JUNE 1998: India under the National Democratic Alliance (I) government (under prime minister Vajpayee) followed by Pakistan (under Nawaz Sharif) entered into ‘the bottomless pit of nuclear rivalry.’ This piece authored by the late veteran peace activist, author and journalist, Praful Bidwai was Communalism Combat’s cover that month. We bring it to our readers now at Sabrangindia, with an accompanying piece by scientist, Zia Mian, to urge restraint and sanity in the region.

Nuclear weapons act like boomerangs on both India and Pakistan

For more than the one and a quarter billion people who live in South Asia, the world has been radically, horrifically, shockingly transformed. After the nuclear tests of India and Pakistan in May, they now live under the shadow of the Mushroom Cloud — that is, to put it bluntly, the threat of mass annihilation, unspeakable destruction, and epochal devastation. Unless India and Pakistan stop their descent into the bottomless pit of nuclear rivalry now, they will inflict unlimited damage upon their societies, states and, above all, their peoples.The bulk of the blame for this terrifying development must be squarely laid at the door of communalism. The nuclear obsession of a particular party was imposed upon a billion people on May 11, when the BJP–led minority government made a violent break with a policy with a 50–year–long continuity — of opposing nuclear deterrence and not exercising the nuclear weapons option. The BJP altered this radically, undemocratically, without the pretence of a strategic review, and without even the fig leaf of a security rationale.

The BJP’s decision to put India on the dangerous path of nuclearisation deeply offends all notions of civilised public conduct. It degrades, it does not enhance, India’s security. It has propelled us into a confrontation with our neighbours and lowered our global stature. India is the object of reprimand, reproach, and humiliating sanctions from the world community. Nuclearisation will promote the profoundly undemocratic values of militarism, secrecy, jingoism and male chauvinism. And it could prove economically ruinous. Most of all, it is fraught with unconscionably destructive human consequences.

Let us look at some of these on the basis of a scientific analysis. To start with, India and Pakistan are likelier to fight a nuclear war than the two rival blocs came close to at any point during the Cold War barring perhaps the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. Even a limited exchange would result in the killing of lakhs of people in the two countries in ways that will make Genghis Khan look like an angel.

If a single nuclear weapon is exploded over a major city such as Bombay, Karachi, Lahore or Delhi, it could result in the death of up to 9,00,000 people, depending on factors such as population density, height of airbust and prevalent wind velocity. Apart from these early deaths, there would be hundreds of thousands of cancer and leukaemia victims due to radiation, besides a host of other serious illnesses and disorders. As Nikita Khrushchev once said: “The survivors would envy the dead”.

That is not all. The damage would be carried to a number of future generations. Some of the worst effects would be caused by plutonium–239, named after the God of Hell, and the most toxic substance known to science, which has a half–life of 24,400 years which means it will not decay fully for millions of years. A few millionths of a gram of plutonium, if ingested or inhaled, can cause cancers of the lung and the gastrointestinal tract over a period of time. The victims of a nuclear explosion would experience a series of effects.

Professor Karl Z. Morgan, former chairman of the International Commission for Radiological Protection, describes these as follows:

The first effect is an intense flux of photons from the blast, which releases 70 to 80 per cent of the bomb’s energy. The effects go up to third–degree thermal burns, and are not a pretty sight. Initial deaths are due to this effect.
The next phenomenon is the supersonic blast front. You see it before you hear it. The pressure front has the effect of blowing away anything in its path. Heavy steel girders were found bent at 90–degree angles after the Japanese bombings.

After the front comes the overpressure phase. This would feel like being under water at a few hundred metres’ depth. At a few thousand metres under the sea, even pressurised hulls implode. The pressure gradually dies off, and there is a negative overpressure phase, with a reversed blast wind. This reversal is due to air rushing back to fill the void left by the explosion. The air gradually returns to room pressure. At this stage, fires caused by electrical destruction and ignited debris, turn the whole area into a firestorm.

Then come the middle term effects such as cell damage and chromosomal aberrations. Genetic or hereditary damage can show up up to 40 years after initial irradiation. In a nuclear blast, with a crude, first–generation Hiroshima or Nagasaki–type bomb, everything within a radius of 0.8 km would be vaporised, with 98 per cent fatalities. There would be firestorms raging at a velocity of 500 kmph and an unbearable overpressure of 25 pounds per square inch. Within a radius of 1.6 km, all structures above ground would be totally destroyed, and the fatality rate would be 90 per cent.In the next concentric circle, with a radius of 3 km, there would be severe blast damage. All factories and large buildings would collapse, as would bridges and flyovers. Rivers would flow counter–current. Winds would blow at 400 kmph. The fatality rate would be 65 per cent.

Next comes severe heat damage within a radius of 4 km: everything flammable burns. People would suffocate because most of the available oxygen would be consumed by the fires. The likely wind velocities: 200 kmph. Likely fatalities: 50 per cent. Injuries: 45 per cent.

In the fifth zone, with a radius of 5 km, winds would blow at 150 kmph. People would be blown around. The fatality rate would be 15 per cent plus. Most survivors would sustain second– and third–degree burns. Residential structures would be severely damaged.

A huge electromagnetic pulse would be produced by the radio-radar portion of the multiple–wavelength discharge of radiation. The EMP effect increases the higher you go into the atmosphere. High–altitude explosions can knock out electronics by inducing a current surge in closed circuit metallic objects — computers, power lines, phone lines, TVs, radios, etc. The damage range can be over 1,000 km.

All these effects would be magnified roughly 25 times if a thermonuclear (hydrogen) bomb with an explosive yield of one megaton is burst over an altitude of 8,000 ft (i.e. about 2,500 metres). India claims to have developed just such a bomb. If a 20 megaton device — which is not difficult to make once the thermonuclear technology is learnt — is used, the destruction would be roughly 100–fold greater.

After a nuclear blast, all water bodies within a radius of 100 to 300 km would be dangerously contaminated. As would all vegetation and the soil. Cattle would be so severely exposed to radiation that milk could not be consumed. Underground aquifers would remain polluted for years. Not just cities, but whole regions, comprising anything between five and 20 districts, would become wastelands.

Millions of people would be severely traumatised and will never be able to live normal, sane lives. Children would be the worst affected, with lasting physical and psychological damage, most of it irreversible.

In the South Asia context, a nuclear attack would have clear trans-border consequences. Bombing Lahore will amount to signing the death warrant for half of Amritsar’s population. Radioactive fallout from Jalandhar will not leave Pakistan’s Punjab unaffected. And Bombay’s bombing could have devastating effects in Sindh. Nuclear weapons will act like boomerangs on both India and Pakistan. Using them would tantamount to committing suicide.

Among the early casualties in a nuclear explosion would be the civil defence and medical infrastructure. As International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War say, First Aid would be reduced to Last Aid. There will be, can be, no defence against a nuclear bomb. These are not fanciful scare–mongering scenarios, but sober estimates based on hard–core physics and biology, developed by Nobel Prize–winning scientists and physicians. These estimates must be treated with the utmost seriousness and gravity.

The threat of megadeath today hangs over India and Pakistan. The very circumstance that a nuclear war between the two is possible should alarm us all. But the situation may be even worse: an India–Pakistan nuclear exchange appears likelier than an East–West nuclear attack at any time during the Cold War except perhaps the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. This is not because Indian and Pakistani politicians and nuclear scientists are more irresponsible than those in America and the former USSR. It is more because South Asia is the only part of the world which has experienced a relentless hot-cold war over 50 years. It bristles with mutual hatreds, suspicions and hostility on so many counts that any of them could turn into a flashpoint — the Kashmir Valley, the border dispute in the eastern sector, military exercises getting out of hand, as happened in 1987 under Gen. K. Sundarji.

The very fact that the two states continue to sacrifice hundreds of men in fighting an insane war at Siachen — the world’s highest–altitude conflict, where it costs Rs.1.5 lakh to reach one chapati to a soldier — speaks of the profound irrationality that mark their relations. And today, their politicians are actually talking about using nuclear weapons — witness Dr Farooq Abdullah’s statement of June 8. Equally worrisome is the likelihood that both are working on battlefield-level tactful nuclear weapons.(Hence the sub–kiloton tests). These considerably lower the danger threshold.

There is, besides, the horrific likelihood of accidental, unauthorised or unintentional use of nuclear weapons. This is not some fantasy, but a real possibility. More than 100 such incidents occurred during the Cold War in spite of scores of confidence-building measures and precautionary procedures adopted by the two warring blocs. These included multiple hot lines, permissive action links (PALs, which are computer chips with codes for authorisation), early warning systems, false alarm filters, efficient radars and expensive control and communications systems.

A Brookings Institution study says that it was sheer luck, not nuclear deterrence, or fear of unacceptable damage that prevented a nuclear war between the two blocs.

At the height of the Cold War, the lag time between the NATO and Warsaw Pact was never less than 30 minutes. Their strategic missiles would take that long to reach their targets. In the case of India and Pakistan, the missile flight–time would be just two to three minutes — grossly inadequate to take remedial action or activate war–prevention procedures. And given that virtually no interception of missiles is possible, a nuclear warhead could almost certainly be delivered across the border before there is time to react — with devastating results.

Nuclear weapons and missiles are highly complex systems with strong coupling between different subsystems and processes and hence a high chance of accidents. There is no way that their accidental or unauthorised use can be reliably prevented. There is, besides, the real possibility of a group of overzealous officers launching an attack on the “enemy” on their own. Pakistan, for instance, has had a series of army coup attempts by Islamic fanatics. If they have access to nuclear weapons, they could play havoc.

You just cannot take chances with nuclear weapons. They are too destructive to be left with even an infinitesimally low chance of use. That is why they must never be made, leave alone deployed, especially in this subcontinent where the two governments are working up bestial responses to one another and indulging in open war–mongering.

All of us citizens who do not wish to be roasted to death and turned into radioactive dust must act to prevent nuclear weapons from being made or deployed. This is too important a task to be entrusted to governments, least of all governments led by recklessly irresponsible fanatics and bigots. We must act by building a citizens’ movement that mounts pressure on our government to stop in its tracks and get them to retrace steps.

They must commit themselves never to test again, and drop all plans to make nuclear weapons, leave alone think of using them or threatening to use them under any circumstances.
We must act NOW. Or it could soon be too late.

Archived from Communalism Combat, June 1998, Cover Story

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Musharraf launches ‘half–a–revolution’

It is a measure of the cynicism that pervades India’s political climate today that many commentators have responded to Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf’s major address to the nation of January 12 with the question: "But will he be able to deliver results? Can he change ground realities? Will he really be able to stop cross–border terrorism and bring Pakistan’s jehadi fanatics to heel?"

This in itself may not be an irrelevant question. But in the circumstances, it’s the wrong question to ask. More precisely, it puts the cart before the horse. The real issue is, what is the true meaning, import and significance of Musharraf’s speech? Does his address constitute a major transformatory change of intent, or a radical shift of purpose, or is it only a trivial or marginal change from the "normal" rhetoric that Pakistan’s officialdom resorts to when it is in crisis? Whether Musharraf can actually translate his intent into practical results logically comes after this question.

To honestly answer the first question, we must recognise, and frankly acknowledge, that on January 12, Pervez Musharraf did something few heads of states ever do — especially when they are beleaguered and in deep crisis. He subverted a major component, if not a pillar, of the ideological foundation which has sustained the edifice of Pakistani society and politics for two decades. He began a major surgical operation on the tumour of militant, political Islam which has long afflicted that country’s body politic. And he launched an ambitious programme of reform of society, the like of which South Asia has never seen before.

Musharraf’s January 12 address will go down as a landmark in this region’s history — even if it were to remain a catalogue of the many disorders that affect Pakistan and a list of pious intentions. But it is likely to turn out to be much more than that. It was preceded, and followed, by South Asia’s biggest–ever crackdown on communal bigots and terrorists. Already, some 2,000 "terrorist" suspects have been rounded up, five organisations including Lashkar–e–Toiba and Jaish–e–Mohammed banned, and 300 of their offices closed down, locked and sealed.

Some of our leaders have slowly, reluctantly, grudgingly, begun to acknowledge the significance of Musharraf’s reform agenda, although they see it purely in terms internal to Pakistan’s domestic politics. Thus LK Advani, fresh from a visit to the US, said (Jan. 16) the address was "path–breaking" from the internal point of view. And AB Vajpayee has finally said (Jan. 17) that Musharraf’s address has many "positive elements". Yet others, especially hawkish media commentators, have called it a successful and effective "public relations" exercise.

It will not do to minimise Musharraf’s address as a defensive or diversionary tactic aimed at appeasing Western powers on the terrorism issue. More than two–thirds of his speech was devoted to diagnosing the pathology of Pakistani society and politics and to outlining an agenda for internal reform, rather than on making concessions on "external" issues like India’s demand to take "decisive" action against its list of 20 terrorists. Of course, there was a degree of flamboyance that went with Musharraf’s much–publicised speech, but PR considerations, alone or mainly, cannot explain its thrust.

What Musharraf has unveiled is a plan to put Pakistan on the road to modernisation and secularisation by severing the links between political Islam and the state, between the military and the mullahs, and between Kashmir and terrorist violence. At the heart of the plan is trenchant criticism of Pakistan’s dangerous mix of religion and politics, and the disastrous consequences this has had on the state and civil society. Whether the general succeeds in achieving his objectives or not, and how soon, it must be conceded that his agenda represents perhaps the most ambitious reform programme undertaken in any country, barring Turkey under Kemal Ataturk, to deal with the issue of religion and politics.

It is certainly the boldest such agenda ever outlined in South Asia since Nehru’s ‘Tryst with Destiny’ speech at Independence.

Musharraf’s reform programme represents a complete reversal of the Islamisation project launched by Zia–ul–Haq to acquire a figleaf of legitimacy for his brutal military dictatorship and to transform the very character of Pakistan. The logic of Zia’s project eventually unfolded in its most developed form through the Taliban, through Pakistan’s attempt to virtually annex Afghanistan and acquire "strategic depth", and through the promotion of a variety of militant groups in West and South Asia, especially in Kashmir.

Musharraf has started cutting the umbilical cord between the Pakistani state and jehadi terrorism. One can argue that this is only the beginning of what is likely to be a prolonged process which will inevitably involve purging the army of pernicious religious–political influences, and even cleansing the ISI. It is by no means certain that Musharraf will succeed. The Pakistan situation is fraught with uncertainty, strife and danger. His agenda will antagonise some of his own military colleagues. He has hit out at the bigoted mullahs who for years have been the mainstay of fanatical groups. Successive governments, including Musharraf’s, have found it hard to rein in such men. Numerous jehadi militants, inflamed by the Taliban’s defeat in Afghanistan, are only waiting to get their claws into Musharraf.

Musharraf has thus embarked on an extraordinarily bold and risky mission. He may have done so under pressure, even compulsion. But that should not detract from the importance of his endeavour and coherence of his purpose. Far–reaching changes are sometimes brought about not because there is a "genuine" change of heart, but because "soft" options vanish, and there is a compelling need to change.

It is tempting to argue, as some Pakistani commentators have themselves done, that only a General (Musharraf) could have undone the legacy of another General (Zia). It is also easy to draw parallels between Musharraf and Algeria’s secular military junta, which a decade ago prevented radical Islamicists from taking power despite their clear victory in elections.

However, that would be trivialising the importance of the overall plan for Pakistan’s political reform, which started unfolding within a week of Musharraf’s address. This has a strong democratisation component, linked as it is with preparations to hold elections by the Supreme Court-stipulated October 2002 deadline, the abolition of communal electorates, and a 48 percent increase in the strength of the National Assembly, along with a new political initiative on Kashmir. So, while Ataturk never succeeded in democratising but only in secularising Turkey, and the Algerian junta forcefully snuffed out democracy, Musharraf’s broadly secular reform comes coupled with a momentum in favour of democratisation of Pakistan’s polity.

Therefore, it would be sheer nitpicking and pettifogging to fault Musharraf for the many omissions in his speech. True, he didn’t refer to the "Lahore process" or the "Shimla agreement". Of course, he didn’t own up the damage that Islamabad militants have caused to Kashmiri civilians, or apologise for it. But that was hardly the function of his address. Did Jaswant Singh and Vajpayee ask if he apologised for what the Taliban had done in Afghanistan when he joined the US-led "anti–terrorist" coalition which New Delhi uncritically supports? What is relevant is that Musharraf unconditionally condemned all forms of terrorism and the "Kalashnikov culture" of all religious extremism. Of equal significance was his insistence that Pakistani groups must not mess around in other countries — no matter what the cause.

It is wrong to make a rigid separation between the ‘internal’ and ‘external’ components of Musharraf’s address. They are strongly, organically, inter–connected or related. Implicit in the insistence on limiting Pakistan’s external role is the view that the country has paid dearly because it pandered to pan–Islamic ideas and the vision of an ummah or Islamic brotherhood at least in this region. Musharraf wants Pakistan to be seen as a ‘normal’, moderate, non–aggressive, responsible nation in the region and the world.

Backing this up is Musharraf’s internal agenda, including the redefinition of jihad as a fight against poverty, illiteracy and backwardness, and strict regulation of madrassas and mosques through a system of registration. His radical plan can potentially transform Pakistan into a modern, forward–looking, open society which is no longer obsessed with religion, or crude, intolerant, interpretations of it. He has clearly posed the choice between this future, and a grim fate for Pakistan if it chooses to be a paranoid, closed, religion-obsessed, backward society.

And yet, despite all its far-reaching, courageous, bold and radical content, Musharraf’s agenda is flawed on two counts. One, it lacks the strong energies that can only come from a "perspective from below", one that arises from the struggles and daily activities of the working people. It is thus very much a revolutionary reform "from above". Secondly, it relies for its self–actualisation on the agency of the Pakistani state, itself a thoroughly corrupt, compromised and unreliable entity. Thus, on a demanding view, Musharraf is attempting only "half–a–revolution" although it is infinitely more ambitious than the conservatism and timidity of Vajpayee & Co.

Musharraf of course asserts that Kashmir "runs through our blood". But he has been careful to decouple Kashmir’s "freedom struggle" from terrorist militancy. And he has offered a dialogue on Kashmir. India must accept this in a spirit of openness, good faith and generosity. It just won’t do to acknowledge — as New Delhi does — that Kashmir is an issue, a dispute, a problem, albeit a bilateral one, and then refuse a bilateral dialogue on one pretext or other. There is a real danger today that failure to discuss Kashmir bilaterally, which India agreed to do at Lahore and Agra, will invite external intervention, with unpalatable consequences.

The US is in a uniquely powerful position today as a hegemonic power which is courted by both New Delhi and Islamabad. India has used the US as the central interlocutor in its post–December 13 strategy of brinkmanship. Having allowed America such a pivotal role, it cannot easily resist its friendly (or not–so–friendly) involvement in Kashmir — if bilateralism fails. Bilateralism must be made to work in its authentic spirit.

Equally important, India must immediately de–escalate its military build–up on the western border. It would be ill–advised to wait for Pakistan to "surrender" any of the 20 terrorists it has named. Musharraf cannot be easily pressurised into handing over any of the Pakistani nationals in that list to Interpol, leave alone to India. Equally unlikely is the surrender of Dawood Ibrahim or Chhota Shakeel, who in any case are gangsters rather than terrorists. India could perhaps get some former Khalistanis exiled in Pakistan handed over to some external agency. But that would be a minor consolation in relation to the substantial gain from Musharraf’s outlawing of JeM and LeT.

It would be unwise as well as unrealistic for India to cast itself in the mould of a superpower by demanding that Pakistan give up the 20 suspects, or else… For one, India has not established convincing links between them and the Parliament attack; it has just cited or raked up old cases. For another, the US was itself wrong, as this writer has earlier argued, to use military force in Afghanistan, without exhausting legal and diplomatic possibilities. It has ended up killing at least 3,700 innocent Afghans — 500 more people than were killed in New York’s Twin Towers. And for a third, India cannot bend its near–strategic equal Pakistan to its will, as the US could with its adversaries in Afghanistan. India is not a superpower which can arrogate to itself the "right" to crush terrorism outside its borders.

It is in New Delhi’s own interest to de–escalate the current eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation. The present build–up is the largest ever, with half a million armed men pitted against one another. Anything can go wrong: a terrorist attack inspired by a rogue agency out to sabotage Musharraf’s plans, an overzealous local commander on either side getting hyperactive, or a plain South Asia–style goof–up. The consequences would be disastrous.

The longer India waits, the greater the chances of a mishap. Today, the Vajpayee government can draw some satisfaction from the fact that Musharraf has taken concrete action against JeM or LeT — although not entirely under India’s muscle-flexing. Colin Powell during his visit has delivered a message in favour of dialogue and de-escalation. If the government acts on its own, rather than under US goading, it might even claim a minor victory and hope that this will help BJP a little in Uttar Pradesh. But Vajpayee must draw the line here. Instead of indulging in more brinkmanship, he should try to find an imaginative solution to the Kashmir issue by widening the opening that has emerged in the Valley both as a result of the Taliban’s ignominious defeat and Musharraf’s new turn against jehadi terrorism. But first of all, Vajpayee must de–escalate.          

Archived from Communalism Combat, January-February 2002 Year 8  No. 75-76, Cover Story 1

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