The various connectivity projects put forward by India show its involvement as an investor in capacity-building efforts in the recipient countries across sectors of their particular needs and choices, not as an overarching and imposing economic power.
The Joint declaration on the Asia-Africa-Growth-Corridor (AAGC) or the ‘Freedom’ Corridor issued at the 52nd annual meeting of the African Development Bank in May 2017 and its subsequent reiteration in the India-Japan Joint Statement during the Japanese Prime Minister’s September 2017 visit to India marked a decisive step in the promotion of connectivity as one of the strategic dimensions of India’s foreign policy. The AAGC Vision Document states that the initiative will concentrate on development and cooperation; infrastructure and digital and institutional connectivity; skill development; and establishment of people-to-people contact between Africa, South Asia, East and South-East Asia, and Oceania.
There has been a global trend towards fostering greater economic connectivity among states and regions. This is in consonance with changing global realities – when international interactions veer between antagonistic to cooperative in a scenario of a ‘multiplex world order’, a world of diversity and complexity, not homogeneity, and a world where, in place of unipolarity, the ‘rise of the rest’ is becoming a distinct possibility. In such a scenario, connectivity offers a nuanced economic-strategic approach for global interactions. This article attempts to analyse India’s involvement in global connectivity endeavours and the way in which it will potentially shape India’s strategic goals.
The Context
The economic, political, cultural, and strategic importance of connectivity projects have been in the global reckoning since the collapse of the USSR in 1991 and the initiation of an array of projects under the identical name of ‘Silk Road’ to revive and re-present the ancient Silk Road in newer versions in Eurasia. The first such initiative was the European Union-sponsored trade and transport corridor Project TRACECA in 1993. It was followed by the West-sponsored Baku-Tbilisi Ceyhan energy Project; the EU-sponsored integrated energy pipelines Project of ‘Southern Corridor’; the NATO-sponsored ‘Virtual Silk Highway’ Project to connect European scientific-educational networks with Eurasia through the internet; UNESCAP’s Trans-Asian Railway Network (or the Iron Silk Road) Project; the CAREC-ADB Project on trade and transport corridors in Afghanistan and Central Asia; the New Eurasian Land Transport Initiative by the International Road Transport Union; the US- sponsored New Silk Road Initiative (NSRI) and the project to transform the NATO-sponsored NDN (Northern Distribution Network) system across Europe to reach non-lethal supplies to Afghanistan into permanent transport corridors across Eurasia. Interestingly, the One Belt One Road is the new version of China’s earlier Silk Road initiatives in Eurasia – an extension of the New Eurasian Continental Bridge Project and the ‘Look West’ Silk Road Development strategy to build energy pipelines connecting China with Central and West Asia.
India was not a part of this revival of Silk Road connectivity programmes in Eurasia though it possesses unique geo-cultural leverages. A number of routes (like Tibet route, Ladakh Route, Gilgit route, Srinagar route, Burma route, etc.) of the ancient Silk Road went through India to reach Persia and Central Asia. In addition to trade in goods, Buddhist ideas were spread from India to Tibet, China, Afghanistan and Central Asia through these routes. In this regard, it is to be noted that in the year 2010, the Archaeological Survey of India applied to UNESCO for the inclusion of 12 Silk Road sites in India in the UN World Heritage List.
But it is also important to note that in the year 2000 India initiated, along with Iran and Russia, the International North-South Corridor – the multi-modal transnational transport network that plans to connect Mumbai with Helsinki through Iran, Russia and Central Asia, and in the process reduce the current transportation time by 10 to 12 days. In addition to India, Iran and Russia, 11 other countries are members of this initiative: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Turkey, Oman and Syria. It was a significant first step for India to enter into the global strategic space of connectivity through an ambitious trade and transport corridor to connect Europe with India, bypassing the traditional route through the Suez Canal.
Further, in the year 2002, India initiated another important connectivity corridor to the East in the form of the India-Myanmar-Thailand Highway project. Now slated to be extended to Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam, this project is called the East-West Economic Corridor. This corridor, along with the India-Myanmar Kaladan multimodal transit transport project, seeks to transform the inter-regional connectivity scenario and aims to provide greater economic viability to the India-ASEAN strategic partnership.
Recent Focus
The current trend in India’s foreign policy approach suggests a more coordinated effort to treat connectivity as a strategy in the regional, inter-regional and global arenas. India initiated the Bangladesh-Bhutan-India-Nepal Motor Vehicles Agreement in 2015 in the South Asian region. And it has stretched the arena of South Asian connectivity into space by launching the first SAARC Satellite in 2017. This latter project will also benefit ASEAN countries as well given that a ground station is located in Vietnam. Further, the recently launched India-Afghanistan air corridor not only provides Afghanistan a direct connectivity route to tap the vast Indian consumer market but also at the same time boost India’s long-term efforts in facilitating Afghanistan’s comprehensive economic reconstruction process.
The trilateral India-Iran-Afghanistan trade and transport corridor project centred round the Iranian port of Chabahar can also become a potential game-changer in the inter-regional strategic matrix of Central and South Asia. India is planning to build a rail route network to connect Chabahar with Zahedan and link it to the Zaranj-Delaram road network (also built by India) in Afghanistan. This will connect India directly to Afghanistan and Central Asia, while offering landlocked Afghanistan, and eventually Central Asia, an alternate route to the Indian Ocean. This project would acquire greater geo-economic and strategic significance if developed as another wing of the INSTC network. Notably, Japan is keen to invest in the Chabahar project, in partnership with India, which will provide a stronger foundation in terms of technology and investment.
It is worth noting that in the 1990s Zbigniew Brzezinski had suggested that the US concentrate on Eurasia since it was imperative to engage in the purposive manipulation of geostrategically dynamic states that have the potential to exert power or influence beyond their borders and thus alter the existing status quo to a degree that affects US interests adversely. Brzezinski identified five such states: France, Germany, Russia, China and India.1 This view gains significance in the contemporary context in a somewhat altered manner, as the recent US announcement suggests that India will be an important partner not only in the revival of the 2011 plan of the-then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for the New Silk Road project involving Afghanistan and its neighbours but also for the Indo-Pacific Economic corridor linking South Asia with South-East Asia. A substantive financial allocation has been made in the 2017 US budget for these two programmes. This US acknowledgement that partnership with India has the potential to connect a wide regional space and facilitate inter-linked development in a comprehensive and positive manner signify India’s growing importance in providing an alternative option in the global strategic spectrum of connectivity.
Apart from Japan and the US, India is also planning to work with Russia to connect South Asia with North-East Asia and the Pacific region through the ‘Chennai-Vladivostok’ maritime corridor, as was discussed during External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj’s visit to Vladivostok in September 2017. The planned corridor will reduce the time to transfer cargo to 24 days as against the usual 40 days through Europe. This project has the potential to provide India an opportunity to better cultivate the natural resource-rich Russian Far East while for Russia, India will be an alternate investor in that region. Greater and better connectivity will also provide a much-needed boost to Indo-Russian trade relations. At the same time, it will connect India with South-East and East Asian countries with an alternate maritime trade route and will promote India’s footsteps in the Pacific region.
Project Mausam, involving 39 countries in the Indian Ocean littoral, is being jointly sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts and the Archaeological Survey of India. It aims to re-establish communications among countries of the Indian Ocean, revive ancient maritime routes where the trajectory of monsoon winds (mausam) helped create shared knowledge systems, technologies and traditions, and re-connect this shared past with the present realities of the Indian Ocean security matrix – a unique blend of geo-culture with geopolitics.
Strategic Significance for India
It is to be noted that the main vector of any connectivity project is the route. As Mahnaz Z. Ispahani has pointed out, the concept of a route is ‘both a geographical and a political idea, both an end and a means’ to create ‘access.’2 And Jean Gottman has commented that access in the geographical as well as political space is ‘organized at all times in history to serve political ends, and one of the major aims of politics is to regulate the conditions of access.’3 Thus, routes, access, economic mileage and geopolitical advantage are interlinked and interconnected in ascertaining the strategic significance of connectivity projects.
It is true that for India investment potential and procedural bottlenecks hindering time-bound implementation of projects still remain the problem areas in such ventures as evident in the slow progress of the North-South Transport corridor and Trilateral Highway projects. Regional instability, intra-regional discord affecting the BBIN accord and the changing contours of global relations like the impending international economic sanctions on Iran or the deteriorating security situation around the Pacific because of North Korea’s nuclear ambitions are the other formidable roadblocks confronting India’s connectivity projects.
At the same time, India’s viability and stature as a power in the global connectivity space evolve from the fact that it does not trample on political sovereignty, economic freedom, human rights and environmental sustainability of the recipient countries. All these connectivity projects show India’s involvement as an investor in capacity-building efforts in the recipient countries across sectors of their particular needs and choices, not as an overarching and imposing economic power. India’s decision to join the International Roads Transport (TIR) Convention as the 71st signatory shows its serious intent to involve itself in the international transport architecture and connectivity network.
From the Indian perspective, it is better not to analyse the connectivity trend completely from the narrow perspective of rivalry with any other country, although it is true that, through all these initiatives, India is attempting to position itself as a viable alternative to maintain the geopolitical balance in regions of its strategic interest. But a wider perspective indicates that Indian involvement in connectivity projects is part of the multidimensional strategy of an aspiring power spreading its wings to stay relevant in the global context through alternate ways by offering recipient countries geographical routes and providing access to more investment, better technologies, larger markets, and greater economic transformation. Apart from economic gains from such inter-regional and transcontinental ‘flows and networks of activity interactions’,4 the strategic advantages for India are in terms of engaging with new friends in Africa and in the Indian Ocean rim area as well as revitalising new areas of cooperation with old friends such as Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and ASEAN states. But the most significant achievement for India is the convergence of its strategic vision with the visions of two global powers, the US and Japan, as evident in the Indo-Japan Vision 2025 Document that provides shared strategic goals in Asia, Africa and the Indo-Pacific as well as the recent policy statements by US decision-makers on India’s role in stabilising Afghanistan and the Indo-Pacific region. These endeavours to further India’s strategic connect with the world will potentially shape the future of the global multipolar spectrum and India’s prominent role in such a framework.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
1. Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives (New York: Basic Books, 1997), p. 35.
2. M. Z. Ispahani, Roads and Rivals: The Politics of Access in the Borderlands of Asia (London: I.B. Tauris, 1989), p. 2.
3. J. Gottman, the Significance of Territory (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1973), p. 27.
4. D. Held, et al, Global Transformations: Politics, Economics and Culture (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999), p. 17.
Strategic Thinking, Foreign Policy
South Asia, Africa, Latin America, Caribbean & UN, East Asia, South East Asia and Oceania
Besides military targets, a number of strategic civilian targets, like urban data and communication centres, stock exchanges, factories and other centres of gravity could also be attacked by e-bombs.
An electromagnetic pulse (EMP) is an intense burst of electromagnetic (EM) energy that causes, or can be used to cause, damage. Though natural EMP is always noticed as disturbances on the radio during lightening, much more powerful EMPs are generated by solar geo-magnetic storms. EMPs can also be generated, and artificially through nuclear explosions, or non-nuclear radio frequency weapons.1 Electric and magnetic fields resulting from such intense EMPs induce damaging currents and voltage surges in electrical/electronic systems, burning out their sensitive components such as semi-conductors.
The existence of a powerful man-made EMP was first proven during the first few nuclear tests. In 1962, the US conducted a high-altitude nuclear test code-named ‘Starfish Prime’. A 1.4 megaton weapon was detonated 400 kilometres above Johnston Island in the Pacific Ocean. Electrical equipment more than 1,400 kilometres away in Hawaii were affected by the EMP generated by the test. Street lights, alarms, circuit breakers, and communications equipment all showed signs of distortion and damage.2
More tests by the US and the erstwhile USSR yielded similar results, with even underground cables suffering damage. Seven low earth orbit (LEO) satellites failed in the months following the Starfish Prime test, as residual radiation damaged their solar arrays and electronics.3 The enormously devastating effects of EMP were only then realized. This led to the further development of nuclear bombs optimized for EMP effects, rather than physical destruction.
The use of nuclear EMP weapons during hostilities between states is likely to be fraught with risks. High altitude nuclear EMP is likely to cause catastrophic damage to electronics in vast regions across thousands of kilometres, and may often affect even the state using the weapon. Besides, the first use of nuclear weapons carries the escalatory risk of retaliatory nuclear strikes.
Andrei Sakharov, the Soviet nuclear scientist conceived of the concept of generating a non-nuclear EMP (NNEMP) as early as 1951. Although work on NNEMP started subsequently, it was only in the 1990s that documents and information began to appear in public about these weapons. Though information on these weapons is mostly kept classified, non-nuclear EMP weapons are now a part of military arsenals of at least major powers such as the US and the UK.4
NNEMP Weapons
Classified as Directed Energy Weapons,5 NNEMP weapons generate a less powerful EMP and have radii of effectiveness ranging from a few hundred meters to a few kilometres.6 Military NNEMP weapons are probably in existence in the form of either aircraft or missile delivered e-bombs7or mounted systems on aircraft, drones or missiles. Boeing claims to have successfully tested an EMP missile — Counter-electronics High-powered Microwave Advanced Missile Project (CHAMP) —at the Utah Test and Training Range in 2012.8 Small suitcase-sized ground-based NNEMP weapons with short ranges are also feasible.9 The adverse impact of a NNEMP attack is envisaged to be more on systems and devices with electronic components, as the voltages required to damage semi-conductors are small.
Experts consider that NNEMP are easy to develop and relatively inexpensive and that these could also be put together using Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) materials.10 Avi Schnurr, CEO and President of the Electric Infrastructure Security (EIS) Council of the United Kingdom (UK), has statedthat ‘the biggest issue with non-nuclear EMP weapons is that the complexity and threshold required to produce them is minimal, to say the most.’11 Given the relative ease of development, not only major powers but even smaller countries could develop them.
On March 25, 2003, CBS NEWS reported the first possible use of an e-bomb by noting that ‘The U.S. Air Force has hit Iraqi TV with an experimental electro-magnetic pulse device called the "E-Bomb" in an attempt to knock it off the air and shut down Saddam Hussein's propaganda machine….’12 Even at their current levels of technological capabilities, there is a possibility that India’s neighbours already possess aircraft or missile delivered e-bombs. Short range briefcase-sized EMP devices could even get into the hands of non-state actors and terrorists, in all likelihood made out of COTS materials.13
Military Employment
EMP weapons could be used against military and civil targets alike. They have been called Day-1 weapons by some experts, as these are likely to be used as early as possible in war to maximize asymmetry over the adversary. Modern militaries are heavily reliant on advanced electronics. Even at the lowest levels, weapons, equipment, communication and data sets, among others, have some embedded electronics. At higher levels, naval ships, aircraft, artillery pieces, armoured vehicles, radars, military communication and data network, command and control centres, automated air defence (AD) weapon systems, etc., have substantial and critical electronic components.
Majority of the present day military equipment and networks are either insufficiently or not at all hardened against EMP. Therefore, at every level, militaries are vulnerable to EMP attacks. An e-bomb with a lethal radius of even a few kilometres could put out of action a deployed battalion-size force or a large number of airfield assets or a naval flotilla. The damage to the electronics will take considerable time to repair and the downtime of the affected combat systems may extend from a few hours to even months. Unserviceable combat systems and the absence of command and information systems are likely to result in prevalence of disorder and uncertainty, giving the offensive side a considerable advantage to wrest initial gains and turn the situation in its favour.
On their part, defending forces can foil enemy offensives by disrupting the latter’s control and coordination through the use of e-bombs. Given the rather limited radius of effectiveness of e-bombs, a large number of e-bombs would however be needed to cover the length and breadth of enemy forces in battle zones, including vital targets like war rooms, operation -centres, force headquarters, airfields, AD systems, etc. E-bombs could prove to be more effective than explosive bombs since they would not spare even the dugout or blast protected targets. A single wave EMP attack could considerably reduce the combat capability of a force. Even localised damage could have the potential to disrupt activity, especially if combined with other forms of attack.14 To ensure optimal use of own EMP weapons and deny a counter EMP strike opportunity to the enemy, militaries would need to devise tactics and strategies.
Besides military targets, a number of strategic civilian targets, like urban data and communication centres, stock exchanges, factories and other centres of gravity could also be attacked by e-bombs.15 Targets hardened against physical destruction or located amidst the civil population could be particularly vulnerable to e-bombs. With increasing networking and redundancies, however, data and communication facilities are becoming resilient against total annihilation.
EMP weapons could also be used clandestinely to take out important targets during peace time, when the use of conventional weapons would be considered outrageous, as it will be difficult to prove who exactly was responsible. Such incapacitating applications of EMP could also prove to be an effective deterrent against enemies contemplating military action.
Since information on e-bombs is kept highly secret, experts are unable to definitively gauge the extent of damage it may cause.16 Damage would depend a lot on the target characteristics also, for instance whether the electronics of the target are enclosed in metal, the percentage of electronic components in the target, exposure of metal cables, connection to power supply, terrain masking, etc. Likely damage could, however, be arrived at by conducting simulation and field testing.
The collateral damage potential of e-bombs, i.e. damage to electronics in hospitals, emergency services, etc., may make their use sinister and would need careful contemplation.
Countermeasures
Faraday’s caging and metal encasing of systems and components is considered to be the most effective protection against EMP, besides physically destroying the weapon delivery platform itself.17 These are designed to divert and soak up the EMP. Additionally, electrical surge protection circuits and terrain masking could be useful. However, the costs of building EMP protected military systems or EMP hardening of all current systems is considered prohibitive by experts. It may be possible for only a few critical systems. At present, no infallible solution seems to be available against NNEMP.
Threat Appraisal
The EMP threat has been a rising concern for all major powers, which have constituted high-level commissions and committees in the recent past to study the threat. Think tanks have also been engaged in discussing the issue. Deposing before the Defence committee in November 2011, the UK’s then Minister of State for the Armed Forces, Nick Harvey, stated that EMP ‘is certainly considered a potential threat. It is not considered a particularly likely one, certainly in the foreseeable future; but we keep that constantly under review.’18 The US also keeps the threat under vigil and has also possibly evolved contingency plans.19
India, with its hostile neighbourhood,20 should not discount facing an overt or clandestine use of NNEMP weapons during either peace or hostilities. Keeping a tab on their possible development in the neighbourhood may be prudent. For retaining combat capability in case of EMP attacks, building redundancies into important military structures and developing fibre-optic networking may be indispensable. Measures like cost-effective Faraday caging and shielding for frontline equipment may be studied.
According to a 2015 news report, India too had started work on EMP in 1985. The report stated:
‘According to publicly available information, KALI (Kilo Ampere Linear Injector) is a linear electron accelerator being developed in India, by Defence Research Development Organisation (DRDO) and Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC). It is designed to work in such a way that if a missile is launched in India's direction, it will quickly emit powerful pulses of Relativistic Electrons Beams (REB). It damages the on-board electronic systems.’21
Looking at the gross asymmetrical advantage it provides against adversaries, India should actively consider developing an offensive NNEMP capability.
Conclusion
Major Western powers have confirmed the existence of NNEMP weapons. However, their effectiveness and likely success rate remains intangible since information on these matters remains classified. With the ease of development and low costs, these weapons are likely to proliferate and should be factored into war contingencies. India is vulnerable to EMP attacks, given the presence of technologically capable neighbouring rivals and adversaries. India should conduct a formal evaluation of the regional EMP threat and work towards building EMP resilient data and communication structures, both for civil and military requirements. There may also be a need to devise contingency plans and procedures for EMP attacks. Looking at the advantages and practical employability of e-bombs, India should also provide impetus to developing and inducting an offensive NNEMP capability.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
16. Ibid, pp. EV-19, Q-11. The UK MoD stated: “In terms of classification, there is quite a bit of material on the internet. We routinely monitor that and assess it. Some of the devices are potentially viable; some are not. Most of them are rather short-range; for instance, with modified microwave sources, you are talking about ranges in the category of hundreds of metres. We keep an eye on those threats. Is it classified? There are some classified areas. We do not want to share our view on what viable devices might be at the high end of non-nuclear EMP, so we protect that very sensitive area because we do not wish to see further proliferation of those competent devices.”
Lull at Doklam: Time for a Holistic Strategic Review
G.G. Dwivedi
October 06, 2017
While the crisis has been defused for the time being, the probability of a future flare up cannot be ruled out. A holistic strategic review ought to be carried out over a wide spectrum and in a multi-dimensional manner with specific timelines.
The recent standoff at Doklam had raised genuine concerns about the situation escalating, given that the opposing troops stood ‘eye ball to eye ball’ for over 10 weeks. While the crisis has been defused for the time being, the probability of a future flare up cannot be ruled out. Post the disengagement, Chinese troops have fortified their positions in the Doklam Plateau with the declared intent of resuming the road construction activity at an appropriate time. The military build-up, which had been undertaken by the two sides in the wake of the crisis, remains in place. The current period of lull is, therefore, a tactical pause. In all prudence, Doklam should be taken as a nudge to initiate a holistic strategic review.
There is an old adage that “the longer you look back, the farther you can look forward”. Chinese leaders have a good understanding of their nation’s history and are known to make comparisons between the present and the past. Zhou Enlai had famously said “diplomacy is continuation of war by other means”, morphing the famous maxim by Clausewitz. Doklam was a well-calibrated small team action aimed at changing the status quo on the ground but with overarching strategic ramifications. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will make further moves on the ground only after the issue has been well deliberated by the Communist leadership.
After being appointed as ‘First Lord of Admiralty’ in 1911, Winston Churchill wrote a memorandum to his cabinet colleagues in which he stated that “Preparation for war is the only guarantee for preservation of wealth, natural resources and territory of the state.” To this end, he identified three key areas; probable dangers, history’s lessons and employment of war material. Interestingly, these guiding tenets are relevant to this day in the Indian context as well.
Probable Dangers
According to Graham Allison, the preeminent geostrategic challenge of the era is not violent Islamic extremism or resurgent Russia but the impact of China’s resurgence. Lee Kuan Yew had observed that the sheer size of China’s displacement meant that the world has to find a new order. Hence, when China cautions Japan to get used to its actions in the East China Sea and India to prepare for more Chinese roads in Doklam, these should not come as a surprise.
Through its assertive behaviour and expansionist approach, China has pursued the strategy of encroachment – ‘nibble and negotiate’ – evident from its actions both along its land borders and maritime frontiers. This is in consonance with the Chinese culture of maintaining a peaceful periphery by keeping the neighbourhood subdued. The Chinese are averse to any challenge or competition. A lonely power, China has optimally used its two allies – Pakistan and North Korea – to serve its strategic interests in the Indian subcontinent and the Korean Peninsula. With the deepening Chinese economic engagement with Pakistan as part of its global outreach, the nexus between the two countries is set to strengthen further.
Given the exponential accretion in China’s Comprehensive National Power (CNP), there is a marked shift from its earlier strategy enunciated by Deng Xiao Ping – ‘to bide for time and maintain a low profile’ till the completion of peaceful rise. Now, President Xi Jinping has emerged as an all-powerful ‘Fifth Generation’ leader whose China dream – fuxing (restoration)– envisions a “powerful and prosperous China”, symbolic of its past grandeur. In the quest to shape a ‘Sino-centric global order’, China seeks a unipolar Asia and a bipolar world. Mega projects like the Belt-Road Initiative (BRI) and Maritime Silk Route launched at Xi’s behest are means of power projection, designed to catapult China into the superpower league.
Xi has accorded high priority to defence modernization, an important component of CNP. Consequently, the PLA is in the midst of path breaking reforms to emerge as a modern military that is capable of winning “limited war under informationised conditions”. To this end, the Central Military Commission (CMC), the highest military body, has been reorganized. All the members of the CMC are senior most PLA Generals, including General Chang Wanquan who has been the Defence Minister since 2012. The massive infrastructure development on the borders aims to overwhelm the adversary with sheer speed and shock action. While a major conflict with India is not in China’s larger interest, it will keep up the pressure astride the Line of Actual Control (LAC) through pre-emptive tactical actions.
Historical Perspective
An analysis of past skirmishes along the border reveal a definite pattern. Mao initiated the 1962 War when he was under serious criticism post the disastrous ‘Great Leap Forward’. The Nathu La Incident in 1967 coincided with an intensely turbulent phase of the ‘Cultural Revolution’. The Sumdurong Chu crisis in 1987 synchronised with the 13th Party Congress. The standoff in the area of Depsang Plateau in April 2013 preceded the visit of Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang. The face off in Chumar in September 2014 happened during President Xi Jinping’s visit to India. Doklam was triggered in mid-June just before Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the US. The timing of the Doklam crisis may also have some connect with the 19th Party Congress due in mid-October 2017. China’s diplomatic moves to defuse the situation at Doklam were primarily to prevent the derailment of the BRICS meeting which would have severely dented Xi’s image. It is evident that China’s internal dynamics have definite linkages with incidences on the border. Beijing has repeatedly resorted to military force against neighbours to achieve political objectives.
Employment of war waging material
In an era of ‘limited wars’, defining lines between strategic and tactical objectives stand blurred. Even small tactical incidents have strategic implications, wherein it is not unusual for the top leadership to willy-nilly get involved, Doklam being a case in point. In a limited war scenario, it is not total force ratios that are critical. What is crucial is the quantum of combat potential that can be brought to bear in an integrated manner at the point of decision, in a telescopic time frame. A flat decision making structure and synergy are sine qua non in modern warfare. Thus, well-developed infrastructure particularly in forward areas is vital. China has gained a strategic edge in this regard. However, its vulnerability of fighting from exterior lines of communications can be optimally exploited.
Strategic Review
In the light of the aforesaid imperatives, a holistic strategic review is no more an option. This ought to be carried out over a wide spectrum and in a multi- dimensional manner with specific timelines. As the Chinese leadership believes in negotiating only with equals, India has to address the current state of asymmetry vis-à-vis China in right earnest. It is only a state of strategic equilibrium between the two countries that can pave way for meaningful dialogue and regional stability. Some of the key facets which deserve attention are enumerated below.
Firstly, as a part of grand strategy, India needs to rebalance in consonance with the geopolitical shift that is in the offing in the Indo-Pacific. To counter Beijing’s growing influence especially around the neighbourhood, New Delhi needs to shed its traditional policy of ambiguity. It has to be forthcoming to play a larger role in the region by aligning with strategic partners, namely the US and Japan, besides other friendly nations. In the process, India must push strongly for a multipolar global architecture to effectively thwart China’s designs.
Secondly, the enhancement of CNP as an integral component of national policy ought to be accorded highest priority to correct the prevailing imbalance. It entails sustaining a fast pace of economic growth, strengthening institutional mechanisms and the optimal utilisation of national resources.
Thirdly, as hard power is a vital component of CNP, enhancement of military capability is a critical imperative. So far, the process of military modernization has followed an ad hoc, incremental, approach in the absence of a well-defined national policy. This demands a strategic shift to make way for a transformational process in order to enable the Indian Army match the PLA. It entails dismantling bureaucratic gridlocks, abolishing service-specific organizational structures, sharpening the teeth-to-tail ratio, fast tracking the procurement cum acquisition procedures and leveraging technology. The consistent downward trend of defence expenditure as a percentage of GDP, which now stands at about 1.6 per cent, needs to be corrected.
Fourthly, there is an urgent need to prepare a ‘White Paper on National Defence’ which should clearly define the prevailing security environment, threat assessment and thrust of military modernization. Given the regional security dynamics, while major wars are unlikely, localised conflicts remain a possibility. The rapid advancement in technology has compressed time and space in addition to making battlefields non-linear. The traditional view of deterrence stands redefined by new concepts of ‘pre-emption’ and ‘prevention’ and these are being increasingly practiced by India’s adversaries.
Fifthly, it is ironic that we are yet to formulate a ‘Doctrine of Limited War’. This has to be a top driven process emanating from a National Defence Policy. Even the much talked of ‘two front scenario’ has varying interpretations between the three services. The current state of infrastructure stands out as a major impediment for the timely employment of combat power at the point of decision. The development of integrated and sustainable logistics is a pre-requisite for success in a limited conflict. The creation of super highways, freight corridors, forward airfields, strategic airlift capability and state of art communications set-up is the way forward.
Lastly, the concept of ‘border management’ requires a relook as the present system suffers from serious lacunae. There is an urgent need to have a single nodal agency to coordinate the functioning of the multiple organs involved in safeguarding India’s borders. Operational control on the Line of Control (LoC) and Line of Actual Control must rest with the Army. The operational capability of the Paramilitary Forces needs to be enhanced on priority basis. The mere enhancement of budgetary allocations without a coordinated security policy will not suffice. As the probability of face-offs and local skirmishes remains high, contingencies must be in place to deliver timely and calibrated responses. Disputed areas must be held in strength ab initio in order to prevent the adversary from presenting India with a fait accompli.
Given divergent national interests and overlapping strategic objectives, rivalry and competition is inherent in India-China relations. The vexed border issue coupled with the Tibet factor further add to the complexities. Hence, politico-diplomatic showdowns and standoffs on the border have to be accepted as a new normal. While sustained efforts to revamp the existing mechanisms of engagement remains a work in progress, there can be no laxity in defence preparedness. China respects strength and despises the weak. Defence and diplomacy being two sides of the same coin, it is boots on the grounds that determine the extent to which an envelope can be pushed at the negotiation table.
Maj Gen G G Dwivedi (retd) is former Assistant Chief of Integrated Defence Staff, has served as Defence Attaché in China, North Korea and Mongolia, and is currently Professor of International Studies at Aligarh Muslim University.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
Need for Sector-Specific Ease-of-Doing Business Indices
Amit Cowshish
October 05, 2017
Sector-specific micro parameters that have a bearing on the ease of doing business need to be identified and quantified.
The ‘Make in India’ initiative of the government is focussed on making India a manufacturing hub by facilitating greater involvement of the private sector. But this objective is not backed in adequate measure by an eco-system conducive to smooth conduct of business by the enterprises. As per the World Bank’s Ease-of-Doing-Business (EoDB) index, conducting businesses in India continues to be a challenge.
In 2015, India ranked 142nd (later revised to 134th) among 189 countries in the EoDB index, prompting the then Minister of State for Finance, Jayant Sinha, to affirm that the government intended to take measures to push India to a slot among the first 30.1 This was reiterated by the CEO of the Niti Ayog in May 2016,2 but by the month of December that year, the target was revised to 50.3
In a federal structure, making such an initiative work requires a very high level of coordination between the centre and the states. Some states have indeed made serious efforts to encourage the manufacturing sector but these efforts have largely been disjointed and have not yielded the intended results. This is evident from the fact that India has inched up only four notches to the130th rank in 2017. Except for the ease of ‘getting electricity’ — which has seen a marked improvement from the 51st rank last year to 26th in 20174, on all other parameters on which the business eco-system is tracked by the World Bank, there is nothing to write home about.
At this pace, the goal of being counted among the first 30, or even top 50, will elude the country for several decades. The economy can ill-afford this, especially with the growth rate being on a downward trajectory and the contribution of the manufacturing sector to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) continuing to be sedate.5 The objective of increasing the share of the manufacturing sector in the GDP to 25 per cent seems distant at this juncture.
This calls for looking beyond the 10-odd parameters that constitute the EoDB index6 and taking a closer look at the micro factors which affect business operations. This is important, because, purely from the point of ease of doing business, all these 10 parameters do not affect each of the twenty five sectors identified by the government to promote manufacturing in equal measure. It is also possible that some factors that are critical for a particular sector do not even figure among these 10 parameters.
While ‘paying taxes’, for instance, may affect every sector to varying degree, ‘trading across the borders’ may be more important for the information technology (IT)-business process management (BPM) sector than it is for the defence manufacturing sector. Within the defence manufacturing sector, ‘getting credit’ may not affect the big firms as much as it affects the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs). An assurance that successful development of a prototype will be followed by an assured supply order is a critical factor in defence but not necessarily in other sectors. But such aspects are not part of the ten parameters comprising the EoDB index.
Excessive focus on the global EoDB index is perhaps taking the attention away from the need to address such sector-specific micro factors that have a bearing on the ease of doing business in that sector. An obvious case in point is the defence manufacturing sector. Unlike other sectors such as automobile components or wellness, defence is an unpredictable monopsony governed by complex procedures and driven by a large number of players.
The factors that make the defence manufacturing sector somewhat unique require the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to develop a sector-specific index of ease of doing business in consultation with the industry, with interwoven sub-indices focused on the foreign manufacturers, public sector undertakings, big players in the domestic defence manufacturing market and the MSMEs. Quantitative norms will also need to be developed to assess the progress made in respect of each parameter constituting these indices.
Without in any way disparaging the steps taken by the government since the defence manufacturing sector was opened to the private sector in 2001, a large number of problems raised by the industry remain either unaddressed or inadequately addressed. This is exemplified by continued dominance of the defence public sector undertakings in defence manufacturing and a meagre increase in foreign direct investment (FDI) in defence in spite of what the government considers to be progressive liberalisation of the FDI regime over the past three years.
There also continues to be a lack of adequate information about MoD’s shopping list. The qualitative requirements of the equipment, weapon systems and other platforms, drawn up by the services, continue to pose a challenge for the industry. Field trials, staff evaluations and contract negotiations continue to take forever to complete. While new procurements are being regularly approved in principle by the Defence Acquisition Council and other competent authorities, the follow-up action on the approved procurement proposals continues to be tardy.
Despite all the improvements made over the years with a view to promoting indigenous production, the procurement procedure continues to be seen largely as complex and opaque. Addition of a new procurement categories like ‘Buy (Indian Designed, Developed and Manufactured) and adoption of formats like the strategic partnership model seem to have complicated the procedure rather than simplified it. Implementation of the offset policy is an ongoing challenge.
The prescribed contract format is not dynamic enough to accommodate the programme-specific requirements. The prescribed time-frame for completing the procurement process is generally followed only in breach. Even mundane issues like prompt payment to the vendors, which perhaps affects them the most, continues to defy solution. Efficacy of the single-windows and grievance redressal mechanisms, wherever these have been created, often falls below the expectation.
Information required by the vendors in connection with the conduct of their business with the MoD is hard to get. The pace and quality of decision-making does not inspire as much confidence as it should. Procurements have truly become what many describe as a game of snakes and ladders in the absence of a composite and distinct defence procurement policy.7
It is issues like these which continue to militate against the ease of doing business in defence that need to be identified in consultation with those who are expected to push defence manufacturing and create measurable indices to monitor the impact of the government’s efforts to address those issues. Such a bottoms-up approach, not just in defence manufacturing but also in sectors like tourism and hospitality which have a huge untapped potential, could help India climb up the global EoDB index rapidly.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
6. These include: starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across the borders, enforcing contracts, and resolving insolvency. See the link cited at footnote 4.
Fallout of the Rohingya Issue on Bangladesh`s Domestic Politics
Gautam Sen
October 03, 2017
With the Bangladesh general elections not far away in 2018, and the unlikely scenario of the Rohingya problem being fully resolved in the next few months, the issue is likely to deeply influence the posture of the various political parties.
The influx of nearly one million Rohingya refugees from the northern portion of Myanmar’s Rakhine province due to severe persecution has affected the political environment in Bangladesh. The impact is particularly acute in the south-eastern district of Cox`s Bazaar as well as to a lesser extent in adjoining Bandarban district and the nearby estuary areas.
The Awami League-led government of Sheikh Hasina has adopted a decisive posture in the matter. Its views have been articulated at the diplomatic level with neighbouring countries and forcefully highlighted by Prime Minister Hasina in her address at the 76th United Nations General Assembly session where she called for the execution of a five-point plan, inter alia, setting up `safe zones` under international supervision for the Rohingyas in the territory of Myanmar and the return of all the refugees in Bangladesh to Rakhine under secure conditions.
Notwithstanding mutual recriminations, a consensus seems to be emerging among the political parties of Bangladesh that the Rohingya refugees have to be eventually repatriated to Myanmar and that Naypyitaw must be compelled to accept them back under assured security and livelihood sustaining conditions. With the magnitude of the problem becoming acute – more details are emerging of atrocities committed on the Rohingya by the Myanmar security forces and majority Burman elements – and the growing negative fallout from the enormous pressure exerted on local civic resources and amenities by the refugee influx in the affected districts, the matter is also becoming a major issue in the internal political domain and influencing political equations.
With the Bangladesh general elections not far away in 2018, and the unlikely scenario of the Rohingya problem being fully resolved in the next few months despite the October 2, 2017 agreement between Bangladesh and Myanmar to set up a working group to devise modalities for refugee repatriation, the issue is likely to deeply influence the posture of the various political parties. Already, the main opposition 20-party combine led by Khaleda Zia`s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has criticized Hasina for her government’s “failure” to obtain a resolution by convincing the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to censure the Myanmar government. The opposition combine wants the UNSC to condemn the Myanmar government for failure to protect the Rohingyas, stop atrocities against them, accept responsibility for their eventual repatriation and, in the interim, share responsibility for providing succour to the refugees in Bangladesh.
Bangladeshi Buddhist groups in Cox`s Bazaar and Bandarban as well as the Buddhist Nagarik Oikya (Buddhist Citizens` Alliance) have also joined the BNP and its political allies in condemning the Rohingya-related developments in Myanmar. This seems to be a significant development, indicative of attempts by the Buddhist community in Bangladesh to build a rapport with the BNP and keep their options open for an understanding or alignment with the BNP should a new ruling configuration emerge post the 2018 elections. However, an underlying fear for their own security if anti-Buddhist sentiments are again aroused by radical Muslim elements on the pattern of the anti-Buddhist frenzy instigated in May-June 2017 would have also induced Bangladesh’s Buddhists, their clergy and the United Forum of Buddhists to voice strong criticism of the Rakhine holocaust.
As it is, the Awami League and its allied political parties will face strong competition-cum-opposition from the BNP and its allies who have been out of power for more than eight years. There is no dearth of issues, genuine and trumped-up, to be bandied about in the domestic political arena. With respect to India, the anti-India elements in Bangladesh have been able to capitalise on New Delhi’s initial non-committal posture in taking note of the anti-Rohingya pogrom in Myanmar and providing relief assistance to deal with the refugee influx. At the global level, the failure of the Bangladesh government to convince the UNSC to pass a resolution on the Rohingya situation has given the BNP-led opposition an opportunity to berate the government. All in all, the Rohingya issue may serve to promote a more contentious factor in Bangladesh`s domestic milieu.
The presence of the huge Rohingya refugee population in Bangladesh is fraught with other consequences as well. There is disquiet within the government as well as among a substantial segment of civil society about the vulnerability of the destitute Rohingyas to the attractions offered by terrorist groups. There is concern about the risk of such groups merging with the local population and posing threats to local communities in the districts sheltering the refugees. The possibility of extremist communal elements, foreign terror groups and the some of the subverted Rohingyas aligning with the anti-Awami League political parties, to the detriment of peace and stability in the run-up to the 2018 general elections, also cannot be ruled out.
The Bangladesh military has been tasked to organize some of the relief infrastructure for the Rohingya refugees in the affected districts. The objective is to erect more than 14,000 refugee shelters in Cox`s Bazaar, temporarily rehabilitate the refugees and separate them from the local population as well as harmful political and anti-social elements, and obviate local tension and repercussions. The military’s involvement is intended to supplement the efforts of the civil machinery on relief administration as well as monitor the refugees and the environment from the perspectives of internal security and counter-terrorism. This use of the military has not been criticized by any of the political parties till now.
The Sheikh Hasina government has dealt with Bangladesh’s basic developmental issues, investment needs and matters pertaining to equitable growth and employment with a reasonable measure of success. In 2016, the country’s GDP grew by 6.8 per cent and the rate of inflation stood at less than seven per cent. However, over the past year, the Rohingya problem has resulted in the diversion of a substantial portion of current revenue (nearly US $ one million equivalent per day) on immediate refugee relief activities and rehabilitation such as the setting up of camps and investment towards capital expenditure on the development of a barren marshy island known as `Thengar Char` off the Noakhali coast in the Bay of Bengal estuarine area. The manner and quantum of rehabilitation assistance have generated contentious views among the political parties, on many occasions as a matter of expediency. There has been criticism from the political opposition, and even within the ruling Awami League and its allied parties, about the adequacy of relief provided to the Rohingya as well as on the extent to which the local communities in the vicinity of the relief camps are being adversely affected. Such criticism is only expected to increase in the near future and pre-election period for achieving political ends, depending on the gravity and outcome of the Rohingya crisis.
The manner in which the international community supports the Hasina government`s efforts to reverse the refugee influx as well as its outcome and improvement in management of the refugees will determine the extent of the fallout on the country’s domestic political milieu. The actions taken by countries like India and China are of salience in this regard considering their capacity to contribute to the mitigation of the crisis to an extent.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
Acquisition of single-engine fighter aircraft – A few suggestions to expedite the procurement process
Amit Cowshish
September 26, 2017
MoD can leapfrog many of the 11 stages in the procurement programme by taking the measures outlined to fulfil the urgent requirements of the Air Force.
It may sound incredible but, according to official statistics, the number of fighter aircraft squadrons with the Indian Air Force (IAF) has gone up from 25 in 20141 to 33 in 2017.2 This has brought the IAF closer to the authorised strength of 42 squadrons, although the gap could widen again if induction of new aircraft does not keep pace with the inevitable de-induction of old ones.
It is becoming increasingly certain that this gap is sought to be bridged to a large extent by acquiring single-engine fighter aircraft, in addition to the HAL-built Light Combat Aircraft Tejas. Presently, Lockheed Martin and SAAB are the only two foreign manufacturers in the race in the single-engine aircraft category. Both have offered to make their products in India for which they have already signed agreements with the Tata Advanced Systems Limited (TASL)3 and the Adani Group,4 respectively.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has also set the ball rolling by issuing the Request for Information (RFI) to these two companies.5 But this is as good as it gets, for RFI is just the first of the eleven stages through which every procurement programme has to pass before the deal is signed. Each of these stages carries within it the potential to derail the programme.
Just to refresh memory, the programme for acquisition of 126 Medium Multi-role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) was aborted after more than three years of commercial negotiations. This incidentally is the penultimate stage before final approval is accorded by the competent financial authority to award the contract.
Considering that acquisition of single-engine aircraft is susceptible to all the vulnerabilities of the existing procurement procedure, it is somewhat puzzling that MoD should have decided to adopt the strategic partnership (SP) model for this programme.
Apart from the fact that any new model throws up numerous challenges when it is implemented for the first time, the success of the ragtag SP model is critically dependent on identification of the Indian companies which could be invited as prime vendors to manufacture the aircraft in India with the help of technology transfer from foreign manufacturers of the platforms chosen by the MoD.
The process of identifying the Indian companies has not even begun. Even if it is assumed that this process will go through smoothly despite all odds, the pre-emptive tie-ups by the two main contenders in the single-engine aircraft programme with Indian companies have rendered this exercise redundant. It will be surprising if these agreements would permit Lockheed Martin and SAAB to tie-up with any other Indian company for manufacturing the aircraft in India.
This poses a problem because under the SP model, the Indian partners, identified by the MoD as potential strategic partners, are required to approach the manufacturers of the platform, chosen by the MoD in a separate exercise, and enter into a legal agreement with the latter before submitting the bids. As things stand today, the two Indian companies with which Lockheed Martin and SAAB have entered into legal agreements have become their potential strategic partners by default.
This should not bother the MoD. In fact, it should be welcomed for it saves MoD the trouble of having to identify the potential strategic partners and to convince the foreign vendors to get into production arrangements with them within the existing policy framework which allows FDI only up to 49 per cent on the automatic route.
It would be frivolous to question the wisdom of the already sealed tie-ups. The foreign companies would not have gone ahead unless they were absolutely certain that their Indian partners will be able to deliver what is expected of both of them under the SP model. More to the point, it should be a big relief for MoD that they have joined hands with the Indian companies of their choice without seeking any special dispensation in regard to control over their management.
As an added advantage, these tie-ups help in cutting short the time that will otherwise have to be given to the potential strategic partners – after they are identified by the MoD - to tie up with the foreign companies.. However, in the event of the MoD not recognising the tie-ups already formed, this could end up creating legal difficulties if the main contenders are forced into new arrangements with other Indian companies.
For sure, this problem may not arise if TASL and the Adani Group get selected as potential strategic partners through an unpredictable and laborious selection process. But what will be the point of it all? On the contrary, MoD can take a short route to issuing the Request for Proposal (RFP) if the validity of the tie-ups is acknowledged by it.
This also opens up the possibility of categorising the acquisition programme under the ’Buy and Make (Indian)’ category or the time-tested ‘Buy and Make’ category. In essence, the difference between the two is this: under the former category the RFP is issued to only Indian vendors; and under the latter category it is issued to foreign vendors. The same end-results can be achieved under either of these categories.
Of the two, however, the ‘Buy and Make’ category seems more appropriate in the present case because the success of the entire project hinges on the conduct of the foreign manufacturer, be it with regard to transfer of technology, quality assurance, maintenance, and the like, for which it will be jointly responsible under the terms of the contract along with the Indian partner.
It is difficult to visualise any objective that cannot be achieved under the ‘Buy and Make’ category but which can be achieved only under the ‘Buy and Make (Indian)’ category or by adopting the SP model for this acquisition programme.
In any case, the tricky part will be the drafting of the RFP in a way that serves the objective of the programme, which should primarily be to ensure that the Indian company is not only able to manufacture and maintain the aircraft but is also in a position to undertake its life extension/up-gradation in future without being unduly dependent on the foreign manufacturer or being constrained by IPR issues.
To illustrate, rather than specifying the scope, range and depth of technology required to be transferred by the foreign manufacturer, the RFP could simply seek information as regards the technologies and capabilities that the manufacturer will not be able to transfer as also the reasons for being unable to do so.
The selection of the foreign company should be linked to the MoD being satisfied by the reasons proffered, and assessment as to whether the IAF can live with such denial of technology or capability, and what impact it will have on manufacturing/life-extension/up-gradation of the platform by the Indian company in future.
It should also be possible to compress the time required for carrying out the trials if the platforms are trial-evaluated only in respect of the parameters which have been added to it by the manufacturers after these platforms were last evaluated in the context of the now-aborted programme for the acquisition of 126 Medium Multi-role aircraft, provided it is technically feasible to do so.
All these measures will help MoD leapfrog to the commercial negotiation stage and, with some bold decision-making, even to the contract signing stage much before the end of the next financial year, which is effectively all the time that is available before the next general elections. It goes without saying that all this trouble will be worth the while only if there is a reasonable certainty of the programme not being stymied by the funds-crunch.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
The Turkish Military Base in Doha: A Step towards Gaining “Strategic Depth” in the Middle East?
Md. Muddassir Quamar
September 26, 2017
The nostalgia among a section of the AKP to recreate the Ottoman past through economic and geopolitical integration has been the driving force behind Turkey’s recent assertive postures in regional matters including the Qatar crisis.
Turkey’s reaction to the rift among the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries—the June 5, 2017 embargo imposed by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt against Qatar for its alleged support to terrorism—has been significant. Within two days of the Saudi-led quartet announcing the severing of ties with Qatar, Turkey’s parliament approved a bill for deploying troops in the Turkish military base at Doha. The bill had been pending for approval since early May 2017 and its approval was hastened by the surprise developments in the Gulf. Turkey’s military base in Qatar, its first in the Arab world, was established in April 2016 in accordance with a December 2014 defence agreement between the two countries. Its aim was to bolster security and stability in the Gulf and, at that time, was welcomed by Saudi Arabia as a move to counter the growing regional influence of Iran and the US ignoring Arab Gulf countries’ concerns over the Iranian nuclear deal. Given the changed circumstances in the wake of the embargo imposed on Qatar, Riyadh along with Abu Dhabi, Manama and Cairo opposed Turkey’s decision to deploy troops in its military base in Doha. The 13 demands, which Saudi Arabia and UAE raised on June 23 as a pre-condition for negotiating an end to the embargo against Qatar, and which was modified on July 19 to six principles, included the closure of the Turkish military base.
Turkey and Qatar not only rejected the call to shut down the military base but termed the demand as against international law and interference in their bilateral ties. Though the demand for the closure of the Turkish military base in Doha was subsequently dropped from the six principles, the Saudi and Emirati opposition to the Turkish deployment of troops and plans for a joint military exercise did not end. Turkey has been sending military personnel to its base in Doha since the parliamentary approval, and on July 18 Ankara sent five armoured vehicles and 23 military personnel to raise the total number of troops deployed in Doha to more than 100. At the time, the Turkish Defence Minister, Fikri Isik, had said that Turkey will raise the number of its personnel in the base to 1,000 in the coming months and form a joint command with Doha that will be headed by a Qatari major general with a Turkish brigadier general as deputy commander. Going ahead with the plan, despite the reservations raised by Saudi Arabia and UAE, Turkish and Qatari militaries conducted a two-day (August 7-8) joint military exercise in the Gulf. The exercise, dubbed Iron Shield, included naval drills and joint training among infantry and artillery divisions of the two militaries. Eventually, Turkey plans to increase the number of its troops in Qatar to 3,000 and maintain a brigade in its Doha base.
The regional reaction to the joint military exercise and increased deployment of Turkish troops in Doha has been mixed. The four Arab countries at the forefront of the boycott of Qatar have criticized Turkey for meddling in Arab affairs. Saudi Arabia has been cold to Turkish overtures and not only refused President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s offer to mediate the crisis but also rejected the Turkish offer to build a military base in the Kingdom as well. Days after Erdoğan’s offer to build a base in Saudi Arabia, a statement by the Saudi Press Agency said, “Saudi Arabia cannot allow Turkey to establish military bases on its territories” as its “armed forces and military capabilities are at the best level.” Later, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir issued a statement articulating the Saudi position that Riyadh wants Arab issues to be resolved by Arab countries themselves. The UAE and Egypt were more vehement in criticizing the Turkish moves. In a series of tweets, Anwar Gargash, UAE’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, criticized Turkey for coming to Qatar’s rescue. For its part, Egypt urged the four Arab countries to expand the boycott of Qatar to include Turkey.
In contrast, the Iranian reaction has been subtle and measured. Tehran had maintained silence when Turkey first decided to establish its military base in Doha with the aim of countering Iran’s growing influence in the region. Although Iran was one of the first countries to offer help to Qatar after the Saudi-led coalition announced its embargo, it had at the same time stated that it would maintain a neutral position in the intra-GCC rift. But this Iranian posture changed after Qatar’s decision in August to restore full diplomatic ties with Tehran, which had earlier been suspended in January 2016 in support of Saudi Arabia’s decision to sever ties with Iran over incidents of arson in the Saudi embassy in Tehran and at the consulate in Mashhad after the execution of the Saudi Shia dissident cleric Nimr al-Nimr. Qatar’s move further angered Saudi Arabia and UAE, but was expectedly welcomed by Tehran. The spokesperson of the Iranian foreign ministry, Bahram Qassemi, stated that “the Islamic Republic of Iran’s principled and permanent policy has been and will be enhancing relations with all its neighbours.” This was a clear indication of a better understanding emerging between Tehran and Doha after the Qatar crisis to the chagrin of Saudi Arabia and UAE since one of the primary triggers for the embargo against Doha was its perceived cosying up to Tehran. While Doha and Tehran continue to improve relations, the Iranian response to the Turkish base and military exercise is also conditioned by strategic considerations in Iraq and Syria where it is working with Turkey to restore peace.
For Turkey, the decision to support of Qatar is driven by both strategic and ideological considerations. Ankara and Doha are the two Middle East capitals which have extended support to “moderate” Islamist forces, particularly the Muslim Brotherhood. Both had extended support to the Mohammed Morsi government in Egypt and had condemned the removal of the democratically elected president in July 2013. Ideological affinity with the Muslim Brotherhood had brought Turkey and Qatar closer soon after the outburst of popular anger in the form of the Arab Spring and they had been working together to support Islamist groups in Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Libya. Further, Turkey’s strategic ambitions in the Middle East have led to a recalibration of its foreign policy since the coming to power of the AKP (Justice and Development Party) in 2002. It propelled Turkey to take a keen interest in Arab affairs and made it intervene in neighbouring Syria and Iraq as violence erupted in these two countries in 2011-12. The Turkish decision to fast track the deployment of its troops in Doha soon after the eruption of the Qatar crisis is part of Ankara’s strategic ambitions to play a larger role in the Middle East. It not only makes Ankara a stakeholder in regional affairs but also gives it a forward military position to project power in the Gulf.
The Turkish military base in Doha and the joint Turkey-Qatar military exercise will provide Ankara a strategic presence in the Gulf. While Turkish leaders and government officials have tried to talk down the significance of the move by emphasising that it is a step towards ensuring security and stability in the Gulf and not aimed at any specific adversary, many Turkish commentators have termed the establishment of the base as the return of the Turks to the Arabian Peninsula. Such references emanate from the penchant among Turkish Islamists to see the Middle East as a natural sphere of influence. The nostalgia among a section of Turkey’s ruling party to recreate the Ottoman past through economic and geopolitical integration has been the driving force behind Ankara’s recent assertive postures in regional matters including the Qatar crisis. The establishment of a Turkish military base in Doha is part of the AKP’s plan of gaining “strategic depth” in the Middle East. It is a different matter that such postures may polarize the already fragile regional geopolitical situation and become a strategic liability for Ankara.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
Qatar, Turkey, West Asia, Military, Defence Cooperation
Now The Right in Berlin: The German Elections of 2017
Bharat Wariavwalla
September 26, 2017
The CDU’s likely coalition partners are the Green Party and the Free Democrats. Such a coalition can work because all partners share a common design on European Unity and socio-economic policies at home.
Most polls predicted a victory for the Christian Democrats (CDU-SCU), but few thought that their margin of victory would reduce so much. In the just held elections, the CDU got 32.8 per cent of the vote, nine percentage points lower than what it had obtained in the previous election.
However, the most significant outcome of this election is the appearance of the anti-immigration, anti-Islamic, Right for the first time in post-war Germany. The Alternative for Germany or AfD as it is called in Germany got 13 per cent of the vote, making it the third largest party. It will now have a seat in the highest legislative chamber of the Federal Republic, the Bundestag.
The other principal party, the Social Democrats, got 20.4 per cent of the vote, which precludes it from becoming a centre of an alternate ruling coalition. It is a party that helped make post-war Germany a social democracy, Germans themselves call the country a Social Democracy, thereby meaning a democracy with strong social content. Germany is today one of the few countries with an extensive public health system, a first class public education system and environmental standards that are the envy of the world. The performance of the Social Democrats at the polls was rather poor because their leader Martin Schultz just could not tell people that the party was different from its rival, the CDU. People saw Martin Schultz as another Angela Merkel but without her staidness and substance.
As always, the ruling government will comprise a coalition of parties. That’s how the German system works. Its vast network of checks and balances are designed to prevent an individual from seizing power and thus prevent the repetition, however inconceivable at present, of the events of 1933. The CDU’s likely coalition partners are the Green Party and the Free Democrats. Such a coalition can work because all partners share a common design on European Unity and socio-economic policies at home.
All other parties, and this is important to keep in mind, completely reject the thinking of the AfD. They all abhor its anti-immigration stance, its concealed racism, and its hostility to European unity. The AfD is a pariah in Germany’s current political spectrum.
With the rise of the AfD, Germany must now contend with atavistic nationalism, as many liberal democracies of Europe such as France, Netherlands and Austria do. Even the oldest of Europe’s democracies, Britain, also has a party that propagates such racism. Nigel Farage of the Independent Party advocated British Exit from the European Union in last summer’s referendum because he wanted to keep the Turks and such “other people” out of the UK.
This is Merkel’s fourth term as chancellor. No one calls her an Iron Lady” as the English did in the case of Margaret Thatcher. Perhaps she would resent such an appellation. To her people, she is just a woman of substance without any pretensions to heroism. She is liked just for being that. Germany is a mature democracy and it does not need heroes. At the end of the war, the great playwright Berthold Brecht said “unhappy is the land that needs heroes.” There are many such unhappy lands in the world today. But no sooner was the Second World War over than the British people threw out their hero Winston Churchill from power and elected as Prime Minister a very modest man – Clement Attlee. He made Britain a welfare state, which is no mean achievement. Indian democracy too got on very well with a prime minister of real substance – Narasimha Rao, the best prime minister since Jawaharlal Nehru.
Racist, aggressive, nationalism has now come to Germany, as it has in much of Europe. Across the Atlantic, America under Donald Trump represents a particularly poisonous form of such nationalism. It is possible that the European and American democracies will defeat this nationalism through strong democratic institutions and the will of the people.
But one must understand that such nationalism flourishes because there is a feeling among the people of the liberal West that their national identity has lost its moorings. Is it the cosmopolitanism accompanying globalization that has undermined the anchor of their national identity? Why do the English, French, and Austrians hanker for the past? They conjure up images of the past that present their nations as rooted in their histories and culture. That’s what Trump, Marine Le Pen, Boris Johnson do - tell the people of their idyllic past and promise to take them back there.
No doubt Merkel will fight such nationalism, which is still in an incipient stage. In this, she has a great companion in President Emmanuel Macron of France who won the presidential election in May 2017 by convincingly defeating his formidable rival Marine Le Pen. Le Pen is the leader of the National Front, which is impeccably anti-EU and anti-immigration and would like to reduce the eight million Arabs living in France to servitude. Macron, on the other hand, wants to integrate these people into French society as equal citizens. And he does not conjure up France’s imperial past. On the contrary, he says that the French conquest of Algeria was a criminal venture.
Both Macron and Merkel are committed to taking the European integration process forward, which means making the Euro a currency that facilitates the growth of all members of the Union. Today, the Union’s poorer members – Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain (famously called the PIGS countries) – feel that their use of the Euro ties them too closely to their rich counterparts and hurts their exports. Kenneth Rogoff of Harvard, an acknowledged expert on Europe, says that the Euro is an obstacle to European integration.
For the EU to prosper, it needs to have flexible arrangements with major trading nations of the world. It has such arrangements today with Canada and Norway. Can it make a profitable arrangement with Britain?
The EU’s foreign policy problems are daunting, With the coming of Trump, its security ties with the United States stand deeply strained. In fact, Trump has done everything to weaken, if not destroy, the EU. He openly supported Marine Le Pen’s stand of pulling France out of the EU, and backed Nigel Farage in his campaign to pull Britain out of the EU.
The EU’s security relations with the United States are deeply strained. Merkel talked about rethinking Europe’s security links with the US after Trump’s bellicose posture towards North Korea in August 2017. Trump’s statement about letting “fire and fury” against North Korea filled Merkel with fright. She wondered whether these were the words to be used publicly by the leader of the most powerful nation in the world and the security guarantor of Europe?
Another country that deeply weighs in the security equation of the EU is Russia. During the Cold War, it was Europe’s principal security threat. Today, Putin’s Russia poses a serious political threat to Europe. Russia, like America, also supports all European leaders opposed to European unity.
Merkel thus has ample problems on her hand. But she has a steady hand and is competent enough to navigate the contending currents both at home and abroad.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
While thermonuclear weapons are not necessary for maintaining a credible deterrent, they serve the purpose of enabling India to make effective use of its relatively limited fissile material stockpile.
In the aftermath of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) testing a “thermonuclear” weapon on 3 September 2017, the focus upon that country’s nuclear capability has been on the yield of the said test. Estimates for the yield vary widely – between 50 kilotons1 and 250 kilotons2 – reflecting the usual lack of consensus among seismologists in interpreting seismic data from suspected nuclear tests. Invariably, comparisons are likely to be made between North Korea’s undoubtedly powerful test and India’s proven nuclear capability to date.
One of those questions is likely to be whether India’s deterrent is “credible” given doubts that have been articulated by Dr. K. Santhanam about the test of a thermonuclear device in 1998. Santhanam has argued that the Shakti-1 device failed to achieve its designed yield and as such has to be considered a failure. That, in turn, means more tests are needed to establish India’s thermonuclear capability.3 It should be noted, however, that Santhanam’s claims were met with a detailed and rigorous rebuttal by Dr. R. Chidambaram and Dr. Anil Kakodkar.4 Kakodkar went even further and claimed, during the course of an interview with Karan Thapar, that India has produced and deployed several thermonuclear weapons:5
Karan Thapar:We have a credible thermonuclear bomb?
Anil Kakodkar: Why are you using singular? Make that plural.
Karan Thapar:So you are saying to me that we have thermonuclear bombs – in the plural?
Anil Kakodkar: Yes.
For the purposes of this article, it will be assumed that Kakodkar is being less than truthful and that India has not deployed any thermonuclear weapon. Two questions arise in this regard:
Is India’s deterrent credible without thermonuclear weapons?
Does India need thermonuclear weapons?
The answer to each of these questions is “yes” because, first, the credibility of India’s deterrent is independent of whether or not it has deployed thermonuclear weapons, and second, India’s deterrent, as it evolves, would benefit from the flexibility of design, weight and yield that thermonuclear weapons allow.
Credibility of the Deterrent
It is unfortunate that Santhanam, among others, has adopted the stance that the “failure” of the thermonuclear test in 1998 means that the Indian nuclear arsenal has been limited to fission weapons with an yield of 20 to 25 kilotons.6 This is patently untrue for, as was confirmed by Chidambaram and Kakodkar, the primary stage of the thermonuclear device was a fusion-boosted-fission device.7 Therefore, any discussion of India’s arsenal must perforce include fusion-boosted-fission weapons.
It should also be stated that the yield of a weapon need not necessarily mean that it is a fission, fusion-boosted-fission, or fusion bomb. The largest deployed fission weapon was the Mk.18 gravity bomb, which, weighing some 8,600 pounds, had a yield of 500-kilotons. Using some 60 kg of Highly Enriched Uranium, 90 of these weapons were produced before being replaced by fusion weapons and converted into lower yield systems.8 Outside of the United States, France deployed the 70-kiloton AN-22 fission bomb, which weighed a mere 700 kg, as well as the MR-31 fission warhead (mated with the S-2 Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles), which too, while weighing 700 kg, had a yield of 120 kilotons.9
There is some anecdotal evidence for India developing fission weapons approaching these French weapons in terms of yield. Indications are that the first Indian nuclear weapons design had a mass of about 1000 kg with a yield of 12 to 15 kilotons. Subsequently, however, perhaps by 1982, when rumours of a fresh round of nuclear tests were in circulation, the said weapon had been scaled down to a more manageable mass of between 170 and 200 kg.10 It appears that a 100 kiloton fission weapon was later produced for aerial delivery with a mass of 200 to 300 kg.11 If this information is indeed accurate, it would mean that India had perfected a relatively high-yield fission weapon with a relatively low mass for its class. One would expect that missile warheads of similar designs and yields would be feasible.
With respect to boosted-fission weapons, the largest to date was the 720 kiloton Orange Herald device, which was tested by the United Kingdom in 1957.12 Given, however, doubts regarding whether fusion boosting actually increased the yield, it is unclear whether Orange Herald should be referred to as the largest fission bomb tested or the largest fusion-boosted-fission tested.13 France had greater success with deploying fusion-boosted-fission weapons with the 700 kg, 500 kiloton, MR-41 warhead, which armed the M1 and M2 Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs).14
A possible confirmation of India deploying the fusion-boosted-fission weapons might be found in the following sentence written by Admiral Arun Prakash in 2009 (at the height of the controversy generated by Santhanam’s statements questioning the success of the 1998 thermonuclear test):15
“In the midst of the current brouhaha, we need to retain clarity on one issue; given that deuterium tritium boosted-fission weapons can generate yields of 200-500 kt, the credibility of India’s nuclear deterrent is not in the slightest doubt.”
An even more potentially revealing comment was made in 2011 by Dr. Avinash Chander to the Business Standard. He said:16
“Now we talk of [accuracy of] a few hundred metres. That allows a smaller warhead, perhaps 150-250 kilotons, to cause substantial damage.”
To discount these statements – one by a former Chairman, Chiefs of Staff Committee and the other by a former Director-General of DRDO – would be folly, to say the least. To these must be added Kakodkar’s consistent assertions that India can field weapons up to a yield of 200 kilotons.17 It should be noted that even a prominent sceptic like Dr. Bharat Karnad acknowledges that India’s boosted-fission capability is significantly more reliable than its thermonuclear capability.18
Data gleaned from the French fission and boosted fission designs makes it clear that the weight of such weapons at even higher yields fits in easily with India’s Agni family of missiles which have payloads ranging from 1000 to 1500 kg. Karnad asserts that Agni-I has been optimized for a 20 to 30 kiloton warhead, the Agni-II for a 90 to 150 kiloton warhead and the Agni-III for a 300 kiloton warhead.19 However, given that India’s 15 to 20 kiloton fission warheads and the 100 kiloton fission weapon developed in the 1980s weighed between 170 and 300 kg, it is somewhat surprising to see a claim that the Agni-I with a payload of 1000 kg would have a warhead with a yield of 20 to 30 kilotons.20 In other words, it is possible that the warhead of Agni-I may have a significantly higher yield than the 20 to 30 kilotons claimed by Karnad.
From a perspective of nuclear yield, it can therefore be argued that India’s needs are adequately met by tested and reliable fission and fusion-boosted-fission designs which can be scaled to meet the varying yield requirements up to a certain magnitude. In this regard, at least, the credibility of India’s deterrent does not require thermonuclear weapons.
Does India need Thermonuclear Weapons?
Despite the credibility of the Indian deterrent being unaffected by a fully proven thermonuclear capability, it is submitted that the development of thermonuclear weapons is an essential part of weapons development and that it will also make the deterrent more flexible.
Thermonuclear weapons need not have higher yields than either fission or boosted-fission weapons. For instance, the French TN-75 fitted to the M45 SLBM has a yield of only 100 kilotons. But they are inevitably lighter, with the 300 kiloton TN-80/81 warhead of the ASMP missile weighing a mere 200 kg.21 These lightweight, but relatively high-yield, warheads would enhance the potential efficacy of any Indian strike, particularly in respect of stand-off air-delivered munitions where the payload/yield trade-off has a direct bearing on the performance of an air-delivered missile.
Thermonuclear weapons achieve this superior weight to yield ratio by virtue of requiring less fissile material. This point is important for India since its reported fissile material stocks of weapons-grade plutonium and highly enriched uranium are relatively modest.22 Given that the Mk. 18 weapon used some 60 kg of HEU, and the Orange Herald device used 117 kg of HEU, it can be seen that large yield fission weapons use a considerable quantity of fissile material.23 Thermonuclear weapons requiring only the critical mass necessary for a fission trigger, offer the prospect of making more efficient use of India’s fissile material stocks.
Thermonuclear weapons also offer the prospect of variable yield weapons. Indeed, shortly after the 1998 tests, Dr. Frank Barnaby suggested that an operational nuclear weapon could have variable yields of 5, 50 and 500 kilotons.24 Such flexibility obviates the need for India to maintain a separate inventory of fission weapons to provide lower-yield options alongside larger fusion-boosted-fission weapons. This would inevitably make fusion weapons a potentially cost-effective option.
Furthermore, if India is considering multiple warheads for missiles – the purported Agni-VI for example – then the lower weight of thermonuclear weapons would be essential for this purpose.25 Thus, the French M4A and M4B SLBMs housed six TN70/71 warheads. While each warhead had an yield of 150 kilotons, the TN70 weighed less than 200 kg and the TN71 less than 175 kg.26 Britain has also followed this model for the Trident D-5 SLBM force.27 In contrast, fusion-boosted-fission weapons of similar yields will, as shown earlier, weigh some 700 kg, making them unsuitable for multiple warhead purposes.
Conclusion
India has not defined its deterrent requirements in either quantitative or qualitative terms. Inferences are drawn from the text of its nuclear doctrine and based on the possible targets in the territories of its rivals and adversaries. While thermonuclear weapons are not necessary for maintaining a credible deterrent, they serve the purpose of enabling India to make effective use of its relatively limited fissile material stockpile. Since India’s deterrent requirements will evolve with time, it behoves a country with limited resources to maintain as flexible a deterrent as possible. To this end, thermonuclear weapons, offering variable yields and light-weight warheads that use less fissile material, should be an essential component in India’s arsenal.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
15. A. Prakash, “Strategic Policy Making and the Indian System”Maritime Affairs, Vol. 5, No. 2, Winter 2009, pp. 22-31. The quoted sentence is on p. 22.
The March of Folly Jointly Led By Kim Jong-Un And Donald Trump
K. P. Fabian
September 12, 2017
The crisis over North Korea’s reckless but successful pursuit of nuclear- weapon capability and the misguided response thereto by the United States is taking the world nearer to an unnecessary and perfectly avoidable catastrophe.
The crisis over North Korea’s reckless but successful pursuit of nuclear- weapon capability and the misguided response thereto by the United States (US) is taking the world nearer to an unnecessary and perfectly avoidable catastrophe. Let us see where we are, why we are there, and how we can get out of the mess.
The coverage in the international media has been lamentably slanted. It gives the reader the absurd impression that, for no rhyme or reason, from time to time, Kim Jong-un has been testing missiles or nuclear devices in violation of Security Council Resolutions It is true that he has been testing. But, that is not the whole story. The joint military exercises (starting from 21st August and continuing) by US and South Korea are seen by North Korea as a rehearsal of, or preparation, for an attack on it. Had the exercises been called off or reduced in scale, North Korea might not have tested the ICBM (InterContinental Ballistic Missile) on 29th August, the first to go over Japan after 2009, or the nuclear device on 3rd September.
We need to raise the fundamental question: Why is Kim Jong-un doing what he is doing? It is indisputable that he does not want to start a war with US as he knows that US can wipe his regime and even his country off the face of the earth. Obviously, he is seeking security in his own fashion by pursuing nuclear weapons. Surely, that security should be provided to him if the alternative is a catastrophe. Kim Jong-un’s public boasts and threats should be taken with a pinch of salt.
US Policy towards the Crisis
The first thing to note about US policy is that the world has stopped taking President Trump’s tweets and public pronouncements as fully representing US policy. Trump threatened North Korea with “fire and fury the like of which the world has never seen” (9th August 2017). Two days later, he tweeted: “Military solutions are now fully in place, locked and loaded, should North Korea act unwisely. Hopefully Kim Jong-un will find another path!"
On 6th September 2017, Secretary of State Tillerson, Defence Secretary General Mattis, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Joe Dunford and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats gave a classified briefing to the House of Representatives and the Senate. The message was that the US would work hard for a strong resolution at the UN Security Council and increase pressure on China to inflict more pain on North Korea by denying it oil. There was no hint that US was preparing a military option to be exercised soon.
The world has recognized that Trump cannot help tweeting. The real US policy could be said to be a mix between what Trump tweets (about 25%) and what his senior aides such as Secretaries of State and Defence as well as the National Security Advisor choose to say in public from time to time (about 75%), taking enormous trouble not to appear to be contradicting their President. They do not always succeed in avoiding the appearance of such contradiction. In short, while Trump has said in so many words that he rules out talking, his senior aides have made it clear that there is still scope for diplomacy. However, they are, as yet, unable to make Trump agree to sending a serious and meaningful signal about Washington’s willingness to sit down and talk to Pyongyang.
There is a danger, clear and present, in all this. Kim Jong-un who is an autocrat himself, might take Trump’s tweets literally and react accordingly. The two of them are running up the escalation ladder each trying to be faster than the other.
The Disunited UN Security Council
There is a sharp difference between the Security Council’s approach towards North Korea’s testing of an intercontinental missile on 29th July and its conducting a nuclear test on 3rd September. In the first case, a united Security Council passed a resolution (2371 of 5th August 2017) condemning North Korea for the test and imposed heavy economic sanctions on it, reducing its export income of $3 billion by a third. Obviously, the testing of a bomb of 160 kilotons of TNT, ten times the strength of the bomb that Truman used on Hiroshima in August 1945 is a more serious matter than a missile test. But, the Security Council is not united, with China and Russia opposing a US move to have a resolution that would, among other things, call for banning the export of oil to North Korea. The country imports about 750,000 tonnes of oil a year with China supplying about 95% and Russia the rest.
It is not difficult to figure out why China and Russia are opposing the new US resolution, the text of which is not yet out. The resolution calls for banning import of textile products from North Korea and employment of North Koreans outside the country. We do not know the exact number of North Koreans employed in China, Russia, the Middle East, Malaysia and elsewhere. It could be anywhere between 50,000 to 100,000. The North Korean government orders its citizens to go abroad and they must send back money. It has been estimated that $2.3 billion is earned this way in a year.
Obviously, if the US resolution is passed and implemented, the North Korean economy will collapse and millions might cross over to China. At the same time, North Korea might continue with its tests, missile or nuclear, as the army might have stocked up a lot of oil. It is absurd to argue that just because pain is inflicted on the common people, Kim Jong-un and his coterie would change their behavior.
There is another bone of contention between US and China.US has threatened to act against any country that trades with North Korea. The obvious target is China. “What we absolutely cannot accept is that”, a Chinese official said, “on the one hand (we are) making arduous efforts to peacefully resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, and on the other hand (our) interests are being sanctioned or harmed."1 The rapidly deteriorating relations between Russia and the US make it even more difficult to have a common stand on North Korea among the big three.
There is an even more fundamental difference of opinion between US on the one hand and Russia and China on the other with regard to North Korea. In March 2017, China proposed a formula of ‘double freeze’ followed by talks. The idea was that US and South Korea ‘freeze’ their military exercises and simultaneously North Korea ‘freezes’ its tests, missile or nuclear. Russia supported the ‘double freeze’ as has Germany, more recently. Even the UK, ever deferential to the US, has supported talks with North Korea. In short, the US might find itself isolated if it wants to seek a military solution.
South Korea and Japan
President Moon of South Korea has stopped calling for talks with North Korea. He has agreed to install more THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defence) anti-missile systems in the country after having opposed it when he was in the opposition, and even after his election as President. He has also got the US to agree to lift some restrictions on South Korea’s missile capacity, with the cap of 500 kg payload being removed. The South Korean military has carried out simulations of an attack to hit crucial nuclear sites as well as the leadership of North Korea.
Japan has worked out evacuation plans for its 57,000 citizens in South Korea. It will need US assistance in this. There have been panicked purchases of nuclear shelters in Japan with some columnists also advocating that Japan should start making nuclear weapons.
In short, South Korea and Japan might not be able or willing to exercise any serious restraint on Trump when these countries themselves are conflicted on how to respond to North Korean actions.
Options before United States
The options before the United States are to 1) Deploy forces for an attack on North Korea hoping that Kim Jong-un will climb down; 2) to live with a nuclear armed North Korea or 3) to talk to North Korea on a peace treaty and extend economic assistance on the basis of eventual dismantlement of the nuclear programme.
President Trump might be tempted to adopt the first option. But, there is the danger that North Korea might send artillery shells to the Seoul Capital Area, about 50 km. away from the border, with a population of 25 million. Tens of thousands might be killed, including US soldiers and Japanese expats, though North Korea might be destroyed in toto. The Pentagon knows all this.
The second option is to be seriously considered as it is difficult to turn the clock back. North Korea is already a nuclear power. It might currently lack the technology of miniaturising the weapon or of safe re-entry into the atmosphere of its missiles carrying a nuclear pay load but it is only a matter of time before it acquires the necessary expertise. Politically, Trump cannot accept this option.
Obviously, if the first two options are not acceptable, the third option needs to be taken seriously.
How to Square the Circle?
Kim Jong-un will not make the first move for talks for fear of rejection. President Trump also will be reluctant to be seen as ‘weak and vacillating’.
Obviously, there is need for discreet mediation by credible agents. The Swiss President Doris Leuthard publicly offered to mediate on 3rd September 2017. Switzerland has prior experience, having represented US interests in Iran since 1980. So far, there is no response to the Swiss offer and it is doubtful that the Swiss offer made publicly would be accepted by either party.
The United Nations Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, is in a better position to mediate. He should discreetly talk to Washington and Pyongyang. If the mediation offer is accepted, the talks between North Korea and US should be kept confidential till an agreement is reached.
The 6-party talks held in the past can be revived later, but the initial talks leading to an agreement must be confined to US and North Korea. The aim of the talks must be to stop North Korea from proceeding with more tests. Once North Korea stops testing, progress towards a peace treaty and economic assistance should follow in parallel. Progressive dismantling of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programme should start at an agreed point of time.
As of now, removing nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula appears almost impossible. What is urgent is to stop the march of folly. Once that march is stopped new possibilities might appear.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
The various connectivity projects put forward by India show its involvement as an investor in capacity-building efforts in the recipient countries across sectors of their particular needs and choices, not as an overarching and imposing economic power.
The Joint declaration on the Asia-Africa-Growth-Corridor (AAGC) or the ‘Freedom’ Corridor issued at the 52nd annual meeting of the African Development Bank in May 2017 and its subsequent reiteration in the India-Japan Joint Statement during the Japanese Prime Minister’s September 2017 visit to India marked a decisive step in the promotion of connectivity as one of the strategic dimensions of India’s foreign policy. The AAGC Vision Document states that the initiative will concentrate on development and cooperation; infrastructure and digital and institutional connectivity; skill development; and establishment of people-to-people contact between Africa, South Asia, East and South-East Asia, and Oceania.
There has been a global trend towards fostering greater economic connectivity among states and regions. This is in consonance with changing global realities – when international interactions veer between antagonistic to cooperative in a scenario of a ‘multiplex world order’, a world of diversity and complexity, not homogeneity, and a world where, in place of unipolarity, the ‘rise of the rest’ is becoming a distinct possibility. In such a scenario, connectivity offers a nuanced economic-strategic approach for global interactions. This article attempts to analyse India’s involvement in global connectivity endeavours and the way in which it will potentially shape India’s strategic goals.
The Context
The economic, political, cultural, and strategic importance of connectivity projects have been in the global reckoning since the collapse of the USSR in 1991 and the initiation of an array of projects under the identical name of ‘Silk Road’ to revive and re-present the ancient Silk Road in newer versions in Eurasia. The first such initiative was the European Union-sponsored trade and transport corridor Project TRACECA in 1993. It was followed by the West-sponsored Baku-Tbilisi Ceyhan energy Project; the EU-sponsored integrated energy pipelines Project of ‘Southern Corridor’; the NATO-sponsored ‘Virtual Silk Highway’ Project to connect European scientific-educational networks with Eurasia through the internet; UNESCAP’s Trans-Asian Railway Network (or the Iron Silk Road) Project; the CAREC-ADB Project on trade and transport corridors in Afghanistan and Central Asia; the New Eurasian Land Transport Initiative by the International Road Transport Union; the US- sponsored New Silk Road Initiative (NSRI) and the project to transform the NATO-sponsored NDN (Northern Distribution Network) system across Europe to reach non-lethal supplies to Afghanistan into permanent transport corridors across Eurasia. Interestingly, the One Belt One Road is the new version of China’s earlier Silk Road initiatives in Eurasia – an extension of the New Eurasian Continental Bridge Project and the ‘Look West’ Silk Road Development strategy to build energy pipelines connecting China with Central and West Asia.
India was not a part of this revival of Silk Road connectivity programmes in Eurasia though it possesses unique geo-cultural leverages. A number of routes (like Tibet route, Ladakh Route, Gilgit route, Srinagar route, Burma route, etc.) of the ancient Silk Road went through India to reach Persia and Central Asia. In addition to trade in goods, Buddhist ideas were spread from India to Tibet, China, Afghanistan and Central Asia through these routes. In this regard, it is to be noted that in the year 2010, the Archaeological Survey of India applied to UNESCO for the inclusion of 12 Silk Road sites in India in the UN World Heritage List.
But it is also important to note that in the year 2000 India initiated, along with Iran and Russia, the International North-South Corridor – the multi-modal transnational transport network that plans to connect Mumbai with Helsinki through Iran, Russia and Central Asia, and in the process reduce the current transportation time by 10 to 12 days. In addition to India, Iran and Russia, 11 other countries are members of this initiative: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Turkey, Oman and Syria. It was a significant first step for India to enter into the global strategic space of connectivity through an ambitious trade and transport corridor to connect Europe with India, bypassing the traditional route through the Suez Canal.
Further, in the year 2002, India initiated another important connectivity corridor to the East in the form of the India-Myanmar-Thailand Highway project. Now slated to be extended to Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam, this project is called the East-West Economic Corridor. This corridor, along with the India-Myanmar Kaladan multimodal transit transport project, seeks to transform the inter-regional connectivity scenario and aims to provide greater economic viability to the India-ASEAN strategic partnership.
Recent Focus
The current trend in India’s foreign policy approach suggests a more coordinated effort to treat connectivity as a strategy in the regional, inter-regional and global arenas. India initiated the Bangladesh-Bhutan-India-Nepal Motor Vehicles Agreement in 2015 in the South Asian region. And it has stretched the arena of South Asian connectivity into space by launching the first SAARC Satellite in 2017. This latter project will also benefit ASEAN countries as well given that a ground station is located in Vietnam. Further, the recently launched India-Afghanistan air corridor not only provides Afghanistan a direct connectivity route to tap the vast Indian consumer market but also at the same time boost India’s long-term efforts in facilitating Afghanistan’s comprehensive economic reconstruction process.
The trilateral India-Iran-Afghanistan trade and transport corridor project centred round the Iranian port of Chabahar can also become a potential game-changer in the inter-regional strategic matrix of Central and South Asia. India is planning to build a rail route network to connect Chabahar with Zahedan and link it to the Zaranj-Delaram road network (also built by India) in Afghanistan. This will connect India directly to Afghanistan and Central Asia, while offering landlocked Afghanistan, and eventually Central Asia, an alternate route to the Indian Ocean. This project would acquire greater geo-economic and strategic significance if developed as another wing of the INSTC network. Notably, Japan is keen to invest in the Chabahar project, in partnership with India, which will provide a stronger foundation in terms of technology and investment.
It is worth noting that in the 1990s Zbigniew Brzezinski had suggested that the US concentrate on Eurasia since it was imperative to engage in the purposive manipulation of geostrategically dynamic states that have the potential to exert power or influence beyond their borders and thus alter the existing status quo to a degree that affects US interests adversely. Brzezinski identified five such states: France, Germany, Russia, China and India.1 This view gains significance in the contemporary context in a somewhat altered manner, as the recent US announcement suggests that India will be an important partner not only in the revival of the 2011 plan of the-then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for the New Silk Road project involving Afghanistan and its neighbours but also for the Indo-Pacific Economic corridor linking South Asia with South-East Asia. A substantive financial allocation has been made in the 2017 US budget for these two programmes. This US acknowledgement that partnership with India has the potential to connect a wide regional space and facilitate inter-linked development in a comprehensive and positive manner signify India’s growing importance in providing an alternative option in the global strategic spectrum of connectivity.
Apart from Japan and the US, India is also planning to work with Russia to connect South Asia with North-East Asia and the Pacific region through the ‘Chennai-Vladivostok’ maritime corridor, as was discussed during External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj’s visit to Vladivostok in September 2017. The planned corridor will reduce the time to transfer cargo to 24 days as against the usual 40 days through Europe. This project has the potential to provide India an opportunity to better cultivate the natural resource-rich Russian Far East while for Russia, India will be an alternate investor in that region. Greater and better connectivity will also provide a much-needed boost to Indo-Russian trade relations. At the same time, it will connect India with South-East and East Asian countries with an alternate maritime trade route and will promote India’s footsteps in the Pacific region.
Project Mausam, involving 39 countries in the Indian Ocean littoral, is being jointly sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts and the Archaeological Survey of India. It aims to re-establish communications among countries of the Indian Ocean, revive ancient maritime routes where the trajectory of monsoon winds (mausam) helped create shared knowledge systems, technologies and traditions, and re-connect this shared past with the present realities of the Indian Ocean security matrix – a unique blend of geo-culture with geopolitics.
Strategic Significance for India
It is to be noted that the main vector of any connectivity project is the route. As Mahnaz Z. Ispahani has pointed out, the concept of a route is ‘both a geographical and a political idea, both an end and a means’ to create ‘access.’2 And Jean Gottman has commented that access in the geographical as well as political space is ‘organized at all times in history to serve political ends, and one of the major aims of politics is to regulate the conditions of access.’3 Thus, routes, access, economic mileage and geopolitical advantage are interlinked and interconnected in ascertaining the strategic significance of connectivity projects.
It is true that for India investment potential and procedural bottlenecks hindering time-bound implementation of projects still remain the problem areas in such ventures as evident in the slow progress of the North-South Transport corridor and Trilateral Highway projects. Regional instability, intra-regional discord affecting the BBIN accord and the changing contours of global relations like the impending international economic sanctions on Iran or the deteriorating security situation around the Pacific because of North Korea’s nuclear ambitions are the other formidable roadblocks confronting India’s connectivity projects.
At the same time, India’s viability and stature as a power in the global connectivity space evolve from the fact that it does not trample on political sovereignty, economic freedom, human rights and environmental sustainability of the recipient countries. All these connectivity projects show India’s involvement as an investor in capacity-building efforts in the recipient countries across sectors of their particular needs and choices, not as an overarching and imposing economic power. India’s decision to join the International Roads Transport (TIR) Convention as the 71st signatory shows its serious intent to involve itself in the international transport architecture and connectivity network.
From the Indian perspective, it is better not to analyse the connectivity trend completely from the narrow perspective of rivalry with any other country, although it is true that, through all these initiatives, India is attempting to position itself as a viable alternative to maintain the geopolitical balance in regions of its strategic interest. But a wider perspective indicates that Indian involvement in connectivity projects is part of the multidimensional strategy of an aspiring power spreading its wings to stay relevant in the global context through alternate ways by offering recipient countries geographical routes and providing access to more investment, better technologies, larger markets, and greater economic transformation. Apart from economic gains from such inter-regional and transcontinental ‘flows and networks of activity interactions’,4 the strategic advantages for India are in terms of engaging with new friends in Africa and in the Indian Ocean rim area as well as revitalising new areas of cooperation with old friends such as Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and ASEAN states. But the most significant achievement for India is the convergence of its strategic vision with the visions of two global powers, the US and Japan, as evident in the Indo-Japan Vision 2025 Document that provides shared strategic goals in Asia, Africa and the Indo-Pacific as well as the recent policy statements by US decision-makers on India’s role in stabilising Afghanistan and the Indo-Pacific region. These endeavours to further India’s strategic connect with the world will potentially shape the future of the global multipolar spectrum and India’s prominent role in such a framework.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
Besides military targets, a number of strategic civilian targets, like urban data and communication centres, stock exchanges, factories and other centres of gravity could also be attacked by e-bombs.
An electromagnetic pulse (EMP) is an intense burst of electromagnetic (EM) energy that causes, or can be used to cause, damage. Though natural EMP is always noticed as disturbances on the radio during lightening, much more powerful EMPs are generated by solar geo-magnetic storms. EMPs can also be generated, and artificially through nuclear explosions, or non-nuclear radio frequency weapons.1 Electric and magnetic fields resulting from such intense EMPs induce damaging currents and voltage surges in electrical/electronic systems, burning out their sensitive components such as semi-conductors.
The existence of a powerful man-made EMP was first proven during the first few nuclear tests. In 1962, the US conducted a high-altitude nuclear test code-named ‘Starfish Prime’. A 1.4 megaton weapon was detonated 400 kilometres above Johnston Island in the Pacific Ocean. Electrical equipment more than 1,400 kilometres away in Hawaii were affected by the EMP generated by the test. Street lights, alarms, circuit breakers, and communications equipment all showed signs of distortion and damage.2
More tests by the US and the erstwhile USSR yielded similar results, with even underground cables suffering damage. Seven low earth orbit (LEO) satellites failed in the months following the Starfish Prime test, as residual radiation damaged their solar arrays and electronics.3 The enormously devastating effects of EMP were only then realized. This led to the further development of nuclear bombs optimized for EMP effects, rather than physical destruction.
The use of nuclear EMP weapons during hostilities between states is likely to be fraught with risks. High altitude nuclear EMP is likely to cause catastrophic damage to electronics in vast regions across thousands of kilometres, and may often affect even the state using the weapon. Besides, the first use of nuclear weapons carries the escalatory risk of retaliatory nuclear strikes.
Andrei Sakharov, the Soviet nuclear scientist conceived of the concept of generating a non-nuclear EMP (NNEMP) as early as 1951. Although work on NNEMP started subsequently, it was only in the 1990s that documents and information began to appear in public about these weapons. Though information on these weapons is mostly kept classified, non-nuclear EMP weapons are now a part of military arsenals of at least major powers such as the US and the UK.4
NNEMP Weapons
Classified as Directed Energy Weapons,5 NNEMP weapons generate a less powerful EMP and have radii of effectiveness ranging from a few hundred meters to a few kilometres.6 Military NNEMP weapons are probably in existence in the form of either aircraft or missile delivered e-bombs7or mounted systems on aircraft, drones or missiles. Boeing claims to have successfully tested an EMP missile — Counter-electronics High-powered Microwave Advanced Missile Project (CHAMP) —at the Utah Test and Training Range in 2012.8 Small suitcase-sized ground-based NNEMP weapons with short ranges are also feasible.9 The adverse impact of a NNEMP attack is envisaged to be more on systems and devices with electronic components, as the voltages required to damage semi-conductors are small.
Experts consider that NNEMP are easy to develop and relatively inexpensive and that these could also be put together using Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) materials.10 Avi Schnurr, CEO and President of the Electric Infrastructure Security (EIS) Council of the United Kingdom (UK), has statedthat ‘the biggest issue with non-nuclear EMP weapons is that the complexity and threshold required to produce them is minimal, to say the most.’11 Given the relative ease of development, not only major powers but even smaller countries could develop them.
On March 25, 2003, CBS NEWS reported the first possible use of an e-bomb by noting that ‘The U.S. Air Force has hit Iraqi TV with an experimental electro-magnetic pulse device called the "E-Bomb" in an attempt to knock it off the air and shut down Saddam Hussein's propaganda machine….’12 Even at their current levels of technological capabilities, there is a possibility that India’s neighbours already possess aircraft or missile delivered e-bombs. Short range briefcase-sized EMP devices could even get into the hands of non-state actors and terrorists, in all likelihood made out of COTS materials.13
Military Employment
EMP weapons could be used against military and civil targets alike. They have been called Day-1 weapons by some experts, as these are likely to be used as early as possible in war to maximize asymmetry over the adversary. Modern militaries are heavily reliant on advanced electronics. Even at the lowest levels, weapons, equipment, communication and data sets, among others, have some embedded electronics. At higher levels, naval ships, aircraft, artillery pieces, armoured vehicles, radars, military communication and data network, command and control centres, automated air defence (AD) weapon systems, etc., have substantial and critical electronic components.
Majority of the present day military equipment and networks are either insufficiently or not at all hardened against EMP. Therefore, at every level, militaries are vulnerable to EMP attacks. An e-bomb with a lethal radius of even a few kilometres could put out of action a deployed battalion-size force or a large number of airfield assets or a naval flotilla. The damage to the electronics will take considerable time to repair and the downtime of the affected combat systems may extend from a few hours to even months. Unserviceable combat systems and the absence of command and information systems are likely to result in prevalence of disorder and uncertainty, giving the offensive side a considerable advantage to wrest initial gains and turn the situation in its favour.
On their part, defending forces can foil enemy offensives by disrupting the latter’s control and coordination through the use of e-bombs. Given the rather limited radius of effectiveness of e-bombs, a large number of e-bombs would however be needed to cover the length and breadth of enemy forces in battle zones, including vital targets like war rooms, operation -centres, force headquarters, airfields, AD systems, etc. E-bombs could prove to be more effective than explosive bombs since they would not spare even the dugout or blast protected targets. A single wave EMP attack could considerably reduce the combat capability of a force. Even localised damage could have the potential to disrupt activity, especially if combined with other forms of attack.14 To ensure optimal use of own EMP weapons and deny a counter EMP strike opportunity to the enemy, militaries would need to devise tactics and strategies.
Besides military targets, a number of strategic civilian targets, like urban data and communication centres, stock exchanges, factories and other centres of gravity could also be attacked by e-bombs.15 Targets hardened against physical destruction or located amidst the civil population could be particularly vulnerable to e-bombs. With increasing networking and redundancies, however, data and communication facilities are becoming resilient against total annihilation.
EMP weapons could also be used clandestinely to take out important targets during peace time, when the use of conventional weapons would be considered outrageous, as it will be difficult to prove who exactly was responsible. Such incapacitating applications of EMP could also prove to be an effective deterrent against enemies contemplating military action.
Since information on e-bombs is kept highly secret, experts are unable to definitively gauge the extent of damage it may cause.16 Damage would depend a lot on the target characteristics also, for instance whether the electronics of the target are enclosed in metal, the percentage of electronic components in the target, exposure of metal cables, connection to power supply, terrain masking, etc. Likely damage could, however, be arrived at by conducting simulation and field testing.
The collateral damage potential of e-bombs, i.e. damage to electronics in hospitals, emergency services, etc., may make their use sinister and would need careful contemplation.
Countermeasures
Faraday’s caging and metal encasing of systems and components is considered to be the most effective protection against EMP, besides physically destroying the weapon delivery platform itself.17 These are designed to divert and soak up the EMP. Additionally, electrical surge protection circuits and terrain masking could be useful. However, the costs of building EMP protected military systems or EMP hardening of all current systems is considered prohibitive by experts. It may be possible for only a few critical systems. At present, no infallible solution seems to be available against NNEMP.
Threat Appraisal
The EMP threat has been a rising concern for all major powers, which have constituted high-level commissions and committees in the recent past to study the threat. Think tanks have also been engaged in discussing the issue. Deposing before the Defence committee in November 2011, the UK’s then Minister of State for the Armed Forces, Nick Harvey, stated that EMP ‘is certainly considered a potential threat. It is not considered a particularly likely one, certainly in the foreseeable future; but we keep that constantly under review.’18 The US also keeps the threat under vigil and has also possibly evolved contingency plans.19
India, with its hostile neighbourhood,20 should not discount facing an overt or clandestine use of NNEMP weapons during either peace or hostilities. Keeping a tab on their possible development in the neighbourhood may be prudent. For retaining combat capability in case of EMP attacks, building redundancies into important military structures and developing fibre-optic networking may be indispensable. Measures like cost-effective Faraday caging and shielding for frontline equipment may be studied.
According to a 2015 news report, India too had started work on EMP in 1985. The report stated:
Looking at the gross asymmetrical advantage it provides against adversaries, India should actively consider developing an offensive NNEMP capability.
Conclusion
Major Western powers have confirmed the existence of NNEMP weapons. However, their effectiveness and likely success rate remains intangible since information on these matters remains classified. With the ease of development and low costs, these weapons are likely to proliferate and should be factored into war contingencies. India is vulnerable to EMP attacks, given the presence of technologically capable neighbouring rivals and adversaries. India should conduct a formal evaluation of the regional EMP threat and work towards building EMP resilient data and communication structures, both for civil and military requirements. There may also be a need to devise contingency plans and procedures for EMP attacks. Looking at the advantages and practical employability of e-bombs, India should also provide impetus to developing and inducting an offensive NNEMP capability.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
While the crisis has been defused for the time being, the probability of a future flare up cannot be ruled out. A holistic strategic review ought to be carried out over a wide spectrum and in a multi-dimensional manner with specific timelines.
The recent standoff at Doklam had raised genuine concerns about the situation escalating, given that the opposing troops stood ‘eye ball to eye ball’ for over 10 weeks. While the crisis has been defused for the time being, the probability of a future flare up cannot be ruled out. Post the disengagement, Chinese troops have fortified their positions in the Doklam Plateau with the declared intent of resuming the road construction activity at an appropriate time. The military build-up, which had been undertaken by the two sides in the wake of the crisis, remains in place. The current period of lull is, therefore, a tactical pause. In all prudence, Doklam should be taken as a nudge to initiate a holistic strategic review.
There is an old adage that “the longer you look back, the farther you can look forward”. Chinese leaders have a good understanding of their nation’s history and are known to make comparisons between the present and the past. Zhou Enlai had famously said “diplomacy is continuation of war by other means”, morphing the famous maxim by Clausewitz. Doklam was a well-calibrated small team action aimed at changing the status quo on the ground but with overarching strategic ramifications. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will make further moves on the ground only after the issue has been well deliberated by the Communist leadership.
After being appointed as ‘First Lord of Admiralty’ in 1911, Winston Churchill wrote a memorandum to his cabinet colleagues in which he stated that “Preparation for war is the only guarantee for preservation of wealth, natural resources and territory of the state.” To this end, he identified three key areas; probable dangers, history’s lessons and employment of war material. Interestingly, these guiding tenets are relevant to this day in the Indian context as well.
Probable Dangers
According to Graham Allison, the preeminent geostrategic challenge of the era is not violent Islamic extremism or resurgent Russia but the impact of China’s resurgence. Lee Kuan Yew had observed that the sheer size of China’s displacement meant that the world has to find a new order. Hence, when China cautions Japan to get used to its actions in the East China Sea and India to prepare for more Chinese roads in Doklam, these should not come as a surprise.
Through its assertive behaviour and expansionist approach, China has pursued the strategy of encroachment – ‘nibble and negotiate’ – evident from its actions both along its land borders and maritime frontiers. This is in consonance with the Chinese culture of maintaining a peaceful periphery by keeping the neighbourhood subdued. The Chinese are averse to any challenge or competition. A lonely power, China has optimally used its two allies – Pakistan and North Korea – to serve its strategic interests in the Indian subcontinent and the Korean Peninsula. With the deepening Chinese economic engagement with Pakistan as part of its global outreach, the nexus between the two countries is set to strengthen further.
Given the exponential accretion in China’s Comprehensive National Power (CNP), there is a marked shift from its earlier strategy enunciated by Deng Xiao Ping – ‘to bide for time and maintain a low profile’ till the completion of peaceful rise. Now, President Xi Jinping has emerged as an all-powerful ‘Fifth Generation’ leader whose China dream – fuxing (restoration)– envisions a “powerful and prosperous China”, symbolic of its past grandeur. In the quest to shape a ‘Sino-centric global order’, China seeks a unipolar Asia and a bipolar world. Mega projects like the Belt-Road Initiative (BRI) and Maritime Silk Route launched at Xi’s behest are means of power projection, designed to catapult China into the superpower league.
Xi has accorded high priority to defence modernization, an important component of CNP. Consequently, the PLA is in the midst of path breaking reforms to emerge as a modern military that is capable of winning “limited war under informationised conditions”. To this end, the Central Military Commission (CMC), the highest military body, has been reorganized. All the members of the CMC are senior most PLA Generals, including General Chang Wanquan who has been the Defence Minister since 2012. The massive infrastructure development on the borders aims to overwhelm the adversary with sheer speed and shock action. While a major conflict with India is not in China’s larger interest, it will keep up the pressure astride the Line of Actual Control (LAC) through pre-emptive tactical actions.
Historical Perspective
An analysis of past skirmishes along the border reveal a definite pattern. Mao initiated the 1962 War when he was under serious criticism post the disastrous ‘Great Leap Forward’. The Nathu La Incident in 1967 coincided with an intensely turbulent phase of the ‘Cultural Revolution’. The Sumdurong Chu crisis in 1987 synchronised with the 13th Party Congress. The standoff in the area of Depsang Plateau in April 2013 preceded the visit of Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang. The face off in Chumar in September 2014 happened during President Xi Jinping’s visit to India. Doklam was triggered in mid-June just before Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the US. The timing of the Doklam crisis may also have some connect with the 19th Party Congress due in mid-October 2017. China’s diplomatic moves to defuse the situation at Doklam were primarily to prevent the derailment of the BRICS meeting which would have severely dented Xi’s image. It is evident that China’s internal dynamics have definite linkages with incidences on the border. Beijing has repeatedly resorted to military force against neighbours to achieve political objectives.
Employment of war waging material
In an era of ‘limited wars’, defining lines between strategic and tactical objectives stand blurred. Even small tactical incidents have strategic implications, wherein it is not unusual for the top leadership to willy-nilly get involved, Doklam being a case in point. In a limited war scenario, it is not total force ratios that are critical. What is crucial is the quantum of combat potential that can be brought to bear in an integrated manner at the point of decision, in a telescopic time frame. A flat decision making structure and synergy are sine qua non in modern warfare. Thus, well-developed infrastructure particularly in forward areas is vital. China has gained a strategic edge in this regard. However, its vulnerability of fighting from exterior lines of communications can be optimally exploited.
Strategic Review
In the light of the aforesaid imperatives, a holistic strategic review is no more an option. This ought to be carried out over a wide spectrum and in a multi- dimensional manner with specific timelines. As the Chinese leadership believes in negotiating only with equals, India has to address the current state of asymmetry vis-à-vis China in right earnest. It is only a state of strategic equilibrium between the two countries that can pave way for meaningful dialogue and regional stability. Some of the key facets which deserve attention are enumerated below.
Firstly, as a part of grand strategy, India needs to rebalance in consonance with the geopolitical shift that is in the offing in the Indo-Pacific. To counter Beijing’s growing influence especially around the neighbourhood, New Delhi needs to shed its traditional policy of ambiguity. It has to be forthcoming to play a larger role in the region by aligning with strategic partners, namely the US and Japan, besides other friendly nations. In the process, India must push strongly for a multipolar global architecture to effectively thwart China’s designs.
Secondly, the enhancement of CNP as an integral component of national policy ought to be accorded highest priority to correct the prevailing imbalance. It entails sustaining a fast pace of economic growth, strengthening institutional mechanisms and the optimal utilisation of national resources.
Thirdly, as hard power is a vital component of CNP, enhancement of military capability is a critical imperative. So far, the process of military modernization has followed an ad hoc, incremental, approach in the absence of a well-defined national policy. This demands a strategic shift to make way for a transformational process in order to enable the Indian Army match the PLA. It entails dismantling bureaucratic gridlocks, abolishing service-specific organizational structures, sharpening the teeth-to-tail ratio, fast tracking the procurement cum acquisition procedures and leveraging technology. The consistent downward trend of defence expenditure as a percentage of GDP, which now stands at about 1.6 per cent, needs to be corrected.
Fourthly, there is an urgent need to prepare a ‘White Paper on National Defence’ which should clearly define the prevailing security environment, threat assessment and thrust of military modernization. Given the regional security dynamics, while major wars are unlikely, localised conflicts remain a possibility. The rapid advancement in technology has compressed time and space in addition to making battlefields non-linear. The traditional view of deterrence stands redefined by new concepts of ‘pre-emption’ and ‘prevention’ and these are being increasingly practiced by India’s adversaries.
Fifthly, it is ironic that we are yet to formulate a ‘Doctrine of Limited War’. This has to be a top driven process emanating from a National Defence Policy. Even the much talked of ‘two front scenario’ has varying interpretations between the three services. The current state of infrastructure stands out as a major impediment for the timely employment of combat power at the point of decision. The development of integrated and sustainable logistics is a pre-requisite for success in a limited conflict. The creation of super highways, freight corridors, forward airfields, strategic airlift capability and state of art communications set-up is the way forward.
Lastly, the concept of ‘border management’ requires a relook as the present system suffers from serious lacunae. There is an urgent need to have a single nodal agency to coordinate the functioning of the multiple organs involved in safeguarding India’s borders. Operational control on the Line of Control (LoC) and Line of Actual Control must rest with the Army. The operational capability of the Paramilitary Forces needs to be enhanced on priority basis. The mere enhancement of budgetary allocations without a coordinated security policy will not suffice. As the probability of face-offs and local skirmishes remains high, contingencies must be in place to deliver timely and calibrated responses. Disputed areas must be held in strength ab initio in order to prevent the adversary from presenting India with a fait accompli.
Given divergent national interests and overlapping strategic objectives, rivalry and competition is inherent in India-China relations. The vexed border issue coupled with the Tibet factor further add to the complexities. Hence, politico-diplomatic showdowns and standoffs on the border have to be accepted as a new normal. While sustained efforts to revamp the existing mechanisms of engagement remains a work in progress, there can be no laxity in defence preparedness. China respects strength and despises the weak. Defence and diplomacy being two sides of the same coin, it is boots on the grounds that determine the extent to which an envelope can be pushed at the negotiation table.
Maj Gen G G Dwivedi (retd) is former Assistant Chief of Integrated Defence Staff, has served as Defence Attaché in China, North Korea and Mongolia, and is currently Professor of International Studies at Aligarh Muslim University.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
Sector-specific micro parameters that have a bearing on the ease of doing business need to be identified and quantified.
The ‘Make in India’ initiative of the government is focussed on making India a manufacturing hub by facilitating greater involvement of the private sector. But this objective is not backed in adequate measure by an eco-system conducive to smooth conduct of business by the enterprises. As per the World Bank’s Ease-of-Doing-Business (EoDB) index, conducting businesses in India continues to be a challenge.
In 2015, India ranked 142nd (later revised to 134th) among 189 countries in the EoDB index, prompting the then Minister of State for Finance, Jayant Sinha, to affirm that the government intended to take measures to push India to a slot among the first 30.1 This was reiterated by the CEO of the Niti Ayog in May 2016,2 but by the month of December that year, the target was revised to 50.3
In a federal structure, making such an initiative work requires a very high level of coordination between the centre and the states. Some states have indeed made serious efforts to encourage the manufacturing sector but these efforts have largely been disjointed and have not yielded the intended results. This is evident from the fact that India has inched up only four notches to the130th rank in 2017. Except for the ease of ‘getting electricity’ — which has seen a marked improvement from the 51st rank last year to 26th in 20174, on all other parameters on which the business eco-system is tracked by the World Bank, there is nothing to write home about.
At this pace, the goal of being counted among the first 30, or even top 50, will elude the country for several decades. The economy can ill-afford this, especially with the growth rate being on a downward trajectory and the contribution of the manufacturing sector to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) continuing to be sedate.5 The objective of increasing the share of the manufacturing sector in the GDP to 25 per cent seems distant at this juncture.
This calls for looking beyond the 10-odd parameters that constitute the EoDB index6 and taking a closer look at the micro factors which affect business operations. This is important, because, purely from the point of ease of doing business, all these 10 parameters do not affect each of the twenty five sectors identified by the government to promote manufacturing in equal measure. It is also possible that some factors that are critical for a particular sector do not even figure among these 10 parameters.
While ‘paying taxes’, for instance, may affect every sector to varying degree, ‘trading across the borders’ may be more important for the information technology (IT)-business process management (BPM) sector than it is for the defence manufacturing sector. Within the defence manufacturing sector, ‘getting credit’ may not affect the big firms as much as it affects the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs). An assurance that successful development of a prototype will be followed by an assured supply order is a critical factor in defence but not necessarily in other sectors. But such aspects are not part of the ten parameters comprising the EoDB index.
Excessive focus on the global EoDB index is perhaps taking the attention away from the need to address such sector-specific micro factors that have a bearing on the ease of doing business in that sector. An obvious case in point is the defence manufacturing sector. Unlike other sectors such as automobile components or wellness, defence is an unpredictable monopsony governed by complex procedures and driven by a large number of players.
The factors that make the defence manufacturing sector somewhat unique require the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to develop a sector-specific index of ease of doing business in consultation with the industry, with interwoven sub-indices focused on the foreign manufacturers, public sector undertakings, big players in the domestic defence manufacturing market and the MSMEs. Quantitative norms will also need to be developed to assess the progress made in respect of each parameter constituting these indices.
Without in any way disparaging the steps taken by the government since the defence manufacturing sector was opened to the private sector in 2001, a large number of problems raised by the industry remain either unaddressed or inadequately addressed. This is exemplified by continued dominance of the defence public sector undertakings in defence manufacturing and a meagre increase in foreign direct investment (FDI) in defence in spite of what the government considers to be progressive liberalisation of the FDI regime over the past three years.
There also continues to be a lack of adequate information about MoD’s shopping list. The qualitative requirements of the equipment, weapon systems and other platforms, drawn up by the services, continue to pose a challenge for the industry. Field trials, staff evaluations and contract negotiations continue to take forever to complete. While new procurements are being regularly approved in principle by the Defence Acquisition Council and other competent authorities, the follow-up action on the approved procurement proposals continues to be tardy.
Despite all the improvements made over the years with a view to promoting indigenous production, the procurement procedure continues to be seen largely as complex and opaque. Addition of a new procurement categories like ‘Buy (Indian Designed, Developed and Manufactured) and adoption of formats like the strategic partnership model seem to have complicated the procedure rather than simplified it. Implementation of the offset policy is an ongoing challenge.
The prescribed contract format is not dynamic enough to accommodate the programme-specific requirements. The prescribed time-frame for completing the procurement process is generally followed only in breach. Even mundane issues like prompt payment to the vendors, which perhaps affects them the most, continues to defy solution. Efficacy of the single-windows and grievance redressal mechanisms, wherever these have been created, often falls below the expectation.
Information required by the vendors in connection with the conduct of their business with the MoD is hard to get. The pace and quality of decision-making does not inspire as much confidence as it should. Procurements have truly become what many describe as a game of snakes and ladders in the absence of a composite and distinct defence procurement policy.7
It is issues like these which continue to militate against the ease of doing business in defence that need to be identified in consultation with those who are expected to push defence manufacturing and create measurable indices to monitor the impact of the government’s efforts to address those issues. Such a bottoms-up approach, not just in defence manufacturing but also in sectors like tourism and hospitality which have a huge untapped potential, could help India climb up the global EoDB index rapidly.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
With the Bangladesh general elections not far away in 2018, and the unlikely scenario of the Rohingya problem being fully resolved in the next few months, the issue is likely to deeply influence the posture of the various political parties.
The influx of nearly one million Rohingya refugees from the northern portion of Myanmar’s Rakhine province due to severe persecution has affected the political environment in Bangladesh. The impact is particularly acute in the south-eastern district of Cox`s Bazaar as well as to a lesser extent in adjoining Bandarban district and the nearby estuary areas.
The Awami League-led government of Sheikh Hasina has adopted a decisive posture in the matter. Its views have been articulated at the diplomatic level with neighbouring countries and forcefully highlighted by Prime Minister Hasina in her address at the 76th United Nations General Assembly session where she called for the execution of a five-point plan, inter alia, setting up `safe zones` under international supervision for the Rohingyas in the territory of Myanmar and the return of all the refugees in Bangladesh to Rakhine under secure conditions.
Notwithstanding mutual recriminations, a consensus seems to be emerging among the political parties of Bangladesh that the Rohingya refugees have to be eventually repatriated to Myanmar and that Naypyitaw must be compelled to accept them back under assured security and livelihood sustaining conditions. With the magnitude of the problem becoming acute – more details are emerging of atrocities committed on the Rohingya by the Myanmar security forces and majority Burman elements – and the growing negative fallout from the enormous pressure exerted on local civic resources and amenities by the refugee influx in the affected districts, the matter is also becoming a major issue in the internal political domain and influencing political equations.
With the Bangladesh general elections not far away in 2018, and the unlikely scenario of the Rohingya problem being fully resolved in the next few months despite the October 2, 2017 agreement between Bangladesh and Myanmar to set up a working group to devise modalities for refugee repatriation, the issue is likely to deeply influence the posture of the various political parties. Already, the main opposition 20-party combine led by Khaleda Zia`s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has criticized Hasina for her government’s “failure” to obtain a resolution by convincing the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to censure the Myanmar government. The opposition combine wants the UNSC to condemn the Myanmar government for failure to protect the Rohingyas, stop atrocities against them, accept responsibility for their eventual repatriation and, in the interim, share responsibility for providing succour to the refugees in Bangladesh.
Bangladeshi Buddhist groups in Cox`s Bazaar and Bandarban as well as the Buddhist Nagarik Oikya (Buddhist Citizens` Alliance) have also joined the BNP and its political allies in condemning the Rohingya-related developments in Myanmar. This seems to be a significant development, indicative of attempts by the Buddhist community in Bangladesh to build a rapport with the BNP and keep their options open for an understanding or alignment with the BNP should a new ruling configuration emerge post the 2018 elections. However, an underlying fear for their own security if anti-Buddhist sentiments are again aroused by radical Muslim elements on the pattern of the anti-Buddhist frenzy instigated in May-June 2017 would have also induced Bangladesh’s Buddhists, their clergy and the United Forum of Buddhists to voice strong criticism of the Rakhine holocaust.
As it is, the Awami League and its allied political parties will face strong competition-cum-opposition from the BNP and its allies who have been out of power for more than eight years. There is no dearth of issues, genuine and trumped-up, to be bandied about in the domestic political arena. With respect to India, the anti-India elements in Bangladesh have been able to capitalise on New Delhi’s initial non-committal posture in taking note of the anti-Rohingya pogrom in Myanmar and providing relief assistance to deal with the refugee influx. At the global level, the failure of the Bangladesh government to convince the UNSC to pass a resolution on the Rohingya situation has given the BNP-led opposition an opportunity to berate the government. All in all, the Rohingya issue may serve to promote a more contentious factor in Bangladesh`s domestic milieu.
The presence of the huge Rohingya refugee population in Bangladesh is fraught with other consequences as well. There is disquiet within the government as well as among a substantial segment of civil society about the vulnerability of the destitute Rohingyas to the attractions offered by terrorist groups. There is concern about the risk of such groups merging with the local population and posing threats to local communities in the districts sheltering the refugees. The possibility of extremist communal elements, foreign terror groups and the some of the subverted Rohingyas aligning with the anti-Awami League political parties, to the detriment of peace and stability in the run-up to the 2018 general elections, also cannot be ruled out.
The Bangladesh military has been tasked to organize some of the relief infrastructure for the Rohingya refugees in the affected districts. The objective is to erect more than 14,000 refugee shelters in Cox`s Bazaar, temporarily rehabilitate the refugees and separate them from the local population as well as harmful political and anti-social elements, and obviate local tension and repercussions. The military’s involvement is intended to supplement the efforts of the civil machinery on relief administration as well as monitor the refugees and the environment from the perspectives of internal security and counter-terrorism. This use of the military has not been criticized by any of the political parties till now.
The Sheikh Hasina government has dealt with Bangladesh’s basic developmental issues, investment needs and matters pertaining to equitable growth and employment with a reasonable measure of success. In 2016, the country’s GDP grew by 6.8 per cent and the rate of inflation stood at less than seven per cent. However, over the past year, the Rohingya problem has resulted in the diversion of a substantial portion of current revenue (nearly US $ one million equivalent per day) on immediate refugee relief activities and rehabilitation such as the setting up of camps and investment towards capital expenditure on the development of a barren marshy island known as `Thengar Char` off the Noakhali coast in the Bay of Bengal estuarine area. The manner and quantum of rehabilitation assistance have generated contentious views among the political parties, on many occasions as a matter of expediency. There has been criticism from the political opposition, and even within the ruling Awami League and its allied parties, about the adequacy of relief provided to the Rohingya as well as on the extent to which the local communities in the vicinity of the relief camps are being adversely affected. Such criticism is only expected to increase in the near future and pre-election period for achieving political ends, depending on the gravity and outcome of the Rohingya crisis.
The manner in which the international community supports the Hasina government`s efforts to reverse the refugee influx as well as its outcome and improvement in management of the refugees will determine the extent of the fallout on the country’s domestic political milieu. The actions taken by countries like India and China are of salience in this regard considering their capacity to contribute to the mitigation of the crisis to an extent.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
MoD can leapfrog many of the 11 stages in the procurement programme by taking the measures outlined to fulfil the urgent requirements of the Air Force.
It may sound incredible but, according to official statistics, the number of fighter aircraft squadrons with the Indian Air Force (IAF) has gone up from 25 in 20141 to 33 in 2017.2 This has brought the IAF closer to the authorised strength of 42 squadrons, although the gap could widen again if induction of new aircraft does not keep pace with the inevitable de-induction of old ones.
It is becoming increasingly certain that this gap is sought to be bridged to a large extent by acquiring single-engine fighter aircraft, in addition to the HAL-built Light Combat Aircraft Tejas. Presently, Lockheed Martin and SAAB are the only two foreign manufacturers in the race in the single-engine aircraft category. Both have offered to make their products in India for which they have already signed agreements with the Tata Advanced Systems Limited (TASL)3 and the Adani Group,4 respectively.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has also set the ball rolling by issuing the Request for Information (RFI) to these two companies.5 But this is as good as it gets, for RFI is just the first of the eleven stages through which every procurement programme has to pass before the deal is signed. Each of these stages carries within it the potential to derail the programme.
Just to refresh memory, the programme for acquisition of 126 Medium Multi-role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) was aborted after more than three years of commercial negotiations. This incidentally is the penultimate stage before final approval is accorded by the competent financial authority to award the contract.
Considering that acquisition of single-engine aircraft is susceptible to all the vulnerabilities of the existing procurement procedure, it is somewhat puzzling that MoD should have decided to adopt the strategic partnership (SP) model for this programme.
Apart from the fact that any new model throws up numerous challenges when it is implemented for the first time, the success of the ragtag SP model is critically dependent on identification of the Indian companies which could be invited as prime vendors to manufacture the aircraft in India with the help of technology transfer from foreign manufacturers of the platforms chosen by the MoD.
The process of identifying the Indian companies has not even begun. Even if it is assumed that this process will go through smoothly despite all odds, the pre-emptive tie-ups by the two main contenders in the single-engine aircraft programme with Indian companies have rendered this exercise redundant. It will be surprising if these agreements would permit Lockheed Martin and SAAB to tie-up with any other Indian company for manufacturing the aircraft in India.
This poses a problem because under the SP model, the Indian partners, identified by the MoD as potential strategic partners, are required to approach the manufacturers of the platform, chosen by the MoD in a separate exercise, and enter into a legal agreement with the latter before submitting the bids. As things stand today, the two Indian companies with which Lockheed Martin and SAAB have entered into legal agreements have become their potential strategic partners by default.
This should not bother the MoD. In fact, it should be welcomed for it saves MoD the trouble of having to identify the potential strategic partners and to convince the foreign vendors to get into production arrangements with them within the existing policy framework which allows FDI only up to 49 per cent on the automatic route.
It would be frivolous to question the wisdom of the already sealed tie-ups. The foreign companies would not have gone ahead unless they were absolutely certain that their Indian partners will be able to deliver what is expected of both of them under the SP model. More to the point, it should be a big relief for MoD that they have joined hands with the Indian companies of their choice without seeking any special dispensation in regard to control over their management.
As an added advantage, these tie-ups help in cutting short the time that will otherwise have to be given to the potential strategic partners – after they are identified by the MoD - to tie up with the foreign companies.. However, in the event of the MoD not recognising the tie-ups already formed, this could end up creating legal difficulties if the main contenders are forced into new arrangements with other Indian companies.
For sure, this problem may not arise if TASL and the Adani Group get selected as potential strategic partners through an unpredictable and laborious selection process. But what will be the point of it all? On the contrary, MoD can take a short route to issuing the Request for Proposal (RFP) if the validity of the tie-ups is acknowledged by it.
This also opens up the possibility of categorising the acquisition programme under the ’Buy and Make (Indian)’ category or the time-tested ‘Buy and Make’ category. In essence, the difference between the two is this: under the former category the RFP is issued to only Indian vendors; and under the latter category it is issued to foreign vendors. The same end-results can be achieved under either of these categories.
Of the two, however, the ‘Buy and Make’ category seems more appropriate in the present case because the success of the entire project hinges on the conduct of the foreign manufacturer, be it with regard to transfer of technology, quality assurance, maintenance, and the like, for which it will be jointly responsible under the terms of the contract along with the Indian partner.
It is difficult to visualise any objective that cannot be achieved under the ‘Buy and Make’ category but which can be achieved only under the ‘Buy and Make (Indian)’ category or by adopting the SP model for this acquisition programme.
In any case, the tricky part will be the drafting of the RFP in a way that serves the objective of the programme, which should primarily be to ensure that the Indian company is not only able to manufacture and maintain the aircraft but is also in a position to undertake its life extension/up-gradation in future without being unduly dependent on the foreign manufacturer or being constrained by IPR issues.
To illustrate, rather than specifying the scope, range and depth of technology required to be transferred by the foreign manufacturer, the RFP could simply seek information as regards the technologies and capabilities that the manufacturer will not be able to transfer as also the reasons for being unable to do so.
The selection of the foreign company should be linked to the MoD being satisfied by the reasons proffered, and assessment as to whether the IAF can live with such denial of technology or capability, and what impact it will have on manufacturing/life-extension/up-gradation of the platform by the Indian company in future.
It should also be possible to compress the time required for carrying out the trials if the platforms are trial-evaluated only in respect of the parameters which have been added to it by the manufacturers after these platforms were last evaluated in the context of the now-aborted programme for the acquisition of 126 Medium Multi-role aircraft, provided it is technically feasible to do so.
All these measures will help MoD leapfrog to the commercial negotiation stage and, with some bold decision-making, even to the contract signing stage much before the end of the next financial year, which is effectively all the time that is available before the next general elections. It goes without saying that all this trouble will be worth the while only if there is a reasonable certainty of the programme not being stymied by the funds-crunch.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
The nostalgia among a section of the AKP to recreate the Ottoman past through economic and geopolitical integration has been the driving force behind Turkey’s recent assertive postures in regional matters including the Qatar crisis.
Turkey’s reaction to the rift among the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries—the June 5, 2017 embargo imposed by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt against Qatar for its alleged support to terrorism—has been significant. Within two days of the Saudi-led quartet announcing the severing of ties with Qatar, Turkey’s parliament approved a bill for deploying troops in the Turkish military base at Doha. The bill had been pending for approval since early May 2017 and its approval was hastened by the surprise developments in the Gulf. Turkey’s military base in Qatar, its first in the Arab world, was established in April 2016 in accordance with a December 2014 defence agreement between the two countries. Its aim was to bolster security and stability in the Gulf and, at that time, was welcomed by Saudi Arabia as a move to counter the growing regional influence of Iran and the US ignoring Arab Gulf countries’ concerns over the Iranian nuclear deal. Given the changed circumstances in the wake of the embargo imposed on Qatar, Riyadh along with Abu Dhabi, Manama and Cairo opposed Turkey’s decision to deploy troops in its military base in Doha. The 13 demands, which Saudi Arabia and UAE raised on June 23 as a pre-condition for negotiating an end to the embargo against Qatar, and which was modified on July 19 to six principles, included the closure of the Turkish military base.
Turkey and Qatar not only rejected the call to shut down the military base but termed the demand as against international law and interference in their bilateral ties. Though the demand for the closure of the Turkish military base in Doha was subsequently dropped from the six principles, the Saudi and Emirati opposition to the Turkish deployment of troops and plans for a joint military exercise did not end. Turkey has been sending military personnel to its base in Doha since the parliamentary approval, and on July 18 Ankara sent five armoured vehicles and 23 military personnel to raise the total number of troops deployed in Doha to more than 100. At the time, the Turkish Defence Minister, Fikri Isik, had said that Turkey will raise the number of its personnel in the base to 1,000 in the coming months and form a joint command with Doha that will be headed by a Qatari major general with a Turkish brigadier general as deputy commander. Going ahead with the plan, despite the reservations raised by Saudi Arabia and UAE, Turkish and Qatari militaries conducted a two-day (August 7-8) joint military exercise in the Gulf. The exercise, dubbed Iron Shield, included naval drills and joint training among infantry and artillery divisions of the two militaries. Eventually, Turkey plans to increase the number of its troops in Qatar to 3,000 and maintain a brigade in its Doha base.
The regional reaction to the joint military exercise and increased deployment of Turkish troops in Doha has been mixed. The four Arab countries at the forefront of the boycott of Qatar have criticized Turkey for meddling in Arab affairs. Saudi Arabia has been cold to Turkish overtures and not only refused President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s offer to mediate the crisis but also rejected the Turkish offer to build a military base in the Kingdom as well. Days after Erdoğan’s offer to build a base in Saudi Arabia, a statement by the Saudi Press Agency said, “Saudi Arabia cannot allow Turkey to establish military bases on its territories” as its “armed forces and military capabilities are at the best level.” Later, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir issued a statement articulating the Saudi position that Riyadh wants Arab issues to be resolved by Arab countries themselves. The UAE and Egypt were more vehement in criticizing the Turkish moves. In a series of tweets, Anwar Gargash, UAE’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, criticized Turkey for coming to Qatar’s rescue. For its part, Egypt urged the four Arab countries to expand the boycott of Qatar to include Turkey.
In contrast, the Iranian reaction has been subtle and measured. Tehran had maintained silence when Turkey first decided to establish its military base in Doha with the aim of countering Iran’s growing influence in the region. Although Iran was one of the first countries to offer help to Qatar after the Saudi-led coalition announced its embargo, it had at the same time stated that it would maintain a neutral position in the intra-GCC rift. But this Iranian posture changed after Qatar’s decision in August to restore full diplomatic ties with Tehran, which had earlier been suspended in January 2016 in support of Saudi Arabia’s decision to sever ties with Iran over incidents of arson in the Saudi embassy in Tehran and at the consulate in Mashhad after the execution of the Saudi Shia dissident cleric Nimr al-Nimr. Qatar’s move further angered Saudi Arabia and UAE, but was expectedly welcomed by Tehran. The spokesperson of the Iranian foreign ministry, Bahram Qassemi, stated that “the Islamic Republic of Iran’s principled and permanent policy has been and will be enhancing relations with all its neighbours.” This was a clear indication of a better understanding emerging between Tehran and Doha after the Qatar crisis to the chagrin of Saudi Arabia and UAE since one of the primary triggers for the embargo against Doha was its perceived cosying up to Tehran. While Doha and Tehran continue to improve relations, the Iranian response to the Turkish base and military exercise is also conditioned by strategic considerations in Iraq and Syria where it is working with Turkey to restore peace.
For Turkey, the decision to support of Qatar is driven by both strategic and ideological considerations. Ankara and Doha are the two Middle East capitals which have extended support to “moderate” Islamist forces, particularly the Muslim Brotherhood. Both had extended support to the Mohammed Morsi government in Egypt and had condemned the removal of the democratically elected president in July 2013. Ideological affinity with the Muslim Brotherhood had brought Turkey and Qatar closer soon after the outburst of popular anger in the form of the Arab Spring and they had been working together to support Islamist groups in Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Libya. Further, Turkey’s strategic ambitions in the Middle East have led to a recalibration of its foreign policy since the coming to power of the AKP (Justice and Development Party) in 2002. It propelled Turkey to take a keen interest in Arab affairs and made it intervene in neighbouring Syria and Iraq as violence erupted in these two countries in 2011-12. The Turkish decision to fast track the deployment of its troops in Doha soon after the eruption of the Qatar crisis is part of Ankara’s strategic ambitions to play a larger role in the Middle East. It not only makes Ankara a stakeholder in regional affairs but also gives it a forward military position to project power in the Gulf.
The Turkish military base in Doha and the joint Turkey-Qatar military exercise will provide Ankara a strategic presence in the Gulf. While Turkish leaders and government officials have tried to talk down the significance of the move by emphasising that it is a step towards ensuring security and stability in the Gulf and not aimed at any specific adversary, many Turkish commentators have termed the establishment of the base as the return of the Turks to the Arabian Peninsula. Such references emanate from the penchant among Turkish Islamists to see the Middle East as a natural sphere of influence. The nostalgia among a section of Turkey’s ruling party to recreate the Ottoman past through economic and geopolitical integration has been the driving force behind Ankara’s recent assertive postures in regional matters including the Qatar crisis. The establishment of a Turkish military base in Doha is part of the AKP’s plan of gaining “strategic depth” in the Middle East. It is a different matter that such postures may polarize the already fragile regional geopolitical situation and become a strategic liability for Ankara.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
The CDU’s likely coalition partners are the Green Party and the Free Democrats. Such a coalition can work because all partners share a common design on European Unity and socio-economic policies at home.
Most polls predicted a victory for the Christian Democrats (CDU-SCU), but few thought that their margin of victory would reduce so much. In the just held elections, the CDU got 32.8 per cent of the vote, nine percentage points lower than what it had obtained in the previous election.
However, the most significant outcome of this election is the appearance of the anti-immigration, anti-Islamic, Right for the first time in post-war Germany. The Alternative for Germany or AfD as it is called in Germany got 13 per cent of the vote, making it the third largest party. It will now have a seat in the highest legislative chamber of the Federal Republic, the Bundestag.
The other principal party, the Social Democrats, got 20.4 per cent of the vote, which precludes it from becoming a centre of an alternate ruling coalition. It is a party that helped make post-war Germany a social democracy, Germans themselves call the country a Social Democracy, thereby meaning a democracy with strong social content. Germany is today one of the few countries with an extensive public health system, a first class public education system and environmental standards that are the envy of the world. The performance of the Social Democrats at the polls was rather poor because their leader Martin Schultz just could not tell people that the party was different from its rival, the CDU. People saw Martin Schultz as another Angela Merkel but without her staidness and substance.
As always, the ruling government will comprise a coalition of parties. That’s how the German system works. Its vast network of checks and balances are designed to prevent an individual from seizing power and thus prevent the repetition, however inconceivable at present, of the events of 1933. The CDU’s likely coalition partners are the Green Party and the Free Democrats. Such a coalition can work because all partners share a common design on European Unity and socio-economic policies at home.
All other parties, and this is important to keep in mind, completely reject the thinking of the AfD. They all abhor its anti-immigration stance, its concealed racism, and its hostility to European unity. The AfD is a pariah in Germany’s current political spectrum.
With the rise of the AfD, Germany must now contend with atavistic nationalism, as many liberal democracies of Europe such as France, Netherlands and Austria do. Even the oldest of Europe’s democracies, Britain, also has a party that propagates such racism. Nigel Farage of the Independent Party advocated British Exit from the European Union in last summer’s referendum because he wanted to keep the Turks and such “other people” out of the UK.
This is Merkel’s fourth term as chancellor. No one calls her an Iron Lady” as the English did in the case of Margaret Thatcher. Perhaps she would resent such an appellation. To her people, she is just a woman of substance without any pretensions to heroism. She is liked just for being that. Germany is a mature democracy and it does not need heroes. At the end of the war, the great playwright Berthold Brecht said “unhappy is the land that needs heroes.” There are many such unhappy lands in the world today. But no sooner was the Second World War over than the British people threw out their hero Winston Churchill from power and elected as Prime Minister a very modest man – Clement Attlee. He made Britain a welfare state, which is no mean achievement. Indian democracy too got on very well with a prime minister of real substance – Narasimha Rao, the best prime minister since Jawaharlal Nehru.
Racist, aggressive, nationalism has now come to Germany, as it has in much of Europe. Across the Atlantic, America under Donald Trump represents a particularly poisonous form of such nationalism. It is possible that the European and American democracies will defeat this nationalism through strong democratic institutions and the will of the people.
But one must understand that such nationalism flourishes because there is a feeling among the people of the liberal West that their national identity has lost its moorings. Is it the cosmopolitanism accompanying globalization that has undermined the anchor of their national identity? Why do the English, French, and Austrians hanker for the past? They conjure up images of the past that present their nations as rooted in their histories and culture. That’s what Trump, Marine Le Pen, Boris Johnson do - tell the people of their idyllic past and promise to take them back there.
No doubt Merkel will fight such nationalism, which is still in an incipient stage. In this, she has a great companion in President Emmanuel Macron of France who won the presidential election in May 2017 by convincingly defeating his formidable rival Marine Le Pen. Le Pen is the leader of the National Front, which is impeccably anti-EU and anti-immigration and would like to reduce the eight million Arabs living in France to servitude. Macron, on the other hand, wants to integrate these people into French society as equal citizens. And he does not conjure up France’s imperial past. On the contrary, he says that the French conquest of Algeria was a criminal venture.
Both Macron and Merkel are committed to taking the European integration process forward, which means making the Euro a currency that facilitates the growth of all members of the Union. Today, the Union’s poorer members – Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain (famously called the PIGS countries) – feel that their use of the Euro ties them too closely to their rich counterparts and hurts their exports. Kenneth Rogoff of Harvard, an acknowledged expert on Europe, says that the Euro is an obstacle to European integration.
For the EU to prosper, it needs to have flexible arrangements with major trading nations of the world. It has such arrangements today with Canada and Norway. Can it make a profitable arrangement with Britain?
The EU’s foreign policy problems are daunting, With the coming of Trump, its security ties with the United States stand deeply strained. In fact, Trump has done everything to weaken, if not destroy, the EU. He openly supported Marine Le Pen’s stand of pulling France out of the EU, and backed Nigel Farage in his campaign to pull Britain out of the EU.
The EU’s security relations with the United States are deeply strained. Merkel talked about rethinking Europe’s security links with the US after Trump’s bellicose posture towards North Korea in August 2017. Trump’s statement about letting “fire and fury” against North Korea filled Merkel with fright. She wondered whether these were the words to be used publicly by the leader of the most powerful nation in the world and the security guarantor of Europe?
Another country that deeply weighs in the security equation of the EU is Russia. During the Cold War, it was Europe’s principal security threat. Today, Putin’s Russia poses a serious political threat to Europe. Russia, like America, also supports all European leaders opposed to European unity.
Merkel thus has ample problems on her hand. But she has a steady hand and is competent enough to navigate the contending currents both at home and abroad.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
While thermonuclear weapons are not necessary for maintaining a credible deterrent, they serve the purpose of enabling India to make effective use of its relatively limited fissile material stockpile.
In the aftermath of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) testing a “thermonuclear” weapon on 3 September 2017, the focus upon that country’s nuclear capability has been on the yield of the said test. Estimates for the yield vary widely – between 50 kilotons1 and 250 kilotons2 – reflecting the usual lack of consensus among seismologists in interpreting seismic data from suspected nuclear tests. Invariably, comparisons are likely to be made between North Korea’s undoubtedly powerful test and India’s proven nuclear capability to date.
One of those questions is likely to be whether India’s deterrent is “credible” given doubts that have been articulated by Dr. K. Santhanam about the test of a thermonuclear device in 1998. Santhanam has argued that the Shakti-1 device failed to achieve its designed yield and as such has to be considered a failure. That, in turn, means more tests are needed to establish India’s thermonuclear capability.3 It should be noted, however, that Santhanam’s claims were met with a detailed and rigorous rebuttal by Dr. R. Chidambaram and Dr. Anil Kakodkar.4 Kakodkar went even further and claimed, during the course of an interview with Karan Thapar, that India has produced and deployed several thermonuclear weapons:5
Karan Thapar: We have a credible thermonuclear bomb?
Anil Kakodkar: Why are you using singular? Make that plural.
Karan Thapar: So you are saying to me that we have thermonuclear bombs – in the plural?
Anil Kakodkar: Yes.
For the purposes of this article, it will be assumed that Kakodkar is being less than truthful and that India has not deployed any thermonuclear weapon. Two questions arise in this regard:
The answer to each of these questions is “yes” because, first, the credibility of India’s deterrent is independent of whether or not it has deployed thermonuclear weapons, and second, India’s deterrent, as it evolves, would benefit from the flexibility of design, weight and yield that thermonuclear weapons allow.
Credibility of the Deterrent
It is unfortunate that Santhanam, among others, has adopted the stance that the “failure” of the thermonuclear test in 1998 means that the Indian nuclear arsenal has been limited to fission weapons with an yield of 20 to 25 kilotons.6 This is patently untrue for, as was confirmed by Chidambaram and Kakodkar, the primary stage of the thermonuclear device was a fusion-boosted-fission device.7 Therefore, any discussion of India’s arsenal must perforce include fusion-boosted-fission weapons.
It should also be stated that the yield of a weapon need not necessarily mean that it is a fission, fusion-boosted-fission, or fusion bomb. The largest deployed fission weapon was the Mk.18 gravity bomb, which, weighing some 8,600 pounds, had a yield of 500-kilotons. Using some 60 kg of Highly Enriched Uranium, 90 of these weapons were produced before being replaced by fusion weapons and converted into lower yield systems.8 Outside of the United States, France deployed the 70-kiloton AN-22 fission bomb, which weighed a mere 700 kg, as well as the MR-31 fission warhead (mated with the S-2 Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles), which too, while weighing 700 kg, had a yield of 120 kilotons.9
There is some anecdotal evidence for India developing fission weapons approaching these French weapons in terms of yield. Indications are that the first Indian nuclear weapons design had a mass of about 1000 kg with a yield of 12 to 15 kilotons. Subsequently, however, perhaps by 1982, when rumours of a fresh round of nuclear tests were in circulation, the said weapon had been scaled down to a more manageable mass of between 170 and 200 kg.10 It appears that a 100 kiloton fission weapon was later produced for aerial delivery with a mass of 200 to 300 kg.11 If this information is indeed accurate, it would mean that India had perfected a relatively high-yield fission weapon with a relatively low mass for its class. One would expect that missile warheads of similar designs and yields would be feasible.
With respect to boosted-fission weapons, the largest to date was the 720 kiloton Orange Herald device, which was tested by the United Kingdom in 1957.12 Given, however, doubts regarding whether fusion boosting actually increased the yield, it is unclear whether Orange Herald should be referred to as the largest fission bomb tested or the largest fusion-boosted-fission tested.13 France had greater success with deploying fusion-boosted-fission weapons with the 700 kg, 500 kiloton, MR-41 warhead, which armed the M1 and M2 Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs).14
A possible confirmation of India deploying the fusion-boosted-fission weapons might be found in the following sentence written by Admiral Arun Prakash in 2009 (at the height of the controversy generated by Santhanam’s statements questioning the success of the 1998 thermonuclear test):15
“In the midst of the current brouhaha, we need to retain clarity on one issue; given that deuterium tritium boosted-fission weapons can generate yields of 200-500 kt, the credibility of India’s nuclear deterrent is not in the slightest doubt.”
An even more potentially revealing comment was made in 2011 by Dr. Avinash Chander to the Business Standard. He said:16
“Now we talk of [accuracy of] a few hundred metres. That allows a smaller warhead, perhaps 150-250 kilotons, to cause substantial damage.”
To discount these statements – one by a former Chairman, Chiefs of Staff Committee and the other by a former Director-General of DRDO – would be folly, to say the least. To these must be added Kakodkar’s consistent assertions that India can field weapons up to a yield of 200 kilotons.17 It should be noted that even a prominent sceptic like Dr. Bharat Karnad acknowledges that India’s boosted-fission capability is significantly more reliable than its thermonuclear capability.18
Data gleaned from the French fission and boosted fission designs makes it clear that the weight of such weapons at even higher yields fits in easily with India’s Agni family of missiles which have payloads ranging from 1000 to 1500 kg. Karnad asserts that Agni-I has been optimized for a 20 to 30 kiloton warhead, the Agni-II for a 90 to 150 kiloton warhead and the Agni-III for a 300 kiloton warhead.19 However, given that India’s 15 to 20 kiloton fission warheads and the 100 kiloton fission weapon developed in the 1980s weighed between 170 and 300 kg, it is somewhat surprising to see a claim that the Agni-I with a payload of 1000 kg would have a warhead with a yield of 20 to 30 kilotons.20 In other words, it is possible that the warhead of Agni-I may have a significantly higher yield than the 20 to 30 kilotons claimed by Karnad.
From a perspective of nuclear yield, it can therefore be argued that India’s needs are adequately met by tested and reliable fission and fusion-boosted-fission designs which can be scaled to meet the varying yield requirements up to a certain magnitude. In this regard, at least, the credibility of India’s deterrent does not require thermonuclear weapons.
Does India need Thermonuclear Weapons?
Despite the credibility of the Indian deterrent being unaffected by a fully proven thermonuclear capability, it is submitted that the development of thermonuclear weapons is an essential part of weapons development and that it will also make the deterrent more flexible.
Thermonuclear weapons need not have higher yields than either fission or boosted-fission weapons. For instance, the French TN-75 fitted to the M45 SLBM has a yield of only 100 kilotons. But they are inevitably lighter, with the 300 kiloton TN-80/81 warhead of the ASMP missile weighing a mere 200 kg.21 These lightweight, but relatively high-yield, warheads would enhance the potential efficacy of any Indian strike, particularly in respect of stand-off air-delivered munitions where the payload/yield trade-off has a direct bearing on the performance of an air-delivered missile.
Thermonuclear weapons achieve this superior weight to yield ratio by virtue of requiring less fissile material. This point is important for India since its reported fissile material stocks of weapons-grade plutonium and highly enriched uranium are relatively modest.22 Given that the Mk. 18 weapon used some 60 kg of HEU, and the Orange Herald device used 117 kg of HEU, it can be seen that large yield fission weapons use a considerable quantity of fissile material.23 Thermonuclear weapons requiring only the critical mass necessary for a fission trigger, offer the prospect of making more efficient use of India’s fissile material stocks.
Thermonuclear weapons also offer the prospect of variable yield weapons. Indeed, shortly after the 1998 tests, Dr. Frank Barnaby suggested that an operational nuclear weapon could have variable yields of 5, 50 and 500 kilotons.24 Such flexibility obviates the need for India to maintain a separate inventory of fission weapons to provide lower-yield options alongside larger fusion-boosted-fission weapons. This would inevitably make fusion weapons a potentially cost-effective option.
Furthermore, if India is considering multiple warheads for missiles – the purported Agni-VI for example – then the lower weight of thermonuclear weapons would be essential for this purpose.25 Thus, the French M4A and M4B SLBMs housed six TN70/71 warheads. While each warhead had an yield of 150 kilotons, the TN70 weighed less than 200 kg and the TN71 less than 175 kg.26 Britain has also followed this model for the Trident D-5 SLBM force.27 In contrast, fusion-boosted-fission weapons of similar yields will, as shown earlier, weigh some 700 kg, making them unsuitable for multiple warhead purposes.
Conclusion
India has not defined its deterrent requirements in either quantitative or qualitative terms. Inferences are drawn from the text of its nuclear doctrine and based on the possible targets in the territories of its rivals and adversaries. While thermonuclear weapons are not necessary for maintaining a credible deterrent, they serve the purpose of enabling India to make effective use of its relatively limited fissile material stockpile. Since India’s deterrent requirements will evolve with time, it behoves a country with limited resources to maintain as flexible a deterrent as possible. To this end, thermonuclear weapons, offering variable yields and light-weight warheads that use less fissile material, should be an essential component in India’s arsenal.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
The crisis over North Korea’s reckless but successful pursuit of nuclear- weapon capability and the misguided response thereto by the United States is taking the world nearer to an unnecessary and perfectly avoidable catastrophe.
The crisis over North Korea’s reckless but successful pursuit of nuclear- weapon capability and the misguided response thereto by the United States (US) is taking the world nearer to an unnecessary and perfectly avoidable catastrophe. Let us see where we are, why we are there, and how we can get out of the mess.
The coverage in the international media has been lamentably slanted. It gives the reader the absurd impression that, for no rhyme or reason, from time to time, Kim Jong-un has been testing missiles or nuclear devices in violation of Security Council Resolutions It is true that he has been testing. But, that is not the whole story. The joint military exercises (starting from 21st August and continuing) by US and South Korea are seen by North Korea as a rehearsal of, or preparation, for an attack on it. Had the exercises been called off or reduced in scale, North Korea might not have tested the ICBM (InterContinental Ballistic Missile) on 29th August, the first to go over Japan after 2009, or the nuclear device on 3rd September.
We need to raise the fundamental question: Why is Kim Jong-un doing what he is doing? It is indisputable that he does not want to start a war with US as he knows that US can wipe his regime and even his country off the face of the earth. Obviously, he is seeking security in his own fashion by pursuing nuclear weapons. Surely, that security should be provided to him if the alternative is a catastrophe. Kim Jong-un’s public boasts and threats should be taken with a pinch of salt.
US Policy towards the Crisis
The first thing to note about US policy is that the world has stopped taking President Trump’s tweets and public pronouncements as fully representing US policy. Trump threatened North Korea with “fire and fury the like of which the world has never seen” (9th August 2017). Two days later, he tweeted: “Military solutions are now fully in place, locked and loaded, should North Korea act unwisely. Hopefully Kim Jong-un will find another path!"
On 6th September 2017, Secretary of State Tillerson, Defence Secretary General Mattis, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Joe Dunford and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats gave a classified briefing to the House of Representatives and the Senate. The message was that the US would work hard for a strong resolution at the UN Security Council and increase pressure on China to inflict more pain on North Korea by denying it oil. There was no hint that US was preparing a military option to be exercised soon.
The world has recognized that Trump cannot help tweeting. The real US policy could be said to be a mix between what Trump tweets (about 25%) and what his senior aides such as Secretaries of State and Defence as well as the National Security Advisor choose to say in public from time to time (about 75%), taking enormous trouble not to appear to be contradicting their President. They do not always succeed in avoiding the appearance of such contradiction. In short, while Trump has said in so many words that he rules out talking, his senior aides have made it clear that there is still scope for diplomacy. However, they are, as yet, unable to make Trump agree to sending a serious and meaningful signal about Washington’s willingness to sit down and talk to Pyongyang.
There is a danger, clear and present, in all this. Kim Jong-un who is an autocrat himself, might take Trump’s tweets literally and react accordingly. The two of them are running up the escalation ladder each trying to be faster than the other.
The Disunited UN Security Council
There is a sharp difference between the Security Council’s approach towards North Korea’s testing of an intercontinental missile on 29th July and its conducting a nuclear test on 3rd September. In the first case, a united Security Council passed a resolution (2371 of 5th August 2017) condemning North Korea for the test and imposed heavy economic sanctions on it, reducing its export income of $3 billion by a third. Obviously, the testing of a bomb of 160 kilotons of TNT, ten times the strength of the bomb that Truman used on Hiroshima in August 1945 is a more serious matter than a missile test. But, the Security Council is not united, with China and Russia opposing a US move to have a resolution that would, among other things, call for banning the export of oil to North Korea. The country imports about 750,000 tonnes of oil a year with China supplying about 95% and Russia the rest.
It is not difficult to figure out why China and Russia are opposing the new US resolution, the text of which is not yet out. The resolution calls for banning import of textile products from North Korea and employment of North Koreans outside the country. We do not know the exact number of North Koreans employed in China, Russia, the Middle East, Malaysia and elsewhere. It could be anywhere between 50,000 to 100,000. The North Korean government orders its citizens to go abroad and they must send back money. It has been estimated that $2.3 billion is earned this way in a year.
Obviously, if the US resolution is passed and implemented, the North Korean economy will collapse and millions might cross over to China. At the same time, North Korea might continue with its tests, missile or nuclear, as the army might have stocked up a lot of oil. It is absurd to argue that just because pain is inflicted on the common people, Kim Jong-un and his coterie would change their behavior.
There is another bone of contention between US and China.US has threatened to act against any country that trades with North Korea. The obvious target is China. “What we absolutely cannot accept is that”, a Chinese official said, “on the one hand (we are) making arduous efforts to peacefully resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, and on the other hand (our) interests are being sanctioned or harmed."1 The rapidly deteriorating relations between Russia and the US make it even more difficult to have a common stand on North Korea among the big three.
There is an even more fundamental difference of opinion between US on the one hand and Russia and China on the other with regard to North Korea. In March 2017, China proposed a formula of ‘double freeze’ followed by talks. The idea was that US and South Korea ‘freeze’ their military exercises and simultaneously North Korea ‘freezes’ its tests, missile or nuclear. Russia supported the ‘double freeze’ as has Germany, more recently. Even the UK, ever deferential to the US, has supported talks with North Korea. In short, the US might find itself isolated if it wants to seek a military solution.
South Korea and Japan
President Moon of South Korea has stopped calling for talks with North Korea. He has agreed to install more THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defence) anti-missile systems in the country after having opposed it when he was in the opposition, and even after his election as President. He has also got the US to agree to lift some restrictions on South Korea’s missile capacity, with the cap of 500 kg payload being removed. The South Korean military has carried out simulations of an attack to hit crucial nuclear sites as well as the leadership of North Korea.
Japan has worked out evacuation plans for its 57,000 citizens in South Korea. It will need US assistance in this. There have been panicked purchases of nuclear shelters in Japan with some columnists also advocating that Japan should start making nuclear weapons.
In short, South Korea and Japan might not be able or willing to exercise any serious restraint on Trump when these countries themselves are conflicted on how to respond to North Korean actions.
Options before United States
The options before the United States are to 1) Deploy forces for an attack on North Korea hoping that Kim Jong-un will climb down; 2) to live with a nuclear armed North Korea or 3) to talk to North Korea on a peace treaty and extend economic assistance on the basis of eventual dismantlement of the nuclear programme.
President Trump might be tempted to adopt the first option. But, there is the danger that North Korea might send artillery shells to the Seoul Capital Area, about 50 km. away from the border, with a population of 25 million. Tens of thousands might be killed, including US soldiers and Japanese expats, though North Korea might be destroyed in toto. The Pentagon knows all this.
The second option is to be seriously considered as it is difficult to turn the clock back. North Korea is already a nuclear power. It might currently lack the technology of miniaturising the weapon or of safe re-entry into the atmosphere of its missiles carrying a nuclear pay load but it is only a matter of time before it acquires the necessary expertise. Politically, Trump cannot accept this option.
Obviously, if the first two options are not acceptable, the third option needs to be taken seriously.
How to Square the Circle?
Kim Jong-un will not make the first move for talks for fear of rejection. President Trump also will be reluctant to be seen as ‘weak and vacillating’.
Obviously, there is need for discreet mediation by credible agents. The Swiss President Doris Leuthard publicly offered to mediate on 3rd September 2017. Switzerland has prior experience, having represented US interests in Iran since 1980. So far, there is no response to the Swiss offer and it is doubtful that the Swiss offer made publicly would be accepted by either party.
The United Nations Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, is in a better position to mediate. He should discreetly talk to Washington and Pyongyang. If the mediation offer is accepted, the talks between North Korea and US should be kept confidential till an agreement is reached.
The 6-party talks held in the past can be revived later, but the initial talks leading to an agreement must be confined to US and North Korea. The aim of the talks must be to stop North Korea from proceeding with more tests. Once North Korea stops testing, progress towards a peace treaty and economic assistance should follow in parallel. Progressive dismantling of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programme should start at an agreed point of time.
As of now, removing nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula appears almost impossible. What is urgent is to stop the march of folly. Once that march is stopped new possibilities might appear.
Views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IDSA or of the Government of India.
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