US DoD 1999 Forecast: "Pakistan Disappears By 2015"

[Riaz Haq]

Asia 2025, a US Defense Department Study produced in summer of 1999, forecast that Pakistan would "disappear" as an independent state by 2015. It further forecast that Pakistan would become part of a "South Asian Superstate" controlled by India as a "regional hegemon".  Two Indian-American "South Asia experts" contributed to this study.  Much of the forecast in its "New South Asian Order" section appears to be wishful thinking of its Indian contributors.

New South Asian Order:

Here are the Key Points of Pentagon's Asia 2025 Report on South Asia region:

1. Pakistan is "near collapse" in 2010 while India is making "broad progress".

2.  Iranian "moderation" in 2010 while Afghanistan remains "anarchic hotbed".

3. Pakistan is "paralyzed" after an "Indo-Pak war 2012".

4. US launches conventional strike on "remaining Pakistan nukes" after the "Indo-Pak war 2012.

5. China "blinks at US-India Collusion".

6. Pakistan "disappears".

Indian-American Contributors: 

The list of people who contributed to this study included two Indian-Americans:  Ashley Tellis and Rajan Memon. Both of these gentlemen are considered "leading South Asia experts" in the United States.  Much of the forecast in "New South Asia Order" appears to be wishful thinking of these two Indian-American contributors.

Ashley J. Tellis is now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace specializing in international security, defense, and Asian strategic issues.  He was with the US government think tank  RAND Corp at the time the Asia 2025 report was written.

Rajan Menon is currently professor of political science at the City University of New York. He was teaching at Lehigh University back in 1999.

Earlier Forecasts of Pakistan's "Collapse":

Western and Indian forecasts of Pakistan's collapse are not new.  Lord Mountbatten, the British Viceroy of India who oversaw the partition agreed with the assessment of Pakistan made by India's leaders when he described Pakistan as a "Nissen hut" or a "temporary tent" in a conversation with Jawarhar Lal Nehru.

Here's the exact quote from Mountbatten: "administratively it [wa]s the difference between putting up a permanent building, a nissen hut or a tent. As far as Pakistan is concerned we are putting up a tent. We can do no more." The Brits and the Hindu leadership of India both fully expected Pakistan to fold soon after partition.

Dire Post-911 Forecasts of Pakistan's Demise: 

Many western analysts have forecast Pakistan's demise as Pakistan struggles to deal with terrorism at home. Among them is former President George W. Bush's adviser David Kilcullen.

"We're now reaching the point where within one to six months we could see the collapse of the Pakistani state, also because of the global financial crisis, which just exacerbates all these problems. . . . The collapse of Pakistan, al-Qaeda acquiring nuclear weapons, an extremist takeover -- that would dwarf everything we've seen in the war on terror today", said Bush Iraq adviser, David Kilcullen, on the eve of Pakistan Day in 2009 commemorating Pakistan Resolution of 1940 that started the Pakistan Movement leading to the creation of the nation on August 14, 1947. Kilcullen is not alone in the belief that Pakistani state is in danger of collapse.

Others, such as Shahan Mufti of the Global Post, argued in 2009 that Pakistan is dying a slow death with each act of terrorism on its soil.

Resilient Pakistan:

Pakistan has defied many dire forecasts of doom and gloom since its birth. Some Indian and western writers and journalists present caricatures of Pakistan that bear no resemblance to reality.  They portray Pakistan as a artificial and deeply divided failed state. What they fail to see is  Pakistan is not one or two dimensional; it's much more complex as explained by Christophe Jaffrelot in his book "The Pakistan Paradox: Instability and Resilience".

Political, military, religious, ethnic, sectarian, secular,  conservative and liberal forces are constantly pushing and pulling to destabilize it but Pakistan remains resilient with its strong nationalism that has evolved after 1971. Pakistan is neither a delusion nor owned by mullahs or military as claimed by some of Pakistan's detractors.

In a 2015 Op Ed for NDTV titled "What Modi Has Not Recognized About Pakistan", Indian politician Mani Shankar Aiyar recognized Pakistani nationalism as follows:

"..unlike numerous other emerging nations, particularly in Africa, the Idea of Pakistan has repeatedly trumped fissiparous tendencies, especially since Pakistan assumed its present form in 1971. And its institutions have withstood repeated buffeting that almost anywhere elsewhere would have resulted in the State crumbling. Despite numerous dire forecasts of imminently proving to be a "failed state", Pakistan has survived, bouncing back every now and then as a recognizable democracy with a popularly elected civilian government, the military in the wings but politics very much centre-stage, linguistic and regional groups pulling and pushing, sectarian factions murdering each other, but the Government of Pakistan remaining in charge, and the military stepping in to rescue the nation from chaos every time Pakistan appeared on the knife's edge. The disintegration of Pakistan has been predicted often enough, most passionately now that internally-generated terrorism and externally sponsored religious extremism are consistently taking on the state to the point that the army is so engaged in full-time and full-scale operations in the north-west of the country bordering Afghanistan that some 40,000 lives have been lost in the battle against fanaticism and insurgency".

Summary:

A 1999 US Defense Department study titled "Asia 2025" forecast Pakistan's collapse by 2015.  It further said that Pakistan would become part of a "South Asian Superstate" controlled by India as a "regional hegemon". Two of the study's contributors were "South Asia experts" of Indian origin. Much of the South Asia section of this study appears to be wishful thinking rather than serious analysis.  Resilient Pakistan has defied this and many other similar forecasts of its demise since its birth. 

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[Riaz Haq]

The Budding Arms Race Among China, India, and Pakistan
By Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr.
May 26, 2023


https://www.foreignaffairs.com/china/nuclear-collision-course-south...



There is also an asymmetry in the three powers’ strategic focus. Pakistani security officials are obsessed with India, while India’s focus is overwhelmingly on China. China’s sights, however, have shifted beyond regional to global rivalries, principally with the United States. It is this competition with Washington that is driving Beijing’s nuclear breakout. For China, India’s deterrent is rapidly assuming a peripheral role, similar to that played by China in American nuclear planning during the Cold War.

Beijing’s support for Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program, which includes providing Islamabad with blueprints for a bomb and fissile material, has further complicated India’s position. Pakistan’s leaders are looking to abandon minimum deterrence in favor of “full-spectrum deterrence,” where their nuclear forces cover multiple contingencies in the event of war with India. There are three central factors spurring Pakistani officials to adopt this more aggressive posture. First, Islamabad is aware that its conventional forces are weaker than India’s and believes it has no alternative but to employ, if need be, its nuclear forces to offset this asymmetry. Second, given that India is far larger than Pakistan, Islamabad believes it must be able to inflict greater destruction on India in a retaliatory strike than India will inflict on it. This requires Pakistan to maintain a larger nuclear arsenal to target India’s population and economic hubs in the event of war. Third, Pakistan also hopes that its nuclear forces prevent India from undertaking large-scale military action against it in response to Islamabad’s ongoing support for militant groups in the disputed region of Kashmir.

Tellis shows that accomplishing full-spectrum deterrence will require Pakistan to expand its arsenal substantially. For instance, he notes that stopping a major advance of Indian conventional forces into Pakistani territory would require scores of so-called tactical nuclear weapons, weapons that Islamabad currently lacks.

A FRAGILE PEACE
Although Tellis argues that Beijing’s and Islamabad’s nuclear provocations do not automatically portend growing instability in the region, the evidence he presents suggests otherwise. He finds that Beijing’s growing arsenal will not necessarily place India’s security at greater risk—but describes a set of highly plausible Chinese actions that, in combination with a superpower-sized arsenal, risk undermining India’s confidence in its own nuclear deterrent.

To begin with, Beijing is seeking the capability to launch nuclear reprisals far more quickly than ever before. This requires China to maintain a portion of its force on heightened alert, which may not have posed a threat to India when China possessed a few hundred weapons. But if Beijing placed a significant percentage of its expanded arsenal of 1,000 or more warheads on high alert, the strategic ground would shift considerably. India would now face a neighbor capable of launching a large-scale attack with little or no warning.

India’s ability to withstand a nuclear strike and retain the capacity to inflict catastrophic destruction in response is closely tied to the security of its underground nuclear storage sites. China currently lacks the ability to destroy them—even assuming it knows their locations. That could change, however, once China’s arsenal has more than 1,000 warheads, especially if China improves the accuracy of its weapons. Such a development, combined with Beijing’s adoption of increased alert levels for its nuclear forces, would set alarm bells ringing in New Delhi; Indian officials could conclude that China has the capacity to disarm India’s nuclear weapons arsenal.

[Riaz Haq]

The Budding Arms Race Among China, India, and Pakistan
By Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr.
May 26, 2023


https://www.foreignaffairs.com/china/nuclear-collision-course-south...



India’s ability to withstand a nuclear strike and retain the capacity to inflict catastrophic destruction in response is closely tied to the security of its underground nuclear storage sites. China currently lacks the ability to destroy them—even assuming it knows their locations. That could change, however, once China’s arsenal has more than 1,000 warheads, especially if China improves the accuracy of its weapons. Such a development, combined with Beijing’s adoption of increased alert levels for its nuclear forces, would set alarm bells ringing in New Delhi; Indian officials could conclude that China has the capacity to disarm India’s nuclear weapons arsenal.

China may also enhance its air and missile defenses, making matters even more precarious for India. These defenses would minimize the threat posed by any “broken-back” Indian nuclear retaliation—in other words, an attack that uses whatever weapons survive a disarming Chinese strike. But New Delhi would surely know that employing the remnants of its arsenal to retaliate against China would leave it vulnerable to Pakistani nuclear blackmail. Put simply, India would risk being left with no credible nuclear deterrent to resist coercion by Islamabad.

Tellis is correct to note that China’s development of these capabilities is not assured. Yet during Beijing’s decades-old conventional military buildup, it has sought to match every significant U.S. capability, including stealth fighters, military satellite constellations, aircraft carriers, and cyberweaponry. Tellis recognizes that even if China creates such a set of capabilities, it must still know the location of India’s storage sites in order to target them—and have high confidence that its intelligence is accurate and comprehensive. This uncertainty could restrain Beijing. But at the same time, New Delhi may not feel comfortable simply trusting that its nuclear sites have not yet been unearthed by Chinese intelligence or presuming that Chinese leaders are wary of taking big risks.

NEW DELHI’S DILEMMA
How might India respond to China’s and Pakistan’s nuclear provocations? Tellis points out that India is not without options—but that each path has its pitfalls.

First, he shows that if India wanted to, it could easily match China weapon for weapon. Yet he believes New Delhi would prefer to maintain its minimum deterrent strategy, emphasizing its ability to inflict severe damage on its adversaries’ cities. This stems in no small part from the expense India would incur by following Beijing in its quest to match America’s nuclear arsenal. Still, Tellis acknowledges that India’s arsenal will have to expand its nuclear holdings to possess the warheads needed to inflict unacceptable damage on both China and Pakistan. And as India increases its arsenal, Pakistan is sure to do the same—completing the regional chain reaction triggered by China’s nuclear expansion.

Tellis rejects the “more of the same” option of expanding India’s underground storage facilities, showing persuasively that it would prove costlier to accomplish than it would for China to simply expand the number of weapons needed to destroy them. Rather, he argues, India’s solution is to be found in stealth and mobility. This could be achieved by creating a nuclear ballistic missile submarine force and by shifting more of India’s arsenal to mobile road and rail missile launchers.

[Riaz Haq]

The Budding Arms Race Among China, India, and Pakistan
By Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr.
May 26, 2023


https://www.foreignaffairs.com/china/nuclear-collision-course-south...



As for China’s air and missile defenses, Tellis points out that India might address the problem by deploying penetration aid decoys on its missiles. These decoys are designed to present themselves as actual warheads to missile defense radars, thereby inducing the defender to expend precious interceptor missiles engaging false targets. This would offset, if only partially, New Delhi’s need to expand its nuclear arsenal.


The United States could provide India with a reliable thermonuclear weapon design.
Yet even if India were to pursue these actions, it would still face significant challenges. The threat of a Chinese preemptive strike may compel India to develop an effective early warning system to enable it to reduce its arsenal’s vulnerability by sending its weapons out to sea and flushing its land-based missiles from their silos. New Delhi would also have to establish a new command-and-control system to direct the actions of its nuclear submarines. Yet while India is in the process of constructing nuclear-powered ballistic submarines, it still has a long way to go in building a significant force and overcoming the technological hurdles necessary to create a credible seaborne nuclear deterrent. Tellis notes that among these challenges, New Delhi is experiencing problems with its naval nuclear reactor designs.

Then there are India’s nuclear weapons. New Delhi has only conducted a handful of nuclear tests—not enough to validate its thermonuclear designs to offer high confidence that these weapons will perform as designed. Its most reliable weapon has a yield of 12 kilotons, whereas China’s weapons have yields as much as 100 times greater. Addressing these shortfalls may require India to resume testing—and risk incurring sanctions from the United States and other nations.

Tellis hints at a tantalizing solution to India’s problems. The United States could provide India with a reliable thermonuclear weapon design. The trilateral security pact among Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States that is known as AUKUS, which will assist Australia in acquiring nuclear-powered submarines, could be expanded to include India. Might the Americans also share their nuclear reactor designs with New Delhi? But for this to happen, India, which has kept the United States at arm’s length practically since its birth, would have to finally and firmly close ranks with the leading Indo-Pacific democracies and formally forsake the nonaligned strategic autonomy it has long enshrined at the heart of its foreign policy.