Bharat Rakshak

Indians will increasingly judge Beijing by its actions rather than its words. They hold Washington to the same standard. Delhi has the means and motivation for a stronger diplomatic and military posture to deal with China. Other governments should too.

in Nepal, they worship a avatar of Shiva called Kala Bhairab...it is a pure form of Shiva associated with annihilation....I feel it will be a apt concept for the next phase of our evolution....

Now India has to declare that if Pakistan attacks India with nuclear weapon, China will also be held responsible for that, and retaliation will happen to both Pakistan and China.

India’s successful test of the Agni-V, a nuclear-capable long-range missile, is a major step forward for New Delhi in attaining nuclear deterrence against regional rival China. The lack of U.S. condemnation of India’s latest missile test demonstrates that the U.S. is comfortable with Indian progress in the nuclear and missile fields and appreciates India’s need to meet the emerging strategic challenge posed by rising China.It is telling that no country has criticized India’s missile test. The U.S. State Department simply called on all nuclear-capable states to exercise restraint but also noted India’s solid record on nonproliferation and its cooperation with the international community on nuclear issues. This is a far cry from Washington’s position on Indian ballistic missile development throughout the 1990s, when Washington pressured New Delhi to modify its nuclear and missile posture.The new U.S. stance also demonstrates a welcome evolution in U.S. nonproliferation policy. While some may view this evolution as a step away from U.S. nonproliferation commitments, this is not necessarily the case. What it recognizes is that U.S. nonproliferation policy should not be a one-way street, where potentially aggressive, non-status quo powers like China build up their nuclear and ballistic missile forces, and the U.S. responds by criticizing its friends and allies for responding to the emerging threat. It is a paradox, but nonetheless true, that sometimes the best option for confronting proliferation is to prepare to respond in kind. From this perspective, the Chinese, in large measure, have themselves to blame for this missile test by India.In turn, this responsive approach raises the question of how the U.S. should pursue nonproliferation goals in South Asia looking forward. First, it needs to account for the fact that it is pursuing these goals under a circumstance where proliferation has already taken place, and should create incentives for both China and India (==) to walk back their nuclear and missile programs. The goal should be to encourage both sides to adopt more defensive strategic postures, as opposed to relying on first strike and retaliatory nuclear options.

Agni-5 is not MAD

Good insights. He is ex DRDO.

Thanks for this piece, Chacko. Despite all the pressures to run such venture, it is pleasure to hear technically sound information in correct perspective. Hope this trend continues. Normally on such pieces we would have heard from 'Pro-fool mythwai' from other media.

Shyamd,

what is PRC hinting at ? how can they prevent a decision we intend taking on some nuclear related matters ? direct military action against our strategic program itself or calibrated action at the border ?

direct action against start. program should be equated to nuke attack ... this red line should be made clear..

Ok, if folks like it. The A5 launch and the Wall Street Journal article on how india sees through the smokescreen, here is another from the author Penetrating US and China Smokescreens – Algorithm for India

WASHINGTON: The lack of US condemnation of India's latest missile test demonstrates that the Washington appreciates India's need to meet the emerging strategic challenge posed by rising China, according to two US scholars.

It also shows "US is comfortable with Indian progress in the nuclear and missile fields", Lisa Curtis, senior research fellow for South Asia, and Baker Spring, research fellow in National Security Policy, at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative thinktank said in a commentary.

"India's successful test of the Agni-V, a nuclear-capable long-range missile, is a major step forward for New Delhi in attaining nuclear deterrence against regional rival China," they said calling it as "telling that no country has criticised India's missile test."

Curtis and Spring also noted that the US State Department simply called on all nuclear-capable states to exercise restraint and underlined India's solid record on non-proliferation and its cooperation with the international community on nuclear issues.

"This is a far cry from Washington's position on Indian ballistic missile development throughout the 1990s, when Washington pressured New Delhi to modify its nuclear and missile posture," they said suggesting "the new US stance also demonstrates a welcome evolution in US non-proliferation policy."

"The US change in position with regard to Indian missile capabilities demonstrates how far the US-India relationship has evolved over the last decade," Curtis and Spring said.

"Now the US views India as a strategic partner with growing economic and political clout that will contribute to promoting security and stability in Asia."

India has taken a substantial step forward in acquiring a credible nuclear deterrent capability with its successful Agni V test on April 19.

The security threats to India are almost unique in that we have two nuclear neighbours who have had military conflicts with us in the past, who even now lay claims to our territory, who seek to corner us strategically and who have long colluded in nuclear and missile matters.

Despite the acuteness of our security challenges our response has lacked a sense of urgency. While aware of their source and nature, we have not been able to make up our minds on the size and scope of our response and the manpower and funds to be allocated to develop the technologies and capacities to meet these threats.

Approach

We have tended to discount any large scale military threat from either adversary. We have felt confident about coping with any Pakistani military adventurism with the strength we possess.

In China's case, our assessment has been that with the existing border agreements on peace and tranquillity and sundry CBMs that reflect the desire of both countries to avoid military tensions on the border, coupled with political level efforts to set up a mechanism for border negotiations, the danger from China was more long term than immediate.

China, in our thinking, would also want to preserve the myth of its peaceful rise and would therefore avoid an unnecessary military conflict with us, particularly as India poses no military threat to its control over Tibet.

We have also been able to dodge taking hard national security decisions by avoiding a military response to Pakistani provocations and a robust political response to those from China. We have not allowed tensions to escalate, preferring dialogue and engagement instead.

If Pakistan does a Mumbai our answer is dialogue; if China questions our sovereignty over Arunachal Pradesh or Kashmir, far from picking up the challenge, we look for a compromise formula to resume military contacts and gratuitously bolster the image of Sinkiang's political head by inviting him to India despite the public upheaval there against Chinese rule.

Even as we are concerned about Chinese strategic inroads into the Indian Ocean, we endorse maritime cooperation with them in these waters.

Thus, we reinforce our proclivity not to take hard decisions by making believe that our security dilemmas can be managed through diplomatic engagement rather than accelerating our strategic military programmes.

In reality, while self-restraint and attachment to peace do mark our policies, we choose soft options also because we are conscious of our weakness and lack of military preparedness.

Comparison

The Agni V test needs to be seen in this broad context. Our Integrated Missile Development Programme began in 1983 but it is only now that we have successfully tested a real strategic delivery capability. Compared to China, our progress has been slow, either because of technical hurdles or inadequate commitment of resources to the task.

If the Chinese needed to develop capabilities to counter the exercise of US power in their neighbourhood, we needed to counter the exercise of combined Chinese and Pakistani power against us, without entering into an arms race with China just as the latter has not entered into one with the US.

The delay in developing our strategic delivery capability compounds our political difficulties.

China is now a mature missile power with ICBM capability. Its new ballistic missile capable of hitting US naval assets at a long distance has attracted attention, but otherwise the upgradation of its long range missiles proceeds quietly. Russia too is developing a powerful new missile but this too hardly makes news.

India's missile programme will take some more years to mature and will therefore continue to be in the public eye, making India, that wants to project the image of a peaceful and responsible power, look like pursuing threatening and regionally destabilising capabilities of the kind North Korea and Iran are accused of.

We have repeated the mistake we made in acquiring nuclear capability much later than we could and should have.

Response

While the China dimension of Agni V will not escape expert commentary, the way our media has played this up reflects our immaturity as a society in handling sensitive strategic matters.

If the Chinese media were to graphically report how Chinese missile deployments in Tibet are intended to bring major north Indian cities into their destructive range, the outcry in India will be huge.

Because of our lack of discretion we have provoked unnecessary polemics against us in the Chinese media, though the Chinese government, to its credit, has reacted with maturity.

In actual fact Agni V should have caused no surprise to the Chinese as India has been transparent about its Agni missile programme and the planned range of 5000 kilometres.

China, in any case, possesses missiles with even longer range. Earlier it was India that was vulnerable to Chinese missiles and now the reverse will be true, creating a better balance in deterrence.

The US's reaction to Agni V is noteworthy as it reflects the new quality of India- US bilateral relations even in areas that were highly problematic in the past. In the 90s and early 2000s, the US was pressing India to curb its missile programme because it was seen as destabilising. Even ISRO had been sanctioned because of the US's missile-related concerns. The thinking today is entirely different.

While avoiding any specific disapproval of India's step, the US has lauded India's non-proliferation credentials and underlined its no-first use policy, which would suggest that India's missile advance is actually seen as serving US interests too in creating a better Sino-Indian strategic balance in the years ahead.

The United States needs a consistent position on nonproliferation if its efforts to lower the nuclear weapons threat is to be taken seriously.

The last two weeks prove the point.

On Thursday, India successfully tested what it called its first intercontinental ballistic missile, the Agni V. Since it traveled only 3,000 miles, the missile would be considered an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) in U.S. terminology. ICBMs travel 6,000 miles or more. Nonetheless, the Agnni V would enable India to strike inside most of China.

On Saturday, however, A. Sivathanu Pillai, an official with India’s Defense Research and Development Organization, told reporters that the Agni V had not been tested at its full range and could reach targets in Europe, 4,800 miles away.

The White House’s initial response to the test shot was equivocal at best. “We urge all nuclear-capable states to exercise restraint regarding nuclear and missile capabilities, and continue to discourage actions that might destabilize the South Asia region,” press secretary Jay Carney told reporters.

The Chinese news media had already asserted that “Western powers were not condemnatory enough” of the Indian missile test. Carney’s statement didn’t hint at any criticism of New Delhi for pushing out the range of its ballistic missiles, which was in sharp contrast to the repeated U.S. condemnation of North Korea for trying on April 13 to use a multi-stage rocket to launch a satellite. Pyongyang was using the satellite launch, which failed minutes into flight, to hide its development of an ICBM, the United States argued.

Faced with that comparison, Carney explained, “I would simply point out, because comparisons have been made to [North Korea] and its actions, that India’s record stands in stark contrast to that of North Korea, which has been subject to numerous sanctions, as you know, by the United Nations Security Council.”

Before I focus on the somewhat hypocritical foundation of that statement, it is worth noting last week’s other U.S. action that illustrates the ambiguities other countries see in Washington’s nonproliferation approach.

On April 15, during its parade in Pyongyang marking the 100th anniversary of the late Kim Il Sung’s birthday, North Korea showed off what appeared to be six mobile ICBMs. Last June, then-Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said that North Korea was trying to develop an ICBM that was “potentially a road-mobile” missile. Some 17 days later, in a Newsweek interview, Gates said, “They are developing a road-mobile ICBM. I never would have dreamed they would go to a road-mobile before testing a static ICBM.”

Yet last week, some analysts studying the pictures of those parading missiles on large trucks concluded that they were not real. “At first glance, the missile seems capable of covering a range of perhaps 10,000 kilometers [6,000 miles]. However, a closer look reveals that all of the presented missiles are mock-ups,” wrote Markus Schiller and Robert H. Schmucker, analysts with Schmucker Technologie in Germany and leading experts on North Korean missiles.

As Schiller and Schmucker pointed out, the ICBMs on the trucks appeared to be solid fueled or liquid fueled. If the latter, they would be too heavy and too dangerous to carry when fueled. Therefore, at best the missiles would be moveable, rather than mobile, since they still would require hours — at least — to be set up for launching. The analysts also noted that the missiles displayed in Pyongyang did not line up with the vertical launching gear on which they were carried.

Real or not, their appearance gave the United States something new to chew over. It appears that the vehicles carrying the missiles may have come from the Chinese. And if they were sold to the North Koreans knowing that they were to be used for mobile ICBMs, the Beijing government would be in violation of Security Council resolutions that bar providing items “which could contribute to DPRK’s nuclear-related, ballistic missile-related or other weapons of mass destruction-related programmes.”

U.S. officials quickly said that they will question the Chinese on whether they are contributing to the North Korean program, setting aside the fact that Beijing joined the United States and others in condemning Pyongyang’s satellite launch.

Washington’s shifting positions on nonproliferation are noticed. For example, this self-identified Iranian reader comment, taken from the Voice of America Web site following its report on India’s missile test: “If North Korea or Iran would test such [a] missile it will soon be condemned BY AMERICA AND ITS ALLIES. Now they are very very calm what is the reason?? Power is Power.”

Then there is a more basic nonproliferation problem for the United States. Its 2008 nuclear agreement with India, signed during the George W. Bush administration, permits New Delhi to keep operating its military nuclear reactors and building nuclear warheads to mount on its new longer-range missile.

Of course, India has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. But neither has Pakistan nor Israel, two other countries that Washington supports militarily.

The hypocrisy attributed to Washington is that the United States talks about enforcing nonproliferation when it comes to countries it does not like but who have signed the treaty, but gives assistance to those countries friendly to it who have not signed the treaty. Both groups are violating the intent of the treaty.

That makes nonproliferation for the United States not a principle but a negotiable position depending on Washington’s view of its national interests. However, the United States appears not to want other, often unfriendly countries, to practice that same flexibility when it comes to nonproliferation.

all the avatars of Vishnu are like India - peaceful, and uses minimal force only in extreme circumstances when all of negotiation and well meant advice are exhausted. he sheds blood only when other means of showing people to amend their ways are not there - as in Narasimha tearing apart Hiranyakshapu.

in Nepal, they worship a avatar of Shiva called Kala Bhairab...it is a pure form of Shiva associated with annihilation....I feel it will be a apt concept for the next phase of our evolution....

http://religiongods.blogspot.com/2007/1 ... shiva.html

people should be careful

Agni V a positive step on security - Kanwal Sibal

India outed its nuclear bomb and yet remained the land of Gandhi. The same message of peace and power should follow the launch of its first ICBM.

With the successful Agni V test on Thursday, India appears to be aiming for status as much as security. Yet without credible reassurances, the by-product of this quest for prestige could be an increasingly insecure region.

Peaceful intentions

As so often in the past, India faces the challenge of reconciling its quest for military and nuclear status with the need to persuade the international community of its peaceful intentions.{Wah! Wah! We get to hear such logic from the whole world because we have taken it upon ourselves to be the Bhishma Pitamah of the world} That India has the experience, skill and track record to do so is without doubt.

For decades, India's nuclear policy and discourse have been built on a curious mix of hard power and principle. The 1974 test was dubbed a “Peaceful Nuclear Explosion,” and successive governments opted to refrain from overtly developing a nuclear weapon capability. Following the nuclear tests of 1998, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee stressed that the tests and India's future nuclear policy would “continue to reflect a commitment to the sensibilities and obligations of an ancient civilization, a sense of responsibility and restraint.”

India's nuclear tests were a means of establishing India's international status and prestige. Yet refreshingly, they were not simply an act of conformity to the dominant might-is-right maxim of the international system.

A synthesis was formed with an enduring set of principled foreign policy values. In the wake of the tests, India stressed its peaceful intentions, announced a voluntary moratorium on further testing, limited itself to a minimum credible deterrent, and later pledged a no-first-use policy.

China reacts

These measures meant that India's tests were an enhancement rather than a negation of an essentially peaceable but unquestionably powerful Indian civilizational self.{Oh! these sweet nothings are uttered to bind us rather than liberate us. See how the tangential reference to restrain and renouncement, to Gandhi and Buddha, suddenly make Indian civilization 'unquestionably powerful'.} The clearest evidence for this is that India's gradual build-up of military and nuclear capabilities from the 1970s onwards have not resulted in new policies based on the use of force.

In a predictable echo of the nuclear tests of 1998, the launch of Agni V, India's first intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), was a moment of national pride. It met with jubilation from Indian defence officials and the Indian media. So far, the near-unanimous hype has centred on India's scientific achievements and new ranking among only a fistful of other states with ICBM capabilities. But little effort has been made to quell the fears about the dangers the launch poses to an Asia on the brink of an arms race.

The official line of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has been that Agni V “is not any country-specific.” Official commentary on the test has had little else to say about India's intentions or the actual purpose, use and deployment of the missile.{And what about the statement issued by the GoI and the PM? Not good enough! They want us to do more to ally the fear of an arms race in Asia. Perhaps a voluntary moratorium on further testing and limiting the range to the current tested one?}

Reading between the lines, many have inferred that strategic Chinese cities are potential targets within the extended range of Agni V. While Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin evenly declared that India and China were “not competitors but partners,” China's influential tabloid, The Global Times, ominously declared that “India should not overestimate its strength” and would not profit “from being arrogant during disputes with China.”

History suggests that an ill-judged, even if unintentional, provocation of China could spell disaster for the region.{So why not get down to our knickers i.e disband our army, destroy all defensive and offensive weapons down to rifles and withdraw all military and people to about 500 km from the border. And what if China feels still provoked? Perhaps all Indians should jump into the Indian Ocean.} India and China's battle for status in Asia in the 1950s and 1960s ended catastrophically for India in the 1962 border war.

The nuclear issue

Since 1998, the nuclear bomb has been a symbol of India's power and prestige, but the nuclear domain has always stood as a site within which India's unique moral judgment could be applied and exhibited. Dominant thinking in international relations finds it hard to reconcile the two trends, and many have scratched their heads in puzzlement over the incongruity of India's peaceful intentions and hard power hype, or the juxtaposition of “the land of Gandhi” and the bomb.{Finally! After so much meandering about. Did she did miss one trick? i.e not talking about Buddha. That would have extended the narrative to renouncement.}

Yet in practice, if not in theory, the international community has accepted India's nuclear ambivalence. The credibility of Indian claims to nuclear restraint and responsibility contributed without doubt to the exceptional civil nuclear trading rights India received, outside the bounds of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), through the India-U.S. civil nuclear agreement.

The launch of Agni V has yet to be tempered with the usual reassurances of India's peaceful intentions towards the Asian region and the world. Without this string to India's ICBM bow, the diplomatic resource of 65 years of nuclear restraint that makes India stand apart will weaken.{Did DRDO not say that Agni V “is not any country-specific.” Not sufficient you say.}

India's traditional status-seeking policy of nuclear restraint need not jar with its desire to shine in the eyes of the global nuclear elite. Back in 1952, G.S. Bajpai, a pioneer of the Indian Foreign Service and one of India's first “realists,” reconciled the two positions in his writings. He claimed that the acquisition of material power need not eclipse India's moral pre-eminence, and that power was indeed essential for moral projection.

With new declarations of strength must come new reassurances. Public statements from the highest level that explicitly reiterate India's abiding policy of nuclear restraint would go some way towards allaying international fears. An official review of India's 2003 nuclear doctrine and incorporation of guidelines on its ICBM capabilities would go even further.{All the build was leading up to this! State what you stated wrt the bums i.e a voluntary moratorium on further testing and limiting the range to the current tested one} Whether Agni V will push India to new international heights or simply place it in regional danger, will depend on how quickly and credibly India restates its peaceful intent.

(Kate Sullivan is Lecturer in Modern Indian Studies, Contemporary South Asian Studies Programme, School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies at the University of Oxford. E-mail: kate.sullivan@area.ox.ac.uk)

The same duffer who spoke like "peta rowdy" to Prashanth Bhushan has the gall to write about handling matters with

This is Kanwal Sibal..not Kapil

It scares me that people with such vacuity in knowledge of strategic affairs and military technology rule over us. It is this fact which gives me sleepless nights, not the Chinese nukes or the CPC. The same duffer who spoke like "peta rowdy" to Prashanth Bhushan has the gall to write about handling matters with maturity. Ack thpoo!

Do not let Agni V's shock and awe endanger Asian stability

(Kate Sullivan is Lecturer in Modern Indian Studies, Contemporary South Asian Studies Programme, School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies at the University of Oxford. E-mail: kate.sullivan@area.ox.ac.uk)

now a bigger upsized one to Noko has been parading around PyongYang.