Nuclear weapons serve two functions: they help keep predators away and they offer something to keep scientists busy with.
Nukes do not make a people safe or secure. They do not improve a country’s morale – a key ingredient in progress.
Attack and defence have been part of the human narrative far more than sense and reason. So, in a big bad world, no country wants to be sitting duck. But even by that yardstick, Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme – the fastest growing in the world– is excessive.
America’s George Mason University says Pakistan could have enough fissile material by 2020 to arm 200 nuclear devices with 11 delivery systems. Pakistan is a broke and failed state in a perpetual flirt with disintegration. What possibly could it need 200 nuclear weapons for?
An alibi Pakistan has for burning time, money and energy on a nuclear stockpile is that it seeks to intimidate India. For some reason, Islamabad seems to think that New Delhi is willing to go to war with Pakistan, conquer the country and take ownership of all its bad news.
India has other concerns at the moment. By 2020, when Pakistan wishes to have 200 nuclear weapons, India seeks to have clean public spaces and institutions, control over disease, smarter and wider education systems for its young, and resurgence in manufacturing.
Pakistan is on hold in India. There are no plans right now to engage on the battlefield with Pakistan.
A second reason for Pakistan’s rush to stockpile nukes is fear of the United States. A school of thought in Islamabad says Washington might have plans to strike and seize Pakistani nuclear weapons before they reach terrorist outfits.
This is odd. It suggests that Pakistan already has a trust issue with friends over its nukes. When friends think of intervening – although the US probably isn’t – Pakistan wants to make the problem so big that even allies leave it to its doom.
src:sify.com