http://www.tehelka.com/channels/commentary/2002/may/20/com052002are.htm
**Are we prepared for war? **
The rock-solid belief in each country that the other is bluffing is
the root cause of the threat of nuclear war in South Asia, says Prem Shankar Jha
**Almost forty years ago, pressure from Indian public opinion made Pandit Nehru commit India to a war in the Himalayas with China for which the Indian armed forces were totally unprepared. The result was a humiliating defeat and a psychological shock to the Indian nation from which it has still not recovered. **
Today, there is an even more impressive consensus in the country that by continuing to send jehadis into Kashmir, Pakistan has left India with no option but to take retaliatory action. While various forms of retaliatory action have been considered, there is a slightly weaker consensus that the response will have to be a military one.
My purpose is not to dispute the need for military action if Pakistan does not act decisively to stop cross-border infiltration into Kashmir. It is to ask whether India’s armed forces are anymore prepared at this moment for the kind of war that they might have to fight with Pakistan than they were in 1962? If not then India’s politicians, intelligentsia and media would do well to contain their anger and use it to fuel the preparations that would give India the overwhelming superiority it needs to fight the proxy war on its own terms.
**The crucial question before India’s planners is, if it hits jehadi points across the LoC in Azad Kashmir, will Pakistan sit still or will it enlarge the conflict further. If it retaliates, will it do so with a conventional or a nuclear strike? **
Pakistan’s military is so deeply committed to a proxy war in Kashmir and is so convinced that India has no answer to it, that it is almost inconceivable that it will allow India to call its bluff and get away with it. India’s military thinkers seem convinced that Pakistan’s response will not be nuclear. Asked to comment on Bruce Riedel’s disclosure that in 1999, Pakistan had already armed its nuclear weapons for a possible strike on India, the Indian intelligentsia dismissed this as a piece of US arm-twisting.
This rock-solid belief in each country that the other is bluffing is the root cause of the threat of nuclear war in South Asia. Pakistan is absolutely convinced, to quote an editor of Dawn in a phone conversation, that “India does not have the balls to cross the LoC in Kashmir”. India is equally convinced that Pakistan does not have the gumption to unleash a nuclear first strike on a nuclear armed foe. It is precisely out of such miscalculations that all wars have been born, including the 1965 and 1971 wars between India and Pakistan.
Once one enters, however imperfectly, the minds of Pakistan’s military leaders, it becomes apparent that almost any conflict in Kashmir will almost certainly widen into a more general conflict between the two countries. If Pakistan retaliates by crossing the LoC in areas where the terrain favours its forces (of which there are many), India will be forced to bring its air force into operation. Pakistan will almost certainly do the same.
India might get the better of the conflict, but if that happens, the Pakistan army will have to choose between losing the proxy war in Kashmir and giving up its half century-old goal of acquiring Kashmir, and raising the level of the conflict. In its present hyped up state, it will certainly choose the latter.
At that point, the generals will have to decide whether they should opt for a conventional war that they are almost certain to lose in the long-run, or launch a nuclear first strike and send its tanks in behind it. A politician might favour the former option, but a military mind could favour the latter.
There is more than an even chance that a conflict in Kashmir will prove indecisive. If that happens, there will be a military stalemate in Kashmir under whose cover Pakistan will pump thousands of jehadis into the state to attack the Indian forces, and civilians, behind the front lines. India will then be left with no option but to attack Pakistan across the international border with the aim of capturing territory that can be exchanged for peace. For Pakistan’s generals, the case for a nuclear first strike will become even stronger.
**Since the only deterrent to the latter will be the threat of a decisive Indian nuclear retaliation, Pakistan’s decision will ultimately hinge on its assessment of India’s capacity to withstand a nuclear first strike and launch a devastating second strike of its own. This is precisely what Pakistan’s generals doubt that India has. **
The reasons are as follows: first, to withstand a first strike and launch a convincing second strike, India must have either a huge numerical superiority in nuclear warheads, or a large number of missile silos hardened to withstand nuclear assault, or a submarine borne nuclear strike force. It does not have the second and third, and may have only a small superiority in the first.
**Second, in case the first Pakistani missile is aimed at Delhi, as it almost certainly will be, does the Indian command structure, especially its nuclear command and control system, have the capacity to continue functioning after such an attack? **Pakistan’s generals may be forgiven for gambling that it does not, because if the government has created such a “hardened” system, it has cut its own throat by not letting the world know about it.
Third, if all that will survive a Pakistani first strike is a small number of scattered, isolated and disoriented nuclear missile batteries, then India’s deterrent capability will hinge almost entirely upon its capacity to launch its own missiles after Pakistan has fired its missiles but before they hit their targets.
But whereas in the US-Soviet standoff this “window of opportunity” was about 25 minutes, for India it is no more than three to four minutes. Can India’s decision-makers recognise the Pakistani threat and issue their orders within this short space of time, and are the propellants, and fire control systems of the missiles sufficiently sophisticated for them to lift off before the Pakistani missiles arrive?
The answer, in a country where most missiles are still liquid fuelled, is “no”. India is, therefore, entirely dependent upon airplane borne nuclear weapons. Other than Delhi, forward airfields will be Pakistan’s first targets.
The conclusion is inescapable. Before Delhi retaliates in Kashmir and most certainly before it does so across the international border, it must increase its numerical edge in warheads, build many more solid fuel-propelled Agnis and Prithvis, disperse them and its nuclear armed aircraft more widely, build many more hardened silos, and above all marry all of its warheads and bombs, and bombs and missiles, for instant use. Most important of all, to minimise the chance of a war by miscalculation, it must let Pakistan and the world know that it has done so.
Since these preparations will take months to complete, India can try other options. First, since there is a possibility that Pakistan’s jehadis are renegades who are trying to make both their enemies, the Indian and Pakistani States, destroy each other, India should open a dialogue with Pakistan to get a better idea of where Musharraf stands, where he would like to go and the extent to which he might turn a blind eye to actions against the jehadis in Azad Kashmir if these become necessary.
If Musharraf is totally uncooperative, India will be justified in declaring that a state of war exists between the two countries, snapping all political and economic links, abrogating the Indus waters treaty and denying water to eastern Pakistan. If the inflow of jehadis continues, it could blockade Karachi port to deny oil to Pakistan. Only after that fails, should the military option be adopted.
(This Article Was Published In The Hindustan Times)
=============================================
We did warn Vajpayee that useless talk could backfire, and here it is in black and white why the hobbling old fool backed down pronto and thus embarrassed the whole Indian nation unnecessarily.
