to Afghanistan places it in the period of NATO’s ISAF mission there (from 2003).
2. The point: NATO, a Cold War alliance, found new roles – so NAM too can remain relevant.
3. Mandela’s presidency (1994–99) ended before NATO went into Afghanistan; Bhabani Sen Gupta was an academic, not a minister replying to critics.

Short trick: NATO in Afghanistan (2000s) + Indian foreign minister of 2004–05 → Natwar Singh.

Concept: The International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 9 December 1999 (in force 2002).

1. It criminalises providing or collecting funds for terrorist acts and requires states to freeze such funds.
2. Geneva Conventions – humanitarian law of war; Kyoto – climate; UN Charter – founding document.

Short trick: The answer is in the name of the treaty itself.

Concept: The line is from Sun Tzu's The Art of War (Ch. 4, Tactical Dispositions).

1. It stresses planning, preparation and creating favourable conditions before fighting.
2. Sun Tzu also said "the supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting".

Short trick: Win before the battle – Sun Tzu.

Concept: Match each line with the states it separates.

1. Blue Line – UN withdrawal line (2000) between Israel and Lebanon → III.
2. Purple Line – 1967 ceasefire line between Israel and Syria (Golan) → II.
3. 38th Parallel – North Korea and South Korea → IV.
4. Palk Strait – between India (Tamil Nadu) and Sri Lanka → I.

Short trick: Blue-Lebanon, Purple-Syria, 38th-Korea, Palk-Lanka.

Concept: The sea route round the Cape of Good Hope (southern tip of Africa) links the Indian Ocean directly with the Atlantic Ocean.

1. Suez Canal links the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea (Mediterranean–Indian Ocean route, not the open Atlantic directly).
2. Malacca Strait links the Indian Ocean (Andaman Sea) with the Pacific (South China Sea).

Short trick: Round Africa = Cape route = Indian ↔ Atlantic.

Concept: Napoleon Bonaparte: "The policy of a state lies in its geography" – i.e. foreign policy is determined by geography.

1. The quote is the classic starting point of geopolitics, cited in texts on determinants of foreign policy.
2. Mahan wrote on sea power, Liddell Hart on indirect approach, Douhet on air power.

Short trick: Napoleon – "politics of a state is in its geography".

Concept: Liddell Hart developed the "Expanding Torrent" theory of attack (1920s), drawing on the German infiltration tactics of 1918.

1. Like water, the attack pours through gaps of least resistance, bypasses strong points and widens as it flows deeper.
2. It anticipated Blitzkrieg and links with his Indirect Approach.

Short trick: Torrent of water through the weak spots – Liddell Hart.