Spying On Buddha

"We anticipate orders of about half-a-dozen images of nuclear and missile facilities in India and Pakistan this week, and another half-dozen images within the next week or two," says John Pike, main analyst and webmaster at FAS. "Although SpaceImaging is an American company that must obey US export control laws, which include restrictions on export of products to some countries such as North Korea, and are legally prohibited from acquiring or selling imagery of Israel, just about anyone else can buy imagery of just about any place, if they can afford the multi-thousand dollar price of the image," adds Pike.

Indian defence officials, however, are obviously tightlipped about whether they’ve bought these images. Some even wonder how ‘reliable’ they would be. "Were I to put up a picture of an army or airforce base, and insist that the barracks actually have nuclear missiles in them...how will anyone know? Since they’re defence installations, you can’t just barge in to check...."

But the FAS, which was founded in 1945 by scientists who built the first atomic bomb and is sponsored today by nearly 50 Nobel laureates, is unlikely to risk its credibility over this. How then will such images affect national security? "Not much," says the defence ministry official. After all, "the Americans already have satellites capable of less than one-metre resolution, but they were still clueless about our N-tests..."

An mea official, however, warned that such information, if true, could be useful to terrorists and anti-national elements. He adds: "As for us, we already have a reasonably good idea of Pakistani (and Chinese) missile bases, just as they too must be aware of ours." Says Pike: "On balance, such satellite imagery improved the security of the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War; I think it has the same potential for India and Pakistan."

Air Vice Marshal Kapil Kak, deputy-director at idsa, however, thinks the comparison to the Cold War scenario is flawed. "That’s because there are more than two protagonists now. In the new world order, such an attempt must be seen as intrusive."

For Dr Brahma Chellaney, professor of security studies at the Centre for Policy Research, "the utility of such sites is decreasing fast. There’s a lot of stuff available commercially from French and American satellites. So such information on a website can’t compromise our security in any way. What’s disturbing is that western organisations are using western commercial satellites to procure such data on countries on their ‘target list’. But while information on democratic countries like India and Russia is available easily, it’s tougher in the case of nations like Israel, China, North Korea and Pakistan."

What does the FAS feel about India’s N-tests? "This was evidently a major setback for stability in the region, and a major setback on the road to controlling the nuclear danger," says Pike. Reacting to allegations that the FAS was a "CIA-watchdog group" (as described by AP reporter John Diamond soon after India’s N-tests), Dr Frank Von Hippel, Princeton University professor and director of the FAS’ nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament project, retorts: "No US government organisation has ever offered FAS funds. It’s supported by its members and by foundations. We criticise US policy in the nuclear area and bring political pressure for improvements more often than we promote it."

"I’d add that the FBI harassed at least the first generation of FAS members during the McCarthy era," says Dr Ramana V. Mani, also of Princeton University, who has written on the fallout of N-explosions, including an assessment of the consequences of such an explosion in Mumbai. Chellaney perhaps has the last word on the issue: "If these organisations are so concerned about nukes, why can’t they put up images of the American arsenal as well?"