MAANPUOLUSTUSKORKEAKOULU STRATEGIAN LAITOS JULKAISUSARJA 1: STRATEGIAN TUTKIMUKSIA No 27 NATIONAL DEFENCE UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF STRATEGIC AND DEFENCE STUDIES SERIES 1: STRATEGIC RESEARCH No 27 ’A responsible nuclear weapons power’ – NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND INDIAN FOREIGN POLICY MIKA KERTTUNEN MAANPUOLUSTUSKORKEAKOULU Strategian laitos HELSINKI 2009 Mika Kerttunen: ’A responsible nuclear weapons power’ – Nuclear Weapons and Indian Foreign Policy Maanpuolustuskorkeakoulu, Strategian laitos Julkaisusarja 1: Strategian tutkimuksia No 27 National Defence University, Department of Strategic and Defence Studies Series 1: Strategic Research No 27 Uusimmat julkaisut pdf-muodossa http://www.mpkk.fi/fi/tutkimus-opetus/julkaisut/stratl/ Kannen kuva: Janne Kopu Kansikuvan kuvalähde: dharma IV © Mika Kerttunen ISBN 978-951-25-1995-8 ISSN 1236-4959 Maanpuolustuskorkeakoulu – National Defence University Strategian laitos – Department of Strategic and Defence Studies Edita Prima Oy Helsinki 2009 At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance. Jawaharlal Nehru Tryst with Destiny August 14, 1947 CONTENT I INTRODUCTION Objectives and Methods 1 Theoretical Framework 5 On the Theoretical Foundations of International Relations 5 On Understanding Political Behaviour 11 Conclusion 20 II Conventions: Indian Strategic Culture 1 Culture as Context 27 2 Rules and Regulations; Ideas and Identities 37 The Constitution 38 State, Society and the Individual 42 Unity 46 Social and Economic Reforms 50 Secularism 53 Non-violence and War 57 Indian Identities – and Values 63 3 The Indian Security Community 71 Political Actors and the Security Administration 71 Decision-Making in Security-Related Issues 75 The Main Political Parties 84 III Indian Foreign and Nuclear Policies 1947–2004 4 Indian Foreign Policy 91 Regional Relations: Pakistan and China 95 A Place in the Sun: Non-alignment and the Great Powers 109 The United Nations and the Maintenance of Peace and 125 Security Conclusion 132 5 Indian Nuclear Policy 135 The Short Story of Indian Nuclear Policy 143 Deterrence in South Asia or a South Asian Deterrence? 174 Conclusion 180 IV The Manmohan Singh Government of India 6 The Government of India and Indian Foreign Policy 185 2004–2007 The Indian National Congress Party Returns to Power 185 Regional Relations: China and Pakistan 190 Global Relations: the United Nations 194 Global Relations: the United States 195 Global Relations: the Russian Federation, the European 201 Union Conclusion 203 7 The Government of India and Indian Nuclear Policy 211 2004–2007 The Prime Minister on Nuclear Policy 211 India in the Conference on Disarmament 213 The Defence Establishment on Nuclear Policy 219 Conclusion 225 V Conclusion 8 Foreign and Nuclear Policies 233 Two Dimensions and Five Claims 233 Two Governments 237 9 Methodological Reflections 243 Appendixes 1 Indian Nuclear Forces and Delivery Vehicles 249 2 India’s Draft Nuclear Doctrine, August 17, 1999 251 3 Cabinet Committee on Security, January 4, 2003 257 4 PM’s Suo-Motu Statement on Discussions on Civil 259 Nuclear Energy Cooperation with the US: Implementation of India’s Separation Plan, March 7, 2006 New Delhi Bibliography 265 Abstract 285 Tiivistelmä 287 Figures Figure no. 1. Research design 5 Figure no. 2. Hierarchy and interaction between different 15 levels of doctrine Figure no. 3. Culture-action nexus over time in time 31 Figure no. 4. Conceptualization of the Indian strategic culture 32 Figure no. 5. The Inclusive-Exclusive and Local-Global 68 Dimensions with Opposing Discourses in Indian Identities Figure no. 6. Indian national security apparatus 78 Figure no. 7. Main values in Indian nuclear discourses 181 Figure no. 8. Comparison between Prime Minister Nehru’s, 208 Vajpayee’s and Singh’s policy orientations. Figure no. 9. Comparison between Prime Minister Nehru’s, 229 Vajpayee’s and Singh’s nuclear policy Tables Table no. 1. Competing idealistic and realistic ontological and 132 methodological discourses in Indian foreign policy Table no. 2. Issues of domestic origin in Indian foreign policy 204 Table no. 3. Regional issues in Indian foreign policy 206 Table no. 4. Global issues in Indian foreign policy 207 Table no. 5. Main themes of disarmament in Indian nuclear policy 226 Table no. 6. Main themes of international nuclear regimes in Indian 227 nuclear policy Table no. 7. Main themes of nuclear doctrine in Indian nuclear 228 policy Table no. 8. Intentions-to in Indian Foreign and Nuclear Policies 234 Table no. 9. Three Frames within Indian Foreign and 239 Nuclear Policies Acknowledgements My journey to India started in the late 1960s when for some unidentified reason I became interested in the Indian subcontinent. The 1971 Indo- Pakistani war even engaged the then 10-year-old observer to write a report for a school paper. This long-lasting curiosity has led me to Skinner, Berlin, Vico and Kautilya and has offered enjoyable moments reading breathtaking speeches like Jawaharlal Nehru’s Tryst with Destiny or Natwar Singh’s Why India Matters. This study would have been much poorer without the unquestioning support I have received from my family, friends and colleagues. I wish to thank especially my wife who has patiently understood my stubbornness and enthusiasm. The National Defence University (NDU) has provided me with an inspiring academic atmosphere, time and financial support without which this research would not have been possible. At this point my warmest thanks go to the former commandant of the NDU, Major General Aarno Vehviläinen and the former director of the Department of Strategic and Defence Studies, Colonel Heikki Hult who had the courage to fight my case against the bureaucratic forces in the early 2000s. There are many others to thank. I will name but a few colleagues whose support I have found essential: the directors of the Department of Strategic and Defence Studies Colonels Kaarle Ruutu, (MajGen) Pertti Salminen, Juha Pyykönen and Erik Erroll for their always vital institutional support; Ambassador Benjamin Bassin for his support in India and elsewhere; Teija Tiilikainen for introducing the history-of-ideas approach to me; Stefan Forss for educating me on nuclear weapons; Torsti Sirén for our never- ending discussions on philosophy and methodology; Tommi Koivula for always having time for linguistic debates; Pasi Sirviö for gathering and organizing my empirical material; Susanna Eskola for her wise comments and corrections on the manuscript; Joonas Sipilä for the editing, and Anna Mikkonen and Mark Shackleton for improving my English. Last but not least, I wish to express my gratitude to my seminar colleagues and professors of the Department of Political Science (University of Helsinki), especially Professors Jaakko Pakkasvirta and Teivo Teivainen, as well as my tutors, Riikka Kuusisto and Professor Tuomas Forsberg. I was fortunate to get Director Raimo Väyrynen and Professor Achin Vanaik (University of Delhi) to pre-examine my manuscript. Their critical and insightful comments helped me to improve this thesis. Kruununhaka, March 2009 Mika Kerttunen 1 I Introduction OBJECTIVES AND METHODS But I am confident that India will enter the next millennium with its head held high, a strong and prosperous nation, proud of its past and confident of its future as a leading member of the comity of nations. Atal Bihari Vajpayee1 ndia has de facto possessed nuclear weapons for the last nearly 35 years. This capacity and capability has been manifested in the 1974 I peaceful nuclear explosive, Pokhran I, in the series of five nuclear detonations in 1998, Pokhran II, and in developing the Agni and Prithvi ballistic missiles. Over her half century of independence India has nevertheless not been able to resolve the questions of poverty, illiteracy, and backwardness that plague the nation.2 The gap between Mohandas Gandhi’s and many Indians’ moral principles of non-violence and the actual policy of the state has sometimes seemed to be widening instead of closing. Ancient Indian scripts provide two opposing views on the role of force: it is at the same time considered a necessity and denounced. Another gap has been that India had nuclear weapons and thus a sort of deterrence for a long time without a specific nuclear doctrine or a strategic or operative command and control system. A demonstrative capacity without a written nuclear doctrine has characterized Indian nuclear strategy, and confronted the nuclear legacy of the five established nuclear weapon states and the theories behind or deduced from this experience. Simultaneously the Indian state has also faced differing desires and interests that have been reflected in the nuclear policies. Domestic actors and factors together with international pressures and bilateral conflicts have all had their say in nuclear issues. Indian voices concerning such issues as whether to acquire 1 Frontline 1997, vol 14, no. 16. 2 India accounts for about one-fifth to one-third of all poor people in the world. See e.g. Deanton & Kozel 2004 or The Times of India, August 27, 2008. The Human Development Index (HPI-1) estimates that about 31% of the Indian population live below the threshold level (HDI). 2 · Nuclear Weapons and Indian Foreign Policy nuclear weapons, to negotiate and sign nuclear non-proliferation regimes, and to constitute threat perceptions and their responses have been many. Often the Indian diversity in this respect, too, had led a questioning of the real motives, intentions, and purposes of New Delhi’s policy makers. The political decision-making on foreign policy and security policy issues is concentrated in the hands of the Prime Minister and high-ranking Cabinet ministers. Despite the existence of cabinet-level institutions like the Defence Committee of the Cabinet, the Political Affairs Committee of the Cabinet, or the Cabinet Committee on Security, strategic planning and decision-making has been haphazard, fragmented and bureaucratic.