An American journalist travelling through Pakistan in 2002 was taken aback at the sight of the “craggy, Gibraltarish replica of a nameless peak in the Chagai range in the center of the biggest traffic circle of every major city”. That craggy peak in Balochistan was Pakistan’s nuclear test site. The journalist, Peter Landesman, went on to observe: “The development, in 1998, of the ‘Islamic Bomb,’ intended as a counter to India’s nuclear capability, is Pakistan’s only celebrated achievement since its formation, in 1947.” That harsh comment paled before his account of a conversation with a retired, “slightly depressed” Pakistani brigadier in his early fifties, who had once served as head of Pakistan’s military intelligence in Sindh Province.
Landesman and Brigadier Amanullah had met at the Islamabad house of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, for whom Amanullah worked after retiring from the army. There, a painting caught Landesman’s eye. It depicted Pakistan’s founder, Jinnah, as a towering figure, flanked by other leaders, with Islamabad spread out below them. “Jinnah’s arm pointed to the vast plain beyond the city, where a rocket was lifting out of billowing clouds of vapor and fire into the sky,” Landesman recalled.
The brigadier noticed the journalist looking at the painting and the two spoke about what it represented. “A nuclear warhead heading to India,” said the brigadier. Landesman initially thought the retired soldier was making a joke, and then realised that he wasn’t.
The American expressed his consternation over “the ease with which Pakistanis talk of nuclear war with India”. “No,” the brigadier responded matter-of-factly: “This should happen. We should use the bomb.” In the brigadier’s opinion, it was all right for Pakistan to use nukes not only in retaliation but also for a first strike.
The brigadier then “launched into a monologue” that reflected both his anger and his depression. “We should fire at them and take out a few of their cities – Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta,” he said. “They should fire back and take Karachi and Lahore. Kill off a hundred or two hundred million people…They have acted so badly toward us; they have been so mean. We should teach them a lesson. It would teach all of us a lesson.”
The brigadier’s monologue continued: “There is no future here, and we need to start over…So many people think this. Have you been to the villages of Pakistan, the interior? There is nothing but dire poverty and pain. The children have no education; there is nothing to look forward to. Go into the villages, see the poverty. There is no drinking water. Small children without shoes walk miles for a drink of water. I go to the villages and I want to cry. My children have no future. None of the children of Pakistan have a future. We are surrounded by nothing but war and suffering. Millions should die away.”
The brigadier blamed India squarely for Pakistan’s backwardness, not its leaders’ decisions to invest in the military at the expense of human development. And he seemed to ignore completely the extent of India’s own poverty. To him, a nuclear attack was justified because “tens of thousands of people are dying in Kashmir, and the only superpower says nothing.” He complained that America had sided with India because it has interests there and repeated that he was willing to see his children killed.
Of course, Landesman’s account, which he published under the title A Modest Proposal from the Brigadier, does not represent policy or even reasoned discussion in Pakistan’s decision-making circles. It does, however, reflect the fervour that has led Pakistan to become the world’s only nuclear weapon power (excluding possibly North Korea) that abjures committing to a “no first use” policy about weapons of mass destruction. Pakistan is also the only country in the world that publicly says that its nukes exist solely for defence against a specific country – India.
As recently as March 2016, Pakistan’s foreign affairs adviser, Sartaj Aziz, said that “India, not terrorism, is the biggest threat to the region” and asked India to reduce its nuclear stockpile so that Pakistan can consider reciprocation. The claim of India being the biggest threat seemed hollow, given that 40,000 Pakistanis have reportedly been killed or injured at the hands of terrorists. Pakistan’s economy, its international relations and the ability of its citizens to travel abroad with ease have all suffered because of it. Still Sartaj Aziz insisted that India imperiled Pakistan more than terrorism. He reflects Pakistan’s fixation with India, which US President George W Bush once described as an “obsession”.
Excerpted with permission from India vs Pakistan: Why Can't We Just Be Friends? by Husain Haqqani, Juggernaut Books.