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India's missile test: More fuel to the
fire
By Hooman Peimani
Following an exchange of threats, including a
nuclear war, between India and Pakistan, on January 9
the Indians tested Agni 1, a medium-range missile
capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to almost all
major Pakistani targets. While the international
community's attention is focused on the alleged future
nuclear threat of Iraq and of North Korea, India and
Pakistan are quietly beefing up their declared nuclear
arsenals along with the required means of delivery to
prepare themselves for a nuclear exchange, a tragic, but
still possible, scenario.
According to a
spokesperson of the Indian Ministry of Defense, P K
Bandopadhyay, Agni 1 was tested at the remote coastal
interim test range located in Chandipore-on-Sea in
India's eastern State of Orissa. Indian Defense Minister
George Fernandes attended the event.
India's
military officials described the test as "a textbook
launch" as, according to them, "everything went
perfectly". Pakistan's Foreign Ministry reacted to the
test by describing it as "no surprise" since India's
"nuclear and missile ambitions were well known" to the
Pakistanis.
The surface-to-surface Agni 1 has a
reported range of 600 kilometers to 800 kilometers and
can carry a one-ton nuclear warhead. It is a
shorter-range type of the nuclear-capable medium-range
Agni series, which have different ranges (1,600
kilometers to 3,500 kilometers), according to the weight
of their payloads. Agni 1 is a highly mobile missile as
it can be launched from rail and road-launchers.
The missile test was only one of a series of
Indian tests scheduled for January. Other tests will
reportedly include testing of the Brahmos missile, a
supersonic cruise missile with a range of 280 kilometers
developed jointly with Russia, and a nuclear-capable
missile from the Prithivi series with a range of 240
kilometers.
India and Pakistan have sought to
create credible nuclear arsenals since May 1998 when
they joined the nuclear club after conducting a series
of nuclear tests. Each country claims that its arsenal
is meant to function as a deterrent against a major
aggression of the other side, while India also seeks to
deter nuclear China.
Given Pakistan's much
smaller land size compared to India, the former needs
medium and long-range missiles to attack most major
Indian cities and industrial zones, while the latter
requires mainly short-range missiles to build the same
capability. Most potential Pakistani targets are well
within a 50 to 250 kilometer radius from the Indian
border. India already has a variety of nuclear-capable
short-range Prithivi missiles with a range varying from
150 to 300 kilometers.
Having an estimated
nuclear arsenal of 100-150 warheads versus Pakistan's
25-50, India's far superior capability to Pakistan in
its nuclear race with that country becomes even more
secured as it acquires missiles such as Agni 1. Such
missiles give the Indians the capability to attack just
about any part of Pakistan. Added to their short-range
missiles, their missile success also includes their far
better medium-range missile experience, as being evident
in their Agni series.
On the contrary, the
Pakistanis' record of success in their missile program
has been far less impressive. Lacking short-range
nuclear capable missiles, their conventional ones, ie,
Hatf 1 and Hatf 2, have suffered from inaccuracy and
test failures, respectively. They have better record in
their medium-range nuclear-capable missile projects, as
reflected in their successful tests and/or deployments
of Ghauri I (1,500 kilometers), Ghauri II (2,000
kilometers), Shaheen I (600-720 kilometers) and Shaheen
II (2,200 kilometers).
The Agni 1 missile test
took place after a dangerous exchange of threats by the
Indian and Pakistani high-ranking officials. Earlier in
the week of testing, Pakistani President General Pervez
Musharraf made a statement as to the threat of a
"non-conventional war", ie, a nuclear war, had helped
India and Pakistan to prevent the escalation of their
conflict over disputed Kashmir in 2002. While his
spokesperson later denied him referring to a nuclear war
against India, but to a popular uprising in
Indian-controlled Kashmir, Indian Defense Minister
Fernandes reacted angrily, saying that in any
retaliatory action against a Pakistani nuclear attack,
his country would destroy Pakistan.
Such
exchange of harsh words reflected a deep-rooted
hostility between the two neighbors, which began right
after their independence in 1947. Disputes over the
status of the state of Jamu and Kashmir currently
divided between the two neighbors, but claimed by
Pakistan for its being predominately Muslim, have been
the root cause of their hostility to which many other
issues have been added over time.
The two
countries have fought three wars (1947-48, 1965 and
1971) since independence, while being very close to
another war over Kashmir in 1999 and in 2002. In both
cases, the real or perceived activities of those seeking
to "liberate" Indian-controlled Kashmir by force
instigated the conflicts. When the two sides deployed
large forces along their common borders, those conflicts
became more dangerous and gained a momentum of their
own. The second incident, which began late in 2001,
continued well through 2002 and gradually began to
subside, although its impact has still kept the two
sides quite aggressive to each other.
India
tested Agni I only a day after Pakistan approved the
deployment of the nuclear-capable medium-range Ghauri
missile. Fear of the devastating consequences of a
nuclear war has so far helped New Delhi and Islamabad
not to resort to nuclear weapons to settle their
conflicts. However, against a background of deep-rooted
hostilities, arms race as reflected in their missile
tests and deployments, has the potential to instigate a
military conflict. In the absence of a
mutually-acceptable settlement of their disputes,
including the one over Kashmir, such conflict could get
out of hand to escalate into a nuclear exchange, if
extremists on both sides took charge. This scenario will
pose a far greater threat of a catastrophic regional
nuclear war with international implications in the near
future than those of Iraq and North Korea.
Dr Hooman Peimani works as an
independent consultant with international organizations
in Geneva and does research in international
relations.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd.
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