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We know what an NRI is, but have you heard of the NIR? That's the Non-Indian
Resident, the desi species which will bend any which way in the name of
international peace and goodwill. With Parliament's Standing Committee on Defence
recommending to build and deploy Agni, the intermediate-range ballistic missile,
the doves are in a flutter. Basically, their argument goes like: India must sign
the CTBT because the world, it is a changing. They say, a powerful coalition
within and outside the US government is making a convincing case for radical
changes in US nuclear policies, that India does not have the political will,
economic resources, or technological width and depth to exercise the nuclear
option, and, what security objectives can be met by going nuclear?
Nuclear debates have been going on since day one - which we can take as 16 July
1945 when the US had nearly concluded the programme (code-named Manhattan Project)
to produce the atomic bomb under the aegis of theoretical physicist J Robert
Oppenheimer. The Nuclear Age began on a silent stretch of desert in Alamogordo,
New Mexico, when, at the moment of reckoning - the first test - Oppenheimer
chanted from the Bhagwad Gita: "Death am I, the great destroyer of worlds.... "
(Kaalosmi lokakshayakrit Pravruddho). Just three weeks later, the A-bomb was
detonated over Hiroshima. While we limply drone Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram, fifty
years ago, America had already digested, acted upon, and benefited from a vital
element of the Gita.
In the three-day hiatus between the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, delegates
of the US, UK, USSR and France met in London to establish a military tribunal to
try Nazi leaders for war crimes and primes against humanity. At the Nuremberg
trials, the principle of individual accountability was upheld against the defeated
Axis powers. But not a word was said, then or later, on whether or not the
principle applied to the holocaust of Japanese civilians. That, my friends, is
realpolitik. The winner of the 1995 Nobel Peace Prize, Joseph Rotblat, has been an
anti-nuke campaigner since his days as a scientist on the Manhattan Project, and
Oppenheimer himself opposed the development of the H-bomb.... The pertinent
question is not whether such debates exist - but if they have achieved anything
significant over the past fifty years.
It's true that a coalition is making a case for radical changes in nuclear policy.
Recently, retired generals Lee Butler and Andrew J Goodpaster came out forcefully
and lucidly against nukes. They were listened to because of their former
positions. Gen Butler had been commander-in-chief of the US Strategic Command, in
which capacity he was responsible for all US Air Force and Navy nuclear forces
which support the security objectives of strategic defence: and Gen Goodpaster had
advised presidents from Eisenhower through Clinton, while also having served as
director of the Joint Staff, and commander of the NATO forces. (Their comments
made the news for a couple of weeks earlier this year: that's all.) What I'd like
to know is: Where were their irenic consciences while they were drawing their
paychecks for over five decades? Or are they still performing a patriotic duty by
dissuading us? Old tigers changing stripes ... ? Gimme more.
>From another angle, which standing officer in the US military would want to
jeopardize his career by recommending the only change that makes sense to India -
ie, total nuclear disarmament? The reduction of stockpiled weapons by the nuclear
powers has little meaning for India. For even if the Big Five bring down their
inventory to a hundred nukes, the use of just ten would be more than enough to
change and even determine the outcome of a war.
They say that China has pledged never to be the first to use or threaten to use
nuclear weapons and has so far stood by its pledge. I've got news for you. NO
nuclear power has agreed to a no-first-use guarantee in case of conflict with even
a non-nuclear state. But let's assume I'm wrong and that China has pledged it.
Are we to now trust past aggressors of India in defence matters? I mean, just a
week ago it was reported that Chinese soldiers regularly intrude into Himachal
Pradesh, scanning and easing the border areas, and do not leave till a face-off
with the Indian Army! Whether or not China may strike first with nuclear weapons
in the course of conventional war is academic. As long as China has nuclear
weapons, no strategist can plan for a war based on the assumption that the enemy
will not use such weapons, no matter what the pledges. That, too, is realpolitik.
Why should India have to depend on assurances from China, anyway? Notice that
none of the big boys themselves are satisfied with promises from anybody else:
They wanted an NPT: they got it. They wanted a CTBT: they got it. They want a
Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty: no doubt, they'll get it. The flower-power
mentality of most Indians and thank god, not of bureaucrats like Arundhati Ghose -
will have us offer even our nether cheeks for more. China may have pledged not to
be the first to use nuclear weapons, and it may have stood by its pledge "so far".
Thanks. But what if Beijing decides to make an exception ... ?
In the late 1940s, when the nuclear race began in earnest, the technological
capabilities of the superpowers were not even comparable to ours today. A country
which had its first nuclear test in 1974, and which has since demonstrated
missile-making capability (Prithvi, Agni, and rumours of a "Surya"), sent
satellites into orbit with its own launchers (PSLV), and developed its own
supercomputer, surely has the width and depth to exercise the nuclear option! And
what's this "exercising of the nuclear option", anyway? One can have broken-down
kits ready for assembly (which the rest think we already have), or one can have
ICBMs and IRBMs sitting in silos, waiting for the push of a button to incinerate a
city (which the nuclear powers most certainly have). Take your pick.
The real issue is not whether India has the economic resources, but if it's wise
to use them for acquiring a nuclear arsenal. But defence planning is not an
either/or game. When China began its nuclear build-up in the '60s, its economic
condition was worse than ours is today -- and look where China is now! The
financial energies of our country have just been released: with adequate guidance,
developing a nuclear. arsenal shouldn't pose much of a problem - despite the Rs
4,901 crore increase demanded by the defence ministry this year. In any case,
with two acquisitive neighbours, do we have an option? India needs to guarantee
its safety in a nuclearised world. The nuclear states have given us through
justifications on why they need to retain their nukes - and India has the very
same security objectives.
Scott D Sagan, an associate of the Center for International Security and Arms
Control at Stanford University admitted that some 57 states now operate or are
constructing nuclear power or research reactors: that "it has been estimated that
about 30 countries today have the necessary industrial infrastructure and
scientific expertise to build nuclear weapons...." Add to that Pakistan's building
the short-range Hatif missiles and acquiring from China the deadly CSS-X-7
missiles. Not to speak of Iran and Saudi Arabia, the great benefactors of Islamic
fundamentalists, possessing the same.
It has already been proved that high-tech nukes (the B-61-11) were being developed
secretly by the US: The Sandia National Laboratories conducted 13 full-scale drop
tests this year,. three in Alaska and ten at the Tonopah Test Range, and presented
the world with a fait accompli. What do the NIRs say about that? Nothing,
naturally.
But the big question that they always think they can stump us with is: What could
India lose if it built the bomb? For starters, since India has never signed the
NPT, building the bomb itself does not Pose a serious problem - so long as it's
kept secret. The problem lies with testing. If we test, we could face economic
sanctions, UN condemnation, international isolation, the whole coercion-works. But
with our growing economy, global interdependence and our vast market, eventually,
isolation would prove futile: You may have noticed that the US has had limited
success in isolating even Iran. My - go ahead, laugh -- instinct says that India
already has IRBMs deployed in silos - and never mind the House panel's April 30
direction to deploy Agni. The Big Five doth protest too much, if we didn't
already have 'em.
I don't believe the next generation is going to take this pacifist crap being
spouted by our own. Pacifism works if the opponent is playing by the same set of
rules. Morality is fine as long as it serves national interests and is widely
observed. But Matsyanyaya - big fish eat small fish - exists. A paper for
Abolition of Nuclear Weapons says: "Today's treaties provide that only delivery
systems, not nuclear warheads, will be destroyed. This permits the US and Russia
to keep their warheads in reserve storage, thus creating a reversible nuclear
potential." And Sandia says: "In FY96, Military Liaison trained more than 1,500
students, a 50 per cent increase over recent yea" due to. the growing demand for
nuclear weapons skills, knowledge, and qualification. . . . "
I say bring out the Arthashastra for reference.
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