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On the Verge of a New Nuclear Age
Achin Vanaik
The Hindu, 17 June 2000
THE SIGNS are ominous. We may well be on the verge of a second nuclear age. Of course, those who have
supported India going nuclear will find it awkward to accept this painful reality because they have every interest in
denying that there was an important interregnum between the first nuclear age and the possible new one. To
acknowledge that a period of serious advance in nuclear arms restraint and reductions actually emerged after the
end of the Cold War and lasted (though with decreasing momentum) till today would then highlight the serious
damage done by Pokhran-II and Chagai, when all self-righteous and patriotic Indians should know that India was
in part 'provoked' to go nuclear for the supposed lack of progress in moving towards greater nuclear restraint and
disarmament!
Be that as it may, the stark reality is that if the line is not held on the question of the US National Missile Defence
(NMD), the post-Cold War 'window of opportunity' will then close completely. The outcome of the Putin-Clinton
summit is cause more for gloom than joy on this score. On the face of it, the Russians have held firm in opposing
any amendment of the ABM Treaty to allow the US to go ahead with a limited 'son of star wars' programme.
But these are only the opening gambits in what will prove long-drawn out negotiations, in which the Russians will
have little bargaining power if the US is determined to push ahead. Mr. Bill Clinton is still to order deployment of
a limited NMD system. The Russian opposition to amending the ABM Treaty as well as the inadequacy of tests so
far to establish the technological readiness of the proposed system may just about combine to get a postponement
of the deployment decision till next year and the taking over of the new administration. But this is not certain.
However, Mr. Putin has already conceded much ground. First, he acknowledged the validity of the motive for the
proposed American shield. He accepted that there was a meaningful threat from so- called rouge states. This is an
absurdity. Even in the best of circumstances, Iran, Iraq and North Korea are some 15 years away from
developing warhead missiles with the ability to reach the US mainland. Even then to believe that a feeble and
rudimentary system (which is all that these countries will ever be able to achieve) nonetheless represents a serious
threat to the US is ludicrous. Apparently, the great US nuclear might is not able to deter the leaders of countries
like these so-called rogue states. By agreeing that the threat from such states is serious enough for the US to be
concerned, Russia itself is acknowledging the fragility of deterrence as the presumed bedrock of nuclear strategic
thinking. This implicitly legitimises the US search for some kind of nuclear shield.
Second, Mr. Putin has proposed some kind of sharing arrangement between the North Atlantic Treaty
Organisation and Russia in regard to a future missile defence system. If, on the one hand, this offer is meant to
reinforce European fears that a US NMD, which can only cover the American mainland, will leave them out in
the cold, on the other, it is also a way of trying to recruit European support for both of them sheltering under a
similar US created (via NATO) shield. Thus, Mr. Putin is trying to buy some form of Russian security in the
future, not by adamantly opposing the very principle of building such missile shields but by hedging his bets in the
face of a possible future construction of some such shields. This is already a form of defensive diplomacy not at all
confident of holding the line against the US on the NMD issue.
We therefore come to the crux of the issue. Why should a limited missile shield be such a source of worry? How
can it be stopped if the Russians are not relied upon to hold the line? From once seeing the ABM as the lynchpin
of strategic nuclear stability worldwide and therefore something that should not be tampered with, the Democrats
have now accepted the unilateral premises of Republican strategic thinking concerning how best to enhance
American security, and differ only in the degree or extent to which they want to follow through on the preparations
that must then be made. To put it another way, now that the US stands unrivalled in the 'game of nations', it is
seeking unilateral measures of 'protecting' itself regardless of what fears or insecurities this may arouse in other
countries. After all, today what can Russia do? It doesn't even have the capacity to maintain the kind of strike
force that is allowed to it under START-II.
This supposedly limited nuclear shield envisages the building eventually of around 250 interceptors, more than
enough to cope with, for example, China's force of some 20 land-based missiles with the range to hit the US.
Moreover, after a US first strike, China's remaining survivable retaliatory force could easily be taken care of even
by a shield which works only at 50 per cent or less reliability. China would then have no choice but to go in for a
major expansion of long-range missiles, develop a submarine force with strategic missiles (which it doesn't have as
yet), put multiple warheads on single missiles (which would be a serious setback to efforts at reducing warheads
and improving strategic stability) and go in for a host of countermeasures to overwhelm any shield that is
constructed. Some of the knock-on effects of any such Chinese reaction would be on India and Pakistan, with the
former trying to establish an ever-moving and rising 'minimum credible deterrent' against China and the latter doing
the same against India. Perhaps we can simply place our hopes in the great wisdom of our pro-nuclear experts
who have been telling us incessantly since Pokhran-II that we need not fear any danger of ever being involved in
any kind of competitive nuclear arms race.
If anyone seeks to take solace from the fact that a limited shield will not adequately protect the US from nuclear
retaliation and therefore its technical inadequacy will eventually put paid to it, then he is mistaken. The voices
demanding a multi-layered, fullfledged Star Wars programme of the type envisioned by Mr. Reagan are stronger
and will certainly get stronger once a limited programme is conceded. In fact, there is a powerful group of
Republican Senators backed by many in the weapons labs and defence services which does not just want the
amendment of the ABM Treaty but its complete scrapping. Behind this call lies another aim shared for the moment
by only some (but very powerful) circles in the US which want command of space itself as the new and crucial
theatre of world dominance and see the Star Wars programme as the way to prepare all relevant technologies for
eventually achieving this.
The pressures that can stop this frightening trajectory towards a US NMD come from neither China nor Russia.
They will have to come from within the US through mobilisation of public constituencies that the saner voices
against such scrapping and even amending the ABM Treaty (and they do exist in the government and outside) can
batten on to strengthen their case. Other pressures will have to come from US allies in Europe and the NATO,
most of which are deeply uneasy about the NMD. India, of course, for all its supposedly new-found
self-importance through acquisition of nuclear weapons counts for absolutely nothing in the effort to stop the
NMD. If anything, by setting an example for further nuclear proliferation it has strengthened the hands of the
pro-NMD lobby. India can only passively accept the logic that a new nuclear age will impose on it. But
reassurance is at hand. How can we forget that we were also told that Indian nuclearisation would actually help to
promote worldwide nuclear disarmament!
Copyright 2000 The Hindu
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