The Hindu : Countering Pak.'s nuclear blackmail

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jan 01, 2003

Opinion

Opinion - News Analysis

Countering Pak.'s nuclear blackmail

By C. Raja Mohan

NEW DELHI Dec. 31. If there were any doubts that the development of missile defences was one of India's most important national security imperatives, they should be removed once and for all by the latest statements of the Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf, on his country's nuclear posture.

Gen. Musharraf's refusal to end cross-border terrorism and his threat to use nuclear weapons in the very first stages of a military conflict should make the early deployment of missile defences an urgent national priority for India.

The central lesson from Gen. Musharraf's nuclear blackmail is simple. Without neutralising Pakistan's nuclear calculus based on the first use of nuclear weapons, New Delhi will not be able to bring effective military pressure on Islamabad to give up cross-border terrorism.

Intuitively, India has already been engaged in an effort to acquire missile defences. It has been negotiating with Israel for the purchase of the Arrow missile, which has some capability to intercept an incoming missile with a nuclear warhead. India has also been looking at advanced air defence systems from Russia, besides trying to develop some of its own.

There has also been some talk here on considering the purchase of the more advanced Patriot system from the United States. The Bush Administration, sections of which have been sympathetic to India's strategic requirements, has offered to make a preliminary assessment of India's missile defence needs. Senior officials from India and the U.S. will meet later this month for a substantive discussion on the subject.

The time has come for India to move beyond this tentative exploration of missile defence options to a more robust effort that would involve early acquisition of systems from abroad as well as the initiation of a substantive national research and development effort to create indigenous capabilities in missile defence technology.

Two national security considerations must guide India. One is the organic link between Pakistan's nuclear posture and its support to cross-border terrorism. Once it acquired nuclear weapons in the late 1980s, Pakistan deliberately chose cross-border terrorism as its national strategy against India.

Pakistan was confident that it had neutralised India's conventional military superiority with its nuclear weapons. It believed that New Delhi had no options to threaten military action against Islamabad's provocative support to cross-border terrorism.

India's coercive diplomacy after the attack on the Parliament in December 2001 was a serious attempt to get out of this difficult corner. Although India's threat to launch an all-out war against Pakistan produced some diplomatic dividends, it could not, in the end, compel Gen. Musharraf to give up cross-border terrorism. But the challenge remains.

One of the few options available for India is to find ways to blunt the nuclear blackmail of Pakistan. While the immediate effectiveness of missile defence may be limited, technologies are beginning to evolve and even the available ones can certainly complicate the nuclear calculations of Pakistan.

Uncertainty over the long-term evolution of Pakistan is another reason why India should be investing in missile defences. The prospect of the state failing in Pakistan and the nuclear weapons falling into the hands of extremists is not one that India should be scoffing at. Missile defences would be a huge hedge against such a development.

Although India boldly supported the missile defence initiative of the Bush Administration in May 2001, apprehensions about Russian and Chinese reactions tended to dampen that initial enthusiasm. Russia is now on-board the missile defence bandwagon and it is only a matter of time before China begins to develop its own capabilities in the area.

In any case, the task of Indian diplomacy should be to promote India's national security interests.

The immediate diplomatic challenge is to overcome the residual resistance in Washington against Indo-U.S. cooperation in missile defences and the opposition there to Israeli sale of Arrow system to India.

The U.S. State Department, which has been unable to get Gen. Musharraf to deliver on his promises to end cross-border terrorism, has little credibility in opposing the transfer of missile defence technologies to India.

In fact, every argument that has been used by Washington to justify its missile defence project applies with greater urgency to New Delhi.

Besides the U.S., India must also begin to engage Japan, South Korea and other Asian countries who are threatened by the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and missile technology to irresponsible regimes like those in Pakistan and North Korea.

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