Terrorist Islamic Republic of Pakistan (TSP): Feb. 12, 2011

[A_Gupta]

What VikramS and Somnath and me have been saying is that what Chipanda(Nooks, Missiles) has done is a Blocker issue for Indian security. Unless that is fixed, the major issues have no relevance as any release manager would know. Any release manager that harps on major issues when Blockers stare them in eye has to look for another job.

Kind of reminds me of Rumsfeld and other Bush admin officials. They thought of military operations in business terms. Therefore, if one division can do the work, you don't send in two. Therefore they obtain the victory, but are unable to secure it; and unable to react quash to the unanticipated civil war in Iraq before it begins.

India's security problems are not to be viewed as business problems, nor as software projects. There is really no need for such metaphors, because these problems have a field of study of their own.

[Karna_A]

Sometimes I imagine a nightmarish scenario where the TSPA goes for a Samson choice first strike on India with everything they have (50-100-150). The SDRE are so shocked that the response is muted with the Chipanda scooping in to destroy anything which is left, lest the SDRE imagine getting even with the Chipanda. Then the millions of Jehadis who are now running out of land and water, swarm into India armed with the 20 million AKs they have....

VikramS, the answer is simple:
How many Bulldozers does Chipanda have? (Chipanda does care about its crown jewel cities unlike TSP)

You can't have this kind of war. There just aren't enough bulldozers to scrape the bodies off the streets.
~Dwight D. Eisenhower
http://www.theburningplatform.com/?p=10085

The scenario is probable, but fortunately is already gamed.
India always keep upto 2 dozen nooks on ready which are periodically moved from one place to another probably every few days. Such nooks increase as the tensions rise. For e.g today they may be at an unknown Andaman islands. These will always be available and used immediately on TSP and Chipanda. This is apart from other survivable 2nd strike capabilities.

Knowing Chipandas, its more probable that in a nook exchange they use their nooks on TSP than India. You just have to be very close friends to a Chinese and understand Chinese mentality to know exactly why?

[Prem]

Can you elaborate in which way?

IMHO,
By making Poaks go Nuclear and his peace yatra knowing very well what Musharraf and Ganja were planning.
ABV exposed Pakistaniat to the whole world. Kargil was the main event which brought Nuclear Poak's reckeleness into the limelight and then came 911 with Poaks spreading wide open in front of Uncle to provide full sevice thus earning the ire of Islamist Pakis. Little hint by ABV to help USA went long way in creating panic among Pindi Gs. Poak's known reaction to any one playing Indian card was first time fully exploited by him to put them on the slippery slope of self destruction.
From Ganja to Gillani , they have been running from one disaster to another and lost not only more than a decade in economic development but have also caused the "aid fatigue" among the donors. Now whole world treat them like a contagious disease to be contained. Nukes , overt islamism facing Westward direction, its ideological bend to treat Strategic weapon as usable in war and finnancial burden to keep Poaks in liquid oxygen were/are all made possible by ABV's decisions as PM. He gave them the boon to become equal oppertunity headache for the whole world, especially the 3.5 backers.

[VikramS]

It is telling that all these frightful scenarios have one thing in common--they implicitly assign a passive role to India and SDREs during the entire run-up between now and whenever the scenario is supposed to take place. I suppose that is the ultimate definition of a status quo power. We are very good at finding risks to justify not aggressively changing the status quo.

The problem is that the SDREs are passive. They let the Chinese take over Tibet, did not attempt to recover POK via force, were totally unprepared for a Chinese assault in 1962, took a few months to even realize that Kargil Hights were lost.

How can you expect the SDRE to take aggressive action when they can not even figure out what the problem is.

In a universe of increasing entropy, standing still (status quo) is defeat and death. If we shrink from taking action due to fear of death, then the consequence of that inaction is, in fact, death.

Well said.

I don't know whether aggressively trying to manipulate the US into stopping the support of TSP will produce a good outcome or not, but I know that placid acceptance--no matter how many clever-sounding excuses we trot out and with what degree of haughty superciliousness we utter them--will destroy India.

It is disheartening that on a forum like BRF there are so many people who are such passionate advocates of docile acceptance of US support of TSP. And no, it is not chanakia or taquiya or anything like that. It is only chanikyan etc. if you first decide to take action, and then take measures to conceal it. It is not chanakyan if you remain inactive, and then later try to spin that inaction into looking chanakyan. Every action that has the potential to produce a good outcome always carries a measure of risk. We should be focusing on strategies to carry out the action and manage the risks.

There lies the problem (the bold part). Trying to understand the reasons behind a particular action is NOT equal to docile acceptance.

However when the thought process is completely drowned by a hypothesis which has not been scrutinized, how can you even think of taking aggressive action?

I get upset enough to make those posts, because to me they simply mirror SDRE passiveness and fatalism of the past. Pick up the lowest hanging fruit and blame everything on it while completely forgetting about everything else. Not too different from the high funda moral preaching of Chacha and Menon in the end result.

A-Gupta ji: Any decision framework requires some definitions of the nature of problems. What Karna pointed out was one such framework. When it comes to strategic issues of course what you need is a framework based upon game theory: An Action<=>Reaction<=>Action kind of structure.

I have been requesting the good doc to actually construct something like vis a vis the TSP; he probably understand them much better than most.

ramana: In my nightmare scenario I do not imagine TSP using nukes as a last resort but using nukes as a the first blow of the battle. Is India prepared for a sneak but massive nuke attack? India has been caught napping too many times in the past.

[sanjaykumar]

Why pretend a Pakistani strike won't result in fused glass sands in Arabia?

Pakistanis don't take their responsibilities lightly.

[shiv]

A_Gupta:

My view is that a TSP which is military weaker does not matter since the conventional military force is not something they rely on as their shield.

US arms supplies to Pakistan may not not matter (much) to India - but it matters in the internal dynamics of who is fighting whom within Pakistan. US arms and monetary aid is keeping one faction stronger than the rest - and that faction are the Pakistan army and establishment. Pashtuns who have wanted Pashtunistan and Balochis are both being dominated by US supplied weapons. And they are being bombed by those US weapons. I care only insofar as these can be used to split Pakistan. Pakistan would split faster minus US arms aid that helps the Pakistan army hold it together,

A failure to understand the internal dynamics of Pakistan causes the delusion that it is a two way India Pakistan issue where the US is interfering. It has gone far beyond that. Pakistan is internally fractured and the US is supporting the one faction that it has always supported- perhaps for want of traction on any other group. I want that US support to end.

If such support ends the Pakistan army will have fewer night vision goggles, helicopters, smart munitions and spares for F-16s to use against the insurgents while maintaining war reserves against India. The power structure within Pakistan needs to be changed and one way to change it would be to damage the relationship between the US and the faction that is allied to them in Pakistan.

[shiv]

Sometimes I imagine a nightmarish scenario where the TSPA goes for a Samson choice first strike on India with everything they have (50-100-150). The SDRE are so shocked that the response is muted with the Chipanda scooping in to destroy anything which is left, lest the SDRE imagine getting even with the Chipanda. Then the millions of Jehadis who are now running out of land and water, swarm into India armed with the 20 million AKs they have....

No need to dhoti shiver sir. What will happen at worst. Some more Indians will be dead. What is the need to start worrying about the numbers now, having happily accepted that it is in the interest of the US to supply arms to Pakistan to kill Indians and they can't hurt India much. Let us now accept that it is in the interest of China and Pakistan to nuke India.

Anyway - we have a big land and 1.1 bilion people. Even by killing 100,000 per nuke - we lose a mere 15 million people from 150 nukes. OK lets make that 100 million as a round figure. 1 billion Indians left. What are those 20 million AK wielding jihadis going to do then? OK they all kill 20 Indians each. Add 400 million to the total of dead. India still has 600 million Indians left. In fact I believe my numbers are exaggerate. A billion Indians will survive all this. And US, Pakistani and Chinese interests will all have been looked after. Why worry about nightmares? The worst that can happen to me is that I will be dead. OK maybe I will suffer burns or a chopped off arm and suffer for hours or days. But after that al will be well.

[negi]

VikramS I should say you echo exactly what I have been saying since all this time (obviously a lot of noisy posts in those 4 hajaar posts have not helped my cause) but I have to disagree with you on the very highlighted part that bothers you; Unkil is very much a part of the problem which ever you look at it, having said that I agree that we cannot 'expect' Unkil to change it's ways just because we would like it do so. This is TSP dhaga so I would keep it short i.e. making Unkil pay (monetarily/diplomatically) on each and every time it supports TSP for a start would definitely send a signal to the paranoid bunch that sits in DC.

[Airavat]

upcoming Pakistani movie tagline "Punishment for Blasphemers: Decapitation":

Aik Aur Ghazi by eminent Pakistani screenwriter and director Syed Noor, which he says he plans to release within two months. And where Taseer’s killer Mumtaz Qadri was fêted mainly by lawyers and religious parties, the killer in Mr. Noor’s film, a convicted criminal, achieves redemption and hero status through murder. Both Qadri and Tariq, the fictitious hero of Noor’s film, are thick-set men with bushy beards and dark, round faces. Both men hail from the province of Punjab, the conservative hinterland. And the film tagline carries the same chilling message backed by Qadri and his supporters: “Punishment for Blasphemers: Decapitation.”

Noor, who recently attracted attention for publicly criticizing a Muslim Pakistani actress for appearing in an Indian reality TV show and developing a love interest with an Indian actor says, “My film has nothing to do with Salman Taseer."

[shiv]

US arms to Pakistan do not matter because Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Since US arms to Pakistan do not matter, it is all right for the US to continue to supply arms to Pakistan. We need not worry about any number of Indian deaths caused by conventional arms. We can safely start ignoring that and prepare for the day when Pakistan chucks all its nukes at us. I learn every day on this forum and I have learned something first thing in the morning today. Or should I say evening, keeping US interests in mind?

If we are so keen to show that the US is merely working for its own interests, and that there is nothing we can do about it and that we must accept it ("It's a tough world out there. Wake up and smell the coffee") why not go one step further and accept that China and Pakistan too work for their own interests and there is nothing we can do about that either. We will get nuked remember? We are deterred.

I am unable to understand the eager enthusiasm shown at "accepting" that the US is working for its own interests and an uncharitable denial that Pakistan and China too have as much of a right to work for their interests and there is nothing we can do about it other than complaining.

I would dearly like to know exactly what ideas are being put forward to deal with Pakistani nukes. After all our nukes are not a deterrent and in any case Pakistan will chuck all their nukes at us in one go making all our deterrence meaningless. We actually need not do anything about Pakistan or China in the way we did not do anything about US arms aid to Pakistan.

[jrjrao]

Latest from the WashPost:

Stakes rise, aid cuts mulled in case of American accused of killing Pakistanis

...officials and politicians in both countries depict the row as a bitter setback to two years of efforts to cement a long-term partnership.

Pakistan's insistence that its local courts resolve the case is viewed by the White House as a diplomatic breach too serious to let slide. It has prompted some members of Congress to threaten aid cuts to the nation, whose cooperation is considered crucial to the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan.
...
The case is "not as simple as it was sometimes being portrayed," Zardari told Kerry, according to a presidential spokesman. Zardari, he said, added that "the strategic partnership and the mutually cordial relations between the two countries should not be allowed to be sacrificed or compromised by predicating them on any single issue."

But U.S. officials have expressed limited patience. A new Gallup poll shows that Pakistan ranks among Americans' least-liked nations, and senior U.S. officials have warned Pakistani leaders that the refusal to release Davis makes them appear unappreciative of billions of dollars in U.S. aid - particularly to a Republican-controlled House of Representatives looking to cut the budget.

In meetings last Thursday with senior House Republicans, Pakistan's ambassador to Washington, Husain Haqqani, was told that significant cuts were a real possibility.

Funding for the 2012 budget is also at stake....Cuts in U.S. assistance to Pakistan could imperil billions of additional dollars of support for Pakistan's teetering economy from international lenders, as well as the survival of its elected government, senior Pakistani government officials said.

To Pakistanis unsympathetic to the U.S. position, including those in the military establishment, the Davis case is a bold symbol of the lack of American trust in Pakistan. According to this view, Davis is a spy or an armed security contractor working covertly, which disqualifies him for immunity.

Threats of aid cuts, combined with what is viewed as insufficient American remorse over the deaths of three Pakistanis in the incident, demonstrate that U.S. vows for a long-term partnership are disingenuous, some here say.

"There are many Raymond Davises running around Pakistan. And why are they running around? Because the Americans don't trust us," said a former security official whose views reflect those of the military establishment. Of threats to funding, the former official said: "This is what we in Pakistan detest, because this is what a transactional relationship is."

Zafar Hilaly, a retired Pakistani diplomat, said that no matter how the Davis case plays out, pressure from the United States would only destabilize the civilian government it claims to back.

"The question is: If you find a friend impaled on a hook, do you help him to get out of it or do you point fingers and laugh at him?" Hilaly said. "I think, frankly, this is the true test of friendship."

[ramana]

jr^2, The possibility articulated by TSP could be the very reason for US pressure. All folks wonder at the language being used and threats. Lets see. if this goes further it will ease pressure on India.

[somnath]

Treating Chinese nukes & missiles to Pakistan as a blocker issue, which preempts any work on the critical issues, is a big mistake. Unlike software projects, national diplomacy can both walk and chew gum at the same time.

Arunji, as a (mildly) facetious observation, most precepts on business "strategy" owe their origins to military and geopolitics!

Anyhow, nation states do not have the luxury of dealing with issues in "ringfenced" terms..So when we deal with the Pak problem, we cannot be oblivious to the effects of our actions on thousands of other important variables..Policymakers in a democracy do not have the luxury of arbitrary "ranking" of priorities either...No politician in India would be able to make a Maoist "what of nukes - they will get 300 million, we will still have 700 million more" or a Bhutto-esque "eat grass to build nukes" comment..We have realised that many times...Latest was during Parakram, when the mobilisation triggered widespread travel advisories by US/Europe, thereby impacting India a lot more than it impacted Pak...

The Kargil episode somehow set a precedent in our strategic thinking..The scrupulous adherence to LoC had its benefits...Mostly in terms of sanctifying the LoC as a de facto, if not de jure border...Which to me is a huge gain...But it hasnt moved on from there..Parakram was a classic instance, wherein we seemed to think that there is nothing between doing nothing and a full scale all-out war...and the latter was just not feasible...

Shyam Saran (and many others) make a valid point - there has to be a space created below full-scale war...Currently the only "option" in that space seems to be "breaking off talks"...that too is a good strategy for starts, but it has to progress into something more..

Which is why an obsession with Paki conventional weapon imports make little sense..We are not being able to fight a war where those weapons are anyway used...And Shivji, the argument that those weapons are more effective in dealing with Baloch or Pakhtun insurgeny is also less-than-valid...No inurgency has been ever pacified by force of conventional arms - F16s, M777s or BVRAAMs...Successful CI ops are basically police-intel ops - recall Punjab, recall NE, or recall the more recent US ops in Iraq...

In fact if anything, we should hope and strategise for Pak spending some MORE money on some of its shiny toys..Defence exp as % of GDP for Pak is realtivelky high (~5%), but really not high enough...(Though it is a very high proportion to its budget, which is "good")...SU for example was estimated to have 30% of its GDP on defence when it broke up...With Pak we can make it happen for much less..some of the more houghtful Pak strategists see the point (Ejaz Haidar for example), but most of the Army estblihment doesnt...If we are to be truly Chankyan, we should have Pak buy a squadron or two MORE of F16s - remember, the more upscale your capital equipment, more is the recurring expenditure too on operating and maintaining the setup....

On the other hand, its a bit surprising for me that we havent tried to evolve a limited India-Iran-US axis on Afghanistan yet..Its a difficult proposition, but if someone can do it, it will be us..Pak's biggest leverage on the US is its location vis a vis Afghanistan...We have invested quite a bit of time and money on the alternative Chabahar route..Is there a game in getting the US interested in the same? It would mean the US collaborating with the "enemy", but they have done it once before, with the same enemy! Maybe its not as implausibe as it seems?

In a nutshell, we need to choose our battles carefully, and never let the big picture slip (and big picture is that we are detined for much greater things than a sub continental scrap with Pak)..

[shiv]

And Shivji, the argument that those weapons are more effective in dealing with Baloch or Pakhtun insurgeny is also less-than-valid...No inurgency has been ever pacified by force of conventional arms - F16s, M777s or BVRAAMs...Successful CI ops are basically police-intel ops - recall Punjab, recall NE, or recall the more recent US ops in Iraq...

In fact if anything, we should hope and strategise for Pak spending some MORE money on some of its shiny toys..Defence exp as % of GDP for Pak is realtivelky high (~5%), but really not high enough.

Somnath ji - you who come across as so knowledgeable appear to me to be fairly ignorant of facts on the ground as written by Pakistani sources from Pakistan.

The truism that you state with such gravity - that "No inurgency has been ever pacified by force of conventional arms - " is precisely what I am talking about. Those conventional arms can only aggravate the insurgency and delay the inevitable. In the meantime those same conventional arms have served as a first line conventional defence against India and as a facilitator for terrorism against India (comm equipment and NVGs, and in the past WLR). Stopping those conventional arms from being supplied is likely to have the twin salutary effects of allowing the insurgency to gain the power that it will inevitably do while reducing the conventional arms threat to India. You who are so rational should understand that Pakistan cannot wantonly "nuke India" without maintaining a semblance of a conventional defence against India. I can state reasons for that and will do if you wish in a separate post.

Pakistani expenditure on arms has been more like 25-40% of its budget and not the 5% you are talking about. A Pakistan with 1/7th India's population is maintaining armed forces half the size of India's forces. That does not come from spending only 5% of its budget on arms. Your figures are wrong and it is easy to see how your conclusions, gleaned from wrong figures are also likely to be wrong.

[ramana]

VikramS, Your scenario has been game and many times countered. ABV said India wont be waiting for TSP to strike first with a nuke. Shiv Shankar Menon the NSA of peaceful MMS said in Oct 2010 in front of Rashtrapati Patil that the NFU applies to non-weapon states. And that has not been retracted or revised. So I wouldn't worry about such nightmare options. Samson was a hero for he became shaheed. TSPA aren't lions like Samson.

Rather use your knowledge to figure out whats behind all this talks while TSP-US relations are breaking down badly.

[Cosmo_R]

For the record. US WLR in Kargil

http://www.indiastrategic.in/topstories129.htm

During the Kargil War, according to Army Headquarters reports, the Pakistanis could detect Indian fire and counter attack while Indians were at the receiving end and had to deploy massively disproportionate firepower later to suppress the Pakistanis.
<snip>
Pakistan has had the advantage of US-supplied radars from the mid-1980s, and they were also built by Raytheon, but an earlier model, AN-TPQ-36.

Why did IA not have WLRs during Kargil? Or, indeed even why GoI get its undies in a twist about using the IAF instead of sending all those poor souls hastily and unconditioned up the steep mountain sides, wearing winter boots hastily procured from Austria. There was a lot of discussion on BR in 1999 on this subject. One of the posters talked about how 'expensive LGBs were and the need to conserve them—implicitly cheapening the lives of those asked to climb vertical heights in the face of fire.

"Worst of all, the WLR episode has shown how little concern there is for the real needs of the Army in the matter of arms procurements. Few people are aware that the search for a WLR system began as early as 1980, when a team of senior officers led by Lieutenant-General Surinder Singh, the then Director-General of Artillery, and Lieutenant-General K.K. Hazari, visited the U.S. Surinder Singh and Hazari checked out systems, including the Series-36 Firefinder that was later purchased by Pakistan, but were unable to close a deal. No one seems certain why this was the case, but priorities changed in subsequent years and the search for a WLR came to a halt. Two decades later, Hazari was appointed a member of the Kargil Review Committee, which discovered that the absence of WLRs had seriously impacted India's ability to engage Pakistani artillery during the 1999 war.

http://www.hindu.com/fline/fl1910/19100250.htm

Basically, you have netas who don't give rat's a** about security. Lots of parades of how the 'next time' we are ready etc. I am referring to that idiot RR Patil who's back in biz. BTW, if you really want a heads up on how netas view Jawans' lives, 'Googal' Najma Heptullah's remarks after the 12/13 attack on parliament about the unarmed guards who saved her big butt.

The Bofors guns won the day and yet 12 years later, we've still not procured a single 155MM artillery gun. The Mirages did their part and and in 2001, the IAF asked for 126 more and this mutated into the MRCA and we're still waiting

Shiv, you are very smart and insightful (I mean that). So, let me posit this:

1. India cannot offend unkil because we need the tech
2. GoI cannot do anything because of #1
3. Blame Indian Americans for not bringing GOTUS to its senses
4. All arms deals including the fabled MRCA are going to take 10 years (2001 when IAF requested M2000) and the IAF Chief is going to plead with losing vendors not complain to the CVC.

In the next flareup with TSP, we will still take unnecessary losses (cheap Jawan lives), order immense quantities of basic stuff from Israel, France etc at extortionate prices and have a probe/commission that will deliver a report in 7-20 years.

So what's the point? Simply that we are perceived not to take our national security too seriously. Accordingly unkil and others don't 't take our national security very seriously either. All I can say is that having briefly interacted with some key individuals in GoI at the ministerial rank, I don't think that they do either. But I could be wrong perhaps it was just a bad wig day.

Weakness is very provocative and we provoke by our indifference.

[Pranav]

Basically, you have netas who don't give rat's a** about security.

This is the point that Shiv ji needs to address.

[shaardula]

VikramS, Your scenario has been game and many times countered. ABV said India wont be waiting for TSP to strike first with a nuke. Shiv Shankar Menon the NSA of peaceful MMS said in Oct 2010 in front of Rashtrapati Patil that the NFU applies to non-weapon states. And that has not been retracted or revised. So I wouldn't worry about such nightmare options. Samson was a hero for he became shaheed. TSPA aren't lions like Samson.
Rather use your knowledge to figure out whats behind all this talks while TSP-US relations are breaking down badly.

isn't that a bit too callous? doesnt it all assume too much about our own abilities in sensing and estimation?

no, i'm not smart enough to figure out the details, but i can see when steps are skipped and leaps of faith made. point is TSP is playing a different game. this has been said before, there might be practicalities of economy etc, but TSP is gaming a different game. As Hamid Gul himself has said, sensitivity to economy, humanity etc are all evolved man's burden. If you can maintain a narrative that falls below the radar of contemporary ideas, you can get away with a lot of murder. and that is what TSP is playing.

[somnath]

Somnath ji - you who come across as so knowledgeable appear to me to be fairly ignorant of facts on the ground as written by Pakistani sources from Pakistan

Shivji, shorn of the sarcasm (and its really not required all the time), let me know which insurgency has been quelled by the force of F16s and BVRAAMs. And if there are Paki analysts asking for more, well, more power to them! As I said before, barring a few like Ejaz Haidar, most Paki analysts are enamoured of shiny toys to do an == with India...

Stopping those conventional arms from being supplied is likely to have the twin salutary effects of allowing the insurgency to gain the power that it will inevitably do while reducing the conventional arms threat to India.

Has there been any major instance of the Kashmiri (or the earlier Punjab) militancy equipped out of American gizmos? Insurgencies are relatively cheap to execute, and there is enough stuff in the world's arms bazaars to equip any insurgency if there is money, will and oportunity...Pak was under Pressler Amendment sanctions since 1990 and the nuke sanctions since 1998 - American arms aid were a trickle in those periods - their enthusiasm on the insurgency or the euipment flow to JEM/LET/KCF wasnt dented by that, was it?
And about "redcing" the conventional threat to India...Again, was Parakram pulled off because Pak had a few more F16s (than they did during Kargil)? Was the response after 26/11 dictated by the 500 BVRAAMs that the Americans gave them?

Pak is not going to use nukes as a "first weapon", that is well understood..Unfortunately, we dont know (neither do they, I think) what is the threshold when they do take out the weapon...And as the threat us unquantifiable, the collateral damage on the same is harsh (on the economy, foreign opinion etc)...And very few real policy makers can afford to take a (so what if 100 million go, we have a billion left still!) view..

BTW,

Pakistani expenditure on arms has been more like 25-40% of its budget and not the 5% you are talking about..
Your figures are wrong and it is easy to see how your conclusions, gleaned from wrong figures are also likely to be wrong

This is what I said!

Defence exp as % of GDP for Pak is realtivelky high (~5%), but really not high enough...(Though it is a very high proportion to its budget, which is "good"

the numbers quoted are right...Please take a second to read what the other person is sying, maybe your thought process (and sarcasm levels) will be different!

[ramana]

Shaardula, I am grounded in reality. What I am saying is bilkul satya vachan. There is no room for any unreality here.

[shiv]

So what's the point? Simply that we are perceived not to take our national security too seriously. Accordingly unkil and others don't 't take our national security very seriously either. All I can say is that having briefly interacted with some key individuals in GoI at the ministerial rank, I don't think that they do either. But I could be wrong perhaps it was just a bad wig day.

Weakness is very provocative and we provoke by our indifference.

It is possible to build up the exact opposite picture of what you have said by merely wording things differently.

Indians take their security very seriously and will definitely respond to threats in their environment by arming themselves. That means that any supply of arms to Pakistan will inevitably cause India to respond by seeking an arms build up to match or exceed that. In the long term, given India's need to spend on education, healthcare and infrastructure the money available for an arms build up is always limited. If India can be forced to spend more on arms, it will equally be forced to spend less on education, healthcare and infrastructure.

The supply of arms to Pakistan effectively utilizes the fact that India is very very concerned about its security. It causes India to react and to spend more money on import of arms to match Pakistani arms rather than putting the money into the slow process of development including technological development in producing its own sophisticated arms.

In 2011, after India has actually heroically got past the above hurdles, it is easy to forget the toll that the supply of arms to Pakistan has taken on India. Both the US and China have benefited by a quick infusion of arms into Pakistan - causing India to pump up its own arms expenditure, starving something else of funds - for example the need to set up a fundamental research institute for high tech defence equipment. In the long term India's "independence" has to come from lack of reliance on others for key tech. That is because we have always had to rely on others to provide us with arms to match the arms supplied to Pakistan - sometimes by the very same nations. The same USA, the same France and the same Sweden supply arms to Pakistan and later to India. If India does not respond - we are at risk, if India responds the supplying nations benefit and understand how to play the game of supplying both nations to arm themselves against each other.

So I put it to you that your conclusions are unfair. Our netas are like BRF. They have differing opinions. That's all, but not an across the board neglect. In fact neta corruption might be causing India to react by buying arms when some other response is possible. For example - it is more lucrative to get a bribe from a US company and order US arms in response to US arms supply to Pakistan, rather than demanding that the US should stp supplying arms to Pakistan. That does not mean that the netas are not interested in security. They are looking after India's security, America;s securit and their own security in one go.

But ist is not good for India the nation. The choices we have are hard.

[habal]

As Hamid Gul himself has said, sensitivity to economy, humanity etc are all evolved man's burden. If you can maintain a narrative that falls below the radar of contemporary ideas, you can get away with a lot of murder. and that is what TSP is playing.

this is very important and a new soundbyte. It is a fact that tsp is playing this game as can be seen from articles printed in their english media. They are keeping the narrative below a certain threshold level.

But more fascinating is that the evolved man (US in this case) is also choosing to support tspa narrative wrt India.

[Pranav]

Indians take their security very seriously and will definitely respond to threats in their environment by arming themselves.

But we haven't been arming ourselves.

[shiv]

Somnathji - I am not going to respond to every point that you have written because you have either not followed what I have been saying or are not interested in following what I have said. I don't think we have any fundamental difference in views except for your propensity to reply to my apple with your orange.

I have never said anywhere that an insurgency can be defeated by F-16s and AMRAAMs. Could I ask you why Pakistan is receiving F-16s and AMRAAMs as part of US aid in the "war on terror"?

If those arms are not going to defeat terror, why is the US supplying them to Pakistan?

[shiv]

Indians take their security very seriously and will definitely respond to threats in their environment by arming themselves.

But we haven't been arming ourselves.

That is a matter of opinion. I disagree. We have armed ourselves with imports and helped the very nations who export arms to various parties on both sides of a conflict. When we try to reduce that - people such as yourself cry foul and say that we are not importing arms as fast as we should import them. Import M777s quickly. Import MRCA quickly. Import everything quickly. But "import from us quickly" is exactly what China and the US wants from Pakistan and the US and france and Europe want from India.

[Pranav]

But we haven't been arming ourselves.

That is a matter of opinion. I disagree. We have armed ourselves with imports and helped the very nations who export arms to various parties on both sides of a conflict. When we try to reduce that - people such as yourself cry foul and say that we are not importing arms as fast as we should import them. Import M777s quickly. Import MRCA quickly. Import everything quickly. But "import from us quickly" is exactly what China and the US wants from Pakistan and the US and france and Europe want from India.

Relying on the whims of foreigners for arms not a sign of seriousness - rather, it is a recipe for disaster. And we have not bothered to make ourselves anything more than a second-rung nuclear power.

If those arms are not going to defeat terror, why is the US supplying them to Pakistan?

Because India is a low-hanging fruit, lead by corrupt netas who love to be weak and diffident before outsiders. If other major powers can remove a potential competitor from the scene, why shouldn't they?

[abhishek_sharma]

One argument which has been repeated here many times is: "China gave nukes to Pakis, US gave only conventional weapons, so China is the real enemy".

American role in Paki nuclear programme has been discussed here many times. I don't understand why people are suffering from selective amnesia.

[somnath]

I have never said anywhere that an insurgency can be defeated by F-16s and AMRAAMs. Could I ask you why Pakistan is receiving F-16s and AMRAAMs as part of US aid in the "war on terror"?

If those arms are not going to defeat terror, why is the US supplying them to Pakistan?

US bribe for Pak's continued cooperation on the Af-front..Thats all..Strategically, if we are to do something, it should be about breaking that dependence...

If you were not referring to F16s or BVRAAMs, which part of the american conventional arms aid to Pak do you think helps them quell the Baloch insurgency? Or the Pushtoon one? It should be instructive that access to all those (and som more) didnt help American troops quell the Iraqi insurgency, or the Afghan one...

[shaardula]

Shaardula, I am grounded in reality. What I am saying is bilkul satya vachan. There is no room for any unreality here.

very brave of you to pitch your theoretical ideas against the emprical evidence provided by by the actual doings of pakis.

historical perspective provides averages of what is possible given geographical and other realities. but pakis are playing the game of deviants - playing a game way above their pay grade, a game way beyond what their geographical and other daal roti type realities theoretically allow them to play.

[habal]

If tsp is given arms by US, then India can procure the same in 17 yrs from US is good strategy.

Obviously if US over-arms tsp then it ups the ante, by making 'the region unstable' and introducing new arms and facilitating an arms race.

But then the rest of the plan must work accordingly, like promoting indigenous tech which is obviously lagging and thus creating perception that we haven't been arming.

[Anujan]

The new Unkil-TSP tamasha is nicely heating up. Spoke to an Unkil diplo-types and ex-colleague. The main reason Unkil seems to be worried is that prosecuting Raymond Davis sets precedent worldwide for Unkil's diplomats/Headley types to be framed and prosecuted by local goons. It opens troubling floodgates and shows that this is an area where people can play brinkmanship and negotiate. So Unkil is pulling out all stops.

OTOH, anyone who releases Raymond Davis will be Qadrified.

Interesting times......

[abhishek_sharma]

My view is that a TSP which is military weaker does not matter since the conventional military force is not something they rely on as their shield.

The only problem is some of those arms are used against us. Remember those stingers in Kargil War. You know what happened to those pilots?

[habal]

Shaardula, I am grounded in reality. What I am saying is bilkul satya vachan. There is no room for any unreality here.

very brave of you to pitch your theoretical ideas against the emprical evidence provided by by the actual doings of pakis.

historical perspective provides averages of what is possible given geographical and other realities. but pakis are playing the game of deviants - playing a game way above their pay grade, a game way beyond what their geographical and other daal roti type realities theoretically allow them to play.

Without US arms and international support, Pakistan is only worth the geopolitical weight of a UP, if a state like UP were to be made a country.

And pakis realize that quite well, and repeatedly say that pakistan will be like bhutan to India, if they lose their strategic privileges, IOW they recognize their uselessness if not for US-boosted nuisance value.

[abhishek_sharma]

Of course if the issue is about financial and other support, then let us stick to that. Why bring arms in to the picture all the time?

Can we really separate the issues? Money is fungible. Really.

[A_Gupta]

Simply that we are perceived not to take our national security too seriously. Accordingly unkil and others don't 't take our national security very seriously either.

This is like the "she was asking for it" thinking.

[A_Gupta]

Shiv, you are very smart and insightful (I mean that). So, let me posit this:

1. India cannot offend unkil because we need the tech
2. GoI cannot do anything because of #1
3. Blame Indian Americans for not bringing GOTUS to its senses
4. All arms deals including the fabled MRCA are going to take 10 years (2001 when IAF requested M2000) and the IAF Chief is going to plead with losing vendors not complain to the CVC.

None of the above excuses Unkil for arming the pathetic excuse for humanity that constitutes the Pakistani army.

[Karna_A]

I would dearly like to know exactly what ideas are being put forward to deal with Pakistani nukes. After all our nukes are not a deterrent and in any case Pakistan will chuck all their nukes at us in one go making all our deterrence meaningless. We actually need not do anything about Pakistan or China in the way we did not do anything about US arms aid to Pakistan.

The way to deal with TSP nookes is to have 3x TSP nookes and keep 1x for TSP and rest to make Arabian sands hot.
Just like Hamid Gul is fond of saying no matter who hits TSP, they hit India.
Just like that Indian policy has to be no matter why or when TSP uses nookes, Arabian Sands will melt.
Just as Israel says that it has to be like a mad dog so no one messes with it, India too has to be like a mad dog in case of TSP attack, that the response would be very obnoxious to everything that TSP cherishes.
And if 26/11 can unite Indians so much a naked nook attack would definately mean that 3500 KMS around India is also burning.

[A_Gupta]

I have never said anywhere that an insurgency can be defeated by F-16s and AMRAAMs. Could I ask you why Pakistan is receiving F-16s and AMRAAMs as part of US aid in the "war on terror"?

If those arms are not going to defeat terror, why is the US supplying them to Pakistan?

US bribe for Pak's continued cooperation on the Af-front..Thats all..

And why does Pakistan want them? Surely they know their nukes are an effective shield (using VikramS's terms). Please answer why these weapons are an effective bribe.

[Pranav]

Simply that we are perceived not to take our national security too seriously. Accordingly unkil and others don't take our national security very seriously either.

This is like the "she was asking for it" thinking.

So we want the luxury of being weak, and foreigners have an obligation to not take advantage of that?

[A_Gupta]

historical perspective provides averages of what is possible given geographical and other realities. but pakis are playing the game of deviants - playing a game way above their pay grade, a game way beyond what their geographical and other daal roti type realities theoretically allow them to play.

Because the help of the 3.5 friends is not factored in.