Deterrence

[nakul]

Nakul: Did not get your point?

MAD has nothing to do with India destroying China or vice versa. MAD only applies when one is not willing to destroy oneself. Hence, the pertinent question is whether China is willing to destroy itself? If no, MAD is applocable. Tomorrow if a leader says that it is willing to get destroyed, MAD will not apply.

[shiv]

In the case of PRC, they should feel that with reasonable possibilty that there will be no Han CHinese left and in the case of Pakis we have enough Nukes left to first a) Wipe out TSP b) negotiate with Saudi, Doha, UAE US and UK to get thier relatives of thier elite extradited and executed.

Aditya may I ask you for an estimate of the number of nuclear weapons and yields needed to wipe out all Pakistanis. Please don't mistake me - I am asking this question as a sort of challenge because I put it to you that the numbers required for covering every square kilometer of Pakistan by an effective nuclear blast cannot be achieved by India. Forget China. I think (I repeat) people overestimate the destructive power of nuclear bombs. The actual areas that are damaged per bomb is shown in the table below.

Pakistan's land area is 800,000 square km. A 1 megaton bomb will cause almost 100% deaths for a radius of about 4 km (50 sq km). Beyond that you will get survivors. Check how many are needed to cover all of Pakistan. Even 10% of the area is unachievable. China's land area is 9.5 million square km

[Aditya_V]

Nothing can completly stop a convential or asymetric war but then there is a significant amount of deterence when you have huge stockpile of Nukes and delivery weapons.

Thats why Chinese didn't invade and take over all thier disputed territories with Japan. Nobody, plays the kind of games on Chinese faultlines like India too.

Idealy our Nuke and conventional forces should be like what the USA is today for the rest of the world. All the wars they get into are chosen by them or worst a few yahoos in Gulf/ western neighbour attack them thinking they enough influence in the state dept to get away with it. Such terror attacks are once in decade/ centuryphenomen for them.

Pakis will not risk sending a Laskar of 10 men on a merchant vessel and them to go to NY of rubber dingy and shoot 165 people, they are detterred , drone attacks notwithstanding.

If you ask

1) a Conventionally very strong force with no nukes will not deter China or Pakistan.
2) Only a Nuke deterent and very poor conventional forces will again mean we will lose a lot of territories.
2) A moderate/limited Nuke force with reasonable convential ability will not deter them but makes them have 2nd thoughts from taking us Head on
3) A very very robust strong Nuke deterent which will be disaster for whole of Humanity i.e ability to destroy China Pakistan and more. hint to saudis we have enough stockpile to consider an attack by Pakis may be considered as attack by Islam and there are enough weapons to destroy Pakis, CHeen and then wipe out large sections of muslim world. Pakis become an international problem rather than India problem.
4) A very strong conventional plus Nuke deterent which will leave for no win scenario will deter both Cheen and Pakis.

Shiv- just saw your post - my guess would atleast 150 TM for Pakistan with a few hundred Tactical nukes to take out miltary formations and cities like Lahore, Isloo, Sialkot etc. Plus anther few hundred missile deliverable Nukes to ensure that the Chinese Eastern seaboard, Beijing, Chengdu, Harbin etc. plus tactical nukes to take out soem of launchers in Tibet Xianyang. After this we need enough Nukes atleast 200 to take on the rest of the world.

that would mean looks like some absurd number of 2000+, till them we would keep dilly dallying talk about FMCT but not sign it etc.

The more India's capabilities expand both economically and miltarily, the more the world is understanding about our sufferings.

Imagine 15 years ago people in the West who made clear and present danger were not even aware that India was a victim of Terrorism. Despite the initial reaction the west has been left with no option but to engage us after 1998 Nuke tests, restarting development of the Agni missile programme.

Our own CBM and restraint from 1974 to 1998 for Nukes, 1994-98 for Agni missiles got us nowwhere.

Infact Chinese able to arms Pakis with impunity with M-9's and M-11's. once we are having the Agni programme reach deep into thier territory, they are more circumpect but not detterred enough with respect to the Pakis.

[shiv]

1) a Conventionally very strong force with no nukes will not deter China or Pakistan.
2) Only a Nuke deterent and very poor conventional forces will again mean we will lose a lot of territories.
2) A moderate/limited Nuke force with reasonable convential ability will not deter them but makes them have 2nd thoughts from taking us Head on
3) A very very robust strong Nuke deterent which will be disaster for whole of Humanity i.e ability to destroy China Pakistan and more. hint to saudis we have enough stockpile to consider an attack by Pakis may be considered as attack by Islam and there are enough weapons to destroy Pakis, CHeen and then wipe out large sections of muslim world. Pakis become an international problem rather than India problem.
4) A very strong conventional plus Nuke deterent which will leave for no win scenario will deter both Cheen and Pakis.

May I add that a small nuclear force with almost no conventional capability is the biggest deterrent? The nation that cannot defend itself conventionally but has nukes will be tempted to use those nukes as soon as war starts because the are bound to lose a conventional war.

Pakistan is heading in that direction. The USSR/Russia was that way for many years. NoKo is aiming for that.

[Aditya_V]

For a normal country yes, you don't want your citizens to be Nuked. But with pakistan is it a normal country?? Only if collapses will some sense come to it, the present state of affairs all logic goes out. One thing is for certain, the stronger and more stable they were, the more damage we had to suffer, like 1984-1993 period. the weaker they are, more they turn on themselves.

SHiv- one thing for certain strong convential force by us but no very limited/ Nukes by Pakis will go for Hiroshima Nagasaki solution which they tried in 1989, when they were ready with F-16's in Chaklala to Nuke us thinking we were Nuke nood.

[ShauryaT]

Pakistan is heading in that direction.

It most certainly is. Their deployment plans flout every known indicator of the escalation matrix, with plans to arm Cruise, short range missiles and artillery shells with nuclear warheads. From their perspective, having such a force deters a conventional attack and is probably cheaper to manage.

[nakul]

Pakistan wants to fly the green flag on the Red Fort. AFAIK no technology has been invented to allow dead people to do that. Until they desire actions that can be done only by the living, they won't turn suicidal. (Note: 72 virgins in jannat can be enjoyed after death. So it does not fit the criterion of actions that can be done by the living)

[pentaiah]

We are talking deterrence not usage only to assuage
its is to dissuade

otherwise its not wise to talk about deterrence or nukes
just chata hai
Amanki Asha
talk tamasha
and waste of resources on empty barc


also
deterrence is not negotiated
deterrence should force negotiations

finally Deterrence works till it breakdowns

[ramana]

....

Interesting. It seems that what you call as deterrence and what i understand as deterrence are completely different.

You are saying that if we have a certain nuclear capability, then Pakistan and China will both become scared of provoking us even in the conventional field - let alone nuclear provocation. They would simply be too scared of nuclear retaliation and even non nuclear provocation like terrorism would vanish. So you believe that building up a nuclear arsenal will deter non nuclear conflict/provocation.

I have always understood nuclear deterrence as deterring nuclear war but not necessarily conventional war.

In the cold war it was assumed that nuclear weapons would deter conventional war, but that is not true because China and the USSR have fought a border war. India and Pakistan have fought in Kargil. Vietnam was not deterred from fighting with China, and Argentina was not deterred from fighting with Britain. So clearly in a whole lot of cases, the presence of nuclear weapons in someone's arsenal has not stopped conventional conflict.

If I am right part of reason for Argentina's loss was also a threat from UK about a Nuke attack from Margerat Thachther which made made the Agosta missiles useless. That is not to say Argentina did not suffer other convential losses, but the Nuke factor was a part of the the surrender. Even today Argentina is constrained by this

Argentina accuses UK of deploying nuclear weapons near Falkland Islands

Thatcher 'threatened to nuke Argentina'

Margaret Thatcher forced François Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina's deadly French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to launch a nuclear warhead against Buenos Aires

"Excuse me. I had a difference to settle with the Iron Lady. That Thatcher, what an impossible woman!" the president said as he arrived, more than 45 minutes late, on May 7 1982. "With her four nuclear submarines in the south Atlantic, she's threatening to unleash an atomic weapon against Argentina if I don't provide her with the secret codes that will make the missiles we sold the Argentinians deaf and blind." He reminded Mr Magoudi that on May 4 an Exocet missile had struck HMS Sheffield. "To make matters worse, it was fired from a Super-Etendard jet," he said. "All the matériel was French!"

......

So the UK violated the negative security assurances* given by the P-5 to the non NWS at the Un in the late 70s and France and US did nothing about that.
No wonder everyone wants a nuke for themselves for escalation control.

In the late 70s the P-5 assured the non-NWS states that they wont use nukes on the non-NWS.

In first Gulf War US threatened Iraq with nukes if they use chemical weapons and called it expanded deterrence.

[shiv]

Personally, Deterence for Chinese and Pakis, is only if India is able to take 95% of thier population in a matter of hours and still has Nukes to deter the world. And blackmail to hand thier relatives and children in UK and USA for execuetion. a few dozen missiles will not deter them.

Aditya the number of nukes you envisage below is not enough for what you have suggested above. India will never have he deterrent that have suggested. I think you are sincere but I don't think you have looked seriously at the practical issues involved and you are making up numbers and percentages as you go along. I think there is enough material that you can study, but you have not done that study yet.

[..] my guess would atleast 150 TM for Pakistan with a few hundred Tactical nukes to take out miltary formations and cities like Lahore, Isloo, Sialkot etc. Plus anther few hundred missile deliverable Nukes to ensure that the Chinese Eastern seaboard, Beijing, Chengdu, Harbin etc. plus tactical nukes to take out soem of launchers in Tibet Xianyang. After this we need enough Nukes atleast 200 to take on the rest of the world.

that would mean looks like some absurd number of 2000+, till them we would keep dilly dallying talk about FMCT but not sign it etc.

[shiv]

Pakistan is heading in that direction.

It most certainly is. Their deployment plans flout every known indicator of the escalation matrix, with plans to arm Cruise, short range missiles and artillery shells with nuclear warheads. From their perspective, having such a force deters a conventional attack and is probably cheaper to manage.

Yes. For Pakistan the leadership have to be personally threatened and the things they value the most in Pakistan need to be destroyed. That is what deterrence will mean for Pakistan. If the millionaire generals are not killed by the destruction of Isloo, Karachi, Lahore they can go and live in a cave like Osama did and then get hunted down like rats. No use trying to kill all Pakis - the generals don't care for all Pakis.

2kt fizzle will do for Murdike.

[ShauryaT]

So the UK violated the negative security assurances* given by the P-5 to the non NWS at the Un in the late 70s and France and US did nothing about that.
No wonder everyone wants a nuke for themselves for escalation control.

In the late 70s the P-5 assured the non-NWS states that they wont use nukes on the non-NWS.

In first Gulf War US threatened Iraq with nukes if they use chemical weapons and called it expanded deterrence.

This is assuming the author of the book is telling the truth or mitterand was? He is dead now, are there any more verifications of this reported threat?

[ShauryaT]

2kt fizzle will do for Murdike.

Not even that. If we get our act together, we can probably achieve our objectives, without moving a single tank and wage a battle from air, artillery, missiles, rockets and the IN from the sea. Fire power is the answer to their perfidies. I say, for every terrorist attack, we should send in a volley of brahmos and let them escalate, if they have the strength - they do not. Break their jaw for bleeding our nose. It is the quickest way to end their perfidies.

[Prem]

The best way is to link the IWT with terrorism coming from their side and keep the Brahmos ready as supporting option. do it braznely with diplomatoc fineese. Paki can select either of these options for themselves .If they accelrate, start nibbling their territory .

[member_22872]

If TSP feels that IWT squeeze and Brahmos are existential threat to it(even thought it isn't, they can always say that to escalate) and use Nukes then what?

[Prem]

If TSP feels that IWT squeeze and Brahmos are existential threat to it(even thought it isn't, they can always say that to escalate) and use Nukes then what?

Let them start climbing in esaclation ladder. If they use , they loose and if they dont they loose again. One with the inherrent strength wins. They simply cant afford climbing. Any How India is slowly doing the both things , Building dams and Varahmochs= Capable of Moching/Vadh the Varahas next door.

[ramana]

Shiv, A regime-based state has to be deterred by threatening the leaders and structures of leadership.

[member_20317]

Personally, Deterence for Chinese and Pakis, is only if India is able to take 95% of thier population in a matter of hours and still has Nukes to deter the world. And blackmail to hand thier relatives and children in UK and USA for execuetion. a few dozen missiles will not deter them.

Aditya the number of nukes you envisage below is not enough for what you have suggested above. India will never have he deterrent that have suggested. I think you are sincere but I don't think you have looked seriously at the practical issues involved and you are making up numbers and percentages as you go along. I think there is enough material that you can study, but you have not done that study yet.

[..] my guess would atleast 150 TM for Pakistan with a few hundred Tactical nukes to take out miltary formations and cities like Lahore, Isloo, Sialkot etc. Plus anther few hundred missile deliverable Nukes to ensure that the Chinese Eastern seaboard, Beijing, Chengdu, Harbin etc. plus tactical nukes to take out soem of launchers in Tibet Xianyang. After this we need enough Nukes atleast 200 to take on the rest of the world.

that would mean looks like some absurd number of 2000+, till them we would keep dilly dallying talk about FMCT but not sign it etc.

The tyranny of a spherical blast wave on a planar surface. You get ^2 impact for every ^3 increase in yield.

Chotus makes better sense unless off course you are some supa powa threatening a fluidic threat like Talipan.

Besides 5-6 well directed chotus can take make a city essentially unlivable for months together if you know where to hit.

Deterrence is a really really funny idea.

[abhik]

Deterrence works on many levels. Our's may have worked for us in the past in certain situations but it has also failed us glaring especially with respect to Pakistan. After it gained nukes India has completely lost the will(and/or ability?) wage large scale conventional wars (take for example Operation Brasstacks, Kargil and Operation Parakram). Also it does not seem to deter them from openly fomenting terrorism, economic warfare and supporting crime against us. No punitive action is ever taken for the fear it escalating to the point where the pakis launch a first strike which is their very clearly stated policy.
Now If the enemy thinks that launching nuclear weapons against you is a viable course of action, that would mean in his mind he does not feel deterred. So the point I'm trying to make is that if your adversary is making an open and clear policy of nuclear first strike(and of course seriously considering it and not bluffing) as pakistan is then your deterrence has clearly failed.

[ramana]

Some studies in US show that counter value(cities) and counter force(military) has the same effelc in destruction and fallout as the latter are located near the former.
So its a moot point to argue about the difference in the two strategies.
However there is difference in representative and totalitarian challengers.

The former value their people more hence a counter value strategy apears suitable.
For the latter the regime's existence has to be personally threatened along with counter value in a sort of mixed strategy.

In India's case the same apporach needs to be thought about.


Both near term challnegers are totalitarian states with the difference that
PRC: Totalitarian-> representative
TSP: Representative - >> totalitarian

[shiv]

Now If the enemy thinks that launching nuclear weapons against you is a viable course of action, that would mean in his mind he does not feel deterred. So the point I'm trying to make is that if your adversary is making an open and clear policy of nuclear first strike(and of course seriously considering it and not bluffing) as pakistan is then your deterrence has clearly failed.

Abhik you are saying that the threat of using nukes is failure of deterrence. Others have said that conventional provocation imposed on us by Pakistan (or on China by say Japan) under a nuclear umbrella are also failure of deterrence.

If deterrence has already failed, then whatever nuclear weapons we have are not deterring anyone.

If that is the case is it your argument that more and bigger nuclear weapons will somehow lead to a deterrence that does not exist as of today?

What would you say to the argument that since deterrence has already failed, it is better to get rid of our nuclear weapons, because if we build more, our adversaries will also build more and our deterrence will stay failed and that fact cannot be changed?

After all why would an adversary who is not deterred by our twentysomething nukes keep quiet and wait for us to develop a bigger arsenal? For our adversaries who know that they are not deterred by us, who know that our deterrent is useless, it is important not to fall behind. They are ahead and will stay ahead by building more and bigger nukes, so our nuclear deterrent is useless. We are depending only on luck. if we are going to depend on luck, then why keep any nukes at all? Is this not a gross policy mistake? What do we gain by spending even a Rupee more on on nukes and missiles?

[D Roy]

european..
http://oilprice.com/Geopolitics/Asia/Is ... India.html

Interesting.

[pentaiah]

Deterrence is like the donkey wearing the tiger skin in the panchatantra story.

As long as the donkey with tiger skin is not caught eating grass or braying it will deter the predators but once....

So it's better to be Tiger than pretend wearing tiger skin

[shiv]

To get back to a question that has been going through my mind.

It seems to me that a significant number of BRFites feel that deterrence is some ideal state of nuclear preparedness that scares off everyone and prevents all wars. Without arguing that this is wrong or right, I would like to point out that this was exactly the view that the US had after World War 2 and the Hiroshima attacks. If you go back and read the pre-cold war mindset after WW2. it was imagined that all wars had ended because anyone who made war would swiftly be finished off by nuclear weapons. So there was a kind of "cloud cuckoo land" era after WW2 and before the Soviets tested a nuke that all wars were now at an end. (As an aside, it is possible that Nehru believed and swallowed this).

In order to follow up on this belief that all wars would be ended by nukes the US decided to rely on long range, high flying heavy bombers, believing that no further weapons would be needed. This delusion did not last long. The USSR tested a nuke in 1949 and then the US knew that their own ability to wage war could be ended by the Soviets nuking them.

For this reason the US started to build up its nuclear weapon numbers with the idea that they would one day simply wipe out all Soviet nukes and end the threat. But the Soviets matched the US weapon for weapon. Somewhere on YouTube is a fabulos interview of McNamara or someone reminiscing about the time the White House was considering wiping out the entire Soviet nuclear arsenal. The US President asked his advisors that if the US did a first strike on the USSR, would there be a guarantee that the USSR would have no nuked left to hit the US. No one could give such a guarantee. No one could guarantee that even if the US used up all its weapons and covered the whole USSR, that the latter would not have at least one weapons left that could take out New York or some other US city. This price - of losing one city was considered too much and that is why the US never conducted its first strike against the USSR. This then led to the nuclear arms race where the US wanted to be sure that they would have enough weapons to wipe out the USSR is the latter attacked first. Since both countries did not attack each other the situation was called "Deterrence based on Mutually Assured Destruction".

I was a boy in the early 60s when the Bay of Pigs crisis took place and the Cuban Missile crisis. I suspect that since at least 70% of the world's population must be younger than me, 70% of the world's population have not seen the world in the way I saw it. In the 1960s the US were shitting bricks because they believed that they were about to be attacked by Soviet nukes. It is difficult to tell what the Russians felt because we got only news from the US and Russia was behind the "Iron Curtain". But US propaganda says that the Soviets were not told anything. US propaganda, as expected, has always been soft towards itself and hard on all opponents. It has not always been truthful.

The US was certainly deterred from attacking the USSR anywhere directly and vice versa. But they all fought proxy wars such as the Korean war. The arming of Pakistan by the US was part of that. The fear of nuclear war seemed to subside in the US by the 1970s when the US got involved in Vietnam. The US and USSR remained on opposite sides in Korea, Vietnam, Arab-Israeli wars, India-Pakistan and Angola. In each case the opposite sides received arms. In each case conventional war was aided and abetted by the US and USSR.

If you look at the countries that were fuc#ed with in those days - almost every one of them developed nuclear weapons but apart from China it was US allies that always got nukes before Soviet allies. South Africa, a western ally under the apartheid regime developed and later gave up nukes. Israel got nukes. But after many wars had been fought. Pakistan got nukes. The so called Indian deterrent came after Pakistan's deterrent and after both countries had fought many conventional wars. North Korea is now getting nukes. Saudi Arabia will get Pakistani nukes.

But unlike the US and USSR all these new nuclear nations have all been armed and encouraged to fight wars during the cold war. Some of them have directly fought with the US. They have all developed nuclear weapons as something they need to destroy an adversary who is already at war with them, not to avoid war. Funnily enough, this is how the US and USSR also started with nukes. Just because the US and USSR avoided war does not mean that the other nuclear nations will avoid all war, or even nuclear war.

In other words deterrence has never been and never will be deterrence of conventional war. And if nuclear war occurs, the word deterrence will not be worth a pile of dog shit. If nuclear war occurs between any two nations, it will be a signal that nukes can be used. More nations wil get them, and US targets will be among the first to feel the heat from the numerous foes that the US has painstakingly built up. I think the US knows this very well.

[Aditya_V]

So all the more the most noble cause is Pakis and Chinese be Denuked, as long they Nukes we need an Ovewhelming number of Nukes.

Basically, a conventially and Nucler Weak Pakistan and similarly CHina is good for world peace.

[ramdas]

Shiv

Indeed for deterrence to work, we must ensure that we upgrade our capabilities to see to it that it dosent fall too much behind the adversaries. The worry at present is that while TSP/PRC are increasing their stockpiles, we are static. This, if continued, will make things reach a point when our deterrent is no longer credible, making the argument about giving up the deterrent valid. At thast point, we would have to accept peace on the adversaries' terms, or become a South Korea like dependant on the U.S.

This can be avoided by systematically upgrading the deterrent to keep up with changes in the adversaries force profile. Dererrence is never static. Once we have decided to have a deterrent, it means that upgrading the deterrent (qualitatively and quantitatively) is a continuous process, which has to be done keeping in mind the adversaries' capabilities. I am sure nobody would disagree with this broad assessment.

[shiv]

The worry at present is that while TSP/PRC are increasing their stockpiles, we are static.

I think Pentaiah's donkey in tiger skin is useful here. If Pakis and Chinese believe what you say, then deterrence is non existent. If they believe that India has a deterrent, then deterrence exists. In other words its not what you believe or what I believe, it is what the Chinese or Pakis believe. One is allowed to be a donkey wearing a tiger skin as long as anyone who looks at the donkey thinks it's a tiger. It matters little even if the donkey is a dead donkey as long as everyone thinks its tiger.

Of course neither the Pakis nor the Chinese will depend on what you or I say. They will make their own independent assessments. For example, when Chidambaram or Atalji said "We have big bum" would the Chinese believe it or dismiss it?

When Santanam and western seismoloigsts say that it was a fizzle, should the Chinese believe that?

The same seismologists say that the Paki bomb was an even bigger fizzle. Should we believe that? If we believe it them Pakistan as no nukes to deter us.

[ramdas]

Shivji,

The solution is to move from being a donkey in a tigers skin to being an honest tiger...

[ramana]

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... c#p1326456

We have to understand very clearly that the FSU-US detente does not apply to India and its neighborhood. Its arms control without prestroika or glasnost.

TSP gets its main nuke weapons related support from China. Earlier it got some enrichment technology from Europe.

The US supports China for its own reasons.

China does not talk to India. There is no prestroika nor glasnost here.

TSP regularly threatens India with nukes. The redlines are getting more and more ridiculous. If TSP feels irregular, they want to launch nukes on India.

US keeps cautioning India and tries to hamstring Indian leadership and decision making.

US Non Prolif Ayotollahs keep bringing in detente type ideas when they do not apply in this case.
They keep pushing the idea of TSP arming without restraints.

Need to keep this in mind when interlopers(sorry interlocutors) come visiting.

[pentaiah]

All I want is our scientists strategic leadership and armed forces to be on the same page, and in unison declare that we have the wherewithal to deter PRC , TSP or any nation that is a security threat to India.

If testing be required for that then do it at the earliest opportunity if no testing is required but all of them truly believe we have everything we need then it is fine as well. But more than anything the deterrence is required to be demonstrated to the foes present and likely in future.

[ramana]

I want to see deeds and not words. Words havent got us far.

And the AV payload weight is a very clear expression of the deed.

[shiv]

All I want is our scientists strategic leadership and armed forces to be on the same page, and in unison declare that we have the wherewithal to deter PRC , TSP or any nation that is a security threat to India.

+1

In fact many of the doubts and fears expressed by people stem from the multitude of voices in India.

As far as I can see - on a purely theoretical, logical level the possibilities are
1. India is nuclear donkey wearing tiger skin
2. India is nuclear tiger wearing donkey skin
3. India is nuclear donkey wearing donkey sin

Because of India's posture, no one calls India a nuclear tiger in tiger skin. "Reluctant nuclear power" is a good description for the wimp out nuclear posture that India shows based on the number of Indians who beat their breasts in frustration at everything about India's so called nuclear deterrent.

Frankly I don't see how testing alone is going to make any difference to a nuclear posture that looks like
1. Weapons are not ready
2. Weapons when ready are not big enough or reliable enough
3. Weapons, even if ready will not be used because Indian politicians are wimps who are always ready to surrender.
4. Indian leaders bend to threats and the Indian nuclear doctrine is trash because it will be overridden by the civil leadership and not used if someone launches a nuclear attack on India.

The points that arise from this are
1. Indian nuclear deterrent is already proven to be useless against conventional attack. India is willing to forgive and forget conventional attacks and give concessions to attackers
2. If India has not faced a nuclear attack so far it cannot be counted as a success of deterrence. It can only be counted as blind luck. The day India gets hit by a nuke its political leadership will not have the guts to hit back in a nuclear retaliation because they will know the game is up as India's deterrence is donkey in donkey skin.

How can mere testing change all this?

Perhaps the only posture suitable for India is to give up all nuclear weapons and then sing about Panchsheel, peace and harmony? If you look at the distance we have to go to become a nuclear tiger - it is so great that it is unachievable. Better to just cop out and fold up and stop pretending, After all confidence in India's nuclear posture has been a mirage all these years. That means that any confidence we have felt for the last 20 years is based on a nuclear self delusion. Why should that change just because we become honest with ourselves. Do we require to lie to ourselves to feel confidence? We need not delude ourselves. Tell the truth openly. We have no deterrent. And carry on as we have done all these decades. Deterrence is holding because others don't want to use nukes. No one is saying that India is deterring anyone. No?

[merlin]

How can mere testing change all this?[/]

Keep the powder dry hoping that sometime in the future we get a leadership that is willing to do what it takes.

[Sanku]

How can mere testing change all this?

The multiplicity of voices that you correctly raise as a issue will go away.

The sound of a big bum working is good enough indicator that everyone has shouted in unison.

[ramdas]

Shiv,

No distance is untraversable. We have to uncompromisingly and continually enhance the deterrent. Testing should be kept open as an option: to be done when the other pieces (like Agni V deployments) are in place.

What you do not seem to get is that deterrent requirements are not static: what has been good till now will not be good for all time. Given TSP/PRC as neighbors, continuous upgrading is the sole option. Any suggestion that we give up nukes is absolutely against the core national interest of maintaining a capable deterrent. This process itself is a dynamic process that requires relentless development and upgrading.

A lot of deterrence is generated simply when GoI is seen to be serious about upgrading and enhancing the deterrent. To some extent, particularly on the missile side, there has been improvement in recent times, as the increasingly frequent missile tests show. This should be the beginning of massive further efforts to enhance the power and reach of our strategic forces.

This also means that we should summarily reject all direct and indirect attempts at curtailing this buildup: CTBT, FMCT etc. This is not a radical thing to do: after all, we have rejected all these treaties since the 1990s. Just continue to stick to this traditional position and continue to buildup the deterrent forces for the foreseeable future (next several decades). Test more advanced warheads when the time is right (i.e, enough delivery systems are deployed with the current generation of warheads).

In this kind of a trajectory, we would continue to maintain the credible deterrence we currently have vis a vis TSP and achieve credible deterrence (as opposed to the current dissuasive capabilities) against PRC in another five years o so. The continuous upgrading of our forces from then on (in response to developments on the other side) will ensure that the deterrent relationship holds.

[ramdas]

One final point: deterrence is not a 1-0 matter. It is more complicated. Currently, PRC will have to pay a price like losing an important city or two in return for destroying India as a coherent nation state (in the event a conflict it chooses to start escalates to the nuclear realm). This ensures that PRC would be much less likely to attempt a repeat of 1962 than would be the case had we not had what we have now. There may still be extreme situations where PRC may be willing to lose a city or two in return for permanently subjugating a strategic competitor. Thus, we currently have a dissuasive capability vis a vis PRC. One we upgrade our forces i.e, deploy Agni V in sufficient quantity, etc, the price PRC would pay for removing India as a coherent nation state would be an order of magnitude higher: the loss of maybe twenty or so cities, leading to PRC being set back by several decades/loosing its coherence as a nation state. Then, we shall have deterrence vis a vis PRC.

[shiv]

One final point: deterrence is not a 1-0 matter. It is more complicated. Currently, PRC will have to pay a price like losing an important city or two in return for destroying India as a coherent nation state (in the event a conflict it chooses to start escalates to the nuclear realm). This ensures that PRC would be much less likely to attempt a repeat of 1962 than would be the case had we not had what we have now. There may still be extreme situations where PRC may be willing to lose a city or two in return for permanently subjugating a strategic competitor. Thus, we currently have a dissuasive capability vis a vis PRC.

Precisely.

But let me add another dissuasive factor that has nothing to do with India.

Imagine a war in which India nukes 2 Chinese cities and China nukes 75 Indian cities. Assume India is no longer a coherent nation state after that.

Would it then be possible for the rest of the world to say "No skin off my nose?"

I suggest that this would not happen, because China would come out of such a war as a nation willing to nuke another country in a war. (India too, but after such a war India would be out of reckoning). Any country with any kind of disagreement with China would have to think about how China made an example of India.

How do you think the post India-China nuclear war scenario of this type would shape up? One answer would be "I am not bothered. Once India is gone I don't care". While that is a valid argument, it fails to take into account the fact that even if Indians do not ant to think about life after such a scenario. the Chinese have to do that. For the Chinese would then be marked as a nation that nuked India and survived and that China is willing to lose a couple of cities to prove a point. That means that any nation with any dispute with China must either bow down before China , or prepare to nuke China to hell.

Do you believe that the Chinese would not think of life after nuclear war if they decide to nuke India out of existence?

[Sanku]

Do you believe that the Chinese would not think of life after nuclear war if they decide to nuke India out of existence?

I believe they would, and they would like how the future looks to them -- precisely for the reasons you listed. The world will fear, a pesky competitor will be gone.

The mandate of heaven will be proven.

What are others going to do -- know that China can attack viciously with nuclear weapon. I somehow dont think they are quite unaware of the fact already. They will make their peace (a MAD peace) with China and move in US-USSR detente.

[shiv]

How can mere testing change all this?

The multiplicity of voices that you correctly raise as a issue will go away.

The sound of a big bum working is good enough indicator that everyone has shouted in unison.

In fact I put it to you that it would make things worse.

1. The day India tests again everyone who wanted India to test again will cheer, but will also point out that they were right all along and that those who were opposed to testing were anti national liars

2. The international community, watching the repeat tests will understand that India was lying all these years and pretending to be a tiger when it was really a donkey. They will then judge that the Indian deterrent has been a bluff for many decades and know that India will be vulnerable after repeat tests because the deterrent is not up to the mark. There would be a window of 5 to 10 years during which India could be pressured with intense efforts knowing that weaponization of newly tested designs would take that long. The simple act of sanctions plus transfer of nuclear technology among some US/China and Pakistan would keep India under intense pressure with no guaranteed deterrence.

If India is a donkey in a tiger skin, there may be some merit in staying that way rather than openly saying "Look - i have been a donkey all these years - and suddenly I want to become a tiger"

[shiv]

What are others going to do -- know that China can attack viciously with nuclear weapon. I somehow dont think they are quite unaware of the fact already. They will make their peace (a MAD peace) with China and move in US-USSR detente.

You are saying that other countries will start acting like Indian wimps after such a war. Not necessarily.

The signal is that there is life after nuclear war (though not for India). That sets the stage for more nuclear wars later. The lesson that sensible non Indian countries will learn is to make nukes and use them early. That not only affects China - but every other country that has any serious enmity with any other country. So although India is destroyed, China and other nuclear armed countries are unlikely to benefit in the longer term, because such a war only sets the stage for more nuclear wars.