New Meanings for Old Words
by M. V. Ramana
India's now famous linkage between nuclear testing and the birthday ofthe great apostle of peace, Gautama Buddha, reflects not only
political crassness but also a propensity to find hypocritical
interpretations for noble sentiments. Indulging in such double-speak
is just another affirmation of India having internalized the forms of
thinking and expression prevalent in the gang of nations that lead the
way in terrorizing the world with their military arsenals - i.e. the
nuclear weapon states.
When speaking of nuclear matters, if there is one phrase Indianofficials use more often than nuclear weapons, it must be nuclear
disarmament. India had a time-bound plan for nuclear disarmament, the
CTBT did not lead to nuclear disarmament, and everything we were doing
was to promote nuclear disarmament. Logically, therefore, in the full
official press statement following the tests, a statement like "India
remains committed to a speedy process of nuclear disarmament" had to
be included. It was. Two days later two more tests were
conducted. Evidently the Indian government thinks that commitment to
nuclear disarmament means conducting nuclear explosions at a speedy
pace.
Soon after these tests, Prime Minister Vajpayee announced that Indiahad declared itself a Nuclear Weapon State (with a big bomb). This was
a rare moment of truth, though for many of us an unpleasant one. Now,
thankfully, analysts in the United States can stop coming up with new
adjectives to describe India's status: threshold nuclear state,
de-facto nuclear weapon state, nuclear-capable state, and so on. At
the rate at which things are going, the day may not be far away when
these terms are not applied to Pakistan either.
However, Vajpayee followed this statement with a new interpretation ofthe role of Nuclear Weapons in international affairs. He said, "ours
will never be weapons of aggression." This is a complete perversion of
history. Nuclear Weapons are quintessentially weapons of genocide. The
"big bomb" that India now has can kill, in a matter of instants,
hundreds of thousands of people, and many more in the years that
follow. No State invests huge amounts of resources to produce them if
it never plans to use them. The question is not whether they are used
first or in response to some one else's use. In either case, an act of
aggression - killing innocent civilians - will be conducted. And, the
Prime Minister's statement the following day - that India will not
hesitate to use nuclear weapons if its defences were threatened -
makes it amply clear that these bombs are intended for use.
By going on from one momentous decision to the next at breathtakingspeed, the BJP government has also given us a new definition of
democracy. The history of a nation of nearly a billion people, and in
all likelihood the histories of the neighbouring nations as well, has
been changed by decisions made literally by a handful of people. Plans
for the test are believed to have been known only to the Prime
Minister, the defence minister George Fernandes, principal secretary
to Prime Minister, Brajesh Mishra, political adviser Pramod Mahajan,
scientific adviser to Prime Minister A P J Abdul Kalam, and Atomic
Energy Commission chief R Chidambaram. This follows well in the
tradition of the 1974 test. Then the decision to test was believed to
be known only to Mrs. Indira Gandhi, her principal secretary P N
Haksar, secretary P N Dhar, B D Nag Choudhury, Atomic Energy
Commission chief H N Sethna, and Raja Ramanna, leader of the team of
scientists that carried out the test at Pokhran.
The BJP is, of course, a past master in the art of redefiningwords. No one could have forgotten how the party, by forcefully
demolishing the Babri Masjid, found new interpretations for secularism
and communal harmony. Not to be outdone in this pursuit are the
various other political parties that have had an equal hand in
determining India's nuclear posture. As is now amply clear, the
assertions by the Congress Government in 1995 that they were not
planning any nuclear test were simply false. Now we also know the real
meaning of the Gujral doctrine. The former Prime Minister himself
admitted slyly that test preparations had been going on during his
tenure with the statement, "You can make out whatever you want to know
from the fact that a nuclear test cannot be done overnight."
By and large, opposition parties have stuck to mealy-mouthed responsesand trying to protect their own patriotic credentials by
congratulating our scientists profusely. At best they have questioned
the timing of the tests and the right of a minority government to take
this decision. These are valid questions indeed. But, they stop way
short of any comment, critical or otherwise, about the tests
themselves. This is not surprising. During the CTBT debate, they were
falling over one another in defending India's nuclear option against
"western treaties". Having done that they have boxed themselves into a
corner, where they could not really question the tests in any
meaningful manner.
The scientific establishment, particularly the Department of AtomicEnergy, by testing a range of sophisticated weaponry has shown that
our "peaceful nuclear program" has been busy reinventing the meaning
of the adjective peaceful. Once again, we have to be thankful that
they did not further denigrate that term by calling these tests
peaceful nuclear explosions.
There is another sense in which declaring India a nuclear weapon statemay reflect an uncomfortable truth. The current five nuclear weapon
states have been the biggest bullies around. They have used their
nuclear weapons on numerous occasions, not by dropping it but by
threatening to drop them on those opposing their will. The US, of
course, leads the pack both in terms of the number of threats it has
issued, and by its heinous attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. By its
repeated demands to be recognized as a great power, and making it
clear that by power it meant the kind of power that the five nuclear
weapon states have (and not for example, the kind of monetary power
that Japan and Germany have), India has also shown its own desire for
this role.
The nuclear weapon states, of course, do not want to have India jointheir club. They argue, quite hypocritically, that they, and they
alone, have a need for (and a right to) these genocidal weapons. It is
sad that when faced with this hypocrisy, India has decided to join
them rather than fight them. By taking the high moral road of
abstinence, or now, renunciation, it could lead the way to a nuclear
weapon free world. The chances of that, unfortunately, are low.