Now work on real deterrence

Now that India and Pakistan have so vividly demonstrated their nuclear capabilities, we have to learn to live with the bomb. What kind of ar...

Now that India and Pakistan have so vividly demonstrated their nuclear capabilities, we have to learn to live with the bomb. What kind of arsenal do we need to give our deterrence credibility? We know who our current adversaries are. Who our future adversaries will be depends on how we shape up economically and how our geo-political interests change. In a couple of decades we will import most of our oil. Clearly we would acquire a competing strategic interests in the oil-producing regions in our vicinity and in protecting the sea lanes running across the Arabian Sea.

But first we have to cope with our present adversaries. The more virulent, Pakistan, is the lesser of our military threats. Yet its internal dynamics have turned it into a seemingly unrelenting enemy, one equipped with Chinese-supplied missiles and Chinese-designed nuclear weapons. The irony of the Islamic bomb is that it is aimed at a country with the world8217;s second largest Muslim population where every town or city has a sizeable Muslimpopulation. But this may not deter Pakistan8217;s Punjabi Muslim military elite.Just as Pakistan is waging a proxy war on us China wages a proxy cold war on us by assisting Pakistan8217;s nuclear and missile programmes. The happily frozen state of our border dispute should logically have blunted its animosity but China seems to regard us as a future threat. The current nuclear imbalance in its favour results in a dangerous vulnerability.

To avoid becoming a victim of someone8217;s nuclear bomb, we have to convince them that we can repay in kind even after taking a decapitating first strike. If an adversary thinks it can use nuclear weapons without retaliation the chances of its using them increase exponentially. Second, if it is convinced that we have limited capability and are likely to use our nuclear weapons before we lose them, the risk of a pre-emptive strike increases greatly.

We need a range of warheads and delivery systems to match all situations and be a convincing deterrent. If an important economic ormilitary target was attacked and our ability to retaliate was restricted to taking out a population centre, our deterrence would not be credible. If a superpower flotilla were to impose a crippling blockade, we could not counter credibly by threatening to destroy his capital as the threatened punishment would far exceed the provocation. But the capability to destroy the flotilla by swift counter-attack using sub-kiloton nuclear weapons would be credible. The successful testing of two sub-kiloton warheads is important provided we develop suitable high-speed and accurate sea-and air-launched missiles.

In 1962 the US Navy blockaded Cuba and intercepted Soviet ships on the high seas. Since the Russians did not have conventional or theatre nuclear capability to break the blockade the US was daring them to up the ante or back down. They backed down because a nuclear war with strategic weapons raised stakes beyond reason. Better to lose face than both destroyed.

The rapid development in conventional-weapontechnologies will widen the gap in conventional military capability. We cannot match the advanced countries without crippling our economy. Nuclear weapons are for us a low-cost option. Those who argue otherwise don8217;t know what they talk about.

Having decided to weaponise we must be careful about how we deploy. Nuclear weapons are not war-fighting weapons. They are weapons of coercive diplomacy to prevent wars. Their use implies utter policy failure. Their only utility is in their non-use. Their deployment and movement is only to semaphore to the adversary our reaction to their provocation to prompt it to de-escalate. It is to evolve an elaborate system of signaling our responses.

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In 1973 in the early days of the Yom Kippur war, as things were going against Israel and after the US imposed an arms embargo on it, the Israelis moved what was purportedly a nuclear weapon out of its storage in Dimona just when a US SR-71 reconnaissance plane was streaking overhead. The US spyplane picked up the 8220;weapon8221; onits sensors and the Americans concluded that Israel was about to attack with nuclear weapons to dissipate the Syrian offensive in the Golan area. President Nixon immediately contacted Golda Meir and promised immediate resumption of vitally needed military hardware. The US airlift began within hours. In February 1953 President Eisenhower threatened to 8220;resume the United Nations offensive with the use of nuclear weapons8221; to force the Chinese and their North Korean partners into an appropriate negotiating attitude to end the Korean war.

The collapse of the Soviet Union revealed that the US had overestimated its military strength. The Pentagon developed a vested interest in exaggerating it. Inter-service rivalries, particularly between US Navy and US Airforce, resulted in an arms race between them. The MoD from time to time plants stories about Pakistan8217;s growing military power. Most are self-serving. We cannot allow an uncontrolled nuclear arms race by fuelling raw passions. The military can be very good atthis and we must guard against it.

Since nuclear weapons are not war fighting-weapons the traditional military must not have them. A separate inter-service command under full and direct civilian and political control must be evolved. A chain of command must be stipulated. Suppose a decapitating nuclear strike is made on the capital taking with it all the top political and military leaders, who will give the order to retaliate? If the enemy believes that the chain of command will collapse with this the probability of it happening increases dramatically. It is important to convince the enemy that attack will entail retaliation.

The officers and soldiers in the Nuclear Command must be carefully chosen for psychological stability and toughness. At least 10-12 per cent of the population are susceptible to mental disorders like depression. Military men are not immune. Consider like Gen. Curtis LeMay, the first commander of the US Strategic Air Command who later earned notoriety by becoming the vice-presidentialrunning mate of segregationist Governor George Wallace. In the single integrated operation plan SIOP drafted by him in 1956 he stated that the main objective was to 8220;turn the Soviet Union into a smoking and smouldering ruin within 24 hours8221;! When the Vietnam War began his characteristic response was 8220;to send them back to the Stone Age8221;.

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It is very important to convey to the adversary that nuclear arms are under the control of a stable and extremely rational leadership, who in Golda Meir8217;s immortal words 8220;will not be the first to use them, but will neither be the last to use them8221;. Nuclear ambiguity has to have a new meaning now.