MillenniumPost
Opinion

A novel concept for India

‘Pre-emptive strike’ has grave implications for two nuclear neighbours

A controversy has arisen about the effectiveness of India's air attack at the Jaish-e-Mohammed terror camp at Balakot in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan. Doubts have been raised about the actual terror base being hit. Some doubting Thomases have also raised questions about the number of casualties caused by the air strike. Or, whether there was any casualty at all. The official statement is that twelve Mirage aircraft took part in the raid in the early hours of February 26.

These doubts and questions obfuscate a more important point. In providing a rationale for the attack, the Government said it became necessary to make a pre-emptive strike on the Jaish base because credible information had been received that the Jaish was planning another terror attack on India. "Pre-emptive strike" - These are pregnant words of grave implication. The significance of the Indian attack was that this was the first time that India was sending a clear message, not only to Pakistan but to the whole world, that if India was certain that an attack was imminent, it would make pre-emptive strike on the source of the threat. It will not wait for the actual strike to take place.

After the second Pokhran nuclear tests in May 1998, the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee formulated India's nuclear doctrine. It committed India to a "No First Use" policy and never to launch a nuclear strike on a non-nuclear country. Now that India has asserted that it has the right (and it will exercise this right) to pre-empt any imminent attack on the country, can this newly introduced concept of "pre-emption" be extended to the nuclear field as well?

Pakistan has a nuclear arsenal which has reportedly more warheads that India has. Pakistan has also repeated many times that it knows it cannot win a conventional war against a much more militarily powerful India and should it face defeat, it will unhesitatingly use its nuclear weapons against India.

Public opinion in India has become increasingly hostile to Pakistan as it has carried on one terror attack after another. After the Parliament attack in December 2001, Prime Minister Vajpayee ordered immediate mobilisation of the Indian army against Pakistan. This was called "Operation Parakram" in which the troops of India and Pakistan faced each other for nearly a year. But Vajpayee had the wisdom and the sagacity not to unleash a war on Pakistan. He only wanted to bring Pakistan under tremendous pressure.

Narendra Modi is no Vajpayee and the BJP of Modi is very different from the BJP of Vajpayee's days. With public opinion boiling against Pakistan after the Pulwama attack and with the general elections knocking on the door, what may be the likely response of India should another Pakistan-sponsored terror attack is launched?

There is no doubt that after Pulwama, India's diplomatic offensive against Pakistan has proved successful to a great extent. Pakistan has come under tremendous international pressure. Even its all-weather friend China now hesitates to side with it on the question of terrorism. At the end of the meeting of Foreign Ministers of India, China and Pakistan at Wuzhen in China on February 27, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said: "We agreed to jointly combat all forms of terrorism through closer policy coordination and practical cooperation. Especially important is to eradicate the breeding grounds of terrorism and extremism." Coming in the wake of the Pulwama massacre and Indian retaliation, the importance of the Chinese Foreign Minister's comment cannot be over-emphasised.

Indeed, China has a direct stake should India-Pakistan hostility break out into a full-fledged war. Beijing's ambitious China-Pakistan Economic Corridor which is estimated to cost a whopping $75 billion, runs through Pakistan occupied Kashmir which India has always claimed to be an inalienable part of it. In an Indo-Pak war, India can easily destroy that part of the CPEC which runs through PoK. China has also built many projects under the CPEC in Pakistan and more are coming up. All these may come under India's air attack. China cannot risk it. So, it cannot afford to be seen siding with Islamabad on the question of terrorism.

Terror outfits in Pakistan are sponsored, financed, armed and trained and the jihadis pushed through the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir by the Pakistan army and the ISI. The "elected" civil government in Pakistan is the façade behind which the army rules. There is no reason to believe that the deep State in Pakistan has changed its attitude or policy toward India even after Balakot. It is likely to lie low for some time till the sense of outrage at Pulwama has died down and international opinion has been assuaged, then activate its terror machinery again.

Another terror attack may lead to an unpredictable situation. Given the tension between the two countries, even a "localised" war or a "limited" war may spin out of control and make the unbelievable a reality. It is time for India to clarify whether the concept of "pre-emptive" strikes in future may extend to the nuclear sphere as well if "credible" intelligence is received that a nuclear attack by our enemy (whoever the enemy may be) is imminent.

(The views expressed are strictly personal)

Next Story
Share it