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The world is in a geopolitical transition marked by great power competition, which has divided the world into two blocs. As the power equations shift and strategic competition intensifies, major powers are revisiting their nuclear doctrines and capabilities.
As Russia makes significant territorial gains, there is a strong demand from Ukraine to escalate the war deep into Russia. In response, Russia has conveyed that any strategically adverse situation so created may not remain conventional, resulting in the use of Non-Strategic Nuclear Weapons (NSNW), along with their attendant consequences.
The shifting global power equations, increasing confrontationist posturing, and ongoing attritional proxy conflicts are creating an environment of great strategic instability, with an increasing probability of using nuclear weapons.
Similarly, in the Indo-Pacific, belligerent China’s increasing intervention in the South China Sea, Taiwan, Indian Ocean Region (IOR), and South Asia, especially India, with negligible escalation control protocols, raises the probability of great power conflagration.
The shifting global power equations, increasing confrontationist posturing, and ongoing attritional proxy conflicts are creating an environment of great strategic instability, with an increasing probability of using nuclear weapons. This multi-domain military brinkmanship, which could lead to the use of NSNWs, poses “real and existential danger”, heralding the unpredictable dimension of nuclear counter-strikes.
Role of NSNWs
Strategic weapons are ultimate weapons aimed at the degrading and destruction of an opponent’s war-waging potential and undermining its will to wage war. NSNWs, on the other hand, are low-yield weapons to be deployed at operational levels, aimed at contributing to the accomplishment of military missions in the eventuality of conventional deterrence failure. These weapons can be defined by multiple means in terms of range, yield, and destruction (precision strike low-yield warheads).
NSNWs in the South Asian context
In the India–China–Pakistan triad, while both India and China are stated to be No-First-Use (NFU) states, Pakistan has advocated for the use of nuclear weapons for warfighting as part of its “full spectrum” deterrence. Pakistan’s outlook on strategic stability is largely driven by its perception of a “fair and just outcome of disputes” against the backdrop of increasing power asymmetry with India.
India-China nuclear equations, on the other hand, are defined by the declared NFU policy, adherence to credible minimal deterrence, and the firm demarcation between controller and custodian of nuclear weapons, backed by rigid centralisation of command authority.
These doctrinal similarities need to be seen from the perspective of the close Sino-Pak nuclear equation, which provides China duality in their combined nuclear posture. China has not only supported but is currently actively engaged in development and modernising Pakistan’s nuclear programme.
Accepting the NFU declaratory doctrines of both India and China at face value implies that nuclear weapons, as tools of deterrence, are outside the equation of any conventional conflict.
Second, accepting the NFU declaratory doctrines of both India and China at face value implies that nuclear weapons, as tools of deterrence, are outside the equation of any conventional conflict. This puts India at a serious disadvantage, given China’s overwhelming conventional military superiority, backed by its advanced space-based C4ISR systems.
Importantly, China could employ its conventional Theatre-Range Ballistic Missiles (TBMs), along with Anti-Ship Ballistic and Cruise Missiles, together with the cyber and information attacks, to degrade India’s conventional forces, command-and-control systems and launch vectors without technically crossing the nuclear threshold. This issue is often overlooked in India’s strategic discourse and planning.
The next consideration is the functional effectiveness of Indian deterrence vis-à-vis China. If “counter-value” targeting strategies are at the heart of nuclear response, India is clearly at a disadvantage. The Indian heartland of Central and Eastern India, comprising the most populous states and strategic assets, falls within the range of Chinese MRBMs and even SRBMs. China’s strategic coastal belt and heartland, on the other hand, can only be reached by India’s long- and medium-range vectors such as Agni 5, K-5, and K-6. This differential, in effect, undermines the Indian doctrine of punitive and massive retaliation.
All strategic targets in India are within range of Chinese conventional missiles, providing China a major advantage.
Another important aspect is China’s dual-use missile force (conventional and nuclear). This essentially means that all strategic targets in India are within range of Chinese conventional missiles, providing China a major advantage. India, too, needs to develop a similar strategic missile capability for engaging targets, both at operational and strategic levels, that can target Chinese strategic and economic hubs within a 1500–2500 km radius (Pearl River and portions of Yangtse River deltas). A similar capability is required at sea to engage PLAN strike forces entering the Indian Ocean Region.
NSNWs in an India–China escalation calculus
Against the backdrop of the prevailing and increasing power asymmetry, India needs to contextualise future conflict scenarios with China, taking the realities of obtaining an operational environment into consideration.
The focused infrastructure, logistics and military build-up in Tibet provides China with the capability and capacity to launch major offensives across a broad front in a single season, further enhanced by the current forward posture since 2020.
Two possible Chinese offensive contingencies are postulated:
- A crisis created by the death of the current Dalai Lama and the anointment of an eight-year-old reincarnation of the Dalai Lama, a Mongolian Rinpoche, in India. An outraged China, imagining an Indian conspiracy, refuses to accept the new Dalai Lama, resulting in widespread disturbances and rioting in Tibet. China holds India responsible and initiates hostilities.
- In a second scenario, given the trip-wire situation which prevails in Ladakh, a “Galwan Plus” occurs, resulting in a major firefight involving the full weight of weaponry, resulting in large casualties on both sides. PLA retaliates with a major attack against India. A more dangerous subset is using ‘Doklam’ as an excuse, China launches an offensive threatening to cut off the strategically important Chumbi Valley, the narrow corridor separating India from its Northeast.
Plausible responses in a conventional adverse scenario
This brings us to the stage of plausible Indian responses. Before analysing India’s options, the authors briefly outline Western discourses emerging from high-end conventional warfare scenarios and their intersection with nuclear options.
The Centre for a New American Security, a US think tank, examined the correlation between high-intensity conventional conflict and the use of NSNWs in a hypothetical Taiwan situation. Broad conclusions that emerged point to multi-domain operations marked by precision and speed to quickly cripple an adversary, resulting in the triggering of a nuclear option. This has been described as the “crossfade” domain, implying a point in the decision matrix wherein risks associated with conventional and nuclear options become unclear. The crossfade is an expanded region of a highly intense and unstable operational environment under seeming strategic stability.
The Centre for a New American Security, a US think tank, examined the correlation between high-intensity conventional conflict and the use of NSNWs in a hypothetical Taiwan situation.
India-China conflict, too, will be conducted in a highly intense intelligence-information-dominated environment, wherein the technologies and approaches of advanced conventional warfare will be applied to devastating effects. This creates a crossfade decision dilemma of whether to pursue conventional operations in an increasingly adverse situation or signal crossing of ‘redlines’ resulting in contemplation of the use of low-yield NSNWs as an act of extreme self-defence.
The next issue is at what stage India will be forced to contemplate the use of NSNWs. In prevailing asymmetry, a situation of serious operational adversity could rapidly emerge, impinging upon both war-waging potential and national morale. Having suffered a setback in 1962, such a scenario will be devastating, both on national self-esteem and international standing.
Escalation dynamics
The critical issue is to define the redlines (and, if needed, nuance them), clearly indicating escalation beyond which will cross India’s ultimate thresholds of tolerance. The stark operational consideration at this juncture will be whether to continue operations and suffer further losses or to signal conventional deterrence breakdown.
Two issues arise: first, what is intended to be gained from such use, and second, its subsequent impact on escalation dynamics. How will China react? Two options are conceivable:
- Flowing from its doctrine of immediate and predictable response, China launches a riposte in terms of a major counterstrike (counterforce or value). The dilemma here will be the nature of Indian retaliation and its impact along the escalation ladder. Tit for tat, uncontrolled escalation will certainly lead the two countries hurtling towards a MAD outcome. This is not easy to predict and requires political forbearance to unequivocally understand the consequences before embarking on the next escalatory steps.
- Second, to avoid a Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) kind of escalation, China can retaliate by graduated tit-for-tat response, implying a willingness to terminate hostilities without any further escalation.
There are political consequences for both options. The entire process is a game of brinkmanship, which will require strong political resolve and national consensus through extensive gaming and repeated iterations.
Despite China’s historical behaviour of ignoring nuclear signalling, credible signalling by a near-peer competitor is something that China cannot easily disregard and thus remains an important tool to convey our political resolve against an unacceptable territorial push. Given the relative capabilities to inflict damage, escalation is likely to be controlled as no side would want a full-fledged nuclear conflagration.
Both China and India have never engaged in nuclear brinkmanship despite decades of provocation at the borders. In the case of nuclear signalling, the initiative, in our opinion, would lie with India (initiator), as it would have indicated its thresholds (redlines) under extremely dire circumstances. The international response, too, is likely to be favourable as it will see India’s actions under extreme compulsion as an act of self-defence, standing up to China’s extraordinary coercion.
India neither seeks nor desires a confrontation with China but will defend its territorial sovereignty and national integrity resolutely.
What is the impact on NFU policy?
India’s nuclear policy of NFU has no doubt stood the test of time during numerous crises, including wars and threats of Sino-Pak collusion. However, till now, it has not faced a major territorial or military challenge from China. Dealing with a large peer competitor like China requires not only a conventional but, should the situation escalate, a possible strategic response. Its policy, however, does not dictate that it is bereft of other options. As highlighted by the Defence Minister, Rajnath Singh, India’s policy is defined by circumstances, providing the full flexibility of a proportionate response if confronted with an extremely adverse situation.
India neither seeks nor desires a confrontation with China but will defend its territorial sovereignty and national integrity resolutely. For this, India needs to build comprehensive national power. In the military domain, it must be prepared to fight a two-front multi-domain war backed by credible second-strike nuclear capability, including the potential use of NSNW under extreme provocation.
Indian policy has never come in the way of developing NSNW capability, but its policymakers feel that nuclear weapons are not meant for warfighting. The world ironically is coming around to the view that under extremely adverse situations, employing NSNWs could be a potent means to signal red lines, prevent escalation, achieve war termination and avert Armageddon.
Lt Gen PR Kumar (Retd) served as the Director-General at Army Aviation in the Indian Army.
Brig. Arun Sahgal is a Senior Fellow at the Delhi Policy Group.
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