IP: note on potential nuclear war in Kashmir

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

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From: "K. N. Cukier" <kn () cukier com>
Date: Fri, 24 May 2002 16:17:53 -0400
To: dave () farber net
Subject: note on potential nuclear war in Kashmir


Dave,

I don't want to clutter IP, go off topic to tech themes, or appear as
a hypersensitive peace-nick. But I'm extremely wary of a situation
that I think is quite important to IP's readership and the US
political and scientific communities.

There's a real chance of the first nuclear weapon detonation since
World War II happening any day now, between India and Pakistan. The
situation has been tense before, but it's at its worst now. This must
become a top priority for Washington, which has significant influence
on the situation. If Kashmir goes nuclear, it will be a foreign
policy failure of the US.

An atomic explosion will, of course, kill millions and wreak
incredible long-term environmental damage that will spill onto many
other countries throughout the region. Once the delicate, informal
pact for the non-use of atomic weapons is broken, it may usher in
other detonations by other states of even greater magnitude, or in
more populated areas -- so the use of nuclear weapons should be
deterred at all costs. It makes Kashmir a test of a much broader
problem with far higher stakes.

Of course, no one would disagree with any of this; we all want to
prevent a nuclear strike. But we've lived too long considering an
atomic detonation as an abstraction, not as a reality. (Truly
consider: the air becomes a furnace of fire, land uninhabitable for
centuries, rivers poisoned, and atmospheric havoc and soot block out
the sun as sub-zero temperatures set in -- this, to greet the
cancerous living). Ordinary development issues in the third world are
tough: Imagine a relief response after a nuclear exchange....

In the US, policy makers have their attention diverted to many other
issues that affect the security of Americans. That is obviously
essential. Yet it's vital that US policy makers, scientists, business
people and media realize how much hangs in the balance right now on
the Indian-Pakistan border, and how what happens there effects others
everywhere, including Americans at home and abroad.

There are things people can do: Put it on the mainstream US political
agenda so Washington understands it must act. A handful of US
officials know the gravity of the issue and are hard at work. But
it's not a top priority for Washington -- and must be. I'm hoping
this note might put constructive pressure on the administration to
treat the problem with the added seriousness it deserves. US
officials have a means to influence the situation and should be held
accountable if they don't act to ensure that tensions are reduced to
the point of a convention war (which although terrible, doesn't wreak
such lasting, global damage).

Below, IPers might be interested in an extremely good comment from
the International Herald Tribune earlier this month on the topic. For
an Indian anti-nuclear weapons view, I recommend Arundhati Roy's 1998
essay "The End of Imagination."

Yours,

KNC

__________

International Herald Tribune, Friday May 6, 2002

A war approaches that could kill millions
By David Ignatius

PARIS: Sometime this month, the Indian intelligence service - known
as RAW because of the initials of its more genteel official name, the
Research and Analysis Wing - will complete a report on whether
Pakistan has complied with an Indian ultimatum that it halt terrorist
infiltration into Kashmir and hand over alleged terrorists.

The Indians will doubtless report the truth, which is that President
Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, for all his good intentions, has so far
failed to meet the two demands the Indian government made last
December, after pro-Pakistani terrorists bombed the Indian Parliament.

But what will the Indian government do then? It has up to 500,000
troops poised along the 2,900-kilometer (1,800-mile) border with
Pakistan, in what experts say is the highest state of mobilization in
30 years.

With a three-to-one superiority in conventional forces, the Indians
could burst across the border and, in a matter of days or even hours,
effectively cut Pakistan in half. And many hawkish Indians will
demand military action when RAW and other security agencies issue
their reports, perhaps next week.

What would Pakistan, a state with nuclear weapons and sophisticated
missiles to deliver them, do in response to an Indian military move?

Pakistan is vague about its nuclear doctrine, so it's hard to be
sure. But many analysts fear Pakistan's missiles are targeted against
Indian cities, and that facing an Indian conventional onslaught, it
would launch a retaliatory nuclear attack on, say, New Delhi, that
would leave millions dead. India would probably retaliate with its
own nuclear weapons, probably dropped from bombers - killing millions
more.

Welcome to what a senior State Department official calls "the other
crisis." It's difficult these days to focus on anything other than
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with its grisly daily death toll.
But in this case it's essential. Because if the India-Pakistan
situation gets out of hand, the death toll could run, not to dozens,
but to tens of millions.

The Indian subcontinent is the only part of the world where nuclear
war is today a serious possibility. U.S. and European officials are
increasingly worried about what could happen there this summer. They
warn that all the ingredients are in place for a disastrous chain of
miscalculation on the order of August 1914, when overarmed European
nations blundered into World War I.

The State Department is alarmed enough that it is hurriedly sending a
senior official to India and Pakistan, probably next week. Secretary
of State Colin Powell is expected to call top officials in the two
countries to caution against miscalculation.

Intelligence reports make clear why U.S. and European officials are
so worried. Western analysts believe Musharraf doesn't have the
political clout to comply with the Indian demands. They argue, for
example, that Musharraf still doesn't fully control the Pakistani
intelligence service, the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, even
after firing its chief, General Mahmoud Ahmad, in October. The
Indians believe the agency is deeply involved in the long-running
terrorist campaign to free Kashmir from Indian control, and the list
of 20 alleged terrorists they have given to Pakistan for extradition
includes people who are reputedly close to the agency.

Musharraf cannot meet the other Indian demand, an end to Pakistani
infiltration of Kashmir. He already ordered such a halt in a widely
praised speech Jan. 12, but analysts say the flow of potential
terrorists into Kashmir has continued. Indeed, they say it has
increased in recent weeks as the Himalayan snows have begun to melt
and transit routes have opened.

It's almost inevitable that pro-Pakistani terrorists will strike
again inside India - triggering demands for retaliation by the fully
mobilized Indian forces.
Another factor worrying U.S. and European analysts is the political
weakness of India's prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Though he
has restrained Indian militants in the past, Vajpayee is in poor
health. The dominant Indian political figure now is Home Minister L.
K. Advani, a hard-liner who has no interest in making a deal with
Musharraf for outside mediation that could defuse the Kashmir time
bomb.

India has maintained its costly mobilization since January, and
analysts note that it has scheduled the rotation of troops and
equipment to keep its forces at peak levels through June and July -
when analysts fear the danger of military action will be highest.

A nuclear war between India and Pakistan would mean loss of life on a
scale the world has never before seen. The simple but unpleasant fact
for the Bush administration is that to reduce this danger, it must
play a more active diplomatic role. As in the Middle East, the United
States is the only power with enough leverage on both sides to make a
difference.

The apocalyptic scenarios may prove wrong, but the Indians and
Pakistanis will have trouble averting them on their own. This is the
real thing, Mr. President - one of those moments when history is
watching and will not forgive inaction.

Copyright © 2002 the International Herald Tribune All Rights Reserved


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