Category Archives: Geopolitics and Strategic Impulses

To Take the Road Less Travelled By*: Nuclear Risk Reduction Measures

Posted on by
4

Transcript of a presentation made to the Chaophraya Dialogue in February 2012.

By

Vice Admiral (retd) Vijay Shankar

Keywords: Nuclear Risk Assessment, South Asia Nuclearization, Tactical Nuclear Weapons, Anti-Ballistic Missile Defense System, NFU doctrine

The Problem

The real problem with nuclear weapons risk reduction is the ability to convince decision makers that no conceivable advantage can be achieved from a nuclear exchange; for, as long as one side believes that there is some value to be had through the deployment and use of nuclear weapons, uncertainties and imponderables creep in that sets into motion a chain reaction that continuously aggravates and raises the degree of risk.

Military planners are more than familiar with the fact that risk assessment is an imperative in the development of a strategic plan. The process of its generation is marked by the persistent motivation to not only eliminate uncertainties and bring about balance in the Objectives-Resource-Means equation but also to ensure that the probability of success and the benefits that accrue far outweigh the hazards of failure. However, the abiding conundrum is that the very nature of warfare is in opposition to such precision.

Nuclear Risk Assessment

When we enter the nuclear arena we must note that strategic imbalance is intrinsic to the Objectives-Resources-Means relationship. From the very start, the equation is irrevocably in a state of unstable equilibrium caused by the fact that whatever means are used the impact will invariably be to obliterate the very objectives or interests that were sought to be achieved. This is the reality of nuclear weapons. Its value lies in its non usage; its aim is, nuclear war avoidance; its futility is, in attempting to use it to attain political goals. 

Strategic Collaboration

Strategic collaboration with a potential enemy is not a concept that comes naturally to the military planner. Tradition is against it and the very idea of sovereignty militates at the thought of it. Nonetheless it can be no nation’s case to destroy the very purpose that polity set out to achieve. Nuclear weapons have put us on a razors edge in part because of our inability to control the manner in which political events and technology are driving the direction nuclear weapon policies and arsenals are headed. While technology invites covertness; the lethality, precision, stealth and time compression that it has wrought demands transparency. Demarcation between custodian and controller and central control are imperatives if at all the risks of an unintended exchange are to be averted and stability of a deterrent relationship assured. The belief that escalation control of a nuclear conflict is possible lacks conviction and therefore any attempt to conventionalise nuclear weapons has to be abhorred.

The Descent to Tactical Nuclear Weapons (TNW)

The absence of transparency manifests itself in ‘speculative bulges’ in the arsenal. The direction in which arsenals are headed with the induction of the ‘Nasr’, ‘Babur’ and the ‘Raad’ is a grim reminder of the upshot of ambiguity and opacity both in policy and control and the risks of a descent to nuclear war fighting becomes a near certainty.

Strategic planners in Pakistan suggest that nuclear weapons have an inalienable place in their military strategy and therefore a flexible response of both the conventional and the nuclear is the order of things. Also, ambiguities and the threat of first use are central to the ‘absence’ of a declared doctrine. Add to this is the actuality of an enfeebled civilian leadership incapable of action to remove the military finger from the nuclear trigger, the active involvement of non-state actors in military strategy and an alarming posture of an intention-to-use all have the makings of a nuclear nightmare in the offing.

Cardinal Principles Governing Risk Reduction

We are now in a position to enunciate some of the cardinal principles that govern risk reduction in the nuclear situation that obtains in the subcontinent:

  • Abiding belief in nuclear war avoidance.
  • Clarity in strategic underpinnings, establishment of coordination centres and a rejection of ambiguities.
  • Stability of the deterrent relationship.
  • Transparency in policy, technology intrusions, intent and alerts.
  • Abhorrence of a descent to tactical nuclear weapons, conventionalising and nuclear war fighting.
  • Centralised command and control with a clear demarcation between Custodian and Controller.

Against the backdrop of what ought to be, an examination of whether nuclear risk reduction measures (NRRM) currently address the rigorous demands of donning the mantle of nuclear weapon states that too in an adversarial predisposition and geographically co-located within a few minutes flight time from each other; the answer must come in the negative. What is striking is that despite several incidents over the last decade and a half that could have escalated to the nuclear level the security establishments on both sides have not set themselves to the task of preparing concrete perspectives on the issue of nuclear risk reduction barring endorsing the principle. Currently the only meaningful risk reduction measure in place is mutual notification of ballistic missile flight tests.

NRRM Measures

There are several NRRMs that can be put in place without in anyway radically altering the material situation. These may be identified as follows:

  • Making transparent strategic and doctrinal underpinnings of nuclear forces and the purpose of technological intrusions.
  • De-alerting of nuclear weapon systems; while this may not be easily verifiable, the process may begin by notifying at all times the alert state of nuclear forces.
  • Making transparent a minimalistic approach by declaring ‘how much is enough’.
  • Developing a common lexicon and understanding of nuclear concepts.
  • Rejecting short range nuclear missiles and the descent to tactical nuclear weapons.
  • Setting up of surveillance and risk reduction centres that provide communication and coordination for implementing these measures

The Value of Ambiguity

The policy of nuclear ambiguity was brought to prominence when Prime Minister Levi Eshkol in 1966 stated that ‘Israel would not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons into the region’. Four red lines were linked to its use. These included successful Arab military penetration; destruction of Israeli Air Force; cities attacked by WMD and use of N-Weapons.  It served as Israel’s ultimate guarantor of security.

The value of ambiguity lies in opacity of policy and an unwillingness to disclose status of the weapon program. When disclosure has occurred and a nation has declared its nuclear weapon status in an ambience of multilateralism, ambiguity loses value and increases the hazards of the unintended. For inherent to an ambiguous policy is its tendency to take advantage of risk aversion, a bedrock of a deterrent relationship (this underscores the Pakistan position).

Indistinctness in policy, when TNWs are in the arsenal immediately suggests that conventional principles apply. Resulting in actions that are contradictory to stated policies which in turn provide an incentive for speculative bulges in arsenal and for opting for a first strike capability/counter force capability on the part of the adversary.

Ambiguity has been used as an offset for conventional inferiority with the belief that control over escalation is possible. This is so obviously a fallacy due to the nature of the weapon. Also its effect in disrupting stability is apparent and the ability to bargain or negotiate is greatly diminished since the potential adversary begins with the assumption of a worst case and accordingly builds his arsenal. Ambiguity must thus be seen as an agent in direct opposition to achieving a stable deterrent relationship.

Technology intrusions coupled with ambiguity of intent increases the hazard quotient geometrically and will make the demand for transparency more urgent if a stable deterrent relationship is the aim.

ABMs
In theory the Anti Ballistic Missile is a defensive system, yet its introduction can not only provoke destabilisation in a deterrent relationship but also can provide the incentive for unpredictability. Where doctrinal underpinnings are similar and the basis of stability is mutually assured destruction, then ABMs would be a destabilising factor for a variety of reasons; chief amongst them is that it undermines the strategic underpinnings of the arsenal and it provides the incentive to launch a first strike.

However, in a situation where a No First Use policy is faced with ambiguity or a First Use situation or there is wide variance in approach to establishing a deterrent relationship, the acquisition of an ABM capability makes strategic sense because of the ‘failure conundrum’ and imponderables that play on the planners mind.

Conclusion

The only way to reduce the risks involved of a nuclear exchange is to convince decision makers that no conceivable advantage can accrue from its use. Its only purpose is to deter its own use. Any attempt to conventionalise the weapon runs the risk of not only decentralising control increasing the risk of unintended application, but also of losing escalatory control and destroying the purpose of polity.

The genii cannot be put back in the lamp, what can be done is to take the road less travelled by and put in place measures that promote transparency, understanding and  de-alerting of nuclear forces.

_________________________

*Frost, Robert. “Two roads diverge in a wood, and I took the one less travelled by, and that has made all the difference”.

Strategic Non-Nuclear Weapons: An Essential Consort to a Doctrine of No First Use

Posted on by
7

By

Vice Admiral (Retd.) Vijay Shankar

This article was first published by the Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi, in January 2014.  

Keywords: Strategic Non-Nuclear Weapons, Doctrine of NFU, Indo-Pak-China Nuclear stability, Non-State Actors, Counter-force strike

Politico-Military thought often harbours a puzzling phenomenon when it organises concepts and institutions in a mosaic of sometimes antithetical notions. Contrary ideas are indeed intrinsic to the art of political sagacity, but when form is defined by a belief, in apparent conflict with content, then there appear distortions more illusory than what logic would suggest. So it is with the emergence of strategic nuclear weapons. They are destructive to the extent that the purpose of warfare is itself obliterated, underscoring a compelling theory of war avoidance. By its side are strategic non-nuclear weapons whose intent is to target nuclear weapons that, ironically, seek a (precarious) stability.

Conventional savvy will first suggest that non-nuclear weapons can neither deliver the requisite high explosive payload to assume a counter-force role against silo-based or caverned nuclear systems; nor do they come with the probability of kill that is demanded with such a role. But just around the technological corner lurks high impact penetration and shaped charges that make a mockery of hitherto simple overpressure reckoning. Second, nuclear pundits will insinuate that a partially successful counter-force strike may in point of fact catalyse escalation to a full blown nuclear exchange; both contain candour of their own.

But strange is our circumstance when on the one hand Pakistan presents us with a nuclear nightmare which when articulated is a hair-trigger, opaque deterrent conventionalised under military control, steered by a doctrine obscure in form, seeped in ambiguity, and guided by a military strategy that carouses and finds unity with non-state actors. The introduction of tactical nuclear weapons into the battle area further exacerbates credibility of their control. It does not take a great deal of intellectual exertions to declare that this nightmare is upon us. However, the very nature of the power equation on the subcontinent and the extent to which it is tilted in India’s favour will imply that any attempt at bringing about conflict resolution through means other than peaceful is destined to fail. In this context it is amply clear that the threat of use of nuclear weapons promotes only one case and that is the Pakistani military establishment’s hold on the nation. On the other hand is a Janus-faced China which, in collusion with Pakistan’s nuclear weapon programme, has not just entrenched proliferatory links, but also doctrinal union that permits a duplicitous approach to the latter’s declared No First Use (NFU) posture and an option to keep the South Asian nuclear cauldron on the boil. Also significant is the alliance bucks the existing global non-proliferation structure.

What may be derived from the current state of affairs, with any conviction, is the political and military unpredictability that prevails. This denies hope for stability and the expectation of fitting conditions into a convenient model, let alone providing for security guarantees. Governments faced with such a conundrum more readily prepare for a worst case scenario than try and reconcile the true dimensions that uncertainty introduces. It is preparedness, therefore, that endows the only tool that can deter possible confrontation of a nature that has earlier been designated as nightmarish.

India today is in a position to impress upon its adversaries a deterrent relationship based on nuclear war avoidance, with the proviso that the rationale of nuclear weapons as a political tool and a means to preclude a nuclear exchange are recognised and adhered to. China’s galloping entwinement with the rest of the world makes this proposition a real probability; contingent upon our resolve and policies of seeking mutuality with like-minded nations to rally around the single point of preventing reactionary overturning of the status quo. This despite the unilateral tensions that China has precipitated in the East and South China Sea over sovereignty, air defence identification zones and the right to control fishing.

Pakistan is, however, a different cup of tea for it portrays a perilous uncertainty, as would any nation under military control that perceives in nuclear weapons the ultimate Brahmastra. As with that weapon of mass destruction, answers lay not just in the promise of disproportionate retaliation but also in the credible ability to prempt and counter its use. India has in place nuclear weapons driven by a doctrine of NFU and massive retaliation. What its strategic forces must now equip itself with is select conventional hardware that tracks and targets nuclear forces (all under political control). This would provide the pre-emptive teeth to a deterrent relationship that leans so heavily on NFU.

China’s Air Defence Identification Zone: At Variance with the Principle of Adherence

Posted on by
15

This article was first published on the Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies website in December 2013.

By

Vice Admiral (Retd.) Shankar

Keywords: Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), East China Sea, Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ), Rise of Chinese Hegemony, “Line of Actual Control”

An Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) is space over land or water within which identification, location, and routing of aircrafts are controlled. It is enforced by a state in the interest of security and safety. While ADIZs usually extend into what is universally acknowledged to be international airspace, even by the countries that maintain them, they in no way confer sovereignty. Its extent is determined by the reaction time to respond to foreign and possibly hostile aircrafts. The authority to establish an ADIZ is not given by any international treaty nor prohibited by international law and is not regulated by any international body. The first ADIZ was established by the United States soon after World War II. As surveillance technologies improved, the scramble for security reached a frenzied peak during the early stages of the Cold War when the fear of a sneak nuclear airborne first strike was a strategic fixation amongst protagonists. The extent of paranoia is exemplified by the American ADIZ off Southern California that stretches more than 400 nautical miles out to sea. Air defence zones should not be confused with information structures which are used to manage air traffic worldwide.

Several countries currently maintain ADIZs including Norway, Britain, USA, Canada, Japan, Pakistan, India, South Korea, Taiwan and China. Three conventional criteria preside over such zones, these are: the Zone cover undisputed territory, Zones do not apply to foreign aircraft not intending to enter territorial airspace, Zones do not overlap. Since states have the right to regulate air traffic only over their land, countries are not legally obliged to comply with another States ADIZ requirements in international airspace, but commercial traffic tend to do so because of the promise of security and safety.

So, on 23 November 2013, why did China establish its East China Sea ADIZ? Despite the knowledge that the central three criteria were breached, it covered the disputed Islands of Senkaku/Diaoyu; the Zone solicited information even if the foreign aircraft had no intentions of entering China’s territorial air space; and intriguingly, the new Zone intruded and overlapped the Japanese and Korean ADIZs. It also, cannot be coincidental that the inexact vesica piscis formed by the intersection of the Japan and China ADIZ along with the intersection of their disputed  Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) are centred on the Chunxiao gas fields (originally disputed but since 2008 overseen by a shaky joint development programme).

This discourse considers the three reasons that China’s establishment have fielded in vindication of their East China Sea ADIZ. First, the Surprise Attack Anxiety.  Surprise may be an essential feature of the “Principles of War”, and theoretical savvy suggest that the danger of a surprise attack is highest when one party to a conflict considers war inevitable and thinks that getting in the first blow would deliver a decisive military advantage; but, the reality is entirely in variance. For State initiated offensive military acts and follow up actions cannot today be masked, primarily because contemporary surveillance systems are designed to effectively discriminate hostile preparations and intrusions. Such technical measures are well known to China and appropriate devices are in place. ADIZs on the other hand are founded on the assumption of adherence and therefore in a state of war or military hostilities, it is inconceivable that one of the antagonists is going to adhere to the niceties of safety obligations. Tensions are undoubtedly high in the East China Sea region at the moment, but this is not Cold War. No country wants to target the heart of the global economy. The surprise attack formulation as articulated by China’s defence ministry is therefore on thin ice and has left China’s ADIZ more a question mark as to what their strategic intent is.

Second, the rationale that it is illicit trafficking of man, material and narcotics that is the object of the Zone is ludicrous since the region is neither a significant drug route nor is it a cognizable unlawful human trafficking corridor. Also the presence of multiple and overlapping maritime disputes and claims in area contributes to a surfeit of  zealous policing agencies which makes the trafficking theory implausible.

Third, the suggestion that the Zone was motivated by a desire to reduce the risk of midair collisions is hardly tenable since the most acute peril that airmen face is when there is duality of control without clear and unambiguous responsibility and power to regulate traffic. The underlying problem is not commercial air traffic, which is already under efficient regulation in the East China Sea, but the movement of military flights which have no obligation to abdicate control to the Zonal controller whilst in international airspace. Proclaiming the ADIZ and declaring the right to “emergency defensive measures”, it has put pressure on China to intercept foreign military flights increasing the risk of accidents. The move up an escalatory ladder jumped a few rungs when military aircraft from the US, Japan and South Korea challenged the ADIZ.

It is evident that China’s ADIZ neither qualifies the 3- conventional criteria test nor does their logic have any prospect of acceptance. It has, however roused a dangerous dilemma for there now exists a real possibility that a commercial plane in the area could receive conflicting instructions and face hazardous consequences. The Zone has also lowered the threshold for armed incidents. Which brings us back to our original question of why the Zone? History has repeatedly shown that the rise of a new hegemon is marked by resistance to the status-quo. China’s ADIZ in the East China Sea must be seen as a manifestation of its growing assertiveness. From the Indian perspective, planners must be prepared to confront similar proclamations over the Line of Actual Control particularly in the Arunachal sector. The riposte lies in defying any such unilateral decree.