There are two types of nuclear “hawks” in Pakistan. In the first category may be included those who write thunderous articles which carry stirring titles or phrases like “It’s now or never”, “Do or die”, “Test or live in shame”, “Don’t let nation down”, “Stop dithering”, “Test or be damned”, “Moment of truth”, “Tomorrow is too late”, etc. There are fiercely proud, patriotic men and women whose emotions tend to overflow when they are confronted with the challenge of devising a rational, long term response to India’s ambitions, American hypocrisy and European doublespeak. They tend to view opposing viewpoints as being “gutless” and “shameless”.
The other kind of nuclear “hawks” is more sophisticated. They are careful to couch their analysis in “objective” terms. There is no hint of emotion or anger. Their thoughts range far and wide. They play wargames of “national security” with seemingly ruthless abandon. Their views are couched in terms like “window of opportunity”, “national obligations”, “there’s no choice”, “realpolitik”. In a rather patronising sort of way, however, they view their opponents as “misplaced peaceniks” who are “deliberately evading an interface with national security issues” because of their intense moral and humanitarian preoccupations”.
We are not in the least impressed by such people. Indeed, we are troubles by the lack of satisfactory answers from the “now or never” brigade to a host of serious and provocative questions.
It is taken as an article of faith in Pakistan that there has been no fourth war between India and Pakistan only because of Pakistan’s “nuclear deterrent”. Yet India exploded a nuclear device in 1974 and Pakistan’s didn’t even claim to be able to make nuclear weapons until 1987 when General Ziaul Haq announced that Pakistan was “only a screwdriver’s turn away from the bomb” and Mr A Q Khan gave a bombshell interview to Indian journalist Kuldeep Nayyar. Why, when India’s hegemonic obsessions and antipathy against Pakistan are of such long standing, and when a conflict over Siachin had already begun in the early 1980s, didn’t New Delhi impose a war on Pakistan from 1974 to 1988 when they had a big bomb and we didn’t?
It is, of course, no good saying that India came “close” to imposing a war on Pakistan in 1984 or 1987. The fact remains that India did not impose a war during that period when we did not have a nuclear deterrent. The fact remains that this had nothing to do with Ziaul Haq’s facile “cricket diplomacy”. Indeed, the fact remains that, despite having agreed to effectively cold-storage Kashmir at Simla 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 stance immediately. Islamabad was now eager to smoke the peace pipe with India. 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 Siachin. It also signed a number of protocols relating to travel and cultural matters. With the focus on peace rather than war, the “nuclear deterrent” seemed to evaporate as a meaningful strategic device.
The equations, however, were changed again by Pakistan when the Kashmiris spontaneously erupted against the injustices of New Delhi at the end of 1989. Sensing a new “window of opportunity”, Islamabad quickly changed tack. It whipped out Kashmir from the cold-storage of Simla 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. This led India to bare its teeth and we were, if the American administration of the time is to be believed, once again on the brink of war in April 1990. This drift into war was during the time when our “nuclear deterrent” was so alive and kicking that Washington had to cut-off all economic and military assistance to Pakistan in September 1990 for “crossing the nuclear red light”.
The new policy of overt and convert assistance to the Kashmiris was deepened by the new regime in Islamabad in 1991 led by Nawaz Sharif who was then a devoted disciple of General Ziaul Haq. Far from any engagement in a peace dialogue with India, it led to a changed formulation of the Pakistani position on Kashmir. Islamabad was now insistent that Kashmir was a “core” issue in its disputes with India without whose resolution in full accordance with the UN resolutions of 1947 and 1948 there could be no dialogue with India. It also led in April 1993 to a palpable threat by Washington to declare Pakistan as a terrorist state. The record shows that Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan flew to Washington in early April 1993 (just before the Sharif regime was ousted by President Ghulam Ishaq Khan) to “apologise” to the American secretary of state and promise good behaviour in exchange for letting Pakistan off the terrorist-state hook. In the event, the Pakistani “nuclear deterrent” led to a cut-off in American aid to Pakistan and undermined its conventional defense capabilities. It also emboldened Pakistan not only to drift towards war with India but also to come to the brink of being declared a terrorist state. More significantly, it did not stop the Indians from thinking of waging war against Pakistan for stoking the fire in Kashmir.
During the second Bhutto regime from 1993-96, Pakistan was more circumspect. On the one hand, it withstood American pressure to roll back its nuclear programme and open its nuclear installations for inspection. On the other hand, it accepted a “freeze” on its nuclear programme in exchange for a commitment from Washington to supply the embargoed F-16 aircraft or return its money back. Its “proactive” Kashmir policy also became less indiscreet than in the past. India, in the meanwhile, had determined to stamp out the revolt in Kashmir by a carrot and stick policy. Even as it buttressed its military machinery in the valley to crush the insurgency, it began to explore avenues of holding elections in Kashmir and granting a degree of “autonomy” to the Kashmiris. New Delhi’s Kashmir policy was supported to the hilt by Washington’s ambassador to New Delhi in 1995, Mr Frank Wisner, who urged Islamabad not to try and sabotage the proposed elections in the valley. There was no talk by Washington of Pakistan’s nuclear program after 1994. Equally, Pakistan was not allowed by the Americans to make any headway in internationalising the Kashmir issue at Geneva or any other international fora.
In December 1995, Pakistan learnt that India was readying its Pokhran site for renewed nuclear testing. Accordingly, a secret policy review took place under the Bhutto regime. But the Americans, it is understood, told the Pakistan authorities to relax because they thought they could persuade the Indians to refrain from testing. There were therefore no official statements from Pakistan decrying India’s “hostile intentions”. However, the curious thing is that there was no public or private debate of Pakistani nuclear strategy from the “hawks” inside and outside the Pakistani establishment even after American satellites revealed in February 1996 that India was readying to test its nuclear arsenal.
This recapitulation lead to several awkward questions. Why were the Pakistani “hawks” so miserly with their strategic insights into the relationship between national security and demonstrated nuclear weapons when the whole world was put on notice of India’s nuclear intentions two years ago? Surely, if a debate had to be conducted on the “ifs” and “whens” of conducting nuclear tests by Pakistan, it should have been launched a long time ago when it was clear that the Indian nuclear intentions establishing was simply waiting for a more propitious political environment in which to clinch its arguments with the politicians. Indeed, it is worth asking why the Pakistani nuclear establishment led by Dr A Q Khan was strangely silent on this issue for two years. It is also noteworthy that political strategists who are baying for the bomb today were asleep when they should have analysed and formulated a coherent response two years ago. The fact of the matter is that Islamabad makes a mockery of the whole issue when it claims that it drew the attention of the world to India’s nuclear intentions some months ago when it transpires that it didn’t even take out the time to hammer out a swift policy of its own in the event that its “dire warnings” were proven right.
Given this background, the irony is all the greater when we note Nawaz Sharif’s keenness to open a peace dialogue with India shortly after becoming prime minister in 1997. In mid-1997, the foreign office informed us that a “historic breakthrough” had been achieved in the secretary-level talks with India. New Delhi, we were told, had finally agreed to discuss the Kashmir “issue” with Pakistan along with the other outstanding issues. For the uninitiated, of course, this did not create any misgivings. But it should have sent alarm bells ringing in our community of knowledgeable “hawks”. Pakistan under Nawaz Sharif had quietly abandoned its eight year stance of insisting that the Kashmir issue was the “core issue” pending whose resolution no other confidence-building matter could be undertaken. It had also agreed to discuss this issue bilaterally, once again a radical departure from its historic position that under the UN resolutions the Kashmir dispute transcends bilateralism. Yet there was not a speak of protest from any quarter of the “hawks” explaining how this policy could be swiftly shipwrecked at the alter of overt nuclear testing by India. Indeed, there were people in Pakistan, including Nawaz Sharif, who believed that the arrival of the BJP to power in India might actually hasten the peace process because the “patriotic” credentials of both right-wing parties could not be challenged.
This bankruptcy of the Pakistani political and intellectual establishment is no where more evident than in the shrill, belated cries for “immediately” adopting a “fail-safe” nuclear doctrine which relies on a tested device for national security. At the end of the day and shorn of its “intellectual” trappings, the arguments is reduced to the following logic: “The BJP has unexpectedly posed a new strategic threat to Pakistan; its track record of one month shows that it promised in its manifesto to test a bomb and it has carried out its pledge; it promised to launch a policy of “hot pursuit” of Kashmiri insurgents across the line of control and it has demonstrated proof of its commitment by authorising RAW to embark on terrorism inside Pakistan; now it is threatening to seize Azad Kashmir by force and it is bound to carry out this threat; if it tries to force an annexation of Azad Kashmir, there will be war with Pakistan; since Pakistan cannot win a conventional war with India, because the conventional balance has been seriously eroded against Pakistan in the last decade, Pakistan will lose the war, when Pakistan is about to lose the war, it will be obliged to use nuclear weapons to thwart defeat; that is why it is imperative to show India that we are not bluffing when we say we have the bomb and will use it if it is necessary to protect our country.”
This is a self-serving argument. It is flawed at many junctures. First of all, of course, it makes light of the fact that Pakistan can only think of using the bomb not to save itself from limited military defeat but to hasten its total annihilation. Second, it ignores a fact which every Pakistani hawk knows but no hawk is willing to acknowledge: the Kashmir insurgency peaked three years ago and has been on the decline since; it is almost over now; the Kashmiris are fatigued and desperate for a respite from the war; indeed, the Hurriet Conference is divided and totally isolated; it is looking for an opportunity to clutch at a face saving compromise from New Delhi. The BJP knows this. In fact, the BJP wants to make sure that whatever is left of the insurgency is crushed as quickly as possible. Its only concern is that this could take longer than anticipated because the Pakistanis might try and infiltrate more men and materials into Kashmir after the snows melt. That is why it has buttressed paramilitary forces in the valley and is talking of “hot pursuit of insurgents into their bases in Azad Kashmir”. If Pakistan (and this is the crucial point) pulls its hand out of Kashmir, there is no reason at all why the BJP might take the risky and totally unnecessary step of permanently hotting up the LoC beyond control.
Third, the significant opposition in India led by the Congress is increasingly becoming critical of the BJP’s “adventurist” stance. Voices are also being raised by the largely secular Indian press that the BJP’s exploitation of serious strategic issues (on which there was a consensus) for short term party political mileage is unacceptable. This opposition is likely to grow. The same Congress and Janata Parties which refused to test the Indian bomb in 1996 and 1997 are not likely to allow the BJP to embark on a full scale adventure across the LoC with Pakistan.
Fourth, how does a test of a nuclear bomb right away by Pakistan deter the BJP from hotting up the LoC if it is determined to do so? Modern armies in a situation like that in Kashmir much prefer controlled, limited, tactical strikes against specific targets to gain political advantage rather than full-scale wars to capture do with its bomb if the BJP decides to launch a calibrated campaign of terrorism across the LoC? Drop it on India?
The hawks have one final argument. That if we did not test now the Americans will nudge the UN Security Council to impose Iraq-type sanctions on us. That would make it impossible for us to test our device later. This is nonsense. We say China is our friend. Why then can’t we expect China to veto any such proposal? At any rate sanctions are sanctions whether imposed by the UN or individual countries. There is another false fear. It is said that India in collaboration with Israel may knock out our nuclear installations if we postpone testing. This is rubbish. It hasn’t happened since we began our nuclear programme and it’s not going to happen now. Pakistan is not Iraq and the Indo-Pak equation is very different from the Middle East imbroglio.
There is one final reason why the “hawks” should reconsider their position of “now or never”. The Indians desperately want to provoke Pakistan to show its hand and test its nuclear device(s) immediately. Everything is calibrated — all the hawkish statements emanating from the enemy in New Delhi day after day — to wound our pride, to make us feel insecure and push us into testing our bomb. Shouldn’t we pause to consider what possible merit there might conceivably be for us of a policy designed and advocated by the enemy?
India stands to gain much and lose nothing from a Pakistani test. First, if Pakistan tests immediately, the heat will shift from India and be focussed acutely on Pakistan because the Hindu bomb is less scary than the Islamic bomb. Second, India and Pakistan can then jointly demand a revision of the CTBT to enable them to formally enter the “nuclear club”. But this will only be advantageous to India because it will enable it to claim a stake in the Security Council as the world’s biggest democratic nuclear power. Pakistan, in the meanwhile, will be left to bask in the shallow glory of misplaced pride. Third, economic sanctions imposed on both countries in the aftermath of Pakistan’s nuclear tests will hurt Pakistan much more than India. To that extent, Pakistan’s relative economic and military balance vis a vis India will decline.
The Pakistan army chief has made an enigmatic statement recently. He said that “there should be a balance between tactical defence, strategic deterrence and a viable economy”. This can be interpreted to mean either temporary “nuclear restraint” or “immediate testing”, depending on one’s perception of the prevalent view in the upper echelons of the Pakistan armed forces. For what it is worth, however, it is interesting that an overwhelming majority of retired army generals who have written or spoken on this issue have called for a “restrained approach”. It is noteworthy that Mr Nawaz Sharif has also followed such an approach until now.
However, if we were to take the “temporary restraint” argument a little further, we might be able to see an outline of what its advocates may have in mind. I there is no immediate threat of full-scale war with India, as explained above, Pakistan might actually stand to derive concrete advantages from “temporary restraint”. First, it would leave the heat on India. Second, it would enable Pakistan to create the space for a better negotiation of its rightful military and economic claims on the United States, Japan and the West. Third, it would not give India added leverage to extract a security council seat from the West. And finally, it would allow Pakistan to retain its option of testing its bomb at a time of its own choosing, preferably after its economy has turned the corner and just before it’s time to hop on board the CTBT as a full-fledged nuclear power.
Pakistan could, of course, decide to go ahead with an appropriate test even before the ink of this editorial is dry. If it does, it will only be because of wounded pride. In time to come, however, we will realise how national security has not been enhanced even as the costs of the test impose severe strains in our economy and polity. National security for a weak state and fledgling political democracy like Pakistan’s can only be enhanced if we learn to live at peace with a big and growing power like India instead of relying upon relatively crude nuclear props to ensure a permanent balance of terror. A pre-requisite for peace with India is, of course, a settlement over Kashmir which the world is prepared to endorse.