Speeding the Indo-Pak peace process

Clearly, both governments have decided to impart a serious momentum to the peace process. That's why there were preparations including a "secret" meeting between National Security Advisers J.N. Dixit and Tariq Aziz. The coming Foreign Secretaries' meeting should lead to a comprehensive discussion of many issues.

This should put at rest fears, especially in Pakistan, that the United Progressive Alliance government won't have the same commitment to reconciliation with Pakistan as Mr Vajpayee's regime.

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There is across-the-board support in India for a peace dialogue. Civil society solidly favours it. Many UPA constituents and supporters have been keen on it. They took sober positions when the NDA, including Mr Vajpayee, was hysterically threatening Pakistan with an "aar-paar ki ladai" (battle to the finish).

The peace process's resumption is good news indeed.

Amidst these developments, a note of caution might sound off-key. Yet, that has become necessary after the nuclear CBMs agreement. The measures are emphatically welcome even though half of them restate what was agreed in 1999. They put nuclear risk-reduction on the table and promote transparency. South Asia would be worse off without them.

However, the measures are modest, and may prove inadequate in reducing the regional nuclear danger. It would be a grave error to regard them as "stabilising" the strategic balance, or "controlling" the nuclear "genie".

On the positive side, Pakistan and India reconfirmed the 1999 agreement to notify each other in advance of missile test-flights and to continue with their moratoria on nuclear tests. Besides, they will establish a hotline between their Foreign Secretaries and upgrade the existing hotline between their Directors-General of Military Operations.

Secondly, they will soon furnish to each other details on the timing of missile test-flights and paths. This will mark a minor improvement on the practice they followed even before 1998.

However, these are, strictly, not confidence-building but transparency measures. They cannot generate confidence that India and Pakistan will substantially reduce the nuclear danger.

The hotline between the two Foreign Secretaries could help clear some misunderstandings. But these officers are not the key decision-makers in nuclear-military matters. They can at best act as conveyors of information.

In general, the agreed CBMs cannot be a substitute for nuclear risk-reduction measures (NRRMs).

I have three simple reasons for saying so. First, the grave nuclear danger India-Pakistan face is the potential use of nuclear weapons, whether by intent or accident. This isn't imaginary. The two neared the brink of a nuclear confrontation three times since 1998: Kargil-1999, and in January and June 2002.

The only way of reducing nuclear risks is non-deployment of nuclear weapons -- by keeping warheads separated from delivery systems (missiles, aircraft, etc.). Once nuclear weapons are deployed, there is a definite risk of their use -- unauthorised, unintentional, or by design. The two should have agreed to non-deployment for one to three years. They didn't.

Second, it's urgent to halt the India-Pakistan missile race. Once medium- and long-range missiles are fully developed, their use becomes likely. Missile flight-time between Indian and Pakistani cities is 3 to 8 minutes -- too little for corrective action.

India and Pakistan should have frozen missile development through a moratorium on test-flights for two to three years. But they didn't.

Worse, their agreed nuclear-test moratorium clause takes away with one hand what the other gives. The test ban will hold "unless ... [either state] decides that extraordinary events have jeopardised its supreme interests." This qualification is fatal.

Third, they should have addressed four specific risks: use of nuclear weapons through miscalculation because of faulty information processing; unauthorised use of nuclear weapons by "rogue" groups or fanatics; accidents and fires near nuclear weapons; and rumours of imminent use and the resultant panic response. They did none of this.

These have been serious accidents in both countries' military and nuclear installations. Good NRRMs can address these risks -- by making authorisation procedures transparent and detecting preparations for unwarranted launches. The two failed to negotiate such NRRMs.

The result is inadequate. The inadequacy's roots lie in two assumptions: that "deterrence", including hair-trigger readiness, is more important than safety; and secondly, the agreement's assertion that nuclear weapons possession promotes "stability".

The first assumption is dangerously untenable. India-Pakistan rivalry is marked by war, miscalculation and volatility. The second is falsified by experience. Nuclear weapons have proved immensely destabilising in South Asia. They have encouraged nuclear sabre-rattling and adventurism.

The CBMs' long-term downside is that India and Pakistan want to appear "responsible" nuclear weapons-states so they get to keep their nuclear weapons. That's why there isn't a single word about nuclear disarmament in the agreement, not even as a long-term goal.

Equally important is the clause jointly calling for "regular working-level meetings to be held among all nuclear powers to discuss issues of common concern." India and Pakistan want a place in the Global Nuclear Club -- itself the greatest danger to world security. They have no intention of promoting disarmament.

We should know better. True safety and security lies in the total elimination of nuclear weapons. NRRMs are best a transitional step to that goal.

Experience shows that CBMs don't create trust. Rather, it is the pre-disposition to trust that guarantees that CBMs will work effectively and promote greater trust. India and Pakistan agreed to conventional CBMs in the 1990sincluding prior warning of military exercises and a commitment not to violate each other's airspace. These were breached because there was no pre-disposition to trust.

Under today's more favourable climate, India and Pakistan should have aimed high. They didn't. Their CBMs could fall below the threshold.

Praful Bidwai is an eminent Indian columnist.