Update | May 7. Here is the full text of the speech.
On April 24th, the Chairman of India’s National Security Advisory Board, Shyam Saran, delivered an important address in New Delhi affirming the credibility of India’s nuclear deterrent. Mr. Saran has over two decades of close engagement on strategic matters, including time spent as Foreign Secretary and Special Envoy dealing with the US-India civil-nuclear agreement. What he said, speaking in his personal capacity, bears close scrutiny.
The tone of these remarks is defensive at the outset, reflecting domestic criticisms of the pace of Indian strategic modernization programs. Mr. Saran also takes aim at US, Pakistani, and Chinese analysts who maintain that India sought the Bomb for reasons of status rather than national security. He seeks to set the record straight, making significant observations and recommendations in the process. Here are a few passages:
Chinese assistance to Pakistan’s strategic programme continues apace. [Note: unless Mr. Saran is referring to China’s help with Pakistan’s nuclear power sector, this is especially noteworthy.]
Pakistan is the only country where nuclear assets are under the command and control of the military and it is the military’s perceptions and ambitions which govern the development, deployment and use of these weapons. This is a dangerous situation precisely because the military’s perceptions are not fully anchored in a larger national political and economic narrative. The pursuit of a more powerful, more effective, and more sophisticated nuclear arsenal, dictated by the Pakistani military, may run in parallel with a steadily deteriorating political, social and economic environment. Would it be possible to island an efficiently managed and sophisticated nuclear arsenal amidst an increasingly dysfunctional polity? There is an air of unreality about the often adulatory remarks about the Pakistani military’s stewardship of the country’s military assets.
What Pakistan is signaling to India and to the world is that India should not contemplate retaliation even if there is another Mumbai because Pakistan has lowered the threshold of nuclear use to the theatre level. This is nothing short of nuclear blackmail, no different from the irresponsible behavior one witnesses in North Korea. It deserves equal condemnation by the international community because it is not just a threat to India but to international peace and security. Should the international community countenance a license to aid and abet terrorism by a state holding out a threat of nuclear war?
Mr. Saran argues that strategic misperceptions regarding the state of India’s nuclear deterrent and the reasons for it can be dangerous. His public remarks, which include helpful clarifications on steps taken to assure India’s second strike capabilities, may signal more to come. He concludes that, “The secrecy which surrounds our nuclear programme… is now counter-productive,” adding,
I would hope that the Government makes public its nuclear doctrine and releases data regularly on what steps have been taken and are being taken to put the requirements of doctrine in place. It is not necessary to share operational details but an overall survey such as an annual Strategic Posture Review, should be shared with the citizens of this country who, after all, pay for the security which the deterrent is supposed to provide for them.
Pakistani authorities have also been close-lipped about their strategic programs and requirements. The people of Pakistan, like those in India, have been in the dark regarding the size and costs of their nuclear deterrent. Would more openness be helpful, or would it add even more impetus to the nuclear competition in southern Asia? This could go either way. It is clear, however, that the absence of disclosure hasn’t slowed down the competition.
Re this:
“What Pakistan is signaling to India and to the world is that India should not contemplate retaliation even if there is another Mumbai because Pakistan has lowered the threshold of nuclear use to the theatre level.”
It’s not clear if the two sides are speaking the same language regarding the deterrent issues here.
Pakistan has a history of having been massively defeated in conventional warfare with India; Bangladesh is a separate country due to one of these, etc.
India out and out announced that they were assuming, planning for, and prepared to launch a massive, no warning conventional attack across the border as a retaliation against further massive acts of terrorism. They seem to feel that shaming Pakistan by taking a bunch of territory is an appropriate deterrent. This is signaled again by the above and the wider discussion.
Pakistan has in few uncertain words declared that such an attack would be a threat to Pakistan’s existence,and that they’d more or less nuke at the border if there was a major blitzkreig attack like that.
There seems to be a disconnect as to the relative strategic depth and danger to Pakistan that such an attack poses. If they SAY it’s a threat to their existence, and they’d nuke in response, perhaps it should be taken seriously…
Pakistan is an unstable state. So is its Military. But giving them a feeling of impunity is also not the right thing.
As Robert said “Pakistan has in few uncertain words declared that such an attack would be a threat to Pakistan’s existence,and that they’d more or less nuke at the border if there was a major blitzkreig attack like that.”
But if India does not respond to Pakistans sustained support to Terrorists, even this Status Quo is also not good.
I am not a supporter of Nuclear Weapons but India is in a dangerous neighbourhood. Mr. Shyam Saran’s statement not only raises the bar for Pakistani Military but also the cost of any further “Mumbai 2008” like events for ISI.
If countries like USA, France and Israel can do it. Why not India.
If you believe that another Mumbai attack like event justifies a nuclear war, just say so and be prepared to launch such a first strike.
Declaring that you will instead launch a conventional attack that appears guaranteed to start at the very least a tactical nuclear war on your border is irresponsible.
Regardless of Pakistan’s instability, India needs to be responsible and think this through. A policy born out of pride rather than prudence, which has already been warned will lead to nuclear war, is not responsibility.
If you think such statements will indicate India’s stability and responsibility to us, you are mistaken.
I am sympathetic to the problem of Pakistani-launched terrorist attacks against India. Nuclear war is not the right solution.
I do not believe a temporary incursion into Pakistani territory constitutes a threat to Pakistan’s very existence. It might be embarrassing to Pakistan, but that’s the most one can reasonable say. Even if (hypothetically) Pakistan would disintegrate into 13 parts, the people of Pakistan would remain alive — unless their military starts a nuclear war. Under either hypothesis, Pakistani embarrassment or Pakistani disintegration, Pakistan would be completely and utterly unjustified to respond by starting a nuclear war with India.
That said, it would be dangerously foolish for India to provoke Pakistan to commit mass atrocities on a nuclear scale. Pakistan would get the greater blame, but that is small consolation when millions lie dead.
Let us hope that the coming Pakistan election results in more moderate civilian influences over Pakistan’s insane military doctrines. Pakistan and India need to make peace.
Jonah –
Pakistan’s issue with the Cold Start attack pattern is that there is no good line of defense for Pakistan to lean on; India could continue an attack deep into Pakistan and actually militarily defeat them, before Pakistan’s mobilization of troops from the far west and north was able to move to respond.
Lahore is immediately vulnerable to being overrun or surrounded; if you look at the geography, there’s little barrier to movement from Lahore to the west and south, eventually all the way down the valley system to the sea. Most of Pakistan’s populace and industry are in that valley.
Islamabad is slightly up in the mountains to the north of the valley, but is also close enough to the border to be seriously vulnerable.
India has enough conventional forces superiority that any Army-level offensive – may divisions worth – poses an immediate threat. The only restraint that matters is India’s intent, which Pakistan simply distrusts and disregards.
One regiment attacking across the border as a retaliation would not pose an existential threat, but Cold Start presumed and asserted the attack would be dozens of them. They practiced with 10 regiments.
George,
O.K. Let’s go with that scenario. Pakistani terrorists manage to kill 10,000 Indians. Enraged Indian leaders proclaim their intent to invade and occupy half of Pakistan for 5 years. Distrustful Pakistanis assume India plans to occupy Pakistan for 50 years.
Would this scenario justify Pakistan starting a nuclear war with India? I say no. Why? Because the planned occupation (whether 5 years or 50 years) would not threaten as many lives as would a nuclear war.
Nuclear war is a genuine threat to Pakistani existence. Having one’s country occupied is not (in and of itself) a threat to a people’s existence. Nuclear war is far worse than any conventional war or outcome of conventional war.
Jonah writes:
George,
O.K. Let’s go with that scenario. Pakistani terrorists manage to kill 10,000 Indians. Enraged Indian leaders proclaim their intent to invade and occupy half of Pakistan for 5 years. Distrustful Pakistanis assume India plans to occupy Pakistan for 50 years.
Would this scenario justify Pakistan starting a nuclear war with India? I say no. Why? Because the planned occupation (whether 5 years or 50 years) would not threaten as many lives as would a nuclear war.
Nuclear war is a genuine threat to Pakistani existence. Having one’s country occupied is not (in and of itself) a threat to a people’s existence. Nuclear war is far worse than any conventional war or outcome of conventional war.
You have just committed a cardinal sin, demonstrating one of the fatal flaws of deterrence theory.
“I am a reasonable educated person,” you say, “and what I think about this situation is X, which forbids them from thinking or reacting that way. Why, them thinking or reacting that way would just be crazy! Crazy, I tell you. Nobody could be that crazy. That’s not what they think. That’s not how they will react.”
Pakistan has said what they said about their perspective on their strategic situation. It is comprehensible and driven by their post-independence history and current fears and aspirations. I take them at their word that this reflects their private thinking.
I do not deny that India should take Pakistan’s threats seriously; they should. Nor do I deny that many Pakistani leaders likely would carry out these nuclear threats, given certain types of situations.
What I do deny is that starting a nuclear war with India is a rational move by Pakistan under any reasonable set of circumstances, up to and including actual invasion and conquest by India. It is a dangerous game to provoke India with terrorist attacks and then hope that nuclear threats will deter conventional war retaliation. This type of “deterrence” may not work and the consequences of nuclear use could be severe. I believe it is important to point this out, so that Pakistanis and their leadership have an opportunity to readjust their thinking.
In reality, India is highly unlikely to invade Pakistan with intent to conquer. Even if this worst-case conventional scenario would materialize, nuclear war is not the correct answer. Pakistan should seek out better answers, including this answer: Make peace with India.
Jonah, that question could easily be turned on its head: suppose such a scenario eventuated, and Pakistan responsed with the use of tactical nuclear weapons against elements of the invasion force. Now, at this point, would this justify India starting a strategic-level nuclear exchange with Pakistan? Surely you say no, because just as in the question you posed, a coldly rational evaluation of this escalation points towards it being worse for the Indian population.
Ultimately you must appreciate that nuclear deterrence does not rely on the assumption that the nations involved will engage in only rational and proportionate use of nuclear weapons – it relies instead of the threat of overwhelming force, even if such a response would be irrational. Perimetr is the salient example.
Try to stop the wars, if possible; but don’t try to regulate those, because that’s impossible.
By the way, it’s sounds good to hear something like that from a Westerners as an Indian — a civilization, which has never invaded any other nation so far historically.
Our Tolerance is our main problem — aggression is not and is responsible for the destruction of our civilization mainly. Today’s Pakistan(East or West) is also a proof of that.
So, please, don’t try to teach us on that matter at least.
Two good responses.
kme, Yes, an Indian full-scale strategic nuclear response to Pakistani tactical nukes would be both immoral and imprudent for India. India should think up and declare more proportional and prudent responses. Declaring full-scale nuclear retaliation against any and all Pakistani nuke use gives both India and Pakistan (out of fear) to try to pre-empt each other, if tactical nukes ever get used.
I agree, strictly as a factual matter, that much of what passes for nuclear “strategy” involves irrational, unjust, and disproportionate threats of incredible devastation. These threats are akin to, “If you rape my daughter, I will not only kill you, I will kill your family, and your cousins too.” I do not agree that such disproportionate threats are either necessary or just for purposes of deterrence.
N.C., I agree we should prevent wars, if possible. The actual practice of war can be regulated (e.g., chemical weapons ban, Geneva convention rules of war). What I proposed above, though, is a rational rethink of nuclear policy, not a regulation.
Before 1947, Pakistan and India had a common history. The main difference I see is that unlucky Pakistan was ruled by military dictators while lucky India was ruled by elected civilians.
George, the big problem for the Indian military & political decision makers is that terrorists keep attacking targets in India, often with the active support & encouragement of the Pakistani establishment, while operating under Pakistan’s nuclear umbrella. There are 2 ways to deal with such attacks – Pakistan itself cracks down on all terrorists operating within its borders. This has not happened in the last ten years, and is unlikely to happen in the future. The other is that India attacks the terrorist bases in Pakistan to take out their leadership and infrastucture – and the army ensures that the scale of the attack is small enough to not encourage a Pakistan nuclear response. That is the purpose of Cold Start – and not to embarass Pakistan, which is pointless (did you see any reduction in Pakistani support for Taliban, after they were “embarassed” by the OBL assassination?).
Gaurab –
I understand India’s position on Pakistan’s hosting the various militant groups that keep committing atrocities in India, and them effectively operating under Pakistan’s nuclear shield.
This is a real problem, one in which India is the aggrieved party, and India is in the moral right. It is not launching indiscriminate attacks in Pakistan or encouraging terrorist groups to do so.
I understand that the idea behind Cold Start was to do such a limited attack. I even agree with the concept, at the conceptual level.
At the practical level, that much force is not discernable from an all-out invasion from the Pakistani perspective.
The United States has had variations on this problem for some decades. We established two distinct behavior patterns – for minor provocations (state supported terrorist incident, etc), we bombed (aircraft, cruise missiles, rarely with naval gunfire). We did not threaten state enemies with US ground forces for minor provocations.
For major provocations, such as invasion of a US ally, or 9/11, or an evident (if mistaken assumption) nuclear proliferation program where there really needed not to be one, we telegraph clearly that US ground forces are coming, and build up to it over time, and then go in.
We have not had to use either against a nuclear weapons power. The Pakistan / India situation is not directly analagous. However, five or ten cruise missiles arriving over Pakistan airspace and detonating on various terrorist camps is not going to be mistaken for an invasion to topple the Pakistani state (though, it needs to be somewhat careful to not be misinterpreted as a nuclear decapitation strike). Cold Start can easily be misinterpreted as an attempt to invade and defeat the Pakistani government.
I am not suggesting you do nothing. And I am not going to insist that Cold Start be replaced exactly and precisely by a cruise missile strike or airstrike. However, if your goal is punishment without escalating with an apparent invasion to topple the regime, something more like the latter seems like a better idea.
That this discussion is happening at all indicates some exceptionally complex and dangerous issues with Pakistan’s interactions with the rest of the world. Which should worry everyone. That said, they are what they are, and I don’t think that it’s time to escalate that problem by topping that government. And it’s certainly unwise to scare that government into thinking it’s about to be toppled, as they’re afraid of that and have nukes and some will to use them.
George, this latest post is beginning to look more like a possible solution for India. Finding a way to use limited cruise missiles, special commando forces, or something else clearly limited, to attack terrorists in Pakistan seems a better way for India than trying to attack with an invasion force as “punishment”.
My understanding is that neither India nor Pakistan (unlike U.S. and Russia) have early warning systems connected up with nuclear launch systems. Hence, a conventional cruise missile attack on limited, clearly not nuclear or command-and-control targets, would not semi-automatically precipitate a nuclear war. It might cause other problems, but not that problem.
To generalize – this is part of why I hate so much reliance on Deterrence in the wider view.
In most cases it’s not as visible, but tremendous gaps in relative appreciation of the risks and situation exist in other areas, and have led to wars in the past.
Anatol Lieven has argued quote – ” The war in Afghanistan is a temporary U.S. interest, in which the chief concern is not the reality of victory or defeat as such (if only because neither can be clearly defined) but preserving some appearance of success in order to avoid the damage to American military prestige that would result from obvious failure. By contrast, preserving the Pakistani state and containing the terrorist threat to the West from Pakistan is a permanent vital interest not only of the U.S. military and political establishments but of every American citizen.” – unquote.
Mr Saran needs to understand that Pakistan is Britain’s and America’s problem, not India’s, which will make his life a lot easier.
–For some reason, I’m imagining this: show me a chart contrasting what things have usually been kept secret from the public in Pakistan, versus what things have usually been kept secret from the public in India.
—If something is made transparent, something that formerly had been hidden from the public, that would be like switching from a privately-run power grid, run at a profit for the benefit of stockholders, to a publically run power grid, run for the benefit of a whole country, with multiple people groups of people having a hand in the decisions.
—For some reason, I’m thinking of an Island in Canada. It is owned by the coast guard service, which runs a light house, and a heard of feral horses. One reason why the island is still the Coast Gaurds responsibility, is because if it becomes the Canadian parks service responisbility, the parks service might have to kill or remove the horses. The Canadian Coast gaurd has already made decisions to cull the horses, in the past. But currently, the horses are *not* the responsibility of of the Parks Services.
http://www.truenorthfineimages.com/sable-island-expedition-august-10-2009/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=sable-island-expedition-august-10-2009
—This is the article about Sable Island, Canada.
Your position here seems to be similar to that of Shyam Saran. He has made the case for more openness on strategic programs. Speaking only for India, this is a goal that needs to be achieved for all liberal democracies.
–Note: an article on Wikipedia says that Sable Island has been the responsibility of the Canadian parks service since 2011. I still stand by the basic point that if something goes from being “held” by one group that is not responsible to public scrutiny, to another group which is responisible to public scrutiny, the decision making process is very different.
The key problem that Mr. Saran is trying to deal with is that India’s nuclear deterrent does not seem to deter Pakistan’s support for terrorism in India. Unfortunately, I doubt if a lot of scary words are going to change this much. Most of what he said was already part of India’s 2003 nuclear doctrine, especially the key point about massive retaliation to any Pakistani nuclear use. But the Indian government has also disowned ‘Cold Start’, the conventional war doctrine that was supposedly designed to punish further Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in India. Obviously, mixed messages, the bane of deterrence efforts.
Rajesh writes in part:
“But the Indian government has also disowned ‘Cold Start’, the conventional war doctrine that was supposedly designed to punish further Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in India. Obviously, mixed messages, the bane of deterrence efforts.”
I have heard mixed messages on Cold Start from Indian military reports over the last year.
Regarding it specifically, one has to assume that Pakistan’s military does not currently believe the Indian military has disowned it and is really not going to carry it out. I believe they’ve seen the political comments, but as they are not entirely under the direction of their civilian government, they symmetrically won’t trust India’s Army to not maintain a “Cold Start” contingency, and India’s government not to keep the idea on a shelf for consideration in a crisis.
Sadly, this type of idea is one of the few which seems to be destabilizing both before and during a crisis.
Mixed messages, indeed…
Well, for whatever it’s worth, even the Indian Army Chief has stated that the Army does not have a Cold Start doctrine:
http://www.ndtv.com/article/wikileaks-revelations/india-has-no-cold-start-doctrine-army-chief-70159
On the other hand, India also does have a problem in figuring out how to deter Pakistan’s support for terrorism in India. Nuclear weapons cannot be allowed to become shield behind which Pakistan can support attacks such as 26/11.
Rajesh, what was Operation Vijayee Bhava if not a Cold Start practice run?
And you even ran it up near the border, with the units that would be in CS if it ran for real.
That’s from 2011, not years and years ago. And Operation Sudarshan Shakti, which was larger but at least in the South rather than up against the border.