  Influencers play a crucial role in shaping public narratives through
information creation and diffusion in the Global South. While public figures
from various walks of life and their impact on public discourse have been
studied, defence veterans as influencers of the political discourse have been
largely overlooked. Veterans matter in the public spehere as a normatively
important political lobby. They are also interesting because, unlike
active-duty military officers, they are not restricted from taking public sides
on politics, so their posts may provide a window into the views of those still
in the service. In this work, we systematically analyze the engagement on
Twitter of self-described defence-related accounts and politician accounts that
post on defence-related issues. We find that self-described defence-related
accounts disproportionately engage with the current ruling party in India. We
find that politicians promote their closeness to the defence services and
nationalist credentials through engagements with defence-related influencers.
We briefly consider the institutional implications of these patterns and
connections
