National Security Doctrine for Global Reach continues....

It was thus eyeball to eyeball for fifty years; but in the end Gorbachev blinked, and opened the Pandora box of glasnost and perestroika. He tried disarmament, but his house collapsed. The USSR was dissolved thereafter.

China appears to have understood this phenomenon as early as 1982. So they abandoned their anti-US posture, and launched their economic modernization programme without reservation. During 1982-94 China has expanded at double the growth rate of India, after growing the previous 28 years (1952-81) at the same rate of growth as India’s. China is thus in a position today to deploy a huge amount of resources for defence, thanks to their lying low during the 1980s and early 1990s, and building their economy.

In other words, if we are to combat China and the USA, the decision to announce our nuclear intentions should have been delayed till we have achieved a 10 per cent growth rate in the economy for about 7 years. (i.e., doubling our national income thereby). Such a growth rate would wipe out unemployment in 5 years, and poverty in 10 years, besides allowing us to triple out defence budget. Thereafter, we could think in terms of global strategic nuclear policy. Rajiv Gandhi as Prime Minister had done on a smaller scale the same thing; raised the growth rate to 5 per cent above our historical ‘Hindu’ rate of 3 per cent, and doubled our defence budget. But alas, he had failed to grasp that foreign debt has a way of coming home to roost. The Bofors scandal and the 1990-91 payments crisis, put a stop his plans.

We could have afforded to wait for Pokharan II since we had already waited since 1964, when we first acquired the capability to explode a bomb, and more since 1974, when we had demonstrated that capability. Therefore, we could have risked waiting till AD 2010.

If India has no plan to build a holistic credible deterrent then these tests in fact have altered India’s national security paradigm by cementing China-Pakistan collusion.

to be continued...

( This account is maintained by Har Anand Publication)