Indias triad: a foregone development
View by Moeed Yusuf There is a need to dispel the concern that Indo-Pak modernisation on the nuclear front could undermine the peace process. The fact is that both sides have managed to disentangle their military expenditures from progress in bilateral negotiations
Last week, India tested a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM), dubbed K-15. The test prompted a hurried response from Pakistans naval chief who raised concerns of a renewed India-Pakistan arms race.
Is the CNS statement merited? Will an Indian sea-based capability force Pakistan to respond? Would it trigger an arms race? Finally, could this end up undermining the peace process?
First, the routine nature of the Indian test must be established at the outset. Indias sub-water test is the latest in a series of attempts over the past year to get the K-15 to attain operational status. Technical testing is routine during the development stage of any such weapon system.
Moreover, as early as 1999, Indias Draft Nuclear Doctrine explicitly stated its objective to develop a triad of nuclear forces. That New Delhi has been pursuing a programme to build the Advanced Technology Vehicle, a nuclear-powered submarine designed to carry SLBMs, is well known. That given, last weeks test ought to be considered business as usual; indeed, in normative terms, it was no different than periodic Pakistani and Indian land-based nuclear capable missile tests undertaken to test technical parameters of these systems.
Further, since India, according to most estimates, is still more than a decade away from operationalising a sea-based launch capability, these tests can be expected to continue intermittently in the future.
But is the CNS claim of a possible arms race justified? The short answer is that while an arms race will not ensue due to an Indian triad, Pakistan will need to rethink the strength of its minimum deterrent.
To understand the impact of an Indian triad on the Indo-Pak equation, one needs to be mindful of Indias vision-capability dilemma. This is a term I coined to refer to the disconnect between Indias global ambitions and its current capability. In a nutshell, the dilemma exposes Indias desire to expand both its economic and military capabilities to project its strength well beyond the region. Its current military capability, however, falls substantially short of this mark and thus requires aggressive modernisation. In the coming years then, India is certain to pursue military acquisitions that have ex-Pakistan (read force projection) concerns in mind.
Indian moves to rid itself of the vision-capability disconnect will create a spin-off dilemma for Pakistan: as the Indians modernise, their procurements will increasingly lend weight to their claim that a number of the new systems have no relevance to Pakistan; yet, the multiple uses of each weapon system will leave all but a handful theoretically usable against Islamabad.
Given the inherent conservatism associated with military planning, Islamabad is likely to base its decisions on Indian capabilities rather than intentions. Consequently, an operational sea-based deterrent, while primarily geared to satisfy global projection concerns (consider that the sea-based deterrent is practically useless in terms of ensuring a second strike option vis-à-vis Pakistan as Indias geographical expanse already rules out any possibility of Pakistani pre-emption) will cause Pakistan to react, albeit without any sense of an imminent danger posed by the submarine-launch capability.
The underlying premise for acquiring a sea-based capability for any nuclear power is to possess an assured second-strike capability. As with air- and land-based delivery mechanisms, there are two options: (i) either to maintain a non-deployed closet sea-based capability; or (ii) to actively deploy nuclear missiles on submarines. In general, since an assured second strike is only possible under a readied state, sea-based capabilities have a greater probability of deployment than do land- or air-based options.
In Indias case, its ambition to develop a blue-water navy that can influence waters deep into the Arabian sea and beyond, as well as its need to tackle Chinas projected expansion, may well nudge it towards deployment. Even if it does not do so, however, New Delhi is likely to maintain an ambiguous posture on this count, keeping its adversaries (read Pakistan and China) guessing as to the exact posture of its sea-based capability. Given the difficulty of detecting sub-water systems then, the Pakistani calculation is still likely to be based on the worst-case scenario.
The theoretical danger to Pakistan will come from the elimination of the considerable lead-time (time required to prepare, deploy and employ equipment and forces) for India to prepare its ground nuclear forces at present. Perhaps one of the most comforting aspects of the current South Asian nuclear regime is the non-deployed and de-mated status of the arsenals. This reduces drastically the possibility of an inadvertent or irrational decision in the fog of war. With an Indian triad in place, the window for de-escalation would disappear, leading an already paranoid Pakistan to perceive the possibility of an Indian pre-emption in the early stages of a crisis as real.
The good news however is that a Pakistani response will not initiate a vicious spiral that may perpetuate an arms race. Likely reactions will be limited to dispersal of the nuclear arsenal, a greater reliance on decoys, hardened silos, a substantial quantitative upgrade of Pakistans own land-based forces, or adoption of a semi-deployed status in the early stages of a crisis. The ultimate move would be the development of a Pakistani triad to ensure its own retaliatory capability.
In terms of an arms race, the scope will be limited by the restricted nuclear ambitions on the Pakistani side. Unlike the super powers, where both sought to outweigh the other for global dominance, Pakistans ultimate desire is a strong deterrent against India, and perhaps over time, limited force projection in South and West Asia. For a relatively poor country with such a confined objective, a deployed triad presents itself as the ultimate rung of the modernisation ladder.
Unlike the self-perpetuating action-reaction spiral in conventional arms modernisation, once Pakistan attains this capability, no level of Indian quantitative upgrades would require a massive rethink on the Pakistani side. Cosmetic up-gradation and force re-posturing may continue but major investments in counter-measures to Indian up-gradation will disappear. In short, a triad will be able to provide the ultimate guarantee against Indian pre-emption.
Finally, there is a need to dispel the concern that Indo-Pak modernisation on the nuclear front could undermine the peace process. The fact is that both sides have managed to disentangle their military expenditures from progress in bilateral negotiations. Indeed, there had to be a willingness on both sides (especially the Pakistani one) to ignore expanding military procurements even to kick-off the peace process. After all, it has been obvious for some time that Indias vision-capability dilemma will continue nudging it to procure big-ticket items which may give it a decisive edge in relative military might, at least on paper.
Even Pakistans reactionary-modernisation was a foregone conclusion. Therefore, the fact that neither side has made military modernisation a bone of contention in the four-year-old peace bid suggests that they are reconciled with this virtually non-negotiable prospect.
Looking ahead, the stance on this issue is likely to remain unchanged from both parties. Neither will hold the peace process hostage to growing expenditures. By the same token, even an upturn in relations will not dent the pace of military modernisation on the Indian side (and subsequently Pakistans response).
Irrespective of the fate of the peace process, India shall build the triad. Pakistans response although the specific nature is unclear is also certain.
The writer is a research fellow at the Strategic and Economic Policy Research (Pvt Ltd.) in Islamabad and a regular contributor to The Friday Times.
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