NEW DELHI: Nearly five years after India and Pakistan became nuclear powers, New Delhi is finally coming to terms with what that status means — the threat of a Pakistani first strike has neutralized its conventional superiority.
Analysts say last year’s inconclusive military standoff between the neighbours highlighted what many had feared when the two conducted tit-for-tat nuclear tests in 1998, that India would no longer dare go to war with Pakistan.
“India has become a victim of nuclear blackmail,” said C. Raja Mohan, strategic affairs editor at The Hindu newspaper.
So, unable to go back, India is copying the example of the United States and the former Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War, building its nuclear deterrent to the point of mutually assured destruction so that neither side would dare go nuclear.
Over the course of this month, it has announced a new nuclear command and control structure, appointed a Commander-in-Chief of the so-called “strategic forces” and begun a fresh series of tests of nuclear-capable missiles.
“These are building blocks. Unless all of them are in place, the nuclear deterrent can neither be credible nor effective,” said retired lieutenant-general V. R. Raghavan.
India massed its 1.1 million strong military along the border for 10 months last year in a standoff prompted by an attack on its parliament on Dec 13, 2001, which it blamed on Pakistan-based militants.
Pakistan responded by mobilizing its own 500,000-strong armed forces and the two sides came to the brink of war in June.
But under intense international pressure, India ultimately pulled back its troops rather than run the risk of a conventional conflict which could go nuclear, and analysts now concede that New Delhi gained little from the standoff.
President Pervez Musharraf appeared to suggest last month it was the nuclear threat which prevented a fourth war between the two countries.
The president said the threat of a “non-conventional war” helped avert a conflict. While his spokesman later said he was talking about a popular uprising, India believed he meant a nuclear war.
MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION: While tensions have eased since the troop pullback was announced in October, the battle is now on to make nuclear weapons too destructive to use.
Making that point, Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes said last week that if Pakistan used nuclear weapons on India, “there will be no Pakistan left when we have responded”.
New Delhi this month set up a new Nuclear Command Authority, formalizing the existing arrangement which gives the civilian political leadership under Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee final power to authorize the use of nuclear arms.
The government also approved an alternative command chain to cover “all eventualities” and said in a statement that “nuclear retaliation to a first strike will be massive and designed to inflict unacceptable damage”.
It gave no details, but last week named Air Marshal T. M. Asthana, a former fighter pilot, to lead a new strategic forces command.
Pakistan already has its own Nuclear Command and Control Authority made up of military, political and scientific officials, with President Musharraf having the final say.
Both countries are in the meantime refining their capacity to deliver nuclear bombs through ongoing missile tests, despite international calls for a halt to the South Asian arms race.
Last Thursday, India test-fired its nuclear-capable Agni-1 missile to a range of about 800kms — a distance seen as targeting Pakistan.
The Agni-1 complements the 2,500-km Agni-II missile intended to hit targets in China. The Agni-1 has a one-ton payload capacity and can be fired from rail and road launchers, making it highly mobile.
Little is known about the number of nuclear warheads the two sides possess, the accuracy of their ballistic missiles or their ability to withstand re-entry to the atmosphere carrying a nuclear warhead.
Defence experts estimate that India has between 60 and 100 warheads and Pakistan 25 to 50.
Unlike the United States and Russia, the missiles and warheads are kept well apart. Even at the height of last year’s military standoff, India did not arm its missiles, defence experts say. It is not known how close Pakistan came to doing so.
NO FIRST USE: As well as testing missiles and beefing up its command structure, some military experts have also floated the idea that India drop its pledge not to be the first to use nuclear weapons.
Pakistan has no such pledge, but with its conventional inferiority is seen as the more likely to use them first, if it felt its entire existence was threatened in a conventional war.
“I don’t see why we should give them the luxury of a first strike,” said retired Major General Afsir Karim.
But most analysts see the “no-first-use” policy staying.
“We have to be a responsible nuclear power, we have to be seen showing restraint, we are not some trigger happy nation,” said Raja Mohan.
A defence official was quoted as saying on Saturday that India would also test a 3,000-km Agni-III missile later this year, putting more of China within strike range.
A further test, of a short range anti-ship cruise missile, is also expected later this month.
“Why do we have to see everything in terms of Pakistan? Nations plan security years in advance, we have to worry about new rivals, threats years ahead,” said retired Lt Gen Hriday Kaul.
India and China fought a brief war in 1962, but ties have improved over the past decade.—Reuters
Dear visitor, the comments section is undergoing an overhaul and will return soon.