India’s Nuclear Doctrine: Review, Not Revision

GS-II – International Relations | GS-III – Internal Security | Nuclear Doctrine | Strategic Stability

Why in News?

·         Nuclear doctrine: India has stuck to its largely unchanged nuclear doctrine for more than two decades despite the rapid changes in its security environment.

·         Fundamentals: Despite its incorporation into operational doctrine in 2003, the fundamental pillars of the doctrine—credible minimum deterrence and announced No First Use (NFU)—have survived.

• Exception: The doctrine retains the option of nuclear retaliation following a major biological or chemical attack on India or Indian forces.
• Strategic question: The question is whether a framework crafted for the early 2000s remains fully aligned with the security challenges of the mid-2020s.

Strategic Context

• Pokhran-II: The 1998 Pokhran-II tests established India as a nuclear weapons state.
• Kargil: Kargil (1999) showed that nuclear deterrence did not rule out conventional war.
• 1999 Draft Nuclear Doctrine: The 1999 Draft Nuclear Doctrine and the Cabinet Committee on Security’s January 4, 2003 decision sought to reconcile deterrence with restraint.
• 2003 operationalisation: The 2003 decision operationalised a posture based on credible minimum deterrence, No First Use (NFU) and massive retaliation to a nuclear attack.
• Second-strike capability: The doctrine is supported by a survivable second-strike capability and firm civilian control.
• Continuity: Judged by its original objectives, the doctrine has provided continuity, predictability and strategic stability for more than two decades.

Strategic Shifts

• China-Pakistan alignment: China and Pakistan have grown more strategically aligned.
• China: China has expanded and modernised its nuclear forces, strengthened military infrastructure along the Line of Actual Control and deepened defence cooperation with Pakistan.
• Pakistan: Pakistan has expanded its nuclear arsenal and Pakistan’s tactical nuclear weapons are designed to counter India’s conventional military advantage.
• Two-front pressures: India must therefore account for the possibility that pressures from two closely aligned nuclear adversaries could interact during a crisis.

Technological Shift

• Emerging technologies: Artificial intelligence, cyber capabilities, space-based surveillance, hypersonic weapons and ballistic missile defence are reshaping deterrence.
• Decision-making: These technologies are shortening decision-making timelines.
• Command and control: They are increasing the vulnerability of command-and-control networks and complicating assumptions about assured retaliation.
• Core principles:  The core principle of the doctrine are not negated by these technologies but they change the environment within which she calls to operate.
• Deterrence: Finally, deterrence relies on some combination of doctrine, capability and survivability.

Geopolitical Shift

• Indo-Pacific: The Indo-Pacific has become a key arena of great-power competition.
• Multipolarity: The international system has grown more multipolar.
• Strategic environment: U.S.-China rivalry, closer China-Russia coordination and India’s expanding partnerships have reshaped the security environment.
• Strategic competition: Nuclear doctrine can no longer be understood only in terms of bilateral deterrence; wider strategic competition abounds, and regional crises take place always against the backdrop of higher-level conflicts.

Review, Not Revision

• Policy tool: Strategic doctrines are policy tools, not sacred texts.
• Options for review: A review could page through the emerging technologies, command-and-control resiliency, second-strike capability (and why existing missions may still matter), and how this relates to doctrine on retaliation.
• Massive Retaliation : There is a considerable question with regard to massive retaliation.
• Tactical nuclear weapons: Pakistan. Intended to complicate India’s response options below the level of strategic exchange or deterrance.
• Deterrent clarity :A review could examine if India’s declaratory posture is sufficiently clear in all nuclear contingencies but does not alter its basic tenets.

Reasons for Caution

·         A more restrained nuclear posture: India’s doctrine has yet again reinforced its credentials as a restrained, responsible nuclear player while giving continuous deterrence.

·         NFU: Ambiguity on basic principles, and especially NFU, may leave adversaries uncertain and lead them to rethink their own strategies as well as hampering crisis management.

·         Operative capabilities: Thus priority should be to improve operational capabilities, modernise delivery systems and command-and-control resilience rather than reopened declaratory policy.

·         NFU review : Unusally the review of NFU does not imply its abandonment It could reassert some of its reasoning, delineate its limits and keep supporting capabilities credible.

·         Review is a difference than revision — You do not review the doctrine, you revise it.

Building Credible Capabilities

• Survivability: Any doctrinal review should assess survivability, command and control, intelligence, early warning, cyber resilience and the nuclear triad.
• Credible capabilities: The aim should be to ensure that India’s declared policy remains backed by credible capabilities in a changing strategic environment.
• Strategic autonomy: Nuclear policy should be aligned with India’s broader diplomatic objectives and strategic autonomy.

Way Forward

• Doctrinal review: A review could examine emerging technologies, command-and-control resilience, second-strike capabilities and the continuing relevance of existing concepts.
• Operational capabilities: Strengthen operational capabilities, modernise delivery systems and improve command-and-control resilience.
• Credible deterrence: Back India’s declared policy with credible capabilities.
• Strategic autonomy: Make nuclear policy part of larger foreign policy objectives that affirm European strategic autonomy.

Conclusion

• Statecraft: A nuclear doctrine is, above all, a tool of statecraft because it is not a black box policy.
• Sound principles: Some unshakeable elements in India’s strategy — (1) Strategic restraint; (2) credible deterrence and (3) responsible nuclear stewardship preserve a collective strategic asset.

UPSC Mains Practice Question

Q. India has had a largely unchanged nuclear doctrine in spite of major changes taking place in the strategic environment. Call for a review of India’s nuclear doctrine, but not necessarily its fundamentals.