THE SOUTH ASIAN NUCLEAR MESS

Pakistan has responded in kind to India's nuclear tests of May 11 and 13. Where will this competitive jingoism lead the subcontinent?

EVER since India conducted a series of five nuclear tests at Pokhran on May 11 and 13, a matching response from Pakistan had seemed inevitable. Despite intense international pressure not to respond in kind, Pakistan exploded five nuclear devices on May 28 and followed that up with one more on May 30. In the wake of the May 28 tests, a state of emergency was imposed in the country and all fundamental rights were suspended, ostensibly to deal with a looming financial crisis.

Pakistan announced few technical details about the nature and scope of the tests, which were believed to have been conducted in the Chagai hills in northwestern Baluchistan. A statement from the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission said after the May 28 tests that the yield from the tests was about 40 kilotons. The statement added that the mission had "boosted the morale of the Pakistani nation by giving it an honourable position in the nuclear world" and "validated scientific theory, design and previous results from cold tests."

Addressing a press conference on May 31, the father of Pakistan's bomb, Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, said that all the tests were of fission devices. He, however, said that Pakistan was capable of testing a thermonuclear device as well.

Khan denied that Pakistan's nuclear programme was based on technology that was acquired clandestinely. He, however, admitted that many things had been bought from many countries, but said that Pakistan's nuclear programme had nothing to do with China.

Claiming that Pakistan's bomb was a "guarantee for peace", Khan said that New Delhi and Islamabad should be able to sort out their mutual differences. Asked if Pakistan was planning further tests, Khan said: "Pakistan won't do any test in the near future ... for the time being we don't need a test." He also said that on May 30, Pakistan was to have tested two nuclear devices but the Government decided that one would suffice.

With these tests, Pakistan has announced that along with India it wished to gate-crash into the nuclear club. In his first public comment on the tests, Chief of the Army Staff General Jehangir Karamat said that Pakistan made "the bare minimum response only to re-establish the strategic balance in the region." Numbers and yields did not matter; he said, only the capability did.

Pakistan Foreign Secretary Shamshad Ahmed said in a statement: "Contemporary history held only one lesson for us. The answer lay in credible deterrence. Today we have proved our capability. There are no doubts left any more. The era of ambiguity is behind us..."

Ahmed also made a telling comment on the issue of weaponisation: "The devices tested correspond to weapons configuration, compatible with delivery systems." By implication, the Foreign Secretary said that Pakistan could mount a nuclear warhead on the missiles available to it. He denied that Pakistan had tested any missiles after the test of the 1,500-km-range Ghauri missile early in April (Frontline, May 8).

Official statements to the media had the veneer of diplomatic sophistication, but the tenor of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's broadcast to the nation on May 28 was markedly different. He said that Pakistan had "settled its scores" with India and that he was not the leader of a "coward nation". It was tit for tat, plain and simple. Sharif succumbed to pressure from influential quarters in Pakistan to match India's test, blast for blast.

AT 1 a.m. on May 28, the Pakistan Foreign Office summoned Indian High Commissioner Satish Chandra and told him that Pakistan had credible information to believe that India planned a pre-dawn pre-emptive strike on its nuclear installations. It also informed Western envoys based in Islamabad about India's "designs". In doing this, Pakistan was evidently building up a case for its own nuclear tests so that it could shift the blame for such tests to India's "designs" on Pakistan's nuclear installations. As a tactic it may not have been bad, but Islamabad realises that there were no takers for the drastic scenario that it had conjured up.

An official statement said that at the midnight meeting, the Indian High Commissioner was "clearly told that any attack on our nuclear facilities would be in violation of our existing (1988) agreement against attack on such facilities." Satish Chandra, the statement said, "was asked to convey to New Delhi that we expected the Indian Government to desist from any irresponsible act" and that "any such act would warrant a swift and massive retaliation with unforeseen consequences." Messages to this effect were immediately transmitted to Washington and to other world capitals.

Newspapers in Pakistan carried definitive reports on the morning of May 28 that Islamabad would conduct nuclear tests later that day. Western satellites had for days picked up the preparations for a test. So much so, the tests themselves came as little surprise.

Ever since India went nuclear on May 11, a debate had been raging in the Pakistani media between those who felt that Pakistan should give a "matching response" to India and those who opposed any such move. The tone of the debate was mostly shrill, almost hysterical. Some of the slogans that were bandied about in support of nuclear tests were: "It's now or never", "do or die", "test or live in shame", "don't let the nation down", "stop dithering", "test or be damned", "the moment of truth has come" and "tomorrow is too late".

Those who pitched for a hawkish line were further inflamed by Indian Home Minister L.K. Advani's warning to Pakistan that interference in Kashmir would cost it dearly in view of the new realities in the region. To them this sounded ominously like nuclear blackmail. In fact, in his broadcast to the nation, Sharif made a direct reference to Advani's warning.

There is reason to suspect that Advani's sabre-rattling may have been part of a plan by India to provoke Pakistan into testing. U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, who arrived in Islamabad on May 15 to dissuade Sharif from responding to the Indian tests, is believed to have told his interlocutors that India was delivering a "sucker punch" to Pakistan. Informed sources said that the U.S. had warned Pakistan not to walk into India's "trap".

In his telecast speech, Sharif said that Pakistan had been forced to go in for the tests because "the international response to the Indian nuclear tests did not factor the security situation in our region. While asking us to exercise restraint, powerful voices urged acceptance of the Indian weaponistation. Pakistan's legitimate security concerns were not addressed, even after the threat of use of nuclear weapons and nuclear blackmail."

While attacking the West for its discriminatory approach, Pakistan, however said, like India, that it was "ready to engage in a constructive dialogue with other countries," especially major powers, on promoting the goals of nuclear non-proliferation "in the new circumstances".

FOR Sharif, the decision to go in for the tests was not easy to make. Pressure to test was mounted by the media, political parties and the weight of public opinion; simultaneously, he had to fend off calls from international community, which was imploring him to exercise restraint.

Right-wing political parties led by the Jamaat-i-Islami organised street meetings calling for an immediate nuclear test. Jamaat chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed said at a press conference in Islamabad that Sharif would be committing "a criminal offence" if he did not order a test. At least three "all-party conferences" were called to discuss how best to respond to India's tests. Generals and media columnists mounted an equally strong campaign.

All this was countered to some extent by the arguments of those who claimed that Pakistan would benefit enormously by not going nuclear: it would escape the hard edge of sanctions, which the country's economy was in no position to withstand, and would earn the goodwill of the West for having taken the moral "high road".

Finally, it would appear that the hawks won out by pointing repeatedly to the "clear and present danger" to Pakistan's security and the need to counter here and now India's "permanent" hegemonic designs. The emotion and sentiment associated with India carried the day and Sharif gave the order to test.

LINKING the Western response to India's tests with Pakistan's security concerns, Shamshad Ahmed said on May 30: "The high priests of non-proliferation do not scratch below the surface. The symptom is their problem. The disease afflicts us. A whole vast field of the non-proliferation regime has been built up. The desire is to confine everybody within its four walls. But the real causes of insecurity, conflicts and tensions in our region need to be redressed. It is, therefore, imperative to find a peaceful and just solution of the Jammu and Kashmir dispute."

While reiterating the offer of talks with India, Ahmed hit out at the international community for forcing Islamabad to discuss outstanding issues with New Delhi in a bilateral context, which he said was futile. "They (the major powers) would leave the critical questions surrounding peace and security here to the narrow confines of the 'bilateral context'. They know very well that this is a dark tunnel where sounds reverberate but do not lead to light at the end of the tunnel."

However, Ahmed said: "We are determined to seek ways and means to cool the temperature and to lower tensions." He said that Sharif had reaffirmed the Pakistan Government's "determination" to resume a dialogue with India to address "all outstanding issues, including the core issue of Jammu and Kashmir as well as peace and security. We are prepared to enter into discussions with India for taking all steps that are necessary to ensure mutual restraint and equitable measures for nuclear stabilisation in our region ... As a responsible country whose record of restraint and responsibility is impeccable, Pakistan today assures the international community and in particular India of our willingness to enter into immediate discussions to address all matters of peace and security, including urgent measures to prevent the dangers of a nuclear conflagration."

PAKISTAN'S strategy of linking nuclear confidence-building measures to Jammu and Kashmir is, however, unrealistic. In the new context of a nuclearised South Asia, Pakistan should see the need to delink the issue of Kashmir from peace and security. It would be in the interest of both India and Pakistan to take a hard look at nuclear security and evolve viable confidence-building measures.

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee reiterated New Delhi's offer to discuss an agreement with Pakistan based on the principle of 'no-first-use' of nuclear weapons; Sharif did the same with his "non-aggression pact". Clearly, the two countries are still "talking at" each other.

Both Pakistan and India must realise that the world powers, which perhaps believe that only the five acknowledged nuclear powers have the maturity to handle the responsibility of nuclear capability, will feel vindicated if irresponsible statements continue to be made in the subcontinent.

In this context, Karamat's statement - that India and Pakistan does not have to start an arms race and that there is no need to escalate tension with unnecessary rhetoric - is considered significant. Karamat further said that "the new balance in the military equation could lead to restraint and rationality..."

However, Pakistan has so far not responded officially to the proposals made by former Prime Minister I.K. Gujral to Nawaz Sharif in January this year. The proposals, which call for simultaneous discussions on all outstanding issues, were intended to kickstart the Foreign Secretary-level talks, which have been in limbo since September 1997.

Pakistan's long-term strategy - of "Kashmir or nothing" - remains the biggest stumbling block in the path of a genuine dialogue between the two countries. In an editorial, the influential Friday Times argued that in the past Kashmir was not a core issue but it had become now become one.

The editorial titled, "It's not now or never", said:

"Indeed, the fact remains that, despite having agreed to effectively cold-storage Kashmir at Shimla in the early 1970s, Islamabad launched a policy of fingering New Delhi in Indian Punjab in 1984, which prompted the Indians to think of hitting back in 1984 and 1987...

"In 1988, democracy was ushered into Pakistan and Benazir Bhutto arrived on the scene. There was a significant change in Pakistan's stand immediately ... it did not argue that Kashmir was a 'core' issue without whose resolution the building blocks of peace could not be first built. Indeed, it went ahead and negotiated the draft of a settlement with India on Siachen ... the equations, however, were changed when the Kashmiris spontaneously erupted against the injustices of New Delhi at the end of 1989... Islamabad quickly changed tack. It whipped out Kashmir from the cold-storage and began to press its case with great vigour. The Pakistanis claimed they were offering only 'moral, diplomatic and political' support to the Kashmiris. In actual fact, however, they did more than their bit to fuel the revolt in the Valley ... The new policy of covert and overt assistance to the Kashmiris was deepened by the new regime in Islamabad in 1991 led by Nawaz Sharif ... Far from any engagement in a peaceful dialogue ... Islamabad was now insistent that Kashmir was a 'core' issue in its disputes with India..."

The Friday Times editorial is important because it lays bare the Pakistani posturing on the Kashmir issue. And, since the "new realities" in the region have done nothing to alter Pakistan's old perceptions, the evolution of the "core" issue needs to be understood in India.

SHARIF's decision to impose a state of emergency at midnight on May 28, through which it was made known that all fundamental rights had been suspended, has come in for considerable criticism. Asma Jahangir, chief of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), said in a statement: "People in this country have had their rights suspended for long spells, mostly under military rulers. Their experience of it is bitter. And they have learnt that the real purpose of this was not to aid national security but to safeguard the autocratic powers of the rulers. The Government should, in fact, resist the temptation of using the excuse or tools of emergency for any kind of aggrandisement of itself or its party. It should also not be misled by the euphoria and emotionalism that has built up behind the blasts. The realities will very rapidly begin to sober up people and wake them up to their hardships, as has indeed begun to happen in India."

Former President Farooq Leghari, who is set to launch a political party in August, said that Sharif had imposed "a civilian martial law and fascist system in the country in order to become a civilian dictator ... The Government should forthwith revoke the proclamation of emergency."

Leghari pointed out that if the Government's objective was merely to freeze foreign currency accounts in the country, it could have imposed a financial emergency under Article 235 of the Constitution. The former President said that if the Government wanted to take swift action against tax defaulters or tax evaders it could have passed suitable legislation.

Finance Minister Sartaj Aziz clarified that the emergency was imposed to tackle the economic problems that the country faced, and not to stifle domestic dissent. This, however, goes against the reason cited for the imposition of the emergency - the fear of external aggression.

PAKISTAN'S economy, already in a perilous shape, is certain to be hit hard by the sanctions that have been announced consequent on its nuclear tests (see box on Page 19). With foreign debt standing at $36 billion and foreign reserves at a mere $1.6 billion and with over two-thirds of its budget devoted to debt-servicing and defence expenditure, Islamabad is aware that it faces a serious test in the days ahead.

In his televised address on May 28, Sharif announced that all ostentation in public life would be ended. The Prime Minister said that he would henceforth not use his newly-built Secretariat in Islamabad; he reportedly travelled from Islamabad to Lahore on a commercial flight on May 30.

There is little doubt that Sharif's stature as a leader has vastly improved following the tests. A senior journalist said: "Sharif resisted five telephone calls from President Bill Clinton. He has finally proved that Pakistan's policies are not made in America, but in Pakistan."

In a country with a history of on-off relationship with the United States, this image of a leader who "stood up to America" will benefit Sharif. However, it will be Islamabad's ability to tackle the economy that will finally reflect the political cost-benefit of Sharif's decision to go nuclear.

Pakistan has done what it felt it had to. In the debate that preceded the tests, many influential persons argued that Pakistan would be walking into India's trap by testing. Today's nuclear reality in South Asia cannot be undone. What can be done is to replace bellicosity with statesmanship in these trying times for India and Pakistan. That is the minimum that the people of the two countries deserve.