exercise or expect it to be a trifling affair. However, if war memories should
ever start to fade, they have routinely been brought back into sharp relief by
Indo-Pakistani crises in 1987, 1990, 1999, and 2001–2, not to mention the
escalation of tension after the Mumbai terrorist attacks of 2008.52 Each of
these crises, to a greater or lesser extent, raised the realistic prospect of another full-blown war.53
The Nuclear Dimension
Fortunately, recent Indo-Pakistani crises have all cooled before they turned into
anything truly horrific. Central to Cold War era theories of nuclear deterrence
was “mutually assured destruction,” the idea that when two hostile countries
49 On the American effort to broker peace in Kashmir, see Howard B. Schaffer, The Limits of Influence: America’s Role in Kashmir (Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2009).
50 SIPRI Arms Transfer Database, http://armstrade.sipri.org/armstrade/page/trade register.php; also Paul K. Kerr and Mary Beth Nikitin, “Pakistan’s Nuclear Weapons: Proliferation and Security Issues,” Congressional Research Service, 7–5700, RL34248, May 10, 2012, p. 3, www.fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/RL34248.pdf.
51 Shuja Nawaz, Crossed Swords: Pakistan, Its Army, and the Wars Within (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 229.
52 P. R. Chari, Pervaiz Iqbal Cheema, and Stephen P. Cohen, Four Crises and a Peace Process: American Engagement in South Asia (Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2007).
53 Polly Nayak and Michael Krepon, The Unfinished Crisis: U.S. Crisis Management after the 2008 Mumbai Attacks (Washington, DC: Henry L. Stimson Center), February 2012, p. 7.
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44
No Exit from Pakistan
are nuclear-armed – and therefore have the unquestioned ability to unleash hell
against the other side – fear of the consequences will induce mutual restraint.
Perhaps there is truth to this theory, but unless relations between India and
Pakistan are altered in fundamental ways, a nuclear exchange will remain a
legitimate fear. That fear is aggravated by the fact that both sides are taking
steps to develop military options that make a war more likely.
For its part, Pakistan is expanding its nuclear arsenal. According to recent
U.S. estimates, Pakistan has about 100 deployed nuclear warheads and enough
fissile material to build 40 to 100 additional nuclear weapons.54 To hear Pak-
istani strategists explain it, the South Asian nuclear arms race is being spurred
by India in two ways. First, India’s non-nuclear military advantage is grow-
ing, and Pakistan has no other way to address that asymmetry. Second, India
unlocked the door to expanding its own nuclear program when it concluded a
civilian nuclear agreement with the United States in 2005. Although that deal
clearly excluded the part of India’s nuclear program related to the military,
Pakistanis – and even some American analysts who opposed the agreement –
asserted that it would free up limited Indian stocks of fissile material and allow
it to go on a bomb-making spree.55 Pakistan’s National Command Authority –
its top leaders and nuclear decision makers – most likely decided to accelerate
Pakistan’s nuclear production at a meeting in early April 2006, after the Indo-
U.S. civil nuclear deal and India’s non-nuclear defense plans became clear to
Islamabad.56
The size of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal makes a difference. More weapons also
increase the chance that something will go wrong.57 Historians of America’s
own nuclear program explain how on multiple occasions the United States
came perilously close to launching World War III by accident; how in 1961 a
B-52 bomber fell apart in flight near Goldsboro, North Carolina, sending
54 David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt, “Pakistani Nuclear Arms Pose Challenge to U.S. Policy,”
New York Times, January 31, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/01/world/asia/01policy
.html?pagewanted=all.
55 Among the American opponents of the deal, Michael Krepon has made this point repeatedly. See
“Unwarranted Assessments,” Dawn, July 23, 2012, http://dawn.com/2012/07/23/unwarranted-assessments/; and “Betting the Ranch on the U.S.-India Nuclear Deal,” Stimson Briefing, June 5, 2005, http://www.stimson.org/essays/betting-the-ranch-on-the-us-india-nuclear-deal/. For more on India’s nuclear weapons development and policies, see George Perkovich, India’s Nuclear Bomb: The Impact on Global Proliferation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001); and Ashley Tellis, India’s Emerging Nuclear Posture: Between Recessed Deterrent and Ready Arsenal (Washington: RAND, 2001).
56 Peter R. Lavoy, “Pakistan’s Nuclear Posture: Security and Survivability,” paper for the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, January 21, 2007, pp. 16–17, http://www.npolicy.org/
article.php?aid=291&rid=6. Lavoy’s assessment fits with the findings of Michael Krepon, The False Promise of the Civil Nuclear Deal (Washington, DC: Henry L. Stimson Center), July 14, 2011, http://www.stimson.org/spotlight/the-false-promise-of-the-civil-nuclear-deal/.
57 Scott D. Sagan and Kenneth Waltz, “The Great Debate: Is Nuclear Zero the Best Option?” The National Interest (September/October 2010).
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The Four Faces of Pakistan
45
two nearly-activated hydrogen bombs crashing to earth; how in 1966 another
B-52 crashed off the coast of Spain with four hydrogen bombs on board, two
of which contaminated the nearby area with plutonium; or how in 2007 the
U.S. Air Force lost track of two nuclear warheads and flew them from North
Dakota to Louisiana without proper security.58 In Pakistan, similar incidents
are possible, even if Pakistani officials claim their safety and security are every
bit as good as those of the United States.
Pakistan’s plans for when and how to use nuclear weapons also make for
disturbing reading. To be clear, it is not as if Pakistani strategists are crazy or
irrational. In fact, there are similarities between Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine and
the doctrine used by the United States during the Cold War. Just as Washington
tried to balance the overwhelming size of the Soviet ground forces in Europe
by threatening to use nuclear weapons, Pakistan also rattles its nuclear saber
to ward off India’s more capable military.
In both cases, the problem facing the country threatening to use nuclear
weapons has been how to convince its adversary that the nuclear threat – one
that would likely carry devastating consequences for both sides – is not hollow.
In Cold War Europe, one of Washington’s answers to that problem was to
develop and field very short range, or “tactical,” nuclear weapons; a risky and
unpopular move among many Europeans, but one that signaled to Moscow
that a Soviet armored offensive into Germany would trigger a nuclear conflict.
Not surprisingly, Pakistan has also started down a similar path. Again,
Pakistani officials point to India as provoking the move, observing that the
Indian military has taken steps to improve its
own ability to hit Pakistan
harder and faster with a non-nuclear strike, as a means to punish Pakistan for
any future terrorist strikes that might originate from its soil.59 Pakistan, fearing
that India might get its punches in before defenses are adequately prepared,
is developing a tactical nuclear program featuring short-range missiles tipped
with small plutonium-based warheads.60
There is little public information about how far Pakistan’s program has
progressed, but already a fair amount of hand-wringing is occurring in interna-
tional arms control circles about what might happen if Pakistan fields tactical
weapons after very limited testing in a region plagued by routine crises and mis-
communication, where the two adversaries share a land border of nearly 2,000
miles.61 Nor is it clear how Pakistan intends to address India’s ever-widening
58 Josh White, “Military Probes How Nukes Flew over U.S.,” Washington Post, September 6, 2007, http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2007-09-06/news/0709051421_1_nuclear-warheads-nuclear-weapons-munitions.
59 Walter C. Ladwig, “A Cold Start for Hot Wars? The Indian Army’s New Limited War Doctrine,” International Security, 32, no. 3 (Winter 2007/8), pp. 158–90.
60 Inter Services Public Relations Press release, April 19, 2011, www.ispr.gov.pk/front/main.asp?
o=t-press release&id=1721.
61 Michael Krepon, “Arms Crawl That Wasn’t,” Dawn, November 2, 2011, http://dawn.com/
2011/11/02/arms-crawl-that-wasnt/.
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46
No Exit from Pakistan
advantage in non-nuclear arms. Pakistani generals might continue to build
more tactical nuclear weapons to keep up, or they might decide that a minimal
arsenal is enough. These and other related issues pose serious challenges to
regional stability.
Oddly enough, when Indians and Pakistanis come together to talk about
the nuclear issue, they tend to discount the potential for nuclear war. South
Asian analysts and officials act as if Americans are entirely too alarmist and
reject Cold War analogies as being inappropriate to the cultural norms of
their own region. Yet there is one undeniable and dangerous consequence of
nuclear weapons that has already taken place. Both sides have turned their
efforts to finding ways short of nuclear war to punish each other.62 At times,
minor conflicts have come close to spiraling out of control and provoking
precisely the sort of war that nuclear weapons are supposed to deter in the first
place.
Afghanistan has been one such proxy battleground. In the summer of 2008,
Pakistan-backed terrorists in the Haqqani network rammed a suicide car bomb
into India’s Kabul embassy, killing 58 and wounding over 130.63 Yet to
hear Indian and Pakistani officials tell it, their spy-versus-spy games extend
throughout the region – including Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. Most
frightening, Pakistan has nurtured militants and terrorist organizations that
have pulled off spectacular attacks inside India, such as the suicidal raid on
India’s parliament building in December 2001 by five Pakistani gunmen. For-
tunately, that attack failed in its mission to kill India’s top political leaders, but it nearly provoked a war. As U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said in
January 2010, “I think it is not unreasonable to assume that Indian patience
would be limited were there to be further attacks.”64 Under such circum-
stances, it is hard to place great faith in the stabilizing attributes of nuclear
weapons.
62 Ashley J. Tellis identifies the various dangers posed by “subconventional violence” between India and Pakistan in Stability in South Asia (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1997), http://www.rand.org/pubs/documented briefings/DB185. Much of the recent scholarly discussion of this topic centers on the concept of the “stability-instability paradox.” See S. Paul Kapur, “India and Pakistan’s Unstable Peace: Why Nuclear South Asia Is Not Like Cold War Europe,” International Security, 30, no. 2 (Fall 2005), pp. 127–52; S. Paul Kapur, “Ten Years of Instability in a Nuclear South Asia,” International Security, 33, no. 2 (Fall 2008), pp. 71–94; Michael Krepon, Rodney W. Jones, and Ziad Haider, eds., Escalation Control and the Nuclear Option in South Asia (Washington: Henry L. Stimson Center, 2004); Michael Krepon and Chris Gagne, eds. The Stability-Instability Paradox: Nuclear Weapons and Brinksmanship in South Asia (Washington: Henry L. Stimson Center, 2001).
63 Declan Walsh, “Deadly Kabul Bomb Targets Indian Embassy,” The Guardian, October 8, 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/08/kabul-bomb-indian-embassy.
64 Julian E. Barnes and Mark Magnier, “Gates Increases Pressure on Pakistan,” Los Angeles Times, January 21, 2010, http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jan/21/world/la-fg-gates-india-terror 21–2010jan21.
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The Four Faces of Pakistan
47
Military Inc.
Critics of the Pakistani military are quick to point out that the generals have
always exaggerated the threat posed by India to serve their own purposes.65
Even if much of the rest of the country has suffered, Pakistan’s military has
always done well for itself.66
For proof, one needs only to visit the Pakistani military’s cantonments,
where roads are well tended, schools are good, and high-quality hospitals treat
servicemen and their families. Servicemen associations founded to care for
retired veterans have come to hold substantial stakes in major sectors of the
Pakistani economy, like cement, fertilizer, oil and gas, and various agricultural
land entitlements, with officers at the rank of major general or above each
allocated fifty acres.68 In land-starved Karachi, an entire oceanside peninsula
roughly the size of Manhattan was doled out in this fashion.69
In part because the military commands a disproportionate share of Pakistan’s
resources, it has come closer than any other national institution at instilling
professionalism, discipline, and esprit de corps throughout its ranks. It has also
accomplished at least some of its own strategic purposes, above all, maintaining
the nation’s sovereign independence from India. In times of grave national
crisis, such as 2010’s epic floods, its personnel have performed heroically. And
when the army has set its mind to taking the fight to domestic insurgents, it
has been effective, if brutal. This was certainly true in the spring of 2009 when
Pakistani Taliban were ousted from control over the Swat Valley. No militant
group in the land can stand its ground in the face of a concerted army offensive,
although just as the U.S. military has found in Afghanistan and Iraq, guerrilla
operations and suicide terrorists make for extremely difficult adversaries.
The army has too often dominated Pakistani politics even when civilians
were nominally in charge. The generals dictate their own budgets, jealously
gua
rd their autonomy, and – with minor historical exceptions – set the nation’s
foreign and defense policy. When they have felt threatened by civilian leaders,
they have taken swift and effective countermeasures. For instance, General
Musharraf’s 1999 coup against Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was prompted
by Sharif’s own plan to dismiss Musharraf. When the army has wanted to tip
65 The title of this section borrows from Ayesha Siddiqa, Military Inc.: Inside Pakistan’s Military Economy (Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto Press, 2008).
66 The economic influence of Pakistan’s military has been documented in a recent book by Ayesha Siddiqa and an earlier one by Ayesha Jalal. See Ayesha Siddiqa, Military Inc. , and Ayesha Jalal, The State of Martial Rule: The Origins of Pakistan’s Political Economy of Defence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990).
67 Siddiqa, Military Inc. , pp. 145–150.
68 Siddiqa, Military Inc., p. 183.
69 Inskeep, Instant City, p. 209.
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48
No Exit from Pakistan
the political balance in its favor – as it did for that same Nawaz Sharif in the
early 1990s – the generals have done that too.
The Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, or ISI, has typically handled the
army’s political manipulations as but one of its many responsibilities. The
record of such dealings is now public, thanks to court proceedings starting in
the late 1990s that investigated whether the ISI funneled money to its favored
political candidates. Although General Musharraf suspended the case following
his 1999 coup, activist judges on Pakistan’s Supreme Court decided to revive
the case in early 2012. Lieutenant General Asad Durrani, who directed the ISI
during the period in question, admitted in court that he followed instructions
from the then-Pakistan army chief to distribute the equivalent of $1.6 million
to right-wing candidates in 1990.70
This practice is no relic of the distant past. Pakistan’s 2002 elections were
thoroughly rigged by the Musharraf regime.71 Worse, even though national