SECURITY and TERRORISM

Economic slowdown presents challenges and opportunities for India's security

Two subjects highlighted by Prime MinisterManmohan Singh in his address to the Combined Commanders' Conference require serious deliberation. First, Singh pointed out the need for comprehensive national power to tackle the challenges posed by the shift in global strategic focus to the Asia-Pacific region. This is exemplified by the US pivot towards Asia and the rise of China and its attendant security and economic consequences. Second, Singh urged the military brass to exercise prudence in defence acquisitions in light of the economic slowdown. Both issues require the armed forces to calibrate strategies accordingly.

There's little doubt that India cannot match China's defence spending in the near future. In fact, India should learn from the mistakes of the erstwhile Soviet Union's arms race with the US and refrain from a similar situation with China. Instead, it should focus on strengthening its nuclear deterrence and second-strike capabilities. Simultaneously, it should concentrate on raising elite forces to undertake special operations - be they to strike at terrorist camps or protect national boundaries. And to help shift the focus from quantity to quality it is imperative that the private sector is made a substantial stakeholder in the defence industry, creating a US-style military-industrial complex and cutting down defence import bills.

Having said that, in this era of globalisation no security strategy cantriumph without appropriate foreign policy. Pakistan has successfully leveraged its relations with China and the US to shore up its defence capabilities. However, India's leadership continues to be influenced by the legacy of the non-aligned movement. But with the international community now concerned about global terrorism and China's growing military might, there's no reason why India shouldn't cultivate a defence cooperation understanding with a broad group including the US, Japan,Vietnam, Australia and Indonesia. Combining this with appropriate bilateral and multilateral economic initiatives is key to the security strategy India needs to adopt.

MH370: India’s wake-up call

Late in the summer of 2012, two young men sat at either end of an Internet connection linking Karachi with Kathmandu, weaving online fantasies. Their dreams, unlike those of most people their age, didn’t centre around music, or money, or love. Muhammad Zarar Siddibapa, alleged to have been the operational head of the Indian Mujahideen’s urban bombing campaign against India, wanted to know if his Karachi-based boss, Riyaz Ahmad Shahbandri, could find him a nuclear bomb. The two men, the National Investigation Agency says, discussed attacking Surat “with nuclear warheads if they could be procured.”

It was a meaningless, idle daydream — the kernel from which all hideous nightmares are born. The surreal disappearance of Malaysia Airlines MH370 is a good occasion for Indians to start thinking about what might happen if we are ever compelled to live those nightmares.

Bar online speculation as idle as the Indian Mujahideen’s Internet chatter, there’s no reason to think that MH370 was hijacked to stage a 9/11-type attack on an Indian city or nuclear installation. There’s even less reason to think the aircraft might have been fitted with nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. Yet, on the morning of September 11, 2001, there was no good reason at all to believe a terrorist attack involving hijacked jets might bring down the Twin Towers in New York.

Threats from the air

The fact is, however, that speculation is a useful intellectual tool. MH370, which succeeded in evading detection during its suspected flight across multiple countries, was in range of Indian cities, industrial sites housing toxic chemicals and nuclear facilities — which necessitates asking the question, “what if”?

Fighting terrorism involves imagining and preparing for the unimaginable: and India has a dangerously poor record of doing either.

Though the prospect of a terrorist group acquiring nuclear weapons or radiological assets remains small, Indian nuclear installations remain at risk from aircraft used as weapons. Though newer nuclear reactors have double-domed concrete structures, in theory capable of withstanding a direct hit, there are obvious reasons to avoid testing the engineering in the real world. In the wake of 9/11, New Delhi promulgated no-fly regulations around several nuclear facilities. However, the scholar, Sitakanta Mishra noted in a 2009 paper for the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, the rules “have not been strictly implemented.” “Surprisingly,” he wrote, “even today, aircrafts can fly over the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre.”

It isn’t only nuclear installations that are at risk. There have, government sources say, been repeated restricted air space violations over New Delhi, each a potential threat to critical targets like Parliament, defence and intelligence complexes, the President’s estate and the Prime Minister’s home and office. None reached crisis-point — but there is little clarity on what would happen if they did.

Air Force sources familiar with air-defence systems at these facilities say one key problem is pre-delegation — instructions for when commanders on the ground can use lethal force against a potential threat. Had MH370 appeared on radar screens guarding Indian nuclear installations, officials up the chain of command would have had minutes to make a decision — knowing all the while that it might be the wrong one. There has never been an explicit political mandate for the exact circumstances in which these choices could be made.

For military planners, the dilemmas involved in such decisions are significant. In 1983, the Soviet Union shot down a Korean Airlines Boeing 747 flying from New York to Seoul. The flight’s malfunctioning autopilot system had, subsequent international investigations revealed, led it into the strategically crucial Kamchatka Peninsula, raising Soviet fears that it might be a hostile aircraft.

Declassified Soviet documents show that the commander of the Soviet Far East District Air Defense Forces, General Valery Kamensky, wanted the aircraft destroyed — but only after it was positively identified not to be civilian. His subordinate, General Anatoly Kornukov, commander of Sokol Air base, disagreed. “What civilian,” the documents show him exclaiming, “[It] has flown over Kamchatka! It [came] from the ocean without identification. I am giving the order to attack if it crosses the State border.”

Minutes later, a Sukhoi 15 interceptor fired Kaliningrad K-8 air-to-air missiles at the Korean Airlines jet: 246 passengers and 23 crew died.

During the run-up to the New Delhi Commonwealth Games, intelligence officials repeatedly discussed the prospect of an attack on a high-profile target using either hijacked aircraft or a remotely-piloted drone fitted with explosives. The Air Force took charge of surveillance, but no firm decision was taken on precisely what events would trigger an armed intervention.

Flailing on the seas

To this day, India does not have a central command centre, where military, intelligence and civilian officials can observe and liaise on real time threats — and take a decision when needed. In emergencies, power rests with the Crisis Management Group, chaired by the Cabinet Secretary. This mechanism allows for effective decision-making after a crisis — but is useless when there are minutes, not hours, to take a call.

In the summer of 2011, a rusting ship floated gently towards Mumbai’s Juhu beach, unnoticed almost until it nudged the shore. The Pavit , a 1,000-tonne Panama-flagged merchant ship that had been abandoned by its crew and reported sunk, had drifted through Indian waters for more than a hundred hours, undetected by the Navy, the Coast Guard and spanking-new police patrol boats purchased after 26/11.

The dangers were unmistakable: the ship could have been carrying terrorists or explosive or toxic chemicals, each with the potential to kill thousands. It isn’t only in the air, the story shows, that India’s borders remain vulnerable.

No official investigation of the failures that enabled the Pavit to drift ashore undetected — or a similar incident involving the merchant ship, Wisdom earlier that month — has ever been made public. In private, though, naval and intelligence sources admit the failures of coordination and technology, like a coastal surveillance radar.

Few of those problems seem to have been addressed: just last year, it transpired that the Seaman Guard Ohio , a 394-tonne floating armoury serving anti-piracy mercenaries, had been operated in Indian waters for 45 days, evading multiple Coast Guard patrols as well as a port search at Kochi. The mercenaries on board were in fact protecting Indian sailors — but could just as easily have been terrorists.

India’s fishing fleet still hasn’t been fitted with a satellite-based tracking and identification system, necessary to stop attacks coming in from across the high seas. Last year, the Comptroller and Auditor General said that “72 per cent of the fast patrol vessels (FPVs)/inshore patrol vessels (IPVs), 47 per cent of the advanced offshore patrol vessels (AOPVs) and 37 per cent of interceptor boats (IBs) were either on extended life or their extended life had expired.” It recorded that 36 of 50 coastal police outposts remained non-functional, since no police were posted there.

The Ministry of Home Affairs’ annual reports have dutifully recorded its determination to act — and then nothing has been done. In 2011-12, the Home Ministry’s annual report said it had asked all States to “carry out vulnerability/gap analysis in consultation with Coast Guard to firm up their additional requirements.” However, its 2010-2011 report, had said they had already “carried out vulnerability/gap analysis in consultation with Coast Guard to firm up their additional requirements.” The 2009-2010 report had said the Ministry had “carried out vulnerability/gap analysis in consultation with Coast Guard to firm up their additional requirements.” Little changed except the page numbers on to which the text was cut-and-pasted.

India’s security system must do better. The resources needed to combat future terrorism will also make the everyday lives of Indians safer: infrastructure for a terrorist chemical weapons attack, for example, will save lives during a catastrophic industrial accident.

It isn’t that nothing is being done: the Central Industrial Security Force now has United States-trained units specialising in guarding nuclear installations; the Border Security Force has at least one battalion with expertise in operating in a nuclear, chemical or bacteriological environment. The Defence Research and Development Organisation has made extensive efforts to train police, while the National Disaster Management Authority has worked to build the rudiments of a proper emergency-response force.

These efforts are too little, though — and too focussed on the catastrophes of the past, not the ones which might confront us tomorrow. Local administrators, moreover, have lacked the resolve needed to give them meaning at the level of cities and towns: not one Indian urban centre regularly rehearses its disaster responses. MH370 might yet go down as one more wake-up call India’s counter-terrorism system slept through.

Tale of an IM operative

Amid the bloodshed that Partition brought along, two among the hundreds of thousands who crossed over to the newly created country of Pakistan were the grandparents of Zia-ur-Rehman alias Waqas, who is the second Pakistani national arrested for alleged links with the terror outfit Indian Mujahideen.

Waqas’ grandparents were from Phagwara in Punjab’s Jalandhar district. The family settled down in the Pakistani side of Punjab where Toba Tek Singh Waqas was born in 1989. From his formative days, according to the Delhi Police, he was exposed to anti-India rhetoric spread by extremist groups that recruited youngsters for terror.

Yasin Bhatkal, during interrogation, described Waqas as over six-feet-tall and weighing 100 kg. He also described him as “lazy”, with “silky blackish hair, a round face, pointed nose and sharp facial features.” He knows Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu.

Foreign tourists, particularly Jewish ones from Israel, coming to Rajasthan, Delhi, Maharashtra and Goa were his prime targets, Yasin purportedly revealed. At a later stage, sources said, Yasin and some other members of the outfit had developed differences with Waqas. However, his expertise in bomb-making made him indispensable.

First brush

Waqas’ first major brush with extremist ideology was at 17, while at college, when he was introduced to the hate speeches by the fugitive Maulana, Masood Azhar. He resolved to “wage war against India.”

“Subsequently in 2009, one Taj Mohammed who collected donations for the Lashkar-e-Taiba front Jamat-ud-Dawa arranged for his training at a Naushera camp,” said Special Commissioner of Police S.N. Shrivastava.

At another camp in the Waziristan Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) of Pakistan, Waqas specialised in making bombs using hydrogen peroxide, potassium chloride and ammonium nitrate. He was then sent to Karachi where he met the IM’s founder-brothers, Riyaz and Iqbal Bhatkal. During interrogation, he purportedly disclosed that he then went to Samastipur in Bihar via Nepal, where he met Ahmad Siddibapa Zarar alias Yasin Bhatkal and other members of the IM’s Bihar module.

When Improvised Explosive Devices planted by the module in the Jama Masjid attack in September 2010 failed to make an impact, Waqas allegedly offered to employ his bomb-making expertise for other projects, including what culminated in the explosions in Varanasi the same year. However, one of the bombs being made by Waqas went off prematurely, injuring two fingers.

Waqas was then sent to Mumbai to prepare for the blasts that took place at Opera House and Zaveri Bazar in June 2011. In the Pune serial blasts about a year later, he along with Asadullah Akhtar aka Haddi and members of the Maharashtra module of the IM joined hands. Then Waqas and Haddi fled to Mangalore

The outfit’s next target was Hyderabad. After Yasin and Haddi were arrested by the National Investigation Agency at Raxaul in Bihar last August, Riyaz directed Waqas to leave the Mangalore hideout. He then moved to Munnar in Kerala where fugitive Tehseen Akhtar met him.

Global jihadism rising on fringes of Indian Islamist movement

“I take pride,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a June 2005 interview, “in the fact that, although we have 150 million Muslims in our country as citizens, not one has been found to have joined the ranks of al-Qaeda or participated in the activities of [the] Taliban.”

Nine years on, there is growing doubt over that claim: the Internet is bringing the global jihad home for a new generation of educated radical Islamists in India.

The revelations in The Hindu of a Singapore-based jihad cell that recruited Chennai college students to serve with Islamists fighting president Bashar al-Asad’s regime in Syria are just the latest in a long series of incidents which show that Indian jihadists are making common cause with transnational groups.

In 2007, Bangalore-origin, London-based Kafeel Ahmad, a post-doctoral scientist, was killed when he crashed a jeep fitted with improvised explosive devices into the Glasgow airport, in the first suicide attack by an Indian national overseas. That summer, north Kashmir resident Aijaz Ahmad Malla was reported killed fighting alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan.

“This case could add a completely new dimension to the terrorist threat to India,” said Ajai Sahni, at New Delhi’s Institute for Conflict Management. “Trained by jihadists overseas, and able to access their resources, these new recruits could prove the core of a more lethal outfit than any we’ve seen so far.”

Earlier this year, National Investigation Agency prosecutors filed evidence that Indian Mujahideen commander Riyaz Ahmad Shahbandri had been in touch with al-Qaeda affiliated jihadists in Afghanistan, seeking support for the organisation’s campaign against India.

For India’s government, one particular concern is that many of these recruits are highly educated and economically successful. No one knows precisely what drove Kafeel Ahmed on his journey from being a studious, upper-middle-class Bangalore undergraduate to suicide bomber. He is known, however, to have abandoned the conservative but non-violent religious traditions of his parents in his early 20s, turning instead to a nee-fundamentalist order

Tamil Nadu cases

Tamil Nadu, interestingly, has had at least one past case involving transnational linkages. In 2011, a Madurai engineering graduate was detained at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport, soon after returning to the country from Algeria. French authorities suspected the man, married to a French national, had raised funds for jihadist groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“We are not aware whether charges were pressed against the suspect,” a police official familiar with the case said. “His family in Madurai claimed that he was innocent and got married against their advice. He did not meet his family after 2010.”

The most famous case of an Indian jihadist overseas, though, is of Muhammad Abdul Aziz, a one-time Hyderabad electrician who fought in Grozny in 1996, under the command of Saudi Arabia jihadist Samir Saleh Abdullah al-Suwailem. He also took part in combat against Serbian forces at Zentica in 1994, hoping to learn skills he could use at home.

Mr. Aziz later told Hyderabad police investigators that he had been radicalised by the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992 — and hoped for revenge.

“The last few years,” said Dr. Sahni “have seen several political developments which have stoked fears among Muslims. There are those who have tried to capitalise on these fears, and the Chennai jihad case shows these elements are having some success on the extreme fringes of Muslim political opinion.”

Terror module had ‘no specific political target’

The Indian Mujahideen’s Rajasthan module was set up to avenge the killings in the Bharatpur riots in 2011, according to the four alleged outfit members arrested by the Delhi Police Special Cell.

Countering reports in a section of the media, a police officer said the module had not been instructed to target any specific political leader. “During interrogation, the accused persons disclosed that fugitive Tehseen Akhtar alias Monu had brought together the module members and he had been coordinating with them and their handlers based in Pakistan. Monu, who is the de-facto India head of the outfit following the arrest of Yasin Bhatkal, had been giving all the instructions to the module,” the officer said.

According police sources, one of the prime targets of the module was the Ganga Mandir in Bharatpur. The plan was to execute blasts at the temple around the time of the Raksha-Bandhan festival in August.

However, families of those arrested in Rajasthan have claimed that they are innocent. Farooq Engineer, father of accused Mohammad Mahruf (21), told TheHindu that his son had nothing to do with any terror activities. “A team comprising over two dozen policemen raided our house in the early hours of Sunday and took away my son. They also seized his laptop. The policemen searched our house, but found nothing incriminating. We were later told by the raiding team that my son was in touch with terror suspects through a social networking website.”

“My son is in the final semester of his engineering course and he was confined mostly to Jaipur. He would occasionally visit his close relatives in Kota and Sikar. He is being framed,” he said, adding that he was on his way to the Capital.

The other two residents of Rajasthan arrested along with Mahruf have been identified as Waqar Azhar (21) and Shaquib Ansari (25).

Sources said the fourth accused, Zia-ur-Rahman alias Waqas, a Pakistani national who has also been arrested by the Delhi Police Special Cell for alleged role in serial blasts carried out by the Indian Mujahideen, told the other members of the outfit that he had undergone training in bomb-making in Afghanistan.

The Special Cell has obtained the custody of Waqas and the three other alleged Indian Mujahideen suspects till April 2 for further investigations.

While the police have so far not commented on Waqas’ association with any Afghanistan-based outfit, another suspect named Asadullah Akhtar alias Haddi had in his statement under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code disclosed that Waqas was associated with the al-Qaeda.

Yasin Bhatkal, who was arrested last year by the National Investigation Agency along with Haddi, reportedly told his interrogators that Waqas first met him at Samastipur in Bihar in September 2010. The Bihar module had then been planning to carry out a major strike in the Jama Masjid area of Delhi, targeting foreign nationals.

However, when the bomb planted close to Gate No.3 of the Jama Masjid did not create the desired impact, Waqas offered to configure bombs for further operations, claimed Bhatkal.

Lessons from Assam’s carnage

The killing of over 30 people, most of them Muslim women and children, across Assam’s Bodoland Territorial Area District (BTAD) is a deadly reminder of systematic efforts towards ethnic cleansing that is under way in that area. The National Democratic Front of Boroland (Songbijit), fighting for a “Sovereign Boroland” to be carved out of Assam, remains the natural and principal suspect for the carnage: it was behind the violence between the indigenous ethnic Bodo community and the Urdu-speaking minority community that erupted in July-August 2012, leading to the killing of more than a hundred people and the displacement of about 4.85 lakh. But the difference this time is that the atmosphere has been vitiated seriously in the context of elections. In a manifesto released for Assam in April, the State BJP unit made a potentially incendiary promise that it would identify and expel all illegal immigrants staying in Assam — but with a caveat. It promised to protect Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and members of the Scheduled Castes who have come there from Bangladesh following “religious, political and social persecution”, and not to treat them as illegal migrants. In such a context, it is hardly surprising that oblique and not-so-oblique statements have been made by different political leaders linking the BJP’s stance on such a sensitive topic, and the recrudescence of violence in the BTAD.

The Assam Police have put the blame on the NDFB (Songbijit). Meanwhile, survivors claimed to have identified some of the attackers as surrendered militants of the erstwhile Bodo Liberation Tigers (BLT). The Bodoland People’s Front (BPF), formed by former leaders of the BLT, that holds the reins of the Bodoland Territorial Council, is also a coalition partner of the Congress in Assam but has indicated it might team up with the BJP, post-election. Significantly, BPF legislator Pramila Rani Brahma had alleged that its candidate for the Kokrajhar constituency was likely to lose as a majority of Muslims did not vote for him. The constituency has about six lakh Bodo voters, nine lakh non-Bodo voters, and four lakh Muslim voters. Narrow election-related interests have complicated the situation, yet it is important that the investigating agencies are able to identify the culprits and reassure the migrant communities of the safety of their lives and property. Urgent steps are needed to ensure their security and protection. Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi’s government should be held to account for the repeated failure in checking the violence, even as it remains under the cloud of militancy that looms over the State. For a start, the government should initiate a process of vulnerability mapping in areas that could see further trouble down the line.

Ajit Kumar Doval's NSA appointment not formalised as lobbying rises for a global expert 

: Ajit Kumar Doval, former
Intelligence Bureau chief who is widely
expected to be Prime Minister Narendra
Modi's pick for National Security Advisor
(NSA), hasn't yet received the official letter
confirming his appointment. People familiar
with the matter said while Doval had been
sounded out and indeed given a firm
indication that he's Modi's NSA pick, three
days into the new government starting work,
as of Thursday evening, the NSA
appointment hasn't yet been formalised.
One reason for the delay in appointment, ET has learnt, is the argument being made by the
foreign policy establishment that the Prime Minister needs a foreign policy expert as much
he does an intelligence and security affairs expert. Doval's career expertise lies in the latter
area. However, some officials are of the view that not having a formal foreign service
background cannot be a handicap, especially because Doval, they say, has established a
wide number of key contacts in the diplomatic community.
ET had earlier reported that the PMO is considering the appointment of a Deputy National
Security Advisor with expertise in foreign affairs. ET has learnt, however, that veteran foreign
policy experts are arguing that another senior advisor with foreign affairs experience should
be considered. Officials familiar with these discussions said this suggestion of two senior
advisors may be one of the reasons Doval's appointment is delayed.

Advisor and MK Narayanan, ex-IB chief, was Internal Security Advisor in Manmohan Singh's

first term that started in May 2004. Narayanan, now Bengal governor, was appointed

National Security Advisor after Dixit passed away.

National Security Advisor is the more senior post among these advisors, and it carries the

rank of minister of state. People familiar with discussions on appointing an National Security

Advisor in the Modi government say there have never been two advisors of equal rank and

this may create serious bureaucratic problems.

The KC Pant committee on national security appointed by the Vajpayee government had

suggested the creation of three National Security Advisor posts in the PMO - with advisors

dealing with internal security, defence and foreign affairs. However, this suggestion was

never implemented by either the Vajpayee government or the subsequent Singh

governments.

Taliban flush with cash, warns U.N. report

New Delhi fears surge in Islamist insurgency’s revenues could mean enhanced aid for Indian jihadists training with it in Afghanistan

                                                                                                                                            

United Nations report has warned that the Taliban insurgency is flush with funds, and added that the “past year has been a bumper year for Taliban revenues, boosted by 

-booming narcotics income, 

-revenue from corruption and extortion, 

- increasingly drawing on revenue from the illegal exploitation of natural resources.”

 as Taliban finances have grown, the Taliban have become more of an economic actor, with incentives to preserve this income and less potential incentive to negotiate with the government.”

New jihadist fronts are springing up, the report says, seeking a share of the money. 

Rajnath reviews NPR scheme

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday reviewed the National Population Register (NPR) scheme, which is described as the biggest security and e-governance initiative in the world.

Mr. Singh directed that effective steps be taken to take the project to its logical conclusion, which is the creation of the National Register of Indian citizens. He instructed that all necessary proposals, including the updating of the database through linkages with the birth and death registration system and the issuance of national identity cards to citizens, be brought for approval soon.

C. Chandramouli, Registrar-General of Citizen Registration, made a presentation on the project outlining its importance for national security.

While Aadhaar is a unique identification number (UID), registration under the Home Ministry’s ‘National Population Register of Indian Citizens’ project is mandatory.

However, confusion among the people remains about differences among census, UID and NPR, particularly as the enrolment for NPR is compulsory and many have also got Aadhaar cards, officials admitted.

They clarified that even after registering for two projects, a person will be issued only one 12-digit unique identification number. UID has so far witnessed enrolment of 63 crore persons who have been issued Aadhaar cards and the new government is all set to order a status check of the scheme.

The NPR project will ultimately have convergence with the UID, aiming to end duplication and providing access to government services.

IDSA COMMENT

Indian Mujahideen Arrests: Lessons Learnt and Future Directions

BRAVADO :

Just a few days before the swearing-in ceremony of India’s newly elected Prime Minister, four Indian Mujahideen (IM) operatives were arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in Jharkhand. These arrests claim to have unraveled the entire conspiracy behind the Bodh Gaya (July 7, 2013) and Patna (October 27, 2013) blasts. 

The four arrested include Numan and Taufiq Ansari, Mojibullah and importantly the key IM operative Haider Ali, alias ‘Black Beauty’. Ali – the main accuse in the two blasts – was reportedly recruiting youth in Jharkhand, Bihar and UP before he was arrested. He is, allegedly, the principal link between the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) and the IM, and is therefore considered an important catch after arrests of prominent IM operatives like Tehseen Akhtar alias Monu and Waqas in March 2014, and Yasin Bhatkal along with aide Asadullah Akhtar in August 2013.

These arrests have been a great success for the Indian Intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Significant cooperation from the international community in the form of deportations of important catches,willingness to share information and other counterterror initiatives, also played an important part in aiding these successes.

CONCERNS:

1.LACK OF SYNERGY AMONG AGENCIES :

 To begin with, despite repeated emphasis on ensuring synergy between the central agencies and state police forces to fight terrorism, on ground coordination between these agencies remains quite dismal. 

This lack of coordination is manifested by inter-agency competition, confusions over operational jurisdictions and disputes over investigations and custodies of the operatives. 

For example, the NIA and Delhi Police have been engaged in a series of turf wars over the investigation of terror cases and custodies of operatives – be it a brawl inside the Delhi High Court for the custody of IM operatives .

 Along with this, the fight against terrorism has been hindered by the tenuous relationship between the Centre and the States, highlighted by instances where the State has shown reluctance to handover terror cases to the Central agencies. The denial of Central government’s offer to order a NIA probe into the train blasts at the Chennai Central railway station by the Tamil Nadu government, being one recent example.

2.QUALITY OF INTELLIGENCE AND ITS SHARING :

It is largely believed that intelligence is vital for any fight against terrorism. It has been generally observed that intelligence sharing among the agencies at the ground level has not been optimum/effective. 

Allegedly, sharing of intelligence, particularly in organizations such as the Subsidiary Multi Agency Centres (SMAC), has become a paper contribution exercise instead of a platform where agencies share daily information. 

There is also a lack of a mechanism to filter any poor orinaccurate information that gets integrated in these Centres and subsequently passed on to all agencies. This aspect is problematic since it leads to the creation of a faulty information base.

Therefore, a serious effort to improve inter-agency coordination and cooperation along with a removal of Centre State differences is the primary need. Perhaps, establishment of a federal anti-terror agency, akin to the National Counterterrorism Centre (NCTC), and fully operationalizing the National Intelligence Grid (NatGrid) could be a good start.

3.DERADICALISATION :

Where organizational reforms might prove to be of great importance in ensuring synergy to counter IM’s existing terror structures, reforms in the social sphere would be useful in curtailing the revival of these terror structures in India. The recent arrests of key operatives have created a crucial void in the operational leadership of Indian Mujahideen. It is believed that whenever an organization is in crisis, significant efforts have made by its leaders to revive it. 

Likewise, it is feared that efforts will be made to revive IM, broadly through a combination of internal and external factors.

Internally, this could be done through a focus on radicalization aiming to renew the indigenous cadres and boost group resilience. This process of radicalization would, most likely, involve – 

(a) tapping potential individuals or groups dissatisfied with the socio-political context in which they live, 

(b) translating their real or perceived grievances into extreme ideas, 

(c) consolidating their views via indoctrination, propaganda, brainwashing, etc., 

(d) presenting the enterprise as representing an honourable and prestigious response, 

(e) motivating them to commit acts of terror, and 

(e) using ideology to reduce moral inhibitors and justify course of action, etc.

To counter such efforts, the government should focus on a novel de-radicalization programme to ensure that the numbers of IM’s homegrown operatives do not rise. 

An important point to bear in mind is that contrary to the existing narrative of radicalization that charges the poor and economically backward classes as the major constituents of terror organizations, most arrested IM operatives are young, educated, middle-class individuals with a technical know-how. 

Thus, it would be important to investigate as to why these educated youth are increasingly getting drawn towards terrorism. Maybe the answer to this is the effectiveness of propaganda by the terror ideologues, frustration pushing identity assertion among the Muslim youth, etc. 

The government should take steps to examine such factors and also conduct careful analysis of increasing activities/alignments of IM operatives with existing terror structures and crime syndicates. For that matter, analyzing the network of front organizations linked to the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) could be an effective counter-measure.

4.KEEPING TRACK OF EXTERNAL FORCES

Further it would be right to say that although for the time being, IM’s operational capacities in India have suffered a setback, however, the real masterminds still thrive. Most of them are said to be operating from Pakistan. As noted above, the efforts to keep the terror architecture indigenous in character would focus attention on recruitments within India; however, these indigenous troops are usually complemented by a set of trained cadres from Pakistan, which has been the case so far. The government should significantly focus on intelligence to keep track of these trainers and also build greater cooperation with regional countries. In addition to strengthening synergism among the internal and external Intelligence agencies, creating inter-agency task forces with specific objectives will help in bringing out a clearer picture.

The government should focus on greater inter-agency cooperation and strengthen defenses to a threat that is aiming to rebuild using resources both within and abroad. This could be achieved by: 

(a) building structures, such as NCTC, to improve coordination among central and state law enforcement organizations as well as internal and external intelligence agencies, and 

(b) initiating a new de-radicalisation programme along with a careful monitoring of IM’s linkages. Unless the necessary reforms – both in the administrative and the social sphere – are made, the vicious circle of terrorism will perpetuate in the country.

IDSA COMMENT

Revisiting India’s Nuclear Doctrine

In principle there is nothing wrong in revisiting the doctrine. Since they are products of human mind and cannot, therefore, be held to be infallible and beyond review/revision. However, such revisions/reviews must be based on sound and valid reasons. These could include, for instance,:

 (i) a legally or administratively mandated periodic review, for example, the congressionally mandated quadrennial defence review in US;
(ii) major changes in the external environment such as, for example, the major arms limitation/control treaties between US and Russia; 

(iii) change in adversary’s capabilities; 

(iv) new threats viz. nuclear and WMD terrorism; 

v) failure of the doctrine under practical conditions, etc. 

1.CONCERN

In the current Indian context, the only pressing reason could be the change in adversary’scapabilities namely the reported Pakistani acquisition of Tactical Nuclear Weapons (TNWs). Pakistan’s acquisition of a TNW such as Hatf IX missile with 60-km range and capable of carrying a nuclear warhead of an appropriate yield has attracted widespread attention in various Indian debates on strategic stability. It has been argued that Pakistan’s acquisition of TNWs has lowered the deterrence threshold thereby affected the overall strategic stability in the region.1 Emphasising this change in India’s strategic environment, the proponents of doctrinal review argue that India’s existing doctrine is ill-suited to deter Pakistan from using TNWs against India.

In the event of an alleged deterrence failure leading to use of TNWs by Pakistan against the Indian troops, what would be the appropriate Indian response? The Indian debate over possible response to Pakistan’s use of TNWs has been largely divided. 

2.RESPONSE

No change:

As early as December 2012, former Foreign Secretary and the current head of National Security Advisory Board, Mr. Shyam Saran, categorically stated that, “For India, the label on the weapon, tactical or strategic, is irrelevant since the use of either would constitute a nuclear attack against India” and that “In terms of India’s stated nuclear doctrine, this would invite a massive retaliatory strike.” In addition, he had categorically rejected possible change in India’s nuclear doctrine and suggested that “Massive Retaliation” would be India’s response to Pakistan’s use of TNW’s.

Change:

On the other hand, others have questioned the credibility of “massive retaliation” as a doctrinal response. The sceptics argue that since both India’s regional adversaries, Pakistan and China possess a robust second-strike capability, or a nuclear arsenal that would survive an all-out Indian attack, equal retaliation should be expected across India. Taking into consideration such all-out destruction, these experts have suggested that New Delhi should opt for a “flexible response” that would allow decision makers more credible options.This change is largely suggested along the lines of change in American doctrine from massive retaliation to flexible response in the 1950s and 1960s after realising the inherent credibility shortfall in a threat of massive retaliation.

3.PURPOSE OF DOCTRINE:

The essential purpose of any nuclear doctrine is to codify country’s beliefs and principles to guide action and ensure uniformity of “thought and action” during peace and war. In other words, the nuclear doctrine conveys the underlying conditions about nuclear weapons use to the adversary in an unambiguous manner.

4.BE PRECISE

However, as McNamara stated in a landmark speech nearly half a century earlier in San Francisco in 1967, nuclear strategy is an exceptionally complex in its technical aspects and unless the terms are well defined and complexities well-understood, rational discussion and decision-making are simply not possible. Elaborating he said, “Now let us consider another term: “first-strike capability.” This, in itself, is an ambiguous term, since it could mean simply the ability of one nation to attack another nation with nuclear forces first. But as it is normally used, it connotes much more: the substantial elimination of the attacked nation’s retaliatory second-strike forces.4 This is the sense in which “first-strike capability”’ should be understood.” Subsequently the NPT recognized nuclear weapon states’ (NWS) between themselves met informally and codified some of the terms and definitions.5

Again a word of caution – there is no universal law that all must agree to the definitions already in use. Each country is free to define its own meaning of the terms. However, in that case, the party should set out and state very clearly the definition and meanings of the terminology employed. Unfortunately neither India nor Pakistan have clearly defined anywhere definitions of terms used where their definitions differ from the commonly accepted meanings. Therefore, in the absence of such explicit definitions, it can be reasonably assumed that the meanings ascribed to these terms are the same as commonly accepted meanings. India’s nuclear doctrine too includes certain terminologies which have specific meanings. For example, two key features of India’s nuclear doctrine are:

1. A posture of "No First Use": nuclear weapons will only be used in retaliation against a nuclear attack on Indian Territory or on Indian forces anywhere; and
2. Nuclear retaliation to a first strike will be massive and designed to inflict unacceptable damage.6

5. SO CHANGE :

Now, in the commonly accepted definitions, a nuclear first strike means either (i) The launching of an initial nuclear attack before one’s opponent is able to use any strategic weapon. First strike is a nuclear attack carried out at such a devastatingly high level of destruction as to nullify an enemy’s capability to launch a major counterstrike or (ii) An initial attack on an opponent's strategic nuclear forces. Such an attack may be undertaken in an attempt to destroy an enemy's retaliatory (second-strike) capability. In either case the damage inflicted will be great and substantial. The Indian nuclear doctrine, not surprisingly, requires the Indian response to a first strike to be massive and unacceptable.

However, use of TNW by Pakistan against Indian troops on Pakistan cannot under any circumstance be considered as anywhere being a first strike. It will have no effect on India’s second strike capabilities. Therefore, India’s current nuclear doctrine does not call for an automatic massive retaliation for Pakistan’s use of TNW against Indian troops on Pakistan soil.

However, this does not mean that such an attack will go unanswered. The doctrine does state in unambiguous terms that “nuclear weapons will only be used in retaliation against a nuclear attack on Indian Territory or on Indian forces anywhere.” It does not define the level of such retaliation; only that a nuclear attack, which is not a first-strike, will be met with nuclear retaliation. 

In short the apprehension that the Indian nuclear doctrine calls for an automatic reflexive massive retaliation for use of TNW by Pakistan on Pakistani soil is totally unjustified. Such use of TNW will be met with a nuclear response. The size and intensity of the response will be a political decision depending on the circumstances surrounding such use. In the absence of any Pakistani doctrine on the use of the TNW, it will not be possible for India to define its response to such attack.

Pakistan’s use of TNW’s has long been presented as a compelling challenge before India’s nuclear doctrine. Such claims largely arise from incorrect reading of the Indian doctrine. While, Pakistan’s acquisition of TNW’s is certainly a dangerous potent for stability in South Asia, it is not a reason enough to argue for revising the doctrine. India’s existing nuclear doctrine includes suitable options to deal with various contingencies of small scale as well as massive nuclear attacks.

BUT CLARIFY THE DOCTRINE ITSELF

The CCS decided that the following information, regarding the nuclear doctrine and operational arrangements governing India’s nuclear assets, should be shared with the public.

2. India’s nuclear doctrine can be summarized as follows:

1. Building and maintaining a credible minimum deterrent;


2. A posture of "No First Use" nuclear weapons will only be used in retaliation against a nuclear attack on Indian territory or on Indian forces anywhere;


3. Nuclear retaliation to a first strike will be massive and designed to inflict unacceptable damage.


4. Nuclear retaliatory attacks can only be authorised by the civilian political leadership through the Nuclear Command Authority.


5. Non-use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states;


6. However, in the event of a major attack against India, or Indian forces anywhere, by biological or chemical weapons, India will retain the option of retaliating with nuclear weapons;


7. A continuance of strict controls on export of nuclear and missile related materials and technologies, participation in the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty negotiations, and continued observance of the moratorium on nuclear tests.


8. Continued commitment to the goal of a nuclear weapon free world, through global, verifiable and non-discriminatory nuclear disarmament.

3. The Nuclear Command Authority comprises a Political Council and an Executive Council. The Political Council is chaired by the Prime Minister. It is the sole body which can authorize the use of nuclear weapons.


4 The Executive Council is chaired by the National Security Advisor. It provides inputs for decision making by the Nuclear Command Authority and executes the directives given to it by the Political Council.


5. The CCS reviewed the existing command and control structures, the state of readiness, the targetting strategy for a retaliatory attack, and operating procedures for various stages of alert and launch. The Committee expressed satisfaction with the overall preparedness. The CCS approved the appointment of a Commander-in-Chief, Strategic Forces Command, to manage and administer all Strategic Forces.


6. The CCS also reviewed and approved the arrangements for alternate chains of command for retaliatory nuclear strikes in all eventualities.

Expose on “Credible Minimum Deterrent”:

The concept of “credible minimum deterrence” is the cornerstone of India’s nuclear doctrine. It, used in conjunction with the concepts of “No First Use” (NFU) and “Non Use” against nuclear weapon states, clearly indicates that India envisages its nuclear weapons as only a deterrent merely for defensive purposes and not as a means to threaten others, that it is not in the business of building up a huge arsenal and that it will not engage in arms racing.

The concept, however, also recognizes that for deterrence to be effective it must be “credible”.

The prerequisites for the credibility of our deterrent in the context of our nuclear doctrine may be listed as follows:

• Sufficient and Survivable nuclear forces both in terms of warheads and means of delivery able to inflict unacceptable damage;
• Nuclear Forces must be operationally prepared at all times;
• Effective Intelligence and Early Warning Capabilities;
• A Robust Command and Control System;
• The Will to Employ Nuclear Forces;
• Communication of Deterrence Capability.

The size and nature of India’s nuclear arsenal would essentially have to be a function of its threat perceptions, its being able to absorb a first strike (on account of its no first use commitment) and thereafter retaining the capability of inflicting “unacceptable damage”. India’s current security environment is by no means rosy. Accordingly, a sizeable nuclear weapons arsenal is essential as we need to factor in the possibility that the same would undergo a substantial degradation, despite all precautions, in a first strike, that some of our own attacks could be negated by defensive measures and above all what we have to inflict is “massive” and “unacceptable damage”. The survivability of our nuclear forces would need to be ensured by a combination of multiple redundant systems, mobility, dispersion, and deception. This also requires that India’s nuclear forces are based on a triad of aircraft, mobile land based missiles and sea based assets.

The need for operational preparedness at all times of the nuclear forces in order for our nuclear deterrent to be credible is self evident. It has been ensured by the creation of a C-in-C Strategic Forces Command to manage and administer our Strategic Forces. He functions under the overall control of the Chairman Chiefs of Staff Committee who is the channel of communication between him and the Government.

Effective Intelligence and Early Warning Capabilities always important in any conflict are critical in the context of a nuclear attack not merely as a means to counter it but also for purposes of retaliation. An apex techint organization notably the NTRO has been set up which would inter alia provide the required intelligence for this purpose.

Robust Command and Control System is essential for the credibility of deterrence. India has for this purpose established a Nuclear Command Authority comprising a Political Council chaired by the Prime Minister and an Executive Council chaired by the National Security Advisor. In keeping with the stipulation in our Nuclear Doctrine the Political Council is the sole body which can authorize the use of nuclear weapons. The role of the Executive Council is to provide inputs for decision making by the Nuclear Command Authority and to execute the directives given to it by the Political Council. The fact that the survivability of the command and control system has not been lost sight of is reflected in the press release of January 4th 2003 which indicated that the CCS “reviewed and approved the arrangements for alternate chains of command for retaliatory strikes in all eventualities”.

The demands on India’s Command and Control system as indeed on its Strategic Forces Command have been simplified due to the nature of its nuclear doctrine. Whereas most nuclear weapon states contemplate the possibility of escalatory nuclear war fighting scenarios the Indian doctrine essentially caters for massive Indian nuclear retaliation in the eventuality of a nuclear attack on it or on its forces. In essence, as per the Indian doctrine, if India or its forces are attacked with nuclear weapons it would more or less automatically unleash a devastating nuclear attack in retaliation. No prolonged nuclear war fighting scenarios are envisaged. This enormously eases the task of the Indian nuclear command, control and communications systems and greatly reduces the costs incurred thereon.

It is not sufficient to have a deterrence capability but also be perceived to have it as well as the will to use nuclear weapons if required to do so. In other words one must communicate or project the same to all concerned. Regrettably, insufficient attention has been paid to this aspect of establishing the credibility of our nuclear deterrent.

Reason for calls to revisit the nuclear doctrine:

The major factor behind the questioning of the Nuclear Doctrine stems from concerns about NFU. Dissatisfaction with our NFU posture is not new. 

Ab initio, in discussions on this in the NSAB a case against it was made out on the grounds that such an approach unnecessarily kept us on the back foot and on the defensive and made it axiomatic that we would have to face the consequences of a first strike before being able to respond. Moreover, it prevented us from keeping a potential adversary off balance. This view did not, however, prevail in the subsequent discussions in the matter.

What is new about the increased opposition to the NFU posture is that it arises in part from increasing evidence of Pakistan’s proclivity to use tactical nuclear weapons against us, and in part from scepticism about our deterrent capability and about our willingness to respond to a tactical strike with a “massive” retaliatory attack. Advocates of a change in our NFU policy would like our nuclear doctrine mimic those of most of the established Nuclear Weapon States which contemplate the use of nuclear weapons even in sub nuclear conflicts.

Since an important element behind the call for revisiting our nuclear doctrine emanates from a lack of confidence in our deterrent and in our willingness to resort to the use of nuclear weapons in a massive second strike in response to an attack on us with tactical weapons the same needs to be addressed by much more effective signaling and a demonstration that the government will do what it says and will not shy from making a robust response when necessary. The following could be some moves in this direction:

1. Government must restore faith in itself by doing what it says and not shying from biting the bullet. Firmness must be shown in all its actions, for instance, on issues of law and order, terrorism and addressing difficult neighbours.
2. Periodic statements about the nurturing and upgradation of our nuclear arsenal and systems including alternate command structure.
3. An indication that our nuclear arsenal will be large enough to take care of all adversaries and will have to be in the mid triple digits.
4. Appointment of a Chief of Defence Staff and upgradation of the NTRO as a capable apex techint organization which would in a fool proof manner provide indicators of any attack on us and ensure swift and massive nuclear retaliation inflicting unacceptable damage.
5. An indication that we have in place multiple, well camouflaged and well secured vectors which are constantly being further refined in order to enable the country to inflict unacceptable damage even after absorbing a first strike by its adversaries

Factors militating against revisiting our nuclear doctrine:

There are many factors which militate against revisiting our nuclear doctrine and sacrificing the restraint it encapsulates by for instance abandoning NFU some of which are enumerated below:

1. All the gains enjoyed by us in the international community by the restraint of our nuclear posture would be frittered away. These do not merely constitute intangibles but entailed the termination of sanctions, support for our entry into the multilateral nuclear export control regimes as well as our civil nuclear cooperation agreements.
2. It would enormously complicate and increase the expenditure incurred by us in regard to our command and control mechanisms which would have to be reconfigured to engage in calibrated nuclear war fighting.
3. It would weaken the possibility of our engaging in conventional warfare insulated from the nuclear overhang.
4. It would encourage the use of tactical nuclear weapons against us under the illusion of no massive response.
5. It would facilitate the painting of South Asia as a nuclear flashpoint and thereby encourage foreign meddling.

OTHER REASONS FOR CHANGE

First, It is impossible for India to achieve a ‘credible minimum deterrent’ toward both of its primary strategic adversaries, China and Pakistan. China’s own force structure and modernisation effort, combined with the location of its primary strategic centres in the far east of the country—furthest from Indian territory—mean that India’s deterrence requirements against China far exceed what it would ‘minimally’ require toward Pakistan in terms of numbers, deployment modes, and reach. Therefore, what is credible toward China will likely not be minimum toward Pakistan; and what is minimum toward Pakistan cannot be credible toward China. This theoretical paradox means that India’s security managers had to choose whom they envisioned their primary deterrent adversary to be, and against whom they wanted to build and maintain a credible minimum deterrent.” - 

It is against this backdrop that the IPCS blueprint talks of “minimal deterrent”, rather than “minimum deterrent”. It says, “India shall maintain a credible minimal deterrent, where credibility comprises three specific components—leadership credibility, force credibility, and technological credibility. ‘Minimal’ was seen as a word better suited than ‘minimum’ to qualify India’s deterrent, which is subject to numerical changes in response to its strategic environment. In conceptual terms, ‘minimal’ provides greater flexibility than ‘minimum’. On the other hand, ‘minimum’ deterrence seals the lower limit of the arsenal, indicating that any number below this limit could endanger deterrence. The term ‘minimal’ therefore better conveys the relationship between the credibility of the deterrent and its numerical flexibility. ‘Minimum’ is both an adjective and a noun. ‘Minimal’, on the other hand, can only be used as an adjective, which emphasises its dependent usage.” - 

Secondly, the concept of “no first use”(NFU) policy needs a thorough debate. The United States or for that matter other western nuclear powers such as Britain and France do not have the NFU policy. Russia, which initially had NFU pledge, has withdrawn it long ago. China, another country that professed NFU policy, is now silent on it.  Its latest biannual defence white paper (2013) omitted for the first time a promise never to use its own nuclear weapons first. Even otherwise, China had asserted before that its NFU would not apply against countries that are in possession of the Chinese territory. That means that China’s NFU does not apply to India as it claims over our lands in Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh. That leaves Pakistan, our other major adversary. But Pakistan too does not believe in NFU. - 

The concept of NFU has other problems as well. For one, imagine that there is a conventional war between India and Pakistan (or for that matter China), and Indian forces target at military establishments within the enemy territory. They do not know which of these establishments are nuclear or nonnuclear and in the process of their operations, they hit at an enemy target that turns out to be a nuclear one and the consequent results are strategically horrible. Will it mean that India did not observe its NFU pledge?  For another, imagine also a situation when the Indian forces engaged in conventional wars simultaneously against China and Pakistan find it difficult to carry on. And here, as the situation challenges the very integrity of the country, should one not exercise the nuclear option? After all, we have already modified our nuclear posture in the events of chemical and biological attacks. Why should then we tie our hands with the NFU when faced with multi-fronted attacks on our territories or forces? - 

Thirdly, review is also due on the concept of our “massive” nuclear retaliation when attacked by nuclear weapons, particularly when Pakistan is openly preparing to use what it says tactical nuclear weapons (TNW) against India’s superior conventional forces. Pakistan has developed “Nasr” ballistic missiles with a range of 60 km that is capable of carrying nuclear warheads. These have been specifically built with the intention of targeting not only Indian cities but also Indian military formations on the battlefield. Now, suppose, one of our Army’s tank columns is attacked by Pakistan’s TNW. Should then India go for a massive retaliation to destroy the whole of Karachi or Lahore? Will not that be highly disproportionate and unethical? If so, should India not go for a proportionate retaliation with its own TNW? -

nd if we really go with our TNWs, then there will be a new problem. By their very nature, the TNWs and their eventual uses are better determined on the spot, that is, in the battlefield itself, by the military commanders concerned. How then that will go with our strict provision that it is only the Prime Minister who will decide when and where to use our nuclear weapons?

All these are very tricky but vital questions. But answers to them cannot wait any more. The future Indian government cannot sit over them.

Conflict, war and terrorism

Introduction

We look at some of the key conflicts in the modern world and develop an awareness of the sources of global conflict, especially linked to developments since 9/11, including issues to do with the so-called ‘war on terror’, nuclear proliferation and other weapons of mass destruction, and the  spread and significance of global terrorism.

From 1945 to 1991 there was a Cold War between the USA and the USSR, the two superpowers.   The Cold War can also be seen as a ideological conflict between Communism and Capitalism.  The map above illustrates the concept of a bipolar world.

The period from 1945 until the 1970s also witnessed a process of decolonisation.  Most of the countries, which had been colonies of European powers, gained their independence.  The world in 1945 looked like this;

By 2011 the picture is different but Colonisation and decolonisation continue to leave a scar.

UN Human Development Report 2008

At the end of the Cold War various American spokesmen announced that they were looking forward to a new era of peace and international co operation. However, in  2001 there was a terrorist attack on the US.

What was the response to 9/11?

http://youtu.be/ZMj9g6WRLfQ

War in Afghanistan

What is the reality of this war?

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/18/afghanistan-mission-accomplished-war-leaders-calamity

War inIraq

Is the ‘war on terror’ a struggle between Islam and the West?   Is it a clash of civilisations?

http://youtu.be/qT64TNho59I

http://youtu.be/px4np1wKaS8

Terrorism

What is terrorism?  How do modern terrorists operate?

How can governments combat terrorism?  What are the dangers with their approach?

The bomb plot in February 2011

What is the impact of the death of Osama Bin Laden

New Wars

Is it accurate to talk about a new type of warfare?

We might consider new kinds of military technology such as drones

We might consider the nature of modern conflicts

Who has the nuclear threat?

Conflict, War And Terrorism

Key themes:

Cultural conflict

Culture and identity – rise of identity politics (declining significance of traditional ideological and class solidarities; growth of ethnic, racial, religious and other particularisms; attack on liberal universalism; political emancipation through cultural self-assertion and re-definition of identity); religion as a global issue (rise of religious movements; explaining the rise of religion and ‘desecularization’ (failure of universalist ideologies; impact of globalization; certainty in an uncertain world, etc); clash of civilisation thesis (‘civilisations’ as global actors; basis for conflict between and among civilizations; criticisms ofclash of civilization thesis).

Islam vs the West? – rise of Islamic fundamentalism (advance of Islamism in Iran and elsewhere); the ‘war on terror’ as a civilizational conflict between Islam and the West?

Changing nature of war – from ‘old’ wars to ‘new’ wars; features of conventional wars (armed conflict between states; war an extension of politics, clear civilian/military divide, etc); features of modern or ‘new’ wars (civil wars rather than inter-state wars; wars of identity (fuelled by ethnic nationalism or religious radicalism); use of guerrilla and insurgency tactics; asymmetrical war(‘mismatched’ enemies, uncertain outcome, intractability of asymmetrical wars, etc); blurring of civilian/military divide; (irregular fighters; civilian targets; overlaps between war and criminality, etc); Afghanistan and Iraq as ‘new’ wars; ‘postmodern’ wars- (revolution in military affairs (Gulf War); ‘hi-tech’ weaponry; ‘virtual’ warfare; casualty-less warfare (Kosovo)). (Note: essay questions will not be set on the changing nature of war.)

Nuclear proliferation

Nature of weapons of mass destruction – nature of WDM (mass collateral damage; widely viewed as ‘non-legitimate’ or ‘inhuman’; significant deterrence effect, etc); nuclear weapons as archetypal WMD; development of nuclear weapons (Hiroshima and Nagasaki); emergence of biological and chemical weapons.

Nuclear proliferation and its implications – horizontal and vertical proliferation; nuclear proliferation during the Cold War period (vertical proliferation among superpowers; only UN ‘veto powers’ had nuclear weapons); nuclear proliferation in post-Cold War period (horizontal proliferations due to regional conflict (India and Pakistan; Israel and Iran, etc); easier access to weapons and technology, etc); debates about nuclear proliferation (implications for peace (‘balance of terror’), greater responsibility etc vs ‘tactical’ use, danger of getting into the ‘wrong hands (‘rogue’ states (Iran, North Korea etc) and terrorist organisations), etc.

Non-proliferation strategies – attempts to control nuclear proliferation (multilateral treaties (1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), etc) and bilateral treaties (SALT I and II; START I and II, SORT Treaty, etc)); US non-proliferation under Obama and its implications, etc.

Terrorism

Spread and significance of international/global terrorism – nature of terrorism; types of terrorism (nationalist terrorism; international, global or ‘new’ terrorism, etc); nature of Islamist terrorism (ideological goals (‘purify’ Muslim world and civilizational conflict with the West, especially the USA); tactics and methods (suicide attacks, coordinated attacks, audacious strategies); network organisation, etc); significance of international/global terrorism (impossible to protect against, acquisition of WMD, etc vs exaggerated fears (‘politics of fear’), limited public support for religious militancy, etc)

Countering terrorism – use of military tactics to contain/destroy terrorism (successes, failures and implications of the ‘war on terror’); state security and domestic repression; extent to which countering terrorism is compatible with protecting human rights (proper balance between public order and civil liberty/human rights?; unique challenges posed by terrorism; suspending human rights as the ‘lesser evil’; importance of moral high ground and ‘soft’ power, etc); political deals to end terror.

Volume 23, Number 2, November 2013

Global politics

Terrorism: a recent history

by Jonathan Carr

You can use this article to expand your knowledge.

The concept of terrorism is one of the most contested in political science. There is little debate that it is ‘a form of political violence that aims to achieve its objectives through creating a climate of fear’ (Goodwin 2006), but it is how the term is used, and about whom, that accounts for its enduring controversy. This was exemplified by the reaction to the murder of British soldier, Lee Rigby, in May 2013. While Prime Minister David Cameron’s response was ‘we will never give in to terror or terrorism,’ the BBC chose to refer to this incident as an ‘attack’ because of the ‘significant political overtones’ of the subject (BBC 2013).

Since the 1980s, much has been written about the changing methods of terrorism and so-called ‘new’ terrorism (Neumann 2009). A brief history of the term reveals that it has gone through several step changes in the last 200 years. However, recent developments in the means terrorist groups use to achieve their ends need not threaten the overall way in which we use the term.

Evolution of a concept

The word ‘terrorism’ hit the European consciousness during the French Revolution and derives from the wave of mass executions as part of the ‘Reign of Terror’. This reminds us that terrorism can be at its bloodiest when used as a ‘top down’ tool of the dictatorial state and that it has not always been a last resort of the powerless.

Only in the following century did terrorism acquire its association with non-state organisations, when it became synonymous with political assassinations (especially in tsarist Russia). In the latter half of the twentieth century, terrorism morphed into its more recognisable identities of nationalist, religious, single-issue and revolutionary terrorism (Ignatieff 2004). We could argue that a further incarnation occurred (and is presently occurring), following the collapse of the Cold War world order in the late 1980s.

Terrorism in the post-Second World War period

Terrorism in this period can be defined by nationalist groups (such as the Tamil Tigers and Irish Republican Army) and insurrectionary groups (such as the Italian Red Brigade and German Red Army Faction). Such groups tended to share three key features.

• First, their aims were essentially secular and usually related to their homelands.
• Second, the groups often adopted a command and control structure with close degrees of companionship and camaraderie within their ranks.
• Finally, these groups adopted the indiscriminate targeting of civilians as a core tactic.

Terrorism since the 1980s

Since then terrorism has broken with its secular background and become linked to religious extremism. Some commentators have labelled this as ‘new’ terrorism. It is tempting to view 9/11 as the key watershed but the emergence of this latest form of terrorism can actually be dated to the collapse of the Cold War world order where religious inspired movements helped to fill the ideological vacuum vacated by superpower politics. The 1997 massacre in Luxor, Egypt, the 1998 attacks on the US embassies, the USS Cole in 2000 and on the World Trade Center in 2000 are all characteristic of this form of terrorism which are three-fold.

• First, religious aims have essentially replaced secular ones.
• Second, the groups involved in ‘new’ terrorism are more loosely organised with weaker ties between members and make use of modern communications to establish disparate international networks.
• Finally, this form of terrorism has come to be associated with actions causing multiple casualties, sometimes in the hundreds. Some commentators termed this ‘catastrophic terrorism’ (Lacquer 1999).

The rise and fall of al-Qaeda: franchise terrorism

Al-Qaeda embodies the type of terrorist group defined above, typified by the concept of its ‘franchise terrorism’. This is the notion that even more important than the group itself is its ideology. Such was the strength of al-Qaeda’s global brand that militants with only a passing contact with the organisation claimed to be members of it and carried out local attacks in its name across the Arab world and in North Africa. According to expert Jason Burke, al-Qaeda subsequently became the ‘label of choice for all Islamic militants’ (2007).

However, counter terrorism measures have undoubtedly weakened al-Qaeda in recent years. The Arab Awakening also revealed weaknesses in its supposed popular appeal leading Jason Burke to anticipate a ‘coming international withdrawal’ (2013). However, the security dilemmas remain. A US House Congress committee recently heard evidence of a still tenacious ideology with future threats coming from affiliated groups (such as Boko Haram in Nigeria), so-called ‘lone wolves’ (such as the Boston bombers) and veterans of the conflict in Syria.

Conclusion

Terrorism is a term that is constantly evolving. We can ascertain four distinct chapters in its evolution: the state-led terror associated with the French Revolution in the eighteenth century, the political assassinations of the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, post-Second World War nationalist and insurrectionary terrorism and the ‘new’ religiously motivated terrorism of the post-Cold War era.

Despite these changes, one feature implicit in terrorism is the debate surrounding the term’s use. Governments remain at pains to draw clear distinctions between the ‘legitimacy’ of their own ‘state-led’ actions as compared to the ‘illegitimate’ actions of their opponents (Greenwald 2013). Attaching the term ‘terrorist’ to these opponents helps them to do this. It is precisely the value-laden nature of the term — its enduring feature — which makes it so interesting.

References

Burke, J. Al Qaeda (2007)

Greenwald, G. Was the London killing of a British soldier terrorism?’, Guardian,May 2013

Ignatieff, M. The Lesser Evil (2004)

Lacquer, W. The New Terrorism (1999)

Neumann, P. Old and New Terrorism (2009)

Townshend, C. Terrorism: A Very Short Introduction (2002)

Jonathan Carr is head of history and politics at Godalming Sixth Form College

Politics Review Resources

Volume 22, Number 2, November 2012

Global politics

The new face of terrorism: beyond Bin Laden

Owen Moelwyn-Hughes

This article, for students of the Edexcel A2 global politics option, is followed by some activities that you can complete individually or as a class.

‘Regardless if Osama is killed or survives, the awakening has started, praise be to God’.

Osama Bin Laden, videoed speech broadcast on 27 December 2001

The killing of Osama Bin Laden in Abbotabad in Pakistan on 2 May 2011, in a raid by US Special Forces, removed one of the most potent symbols of non-state terrorism in the modern era. However, as a blow against what al-Qaeda represented, the killing of its leader almost certainly carries more symbolic, rather than practical, value. Thus, questions about his precise legacy now remain, especially in terms of assessing the current terrorist threat to global security.

The global terrorist threat is diversifying. Ten years after the unprecedented 9/11 attacks, al-Qaeda, once the core of the global terrorist movement, no longer occupies the centre stage in global security. Relentless US targeting has led to a massive degradation of al-Qaeda. Apart from the killing of Osama Bin Laden, the network has suffered further blows as drone strikes have eliminated other key figures in the movement, such as Ayman al-Zawahiri’s (the current head of al-Qaeda) deputy. Nonetheless, al-Qaeda’s ideology and its affiliates in regions such as Yemen, the Maghreb, the Horn of Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa are still sowing instability and fear in societies and governments around the world. Although these possible al-Qaeda ‘clones’ might be less capable of mounting a global threat — being generally intertwined with local issues — it is still worth considering whether they might become an international terrorist threat with a global jihadist ethos.

What has been the impact of Bin Laden’s death?

The greatest impact of Bin Laden’s death has been symbolic, as opposed to ending the operational capacity of al-Qaeda. Dr Maha Azzam of Chatham House asserts that the killing of Osama Bin Laden is a major blow to al-Qaeda, as they have lost their primary symbol as ‘a movement that laid a great deal of emphasis on Osama bin Laden as a key figure in its recruitment of people’. Al-Qaeda is a less potent symbol now that he is dead. Although, for the longer term, Paul Cornish of Chatham House asserts that it would be a mistake to assume that Osama Bin Laden’s death means the end of al-Qaeda and the end of the jihad — as if Bin Laden, al-Qaeda and jihad are not just closely connected but are three inter-dependent pillars. Osama Bin Laden created a franchise for international terror that is designed to survive without him. For his followers, and for others in the future who subscribe to the myth, Bin Laden will be seen to have died like a warrior, if not a martyr. As the man who inspired and symbolised jihad against the USA and its allies, Bin Laden will continue to inspire Islamic militants for decades to come.

Has al-Qaeda been defeated?

Bin Laden’s death inspired a surge of triumphalism, such as President Obama proclaiming ‘we have put al-Qaeda on a path to defeat’ and the US defence secretary asserting that the US was ‘within reach of strategically defeating al-Qaeda’. However, even if organisationally al-Qaeda proper has been decimated, as a movement it has metastasized. Far from being dead and buried, the terrorist organisation has a global presence and is now riding a resurgent tide as its affiliates engage in increasingly violent campaigns of attacks across the middle east and north Africa — recent examples include the killing of Shiites in Iraq and the seizing of Radda in Yemen. This new terrorist threat is acknowledged in a recent report from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) which asserts that al-Qaeda affiliates, such as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and al-Shabaab in Somalia, and attempts to influence the terror group Boko Haram in Nigeria, raises a ‘worrying aspect of an arc of regional instability encompassing the whole Sahara-Sahel strip and extending through to east Africa’. As a result, the focus of anti-jihadist counter-terrorism is shifting to Africa, and the report adds ‘Western intelligence and security services understand what is happening in Pakistan, in the Maghreb and in Yemen, even if they cannot do very much about it’.

Globally, al-Qaeda’s network has in fact expanded since the 9/11 attacks. Al-Qaeda in Iraq, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), and Somalia’s al-Shabab have formally joined al-Qaeda, and their leaders have all sworn bayat — an oath of loyalty — to Bin Laden’s successor, Zawahiri. These affiliates benefit from the ‘core’ al-Qaeda’s ideological inspiration and guidance. Al-Zubair, al-Shabab’s emir, felt their place had been lifted in the jihadi world and beckoned Zawahiri to ‘lead us on the path of jihad and martyrdom that was drawn by our imam, the martyr Osama’. Some of these groups are also capable of holding territory — for example in Yemen where AQAP has exploited political instability to cement control in several provinces. The number of attacks also seems to be on the up — al-Qaeda in Iraq in the last year has conducted over 200 attacks and killed thousands of Iraqis. Other allied groups have emerged that have developed relationships with al-Qaeda, most notably in Nigeria where the Salafi group Boko Haram has emerged as an increasingly deadly threat — killing 200 people in January — and having their operatives trained by AQIM in Mali. Furthermore, despite its bloody legacy, al-Qaeda seems to have maintained a level of popular support, for example in the Palestinian territories, Egypt, Indonesia and Nigeria, even if it has markedly declined in others. This is a worrying fact considering that al-Qaeda has shown that it does not require significant levels of support to accomplish its bloody work.

Some hold that Zawahiri is not the leader that Bin Laden was — as he lacks charisma and appeal — and thus have brushed him aside as being too unpopular to hold and consolidate power. However, so far he is ahead in one category — he has survived. He also been the main architect of al-Qaeda’s franchising strategy and has encouraged the exploitation of the Arab Spring, as he exhorted in his recent video ‘Onward, Lions of Syria’. However, he still has his weaknesses — among jihadists he is seen to be lacking in warrior credentials and he has been a polarising figure, given to feuding with other Islamic movements and rival leaders (such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt).

What effect has the Arab Spring had?

The instability caused by the Arab Spring has provided al-Qaeda with fertile ground in which to expand its influence across the region. Some argue that the Arab Spring was bad for al-Qaeda, showing that they had lost the war of ideas. In the article ‘Al-Qaeda’s Challenge’ in Foreign Affairs, William McCants writes:

‘On 9/11, the global jihadist movement burst into the world’s consciousness, but a decade later, thanks in part to the Arab Spring and the killing of Osama Bin Laden, it is in crisis. With Western-backed dictators falling, al-Qaeda might seem closer than ever to its goal of building Islamic states. But the revolutions have empowered the group’s chief rivals instead: Islamist parliamentarians, who are willing to use ballots, not bombs.’

Furthermore, the scholar Fouad Ajami asserts ‘the young men and women who had filled Liberation Square, wanted nothing of that deadly standoff between the ruler’s tyranny and the jihadists’ reign of piety and terror’. However, weak and ineffective governments are critical to the rise of insurgencies and are fertile ground for terrorist groups. In other words, the Arab Spring revolutionaries may not be sympathetic to violent jihad, but the instability they sow may be to al-Qaeda’s gain. Especially given that the uprisings have weakened governments across the world from Syria to Yemen. Also, democratic states are still just as likely to face terrorism.

Conclusion

Since 9/11 the West has repeatedly declared al-Qaeda all but dead and buried, only to see it rise again. The weakness of governments across the Arab world and south Asia, the durability of some of al-Qaeda’s main allies, and the decreasing US presence in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan could all contribute to al-Qaeda’s survival. Drone strikes and special operations may certainly kill some of al-Qaeda’s leaders, but they will not resolve the fundamental problems that have turned the region into a breeding ground for terrorism and militancy. Predictions of al-Qaeda’s imminent demise are more rooted in wishful thinking and politicians’ desire for applause than in rigorous analysis. Al-Qaeda’s broader network is alive and prospering. Certainly these so-called al-Qaeda associated movements are more insulated and entwined with local conflicts, grievances, and causes, and less focused on hitting international targets than al-Qaeda was. However, these groups still profess adherence to a wider global jihad and, ultimately, the chilling fact is that it only takes one successful terrorist attack to once again turn global security on its head.

Activities

 (1)            Having read this article, the class could have a follow on discussion:

‘To what extent is terrorism a threat to current global security?’

In particular, consider the current threat posed by al-Qaeda and its affiliates.

(2)            Read Jason Burke’s Al-Qaeda: The True Story of Radical Islam (Penguin, 2007), even if you just read Chapter 1 ‘What is al-Qaeda?’. The book contains much food for thought and debate.

(3)            Try this classroom activity — allocate each member of the class a terrorist organisation relevant to the article, such as:

• Al-Qaeda
• AQAP
• AQIM
• Boko Haram
• Al-Qaeda in Iraq
• Haqani Network
• Lashgar-e-Taiba
• Jemaah Islamiyah
• Al-Shabab

Each member of the class should research their allocated terrorist group and fill in a table like the one shown below (which has al-Qaeda filled in as a rough example). The students can then report back on their findings. A good way to do this is for each member of the class to explain their findings in 3–4 minutes to another member of the class, and then vice versa. The students should then rotate around the class and this process should be repeated until each student has shared their findings with everyone in the class on a one-to-one basis. The filled in tables could then be collated to make a handout comprising all the terrorist organisations researched.

Group	Al-Qaeda
Type	An Islamist group founded sometime between August 1988 and late 1989/early 1990. It operates as a network comprising both a multinational, stateless arm and a fundamentalist Sunni movement calling for global jihad. It was established by Osama Bin Laden in 1988 with Arabs who fought in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union.
Aim	Goal is to unite Muslims to fight the USA as a means of defeating Israel, overthrowing regimes it deems ‘non-Islamic’, and expelling Westerners and non-Muslims from Muslim countries. Eventual goal would be establishment of a pan-Islamic caliphate throughout the world.
Methods	Characteristic techniques include suicide attacks and simultaneous bombings of different targets. Activities ascribed to it may involve members of the movement, who have taken a pledge of loyalty to Osama Bin Laden.
Effectiveness (actions)	On December 29, 1992, al-Qaeda’s first terrorist attack took place as two bombs were detonated in Aden, Yemen. Al-Qaeda has attacked civilian and military targets in various countries — the most notable being the September 11 attacks in 2001. The US government responded by launching the ‘war on terror’. In 1990, the US embassy bombings in east Africa took place, resulting in upward of 300 deaths, mostly locals. To sum up, it has been an effective terrorist group.

 Owen Moelwyn-Hughes is head of politics at The King’s School, Canterbury

4D Conflict War and Terrorism

Short Answer Questions

Why have some modern wars been classified as ‘new’ wars? (15 marks)

The category of ‘new wars’ has been applied to conflicts particularly since the mid 1980s (Kaldor).

These wars differ from traditional, inter-state wars in a number of respects. In the first place, armed conflict increasingly takes place within states rather than between them. New wars are therefore civil wars, often related to the disintegration and collapse of states, sometimes linked to the pressures generated by globalisation.

Second, these wars are often associated with questions of identity and culture, a major cause of wars since 1990 being the demand of various groups for national self-determination.

Third, new wars are characterised by the use of guerrilla or insurrectionary tactics, often involving the use of informal fighters and serving to blur the distinction between the ‘soldier’ and the ‘civilian’ in terms of both military personnel and military targets. Such wars are also very difficult to end, even when one of the participants is economically much more advanced than the other.

Fourth, the ‘military/civilian’ divide is also weakened by the association of such wars with corruption and criminality.

So-called ‘post-modern’ wars may also be seen as new, in the sense that they rely heavily on the use of modern technology and ‘smart’ weapons, greatly reduce the casualties from warfare (hence the idea of casualty-free or virtual wars), and often take place between combatants with very different levels of development (asymmetric warfare).

How and why has religion become more important in global politics? (15 marks)

Religion has become more important in global politics through the growth and growing significance of religiously-inspired social and political movements.

This has been particularly evident in the Moslem world through the growth of Islamic fundamentalism and the upsurge in Islamism as a politico-religious ideology.

Manifestations of this can be seen in the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the Taliban in Afghanistan, the activities of religiously-based insurgency groups such as Hamas and Hizbollah, and in religiously- motivated terrorist organisations such as al-Qaeda.

However, it is a phenomenon that extends beyond Islam and, for example, affects Hindu and Sikkh militancy in India (as well as relations between India and Pakistan), Singalese nationalism in Sri Lanka, the Christian New Right in the USA and so forth.

The growing importance of religion in global politics is usually seen as part of a larger trend in favour of the politics of identity and culture. As such, it has been explained in various ways, including through the decline of revolutionary socialism since the 1970s, as a backlash against neo-colonialism (religion providing people with a non-western or even anti-western political identity), and as one of the consequences of globalisation, which has both strengthened anti-westernism and undermined the capacity of ‘civic’ nationalism to establish secure and stable political identities.

The rise of religious groups has also been explained in terms of the ‘clash of civilisations’ thesis, in which the decline of ideological conflict associated with the Cold War would give rise to conflict between ‘different civilisations’, with religion often serving as the basis of civilisational identity.

In what ways did 9/11 redefine the nature of terrorism? (15 marks)

Terrorism, in its broad sense, refers to the use of terror for furthering political ends, by seeking to create a climate of fear, apprehension and uncertainty. However, events such as the 9/11 attacks on the USA and groups such as al-Qaeda threaten to redefine the phenomenon of terrorism.

There has been much debate about whether, and the extent to which, 9/11 altered the nature of terrorism. A number of allegations have been made, including the following.

First, 9/11 has often been seen as illustrating the fact that terrorism has become a transnational, if not global, phenomenon, whereas earlier forms of terrorism were often carried out by nationalist groups and were confined to a particular state.

Al-Qaeda and the wider Islamist movement, are certainly transnational in terms of their organisation, goals and activities. The 9/11 attacks marked the advent of terrorism with a global reach, dramatically transforming the significance of terrorism.

Second, this form of terrorism is motivated by a broad and radical ideology, in the form of Islamism rather than by narrower and more specific political goals. Islamist terrorism aims to inflict damage and humiliation on the USA and transform the global relationship between Islam and the west.

Other differences include that the sheer scope and scale of the 9/11 attacks was historically unprecedented, creating the phenomenon of ‘catastrophic terrorism’, and that the combined use of suicide attacks and coordinated attacks against several targets suggest the advent of new terrorist tactics.

Why are ‘asymmetrical wars’, such as those in Iraq and Afghanistan, so difficult to win? (15 marks)

Asymmetrical wars are wars fought between radically unequal parties. This certainly applies in relation to the party’s level of economic and technological development, but also applies in relation to their relative military capabilities. Examples include the Vietnam War, the Iraq War and war in Afghanistan.

It is difficult for developed states to win asymmetrical wars for a number of reasons, including the following:

Developed states are often prevented by diplomatic pressures and global public opinion from using some of the more devastating weapons in their armoury.

This particularly applies to ‘unusable’ nuclear weapons.

Relatively weak states and forces have developed strategies that are appropriate to their limited resources and are very difficult for developed powers to counter.

These include guerrilla tactics, the use of popular insurrection and various forms of terrorism.

Insurrectionary wars are particularly difficult to resolve because the mass of the population often support, explicitly or implicitly, insurrectionary forces. Victory can therefore only be achieved by winning ‘hearts and minds’, not by military means alone.

Explain why the term ‘terrorism’ is controversial and contested. (15 marks)

Terrorism is usually taken to refer to attempts to further political ends by using violence to create a climate of fear, apprehension and uncertainty, through acts such as bombings, assassinations, hostage seizures and plane hijacks.

Terrorist violence is typically high profile, consciousness shocking and seemingly arbitrary, and, conventionally, it is carried out by non-state actors.

The term terrorism has been considered controversial for a number of reasons:

It carries deeply pejorative implications, meaning that the term tends to be used as a political weapon, implying that the group or action to which it is attached is immoral and illegitimate (one person’s terrorist can therefore be another’s freedom fighter).

As all forms of violence generate fear and apprehension, the use of the term may be arbitrary.

As terrorism is often portrayed as an anti-government activity, carried out by non-state groups, critical theorists have argued that the term has been used to systematically de-legitimise such groups and their motives, thereby upholding the existing power structure at a national or global level.

Radical theorists reject the intrinsic link between terrorism and non-state actors, placing greater emphasis on so-called ‘state terrorism’.

Essay Questions

‘The 2003 Iraq war was justified.’ Discuss. (45 marks)

The 2003 Iraq war was extremely controversial, notably because its legitimacy both in international law and in morality was so doubtful.

At various times different reasons have been given for the war.

The justification for the war was to prevent Saddam Hussein from attacking neighbouring states, as he had previously done (Iran and Kuwait).

The war was a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, which ‘supposedly’ had been a major protagonist in the Sept 11 attacks.

The war was necessary, it was argued, because Iraq was close to developing nuclear weapons, after which the cost of engaging in war against Iraq would be too great.

The war was necessary to enforce the will of the UN, which Saddam had repeatedly flouted.

It was necessary to rid the Iraqi people of a terrible dictator who had committed atrocities against the Kurds, and the Shi’ites.

It was important to bring democracy to the Iraqi people.

No wonder such controversy existed, and still does. Kofi Annan himself declared the war as illegal under international law.

Iraq was not the aggressor nation. No WMD were found. The threat to Western security was allegedly ‘sexed up’.

Iraqis were suffering before 2003, but their suffering was not only due to an oppressive regime, but also to the sanctions imposed post Gulf War 1.

It now seems that Iraq had exaggerated its own military strength, so as not to appear weak. Or the US intelligence had received information it wanted to hear, not accurate intelligence.

Many criticised the pre-emptive strike argument, but there is an accepted precedence, the Caroline case (when Britain sank a US merchant ship carrying weapons for the French Canadian independence forces).

However, not only were there no WMD, but there was no link between Saddam and attacks against the US. The UN argument also is weak.

There was no UN resolution permitting the use of force, so the US led coalition cannot realistically argue that they were carrying out the will of the UN.

Moreover, Iraq is less stable now than it was before the war. Thousands of Iraqis have died, yet violence continues.

If pragmatists wish for the war to be judged on whether the world has become more stable; that the Middle East is more stable, that Iraq is more stable, that Iraqis at least have freedom, democracy and human rights protection, then the war is not justified.

To what extent is countering terrorism compatible with upholding human rights? (45 marks)

The relationship between human rights and terrorism has become a major issue of debate as a result of the ‘war on terror’.

While some argue that the infringement of human rights is a necessary ‘lesser evil’ compared to the ‘greater evil’ of terrorism, others argue that infringements of human rights are simply unacceptable and may also be counter- productive in terms of countering terrorism. Infringements of human rights as part of the larger campaign to contain the threat of terrorism can be justified on both practical and ethical grounds.

In practical terms, terrorism poses particular difficulties, in that it is a covert military threat posed by people who often have fanatical views and beliefs.

Unconventional threats require unconventional responses. This is why the USA created an internment camp at Guantanamo Bay, where it interned hundreds of people without trial, subjecting some of them to forms of torture such as ‘waterboarding’ (simulated drowning).

The practice of ‘extraordinary rendition’ also allowed for the easier violation of human rights. Detention without trial has also been introduced by other states fighting terrorism; for example, through a number of anti-terrorist laws in the UK.

Sensitivity to issues of human rights would put governments at a grave disadvantage in confronting an enemy that has no concern itself for human rights.

The moral argument supporting this view is based on the balance of the suffering cause. For example, the murder of 3,000 innocent civilians in the 9/11 attacks was itself a major human rights violation.

Restrictions of terrorist suspects’ political and civil rights can, by contrast, be regarded as a ‘lesser evil’ (Ignatieff).

On the other hand, abuses of human rights in such circumstances can be seen to make no moral or practical sense.

Human rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have condemned Guantanamo, the use of torture and detention without trial on the grounds that human rights are inviolable.

Human rights cannot be ignored or set aside for matters of political convenience, as human rights establish absolute moral values.

The ‘war on terror’ is therefore not a ‘just war’ as it has not been fought using just means.

The practical argument against violating human rights in the cause of anti- terrorism is based on the damage done to a state’s moral authority and global influence.

The USA’s ‘war on terror’ has been more difficult to win because its own behaviour has weakened global support, particularly in Moslem countries damaging the USA’s ‘soft’ power.

This helps to explain the Obama administration’s initial decision, for example, to close Guantanamo Bay, subsequently not followed through with.

‘Concerns about an emerging “clash of civilisations” have been greatly exaggerated.’ Discuss. (45 Marks)

The idea of a ‘clash of civilisations’ suggests that twenty-first century global order will be characterised by growing tension and conflict between rival cultures or civilisations, as opposed to the political, ideological or economic conflict of old.

Supporters of the ‘clash of civilisations’ thesis have advanced a number of arguments. These include the following:

There is undoubted evidence of the growing impact of culture and religion in world politics. This is evident in the rise of forms of ethnic nationalism and religious fundamentalism, particularly political Islam.

Cultural conflict has in many ways been increasing, especially in the form of tension between Islam and the West. The advent of global terrorism and the ’war on terror’ have both been seen as evidence of a ‘clash of civilisations’. Conflict between Islam and the West is very different from the politico-ideological conflict during the Cold War period between the USA and the Soviet Union.

Growing rivalry between the USA and China can be seen as an example of civilizational tension, the rise of China being part of an ‘Asian affirmation’ which is based on distinctive values drawn, in part, from Confucianism as opposed to those of the liberal-democratic West.

However, the idea of a ‘clash of civilisations’ has been criticised for a number of reasons. These include the following:

Civilisations are not homogeneous and unified entities. Rather they are complex and fragmented.

Civilisations are simply not global actors; states, with their distinctive national interests, remain the key actors in global politics.

There is significant evidence of cultural harmony and peaceful coexistence between different civilisations. Cultural difference by no means necessarily leads to conflict.

Most wars and international conflicts take place between states from the same, not different, civilisations.

Events such as the ‘war on terror’ and growing tensions between the USA and China, are better understood in terms of great power politics and the pursuit of national interests than they are in terms of a supposed ‘clash of civilisations’.

To what extent is global terrorism a major threat to order and security? (45 marks)

Terrorism refers to the use of terror for furthering political ends; it seeks to create a climate of fear, apprehension and uncertainty. Global terrorism is terrorism that has a global reach, particularly as demonstrated by the 9/11 attacks on the USA.

The significance of global terrorism as a threat to order and security has been the subject of considerable debate. Those who see it in this light advance a number of arguments, including the following:

The 9/11 attacks underline the threat of global terrorism because it demonstrates how the world’s most powerful state, in military as well as economic terms, can be vulnerable to external attack when it is no longer vulnerable to conventional attacks by rival states.

These threats are all the greater because of the possibility that terrorist networks may be able to acquire and use weapons of mass destruction, and perhaps even nuclear weapons.

The threat of global terrorism is so great because it requires few resources and can be carried out by small groups or even lone individuals.

Increased global flows of peoples, ideas and information also make global terrorism particularly difficult to contain or prevent.

The USA’s ‘war on terror’ was an appropriate response to the advent of global terrorism, since it recognised that such terrorism has its roots in a transnational ideology that has spread to various parts of the Middle East, North Africa and central Asia.

However, some argue that the threat of global terrorism has been much overstated. This has been for a variety of reasons, including the following:

Although 3,000 people died in the 9/11 attacks, this is very small by comparison with the scale of death that has occurred as a result of conventional warfare.

Terrorism, by its nature, consists of a series of sporadic attacks on a variety of targets, and is very different from the concerted, sustained and systematic destruction that is wreaked by mass warfare conducted between states.

Terrorism, in itself, cannot overthrow a government, unlike revolution and inter- state war.

Terrorism ‘works’ only when there is a military overreaction to it that ends up being counter-productive in terms of strengthening support for militant or extremist groups.

Some argue that the over-reaction to global terrorism through the ‘war on terror’ has been an attempt to consolidate advanced societies by creating the image of an external threat in place of the ‘communist threat’ of old.

Paper 4 Questions by Topic: Nuclear Proliferation and Disarmament.

Short Answer Questions

Why is it difficult to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction? (15 marks)

The desire for physical security is at the heart of human life. Thus, humans have throughout history used tools to provide security against violence.

Of course these tools can provide greater security if they are powerful, but as they can be used also to attack and kill, their existence inevitably provokes nervousness in others.

Weapons of mass destruction (WMD) are simply more devastating and non-selective weapons. Clearly, states wish to acquire as deadly a weapons arsenal as possible.

Thus developing WMD is a standard defence policy aim.

Nuclear weapons are the most powerful and awesome of all weapons of destruction. The possession of nuclear weapons is seen as a guarantee of security and many states are intent on acquiring a nuclear defence capability.

However, if one state is seen to be acquiring such weapons then the rivals of this state will begin to feel insecure. Their security, they believe, will only be maintained if they too acquire nuclear weapons.

Given that national security is usually of primary importance states tend to be willing to break international agreements on nuclear proliferation.

WMD are made in science laboratories, not conventional armaments factories.

The most significant factor in their production is knowledge. Once the secret of a particular WMD has been learnt and practiced, the secret can be passed on.

The ingredients of many WMD are found in most chemical plants. Thus the development of most WMD is relatively easy and relatively cheap, yet their effect can be devastating.

Whereas a conventional bomb kills those close to the initial impact, chemical and biological weapons can kill and maim over a much greater area and without sound or warning.

What are the major reasons behind the proliferation of nuclear weapons? (15 marks)

The main contemporary concerns about nuclear proliferation focus on ‘horizontal’ proliferation in terms of the acquisition of nuclear weapons by an increasing number of states.

There are a number of reasons behind this form of nuclear proliferation, including the following:

• The possession of nuclear weapons is seen as the ultimate guarantee of non-intervention by more militarily powerful states. The USA thus intervened against Iraq but did not do so against North Korea. This has major implications for Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons.

• The acquisition of nuclear weapons is seen to mark out a state as a great power, as indicated by the nuclear weapons possessed by the ‘veto powers’ of the UN Security Council.

• Regional tensions have been a powerful driver behind the acquisition of nuclear weapons. This applies both in the case of India and Pakistan and in the case of Israel and Iran.

Essay Questions

To what extent does nuclear proliferation threaten peace and security? (45 marks)

Nuclear proliferation refers to the spread of nuclear weapons, either by their acquisition by more states or other actors (horizontal proliferation) or by their accumulation by established nuclear states (vertical proliferation).

The Cold War period was characterised by significant vertical proliferation, as the USA and the Soviet Union each acquired massive nuclear arsenals, while the post-Cold War era has been characterised by a tendency towards horizontal proliferation, with nuclear weapons being acquired by India, North Korea and, covertly, by Israel. However, views differ about the implications of nuclear proliferation for peace and security.

The argument that nuclear proliferation poses a substantial threat to peace and security derives from the massive destructive capacity of nuclear weapons.

This, then, enables nuclear powers to dictate to other powers, as the USA did in using nuclear weapons to bring an end to the war against Japan in 1945.

Nuclear proliferation can be seen as inherently unstable on the grounds that it creates at least temporary imbalances, allowing states that seek military advantage to pursue offensive policies.

Nuclear arms races therefore tend to increase the likelihood of war. Such fears have intensified in the post-Cold War era as proliferation has made regional conflicts considerably more dangerous.

This applies to tension between India and Pakistan as well as to tension between Israel and Iran.

Nuclear proliferation is thus more dangerous in the emerging multipolar world order than it was in the relatively stable bipolar ‘first’ nuclear age.

Anxieties about nuclear weapons have been substantially heightened by the belief that recent developments make it more likely that they will be used.

This is evident in the development of ‘tactical’ or ‘battlefield’ nuclear weapons that are designed to be usable, but it is particularly linked to the fear that nuclear weapons may fall into the hands of military- based dictatorial regimes, or even terrorist groups, which will have fewer scruples about using them.

Nuclear terrorism is thought of by some as the ultimate modern security threat.

However, nuclear proliferation has also been seen to promote peace and security.

The most remarkable thing about nuclear weapons is how rarely they have been used. Their massive destructive capacity in fact makes them primarily weapons of deterrence.

States thus acquire nuclear weapons and increase the size of their arsenals in order to prevent war.

This especially occurs when a nuclear stalemate is established, as both states in a dispute acquire a second- strike capability, creating a ‘balance of terror’ as occurred during the Cold War.

Horizontal proliferation since the end of the Cold War has not been as destabilising as many fear, as the possession of nuclear weapons may engender a sense of responsibility and a bias in favour of caution, even in states that have previously been inclined to adventurism or aggression. In this view, conflict between India and Pakistan is less likely to result in war because both states have a ‘nuclear option’. Similarly, the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran may bring greater stability to the Middle East than has occurred through the existence of a single nuclear power, Israel.

‘Nuclear weapons are of symbolic importance only.’ Discuss. (45 marks)

The idea that nuclear weapons are of symbolic importance only suggests that states seek to acquire such weapons for the status they bring rather than because of their political efficacy.

Such a view is supported by the fact that apart from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nuclear weapons have never been used in warfare, and threats to use them have been extremely rare.

This is linked to the fact that it is commonly believed that nuclear weapons are beyond the pale in moral terms, not only having a unique status in terms of their potential level of destruction but also making them, probably, useless as offensive weapons.

However, nuclear weapons may have political efficacy in at least two respects.

First, regardless of their value as offensive weapons, nuclear weapons have an indisputable defensive significance in deterring attacks on nuclear powers. Nuclear weapons, for example, helped to ensure that the Cold War remained ‘cold’, and the possession of nuclear weapons by states such as North Korea helps to explain why intervention against such regimes is almost unthinkable.

Second, new generations of ‘battlefield’, or ‘tactical’, nuclear weapons may be usable in a way that traditional, strategic nuclear weapons were not. Potentially, they could therefore be instruments of offensive warfare.

The chances of this are greater when nuclear weapons may fall into the hands of rogue states or terrorist groups, which may have fewer scruples about their use compared with national governments.

‘Operation Hamla’ kick-starts

In fact, the whole ‘reds’ versus ‘blues’ match-up was more about game theory involving tactics, critical thinking and strategic decision-making than a game itself.

‘Operation Hamla,’ a multi-agency, or a multi-player if you like, which kick-started at 6 a.m. on Wednesday is a mock drill to test the reliability and the robustness of the city’s anti-terror security assets and surveillance systems.

The mandate for a crack team of commandos (reds) was to try and infiltrate the barriers set up by the blues — sometimes the reds even place a bomb to cock a snook at their rivals.“We’re kept in the dark about how many reds there are,” a Coast Guard official said.

Through the day, intelligence inputs about potential infiltration along the porous coastline stretching up to Cuddalore and Karaikal kept surfacing but water-tight patrolling with boats and landward assets helped blues thwart the reds, a spokesman for the ‘blues’ said.

‘Operation Hamla’, code-named so after the 26/11 Mumbai attacks where terrorists infiltrated the country through the sea route, is a bi-annual exercise involving the Navy, Indian Coast Guard, Ports, State police, Fisheries and Customs, Transport and Highways departments.

Fisherfolk are also engaged in the operation as they are regarded as crucial ‘eyes and ears’ of vigilance.

District Headquarters No. 13 of the Eastern Command has its patrolling boundaries spread over about 60 nautical miles off the coastline in Puducherry, Cuddalore and Karaikal.

Barrier patrols will sustain surveillance across vantage and vulnerable spots, entry-exit points, vulnerable places of worship and fish landing grounds until the operation is formally called off on Thursday.

Toll-free lines (1554 and 1093) are available for the public to report any dubious activity, stranger movement or unattended suspicious objects.

For an arms embargo in a conflict zone

The horrific war in Syria continues to worsen and bleed beyond its borders. A cold calculation seems to be taking hold: that little can be done except to arm the parties and watch the conflict rage. The international community must not abandon the people of Syria and the region to never-ending waves of cruelty and crisis.

The death toll may now be well over 1,50,000. Prisons and makeshift detention facilities are swelling with men, women and even children. Deaths by summary executions and unspeakable torture are widespread. People are also dying from hunger and once-rare infectious diseases. Whole urban centres and some of humankind’s great architectural and cultural heritage lie in ruins. Syria today is increasingly a failed state.

No end to the conflict yet

The United Nations has tried hard to address the conflict’s deep roots and devastating impact. Our humanitarian and other efforts are saving lives and reducing suffering. But our fundamental objective — an end to the conflict — remains unmet. The bleak prospects for peace have darkened further with the flare-up of violence and sectarian tensions in Iraq. The cohesion and integrity of two major countries, not just one, is in question.

The following six points can chart a principled and integrated way forward.

First, ending the violence. It is irresponsible for foreign powers to give continued military support to parties in Syria that are committing atrocities and flagrantly violating fundamental principles of human rights and international law. I have urged the Security Council to impose an arms embargo. The sides will have to sit across from each other again at the negotiating table. How many more people must die before they get there?

Second, protecting people. The United Nations continues to manage a huge humanitarian relief effort. But the government continues to impose unconscionable access restrictions; it has removed medical supplies from aid convoys and deliberately starved and collectively punished communities it regards as sympathetic to the opposition. Some rebel groups have acted similarly. Moreover, the international community has provided barely a third of the funding needed for the relief effort. I continue to appeal for an end to the sieges and for unfettered humanitarian access across internal frontlines and international borders.

Third, starting a serious political process. The warring parties systematically blocked the relentless initiatives of two of the world’s leading diplomats, Kofi Annan and Lakhdar Brahimi. The presidential election earlier this month was a further blow, and failed to meet even minimal standards for credible voting. I will soon name a new Special Envoy to pursue a political solution and a transition to a new Syria. Regional countries have a special responsibility to help end this war. I welcome recent contacts between Iran and Saudi Arabia and hope that they will build confidence and reverse a destructive competition in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and elsewhere. Syrian civil society groups are making courageous efforts to maintain the fabric of society and keep open channels of solidarity and communication.

Ensuring accountability

Fourth, ensuring accountability for serious crimes. Last month, a resolution that aimed to refer the conflict to the International Criminal Court failed to pass the Security Council. I ask those Member States that say no to the ICC, but say they support accountability in Syria, to come forward with credible alternatives. The Syrian people have a right to justice and action against impunity.

Fifth, finishing the destruction of chemical weapons in Syria. The United Nations and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons have worked together to destroy or remove from the country all of the declared materials in a once-large arsenal. Many Member States have provided critical resources and support for this challenging task, which was undertaken in an active war zone, and which will now be completed at various destruction facilities outside Syria. While almost all of the killing in Syria is being done with conventional weapons, it has been essential to reinforce the global norm banishing the production and use of chemical weapons.

Sixth, addressing the regional dimensions of the conflict, including the extremist threat. Foreign fighters are in action on both sides, increasing the level of violence and exacerbating sectarian hatreds. While we should not blindly accept the Syrian government’s demonisation of all the opposition as terrorists, neither should we be blinded to the real threat of terrorists in Syria. The world must come together to eliminate funding and other support for Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham. ISIS is also a threat to all communities in Iraq; it is crucial for the region’s leaders — political and religious — to call for restraint and avoid a spiral of attack and reprisal.

Upholding responsibilities

For the moment, the greatest obstacle to ending the Syria war is the notion that it can be won militarily. I reject the current narrative that the Government of Syria is “winning.” Conquering territory through aerial bombardments into densely populated civilian neighbourhoods is not a victory. Starving besieged communities into surrender is not a victory. Even if one side were to prevail in the short term, the devastating toll will have sown the seeds of future conflict.

Dangerous sectarian tensions, massive movements of refugees, daily atrocities and spreading instability make the civil war in Syria a global threat. All the values for which we stand, and all the reasons for which the United Nations exists, are at stake across the devastated landscape that is Syria today. The time is long past for the international community, in particular the Security Council, to uphold its responsibilities. — Courtesy: UN Information Centre for India and Bhutan

For anti-terror ops, NIA for more teeth

Deeptiman Tiwary

New Delhi: TNN





If NIA has its way , tougher anti-terror laws with enhanced powers to the agency may be in the offing.
In the forthcoming visit of home minister Rajnath Singh to NIA headquarters, the agency is likely to propose certain changes in Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and the NIA Act that could allow the agency to exercise powers that were enshrined in the now-repealed anti-terror law POTA.The proposed legal changes would vest the agency with power to detain a terror accused in custody for more than 30 days and give it the time period of one year to file a chargesheet as against 180 days available now under UAPA. Sources said NIA has made such proposals in the past and is likely to push for it with the new regime which is perceived to have a tough stance against terrorism. It is also pinning its hopes on the fact that BJP had put “strengthening of NIA“ as top priority in its manifesto.
If accepted, it could be back to POTA/TADA days with the only exception of statement given to police not having evidentiary value. Enacted by previous NDA regime, POTA was repealed by the UPA government on the ground that it was draconian.
However, a majority of its provisions were reincorporated in UAPA.
The agency has argued that because its investigations have international ramification which involve longdrawn processes of letter rogatory and Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) engagements with other countries, it should be given more time to file chargesheets. Also the complexity of terror cases demands more custody time, said sources.
It is also likely to demand changes that would help the agency retake custody of an accused in the face of fresh evidence even after a charg esheet has been filed.
NIA is also learnt to be pushing for powers to investigate cyber crimes that do not come under scheduled offences. The agency argument is that even the seemingly unconnected-to-terror acts such as hacking of a government website has distant links with terrorism and such powers will help the agency to take comprehensive action against terrorism. As of now the agency can't investigate cases under IT Act.
Apart from this, the home minister is likely to be made aware of the severe shortage of manpower at inspector and DSP level and the paucity of financial resources. The agency is also likely to push for its own intelligence wing and powers to conduct counter-terror operations.

India among jihad targets of ISIS

Ibrahim Awwad al-Badri,pseudonym Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ,commander of the insurgent group Islamic State of Iraq and al-Shams (ISIS), has vowed war against several countries, including India, in a Ramzan speech released online late on Tuesday.

The reference to India, the first in an ISIS manifesto, raises new concerns for the safety of the almost hundred of its nations trapped in Iraqi cities controlled by the Islamist group, which is battling the governments of Iraq and Syria.

Second covert defence site in Karnataka: report

Karnataka appeared to be the site of hectic activity for India’s covert uranium enrichment programme as well as a secret testing ground for armed drones, according to satellite photographs and other evidence compiled by a U.S. think tank.

The discovery that India’s nuclear establishment has pressed forward into the early development stages of a Special Material Enrichment Facility (SMEF) came as the second instance of the veil of secrecy surrounding a nuclear facility being pierced in less than two weeks, in the same Indian State.

On June 20, IHS Jane’s revealed that India was possibly extending the Mysore Rare Materials Plant into clandestine production of uranium hexafluoride that could theoretically be channelled towards the manufacture of hydrogen bombs.

This week the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) suggested that the country appeared to have followed through on its publicly announced intention to build the SMEF and started constructing a large enrichment centrifuge complex near Chitradurga, Karnataka, where, between 2009 and 2010, approximately 10,000 acres of land was allegedly diverted for various defence purposes.

Long-range drones

Within this walled-off tract, 1,410 acres in Ullarthi Kaval and 400 acres in Khudapura were allocated to the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre for developing the SMEF, ISIS said. The report added that a further 4,000 acres in Varavu Kaval and 290 acres in Khudapura were allocated to the Defence Research and Development Organisation for developing and testing “long-endurance [48-72 hours] Unmanned Aerial Vehicles [UAVs] and Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles [UCAVs].”

So far as the drone programme was concerned, April 17, 2014 Airbus commercial satellite imagery appeared to show two areas isolated with 10 km and 5 km walls, as well as a 3.5 km runway and a secondary runway that was “clearly visible” south of this area, believed to be in DRDO’s test centre for long-endurance UAVs and UCAVs.

Evidence supporting these conjectures was compiled from commercial satellite photographs attributed to Airbus, as well as publicly available information, noted ISIS, including reports by environmental groups that have sought to challenge the siting of the BARC facility in Karnataka as illegal.

ISIS report authors David Albright and Serena Kelleher-Vergantini said the new facility “will significantly increase India’s ability to produce enriched uranium for both civil and military purposes, including nuclear weapons,” and urged India to therefore announce that the SMEF would be subject to International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards, committed only to peaceful uses.

N-suppliers warned

The report also alerted other governments and suppliers of nuclear-related dual use goods to the need for vigilance “to prevent efforts by Indian trading and manufacturing companies to acquire such goods,” for either plant.

At the heart of India’s apparently strong enrichment thrust is an urgent need for Highly Enriched Uranium for the indigenously developed INS Arihant nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine and probably for nuclear and thermonuclear weapons.

The geopolitics of the Islamic state

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi welcomed this Ramadan by declaring the formation of the Caliphate, with him as the Caliph — namely the successor of the Prophet Mohammed. It is the first return of a Caliphate since Kemal Atatürk’s Turkish National Assembly abolished it in 1924. Al-Baghdadi, the nom de guerre for the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), has now announced that borders inside thedar al-Islam , the world of Islam, are no longer applicable. He has been able to make this announcement because his fighters have now taken large swathes of territory in northern Syria and in north-central Iraq, breathing down on Baghdad, the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate (750-1258).

Al-Baghdadi’s declaration comes after ISIS threatened to make its presence felt outside the territory it now controls. Bomb blasts in Beirut, Lebanon, hinted at ISIS’ reach. Jordanian authorities hastened to crack down on “sleeper cells” for ISIS as soon as chatter on social media suggested that there would be a push into Zarqa and Ma’an. Private Kuwaiti funding had helped ISIS in its early stages, but now Kuwait hinted that it too is worried that ISIS cells might strike the oil-rich emirate. When ISIS took the Jordan-Syria border posts, Saudi Arabia went into high alert. There is no substantive evidence that ISIS is in touch with al-Qaeda in Yemen, but if such coordination exists (now that al-Baghdadi has fashioned himself as the Caliph) it would mean Saudi Arabia has at least two fronts of concern. “All necessary measures,” says the Kingdom, are being taken to thwart the ISIS advance.

Jihad hub

Several months ago, two intelligence agencies in the Arab region had confirmed that ISIS is a genuine threat, not a manufactured distraction from the war in Syria. Many of those associated with the rebellion in Syria had suggested that ISIS was egged on by the government of Bashar al-Assad to allow his preferred framing of the Syrian war — that his is a war against terrorism and not against a civic rebellion. While it is true that Assad’s government released a number of jihadis in 2011, there is no evidence to suggest that he created ISIS. ISIS is a product of the U.S. war on Iraq, having been formed first as al-Qaeda in Iraq by the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Deeply sectarian politics, namely an anti-Shia agenda, characterised al-Qaeda in this region. Funded by private Gulf Arab money, ISIS entered the Syrian war in 2012 as Jabhat al-Nusra (the Support Front). It certainly turned a civic rebellion into a terrorist war. Political support from the West and logistical support from Turkey and the Gulf Arab states allowed it to thrive in Syria. It became a hub for international jihad , with veterans from Afghanistan and Chechnya now flocking to al-Baghdadi’s band of fellows. By the start of 2014, ISIS held two major Iraqi cities (Ramadi and Fallujah) and two Syrian cities (Raqqa and Deir Ezzor). Their push to Mosul, then Baghdad was on the cards for at least a year.

The West has been consistently naive in its public assessment of events in West Asia. U.S. policy over Syria was befuddled by the belief that the Arab Spring could be understood simply as a fight between freedom and tyranny — concepts adopted from the Cold War. There was a refusal to accept that the civic rebellion of 2011 had morphed quite decisively by late 2012 into a much more dangerous conflict, with the radical jihadis in the ascendancy. It is of course true, as I saw first-hand, that the actual fighters in the jihad groups are a ragtag bunch with no special commitment to this or that ideology. They are anti-Assad, and they joined Jabhat al-Nusra or Ahra¯r ash-Sha¯m because that was the group at hand with arms and logistical means. Nevertheless, the fighters did fight for these groups, giving them the upper hand against the West’s preferred, but anaemic, Free Syrian Army. The Islamic State’s breakthrough in Iraq has inspired some of these men to its formations in Syria. They want to be a part of the excitement.

The West’s backing of the rebellion provided cover for Turkey’s more enthusiastic approach to it. Intoxicated by the possibility of what Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutog˘lu favoured as “neo-Ottomanism,” the Turkish government called for the removal of Assad and the emergence of a pro-Istanbul government in Damascus. Turkey opened its borders to the “rat-line” of international jihad , with planeloads of fighters from Libya and Chechnya flying into Turkey to cross into Syria to fight for ISIS and its offshoots. ISIS spat in Turkey’s salt. ISIS struck Turkey in 2013 with car bombs and abductions, suggesting to Ankara that its policy has endangered its citizens. In March, the Governor of Hatay province, Mehmet Celalettin Lekesiz, called upon the government to create a new policy to “prevent the illegal crossing of militants to Syria.” His report was met with silence.

Blowback

An ISIS billboard in Mosul depicts the flags of the states in the region. All are crossed out as being traitorous regimes. Only the ISIS black flag stands as a sentinel for justice. Among the regimes to be overthrown is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has used its vast wealth to influence the region, and to outsource its own problems with extremism. In 1962, the Kingdom created the Muslim World League as an instrument against secular Arab nationalism and Communism. Twenty years later, the war in Afghanistan provided the opportunity for the Kingdom to export its own disaffected youth (including Osama bin Laden) to fight the Afghan Communists rather than their own royal family. The 1979 takeover of the Mecca mosque by jihadists was an indication of the threat of such youth. Saudi policy, however, did not save the Kingdom. Al-Qaeda, the product of this policy, threatened and attacked the Kingdom. But little was learned.

Saudi policy vis-à-vis Syria and Iraq repeats the Afghan story. Funds and political support for jihadis in the region came from the Kingdom and its Gulf allies. Saudi Arabia tried to stop its youth from going to the jihad — a perilous mistake that it had made with Afghanistan. On February 3, the King issued a decree forbidding such transit. But there is no pressure on Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies to stop their tacit support of ISIS and its cohort. Nor is there pressure on it to stop its financing of the harsh repression in Egypt, sure to fuel more conflict in the near future. The Arab world, flush with hope in 2011, is now drowning in a counter-revolution financed by petrodollars. Saudi Arabia’s response to the rise of ISIS misleads — no intervention to help the Iraqi state. “We are asked what can be done,” wrote its Ambassador to the U.K., Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdul Aziz. “At the moment, we wait, we watch and we pray.”

No age-old conflict

The fact is that both the West and the Gulf Arabs are doing more. They continue to finance the jihadirebels in Syria (all promises of vetting by the U.S. are comical), and they continue to see the Assad government as an obstacle to peace in the region. Both the West and the Gulf Arabs suggest that the terrorism that they dislike against themselves is acceptable to others. The history of their policies also suggests that Western and Gulf Arab intervention leads inexorably to the creation of police states (as in Egypt) and terrorist emirates. A lack of basic commitment to people’s movements — anchored in unions and in civic groups — will always lead to such diabolical outcomes.

Meanwhile, sectarian lines are being hardened in the region. The battle now does not revisit the ancient fight at Karbala. This is not an age-old conflict. It is a modern one, over ideas of republicanism and monarchy, Iranian influence and Saudi influence. Shadows of sectarianism do shroud the battle of ordinary people who are frustrated by the lack of opportunities for them and by the lack of a future for their children. What motivates these fights is less the petty prejudices of sect and more the grander ambitions of regional control. Al-Baghdadi has announced that his vision is much greater than that of the Saudi King or the government in Tehran. He wants to command a religion, not just a region. Of such delusions are great societies and cultures destroyed.

(Vijay Prashad is the Edward Said Chair at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon.)

Sectarian lines are being hardened in the Arab region.

The battle now does not revisit the ancient fight at Karbala. This is not an age-old conflict. It is a modern one, over ideas

of republicanism and monarchy, Iranian influence and

Saudi influence.

Both the West and the Gulf Arabs suggest that

the terrorism that they dislike against themselves is acceptable to others. The history of their policies also suggests that their intervention leads inexorably to the creation of police states and terrorist emirates. A lack of basic commitment

to people’s movements will always lead to such diabolical outcomes

India should welcome foreign defence firms

Defending borders needs high-class equipment and not high-class debate

Illustration: Shyamal Banerjee/Mint

India has tied itself into knots on permitting foreign direct investment (FDI) in various sectors of the economy. One domain has proved particularly nettlesome: defence manufacturing.

Currently, India allows FDI up to 26% in defence. Further investment requires a clearance from the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), one of the highest decision-making bodies in India. A CCS approval is the mother of all political-cum-bureaucratic battles, virtually signalling no entry for any investor.

The Narendra Modigovernment may change things. There are plans to raise the level of FDI in defence to upto 49% without transfer of technology and above that with technology transfers. India’s private sector—which has shown increasing interest in this market—wants this upper limit on FDI in this sector. This virtually amounts to raising a protective barrier to keep the local defence manufacturing industry shielded. It should be avoided and the government should think through the matter. For a change, the government should allow the armed forces, the ultimate consumers of these goods, a say in policymaking. They will have a very different perspective to the one of local manufacturers, at whose mercy they often find themselves.

Unlike FDI in most sectors, the defence sector has characteristics that merit special attention. For example, defence supplies and spares are crucial in the time of war and when the threat of external hostilities is high. At that juncture, the country can be threatened by suppliers who may want to charge exorbitant amounts for equipment. They may also withhold supplies for political reasons. This is one ground for attempting self-reliance/indigenization in defence manufacturing. That has not taken off in the last 60 odd years: India continues to rely on foreign manufacturers for getting major defence equipment.

If, instead, foreign manufacturers come and set shop in India, the government should welcome them. Unlike equipment manufactured at facilities abroad, sophisticated equipment made by foreign manufacturers on Indian soil is a different matter.

The danger, that in case of war supplies can be shut down can be minimized. The Union government can enter into various safeguards to ensure that such an eventuality does not come to pass. It can, for example, insist that a sufficient number of Indian citizens be employed in key technical positions; it can also insist that in case of war if the manufacturer refuses to supply the quantity of equipment ordered, the government can take over the manufacturing facility.

These are far-fetched possibilities. India has spent close to $50 billion in the past five years on military expenditure (based on constant 2011 value of the dollar). This market is growing and the country is poised to vastly modernize its defence forces in the years ahead. No foreign manufacturer who sets up shop in India is likely to make mistakes and lose this market and its investment in plant and equipment. For that reason—coupled with the safeguards that any government should insist on—FDI in defence manufacturing should be encouraged.

From that perspective, conditions such as insistence on technology transfers, “offset” clauses—the purchase of local materials as a percentage of the overall purchase made from the foreign company—and other restrictive clauses are self-defeating. India’s priority at the moment should be to ensure a steady supply of high quality equipment.

This should not be confused with other objectives such as fostering a local defence industry. There are strategic projects—for example the construction of nuclear submarines and the design and manufacturing of missiles—that should be executed locally. These fall in the class of technologies that no country, even one’s strategic partners, would be willing to supply. Let India’s domestic companies prove their mettle on this ground. If they succeed, their success should be welcomed and their participation in our defence market welcomed. But the country’s defence does not brook an infant industry argument. Defending our borders is too vital a task for that ideological exercise.

Six laws to police high seas, haze on who enforces them

Five years after terrorists sneaked in from the Arabian Sea and unleashed terror in Mumbai, India remains clueless about the government agencies that should check and investigate offences committed on high seas.

Following a Supreme Court order in the Italian marines case, the Ministry of Home Affairs asked the states and central ministries to identify the legal entities guarding and implementing the rule of law in country’s territorial and international waters.

It found that in six offshore acts/rules, the agencies empowered to track their violations had not been set up or appointed or, worse, the establishment was unaware of the progress of the notification. “…There is no clarity on the status of the notification of the enforcement and investigation agencies under these acts/rules for various offences in territorial and international waters (contiguous zone, EEZ and continental shelf) and instances have been noticed that notification of enforcement and investigation agencies are still pending under some of the acts/rules,” the MHA realised.

Faced with a lackadaisical response, the MHA last March asked the states and central ministries to prepare a “status report” to track the notification of enforcement and investigation agencies appointed under the n Maritime Zone Act of 1973

# Maritime Zones of India (Regulation of Fishing by Foreign Vessels) Act of 1981

# Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against Safety of Maritime Navigation & Fixed Platform on Continental Shelf Act of 2002

#  Merchant Shipping (Presentation & Pollution of the Sea by Oil) Rule of 1974

# Offshore Areas Mineral (Development & Regulation) Act of 2002

#  Petroleum and Natural Gas (Safety & Offshore Operations) Rules of 2008.

Interestingly, officials said, the April 15 deadline for submission of reports has passed and only two departments out of the five had responded so far.

The realisation of tardy execution of acts and rules would not have dawned upon the MHA but for the court’s January 2013 order in the marines case limiting Kerala police jurisdiction to investigate offences only in territorial waters (12 nautical miles from the shore) and central agencies’ regime beyond territorial waters and up to the exclusive economic zone (200 nautical miles).