Trying, of course, is not the same as succeeding. And when Pakistan is shaken, so too is India, its less than neighborly rival and nuclear competitor. Pakistani jihadis come in many different shapes and sizes, but no matter: The possibility of a nuclear-armed terrorist regime in Pakistan has now grown from a fear into a strategic challenge that no American president can afford to ignore.
The nation that has both nuclear weapons and a dangerous mix of terrorists was — and remains — Pakistan. We keep a close eye on everything, even the Islamic madrassas, where more than 2 million students are more likely studying sharia law than economics or history. These official assurances have fallen largely on deaf ears at the White House, principally because one president after another has learned from American intelligence that these same Pakistani leaders have often been working surreptitiously with the terrorists to achieve common goals.
One such goal was the recent defeat of the Kabul regime, which had been supported by the U. Bin Laden fled to the one place where his security could be assured — Pakistan.
In , when the U. The U. That Pakistan was also known to have helped North Korea and Iran develop their nuclear programs has only deepened the distrust. When repeatedly questioned about the plan, U. Even though U. How long can America look the other way?
The ground arsenal consists of approximately land-based missiles with yields of kt. Pakistan is in possession of several nuclear-capable, road-mobile ballistic missiles, including the short-range Abdali, Ghaznavi, Shaheen-1 and NASR and medium-range Shaheen-2 and Ghauri.
Pakistan has 6 operational nuclear-capable ballistic missiles. Pakistan is also developing the Ababeel medium-range ballistic missile MRBM that is believed to have multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle MIRV capabilities.
Pakistan has developed the NASR Hatf-9 ballistic missile, which, with a range of just km, cannot hit strategic targets in India. Imagery analysis of the Nasr missile suggests that its diameter is 30 centimeters about 12 inches across, and could therefore be able to carry a very compact nuclear warhead comparable to the U.
W nuclear artillery shell that has a yield varying from less than 1 kiloton to about 10 kilotons. Actually incapacitating a tank requires an overpressure of about 45 psi. See table 1 for another estimate of the effects on tanks separated by meters. If tanks are spaced at meters or feet apart, the number of weapons necessary to achieve 55 so-called kills rises from one to eight. By this calculation, destroying a well-dispersed force of tanks would likely require kiloton weapons.
An independent battle group would send fewer tanks than a strike corps, supported by mechanized infantry fighting vehicles, self-propelled and rocket artillery, and close air support. India has also conducted several military exercises involving simulated nuclear attacks on its forces. Should Pakistan decide to deploy TNWs, it can probably use part of its existing arsenal to produce lower-yield devices in addition to producing new warheads dedicated for counterforce employment.
Similarly, a kiloton or even a kiloton weapon could be detonated at an abnormally high altitude— meters and 1, meters, respectively—to replicate the air blast radius of a five-kiloton device.
However, Pakistan can easily develop miniaturized warheads for the Babur and Raad cruise missiles and the higher-payload Hatf-1A, Abdali, and Ghaznavi short-range ballistic missiles. One analysis maintains that developing a miniaturized plutonium warhead for the Nasr would require twice the plutonium required by a similar yield, non-miniaturized device, since the warhead would have to be based on a linear instead of spherical implosion.
The other short-range cruise and ballistic missiles mentioned above can potentially carry all types of nuclear warheads, including hybrid or composite cores made from both HEU and plutonium. Warheads with variable yields have been developed by the United States, but it is highly unlikely that Pakistan has developed similar designs. These calculations suggest that Pakistan might be able to field one hundred warheads for counterforce roles while still retaining a substantial survivable force for countervalue targeting.
While fielding these weapons is certainly more plausible now than it was in , fissile material constraints still pose a substantial problem, especially since Pakistan has eleven types of missile systems designed to fulfill a variety of targeting objectives within the full spectrum deterrence posture. At present, Pakistan is believed to have produced about 3, kilograms or about 6, pounds of weapon-grade HEU and — kilograms or about — pounds of weapon-grade plutonium, sufficient for approximately HEU warheads at 20 kilograms per device and 45 plutonium warheads at 4 kilograms per device.
However, longer-range missiles would carry bigger warheads with greater yields—suitable for countervalue targeting—and would thus leave more material for fabrication into warheads for two cruise the Babur and the Raad and three short-range ballistic missile systems the Hatf-1A, the Abdali, the Ghaznavi, and the Nasr. For the Nasr specifically, assuming that one multi-tubeNasr battery—each with four missiles—was designated for each Indian IBG, Pakistan would need 32 warheads.
If only one single-missile battery is assigned to an IBG, only eight missiles would be necessary. A missile Nasr force would require kilograms or pounds of weapon-grade plutonium. It is therefore more plausible to presume that Pakistan will assign single-missile batteries against each IBG, requiring only eight 8-kilogram devices, or 64 kilograms about pounds of plutonium. This spares the additional plutonium for deployment of multi-tube Nasr batteries in selected hot spots.
On the other hand, if Pakistan is able to build a miniature spherical implosion device for the Nasr, then the same amount of fissile material can be used to create twice as many devices. Realistically, though, developing miniaturized fission designs for cruise missiles with higher maximum payloads appears more feasible, not to mention survivable given that cruise missiles can be launched from standoff ranges.
Other short-range ballistic missile systems, particularly the Abdali and the Ghaznavi, can also carry greater payloads than the Nasr kilograms, or 1, pounds, and kilograms, or 1, pounds, respectively and can be armed with simple fission warheads without profligate use of scarce fissile material.
The kilometer Abdali missile can also be launched on a depressed trajectory to achieve the same effect as the Nasr, perhaps with greater destructive potential. Pakistan is unlikely to compromise its strategic nuclear stockpile for tactical nuclear weapons. Instead, it will maintain a balance among the many different types of missile systems in its inventory—which offer deployment and targeting flexibility for the full spectrum deterrence posture.
Regardless of how effective a 0. While it is true that hundreds of low-yield nuclear weapons deployed on an assortment of delivery platforms are necessary for effective warfighting strategy, even a simple deterrence strategy calls for a limited number of low-yield weapons for counterforce targeting.
Given limits on fissile material stockpiles and production capacity, Pakistan will probably not have the ability to deploy hundreds of warheads for battlefield use in the foreseeable future. The existing system leaves some unresolved questions about how Pakistan is going to create a credible risk without forward deploying TNWs, or how it is going to play a deliberate strategic game when its weapons lack negative controls. Pakistani officials have on several occasions emphasized that the NCA will maintain assertive control over any battlefield nuclear weapons—including the Nasr—that would be forward deployed during a crisis.
Retired senior military officials also claim that centralized control would be kept through multiple redundancies that have been built into the C2 system. Codes themselves are held by the NCA, which must then transmit the codes to a field commander in order for that commander to launch. Senior Pakistani military officials claim that they have guarded against the possible breakdown of normal communications with multiple redundancies and backup channels of communication to maintain contact with local field commanders.
Several scholars have raised the possibility that TNWs are inherently destabilizing when deployed so close to a border, as they would be in Pakistan. Still, Pakistan is likely to deploy TNWs for possible employment as a counterforce weapon against enemy armor, mechanized, and reserve force concentrations, and logistical, command and control, and supply nodes.
Pakistan does not have a declared nuclear doctrine, nor has it shown telltale signs—like reorganization of the conventional force structure to incorporate nuclear tactics—of a shift to a warfighting strategy. Conversely, the same doctrinal opacity could be exploited by India to push Pakistan into a situation where it would be too late for TNWs to be effective.
In areas where the lines of communication [are] perilously close to the border—such as the heartland in Punjab—the scope for trading space would be very limited. Pakistan must stop any Indian incursion at the border as a matter of both national pride and military necessity.
Any successful Indian armored thrusts, even on a small scale of a few kilometers in depth, would lead to rapid escalation. Pakistani analysts argue that this might force Pakistan to use battlefield nuclear weapons on its own soil against attacking Indian forces, a possibility strongly denied by Pakistani strategic planners.
Then, as now, the threat of limited ground incursion between 10 kilometers about 6 miles and 50 kilometers about 31 miles was equally the threat of losing major urban, industrial, or critical logistical centers. The operational complexities of TNW deployment are deepened by doctrinal and force posture developments across the border in India. He added that the BeiDou satellite system also had tremendous peaceful applications.
ISR and cyber asymmetries are particularly destabilizing as these can prompt India to attempt to degrade C2 and ISR networks in Pakistan, 87 Further, since the introduction of missile defenses, coupled with canisterized, nuclear-capable, and potentially MIRVed meaning the payload is a multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle ballistic missiles like the Agni-V, ISR asymmetries incentivize escalatory behavior even more.
This same principle was aptly demonstrated during the first Gulf War, when the United States Air Force was unable to destroy all Iraqi mobile Scud launchers, even though the coalition air forces enjoyed complete command of the air and had unrivalled ISR, satellite, and targeting capabilities at their disposal.
Even if India cannot completely eliminate road-mobile missiles, though, ISR and air force capability will certainly make it difficult for Pakistani planners to ensure effective camouflage of deployed TNW or Nasr batteries without adequate ground and field security. The major strategic stability impact of Pakistani TNWs is forcing India to include flexible response options in its nuclear strategy.
It would be irrational for Pakistani decisionmakers to unnecessarily expose the Nasr to any situation where loss of control, inadequate field security, or weak concealment might make it vulnerable to preemptive attack by India. One possible solution is to deploy them without actually declaring the type of warhead or only placing conventionally tipped Nasr missiles at selected places. India will likely persist with the belief that the Nasror other short-range systems are all carrying nuclear warheads.
How and when Pakistan uses these short-range systems will depend on the evolving shape of the battle and will be decided by the NCA, without actually delegating the launch authority to field commanders. The evolving Indian conventional force modernization and rapidly increasing ISR and space capabilities will also exacerbate the conventional and technological asymmetry between India and Pakistan.
Pakistani planners have chosen to plug this perceived deterrence gap by introducing TNWs, while simultaneously attempting to plug gaps in conventional forces where possible. Indian claims of the successful development and deployment of a ballistic missile defense shield around New Delhi, its possible extension to other major population centers, and plans for developing cruise missile defenses will also further erode deterrence and crisis stability in the region.
Even as India and Pakistan continue to develop their nuclear forces toward triadic posture and assured second-strike capability, conventional force modernization continues in parallel. In order to bolster conventional forces, the Pakistan Army plans to standardize all its artillery pieces to millimeters, procuring new self-propelled howitzers from the United States, China, and Turkey, and a new multiple-launch rocket system from China.
TNWs are weapons of last resort, but once a decision is made to use nuclear weapons on the battlefield by the NCA, TNWs are likely to produce strategic consequences, like rapid escalation.
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