The Need for A Declared Nuclear Policy

Contributing Editor Vice Adm (Retd) IQBAL F QUADIR talks about the importance of clearly annunciating a nuclear policy

As a result of this failure to appreciate correctly and fully the likely outcome of becoming a nuclear weapon state, the country is now caught up in a whirlpool of unexpected domestic and international reactions. Not that acquiring or demonstrating national nuclear capability was in any way wrong. It was in fact the only correct solution if the country was planning to become anything of importance economically, politically or militarily in the coming millenium.

In fact, this scribe has been consistently advocating the acquisition of nuclear weapons capability ever since I can remember, certainly long before India exploded its nuclear device in 1974 for what it called peaceful purposes. This was an opinion formed after a visit to Hiroshima in 1951, which was that, 'a country should never get caught in a war without being fully prepared.' Further, with the Indian history of successive aggressions against Pakistan in Junagadh, Mongrol, Munavadar, Kashmir and East Pakistan it would be naive if not something worse, were Pakistan to disregard what that country was up to in the nuclear weapons field and maintains a credible means of defence all the time. Israel, despite its Security Pact with USA has acquired nuclear weapons for defence against its non-nuclear neighbours without exciting the ire of USA and Western Europe. Pakistan, without any similar external surety for its security as provided to Israel, living on pious hopes that the elephant would go against the grain of its genes can only bring us disaster in not too far off a future. Not that we should not learn how to live with this elephant while keeping it at a proper arms length.

Indian leaders, including Chaudhri Zafruulla Khan (later Pakistan's first Foreign Minister) and Mr Asif Ali of the Congress Party had before independence made it clear that the size and geography of Bharat provided the reasons for extending its influence from West Africa to areas in South Pacific. After independence, Indian leaders and even government officials have consistently talked of an Akhand Bharat (greater India) and of attaining the rank of a first class world power. Akhand Bharat, as we know, extends from Central Asia to South Pacific Islands and first class world power means much more than the recently declared nuclear doctrine by India. It would certainly include a geographical area including Pakistan under its economic and political influence. Mr Vajpai as Foreign Minister, talking to Institute of Strategic Studies in Islamabad had made it clear that India would build up its navy capable of preventing any further threats to India from the two southern corners of the Indian Ocean. Nuclear weapons would thus, under the new Indian Nuclear Doctrine, be part and parcel of equipment onboard the Indian Navy vessels like in the case of other two services. In this scenario, for Pakistan not to have had a clear nuclear doctrine of its own that is independent of Indian nuclear policy moves, is difficult to understand and appreciate. We know what USA and G-8 want of Pakistan and of India. Their various but discriminatory moves through the Security Council, the General Assembly, other UN and self created agencies and some directly e.g. Symington and Pressler Amendments etc., make western aims abundantly clear. However, we should be clear and definite in our minds as to what 'nuclear and other type of' knowledge and technology that Pakistan needs for its security and, in addition, what more of these technologies is essential for the country's future economic development. The number and type of nuclear weapon systems needed would, in ultimate analysis, depend on the type and scale of threat that Pakistan could face in the future and would vary with passage of time. Based on these requirements and other diplomatic as well as domestic political considerations a suitable Nuclear Doctrine could be worked out in Pakistan and publicly formulated to build up confidence amongst the population and in foreign countries. This would be much better than the present system of a knee jerk reaction to every American or Indian move.

Here one must appreciate that it is not for any outsider to tell or advise India what is good for that country or what would benefit the Indian people more. They have their own ambitions, desires and much more than that experiences since independence, which have provided them with what I would call, over confidence. That country got away Scott free whenever it aggressed militarily against Pakistan. Even Portugal got no support when India invaded Goa. It got economic and military support of two super powers after it aggressed against China in Tibet. In Kargil, the West came to the rescue when India found itself in deep trouble at the very base of the mountains. Most recently, what did the 'powers that be' in the world do when the Indian Air Force carried out the act terrorism in Pakistan's air space and shot down an unarmed patrol aircraft over Pakistani soil when they failed to skyjack it to India? Besides this experience of getting away with all her shenanigans, the Indians have gained great confidence as a result of two other events. Firstly the feeling of superiority because of the resurgence of the over five thousand year old Hindu civilization which had been under foreign domination for almost a thousand years (See Nehru's letters from jail in the thirties to his daughter Indra). Second, the wisdom and success of policies, political and economic, followed at home and abroad, by all post independence governments in New Delhi, which are now paying rich dividends to that country. India now has the largest middle class in the democratic world and still growing in numbers. Furthermore, with the rate of economic progress that would be possible after sanctions imposed by USA and Japan are lifted, the Indians could reasonably hope to join the ranks of G-8 economically and industrially in the next quarter century or so. Given such a rate of economic cum industrial progress together with rising self-confidence amongst the population of India it would be difficult for any one, except a Force Majeure, to stop our unpredictable and aggressive neighbour's attaining objectives it has publicly set out for itself.

The message for Pakistan is thus clear. The international agenda prepared by USA, the regional agenda being got ready by India and absence of vision in Pakistan's policies, all are leading us more and more towards isolation from the rest of the world. Our short sighted policies that have been successively followed by governments since 1954, having accumulated their negative effects over forty five years are now coming home to roost. Every Pakistani for no fault of his must be the most heavily indebted individual in the world. At the same time, a few beneficiaries of these very shortsighted policies have accumulated abroad the equal of more than fifty percent of the total national debt. Some of them even today control the policies of this country. None of our leaders, either in the government or from the opposition, are today in the mood of either offering any solution to our economic problems or setting an example of austerity in their public or private life styles. Furthermore, neither they have the time to consider national problems save that which effects the occupation of the ghaddi (chair) or quick takes, nor, they appear interested in them. Regrettably, we are like a house divided against itself and this division is getting deeper and deeper as the leaders isolate themselves further and further away from the people and their problems. In this process the essentials of what needs to be done are being pushed more and more into the background. And, one of the most essentials of these, the formulation of a nuclear doctrine for Pakistan reflecting the ethos and will of the nation remains the most neglected. The world and the tide of events cannot continue to wait too long for Pakistan to wake up and act in its own interest. It is high time the government and the nation realized the need of speed to formulate its own Nuclear Doctrine or else it could become too late. Any further delay would lead to our nuclear policies being decided for us by one world organization or the other just as our economic and fiscal policies are by IMF and other international financial institutions currently. One hopes and prays that this does not come about.