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No second thoughts
The Chief of the Army Staff,General Deepak Kapoor,is reported to have suggested
that the country may have to revisit its No First Use (NFU) policy...
Written by K. Subrahmanyam | Published:September 8, 2009 3:02 am
The Chief of the Army Staff,General Deepak Kapoor,is reported to have suggested
that the country may have to revisit its No First Use (NFU) policy in the light of
reports from some credible US sources that Pakistan may have an arsenal of 90 n
uclear weapons and may be building up further stocks.
When NFU was formulated ( I was the convenor of the National Security Board that
drafted it) there were no assumptions on the size of the Pakistani arsenal. The
doctrine stands by itself irrespective of the size of the potential enemy s arsen
al. There is a second component of the nuclear doctrine: the credible minimum de
terrent. It is that component that may call for some adjustments if the potentia
l enemy s arsenal were to increase. Even that is not a necessity from the point of
view of deterrence,but a question of influencing the perception of the adversar
y. The crux of deterrence is the survivability of the retaliatory force and the
aggressor s calculation as to whether the casualties and damage likely to be infli
cted by the survived retaliatory force on his population and cities can be justi
fied by the strategic gain the unleashing of the nuclear attack will secure for
the aggressor. Very rarely,if at all,can the answer to that question be in the a
ffirmative. In such circumstances deterrence will prevail.
Deterrence is not a question of having the ability to inflict much larger casual
ties and damage on the adversary than,according to one s own calculation,one is li
kely to suffer in retaliation. An aggressor s attack can be counter-force or count
er-value. If it is counter-force the aggressor can never be certain that he can
destroy all the force of the other side and escape retaliation. In the early 60s
the United States planned a total disarming strike on the Soviet Union,when it h
ad more than ten times the USSR s number of warheads. When the president asked whe
ther there could be certainty that no Soviet warhead would hit the US the answer
was a clear negative. That was enough to deter the US from proceeding with its
disarming strike in spite of a ten-fold superiority. Since then,surveillance met
hods and missile accuracies have improved. But so also the mobility of the weapo
n platforms,even on land; the submarine deterrent is of course exceedingly survi
vable. When India s nuclear doctrine was published,many Westerners questioned the
need for a sea-based deterrent; a senior NDA minister (a member of the cabinet c
ommittee on security) even called it an academic exercise . In our country,the lear
ning process on nuclear issues has just begun.
The NFU doctrine was formulated in 1999 by the National Security Advisory Board
and was officially adopted in 2003. Only after its official adoption were strate
gic force commanders appointed; we have had four,two from the air force,one from
the navy and,presently,from the army. In the last six years,scientists of the D
epartment of Atomic Energy and the Defence Research and Development Organisation
have acquired valuable experience in operationalising the arsenal. So,certainly
,there is a case to review our deterrent posture and policy six years after the
National Command Authority was set up. The government will be well-advised to co
mmission a taskforce,comprising the ex-strategic force commanders,senior officia
ls of DAE and DRDO familiar with the deterrent force s standard operational proced
ures and three-star representatives from the services as well as an intelligence
specialist with a background in nuclear strategic matters and one or two civili
an experts to carry out such a review. Committee members should be cleared for t
op-secret classification,and have full access to all data (except the current ac
tual operational plan). They should be in a position to discuss alternative futu
re operational strategies. As time goes by more and more people privy to nuclear

secrets will retire from service. Therefore there should be a realistic approac
h to making data available to such a group of experts after they sign the Offici
al Secrets Act pledge.
There are a number of ways the increase in the Pakistani stockpile can be counte
red,besides responding to it with a similar increase in the size of our credible
minimum deterrent. In India,the credible minimum deterrent was always envisaged
in three-digit numbers; that itself gives sufficient flexibility.
The best short-term counter measures will be to improve our surveillance and war
ning capabilities,the mobility of our land-based missiles,and survivability of o
ur airborne retaliatory force. As the potential adversary improves his technolog
y these measures will be necessary and it will be prudent to start on such progr
ammes straightaway. The new scientific adviser is a specialist in theatre missil
e defence and there are reports of India jointly developing missile defence syst
ems with Israel. The missile defence further increases the uncertainty of the ag
gressor and reinforces deterrence.
The more robust the deterrence,the stronger the justification for the NFU strate
gy. It reflects greater confidence in the survivability of one s arsenal and abili
ty to retaliate punitively,according to the original wording of the doctrine in
1999. In 2003,this wording was changed from punitive to massive ,a discredited term i
n the nuclear lexicon. Further by copying the Americans and including largescale
WMD attacks as justification for nuclear retaliation
the 2003 document diluted
the NFU pledge. If today an increase in the Pakistani nuclear stockpile and the
development of Babar cruise missile cause concern about a decapitating first str
ike,then the logical remedy is not to abandon our NFU but to provide for credibl
e,visible succession for both political and military command,and to streamline t
he chain of command. It is a well-known joke that the camel is a horse designed
by a committee. We know committee deliberations could not stop IC-814 from takin
g off from Amritsar. It is just incredible that committees are going to handle n
uclear command and control. These are vital issues to be addressed to enhance ou
r deterrence irrespective of the size of the potential enemy s stockpile.
Giving up NFU will only increase nuclear tension without solving the problem of
the risk of a possible decapitating strike by the potential enemy. There must be
a better understanding of the national no-first-use policy among our armed forc
es and other decision- and policy-makers,as well as a deeper grasp of the concep
t of deterrence.
The writer is a senior defence analyst
express@expressindia.com