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Pakistan must exercise vocal restraint as both sides live dangerously

The father of the Pakistan bomb, Dr A Q Khan, in his periodic declarations, claimed recently that Ghauri missiles could "wipe out thrice, all the big cities of India". It is such inflammatory remarks that have forced Bill Clinton to call Kashmir the most dangerous place in the world.

The first-ever discussion on nuclear risk reduction in South Asia after India and Pakistan went overtly nuclear, organised in Delhi, was last month. There was one other held at Bangkok a month earlier. At this unofficial meeting, strategic experts from both countries, as is their wont, agreed to disagree on the larger questions of minimum deterrence and its first and no first use.

But they were unanimous about the urgency of putting in place a mutually acceptable nuclear restraint regime which would minimise risks from accidental or inadvertent use of nuclear weapons. An informal interaction on risk reduction measures has become vital due to the lack of transparency and unwillingness to talk at the official level. What complicates a nuclear dialogue is the fact it is not just a bilateral but a trilateral issue involving another nuclear neighbour, China.

This conference could not have been better timed. It happened the very month a frighteningly real novel called Dragonfire about India fighting a two-front collusive nuclear war with Pakistan and China hit the stands. The moment of high drama in the book is when Pakistan fires off a tactical nuclear weapon on an Indian armoured column in the Thar desert which triggers off a set of unmanageable, escalating situations leading to an all-out nuclear war. While Pakistan's nuclear capability is India-centric, India has to contend with two nuclear adversaries one of which, China, is both the cause and cure of nuclear instability in the region.

At the outset, the leader of the Pakistani delegation, an articulate brigadier, clarified that Pakistan's nuclear capability was India-specific and it had no desire to match India which had to deal with China also. He said Pakistan could never subscribe to a No First Use doctrine because of his country's inferiority in conventional military forces. He added that recent Indian postulations of a limited war were provocative and had forced Pakistani leaders to respond: that in the event of war, they would be forced to use nuclear weapons. This, the brigadier knows, is not the whole truth.

In the first-ever exchange of ideas on each others' perceived nuclear doctrine and strategy, Pakistan, it seemed, was trying to rationalise the use of nuclear weapons including tactical warheads on the battlefield to the perceived asymmetry in military strength. The brigadier made the claim that Pakistan had "a primitive second strike capability due to its terrain" probably referring to a stockpile of survivable nuclear weapons in the bowels of Chagai Hills.

What came out vividly from the one-day seminar was Pakistan's sense of insecurity vis a vis India, despite the nuclear and the missile cooperation with and security assurances from China. But Pakistan's past experience in wars with India has shown that China, despite its all-weather brotherly relations with Pakistan, has been no more than a cheerleader.

The Pakistani delegation emphasised that "we were living on a razor's edge" given the fatal reality that the launch to target time in a nuclear strike on the subcontinent was anything from three to seven minutes compared to the much longer fuse of 40 minutes available during the Cold War. Without minimising the risk inherent in an unstable standoff, this writer, who was one of the participants in the seminar, confirmed the impression that Pakistan has invariably exaggerated the nuclear flashpoint theory to attract Western intervention in J & K.

The seminar provided the first glimpses of perception of the nuclear strategy of each side: Pakistan advocating a military use for its nuclear weapons while India regarding it as a political weapon to deter war and blackmail. The discussion focused on three issues: lessons of the Cold War, command and control systems and risk reduction measures. Both sides reviewed the nearly two dozen cases of 'near-misses' -- accidents and hairtrigger nuclear crises -- that led to taking crisis stability measures. The first formal Cold War Nuclear Risk Reduction Centre, containing mechanical safeguards was established after the Cuban missile crisis, 18 years after Hiroshima.

The Pakistan side refused to buy the Indian thesis that nuclear stability worked during the Cold War because both sides had accepted status quo, implying that neither side wanted to change political or territorial boundaries by use of force. Instead, they highlighted the difficulties and differences in terrain on the subcontinent: close proximity, dense population and near zero warning time.

On command and control systems, neither side, it appeared, was well informed or forthcoming. Even so, both accepted its centrality to deterrence stability. The Pakistani presentation confirmed that the military in Pakistan has been in charge of the country's nuclear programme from its very inception. It was accepted that as tactical nuclear weapons are integral to Pakistan's politico-military strategy, delegation of authority to field commanders was inevitable. Unfortunately, neither side shed any light on the existing command and control structures though published literature on it was spelt out. It is overseen by three committees: employment control committee, development control committee and a strategic plans division. There is a strategic force command with the army component reportedly already in place.

Under military rule, the national command authority looks like this: The chief executive officer who is also the joint chairman, chiefs of staff and the army chief, heads the National Security Council, the supreme decision making body.

At the next tier is the strategic force command which would alert the service designated to deliver the nuclear strike. In the present dispensation, the National Command Authority is Musharraf and Musharraf Incorporated.

The Indian command and control system, though in place, has not yet been declassified but one can guess it will also originate at the NSC but with a major difference: it is chaired by a civilian prime minister. It will flow to the chairman chiefs of staff and on to the nuclear force command.

Nuclear risk reduction measures and a restraint regime generated maximum debate. The participants were reminded that India and Pakistan, through diplomatic and non diplomatic channels, had agreed as far back as 1987 -- when Pakistan was first known to have a usable bomb -- to exchange information on each others' nuclear facilities. By 1994, India had proposed a memorandum on non-attack of nuclear facilities as well as no attack on civilian and economic targets.

As for the nuclear risk restraint regime, it was included in the 1999 Lahore Declaration: an agreement to constitute a joint working group to evolve nuclear risk reduction measures. In one fell swoop, Kargil destroyed the nuclear confidence building measures being nurtured since 1987. It is also not well known that hotlines between the prime ministers, foreign secretaries and directors general military operations are in place, though only the last is in use.

At the end of the day, all agreed on the necessity of increasing the length of the nuclear fuse and strategic response time. It was also agreed that the next session should include technical experts to help evolve a framework for reducing the risks of possessing nuclear weapons. Both sides felt that neither country was going to consciously use nuclear weapons. Equally, a miscalculation on this was unlikely. The wry conclusion was that it was the inadvertent or accidental use of nuclear weapons that was the biggest danger at present.

The sarcasm attending the discussion was mitigated by the Pakistani endorsement of an Indian proposal not to attack each others' nuclear command posts whenever these were constructed. This is not an original thought but is one worth accepting officially by both sides.

It is a pity that neither side has made any proposal to renew the dialogue on nuclear risk reduction started in the 1980s and 1990s. Many security experts had expected the Americans to persuade Vajpayee to at least agree on a limited dialogue on a nuclear restraint regime assuming that Musharraf would have relented on his agenda of Kashmir or nothing. The minimum Pakistan can do is to exercise vocal restraint as both sides continue to live dangerously.

Major General Ashok K Mehta (retd)