The National Security Doctrine

Any national security doctrine (NSD) of India has to cater to the possibility of threats from twosources--- China and Pakistan.

The threat from China was rated high till 1988 because of the unresolved border dispute between the twocountries, the clandestine military and nuclear assistance given by the Chinese Government to the PakistaniArmed Forces in order to keep the Indian Security Forces preoccupied on two fronts and the support extended bythe Chinese intelligence agencies to the tribal insurgent groups of India's North-East.  The borderdispute had led to a war between the two countries in 1962.  Between 1967 and 1979, many of theseinsurgent groups went to Yunnan in China vis North Burma and were trained and armed by the Chineseintelligence.

The visit of Rajiv Gandhi, the then Indian Prime Minister, to China in 1988 and his meeting with DengXiao-peng set in motion the process of improving the bilateral relations.  In 1988 and thereafter, thetwo countries agreed on a number of confidence-building measures, set up a  joint working group todiscuss the border problem on a sustained basis and  decided not to let the pending border dispute comein the way of an improvement in the relations in the economic, cultural and other fields. The Chineseintelligence, which had already started reducing its clandestine assistance to the tribal insurgent groupsfrom 1979, totally stopped it after 1988.

Despite this, China continues to pre-occupy the attention of India's national security managers due to thefollowing reasons:
 

• The very slow progress of the talks on the border issue giving rise to misgivings that it probably wantsto keep this issue alive till it has totally pacified Tibet to its satisfaction.  Though there is no moreunrest in Tibet, which has been developing economically, the Dalai Lama still enjoys a large followingthere. 
  
  The Chinese are determined that when the present Dalai Lama dies, his successor would be a man of theirchoice. They apprehend that this could give rise to serious unrest, which could be exploited by the Tibetandiaspora in India and elsewhere. By keeping the border issue alive, China wants to retain a pressure pointwhich it can exploit should India show reluctance to keep the Tibetan refugees under control.  
  
  In national security matters, the Chinese, unlike the Indians, work on a long-term basis and try to developtoday options which they may need years hence should circumstances so warrant.
  
  
• China's continued clandestine assistance to Pakistan in the military nuclear field and in the acquisitionof a missile-based delivery capability.  Even as Beijing was entering into an agreement with Rajiv Gandhion improving bilateral relations, it was secretly entering an agreement with Islamabad for assistance in themissile field.
  
  
• China's decision in 2001 to assist Pakistan in the construction of the Gwadar port on the Balochistancoast, which would reduce Pakistan's present dependence on the Karachi port, which is within easy reach of theIndian Navy, and give the Pakistani Navy a greater operational flexibility.

• Pakistan's inability to reconcile itself to the loss of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) and its obsessiveurge to gain control of this territory by hook or by crook.
  
  
• Its equally obsessive urge to avenge its defeat at the hands of India in 1971 and its loss of the thenEast Pakistan.
  
  
• The predominant role of the revenge-seeking Pakistani Army in its national security management, withpractically no role for an elected political leadership in this matter.
  
  
• Its refusal to work for a reduction of tension and for the improvement of relations in other fields till anegotiated solution could be found to the Kashmir question.
  
  
• The complexes and the feelings of insecurity from which the Pakistan Army suffers vis-a-vis its Indiancounterpart.
  
  
• The role of the pan-Islamic extremist elements in moulding perceptions towards India, whether in the civilsociety or in the national security apparatus.

Its 1971 defeat at the hands of India brought home to Pakistan the ground reality that it could never hope toachieve its territorial objective through a conventional war on India.  It, therefore, embarked upon apolicy of waging a proxy war through the use of terrorism as a weapon against the Indian State. Pakistan hadbeen using terrorism against the Indian State since 1956 when the Naga insurgency broke out. Whereas its useof terrorism against India before 1971 was a defensive measure to keep the Indian Security Forces preoccupiedwith internal security duties so that they could not pose a threat to it, its use after 1971 was an aggressivemeasure having the dual objective of continuing to keep the Indian Security Forces bleeding and preoccupied with internal security duties and achieving its strategic objective of annexing J&K withoutthe direct use of its Army in a conventional war.

Till Pakistan achieved a military nuclear capability in the late 1980s, which was subsequently openlydemonstrated in the Chagai nuclear tests of 1998, it kept its proxy war restricted to the training and armingof Indian separatist groups, whether in Punjab or J&K, which had taken to arms against the Govt. of Indiadue to various grievances.  The acquisition of the military nuclear capability made the Pakistanimilitary leadership conclude that the possibility of an Indian-imposed  conventional war in retaliationfor its proxy war had been reduced considerably, if not largely eliminated, and hence it could furtherescalate its proxy war by training, arming and infiltrating into India its own nationals under the guise ofjihadi volunteers from different pan-Islamic organisations to intensify the jihad against India.  Till1995, the role of these mercenaries was largely confined to J&K, but since then Pakistan's Inter-ServicesIntelligence (ISI) has been using them in other parts of India too.

Pakistan looks upon its nuclear arsenal and its missile delivery capability not as a weapon of deterrenceto deter India from using its nuclear capability against it, but as a weapon of intimidation to prevent Indiafrom retaliating against it through its armed forces for its proxy war and as a weapon of psychologicalpressure by creating fears of a possible nuclear holocaust and thereby moving the rest of the world,particularly the US, to exercise pressure on India on the J&K issue. Its consistent refusal to subscribeto the no first use of nuclear weapons declaration and its repeated reiteration of its readiness to make firstuse of its nuclear weapons to prevent the Indian Army from over-running its large cities and crushing its Armyare part of its intimidatory tactics.

The nuclear threat from Pakistan is compounded by the presence of pan-Islamic jihadi elements which justifythe use of the weapons of mass destruction to protect Islam, if necessary. The possibility of thenuclearisation of terrorism originating from the terrorist hub of Pakistan is a matter of great concern notonly to India, but also to the international community as a whole, confronted with the threat of pan-Islamicjihadi terrorism.

Since Gen. Pervez Musharraf seized power on October 12,1999,Pakistan has embarked on a policy of over-projecting its nuclear and missile capability in order to reassure its own population of the adequacy ofits  capability and to intimidate India and prevent a retaliatory conventional strike against its proxywar.

The objectives of India's NSD vis-a-vis China are two-fold and simple:
 

• How to prevent a repeat of  1962, by maintaining an adequate level of conventional militarycapability to deter any Chinese temptation to enforce its territorial claims against India by force?
  
  
• How to maintain a credible nucleat  deterrent against it?

• How to find a controlled retaliatory response to Pakistan's proxy war without allowing the response todegenerate into a war involving the use of nuclear weapons?
  
  
• How to neutralise  the Pakistani attempts to intimidate and demoralise the Indian population throughover-projection of its nuclear and missile capability and irresponsible nuclear rhetoric?
  
  
• Whereas any war with China will most probably be fought in Indian territory, any war with Pakistan will bein Pakistani territory. How to prevent India's overwhelming conventional superiority from pressing the panicbutton in Pakistan's military leadership and triggering off a nuclear response ?
  
  
• How to achieve India's military objectives in the shortest  time possible before internationalintervention comes in the way of the further conduct of the war?

• Greater transparency about India's nuclear and missile capabilities to reassure our own population and tohave a sobering effect on Pakistan's adventurist Generals.
  
  
• A public announcement of India's nuclear command and control mechanism.
  
  
• Discarding India's no first use of nuclear weapons policy.
  
  
•  India's readiness and ability to fight a  limited conventional war without allowing it toescalate into a nuclear confrontation.
  
  
• A counter-terrorism doctrine to exploit Pakistan's vulnerabilities through covert action to make it pay anincreasingly prohibitive price for its proxy war.
  
  
• Co-operative action through other concerned powers to prevent Pakistan's weapons of mass destructioncapabilities from falling into the hands of its terrorists.

However, the nuclear doctrine by itself will not complete the national security doctrine unless it issupplemented by a counter-terrorism doctrine to enable India exercise its right of active defence against thePakistani use of terrorism as a weapon to achieve its strategic objectives.  Such a doctrine should havea mix of carefully-controlled overt and extensive, sustained and deniable covert actions. The nationalsecurity managers should now devote themselves to this task.  It brooks no delay. 

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, and, presently,Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai)