Deterrence

[ShauryaT]

. . . why India delayed test of it bum until 1998?

RKumar, two reasons. One was our economic situation and the other was our well-known fear/inability to take decisive action which is probably precipitated by too much analysis.

and ideological infirmity. This was the difference between ABV and PVNR.

[RKumar]

Thank you for your answers.

who is stopping us to detonate sub-kiloton devices as

On 13 May, at 12.21 p.m.IST 6:51 UTC, two sub-kiloton devices (Shakti IV and V) were detonated. Due to their very low yield, these explosions were not detected by any seismic station.

Only for argument, as per many open sources we have problem with our thermo bum. Can't we validated and improved it with smaller tests like 1-5k without invoking too much foreign pressure on our week govt.

[ramana]

A couple of old posts to put things in prespective after NSA Menon's speech

Inder Malhotra on when Mrs. G took the decision to test. Right after victory in East Pakistan. Why> USS Enterprise in Bay of Bengal.

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 9#p1212399


BTW this page 41 in the Deterrence thread gives the whole story.

[ShauryaT]

Embroiled in continuing political turbulence, judicial activism, internal instability and a stagnating economy, Pakistan appears to be hurtling inexorably downhill. The terrorist strike on Minhas airbase in Kamra on August 16 in which one Pakistani soldier and nine terrorists were killed is but the latest manifestation of the country's inability to protect even its vital military installations from attack. The fact that nuclear warheads are stored at the airbase makes the attack even more ominous. The strike was launched by fighters of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a terrorist organisation that is committed to the establishment of a "true Islamic state" in Pakistan.

Pakistan’s descent into chaos
Terrorists getting close to seizing N-warheads
by Gurmeet Kanwal

[ramana]

AQK also known as Xerox Khan has launched his own TTP party. Maybe he wants a part of the arsenal.

[ramana]

Revealed: Pakistan, US blackmailed India with nukes

Although National Security Advisor Shiv Shanker Menon shied away from naming the countries that tried thrice to nuclear blackmail New Delhi, the nuclear establishment here has revealed that Pakistan twice explicitly threatened to use nuclear devices against India while the American threat was more of implicit nature during the 1971 India-Pakistan war.

Top government sources said Pakistan threatened to nuke India in 1987 during large scale Indian Army mobilisation under then General K Sundarji for war game 'Operation Brasstacks' in the Rajasthan deserts. The war game conducted from November 1986 to March 1987, saw Pakistan Army and Air Force mobilisation in response by then President Zia-ul-Haq.

In an interview to journalist Kuldip Nayar in January 1987, Pak nuke scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan said, "Nobody can undo Pakistan... We are here to stay. Be clear that we shall use the bomb if our existence is threatened." The threat, Indian officials say, was conveyed through diplomatic and other channels.

The second time India was subjected to N-blackmail when then Pak PM Benazir Bhutto sent her foreign minister Lt Gen Sahabzada Yaqub Khan to India on January 21, 1990 to pressurise New Delhi on Kashmir issues.

With Kashmir separatist movement at its peak, Khan told his Indian counterpart IK Gujral that "war clouds would hover over the sub-continent if timely action was not taken."

While these two threats were direct, the US under Richard Nixon administration gave India an implicit threat by moving the USS Enterprise, world's first nuclear- powered carrier, into Bay of Bengal on December 11, 1971 during India-Pakistan war with collapse of Dhaka being imminent. India, however, did not budge and the war ended with a decisive victory for New Delhi on December 16, 1971.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-new ... 17921.aspx

All three scoundrels met a sorry fate.

Nixon had to resign in disgrace after Watergate


Zia got his mango crate

BB got the sun roof lever


Moral: Don't threaten India for karma catches up with you.

[ShauryaT]

AQK also known as Xerox Khan has launched his own TTP party. Maybe he wants a part of the arsenal.

Probably, for he cannot make one!!

[SSridhar]

Revealed: Pakistan, US blackmailed India with nukes

In an interview to journalist Kuldip Nayar in January 1987, Pak nuke scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan said, "Nobody can undo Pakistan... We are here to stay. Be clear that we shall use the bomb if our existence is threatened." The threat, Indian officials say, was conveyed through diplomatic and other channels.

Apart from the fact that AQ Khan admitted to the possession of the bombs as well as threatening India with it, he also revealed in that same interview that the Americans were aware of the fact.

[ramana]

Closure to a tragic/traumatic plane crash in the sixties.

x-posting

Shree Homi Jehangir Bhaba's plane, The Kanchenjunga

India diplomatic bag found in French Alps after 46 year

46 years later, Indian diplomatic bag discovered on Mt Blanc

[ramana]

Prepare against Pakistani Nukes

Prepare against Pakistan nukes

By Satish Chandra
28th August 2012 11:56 PM
The rapidity of Pakistan’s nuclear weaponisation in recent years has been under constant scrutiny in the United States and has been well-documented in articles in the ‘Bulletin of Atomic Scientists and the Nuclear Threat Initiative’ as well as in numerous reports of the Congressional Research Service (CRS). Regrettably, this does not appear to have been the subject of as much independent analysis and comment in India as in the US despite the fact that Pakistan’s nuclear weapon programme is clearly India-centric. Accordingly, the CRS’ latest report of June 26, 2012 titled ‘Pakistan’s Nuclear Weapons: Proliferation and Security Issues’ merits attention.

Addressing widespread apprehensions, particularly in the US, about the possibility of Pakistani nuclear weapons falling into the hands of jihadi elements, the report tends to suggest that Pakistan has put in place adequate security systems to obviate such a development. It, however, concedes that ‘the collapse or near-collapse of the Pakistani government is probably the most likely scenario in which militants or terrorists could acquire Pakistani nuclear weapons’. It may be recalled that much the same point had been made by former president Prevez Musharraf. The attacks by jihadi forces with inside help on Pakistani military bases, most notably at the Mehran Naval Base in May 2011 and recently at Kamra, would suggest that the possibility of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of militants is much higher than the CRS report would have us believe.

Significantly, the report places the Pakistani nuclear warhead stockpile at 90-110 as against 60-80 for India and suggests that vigorous moves are underway in order to effectuate a ‘quantitative and qualitative improvement in Islamabad’s nuclear arsenal’.

These assertions echo those made in a 2011 Hans Kristensen and Robert Norris report published by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists which inter alia said that Pakistan has the world’s fastest growing nuclear stockpile and at current rates of expansion its 90-110 warheads could, over the next 10 years increase to 150-200 warheads; its stockpile of highly-enriched uranium and weapons-grade plutonium, as estimated by the International Panel on Fissile Material in 2010, were sufficient to produce 160-240 warheads; its current rate of production of fissile material is sufficient to produce 10-21 nuclear warheads annually. This capability will be enhanced as it is building two new plutonium production reactors and an additional plutonium reprocessing facility; its two squadrons of F16 A/B aircraft with a range of 1,600 kms have for long been earmarked for delivery of nuclear bombs. In March 2011 a new squadron of F16 C/D was also acquired for this role; it has three operational ballistic missiles: the Ghaznavi (Hatf-3, range under 400 kms), the Shaheen (Hatf-4, range over 450 kms) and the Ghauri (Hatf-5, range over 1,200 kms). In addition, it has three other ballistic missile systems likely to see early induction notably the Shaheen II (Hatf-6, range over 2,000 kms), the Abdali (Hatf-2, range 180 kms) and the Nasr (Hatf-9, range 60 kms). Pakistan is also developing two nuclear capable cruise missiles namely the ground launched Babur (Hatf-7, range 600 kms) and the air/sea launched Ra’ad (Hatf-8, range over 350 kms).

Unlike India, Pakistan does not have a ‘no-first-use’ policy and not only is its nuclear arsenal India-specific but also the threshold for its use is disturbingly low. This is corroborated by Pakistan’s focus on short range nuclear capable ballistic and cruise missiles. One may also refer to the interview given to the Landau Network, an Italian arms control organisation, in January 2002, by General Khalid Kidwai, the director general of the Strategic Plans Division of the National Command Authority of Pakistan wherein he indicated that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons were ‘aimed solely at India’ and would be used against it if India attacked Pakistan and conquered a large part of its territory, or if India destroyed a large part of either its land or air forces, or of India sought to strangle Pakistan’s economy or if India attempted to destabilise Pakistan’s polity or created large-scale internal subversion.

{Sounds like Hiranya Kashyap's demands}

The rapidity of Pakistan’s India-centric nuclear weaponisation, the low threshold at it which it is likely to resort to a nuclear attack, its propensity to military adventurism, and its readiness to act as China’s cats paw, makes it incumbent upon us to ensure that the credibility of India’s nuclear deterrent is never in doubt. This calls for speedily undertaking a host of measures. India should think of enhancement and upgrade of its nuclear weapon arsenal with a view to inflicting unacceptable damage simultaneously on both Pakistan and China as they may well act in collusion. This would call for a nuclear warhead arsenal running at least into the low hundreds that can be launched from air, land and sea both by surface craft and submarines. Land-based missiles should be mobile and located in camouflaged and hardened shelters. A sufficiently large, diverse, and survivable nuclear arsenal is essential in order to deter an enemy from contemplating the resort to a nuclear attack.

The creation of a chief of defence staff in order to provide 24/7 leadership, guidance and oversight to our strategic forces command and to ensure the speedy development of an effective nuclear force must be done. Fail-safe procedures for the effective deployment and operation of our nuclear deterrent in all situations should be established. Alternative chains of command should me made fully functional so as to ensure an element of automaticity in the effectuation of a prompt and devastating retaliatory nuclear strike in the event of decapitation of our nuclear command authority.

Importantly, our ‘no first use’ policy needs to be tweaked by suggesting that if India is subjected to a nuclear attack by a country aided by a nuclear weapon state it would not merely react with nuclear weapons against the country, which initiated the attack, but may also do so against the abetting nuclear weapon state. Hopefully such a move may cause China to refrain from such collusive action with Pakistan and perhaps even induce it to act as a restraining influence on it.

Finally, the fact that India’s nuclear arsenal is being assiduously nurtured and that India has the political will to use it needs to be clearly signalled. The former can be achieved by holding regular meetings of the nuclear command authority and publicising the same as also the upgrade of our nuclear arsenal. The latter would be automatically signalled if we are uncompromising in addressing all security-related issues with firmness and despatch.

UPA might have to go for the latter to happen as they are compromised with US.

[ShauryaT]

Nuclear correctness

National security adviser (NSA) Shiv Shankar Menon was at an Indian Council of World Affairs (ICWA) meet on August 27 to launch a revived Rajiv Gandhi Action Plan for nuclear disarmament. In his speech, he teased the audience with his claim that pre-1998, India faced “explicit or implicit” nuclear coercion on three occasions “to try and change India’s behaviour”.

Making informed guesses, two obvious instances are, of course, the 1971 episode of the Navy aircraft carrier USS Enterprise armed with a battle crew with nuclear ordnance steaming into the Bay of Bengal holding out an explicit threat. Another equally explicit threat was, perhaps, made in 1995 thwarting Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao’s decision to conduct a nuclear test. The third instance is the tricky one but it happened, I believe, in 1974 immediately after the first nuclear test. Indira Gandhi had approved an open-ended series of underground tests but abruptly cancelled testing after just the first Pokhran explosion on May 11.

The question why had troubled a number of senior nuclear scientists at the time, who were aware that Dr Homi Bhabha, the nuclear visionary, was killed by an American timed-explosive on board his Geneva-bound flight, which has since been borne out by an admission by the alleged agent who admitted placing the explosive on the plane. Both because stopping the Indian bomb was a Washington priority and it was surprised by the Indian test, an implicit threat was likely conveyed to the Indian government to halt testing or face action. There was no further testing in Indira Gandhi’s lifetime.

Hard pressure and dire threats have always been part of the standard operating procedure of the nuclear haves to keep the nuclear club manageably small, and a way of imposing disarmament on the nuclear have-nots. Rajiv Gandhi’s 1988 Action Plan for a nuclear disarmed world was a quaint attempt to replicate Jawaharlal Nehru’s championing nuclear disarmament in the Fifties. Except, Nehru cleverly sought “general and complete disarmament”, which required all countries to disavow nuclear weapons, of course, disband their conventional militaries and retain only small constabularies for internal law and order purposes.

The thinking behind Nehru’s stratagem was that general and complete disarmament being an unrealistic and unachievable goal, it allowed India to take the moral high road while providing cover for an India furtively pursuing the weapon option and reaching the weapon threshold by 1964 with the commissioning of the plutonium reprocessing plant in Trombay.

The main difference between the Nehruvian initiative and the Action Plan was that the latter lacked the former’s realpolitik foundations. People around Rajiv Gandhi actually believed that the Action Plan was a practicable proposition and that nuclear weapon states would rush to zero out their thermonuclear arsenals as per a definite timetable.

The same people, with Rajiv Gandhi’s confidante Mani Shankar Aiyar in the van, are now seeking to revive that Plan at a time when US President Barack Obama’s Prague Initiative, eventuating in two nuclear summits in Washington in 2009 and in Seoul two years later, packs far greater international weight and credibility. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been a regular at these summits, and endorsed this US-led effort. With the Indian government on the Obama bandwagon and the nuclear summits trumping the Action Plan, not only does the latter not have a chance, it does not even pack much moral heft that Nehru’s advocacy did 60 years ago. It is rather like a tired, old mare being whipped to go round the track one more time.

As to why Congress party stalwarts, like Mr Aiyar, see political value in reviving the Rajiv Plan is hard to say except in terms of trying to remain relevant in a Nehru-Gandhi party because, in the real world, more countries are inching towards the safety and security afforded by nuclear weapons.

Actually, with uncertainty and spreading international anarchy, nuclear weapons are a security comforter for many nations. In the event, Mr Menon’s straight talk on the subject at the ICWA event — “Until we arrive at that happy state (of) a world truly free of nuclear weapons”, India will not disarm — was the firmest official declaration to date. It also torpedoed the refloated Action Plan.

Alas, the NSA stuck to the establishment view revolving around the minimum deterrence concept, which seriously needs to be junked. Derived from this concept is the view that Mr Menon dutifully mouthed that nuclear weapons are not meant for “war fighting”. Naturally, a small nuclear force cannot perform diverse strategic roles other than try and deter the adversary with the threat of “massive retaliation”. But this is a manifestly incorrect take on the military aspects of the bomb incessantly propagated by the late K. Subrahmanyam. Unfortunately, it has put down deep roots in the higher bureaucratic and military circles.

In the nuclear realm, as in the conventional military sphere, the greater the variety of armaments and the more of them a country has in its nuclear weapons inventory, the larger will be the array of options available to meet different military contingencies, and why is that not preferable to limiting one’s choices?

Because for every incident, the Indian response is “massive retaliation”, it didn’t take Pakistan, for instance, long to work out that it can get away with “small” provocations and, hypothetically, even initiation of low-yield nuclear weapons use on Indian formations on its own territory because massive retaliation is simply too disproportionate a reply to be credible. This is the reason why “minimum deterrence” and secondary precepts (No first use, etc.) are worth discarding in substance, if not as rhetoric.

There’s a desperate need, moreover, for a large and diverse arsenal with nuclear weapons in every yield bracket, and tactical doctrines for their use. Deterrence may be the desired end state, but training for fighting nuclear wars and practising and preparing for it is the means to enforce it. The Strategic Forces Command must never forget this. Parroting the “not-for-war fighting” mantra may be the politically correct thing to do, as it is reassuring to the political leadership, but for India to actually stick to it would be to lose the nuclear game before it begins.

The writer is a professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

[ShauryaT]

The long shadows the bomb cast on India - M Rasgotra

AS the Foreign Secretary in 1984, I was engaged in talks with Pakistan to negotiate a peace treaty. The Indo-Israeli plan to attack Kahuta is one of those implausible canards Pakistan's strategists keep inventing now and then to brag about their country's nuclear valour. There were no tensions and no occasion for Pakistan to threaten India with a nuclear attack. Friendly visits were taking place between the two countries, though Pakistanis were enjoying India's discomfiture in Punjab.

In October 1984, President Zia-ul-Haq came to Delhi to attend Indira Gandhi's funeral and to extend friendship to Rajiv Gandhi. We knew that Pakistan was at it, but did not yet have all the wherewithal of the Bomb in 1984. It had it in 1986.

In 1987, there was concern in Pakistan about India's Brasstacks exercise involving the movement of a large body of Indian armour close to the Pakistan frontier. But Rajiv Gandhi had personally allayed Zia-ul-Haq's fears. And while the General had alerted his army as a cautionary measure, there was no threat from him of a nuclear response in the event of Brasstacks ending in an attack on Pakistan.

Souring relations: In 1990, relations with Pakistan were beginning to sour because of the Kashmir insurgency planned and supported by the ISI. The Indian Army had gone into Kashmir in strength. Pakistan had also moved some additional forces to the PoK. In such situations, Americans are always fearful of an outbreak of a major war between India and Pakistan. Hence, the Gates Mission. I do not believe India had contemplated an attack on Pakistan. Pakistan might have bragged about its nuclear weapons and missiles, but I recall no threat that was taken seriously by Delhi.

Nixon's Pak tilt: In 1971, I was Deputy Chief of Mission in Washington DC. President Nixon had ordered the nuclear armed 7th Fleet to the Bay of Bengal, much against the advice of his Naval chief. Nixon's orders to him were to do "something" in support of Pakistan and deter India, interdict Indian Navy's movements, or even interfere in the IAF operations. The US fleet reached the Bay of Bengal three or four days after the war was over. It was meant to intimidate India. Nixon's action had attracted severe and widespread criticism from the Congress, the US media and the public. There was no question of a nuclear attack on India, but the US action helped make up Indira Gandhi's mind to go in for a nuclear deterrent.

An additional factor in the timing of the Peaceful Nuclear Explosion (PNE) was Zulfiquar Ali Bhutto's decision in 1972 to develop his "Islamic Bomb". But the basic motivation behind the 1974 explosion was to counter China's acquisition of the Bomb in 1964, two years after its invasion of India.

In 1974, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi wanted a series of tests and our scientists, I believe, were ready to conduct the explosions. But the Prime Minister's advisers dissuaded her because of the US threat to cut aid worth about $2 billion a year. And in panic, the advantage of the explosion was squandered by nicknaming the Bomb as a PNE!

Homi Bhabha snubbed: Homi Bhabha was keen on doing a test, or initiating preparatory work for it in the late 1950s or early '60s. In the course of an evening at a friend's house after the Chinese invasion in October 1962, Bhabha had mentioned to me that on several occasions he had sought Prime Minister Nehru's permission to bore a hole in Ladakh and conduct an underground explosion, but on a recent suggestion, Nehru had virtually thrown him out of his office.

The solo PNE failed to confer on India the credibility and stature of a nuclear weapon power. The period of seven or eight years, following the Congress' defeat in the 1989 elections, was marked by much indecision in this regard.

The Vajpayee factor: Vajpayee and his principal adviser Brajesh Mishra had long been in favour of India going nuclear. A couple of years before he became Prime Minister, Vajpayee had said to me that to be recognised as a power, India would have to go demonstrably nuclear and face the consequences. The intention to go for the tests had been mentioned in the BJP manifesto, which foreign diplomatic missions in Delhi, including the US and Chinese Embassies, either did not read or chose to ignore as empty bravado.

The Bomb had been in India's possession since 1974. The tests of 1998 were not a response to any threat, but a well-considered policy to claim India's rightful place in the front ranks of world powers. It had the desired effect. And it reinforced the country's security.

(The writer is a former Foreign Secretary of India. He is now the President of Centre for International Relations, Observer Research Foundation)

[ramana]

MK Rasgotra's article is full of hot air and delusions.

I will list them this weekend.

Quick look

- He is underming the current NSA's statemetns
- He doesn't know the specifics of the PNE and a weapon
- Being from MEA he should know the intircacies of the language of NPT
- What does he think the Enterprise was carrying? Lollypops?
- He contradicts himself here when he says MrsG's PNE decision was the Enterprise for it does not follow from his earlier assertion
- He follows up with the assertion that 1974 was due to China's explosion in 1964
- He seems to have more trust of Zia Ulloo Haq
- ACM Mehra the IAF commander in 1990 has stated to those are willing to listen to him that the TSP threat was nuclear and he was going to respond in kind

So don't really know what he is trying to say by that article?

The 1974 PNE was a weapon!
I guess such delusions are a special preserve of MEA chosen and groomed by JLN.

If NSA made a statement then he must have his reasons at this time.


This NSA has expanded the MND quite a bit in 2010.

--------
Note on Karnad's view that massive retaliation clause
It is there to prevent any first use singly or in collusion(along with the clause on allies og using nation)

Its above the Sunderji doctrine of terminating at lowest level of yield

- Many observers and participants are on record that there wasnt too many back-ups to the PNE in 74. Only one shaft was drilled and used.
- All the other shafts used in 1998 were dug later in 1983 to 1996 per WOP by Chengappa
So where is the question of open-ended test program in 1974 comes from?

[ShauryaT]

Agree with the view on Rasgotra article.

On BK, the open ended is not necessarily a series of tests, one after the other, needing multiple shafts in 74 itself. The testimonies of PKI, Sethna and A.N Prasad are on record of their attempts to get tests done, which IG did not authorize after 1974. She came close in 1983 but backed out again. So, something must have happened here. Now, to what degree was the American threat a factor, who knows but I have my own interpretation of the matter based on IG's psyche and her politics.

BK's critique of NFU/MND in this scenario is that a massive retaliatory doctrine against say a small localized WMD attack on Indian forces in foreign land does not seem credible.

What I find strange is all three of the threats, BK attributes them to Unkil onlee.

[nakul]

He hasn't read this article

Revealed: Pakistan, US blackmailed India with nukes

Although National Security Advisor Shiv Shanker Menon shied away from naming the countries that tried thrice to nuclear blackmail New Delhi, the nuclear establishment here has revealed that Pakistan twice explicitly threatened to use nuclear devices against India while the American threat was more of implicit nature during the 1971 India-Pakistan war.

Top government sources said Pakistan threatened to nuke India in 1987 during large scale Indian Army mobilisation under then General K Sundarji for war game 'Operation Brasstacks' in the Rajasthan deserts. The war game conducted from November 1986 to March 1987, saw Pakistan Army and Air Force mobilisation in response by then President Zia-ul-Haq.

In an interview to journalist Kuldip Nayar in January 1987, Pak nuke scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan said, "Nobody can undo Pakistan... We are here to stay. Be clear that we shall use the bomb if our existence is threatened." The threat, Indian officials say, was conveyed through diplomatic and other channels.

The second time India was subjected to N-blackmail when then Pak PM Benazir Bhutto sent her foreign minister Lt Gen Sahabzada Yaqub Khan to India on January 21, 1990 to pressurise New Delhi on Kashmir issues.

With Kashmir separatist movement at its peak, Khan told his Indian counterpart IK Gujral that "war clouds would hover over the sub-continent if timely action was not taken."

While these two threats were direct, the US under Richard Nixon administration gave India an implicit threat by moving the USS Enterprise, world's first nuclear- powered carrier, into Bay of Bengal on December 11, 1971 during India-Pakistan war with collapse of Dhaka being imminent. India, however, did not budge and the war ended with a decisive victory for New Delhi on December 16, 1971.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-new ... 17921.aspx

[ramana]

ShauryaT, What do you find incredible?

Maybe your statement will clear the cognitive dissonance among the MUTU folks.

[abhishek_sharma]

Understanding the Arms "Race" in South Asia

[ShauryaT]

ShauryaT, What do you find incredible?

Maybe your statement will clear the cognitive dissonance among the MUTU folks.

I simply cannot believe that Unkil is that stupid to be making these type of threats. I mean, even if there has been a SINGLE serious threat of this nature, they are asking for the enmity of a billion people for generations. 40 years down the sailing the 7th fleet in the vicinity still rancors and will cost Unkil the mistrust of 2-3 generations, which will show up in a multitude of ways. How much more stupid can they be? Why should the world trust Unkil with the Bomb or its ships in our seas, if they go about threatening civilizational powers in this manner. Now, they are indeed completely capable of such stupidity as they demonstrated with their threats against China in the Korean war. But, that was in the midst of a direct war at least - it were these threats that led to Mao's famous statement of 300 million. The Chinese will not forget easily.

[Prem]

Well,
Babu Rasgotra and Bhandari are not actually known for their intellectual calibre in foreign policy circle.

[ramana]

ShauryaT, A big problem is they doubt the capacity of the Indic mind and hence such threats. A lot of people were similarly mistaken.

[devesh]

they have full faith in the current political elite/system to take care of any "civilizational" impulses. they don't think India or Indians are capable of anything more than "peaceful scientific explorations". and they cannot be blamed entirely for this. we ourselves have taken great care to consistently position ourselves in that image. so our own propaganda is working....against us.

[RamaY]

]I simply cannot believe that Unkil is that stupid to be making these type of threats. I mean, even if there has been a SINGLE serious threat of this nature, they are asking for the enmity of a billion people for generations. 40 years down the sailing the 7th fleet in the vicinity still rancors and will cost Unkil the mistrust of 2-3 generations, which will show up in a multitude of ways. How much more stupid can they be? Why should the world trust Unkil with the Bomb or its ships in our seas, if they go about threatening civilizational powers in this manner. Now, they are indeed completely capable of such stupidity as they demonstrated with their threats against China in the Korean war. But, that was in the midst of a direct war at least - it were these threats that led to Mao's famous statement of 300 million. The Chinese will not forget easily.

Unkil was not stupid. By 1971
- he used nukes against Japan and also convinced their public that USA is friend of Japan.
- also ensured that Japan denounces its right to have offensive military capability and nukes of its own.

One must remember the status of India in 1971. There is this JK issue and there is the BD issue. India was filled with 600 million dhimmis who were under JLN/MKG spell.

If USA nuked India then, the probability of India becoming another Japan, without it's economic progress is more than 90%. Indian society can never hate anyone, anytime for more than a day.

[svinayak]

I simply cannot believe that Unkil is that stupid to be making these type of threats. I mean, even if there has been a SINGLE serious threat of this nature, they are asking for the enmity of a billion people for generations. 40 years down the sailing the 7th fleet in the vicinity still rancors and will cost Unkil the mistrust of 2-3 generations, which will show up in a multitude of ways. How much more stupid can they be? Why should the world trust Unkil with the Bomb or its ships in our seas, if they go about threatening civilizational powers in this manner. Now, they are indeed completely capable of such stupidity as they demonstrated with their threats against China in the Korean war. But, that was in the midst of a direct war at least - it were these threats that led to Mao's famous statement of 300 million. The Chinese will not forget easily.

American elite considers India to be a small power in a small geo graphic land and is also vulnerable to many threats from its neighbors. They also considers Indians to be small in size and not comparable to other races they deal with.

They consider Indians to be malleable to pressure and also easily bought with money- hence the conversion using money.
They consider Indian leadership to be weak and leader such as IG to be arrogant and obnoxious. They consider that Indians have many enemies such as Pakistani Muslims and other state enemies such as PRC and smaller nations who confide to Americans in private. Even BD folkds confide to Americans in private.

Minority Indians also confide to Americans and they have found lot of Indians who are willing to betray Indians on many occasions. also they India as a future terrorist breeding ground which will become a larger threat to American nationals and also American interest.

With all these side information from other nations and state Americans have made up their mind that India is a target for social change and even frgamentation. Some of their scholars talk about India is incomplete and more freedom movement still needs to happen. They have received inputs about India from the British and other Euroepan countries. They have their own experiance from the Hippies of the 60s and 70s and also the new experience with Indian Christians who are now willing to do anything with the Americans,

[D Roy]

As usual they have very bad advisers.

And thanks to Auntistan and its "old networks" they meet exactly those people who tell them exactly what they want to hear.

[ShauryaT]

Acharya Ji: The world has indeed moved from the 50's and 60's era. High time, we stop thinking about America or the west or what they may think or do. I have my own views on this interpretation of the so called three threats on which there is very little data. I would not be surprised to find out it is akin the Pranab Mukherjee's incredible statement post 26/11 - “Do you understand what you are all saying? If we do that (attack Pakistan) foreign forces will enter Kashmir the next day. We have kept them out of Kashmir all these years. And now you want us to invite them in?”. Now, if this is the caliber at the highest levels of our interpretation of interests and capabilities of foreign powers vis-a-vis India's ability to defend herself, what can one say?

[Aditya_V]

He hasn't read this article


http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-new ... 17921.aspx

SO HT, INC mouthpiece finally comes with the Truth, After May 1998- SHakti, every tom, donkey and dick in Secular Media was stating that AFter India became Nuclear, Pakistan became Nuclear. So, India lost big time since we helped Pakistan become Nuclear. But the truth is Pakis Weaponised first and if we did not have Nukes, they would have Nuked us and asked for Hirosimha / Nagasaki type of surrender.

SOmething which is completly lost on a majority of Indians.

[ramana]

Nakul and Aditya_V, That HT article is by Sishir Gupta, a very able journalist. He is no ordinary DDM. His dad was Foreign Policy chronicler/scholar.

[ShauryaT]

The CTBT conundrum - SHYAM SARAN

In his article in The Hindu “Defusing the nuclear powder keg” (April 4, 2012), Jayantha Dhanapala makes three key observations.

1. The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO) with its “over 300 state-of-the-art sensors in every corner of the world,” gives assurance that “any nuclear test will be detected.”

Comment: There are actually 337 CTBTO stations in the world, but only 250 or so have been internationally certified. So there is still some way to go before the level of confidence in the verification procedures can be considered adequate. It may also be noted that the CTBT does not bar virtual tests undertaken through computer simulations. With rapid advances in computing power and sophisticated software, the actual testing of a nuclear device may not be necessary to either improve existing weapons or assemble a modest but workable nuclear arsenal. There is also the possibility of a fully tested design of a nuclear weapon or even an actual device being transferred clandestinely from a nuclear weapon state to a non-nuclear weapon one. This is what China did with respect to Pakistan in the late 1980s. The CTBT and the CTBTO provide no answer to such challenges.

2. There is a looming danger of nuclear warfare in South Asia, which would be catastrophic for the entire region.

Comment: The greater danger today is not the threat of a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan but the threat emanating from a loss of control over Pakistan's nuclear weapons as a result of increasing dysfunction and even possible disintegration of the country's polity and governance structure. There is a growing risk that these weapons may fall into the hands of jihadi and extremist elements. In that case, not only India and South Asia, but also the entire world would be under a nuclear threat.

Further, regional issues, should not detract from the urgent focus required on achieving a world free of nuclear weapons. CTBT has significance only if it is integrally located within a credible and time-bound programme of nuclear disarmament. The link between nuclear weapons and international terrorism, highlighted by the United Nations, is a new dimension of the nuclear threat which demands a renewed priority to nuclear disarmament.

3. The ratification of the CTBT by non-nuclear weapon states in the Asian region, would serve to put the “eight CTBT holdouts in the spotlight.”

Comment: This is a simplistic argument. These countries have little or no impact on the security perspectives of the eight holdouts. The holdouts themselves are motivated by different factors. India, Pakistan and North Korea have neither signed nor ratified the CTBT. It would be fair to say that Pakistan's calculations are influenced by what India does. In 1999, Pakistan and India committed themselves bilaterally to a moratorium on nuclear testing. India's calculations are similarly conditioned by what China does and China is unlikely to become a party unless the U.S. does.

Egypt and Iran obviously link their decisions to what happens to Israel's undeclared nuclear weapon arsenal. North Korea is a problem country in its own right. What would hasten the coming into force of the treaty is a U.S. decision to ratify the treaty, which would likely trigger a chain of positive decisions among the other holdouts. Not all “holdouts,” therefore, are equal in this respect.

India has declared that it would be unable to sign and ratify the CTBT as it currently formulated, but will continue its voluntary and unilateral moratorium on further testing. At one point, India had also declared that it would not stand in the way of the CTBT coming into force, but that would require an amendment to the treaty's unusual provision that it will come into force only if it has been signed and ratified by all the 44 nuclear-capable states, including India. India is the only nuclear weapon state to declare that it believes its security would be enhanced, not diminished, in a world free of nuclear weapons.

It is willing to engage in multilateral negotiations on an International Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Manufacture, Deployment and Use of Nuclear Weapons, at the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva. Success in these negotiations would automatically take care of the issue of nuclear testing.

I agree that the world may be perched on a “nuclear powder keg.” But that requires us to move beyond partial and interim measures such as the CTBT and deliver, with a sense of urgency, on the long-standing international commitment to eliminate nuclear weapons altogether as a category of weapons of mass destruction, as has already been achieved with chemical weapons.

( Shyam Saran is a former Foreign Secretary and is currently Chairman, RIS, and Senior Fellow, CPR .)

[pentaiah]

So the Shitty bitty sensors are like DRS sensors in the cricket games
Occasionally reliable at best

[ramana]

ShauryaT,
The CTBT conundrum - SHYAM SARAN

In his article in The Hindu “Defusing the nuclear powder keg” (April 4, 2012), Jayantha Dhanapala makes three key observations.

1. The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO) with its “over 300 state-of-the-art sensors in every corner of the world,” gives assurance that “any nuclear test will be detected.”

Comment: There are actually 337 CTBTO stations in the world, but only 250 or so have been internationally certified. So there is still some way to go before the level of confidence in the verification procedures can be considered adequate. It may also be noted that the CTBT does not bar virtual tests undertaken through computer simulations. With rapid advances in computing power and sophisticated software, the actual testing of a nuclear device may not be necessary to either improve existing weapons or assemble a modest but workable nuclear arsenal. There is also the possibility of a fully tested design of a nuclear weapon or even an actual device being transferred clandestinely from a nuclear weapon state to a non-nuclear weapon one. This is what China did with respect to Pakistan in the late 1980s. * The CTBT and the CTBTO provide no answer to such challenges.

....

(* Shyam Saran is a former Foreign Secretary and is currently Chairman, RIS, and Senior Fellow, CPR .)

So a former MEA secy is making the charge that China transferred nuke weapons to TSP in late 1980s. The US and the UN did nothing about this. Had India signed the CTBT in 1996 as teh idiots wanted India to do, India had no recourse to nuke blackmail from TSP-PRC with US looking away.
So not signing the CTBT was the right thing to do when super powers collude for their petty reasons.

[ShauryaT]

It is the world's worst kept secret that PRC and I will say Unkil colluded to arm TSP with a nuclear bomb. A fact that they want to forget now. What these turds in power do for short term gains will make even Mao look sane.

[pentaiah]

The Regan administration and carter administration wee so obsessed with a pay back for Vietnam
(including the sadistic duo of Nixon and Kissingher) that they brought religion into war, armed jihadists, created a nuclear demon, and with PRC hand in glove to contain SU and India in one shot
Completely knowingly transferred Nukes to TSP including delivery vehicles( missiles)

Uncle ko Jo G pe lath mar raha hai usi ka G choos raha hai abhi bi

[ShauryaT]

Dangers of Sino-Pakistan nexus

If a graph were drawn with Pakistan government’s bluff, bluster, and threats of nuclear weapons use on one axis and the growth of its nuclear arsenal on the other axis, what you’d trace is actually a line that has been steadily dipping as our neighbour’s nuclear weapons inventory has grown. The conclusion would be that a weak Pakistan feels more reassured and secure with a reliable nuclear arsenal by its side, believing it will deter the much larger, more powerful, India it has always apprehended as a mortal threat.

China was at its obnoxious worst in the mid-1950s when it had just embarked, with Soviet Russian help, on its nuclear weapons programme. Mao Zedong declared that China could absorb the loss of 300 million people in a nuclear attack. That statement, because of its outrageousness, alerted American war-planners to the fact that they had a huge strategic problem on their hands: Mao’s China would not be easily deterred. Up until then, the United States routinely issued nuclear threats. However, with China fast-tracking the development of both the megaton thermonuclear weapons and the inter-continental ballistic missile able to reach targets in America, and achieving these capabilities by 1967, the US defence secretary Robert S McNamara conceded that China had attained deterrence vis-a-vis America.

In the Fifties serious plans were hatched by the Pentagon to take out the Chinese gaseous diffusion plant producing enriched uranium for bombs and other nuclear facilities in Lop Nor, graphically referred to by mission-planners as “throttling the baby in the cradle”. This plan remained unimplemented because of the uncertainty of the USSR reaction to such a strike. After the rift between Moscow and Beijing and a couple of years before the first Chinese atomic test in October 1964, Russians mooted a joint bid to destroy Chinese nuclear weapons-making capability. This time, the US acted coy for reasons not entirely clear. With the loss of those two opportunities and the subsequent fast-tracked development by China of a megaton thermonuclear weapon and an intercontinental ballistic missile able to hit the farthest targets in Russia and the US west coast, its ascent to great power became unstoppable.

India could have pre-empted the nuclear danger from Pakistan by attacking the nuclear installations in Kahuta and the Indian government contemplated such strikes, the first time in 1982 in cooperation with the only specialists in the business, Israel, and the second time in early 1984, when a solo effort was considered. In both instances, the Indian government, as is its wont when making critical decisions, got cold feet. The attack window on Pakistani nuclear facilities closed in 1988 with the Pakistani acquisition of a deliverable device. Writing in that period, I had urged bombing Kahuta, which shocked many people. I had also warned then that once the Pakistani bomb came on line, India would ‘forever have to hold its peace’ with Pakistan.

Much of Indian thinking and writings pertaining to national security is suffused, not with realism, but passion and sentiment. It so colours the view and clouds judgement that hard decisions are impossible to make. Having not made the crucial decision, countries have to live with the consequences — the US, Russia, and the world with a nuclear China, and India with a nuclear-armed Pakistan.

However Nuclear adversaries on its flanks with a nexus between them, poses a tremendous strategic challenge to India. Pakistan has been more forthright and direct in exploiting its new-found sense of nuclear security to wage ‘asymmetric warfare’, using terrorism. It recruits malcontents in Pakistan society and among the Indian Muslim community, trains them, launches them on terrorist missions within India, rides the disaffection of the people in Kashmir, and generally creates a heck of a nuisance.

India, on the other hand, with much bigger ambitions and potential, has been just so glad to beat the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty-deadline and barely cross the line with simple fission and boosted-fission weapons, it has chosen to virtually shut its nuclear shop. However, there’s not much strategic profit to milk if you don’t go the whole hog, which the Indian government hasn’t had the guts to do because it would require open-ended nuclear explosive testing to obtain a variety of proven and performance-certified nuclear weapons and thermonuclear weapons and panoply of delivery systems, including intercontinental ballistic missiles to take on China.

Pakistan is best dealt with by an array of targeted intelligence operations, which can be modulated depending on whether the uptick in trade and economic relations has moderated Islamabad’s behaviour. The benefits to Pakistan from plugging into the Indian economic engine, according to Shahid Javed Burki, a former vice president of the World Bank, and one of the strongest advocates of free trade under the South Asian Free Trade Agreement, is an increase of as much as 2.4 per cent in its gross domestic product. No small attraction for a country tipping the scales in the ‘failed states’ index. Indeed, well-known Pakistani analyst Ayesha Siddiqa claims that pressure from the Pakistani business community made the Pakistani army chief General Ashfaq Kayani green signal the peace process underway with India.

The trouble is the Indian government is either primed for peaceful relations or for adversarial relations, not for the more real-life mixed relations in which trade, cultural exchanges, and open visa regimes co-exist with remotely-controlled acts of terrorism and subversion, and military provocations on the side. It is the sort of multi-pronged policy China has perfected and prosecutes smoothly against India. Such a multi-purpose policy is what India needs to adopt except against China the effort will have to be sharper, ruthless, and more proactive. Thus, as priority China has to be paid back for its actions to nuclear missile-arm Pakistan, by transferring nuclear-warheaded cruise and ballistic missiles on the sly to Vietnam, and the ‘Tibet card’ will have to be revived and put on a war footing, all this even as bilateral trade inches towards the $100 billion mark and our diplomats prattle pleasantly in Mandarin.

[ramana]

It is the world's worst kept secret that PRC and I will say Unkil colluded to arm TSP with a nuclear bomb. A fact that they want to forget now. What these turds in power do for short term gains will make even Mao look sane.

Could we spread this message to the psec elite of India! They seem to be the only folks in the world in darkness about this 'secret'.

-----------

Also please some one wake up Prabhu Chawlaji. TSP nuke capability is not from any local production but direct transfer from PRC with US blessings. So bombing Kahtua would be a brutus fulmen: a useless thunderbolt.

It was not 'cold feet' but 'thanda damak' (cold calculation) realization that the TSP-PRC-US nexus is a different game.
For instance it was the PRC provided bombs that were set off in Chagai in 1998. The missing Pu sample form US labs is an indication of their knowledge.

The way to break is escalation and Mrs G went for TN.
Unfortunately the 1998 tests did not realize the full potential but all is not lost.

[svinayak]

50 new test will straiten things out

[ShauryaT]

Nuclear Stability in South Asia

General

A Round-Table discussion on “Nuclear Stability in South Asia: Missile Transparency and Confidence Building” was held at CLAWS on 19 September 2012. A team each from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Sandia National Laboratories, USA participated in the discussion. The Round-Table discussion was chaired by Amb Arundhati Ghose, former Permanent Representative to the UN and attended by select defence forces personnel and members from think tanks and academia.

Amb Arundhati Ghose

The government policy today is to have CBMs with Pakistan. This round-table provides us an opportunity to explore the security implications of a CBM in the nuclear field and whether it is an effective measure and can be achieved without compromising our national security. It is an opportunity for us to learn from the best practices of western countries in this field and adapt to our needs.

Dr Zachary Davis

Strategic forces have a primacy in nuclear deterrence. As India re-structures its forces to build an effective triad for achieving credible minimum deterrence, there is a need to examine where to stop. India faces a complex threat with the complexity to maintain deterrence against two forces, China and Pakistan. The question that needs to be asked is what constitutes deterrence and whom are you trying to deter. There are some limits in terms of what quantities are required and how much is enough to achieve deterrence. Can mutual deterrence be understood in a similar way by the adversaries? It is probably good to have some mechanisms in place. The Colombo group developed a common concept on evolving transparency measures on nuclear testing, setting liabilities, etc between India and Pakistan as a nuclear CBM. Under the mechanism, mutual information would be provided by exchanging information and data on first generation SRBMs (which have already passed their service life) for retirement. The CBM would require no formal agreement and the purpose can be achieved by mutually agreeing upon limits for eliminating a certain class of weapons. The mechanism would be an experiment in achieving transparency in a joint and mutual manner.

Douglas Tichner, Sandia National Laboratories

The process of storing warheads has several complexities. Even a minor fault can induce catastrophic failures. Several threats can be posed to the safety of warheads due to the energetic materials ageing and it is better for ageing warheads to be destroyed than be given periodic life extensions. Failure can occur at any stage. Traditionally, liquid fuel components are more stable than solid ones and have longer life spans.Degradation is not just a propellant problem; it can occur with time, are structured and aged-out quids can also cause degradation. India’s first generation SRBMs – Prithvi I and Dhanush I are in service since 1983 and have passed their service life. Similarly, Hatf I and Hatf 2 of Pakistan (commissioned in 1987) have also crossed their life-spans. Abdali V and Abdali VI have can also be considered for retirement. The obsolescent systems just need to be retired as they can have a huge impact on safety and can be replaced by newer ones which have better accuracy, reliability, survivability and operability.

Dr Geoffrey Forden and Eric Wallace, Sandia National Laboratories

A demonstration of a simulation exercise to exchange data and functioning of the virtual reality tool in achieving missile transparency was presented.

Achieving missile transparency can pass through various stages of low, medium and high. Declarations and advance notifications can be provided at the medium stage while data exchange and transparency visits and on-site inspections by both sides can be carried out in the final (high) stage.

The applicability of the above arms control principle based on the US-Soviet model can be re-examined for suitability in an Indo-Pak context.

Brig Gurmeet Kanwal (Retd)

There are inherent dis-advantages in SRBMs being nuclear capped. It poses several detection dilemmas as it is difficult to interpret whether an SRBM is nuclear or conventionally tipped. They pose greater danger to the crew than to adversaries. When adequate numbers of Agni I (with a range of 700-800) are inducted, then the Prithvi I missiles can be retired. Such a step would make technical and operational logic. The Prithvi II was not nuclear capped. Similarly, Pakistan should also retire Hatf I and Hatf II from their arsenal. If both countries can do it together, then it would make a good Nuclear Risk Reduction Measure (NRRM). SRBMs can be easily destroyed by plugging holes in the air-frames or by strapping Heavy Explosives on them. As part of the CBM, a missile should be symbolically destroyed at Pokhran and the Defence Minister of Pakistan should be invited to witness the missile destruction ceremony. Subsequently, representatives from both sides could visit each others’ facilities to see if the missiles are being dismantled.

The arguments against phasing out SRBMs include the question whether enough numbers of Agni I are being produced or not and that SRBMs have better CEPs (16 m) than long-range missiles. It is likely though not confirmed that Pakistan has already done away with Hatf I and Hatf II for nuclear use.

Discussion

• Deterrence is a mind game and numbers do matter. The mere presence of TNWs in the battlefield increases the importance of Prithvi I in the battlefield.

• What is the hurry in retiring first generation SRBMs ? The Indian Armed Forces do deploy weapons in a mated condition. No nation keeps a weapon for more than 10 years (and their life-spans are extended after every five years); hence there are no safety issues. It would therefore not be appropriate to cloak technical requirements with a CBM. The matter should be best left to the experts and India must be having a missile ageing policy.

• It is difficult to understand whether Pakistan is threatened by India. For India, the real threat comes from China. In any case, nuclear missiles will be introduced in the later stages of a war.

• The Army requires to factor in all types of weapons and firepower in battlefield scenarios. The capacity of air-power is limited in mountainous terrain where all-weather weapons like artillery and SRBMs are required. China has so many SRBMs in its inventory and many of them are now deployed in Tibet. Military requirements would determine such steps.

• Pakistan’s development of the Nasr is a worrying step and would add to the nuclear instability in the region. Pakistan’s motive behind developing TNWs has been guided by its perception that India’s so called ‘Cold Start Doctrine’ can be executed on the ground. It believes that TNWs can plug a gap in its deterrence against India.

• Does India want to compete with DF-I and DF-II with Prithvi I when it has superior cruise missiles like Brahmos and newer and technologically superior missile systems are available?

• The role of Prithvi I in conventional military operations and a cost to benefit analysis overrides other missiles for this purpose.

• If this NRRRM has to be successful then it is imperative to bring China in its ambits as well.

• The larger question that needs to be asked is whether India threatens Pakistan’s existence? If India had offensive designs on Pakistan then it can easily dismember it by inducting four or five more infantry divisions to its orbat. India does not require nuclear missiles to break Pakistan. India requires nuclear weapons for its national defence and not for prestige. The logic behind proposing this nuclear CBM is a non-starter. Will the US agree to an Asian Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty? Such a step would make more sense.

• India’s options are to retain a capability to convince Pakistan to give up on terrorism as an instrument of state policy and at the same time keep it engaged in a dialogue process.

• Long-range missiles can carry out tasks of SRBMs. It would also remove the ambiguity of dual-use of SRBMs.

• Arriving at a decision to retire SRBMs will take a long time and a calculation of the overall security spectrum will have to be carried out. The CBM is kind of a gesture and a joint-experiment in talking about nuclear strategy.

[ramana]

My comments in blue

Nuclear Stability in South Asia

General

A Round-Table discussion on “Nuclear Stability in South Asia: Missile Transparency and Confidence Building” was held at CLAWS on 19 September 2012. A team each from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Sandia National Laboratories, USA participated in the discussion. The Round-Table discussion was chaired by Amb Arundhati Ghose, former Permanent Representative to the UN and attended by select defence forces personnel and members from think tanks and academia.

{Usual round of suspects from US side. They have been following the Indian program since the early 60s at those two places. Ref Vipin Gupta paper.}

Amb Arundhati Ghose

The government policy today is to have CBMs with Pakistan. This round-table provides us an opportunity to explore the security implications of a CBM in the nuclear field and whether it is an effective measure and can be achieved without compromising our national security. It is an opportunity for us to learn from the best practices of western countries in this field and adapt to our needs.

{Articulated like a true leader. However CBMs with TSP are not a two -person game. The history since 1970s has shown that there is direct presence of PRC and indirect presence of US in this issue. CBMS have to also include those two actors.}

Dr Zachary Davis

Strategic forces have a primacy in nuclear deterrence. As India re-structures its forces to build an effective triad for achieving credible minimum deterrence, there is a need to examine where to stop. India faces a complex threat with the complexity to maintain deterrence against two forces, China and Pakistan. The question that needs to be asked is what constitutes deterrence and whom are you trying to deter. There are some limits in terms of what quantities are required and how much is enough to achieve deterrence. Can mutual deterrence be understood in a similar way by the adversaries? It is probably good to have some mechanisms in place. The Colombo group developed a common concept on evolving transparency measures on nuclear testing, setting liabilities, etc between India and Pakistan as a nuclear CBM. Under the mechanism, mutual information would be provided by exchanging information and data on first generation SRBMs (which have already passed their service life) for retirement. The CBM would require no formal agreement and the purpose can be achieved by mutually agreeing upon limits for eliminating a certain class of weapons. The mechanism would be an experiment in achieving transparency in a joint and mutual manner.

{The US and FSU had the SALT talks which are the real begining of CBMs. One reason why SALT successful was there were no third party interlopers muddying the waters by suppling weapons to the other (PRC to TSP) and others covering up this perfidy (US covering up for PRC) And to talk of limiting Indian deterrence when faced with two front threat is ludicrous. How many did the US feel it needed when threatened by FSU?}

Douglas Tichner, Sandia National Laboratories

The process of storing warheads has several complexities. Even a minor fault can induce catastrophic failures. Several threats can be posed to the safety of warheads due to the energetic materials ageing and it is better for ageing warheads to be destroyed than be given periodic life extensions. Failure can occur at any stage. Traditionally, liquid fuel components are more stable than solid ones and have longer life spans.Degradation is not just a propellant problem; it can occur with time, are structured and aged-out quids can also cause degradation. India’s first generation SRBMs – Prithvi I and Dhanush I are in service since 1983 and have passed their service life. {India's IGMP was launched in 1984. All the above are products of much later years. If he is wrong on this what else is he wrong on?} Similarly, Hatf I and Hatf 2 of Pakistan (commissioned in 1987) have also crossed their life-spans. Abdali V and Abdali VI have can also be considered for retirement. The obsolescent systems just need to be retired as they can have a huge impact on safety and can be replaced by newer ones which have better accuracy, reliability, survivability and operability.

{Firstly he talks about warheads and also delivery vehicles. Quids is squibs that is initiators for the weapons. He talks more about TSP weapons and should talk to them about the hazards such aging systems create! Why talk to India about TSP weapons? Or is he saying that India should get rid of Prithvi and Danush in exchange for the four Paki birds? Again that would be an uneven exchange. By his own conclusion, liquid fuels dont age as much as solid fuels. The four aging Paki birds are more hazardous to TSP than to India!}

Dr Geoffrey Forden and Eric Wallace, Sandia National Laboratories

A demonstration of a simulation exercise to exchange data and functioning of the virtual reality tool in achieving missile transparency was presented.

Achieving missile transparency can pass through various stages of low, medium and high. Declarations and advance notifications can be provided at the medium stage while data exchange and transparency visits and on-site inspections by both sides can be carried out in the final (high) stage.

The applicability of the above arms control principle based on the US-Soviet model can be re-examined for suitability in an Indo-Pak context.

{Again see my comments about third party interlopers not muddying the US-Soviet model}

Brig Gurmeet Kanwal (Retd)

There are inherent dis-advantages in SRBMs being nuclear capped. It poses several detection dilemmas as it is difficult to interpret whether an SRBM is nuclear or conventionally tipped. They pose greater danger to the crew than to adversaries. When adequate numbers of Agni I (with a range of 700-800) are inducted, then the Prithvi I missiles can be retired. Such a step would make technical and operational logic. The Prithvi II was not nuclear capped. Similarly, Pakistan should also retire Hatf I and Hatf II from their arsenal. If both countries can do it together, then it would make a good Nuclear Risk Reduction Measure (NRRM). SRBMs can be easily destroyed by plugging holes in the air-frames or by strapping Heavy Explosives on them. As part of the CBM, a missile should be symbolically destroyed at Pokhran and the Defence Minister of Pakistan should be invited to witness the missile destruction ceremony. Subsequently, representatives from both sides could visit each others’ facilities to see if the missiles are being dismantled.

The arguments against phasing out SRBMs include the question whether enough numbers of Agni I are being produced or not and that SRBMs have better CEPs (16 m) than long-range missiles. It is likely though not confirmed that Pakistan has already done away with Hatf I and Hatf II for nuclear use.

{So GKji doesn't include Agni-I in the SRBM category. He is also saying P-II is not nuke armed. And his remarks about Hatf I &II are conjecture. Further, its irrelevant in TSP-India case whether the SRBMs are nuke armed or not for the TSP redlines clearly state a prospect of a defeat even with conventional forces would lead the TSP to break out.}

Discussion

• Deterrence is a mind game and numbers do matter. The mere presence of TNWs in the battlefield increases the importance of Prithvi I in the battlefield.

• What is the hurry in retiring first generation SRBMs ? The Indian Armed Forces do deploy weapons in a mated condition. No nation keeps a weapon for more than 10 years (and their life-spans are extended after every five years); hence there are no safety issues. It would therefore not be appropriate to cloak technical requirements with a CBM. The matter should be best left to the experts and India must be having a missile ageing policy.

{US group's suggestion appears to remove a comparative advantage of India and retire a risk/hazard from TSP side! On the positive India seems to have ten-year recertification process for its special payloads and vehicles with five year extensions. Maybe the US experts are cautioning against that and talking of squibs ('quids') and conventional solid propellent and explosives going pphat instead of boom.}

• It is difficult to understand whether Pakistan is threatened by India. For India, the real threat comes from China. In any case, nuclear missiles will be introduced in the later stages of a war.

• The Army requires to factor in all types of weapons and firepower in battlefield scenarios. The capacity of air-power is limited in mountainous terrain where all-weather weapons like artillery and SRBMs are required. China has so many SRBMs in its inventory and many of them are now deployed in Tibet. Military requirements would determine such steps.

{Again the US group suggestions are to remove an Indian advantage and help TSP. When India has two front problem to pretend all the problems are from TSP is not useful!}

• Pakistan’s development of the Nasr is a worrying step and would add to the nuclear instability in the region. Pakistan’s motive behind developing TNWs has been guided by its perception that India’s so called ‘Cold Start Doctrine’ can be executed on the ground. It believes that TNWs can plug a gap in its deterrence against India.

{TSP has not thought through the logic. Their logic of adopting Nasr or whatever is more like self inflicted wound. Its more like nasl (vasectomy) than Nasr for its usage would convert TSP to a nuke battle ground like mad max at thunderdome.}

• Does India want to compete with DF-I and DF-II with Prithvi I when it has superior cruise missiles like Brahmos and newer and technologically superior missile systems are available?

{This is irrelevant. P-I is proven system and with the forces. The others are still getting inducted. A crusie missile is not an answer to a BM for it can be shot down and has potential accuracy issues}

• The role of Prithvi I in conventional military operations and a cost to benefit analysis overrides other missiles for this purpose.

{Wow! So payload delivery at short ranges is outstanding. P-I is really a good theatre Ballistic Missile.}

• If this NRRRM has to be successful then it is imperative to bring China in its ambits as well.

• The larger question that needs to be asked is whether India threatens Pakistan’s existence? If India had offensive designs on Pakistan then it can easily dismember it by inducting four or five more infantry divisions to its orbat. India does not require nuclear missiles to break Pakistan. India requires nuclear weapons for its national defence and not for prestige. The logic behind proposing this nuclear CBM is a non-starter. Will the US agree to an Asian Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty? Such a step would make more sense.

{Rohitvats note this item and think about dual zone deployments of the MSC divisions in West Bengal!}

• India’s options are to retain a capability to convince Pakistan to give up on terrorism as an instrument of state policy and at the same time keep it engaged in a dialogue process.

• Long-range missiles can carry out tasks of SRBMs. It would also remove the ambiguity of dual-use of SRBMs.

• Arriving at a decision to retire SRBMs will take a long time and a calculation of the overall security spectrum will have to be carried out. The CBM is kind of a gesture and a joint-experiment in talking about nuclear strategy.

[svinayak]

One may never know if this US group may have worked with the Pak strategic forces SPD to stabilize their process and security

[ramana]

Looks like the is Nasr is getting a lot of US attention.

PTI story in Pioneer

LINK

Pakistan developing non-strategic nuclear weapons Pakistan developing non-strategic nuclear weapons .

Tuesday, 25 September 2012 12:38 PTI | Washington

To enhance its nuclear capability, Pakistan is developing non-strategic nuclear weapons, and thus joining the ranks of countries like the US and Russia, a leading American think-tank has said.

India, however, not listed among five of the nine-nuclear weapons powered countries that has or is developing non-strategic nuclear weapons said Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project, and Dr Robert S Norris, senior fellow for Nuclear Policy, in a new edition of Nuclear Notebook.

"Today, at least five of the world's nine nuclear weapons states have, or are developing, what appears to meet the definition of a nonstrategic nuclear weapon: Russia, the United States, France, Pakistan, and China," they concluded in the latest issue of Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Like France, Pakistan characterizes all its nuclear weapons as strategic.

"However, Pakistan is developing a new short-range rocket with nuclear capability that certainly would be characterized as a nonstrategic nuclear weapon if it belonged to Russia or the United States. Moreover, even the Pakistani statements about the weapon clearly place it in a different category," Kristensen and Norris wrote.

In their report, the two American nuclear scientist wrote that the new weapon, the Nasr, is a 60-kilometer ballistic missile launched from a mobile twin-canister launcher.

{In case the first one is dud?}

Following its first test launch in April 2011, the Pakistani military news organization, Inter Services Public Relations, described the Nasr as carrying a nuclear warhead "of appropriate yield with high accuracy," with "shoot and scoot attributes" that was developed as a "quick response system" to "add deterrence value" to Pakistan's strategic weapons development program "at shorter ranges" in order "to deter evolving threats."

{Would be very helpful when TTP comes marching down the Suleiman mountains!}

"This language, which has been repeated after subsequent Nasr tests, strongly indicates a weapon with a new mission that resembles nonstrategic nuclear weapons," they wrote.

According to the report, rumors of Chinese nonstrategic nuclear weapons have been around for a long time, but there is little reliable public information about their current status.

{So most likely its PRC developenmt being passed off as TSP's. That begs the question what role does PRC see for a Nasr type weapon?}

China conducted a nuclear test in the 1960s with a nuclear bomb delivered from a fighter-bomber. It is possible, but unknown, that a few fighter-bomber squadrons may have a secondary nuclear capability today, they said.

"Likewise, the US intelligence community at various periods has assessed that a nuclear capability may have been developed for short-range ballistic missiles such as the DF-15. Moreover, the US intelligence community describes the DH-10 ground-launched cruise missile "conventional or nuclear," a designation also used for the Russian dual-capable AS-4 cruise missile," the report said.

Those US eperts are on a fishing trip in India to make India give up something(Prithvis) that they can then ask the TSP to give up the Nasr.

[D Roy]

I have been to a few of these "seminars" of late - both for civ tech as well as deterrence stability.

They are fishing trips certainly. These guys simply do not know enough about what the Yindoos are really doing and it is driving them up the wall.


Funnily enough, the yindoo analysts invariably start displaying a level of animosity if not hostility towards the "guests" that is a little unexpected for a seminar.

I think now the goras are looking for seminars in Dilli where they'll get yindoo analysts who'll "take the discussion forward".