US Tactical Nuclear Weapons More an Irritant Than Deterrent

7/30/2019 US Tactical Nuclear Weapons More an Irritant Than Deterrent

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The B61 dial-a-yield bo mb

By Russ Wellen , June 26, 2013 .

U.S. Tactical Nuclear Weapons More an Irritant Than Deterrent

Youve heard of planned obso lescence tactical nuclear

weapons are a case of deferred obsolescence: a weapon

that has long ago worn out its welcome in the U.S.

arsenal. On June 6, in an op-ed f or t he Los Angeles

Times, Steve Andreasen, a consultant f or the Nuclear

Threat Initiative, wrote:

Throughout the Cold War, thousands of tactical

nuclear weapons short-range nuclear artillery

shells, missiles and bombs were deployed by the

United States to deter the Soviets from exploiting

their advantages in Europe to mount a lightning

attack. After the Soviet Union collapsed,

President George H. W. Bush ordered the return of almost all U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, leaving

only a few hundred air-delivered gravity bombs the B61 in European bunkers.

Politically, however, there are still voices that argue that even a bomb with no military utility is

reassuring to certain allies, and that storing this artifact in European bunkers and maintaining allied

aircraft capable of dropping this bomb is a valuable demonstration of NATO burden sharing.

Moreover, these proponents are prepared to pay or rather, have the U.S. pay $10 billion to

modernize and store the B61.

But to a state such as Pakistan, tactical nuclear weapons present an exciting new addition to their arsenal fo r

which they may have big plans. At his Foreign Policyblog Best Defense, Tom Ricks interviews Richard Armitage

deputy secretary of state during the George W. Bush administration. He said that Pakistan is

now are looking at tactical nuclear weapons. [Their fear, Armitage said, is that if there is

another Mumbai-like attack, India will respond with a corps-sized attack on Pakistan.] Tactical

nukes is what youd use against a corps. [This might provoke India to escalate further.] But

Pakistan would say that its tactical nukes would deter that. [Brackets are Rickss.]

In a recent post titled Would Pakistan Respond t o Indias Use o f Conventional Weapons With Tactical Nukes?

I excerpted the Times of Indias Indrani Bagchi, who quoted Shyam Saran, the convener of Indias National

Security Advisory Board. The latter said that Pakistan (according to Indian po licymakers) hopes, by developing

tact ical nuclear weapons,

to dissuade India from contemplating conventional punitive retaliation to cross-border

terrorist strikes such as the horrific 26/11 attack on Mumbai. What Pakistan is signalling to India and

to the world is that India should not contemplate retaliation even if there is another Mumbai

because Pakistan has lowered the threshold of nuclear use to the theatre level. This is nothing
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short of nuclear blackmail.

What Pakistan is signaling to me is that it doesnt want to f eel compelled to stay the hand of its Islamist

militants , who its long viewed as its wild card. (That s making the generous assumption that the army and/or I

wont be complicit in a f uture militant attack on India.) Instead, Pakistan is making contingency plans f or the

retaliation f rom India that it expects . But, is the luxury of keeping militants around worth developing and

maintaining tact ical nukes to clean up their messes? T hats some skewed calculus.

To give you an example of the problems this created, consider Rickss remark This might provoke India to

escalate f urther. Saran says (emphasis added):

India will not be the first to use nuclear weapons, but if it is attacked with such weapons, it would

engage in nuclear retaliation which will be massive and designed to inflict unacceptable damage on

its adversary. The label on a nuclear weapon used for attacking India, strategic or tactical, is

irrelevant from the Indian perspective. A limited nuclear war is a contradiction in terms. Any

nuclear exchange, once initiated, would swiftly and inexorably escalate to the strategic level.

In other words, not only wouldnt India be deterred f rom retaliating by Pakistans tact ical once called

batt lef ield nukes, it would retaliate with s trategic your garden-variety, apocalyptic nukes! This whole

business is riddled with opportunities f or miscommunication that could result in an all-out nuclear war. In

October 2012, George Perkovich explained in a Stimson Center report , about which I posted a month later.

Many worry about Islamist militants acquiring proprietorship of Pakistans nuclear weapons. But the

greater risk, according to Perkovich, is the confusion that India experiences in situations such as

when its parliament was attacked in New Delhi in 2001 and during the Mumbai 2008 assault. Thus

the nuclear deterrence model, which, according to conventional thinking, worked for the United

States and Russia, may not be universally applicable. Why?

Perkovich writes that, when it comes to initiating and managing warfare between nuclear-armed

states, it is generally assumed that a tight, coherent line of authority is S.O.P. Otherwise the

implications for deterrence stability are profound.

For example, if

India is attacked by [Islamist militants] emanating from Pakistan and with ties to Pakistani

intelligence services, [India] naturally infers that such actions represent the intentions and policies ofPakistani authorities. If Pakistan does not detain and prosecute the perpetrators pressure

mounts for India to demonstrate through force that it will [retaliate].

Perkovich presents t his scenario.

For example, while India could perceive that the terrorist attacks it attributes to Pakistan signal

Pakistani aggressiveness, Pakistani leaders [may only have intended the] initial terrorist attacks as

a signal that the Pakistani state does not seek a wider conflict but [merely seeks] to press India to
http://www.fpif.org/blog/theft_is_not_the_only_threat_militants_pose_to_pakistans_nuclear_weaponshttp://www.stimson.org/images/uploads/research-pdfs/George_Perkovich_-_The_Non_Unitary_Model_and_Deterrence_Stability_in_South_Asia.pdf


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make political accommodations, in Kashmir or more broadly.

This signaling process becomes all the more difficult and precarious if the Pakistani leaders who

are presumed to be the authors of Pakistans signals and actions deny that the [terrorists] actually

do manifest the policies of the state.

In that case

Indian leaders then face a highly unstable dilemma. They could act as if the initial violence reflects

the intentions of Pakistans chain of command, and send signals of retaliatory action according to

normal models of deterrence.

But this might only conf use Pakistan. Perkovich explains (emphasis added).

if Pakistani leaders believe or claim that the perpetrators were not carrying out state policies, and

India does escalate, Pakistani leaders will feel that India is the aggressor.

It becomes obvious that not knowing on whose authority an Islamist extremist at tack on India was mounted

produces dangerous confusion and ambiguity that interfere in the management of deterrence.

Who is sending signals through violence that is perceived to be emanating from the state and/or its

territory? What is being signaled?

In the end

disunity erodes the rationality on which deterrence is predicated.

Returning to Ms. Bagchi and tactical nukes, she writes that another reason Pakistan developed them is

to keep its weapons from being confiscated or neutralized by the US, a fear that has grown in the

Pakistani establishment in the wake of the operation against Osama bin Laden.

In a recent ebook, historianAgha Humayun Amin, a f ormer major in the Pakistani Tank Corps, conf irms t his.

The Pakistani military perception right from 2001 was that the USA was a threat for Pakistans

nuclear program and US arrival in Afghanistan had more to do with Pakistan and less with the

Taliban. Therefore the Taliban had to be supported. As long as the Americans were busy with the

Taliban, Pakistan or Pakistani nuclear assets were safe.

Or, re orts Elaine Grossman for the National Journal em hasis added :
http://www.nationaljournal.com/nationalsecurity/why-almost-nobody-likes-news-about-pakistani-nuclear-security-20130308?page=1http://www.amazon.com/TALIBAN-Setting-Straight-Riedels-Strategic-Narrative/dp/1481007645/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367929063&sr=1-1&keywords=usa%2C+isi%2C+al+qaeda+and+taliban+setting+straight


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When the U.S. says that they are worried about the security [of] Pakistans nuclear arms, it means

it fears that these might fall in the hands of such elements as the extremist Taliban, said a

commentary published by Pakistans Frontier Post in late 2011. However, when [former Foreign

Minister Shah Mehmood] Qureshi says so, he means that these are in danger of being whisked

away by the U.S. armed forces.

Update on the B61 fromArms Control Now:

But today (June 27), the Senate Appropriations Committee voted to cut funding for the B61 by $168

million, or 30 percent below the request, to $369 million.
http://armscontrolnow.org/2013/06/27/senate-scales-back-the-b61/