The nuclear menace

Published : Mar 16, 2002 00:00 IST

ON February 16, 1994, Indian, Pakistani and American soldiers and diplomats who had been involved in the Indo-Pakistan crisis in 1990 met in Washington under the auspices of the Henry L. Stimson Centre. Towards the end of the meeting, former Chief of the Army Staff Gen. K. Sundarji remarked that it was rather strange that nobody had commented on a possible cause of the relative stability - a "de facto, perceived, non-deployed nuclear deterrence in operation." If it had existed since 1947, he added, the Indo-Pakistan "shooting matches" might not have occurred.

To an extent, Kargil proved the General wrong. It will be some time before the lessons are learnt from the deployment of nearly two-thirds of India's Army on the Indo-Pakistan border, the largest such deployment by any country since the Second World War. Was it the bomb which preserved the peace? Or, was it a gamble in coercive diplomacy? Lt. Gen. (retd.) V. R. Raghavan wrote: "War was never an option for India despite the political leadership's war rhetoric. It is now more than ever unlikely that the loud talking leadership will attempt a military venture. There is, therefore, a sense of deja vu and of regret, that the political leadership had apparently not thought through the strategic implications of placing the nation's defence forces on battle readiness against Pakistan" (The Telegraph; February 26; emphasis added throughout). Nor reckoned with the risks of a nuclear clash.

Neither India nor the region is any the more secure after the tests at Pokhran in May 1998 which Pakistan aped in Chagai. What is clear beyond doubt is that, both, Pokhran-I in 1974 and Pokhran-II in 1998 were enacted for political reasons. India was comfortable with a "recessed deterrence". Pokhran-II launched it on a course fraught with grave consequences. Only a brave and statesmanlike leadership can arrest the trend and accomplish a modus vivendi with Pakistan and China. The Bharatiya Janata Party regime is innocent of any such thought. M. V. Ramana has described the steps being taken towards deployment of nuclear weapons (''A nuclear wedge''; Frontline; December 21, 2001).

The Washington Post reported the new mood in New Delhi that the bomb is no deterrent to conventional war. (International Herald Tribune; January 18). The firing of the nuclear-capable Agni-2 on January 25 with a range of 800 to 900 km was designed to send a message across.

Ironically, the acclaim which Ashley J. Tellis' formidable work has justly received does scant justice to the richness of its nuances and acknowledges barely the service he has rendered in describing, in a wealth of detail, the hurdles that lie ahead as we move from a recessed deterrent to a nuclear arsenal. If the enormous jug of ice cold water he pours on the heads of nuclear drunks will not abate their inebriation, nothing else can.

Most Indians and Pakistanis readily lapped up the claims made by their governments after the tests. "India is now a nuclear weapons state," Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee said. Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif made an identical claim for Pakistan. Benazir Bhutto fervently pleaded with the West for a military strike on India (Los Angeles Times; May 17, 1998).

Ashley Tellis' work suggests that the claim may be somewhat dubious - and the truth of the matter is much more complex than most Indian analysts believe. "This volume will suggest that despite having demonstrated an ability to undertake nuclear explosions successfully - including nuclear weapon test explosions - India still has some way to go before it can acquire the capabilities that would make it a significant nuclear power. The analysis will further demonstrate that in many ways India remains at a cross-roads with respect to its nuclear weapon programme. In contrast to much of the superficial commentary that appeared in the wake of the May 1998 tests, however, it will argue that the challenges facing India are not as onerous as they are often assumed to be, although they will compel New Delhi to move - at least initially - in a direction quite different from that which most previous nuclear weapon states have taken. It will be posited that this nuclearisation process will in all probability involve a large but finite number of steps that will occur covertly rather than overtly. In short, it will be argued that India's emergence as a true nuclear weapon power will more likely be a slow, gradual, and distinctive process, thanks to a number of factors..." (pp. 4-5).

He proceeds to say: "India possesses nuclear weapons, even if only in disassembled form, but it still does not possess the panoply of delivery capabilities it desires or the supporting infrastructure and procedural and ideational systems necessary for the effective conduct of a wide range of nuclear operations. This implies in turn that India's claim to have become a significant nuclear power as a result of its tests is at best premature and at worst preposterous. Indeed, it is not even clear whether these tests changed anything as far as India's raw strategic capabilities are concerned, since the development of both nuclear weapons and assorted delivery systems, together with their potentially slow production, would have continued even if the 1998 nuclear tests had not taken place. And while these tests will no doubt enhance both India's and Pakistan's ability to pursue some of these objectives, it is too early to argue that they have engendered a qualitative change in the regional environment at least as far as both states' technical proficiency is concerned; if anything, they have merely confirmed capabilities that most observers had long suspected existed in the region" (pp. 246-7).

This is not written to belittle India's accomplishments in this sphere. Born in Mumbai and educated there, Ashley Tellis went to the United States less than two decades ago and rose to become the foremost specialist on South Asia's security issues. He is currently Senior Adviser to U.S. Ambassador Robert D. Blackwill. The book is addressed to American as well as Indian readers. It is based on published literature and interviews with key policy-makers in India. The principal aim is to make U.S. policy-makers in particular and the American strategic community in general understand the motivations behind India's decisions as well as the nature of Indian thinking about nuclear weaponry and the character of the evolving Indian deterrent - especially insofar as these issues affect U.S. diplomatic initiatives, non-proliferation policy, and regional strategy.

It reflects the author's understanding of India's concerns. He analyses the choices India faces from its perspective to discern which courses of action appear most appealing to its civilian security managers - the political leadership and senior bureaucrats in the PMO, the Cabinet Secretariat, and key Ministries. It assesses how such choices would affect the U.S.' strategic interests.

Every bit of Indian writing of any significance on the subject has been consulted. The details into which the author plunges are amazing. For instance, the Prime Minister's consultative duties towards the President on security issues are described with a precision that no constitutional lawyer can fault. Even the warrant of precedence is set out to show what can happen if calamity hits us. There is not a single work on the subject which discusses the daunting array of complex issues as thoroughly as this encyclopaedic work does. In the result it shows up the simplistic character of most Indian thinking on the nuclear question.

"Indian policy-makers, being overwhelmed by the political significance attributed to the possession of nuclear weapons, often tend to err in exactly the opposite direction: refusing to think seriously about the contingencies involving nuclear use rather than jumping at the prospect of designing clever nuclear-use strategies. In any event, it is important to recognise that New Delhi simply does not and will not possess the resources to engage in satisfactory damage limitation vis-a-vis China (and Pakistan, for that matter) through either pre-emptive action or premeditated first strikes, although some marginal attrition strategies pursued through conventional means are possible if the nuclear-use contingency is preceded by a lengthy conventional war. Beijing's nuclear superiority over New Delhi and the geographic location of China's nuclear assets vis-a-vis India's force-structure weaknesses prevent damage limitation strategems from even being contemplated in the Sino-Indian case, while Pakistan's emphasis on producing a wide variety of mobile delivery systems in significant numbers - all tightly integrated into its strategic planning and conventional war-fighting capabilities and ready for rapid, efficient, and covert dispersal - actually ensures that even if Indian damage-limiting strikes are contemplated, successful interdiction of these reserves is unlikely unless it is presumed that New Delhi would actually unleash a bolt-out-of-the-blue attack without any provocation" (p. 618).

A careful reader will find much which explains some of the Indian government's recent responses; for example on the U.S. proposals for a national missile defence system. "India's security managers have already signalled their concern about these developments. In private conversations, they have revealed great interest in understanding the intent, scope, and time lines surrounding ongoing U.S. efforts to develop a thin national missile defence (NMD) system and a localised theatre missile defence (TMD) system that may be deployed first in East Asia and then elsewhere. Their concern about these systems is driven not by an interest in U.S. strategic planning per se but rather by a desire to anticipate China's strategic response to such developments... This private concern is now being articulated at a public level, albeit elliptically" (p. 38).

The Government of India's avowed objective is to establish a credible minimum deterrent; not "a robust and ready arsenal" but "a force in being". The Draft Report of the National Security Advisory Board on Indian Nuclear Doctrine, released on August 17, 1999 by Brajesh Mishra, the Prime Minister's National Security Adviser, was soon repudiated in all but name by Jaswant Singh, Minister for External Affairs. "Besides causing panic in Pakistan and exacerbating prevailing suspicions in China, it riled many Indian security specialists and commentators, who lambasted it for a variety of reasons ranging from poor grammar and syntax to internal inconsistency to unrealistic albeit ambitious posturing" (p. 253).

Of the Board itself, Tellis writes: "Many of the members selected during the last two iterations of the board's existence are not specialists in the truest sense of the term but merely diverse opinion makers of different stripes in national politics" (p. 656). The National Security Council has proved to be a joke.

Defence Minister George Fernandes disapproves of public debate on nuclear issues. He said on October 11, 1998: "When people keep commenting that the nation is divided on the nuclear tests and that it has become a contentious issue, then we are only providing our opponents an assurance... that we are not even united on our own survival... A nation can be at war on issues like what should be our priorities, on issues relating to social justice, etc. But on our very survival, never."

India's nuclear policy rests on two related fundamental - the doctrine of "No First Use" and emphasis on the deterrent character of the bomb rather than on its use as a weapon of war. The Draft made dents in both. It is unnecessary to consider it in view of its rejection.

The author holds: "The fact that India will probably settle for a relatively small nuclear arsenal consisting of 150-odd weapons, together with a number of delivery vehicles to carry such an inventory to target - all oriented toward holding between 8 and 15 target sets in China and Pakistan at risk - provides a more concrete image of the Indian version of minimum deterrence. To be sure, such a force does not yet exist and probably will not exist in full form for at least another decade or two. In the interim, there is little evidence that New Delhi is pursuing these capabilities at an accelerated pace across the board, because India believes, despite occasional claims to the contrary, that it is already ahead of Pakistan where nuclear weapons are concerned and does not expect serious strategic competition with China for another 15 to 20 years" (p. 401).

This is where we enter the realm of dangerous uncertainty where miscalculation and error can wreak sheer ruin. Deterrence, like beauty, lies in the eye of the beholder. It rests on perceived rational responses. It can breakdown if there is miscalculation or if a bluff is called. "Even stronger nuclear powers can be dissuaded from embarking on a course of strategic action that threatens the core interests of a relatively weaker state. It is precisely this kind of calculus that under writes New Delhi's belief that even relatively weak nuclear forces are sufficient to deter China - because so long as India's nuclear capabilities present more than just token opposition, and so long as Beijing cannot be certain that it can interdict India's nuclear reserves successfully... China will in all likelihood be deterrable even in dyadic encounters characterised by a substantial asymmetry in relative nuclear capabilities" (p. 703).

But, the same calculus applies also to the Indo-Pakistan equation. "The advantages India currently enjoys in relative vulnerability over Pakistan will slowly decay over time as Islamabad develops a larger nuclear arsenal and progressively longer-range delivery systems - and at some stage, there will come a point where Pakistan, despite its relative disadvantage in size, will be able to comprehensively target the Indian land mass and inflict such horrific levels of damage as to make any distinction in relative vulnerability more or less academic."

All the three actors in the nuclear play in the region - China, India and Pakistan - are busy perfecting their nuclear arsenal; Pakistan, with China's support which Tellis carefully documents (pp. 46-47).

The U.S. will, doubtless, "monitor" the interaction among the three. Chinese press comment on India's troops deployment has been overlooked. The apparent even-handedness did not conceal disapproval of India's action (vide Beijing Review, January 10, 2002).

India has yet a long way to go to acquire even a respectable nuclear force. "If an arsenal of around 150 weapons is treated as desirable from New Delhi's point of view, then irrespective of which estimate of India's fissile-material inventory one accepts, India still has some way to go before it can be satisfied that its fissile-material stockpile is sufficient for its future deterrent... At the moment New Delhi possesses at best a monadic delivery force consisting of relatively short-range tactical strike aircraft like the Jaguar, Mirage 2000, MiG-27, and Su-30MK. None of these platforms has been designed for the conduct of all-weather strike operations, and consequently attack missions carried out in other than daylight conditions would require high pilot skill, ingenious mission planning, and favourable environmental factors for their success. Moreover, if Indian press reports are to be believed, these delivery systems are still more notional than real" (pp. 491 & 529-30). India is determined to overcome these handicaps. Pakistan is unlikely to sit still. Nor, beyond a point, will China. The region is set inexorably on a suicidal arms race. The U.S. will perform the same role that it has been performing in recent weeks - acting in the light of its own national interests. Ashley Tellis has a word of advice for it. "The United States should concentrate on shaping the character of the evolving Indian (and Pakistani) nuclear arsenals so that they comport with the following injunctions: Keep 'em small... Keep 'em stealthy... Keep 'em slow" (p. 760).

India, thus, faces a clear choice between sustained American umpireship in the region and conciliation with both its neighbours - Pakistan and China. The nuclear question cannot be divorced from strained political equations. Few in India seem willing to improve those equations significantly and move towards a regime of nuclear restraint that accords with the interests of all three.

LT. GEN. KAMAL MATINUDDIN, a distinguished soldier and writer on strategic affairs, presents the Pakistani view. The 15 Appendices, texts of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), Pressler, Glenn, Symington and Brown Amendments, the Draft National Security Advisory Board Report and useful chronologies of developments in India and Pakistan - alone suffice to make the book a useful work of reference. He is, however, sparse on analysis and long on rhetoric. The relevance of Congress-Muslim League differences in 1937 to the nuclear issue is not evident to lesser mortals. The data he cites from his perspective is useful.

He mentions efforts by the Islamabad Policy Research Institute and the Delhi Policy Group to initiate a sustained dialogue on nuclear matters. "Several proposals and suggestions have been floated at these unofficial meetings. Some of the more significant ones are: regular meetings of core groups of experts; the need for transparency; clarity of each other's nuclear doctrines; knowledge of each other's force structures, nuclear alert concepts, renunciation of producing tactical nuclear weapons, establishment of joint crisis centres, military to military contacts, safety of nuclear sites, and prevention of nuclear terrorism.

"Given the ground reality of suspicion, mistrust and animosity between India and Pakistan, some of the proposals are utopian in character. Some of them are not in the realm of possibility as it is very doubtful if India would give up its aim of claiming a regional superpower status based on an array of nuclear weapons and their delivery means. Some of the suggestions can mature only if there is a major shift in the strategic environment." Proposals by both sides, set out in appendices, reveal little common ground.

HILARY SYNNOTT, the British High Commissioner to Pakistan, tackled aspects of the problem in an Adelphi Paper for the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. He analyses crisply the motivations behind, and the consequences of, the tests. In his view, "Both India and Pakistan appear to have neglected issues of doctrine. Since nuclear policy will always contain elements that governments will wish to keep secret, it is unclear what either government has done, or intends to do. The main elements needing attention would include: refraining from military procurement and deployment which increases rather than diminishes the risk of nuclear conflict; steps to make nuclear weapons safe from accidental detonation and unauthorised interference; measures to ensure adequate central or political control of nuclear policy and related activities; and procedures to manage the consequences of a nuclear-related political or military incident."

He counsels India and Pakistan to consider the following specific steps: "Explicitly ruling out launch-on-warning" policies; engaging in operational arms control, including keeping nuclear forces off alert; not attaching warheads and other vital components to delivery systems and extending the time required to make nuclear forces ready for launch; and refraining from deploying nuclear-delivery systems."

Even if a dialogue is held between the two countries on the nuclear issue, it will be long before negotiations are seriously held on proposals such as the ones Synnott helpfully outlines. Meanwhile, the menace of a nuclear clash looms large over the region.

India's Emerging Nuclear Posture: Between Recessed Deterrent and Ready Arsenal by Ashley J. Tellis; Oxford University Press; pages 885, Rs. 895.

The Nuclearization of South Asia by Kamal Matinuddin; Oxford University Press; pages 355, Rs. 495.

The Causes and Consequences of South Asia's Nuclear Tests: Adelphi Paper 332 of the International Institute for Strategic Studies; Oxford University Press; pages 85, Rs.195.

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