En el mes de marzo, mientras el mundo segu\u00eda con preocupaci\u00f3n la evoluci\u00f3n de la invasi\u00f3n de Rusia a Ucrania, se produjo el disparo accidental por parte de India, de un misil Brahmos II que puede ser equipado con cabezas de guerra convencionales y nucleares. Si bien el mismo no estaba equipado con cabeza de guerra nuclear, al impactar en territorio de Pakist\u00e1n, podr\u00eda haber iniciado una escalada con consecuencias catastr\u00f3ficas en esa regi\u00f3n, ya que ambos pa\u00edses disponen de la capacidad nuclear en su armamento. Los sistemas misil\u00edsticos son extremadamente complejos y por ello, susceptibles a los accidentes normalmente por fallas humanas. El hecho que estas armas dispongan de la capacidad dual (Conv \u2013 Nuclear) genera adem\u00e1s un riesgo latente, al resultar dif\u00edcil para el pa\u00eds agredido, determinar si se trata de un accidente, una advertencia o un ataque concreto y, en el breve tiempo que el misil est\u00e1 en curso, los decisores deben resolver cu\u00e1l ser\u00e1 la respuesta en cada caso.<\/p>\n
Last month, while most of the world focused on the war in Ukraine and worried that a beleaguered Russian leadership might resort to nuclear weapons, thus escalating the conflict into a direct war with the U.S.-led NATO nuclear-armed alliance, a nearly tragic accident involving India and Pakistan pointed to another path to nuclear war. The accident highlighted how complex technological systems, including those involving nuclear weapons, can generate unexpected routes to potential disaster\u2014especially when managed by overconfident organizations.<\/p>\n
India and Pakistan possess\u00a0more than 300 nuclear weapons<\/a>\u00a0between them, and have fought multiple wars and faced many military crises. On March 9, three years after their dispute over Kashmir escalated into\u00a0attacks by jet fighters<\/a>, the Pakistan Air Force\u00a0detected<\/a>\u00a0\u201ca high speed flying object\u201d inside Indian territory change course and veer suddenly toward Pakistan.* It flew deep into Pakistan and crashed. The object was a\u00a0BrahMos cruise missile<\/a>, a weapon system developed jointly by India and Russia. India soon stated the launch\u00a0was an accident<\/a>.<\/p>\n The firing of the BrahMos missile falls within a long history of accidents involving military systems in India. Military\u00a0aircraft<\/a>\u00a0have strayed across the borders during peacetime. India\u2019s first nuclear submarine was reportedly \u201ccrippled<\/a>\u201d by an accident in 2018, but the government\u00a0refused to divulge<\/a>\u00a0any details. Secrecy has prevented the investigation of\u00a0an apparent failure of India’s ballistic missile defence system<\/a>\u00a0in 2016. Engagements between India and Pakistan can arise from such accidents, as in 1999 when a\u00a0Pakistani military plane was shot down<\/a>\u00a0along the border by India, killing 16 people. Pakistan has had its share of accidents, including a Pakistani fighter jet\u00a0crashing<\/a>\u00a0into the capital city in 2020.<\/p>\n All these weapons systems are inherently accident-prone because of two characteristics identified by organizational sociologist Charles Perrow decades ago\u2014interactive complexity and tight coupling\u2014that combine to make accidents a \u201cnormal\u201d feature of the operation of some hazardous technologies. The first characteristic refers to the possibility that different parts of the system can affect each other in unexpected ways, thus producing unanticipated outcomes. The second makes it hard to stop the resulting sequence of events. For Perrow, \u201cthe dangerous accidents lie in the system, not in the components<\/a>,\u201d and are inevitable.<\/p>\n Perhaps the best and most troubling proof of this proposition is in the realm\u00a0of nuclear weapons<\/a>\u2014which embody all the properties of high-risk technological systems. Despite decades of efforts to ensure safety, these systems have\u00a0suffered many failures, accidents<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0close calls<\/a>. During 1979\u20131980, for example, there were\u00a0several false warnings of Soviet missile attacks<\/a>, some of which resulted in U.S. nuclear forces being put on alert. \u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n Illustrating political theorist Beno\u00eet Pelopidas\u2019s observation that luck has long played a \u201ccrucial role … in preserving the world from nuclear devastation<\/a>,\u201d the BrahMos accident was not more consequential because of three lucky circumstances. First, the missile was not armed with a warhead. Second, the accident occurred during peacetime, not during a bout of armed conflict or a period of military tension between the two countries; had that been the case, the Pakistani military might have interpreted it as a deliberate attack and responded militarily. Third, BrahMos apparently is not designed to carry nuclear weapons. But\u00a0India<\/a>\u00a0has cruise missiles that can carry nuclear warheads, as does\u00a0Pakistan<\/a>.<\/p>\n Compounding the risk is the mobility of India\u2019s\u00a0expanding fleet of nuclear capable missiles<\/a>. These can be launched quickly from\u00a0specially developed vehicles<\/a>\u00a0that move around on roads or rails\u2014meaning that military planners in Pakistan and China, the nuclear-armed neighbors against whom India has\u00a0war plans<\/a>, have to be prepared for sudden missile launches from almost anywhere in India\u2019s vast landmass.<\/p>\n Given the secretive nature of Indian nuclear policymaking, little is known about India\u2019s nuclear\u00a0command and control system<\/a>. However, the 1999\u00a0Draft Nuclear Doctrine<\/a>\u00a0called for \u201cassured capability to shift from peacetime deployment to fully employable forces\u00a0in the shortest possible time<\/em>.\u201d (Emphasis added.) The combination of technology and plans for being able to rapidly launch nuclear weapons raises the risk of accidental and inadvertent escalation to nuclear war.<\/p>\n South Asia\u2019s geography is pitiless. It would\u00a0only take five to 10 minutes<\/a>\u00a0for a missile launched from India to attack Pakistan\u2019s national capital, nuclear weapon command posts or bases. For comparison, the flight times between missile launch sites and targets in the United States and Russia are about 30 minutes. Even this extra time may be insufficient. In the event of a military crisis, no leader can make a judicious decision during this period, when faced with\u00a0impossible choices<\/a>. But shorter\u00a0flight times<\/a>\u00a0increase the\u00a0likelihood of mistakes<\/a>.<\/p>\n The mistake that is of greatest concern is a false alarm of an incoming nuclear attack, possibly directed against nuclear forces. Indian or Pakistani\u2014or Russian or NATO\u2014policy makers may find themselves under immense pressure to launch a preemptive attack, thereby compounding the crisis. The terrible dilemma confronting them would be whether to use their nuclear weapons first or wait for the bombs from the other side to land. Nuclear war, even of a limited nature, between India and Pakistan could\u00a0lead to millions of deaths<\/a>\u00a0in the short term and even graver consequences in the longer term for the region and beyond.<\/p>\n Compounding these dangers is the overconfidence of India\u2019s officials, who displayed no recognition of the gravity of the Brahmos accident. A \u201ctechnical malfunction\u201d had \u201cled to the accidental firing of a missile,\u201d the official statement declared, noting glibly \u201cit is learnt that the missile landed in an area of Pakistan<\/a>.\u201d India\u2019s defense minister assured parliament members that the system is \u201cvery reliable and safe<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n As the legendary analyst of nuclear command and control\u00a0Bruce Blair<\/a>\u00a0warned, among nuclear weapon system managers and operators there is an \u201cillusion of safety<\/a>\u201d that masks \u201cthe systematic potential for tragedy on a monumental scale.\u201d Whether it is India and Pakistan preparing for a fifth war, or the forces of a nuclear-armed Russia struggling ever more violently to subdue Ukraine and stem the flow of lethal NATO weapons, such illusions threaten the destruction of cities and may lead to the killing of nations.<\/p>\n