The project proposal at IDSA and outcome 2008-2010: 

https://www.idsa.in/monograph/ReconcilingDoctrinesPrerequisiteforPeaceinSouthAsia_aahmed_2010

PROJECT SYNOPSIS:

APPLICANTION FOR ASSOCIATE FELLOWSHIP AT IDSA 2008

 

RECONCILING MILITARY STRATEGIES AS PREREQUISITE TO PEACE IN SOUTH ASIA

 

Thesis Statement

 

A reconciliation of military strategies of India and Pakistan is a necessary prerequisite for peace in South Asia.

 

Aim

 

The aim of the study is to arrive at a policy recommendation on defence policy through a study of the competing military strategies of India and Pakistan on the three levels – subconventional, conventional and nuclear.

 

Conceptual Approach

 

It is assumed that peace begets prosperity and prosperity is the national aim. The proposed study privileges ‘security through peace’ over ‘peace through security’. Present defense policy is predicated on exertions towards security so as to beget peace. Since these exertions contribute to the relative insecurity of neighbours, their actions and reactions constitute ‘threats’ to security. Further efforts at security along the same general direction serve to heighten neighbours threat constituting behaviour. Thus ‘peace through security’ is a receding horizon. Instead, a ‘security through peace’ model cognizant of the underside mentioned, attempts to undercut the rationale of the neighbour by reconciling the efforts towards security of both. The emphasis is thus reversed with peace begetting security, and in turn prosperity.

 

Background

 

In the popular narrative regional instability over the past two decades is attributed to a military-dominated revisionist Pakistan posing a strategic challenge to status-quoist India’s natural growth to regional power status. At the subconventional level Pakistan has waged a proxy war in Kashmir and fostered the growth of minority based terrorism elsewhere in India. It has sought to limit India’s advantages at the conventional level through a ‘first use’ nuclear strategy. India for its part has attempted to acquire an escalation dominance capability at all three levels by waging Low Intensity Conflict operations, refurbishing conventional doctrine and posture and adopting massive retaliation as mainstay of its nuclear deterrence.

 

The ongoing Global War on Terror has had a benign impact for the present, with a putative détente prevailing. The current hiatus in tensions between the two neighbours is being taken advantage of by India for stabilizing Kashmir and a deepening of democracy in Pakistan.

 

Assumptions

 

An assumption in respect of India is that the national aim is sustenance of its economic trajectory, thereby enhancing its great power credentials and bringing prosperity to the nation. With respect to Pakistan the assumption is that a democratic Pakistan would be to its best interest, a prerequisite for which is a drawdown in military’s control of the state.

 

Central Argument

 

Pakistan’s military has used the bogey of Indian hegemonism to retain praetorian control over its state and perpetrate a provocative subconventional strategy. India’s actions, both in exercise of its power in keeping with its self image as a regional power and in reaction to Pakistani proxy war, have contributed to a convergence between Pakistani perception and reality. The nuclear overhang has had the dual influence of both enabling this strategic competition on the lowest, subconventional, level, even while ensuring restraint at the middle, conventional, level. The self-serving argument of the military in Pakistan can be dispelled through a mutual retraction of respective offensive strategies at various levels. This would deepen democracy in Pakistan, reduce Pakistani propensity to heighten internal problems in India and enable a rethink in its nuclear use philosophy. 

 

Since India has no extra-territorial designs on Pakistan and the proposed balancing would not undercut Indian conventional deterrence, there is a case for it to countenance engaging its neighbour in reconciling military strategies. The fallout would be on better internal security at the subconventional level and a reduced salience of the nuclear level.

 

Progress in the peace process is predicated not so much on the improved conditions in Kashmir, but on arriving at an inter-state balance of power. An interpretation of Pakistani interest in Kashmir is that it is less on account of identity issues but more to redress the military balance with India by tying its conventional superiority down in a subconventional engagement in Kashmir. In which case unless this disparity is addressed to Pakistan’s satisfaction peace will be elusive. The current hiatus in strained relations owes to Pakistan’s preoccupation with its western borders. Once its straitened circumstances are navigated past, instability will return. Intervention with any meaning for peace entails discussing Pakistan’s take on the Indian conventional edge. Thus the tradeoff would be a draw down by Pakistan in its offensive posture at the subconventional plane in return for India’s reciprocation on the conventional plane.

 

 

 

Arguing the case

 

The study would have to pose and answer the following questions:

 

• What are the wellsprings of India’s defence policy?
• How does India’s strategic posture impose on Pakistan?
• What are the implications of reconciliation of offensive postures on India’s conventional deterrent? Would such engagement result in its dilution?
• Would Pakistan view the idea/initiative as in its interests?
• What are the counter-arguments against the idea and how can these be dispelled?
• Under what conditions would India and Pakistan be receptive to engaging in reconciliation of military strategies at the three levels?
• What are the contours of such balancing?
• How would the idea be required to be packaged both internally and externally?
• What are the anticipatory problem areas in implementation and what measures need be taken to overcome these?

 

Methodology

 

Since adversarial military postures are a symptom of the health of political relations, political aims of both states would require first to be discerned. This would ascertain the strength of the assumptions on which the study is based. There is adequate commentary existing on this issue and primary sources in terms of MOD and MEA reports in the public domain are available. Declaratory policy would require to be contrasted against policy in action. Ultimately, sustainability of the proposal would be determined by its internal political acceptability and institutional resistance encountered. This would be a function of the future vision for India – an active participant as a global player in great power strategic balancing or as an introspective power in the model of post war Germany and Japan. 

 

Next recent operational histories and operational thinking in both armies would require to be studied. There is ample secondary reading on this issue, particularly on the internet, with interviews with retired military protagonists enabling further insight. Advantage would be taken of the effusion in doctrinal thinking in India since the Kargil War.

 

A review of force structures would need to be done through input from open sources and interviews. Making sense of these would require input from operations experts. Limits and implications of options can be formulated based on this.

 

Existing CAMs and CBMs and ideas on next generation steps would require vetting. The envelop would have to be pushed since the idea here has a broader dimension than can be subsumed among other CBM.    

 

The Pakistani perspective of India is crucial to read accurately so as to eventually turn out a practicable study. This would require interfacing with the Pakistani strategic community and understanding the Track II contribution so far.

 

Conclusion

 

Adversarial military strategic engagement between India and Pakistan is on all the three planes: subconventional, conventional and nuclear. It can be anticipated that balancing would not be restricted to conventional forces but would impose on forces conducting and configured for Low Intensity Operations in so far Pakistan’s demand on India is concerned; and on nuclear ‘first use’ postures in so far as India’s claim on Pakistan can be anticipated. Thus there would be mutuality in ‘give and take’ with Pakistan requiring to agree to forego its offensive posture on the subconventional level while India dilutes its offensive conventional posture. At the nuclear level, Indian amenability at the conventional level would make for a better case for No First Use adoption by Pakistan and lead to a configuration of its nuclear deterrent posture accordingly. On the nuclear level for India the implication would be a stay on any likely move towards ‘flexible response’ and the nuclear warfighting posture this entails.

 

It would be naïve to believe peace is necessarily the condition desired by political forces in society. Power for its own sake and for projecting in keeping with a self image are also contending visions. Leveraging of power as a candidate route to peace can be a preferred alternative for political forces of certain persuasion, those with alternative strategic  perspectives and institutions protective of their interests. Thus the political element would bear scrutiny in greater measure than ‘bean counting’, as the term ‘balancing’ may superficially suggest.  The policy import of the study on this account extends beyond the parameters of defence policy into the ideational realm of the state.