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Gurmeet Kanwal, Sharpening the Arsenal: India's Evolving Nuclear Deterrence Policy, (Harper Collins, New Delhi, 2017), Pages: 272, Price: Rs. 599.00
Gurmeet Kanwal, one of India's foremost military analysts, has been thinking and writing about India's nuclear policy for over two decades. That makes his voice one of the most authoritative on the subject, outside of the government. His latest offering can be seen as a continuation of his previous book on India's nuclear policy, Shaping the Arsenal. This is a thoughtful and excellent contribution to the ongoing debate about India's nuclear doctrine that hopefully India's decision-makers would take note of.
Here, Kanwal covers all the key issues and debates around India's nuclear arsenal, outlining India's current status and its options on a whole host of key issues. Kanwal comes out of the K. Subrahmanyam/Jasjit Singh school of nuclear policy which strongly advocates a limited nuclear force mated to a No First Use doctrine under tight control, monitored and commanded by the civilian leadership, even if operationally under the control of the military. Nevertheless, even those who advocate a limited nuclear arsenal cannot but be concerned by the glacial pace of the development of India's strategic capabilities. More than three decades after the Indian ballistic missile programme was initiated, India still does not have a missile with sufficient range to cover all of China, its principal adversary. Considering that the distance from the southern tip of India to the farthest point in China is about 6800 kilometres, and that the effective range of ballistic missiles is 70-90 percent of their total range, India would need a missile with a...