General Mirza Aslam Beg
It is a misnomer to call any bomb - Islamic, Christian, Jewish or Hindu. Associating any religion with a weapon of mass destruction, chemical, biological or nuclear tantamounts to debasing it and promoting a vicious and sinister idea that man's basal instincts - aggression and pugnacity - find encouragement and support from faith. Islam, by its very nomenclature is symbolic of peace and promotes humanistic order. To single it out for projecting a bellicose and a frightening militant image is a semantic aberration and a malicious propaganda. The prejudice against Islam is endemic, among a number of western scholars who want to perpetuate the economic and political power of the so-called civilized and liberal West. In New York Times, depicting The Islamic Wave - Judith Miller - spoke of the rise of fundamentalist Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) in Algeria. She said, "Algeria has a nuclear programme. Imagine not just the restoration of the Islamic Caliph, a leader who combines temporal and spiritual power - but a nuclarized Caliph". This shows how irrationally the western mind tends to uphold its own so called rationality. The underlying assumption that nuclear weapons as well as the weapons of mass destruction are quite safe in the western hands, whereas in the case of the Arab and other Muslim nations these are not so, speaks of how objective facts can be blatantly ignored to bolster western conceit. The two nuclear bombs dropped on the hapless people of Japan, transgressing all norms of compassion and human-heartedness were by USA. History testifies that these were not even for military purposes, as much for projection of its invincibility and over awing sense of preponderance to take command of the world.
The danger of Islamic Bomb as analysed by Hippler, "is predominately the danger of countries from the Third World breaking out of the western-dominated system of international relations....Islam is not a problem as such, nor it a threat in itself, even ideologically. But Islam can work as pro-western or anti Western force. This is even true of Islamic Fundamentalism. However, the situation becomes really serious when anti- Western feelings run high. The root of it lies somewhere else. Shireen Hunter goes to the heart of the matter. "It is not for any spiritual reasons that the west fears fundamentalism, but rather for very concrete reasons: "Islamic sentiments are still strong in the region. The fundamentalists are particularly averse to a permanent, large scale presence of foreign military forces in Muslim lands. If the Islamic fundamentalists, were pro-western, if they would support American military bases in the Middle East and keep oil prices reasonable and stable, what could we then have against Islamic fundamentalism?".
Bomb is a bomb. Mankind has known it since time immemorial. Only its sophistication and killing power has progressed as man has mastered science and technology. A primitive catapult and nuclear missile, in a sense are no different, as they both hurl objects from a distance. The difference lies only in the quantum of killing they could cause. An Islamic bomb can not kill more than what a Hindu or Christian bomb can. The killing power of a weapon depends upon the level of scientific progress of a nation or civilization. It is in this sense that one could say that Western world had devised not only atomic bombs but even super bombs, which could totally annihilate humanity. Muslim civilization was left far behind, as it became a back-bencher in the field of scientific knowledge, which was once the hallmark of Islamic Renaissance. It was in this sense that late Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, made a prophetic statement. "We know that Israel and South Africa have full nuclear capability. The Christian, Jewish and Hindu civilizations have this capability. The Communist powers also possess it. But only the Islamic civilization was without it. But the position was about to change". The position did change on the historic day of 28 May 1998 and the prophecy did come true. He had voiced the popular sentiments and total consensus of the people of Pakistan, when he said. "If India builds the bomb, we will eat grass or leaves, even go hungry, but we will get one of our own. We have no alternative."
The nation did face a conflict paradigm in which the testing of the nuclear weapon had indeed no alternative. The time lag of seventeen days to take such momentous a decision was only to ensure if the West was really sincere in restricting the nuclear club only to five members, or by contriving a fate-accompli situation, it had connived to accept India as the sixth member, as a quid-pro-quo for a new geo-strategic management of the region. China,as a fast emerging economic power, had to be check-mated and its nuclear monopoly in the Pacific region, which is destined to become the centre of gravity of the 21st Century, had to be broken. India was to be formally declared as a nuclear rival to China. To create a semblance of threat from China, strategic pin-pricks like fomenting trouble in Tibet, and embarrassing China by the support and projection of Dalai Lama, were manipulations to extract favours from USA, which is quite apprehensive of another ideological rival emerging in the power arena of the world after the knock out of the Soviet Union. Ironically, Dalai Lama obliged by justifying the Indian nuclear explosions, ignoring the spiritual sanctity of the saffron robe he wears. China rightly reacted by calling it an utter hypocracy. Indian Defence Minister's rather absurd expression of so called strategic threat from China, was only a ploy to put psychological input and capitalize upon USA's sensitivities. India is no match to China on any count. It is Goliath against David. India itself has no illusions about it.
The objective, however, where there is no ambiguity among the Indian strategists is that, Pakistan was not to emerge a nuclear power to seek parity with India, endowed with nuclear weapons India would exercise full control over South Asia, and then extend it progressively to fulfill the strategic fantasy of building a Hindu Empire of the Vedic times. The cinematographic depiction of the glory of the Mahabharta created the consciousness, which ultimately became catalyst to bringing Hindu Fundamentalists at the helm of political power in India. The whole mood and temper of the Hindutva-brand- politicians was one of shunning dialogue and negotiation with Pakistan and an outright imposition of its will in the Indian held Kashmir and ruthless suppression of the freedom movement, even if it entailed a nuclear attack on Pakistan. The verbal signals were indeed as humiliating as these were distressing. What could Pakistan do under such nightmarish scenario other than what it did and what it aught to have done to steer a course of honourable existence. It is time, therefore, to seize the opportunity to liberate Kashmir and help the freedom fighters to let the movement bear fruition to conform to the military logic of such armed struggles. How long shall India held Kashmir remain an extended human abattoir? The tyranny must end, which is the law of the Nature.
A nation's resilience comes to test under such trying moments. Pakistan came out triumphant in maintaining its nerves and explode the nuclear devices. If Pakistan did not take this courageous decision, its fate was going to be similar to that of Iraq, whose nuclear installations were raised to the ground through surgical strikes by Israel. A plot was hatched by India through collaboration with Israel - its strategically to enact the same drama. Not only the nuclear installations would have been demolished but any hope of Pakistan detonating a nuclear weapon would have been totally frustrated. Some analysts feel that the strategies for persuading Pakistan not to test, and alternatively using carrots and sticks, the frequent telephonic personal contacts of the US President and UK's Prime Minister with the counter-part in Pakistan, were in fact, ruses to stall for time so that the surgical strike could be meticulously implemented. A similar conspiracy was hatched in 1986 and 1990 when Israel had planned to undertake such an adventure which was somehow averted.
If Pakistan had not taken the correct measure to counter-balance the Indian - Israel collusion by a credible demonstration of nuclear retaliation through Ghauri and detonating nuclear warheads a day earlier than scheduled, it would have been reduced perhaps to a non-entity in the region, far less to serve as a bastion of strength and support to the Muslim countries, whose strength and unity have been systematically undermined by the west. It is plundering their wealth and resources to sustain its affluence and preserve its values which George Bush identified as one of the objective for waging the Gulf War.
Nemesis has strange ways of dealing with nefarious designs and conspiracies to keep the Muslim world devoid of any power to determine its own course on history. Israel is playing a role of surrogate power of USA in the Middle East and the Gulf countries and the massive military presence of USA in this oil-rich region, has turned Muslim countries rather diffident and they were not seeing any change in their predicament. Indo-Israeli policy under the tacit patronage of USA was obsessively committed to obstruct Pakistan from becoming a nuclear power state.
Islamic Bomb - euphemistically termed to create a psychological dread against the Islamic Fundamentalism later revised as Islamic Extremism, has become a physical entity. The explosion has brought a Muslim country - Pakistan in the group of nuclear nations. All efforts by India and Israel to deny this status to any Muslim country has been nipped in the bud. The so called Pakistani `Islamic Bomb' which is India specific, it now has new strategic dimensions - it will serve as an effective dual deterrence. The Ghauri missile has in its range all the important military and nuclear installations of India, and with an added range it could also reach Tel-Aviv. We may have such a missile but perhaps could not test it, because we don't have enough space for a missile with a range of 2500 Km.
Pakistan nourishes no jingoistic designs. In fact Pakistan after the test explosion must steer a campaign for total elimination of nuclear weapons from the world. The idea is only to provide the requisite deterrence to our Muslim countries who are under strategic bondage of Israel, for too long. They too have a right to live in dignity and honour. Pakistan's emergence as a nuclear power with missile delivery system - Ghauri is a harbinger of regional peace and harmony. It is in this context, that one can fully discern the implications of the recent statement by Iranian Foreign Minister in which he unequivocally asserted that Pakistan's nuclear capability will deter Israel. Lebanon's Prime Minister also exposed the duality in approach by the West. While concern was being shown about nuclear race in South Asia, but no one bothered about Israel which is the real threat to peace in the Middle East.
Thus Pakistan’s nuclear capability, serves to maintain the correct level of deterrence against India, as well as provides a meaningful deterrence against Israel. This enhanced capability provides new geo-strategic options to Pakistan and opportunities, demanding a much more aggressive and dynamic foreign policy to strengthen the security of Pakistan and the entire region from the Middle East, to the Gulf, West Asia and South Asia. However, all by itself Pakistan may not be able to fully exploit this opportunity of the century and would therefore need understanding and support from friendly countries, to play the role of an equalizer and balancer of power in the region. Allah be praised for bestowing such ability and opportunity upon Pakistan.
Pakistan occupies a very sensitive geo-political position and consequently has a great moral responsibility. During the Gulf war, I had emphasized the role of Pakistan and Iran in seeking a regional solution to the problem and had also highlighted the need for developing strategic consensus among the Muslim countries. Pakistan's ascendancy to a nuclear power status, is a giant step towards that vital mental commitment. As they say, "Tyrants have not yet discovered any chains that can fetter the mind".