Preventing a Nuclear Arms Race in South Asia: U.S. Policy Options

November 02, 2000 By David Cortright, Samina Ahmed Policy Brief, The Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, No. 2 January 2000. Reprinted in the Congressional Record (March 21, 2000): E365-E367.

Recommendations

• The United States must unequivocally demand that India and Pakistan join the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as non-nuclear weapon states.
• The United States should retain punitive sanctions which target Indian and Pakistani institutions and policymakers responsible for their nuclear weapons programs.
• Targeted incentives should be provided that seek to diminish internal support for nuclear weapons in India and Pakistan.
• The United States should fulfill its obligation under Article VI of the NPT to achieve global nuclear disarmament.

U.S. nonproliferation policy faces a major challenge as an all-out nuclear arms race threatens to break out in South Asia. An Indian draft nuclear doctrine released by an officially constituted advisory panel to the Indian National Security Council on August 17, 1999 envisages a nuclear triad in which nuclear weapons would be delivered by aircraft, submarines and mobile land-based ballistic missiles. While it is not certain that New Delhi will opt for such broad capabilities, the current direction of policy is clearly toward nuclear weapons deployment. Since Pakistan's nuclear policy is India-centric and reactive in nature, the introduction of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems within the Indian armed forces would greatly increase the likelihood of a retaliatory Pakistani deployment. Operational nuclear weapons and delivery systems will result in a South Asian nuclear arms race that could have serious consequences for regional stability, the stability of the Middle East, and global peace.

For the past three decades, India and Pakistan have been engaged in a nuclear rivalry that is both a symptom and a cause of their bilateral discord. India and Pakistan have a long history of conflict including three wars and a long-standing territorial dispute over Kashmir. Each Indian and Pakistani step up the nuclear ladder introduces new tensions in their troubled relationship. India's decision to acquire nuclear weapons and to demonstrate its nuclear weapons capability in 1974 resulted in the Pakistani adoption of a nuclear weapons program. As their nuclear weapons capabilities grew, so did their mutual suspicions and animosity. In May 1998 as India and Pakistan held nuclear tests, abandoning nuclear ambiguity for an overt nuclear weapon status, relations between the two states were seriously strained. From May to July 1999, India and Pakistan came perilously close to war during a major military clash near Kargil in the disputed territory of Kashmir, a conflict that had the potential of escalating into a nuclear exchange. Since mistrust and hostility continue to mar their relationship, as the recent controversy over the hijacked Indian airliner underscored, the potential for a conventional war remains high. Nuclear weapons deployment will fuel a nuclear arms race between India and Pakistan and at the same time heighten the chances of an intentional or inadvertent nuclear exchange.

Since a nuclear arms race between India and Pakistan will further destabilize a violent and conflict-prone region, there is a pressing need for the U.S. to dissuade India and Pakistan from deploying nuclear weapons and to reverse their nuclear course. Beyond the immediate threats posed by such an arms race to the one-fifth of humanity which resides within South Asia, nuclear weapons deployment in India and Pakistan would also have a far-reaching impact on the nuclear dynamics in the region and beyond, threatening vital U.S. national security interests. The deployment of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems in Pakistan, for instance, would strengthen the position of nuclear advocates in neighboring Iran. The deployment of nuclear weapons and nuclear-capable ballistic missiles by India would influence China's nuclear doctrine. An India-Pakistan nuclear arms race could therefore result in a parallel Pakistan-Iran and Sino-Indian nuclear arms race. A South Asian nuclear arms race would also erode the global non-proliferation regime, embodied in the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), undermining the confidence of signatory states in the treaty's ability to buttress their security. For all these reasons, the U.S. must prevent the incipient nuclear arms competition in South Asia from becoming an all-out arms race.

U.S. Policy and Nuclear South Asia

Some analysts and policymakers argue that the United States has failed to prevent nuclear proliferation in South Asia because of flawed policy directions and an over-reliance on sanctions as an instrument of U.S. influence. Since the initial U.S. emphasis on the rollback and elimination of Indian and Pakistani nuclear weapons capabilities failed to contain South Asian nuclear proliferation, these analysts contend, the U.S should accept nuclear weapons in South Asia and adopt the more realistic goal of "arms control," which merely seeks to limit their number and sophistication. According to this view, Washington should concentrate on encouraging India and Pakistan to refrain from a nuclear arms race and seeking ways to reduce the risk of nuclear war. At the same time, incentives should replace sanctions as the primary means of influence. U.S. interests would be best served, according to this view, by a policy of engagement with India and Pakistan that goes beyond the one-point agenda of nuclear non-proliferation.

To prevent India and Pakistan from embarking on a nuclear arms race, it is indeed important to examine the previous shortcomings of U.S. nonproliferation policy in South Asia and to identify alternative policy options. This must not mean, however, abandoning non-proliferation goals in favor of arms control. Any U.S. attempt to promote an India-Pakistan arms control regime is unlikely to succeed. Aside from the challenges posed by conventional and nuclear asymmetries between India and Pakistan and the integration of a reluctant China into a South Asian arms control arrangement, a formal India-Pakistan nuclear restraint regime requires at the very least the absence of war and a modicum of mutual trust. On the contrary, relations between India and Pakistan are shaped by an ongoing, decade-old, low-intensity conflict in the disputed territory of Kashmir and three near-war situations since the 1980s.
It is imperative for the United States to dissuade India and Pakistan from going further down the nuclear road. Washington cannot achieve this goal through the abandonment of non-proliferation, and the tacit acceptance of India and Pakistan's nuclear weapons status.

Proliferation may have occurred already in South Asia, but India and Pakistan can be convinced to cap, rollback and even abandon their nuclear weapons programs if the reasons that prompted them to acquire nuclear weapons are addressed. Indian and Pakistani decisions to acquire nuclear weapons were the outcome of cost-benefit analyses of the presumed benefits of nuclearization. The United States can play a major role in influencing the present and future directions of nuclear proliferation in South Asia by convincing Indian and Pakistani decision makers that the costs of nuclearization far exceed its benefits. This will require clearly defined non-proliferation goals and the use of the most appropriate instruments to reverse the nuclear directions of India and Pakistan.

In the past, U.S. policy goals and objectives were contradictory. As a result, the tools of U.S. policy, sanctions or incentives, failed to dissuade Indian and Pakistani decision makers from pursuing their nuclear ambitions. Cold War strategic considerations often took precedence over non-proliferation objectives. U.S. policy shifted from elimination to rollback and then to the current emphasis on a cap on Indian and Pakistani nuclear weapons capabilities. Each shift in U.S. policy emboldened India and Pakistan's nuclear advocates.

Washington's use of policy instruments was also ineffective. Sanctions and incentives only succeed if they are properly targeted and consistently applied. These preconditions were not present in South Asia. Washington's reluctance to sanction India after its nuclear test in 1974 motivated Pakistan to follow the Indian nuclear example. In the 1980s Washington again sent the wrong signal to Indian and Pakistani decision makers. The United States not only failed to sanction Pakistan for its nuclear development but showered billions of dollars of military aid on the Zia ul Haq dictatorship as part of the struggle against Soviet involvement in Afghanistan. In the 1990s Washington offered incentives to India and Pakistan to encourage nuclear restraint, despite accumulating evidence of each country's continuing nuclear weapons development.

Following the May 1998 nuclear tests in South Asia, Washington imposed mandatory sanctions on India and Pakistan and identified five benchmarks for their removal: curbs on the further development or deployment of nuclear-capable missiles and aircraft, Indian and Pakistani accession to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), participation in Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) negotiations, curbs on the transfer of nuclear technology and hardware, and an India-Pakistan dialogue on normalization of relations. The imposition of sanctions initially led to Indian and Pakistani concessions, including their declared willingness to accede to the CTBT and the resumption of an India-Pakistan dialogue. The United States subsequently failed to sustain these punitive measures, however. India and Pakistan backed away from their earlier pledges to join the CTBT, while their normalization dialogue became the casualty of the May-July 1999 undeclared war in Kashmir and the presence of hardline governments in both states.

With tensions in South Asia remaining high, the United States must clearly state its opposition to the presence of nuclear weapons in South Asia. Washington must demonstrate its resolve through targeted, consistently applied sanctions and incentives designed to influence the cost-benefit analysis of Indian and Pakistani nuclear decision makers. A failure to do so will result in the deployment of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems in India and Pakistan and the likelihood of the first use of nuclear weapons since 1945.

Policy Recommendations

1. In its policy toward India and Pakistan, the United States must unequivocally demand that India and Pakistan join the NPT as non-nuclear-weapon states. The current U.S. emphasis on South Asian nuclear restraint is being misconstrued or deliberately misrepresented by the Indian and Pakistani governments as a tacit acceptance of their nuclear weapons status.
2. In an amendment contained in the U.S. Defense Appropriations Bill, Congress has given the President indefinite waiver authority to lift military and economic sanctions, including those imposed automatically under earlier legislation on Pakistan and India. This waiver authority must be used judiciously. Broad and sweeping economic sanctions that adversely affect the weaker segments of Indian and Pakistani society should be removed. But Washington should retain those punitive measures that target Indian and Pakistani institutions and policymakers responsible for their nuclear weapons programs. These include curbs on the sale and supply of military hardware to Pakistan, the transfer of dual-use technology to India, and military and scientific exchanges with nuclear entities and actors in both states.
3. Targeted incentives should be provided, conditional on progress towards nonproliferation, that would seek to diminish internal support for nuclear weapons in India and Pakistan. These could include the partial forgiveness of India and Pakistan's external debt, increased U.S. assistance for social sector development, and enhanced U.S. support for developmental loans and credits from international financial institutions to India and Pakistan. Such assistance should be linked to concrete steps toward military and nuclear restraint.
4. In re-committing itself to the goals of non-proliferation, the United States should fulfill its own obligation, under Article VI of the NPT, to achieve global nuclear disarmament. This will encourage the advocates of denuclearization in both India and Pakistan and strengthen the norm against the development and use of nuclear weapons not only in South Asia but throughout the world.

©2000 Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. The views expressed in Policy Briefs are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Kroc Institute or the University of Notre Dame.