Psycho Skirmish

PAKISTAN has announced the successful test firing of an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM), Ghauri, on April 6. This has set off alarm bells in India, both in the media and political circles. Which begs the question: should we as a country indulge in emotional tantrums just because Pakistan has done something which was anticipated.

A historical recall is merited. Pakistan had commenced building a delivery system for conventional and nuclear warheads in the mid-1980s ever since it achieved tangible nuclear weaponisation. Both Gen Mirza Aslam Beg, the then chief of army staff, and Dr Abdul Qadir Khan, father of Pakistan's nuclear programme and director, Kahuta nuclear project, have since 1988-89 repeatedly claimed on record that Pakistan is going to upgrade its nuclear and missile weapons system as a force multiplier of its defence capacities to balance India's conventional weapons superiority vis-a-vis Pakistan. No scope for surprise.

The Pakistan space research organisation has operational cooperative arrangements with its Chinese counterparts. Pakistan's weapons and defence technology acquisition programmes involve a wide range of external connections—including with China, North Korea, Japan, Germany, France, Holland and the US. After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Pakistan has also developed defence supply linkages with important East European countries like Ukraine, Poland and the Czech Republic. The point is, Pakistan has been putting in place a structured and purposive military capacity development policy for nearly two decades now. The missile capacity expansion is an important and integral part of this process.

It is well-known that Pakistan has received a steady supply of M-9 and M-11 missiles from China, along with related supporting technologies; these missiles were reincarnated as the Hatf series. Since 1989-90, Pakistan's military industrial complex at Wah has been trying to indigenise the production of this category of missiles. Gen Aslam Beg had announced in 1991 that Hatf-1 and Hatf-2 missiles had become deployable, asserting that they would constitute a response to India's Akash and Prithvi missiles. Dr Abdul Qadir Khan had also asserted at the time that Pakistan was engaged in developing an appropriate delivery system for weapons. The Hatf-1 to Hatf-4 series of missiles reportedly have a range of between 150 km and 800 km, with a payload varying from 50 kg to 350 kg.

India's advancing its missile development programme into the intermediate range, with the successful test-firing of Agni in January 1994, evoked an expected response from the Pakistanis. The then Pakistani chief of army staff, Gen Asif Nawaz Janjua, had asserted that Pakistan would develop an appropriate answer to this new Indian strategic threat. So there is really no cause for the Indian intelligentsia to feign surprise about the reported successful test-firing of the Ghauri missile.

There is an attendant emotional dimension to this test launch. There have been reports that the Pakistanis have named the missile Ghauri in response to India's Prithvi missile system. The allusion is to the historical confrontation between Prithvi Raj Chauhan and Shahbuddin Mohammad Ghori in the first quarter of 12th century when the latter defeated Chauhan and killed him. But this dramatic, indeed psychological, dimension to this strategic development ignores certain historical facts. Though Ghauri finally defeated Prithvi Raj

Chauhan, he had been defeated and captured three or four times before his final victor y. Legend has it that each time Ghauri was defeated and captured, he arrived in Chauhan's presence with a blade of grass in his mouth, claiming the status of a surrendering refugee. According to tradition, Chauhan set the invader free on each occasion before ultimately suffering defeat and death at his hands. So the attempt to underline the efficacy of Ghauri missile by historical allusion has little relevance to actual facts.

The Ghauri missile is reported to have a range of 1,500 km and a payload of 500-700 kg. Both in range and payload, the missile doesn't match the proven capacity of Agni or the shorter-range Prithvi. If the claimed range and payload of Ghauri is accurate, then most of north, central and southern India would come within the target range of the missile, depending on the location in Pakistan from which the missile is launched. We have to take note of the operational as well as strategic threat inherent in Pakistan acquiring this capacity. Compared to Ghauri, Agni has a range of 800-2,300 km and can carry a payload of 1,000 kg. The Prithvi, with its range varying from 150 km to 250 km (depending on the army and the air force versions) and a payload of around 300 kg and Akash missile systems, though of a shorter range, are now in a deployable and operational stage. So there is no need for India to develop high blood pressure about Pakistan having claimed to have launched a missile of sub-IRBM capacity, that too as an experiment rather than a technology demonstration exercise as India did.

TWO dimensions of the Indian reaction to the Ghauri test leave one somewhat bemused. Defence minister George Fernandes indulged in spontaneous sabre-rattling by stating that every corner of Pakistan is within the range of India's missile system. But boasting about India's missile capacity to Pakistan, and the world at large, is certainly not going to deter Pakistan from continuing with its missile development programme. It was Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee who articulated a more sensible response on April 8 when he said there was no cause for anxiety and India was capable of taking care of its security.

The second perplexing aspect is the mixture of self-congratulatory smugness and illogical scepticism evoked. A number of Indian experts have opined that the missile was not launched at all, that it does not exist, that Pakistan does not have the requisite propulsion fuel or technological capacity to launch such a missile, that the visuals of the launch in the electronic and print media indicate that the missile is not really an IRBM, etc.

One is in no position to make an informed judgement on these specific and minute doubts, but the fundamental governing principle of strategic planning is not only the ability to respond to anticipated challenges but also a readiness to meet unexpected contingencies. The prime minister of Pakistan has declared that an IRBM missile called Ghauri has been test-fired. The American official spokesman has confirmed the launch. The American government has appealed for restraint to both India and Pakistan in their missile development programmes in the aftermath of the launching of the missile.

Common sense dictates that we take note of and acknowledge the official statements and claims of Pakistan seriously. The various dimensions and magnitude of the threat posed by this missile can be analysed by our experts over a period of time to provide a basis for an appropriate response to the threat. But to ignore the threat on the basis of an immodest and self-centered sense of superiority and derisive scepticism is the surest way to be caught unawares.

Another point made is that Pakistan's launch of the Ghauri missile is a response to the BJP's declared intention of nuclear weaponisation and the development of Agni. That is akin to Minerva emerging out of Jupiter all of a sudden. The Pakistani missile launch necessarily required preparation over several weeks, if not months. Whatever immediate political justification may be given, the Ghauri launch is part of Pakistan's ascending assertive strategic posture in the subcontinent. India would do well to remember that threats can be neutralised only by matching strength not by technological scepticism or political bravado.