Source: DAWN - the Internet Edition, 17 May 1998 (Sunday)
India's obsession, our choice
By Eqbal Ahmad
YOUNG people to whom the future belongs are oftenright when powerful old men in khadis and suits
are not. The Japanese youth who stood the other
day holding a placard in Tokyo was absolutely
right. "Nuclear Test?", the placard asked after
three tests by India, "Are you crazy?" Then there
were five. "Gone berserk", was Pakistan Foreign
Minister's apt description.
It is well known that Indian leaders generally andthe BJP wallahs in particular are obsessed with
projecting India as a big power. They view nuclear
weapons as a permit to the club in which India
does not belong, and should not enter with a
population of half a billion illiterate and four
hundred million under-nourished citizens.
Furthermore, it is illusory to search for power
through nuclear weapons. The nature of power
changes in accordance with shifts in modes of
production, knowledge and communication. In our
time these shifts have been revolutionary. Power
has changed in ways least understood by those who
formally hold the reins of power.
Take the nuclear weapon. When first invented, itwas viewed as a weapon of war, and wantonly
dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Its development
and possession coincided with the rise of the US
as a global power, a coincidence which confirmed
it as a modern component of power. Its use also
proved that it was a weapon of total annihilation,
therefore not usable, notwithstanding the crackpot
realists like Henry Kissinger and Herman Kahn.
After the USSR tested its hydrogen bomb, it becamea weapon of terror and of deterrence against war
between two giants in a bipolar world. It also
served as an umbrella for covert, proxy warfare.
Given these facts and its association with
superpowers, in the 1950s the identification of
nuclear weapons with power was total. It was in
the interest of the United States and the USSR to
perpetuate this perception. But change has its own
inexorable logic.
Three events helped devalue nuclear weapons as acomponent of power. There were first the cases of
Cuba and Vietnam. Together, the liberation
movements of these two small nations reduced the
most awesome nuclear power, in the words of
Senator J.W. Fulbright, to "a crippled giant".
Castro's revolution succeeded and survives to this
day despite American nuclear power; in fact the
possession of nuclear weapons constricted American
ability to destroy that revolution. The Vietnamese
demonstrated that a nuclear giant can in fact be
defeated, even militarily. France offered a
negative example. It tested and inducted nuclear
weapons as a means to challenge the paramountcy of
the United States in Europe. It did not work.
A third, related reality dawned: the world waschanging in a way that for the first time in
history political economy took precedence over
military might as a component of power. In Europe
the influence of France, now a nuclear power, does
not surpass that of non-nuclear Germany.
Similarly, Japan exercises much greater influence
in the world than does China or France. South
Africa and Israel offer contrasting examples.
South Africa's prestige and influence in world
politics increased after it had renounced and
dismantled its nuclear arsenal while Israel's
considerable nuclear capability - so scandalously
tolerated and augmented by the United States - has
added not a bit to its influence or security in
the Middle East or beyond. That in 1998 India's
leaders still view the possession of nuclear
weapons as a necessary element to gain recognition
as a world power, speaks volumes about their
intellectual poverty and mediocre, bureaucratic
outlook.
In effect, these five tests may set back India'sambitions. As any politician and gang leader
knows, power grows from the neighbourhood. A
country that does not command influence and
authority in its own region cannot claim the
status of a world power. India's standing with its
neighbours, already low, will not now sink
further. It tested a fusion bomb which
demonstrated thermonuclear capability, then went
on to test its ability to produce tactical
weapons. This cannot but raise the anxiety of
India's non-nuclear neighbours while contributing
little to its military balance with China or
Pakistan.
Similarly, while the tests may be psychologicallysatisfying or politically beneficial to the BJP's
insecure leaders, the material losses to India may
be greater than they surmise. India was expected
in the coming years to achieve a growth rate of 7
per cent. If the international sanctions,
including technology transfers, are half as severe
as Japan and the US are threatening, this may be
in jeopardy. Lastly, with these tests Delhi may
have put India in the fast lane of the arms race.
A third world country can crash more easily in
such a race that the second world power did.
What then should Pakistan do? My advice is: do notpanic, and do not behave reactively. This
translates as: do not listen to people like Qazi
Husain Ahmad and Benazir Bhutto who, either out of
ignorance, or more likely crass opportunism, are
advocating nuclear tests, here and now. The
arguments for steadying the jerking knee are
compelling. Consider these: One, India is
currently the focus of adverse world attention
both governmental and popular, and is likely to
remain so for a while. A Pakistani test will
immediately relieve the pressure on India and
shift it to Pakistan with consequences surely
worse for us than it would for India. Islamabad
should not take Delhi's burden upon itself.
Rather, this is time for it to mount diplomatic
initiatives and international campaigns to put
pressure on India both within SAARC and worldwide,
and reap some benefits for Pakistan's
statesman-like posture.
Two, Pakistan's objective in developing nuclearweapons are different from India's. Delhi's
nuclear programme has been linked to the quest,
however misguided, for power. Islamabad's is
related to security. What Pakistan has sought is a
shield against India's nuclear power. That
requires the achievement of sufficient deterrence
which we possess by all appearances. India's five
tests do not change that reality, at least not
from what I know of strategic weaponry from a life
time of studying it. Scientists and their managers
like to test; that is what they do. The question
we need ask is: Are we less defence capable today
than a week ago? I don't think any honest person
can answer in the affirmative.
Three, one major risk Pakistan runs is to getdrawn into an arms race with India, a country with
far superior resources than ours. There is
evidence to suggest that India would like us to do
just that. But we shall be getting into the wrong
lane. The development of strategic armaments is an
expensive business which carries little Keynesian
logic. In other words, while it costs a lot the
economic multiplier is negligible. The reasons are
that the development and production of strategic
weaponry is a capital intensive and largely secret
activity which means that it rarely yields either
the economic multiplier or the technological spin
off. It is thus that the Soviet Union and its
satellites such as Poland and Czechoslovakia
became highly sophisticated arms producers, but
remained very underdeveloped economically. As a
consequence, their states and societies grew
dis-organically and eventually collapsed. For
Pakistan to avoid that fate, it must resist
falling into the trap of seeking strategic
equivalence with India. Our requirement is
effective deterrence not equivalence. Deterrence
demands fewer shifts in strategic planning and
weaponry, providing a more stable environment for
economic growth.
Finally, the most basic problems facing Pakistantoday are economic and social. It is not an
exaggeration to say that our future depends on how
well we confront the challenges of economic
slow-down and social fragmentation. Both are
expressions of fundamental structural crises of
our state and society, and neither is susceptible
to simple crisis-management. In an environment
such as this Pakistan is considerably more
vulnerable to international sanctions than India
which, whatever its other weaknesses, has been and
remains less dependent on foreign aid, loans and
technology transfers than we are. For these
reasons and more, it is much better for Islamabad
to stay cool, calculating, and utilizing the
opportunities Delhi has presented. May reason
prevail!
© DAWN Group of Newspapers, 1998