India’s Perceptions of China’s Nuclear Advancement

you're listening to an event from the US Institute of Peace part of the US iip podcast Network for more information about our work around the world visit usp.org and check us out on social media hello and welcome to the US Institute of Peace uh and our webinar on India's perceptions of China's nuclear advancement I'm Dan Mary a senior adviser here at the US Institute of Peace and it's my pleasure to be joined by three great experts on this topic the first is Dr Raji ropan and she is the author of an important new usip special report that we commissioned in an effort to better understand how India is thinking about and might respond to China's growing and improving nuclear arsenal we know from us def defense department reports that China is not only adding to its total number of warheads in its Arsenal but that it's also made big and important strides in the quality and diversity of its Delivery Systems and some believe that China may be shifting aspects of its Doctrine as well as far as we can tell much of this effort appears directed at better deterring and competing with the United States but in a world of nuclear armed States including India we anticipate the changes in one Arsenal could have Downstream perhaps even unintended consequences for others this was one of the analytical findings of a 2022 usip senior study group report on strategic stability in southern Asia fortunately for us uh rajie was willing to undertake some additional research for us and as she will explain she devoted considerable time to interviewing a range of well-placed Indian experts and former policy makers rajie is currently a resident senior fellow at the Australian strategic policy Institute or asby where she joins us from canura today prior to joining asby rajie was a director of the center for security strategy and Technology at The Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi over her distinguished career she has worked in and out of government and is the author co-author or editor of more than a dozen books today rajie will explain her Topline findings and then we'll get responses from two additional colleagues first we will hear from Robert Peters Bob is currently a research fellow for nuclear deterrence and missile defense in the Heritage foundation's Allison Center for National Security prior to joining Heritage he worked in government at the defense threat reduction agency or ditra in other and in other government private sector ctor and research roles second we'll hear from Dr Samir lawani a senior expert and I'm happy to say my colleague here at the United States Institute of Peace he's also a non-resident senior fellow at the center for strategic and bu budgetary assessments he's a prolific researcher and writer and prior to joining usip he served as the Director of the south Asia program at the Stimson Center so we clearly have all the necessary ingredients for an outstanding disc discussion of what I think is a very important topic after each of our speakers make opening remarks I will moderate a conversation to draw them out on various related issues for our audience joining online I would encourage you to ask questions in the chat window on the usip website page um and other usip colleagues will be collecting those questions and sharing them with me so that I can ask some of our panelists later so without further ado let's get going uh rajie over to you with for your thoughts thank you thank you so much Dan good morning good evening to everyone joining from the US and Australia uh it's great to be part of this conversation today thanks Dan for putting this together uh for me it's a huge sense of relief to have this report out because it took about three years since I started the work um I was initially planning to rely on a lot of the second resources including Indian scholarly work on India's on China as nuclear expansion uh but once I began the research I came to realize the huge gap in Indian literature there was literally nothing other than a few opinion pieces on China's nuclear expansion uh to the point where I had to change the methodology to an interview based work uh where I interviewed recently retired military officials including former strategic uh strategic Force commanders military Chiefs former diplomats who have dealt with China and nuclear issues including former nsas National Security advisers um and other Scholars in the in the Indian Think Tank Community again all of them were willing to share their perspectives on what they thought to be the rational for China's nuclear expansion uh uh how India might respond and the broader consequences of China's nuclear expansion uh and close to three years after I started the work on this report there is still no new new literature in India that tries to explain the Indian position are the Indian options in the face of China's nuclear expansion um so I'm really glad to have this report out and hope it generates um some debates within India among the policy makers and I I think it's also required um in the broader indopacific context as well I see in canbera there is a very little Australian debate on China's nuclear expansion modernization so I think there is a greater need for this conversation uh to happen across the indopacific context so I'm very thankful to Dan Mari and the entire us IP team especially Bri brigeta who helped me to uh get this report in its final shape um so this report as Dan said is an effort to provide an assessment of India's perceptions of China's nuclear expansion um we have seen massive expansion of nuclear China's nuclear forces which has been sudden and unexplained in many ways because China has not really come up with any rational explaining the uh um uh the growth uh the V massive expansion that we seeing and it has left many countries uh in the region and Beyond to come up with an appropriate response uh because it is unclear like I said why China has undertaken this significant expansion uh of its nuclear forces uh the China military power report of the US Department of Defense of December 2024 stated that China is still continuing this expansion and it expects that China will have over thousand nuclear warheads by the end of the decade um this is a dramatic development considering that China for decades maintained a nuclear with around 300 nuclear warheads and of course China has not come up with any explanation or rational at least publicly as to why this buildup and there is also no end point to this expansion like what is where is this heading uh what is the goal of this expansion is it to uh reach a comparable size with the of the US Arsenal or Russian Arsenal um so there is no there's no clear understanding from the Chinese explanation of the Chinese side on any of these critical question many around the world are con concerned about the expansion but the and the likely consequences but I think uh it is India that's going to be uh likely the most affected by China's nuclear expansion but like other countries India is yet to come up come up with a decision on how it should respond um this is an important issue for India because India has held on to a nuclear philosophy somewhat similar to that of China that looking at nuclear weapons from a political rather than military uh utility point of view therefore um stressing and no stressing on a no first use Doctrine with a relatively small nuclear Arsenal but if India's nuclear deterrence calculations change because of China's nuclear expansion it will set set in motion a series of actions it will have an effect not only on Pakistan's nuclear force but also potentially wider ramifications in the indopacific and Global nuclear politics to take uh one implication for instance Indian effort to keep up with the nuclear force uh in proportion to China that could complicate any future Arms Control efforts and will also likely bring in other effects on nuclear stability itself therefore studying India's thinking on China's nuclear expansion is particularly important which is what I've tried to do in this usip report Indian government has not really come up with come out with any statement on China's nuclear expansion at least officially but my interviews with former Indian military and civil officials as civilian officials as well as others from the Strategic Community provides some sense of how official New Delhi may be thinking about its responses to China's nuclear expansion I would say despite the official silence and the as well as the meager public reaction by the Indian strategic Community um but the Indian government is taking uh China's nuclear expansion quite seriously uh during my interviews I also got to hear how India has been monitoring China's nuclear forces closely and there is some indication that Indian officials may have been aware of um certain internal Chinese debates about nuclear expansion for some time uh this came out maybe I'm thinking uh there is not no date yet but from the interviews I got the sense that this may have been around the late 2000s uh this assessment India seemed to have shared with at least with Russia I don't know whether which are the other countries that it has been shared with as in other capitals there is little consensus about what is driving China nuclear expansion with possible re reasons ranging from China's desire to become a global Power by 2049 to competition with the US concerns about the US missile defense system and its effects on China's second strike capability uh but some of the more interesting questions that came up during the writing of this report is what impact will the expansion of China's nuclear Arsenal have on its China's nfu Doctrine uh the general Indian consensus appears to be that China will continue to make maintain its nfu status though Indian analysts also expect that China will broaden the definition of nfu to permit a variety of nuclear operations including potentially launch on warning capabilities the expectation is that over time and expanding Chinese nuclear of Arsenal will lead to contradictions with the nfu doctrine leading to a dilution of the nfu uh nevertheless Indian analist maintain or at least they don't expect China to give up on nfu as a formal position because the doctrine provides China with some diplomatic and normative benefits as a responsible stakeholder and so on and so forth um though there is also some concerns that China May learn from Russia's successful effort at detering Western involvement in Ukraine with loose talk about the use of nuclear weapons and China could ex could be expected to make similar threats in a contingency involving taian that would require uh also but CH China to change um into a or move into a style first used Doctrine so we don't know where that is going to be leading to in a sense um surprisingly despite some concerns about China's possible abandonment of the nfu there is little support for India to move away from the nfu though support for India's nfu itself fairly is lukewarm uh understandably the sense was that it was the Indian military that was the most uncomfortable with the nfu as it is essentially a reactive posture uh but many other supported it precisely because for that reason in a sense so despite these differences generally there was little enthusiasm for abandoning the entire nfu policy entirely especially since the nfu could itself be stressed to accommodate a variety of options including launch and warning as China appears to be doing overall the sense was that the current Indian nfu posture was robust and dynamic enough and does not require any changes uh as regards to specific of China's nuclear expansion and the issues of particular concern to India uh the focus was almost entirely on the landbased missile system such as the df-41 and a potential Hypersonic Glide vehicle based on that missile uh equally Indian analysts were concerned about a potential dual use system essentially missiles that could that could carry both a conventional or a nuclear warhead which leads to possible problems of uh disting distinguishing between them uh Indian analysts particularly concerned about the df-26 which again because of its high accuracy and the Dual use nature could potentially be a dangerous counter force weapon uh China's decision to put all longrange missiles under the pla rocket forces added to these concerns Indian analyst seemed less concerned with China's seab based deterant uh and even less so about China's air-based deterant Force because these were seen as old and technologically inferior but again I have to note here that these interviews were conducted much before many of much of the information about China's new stealth bum protot prototypes H20 and the jxx came out um so the interviews mostly were aware of the G H20 but they mostly saw it as a vanity project that China did not have the capacity to build uh but today if I were to conduct this interview I think they may have a very different sense of how it is going about uh in my interview there were also significant differences between the Indian analysts on China as nuclear capabilities uh with some being even outright skeptical about whether it even had a Triad uh considering the weakness in the C based leg of the nuclear force but I think that also has undergone some changes um disagreements were also about why China has impact on its massive nuclear expansion there were also disagreements about the importance of some of the institutional changes that China has undertaken such as the creation of the pla uh rocket force or the pla um strategic support Force um again these were uh interviews were conducted before the termination of the Strategic support force in April 2024 with many of at least some of the interviews seeing these institutional Innovations as important but seeing that uh at the end of the day the Chinese um civilian leaders were in control of the situation irrespective of the institutional changes on questions of how India should respond again there were fundamental disagreements with some feeling that India should build up its nuclear arsenals While others were much more sanguin about the consequences of China's nuclear buildup um this in a sense mirrors some of the the opinions among experts in other countries as well in as to how they should respond to China's action with some taking it as a threat requiring much more robust response than others those who were concerned about China's nuclear expansion pointed out that China could have more than a thousand Warheads by the end of the decade and that could potentially lead to a more aggressive Chinese Behavior against India across the border even in conventional terms um there were also questions about others noted that um the explosive wheels of China's nuclear warheads were far higher um again referring to some of the old controversy about whether Indian hydren bomb test was successful in 1998 uh there was an outlier opinion which went on to suggest that India's deterrent itself would be called to question as a result of China's uh nuclear expansion um the Indian analyst those who were sanguin about What mattered were not the numbers involved in China's expansion but rather the qualitative advances that China was making again India's response therefore they felt it should focus on the quality of its nuclear forces such as the range of its missiles better sub based DET force and Superior Ming technology and so on and so forth but irrespective of the disagreements uh there was consensus across the interviews that India needed to respond in some fashion uh this range from relatively benign responses such as reviewing India's nuclear force posture to much radical ones such as a small um number but presuming nuclear testing and even revising ring revising the nfu posture um all of this suggest that India will respond in some manner but uh given the risk Avers nature of the Indian leadership and gener conservative approach to nuclear policy is unlikely for in for example uh prime minister first when he campaigned he talked about re revising the nfu but this was quickly averted um um averted and he in fact altered the Viewpoint to say that we will be reviewing the nfu once he uh came into office so I it's unlikely that India will radically revise this nuclear force or resume nuclear testing unless others started testing first um us responses were also an important consideration though there were differences about how Indian analysts felt about the likelihood of us response to any change in nuclear policy uh some felt that the US would understand if India expanded its nuclear Arsenal or resumed testing especially if Indian weapons did not Target the US uh While others were somewhat less certain about it but there was clear consensus that India should engage with the US uh while considering its uh response um so there is um very little uh doubt um to that India is concerned about China's nuclear expansion especially because of the confrontation of the Border uh since uh the summer of 2020 and the various political disagreements with China and the overall the tone and tenor of the relationship between India and China uh it's quite likely that the Indian concerns will continue to grow if the Chinese Arsenal continues to expand beyond the currently expected uh even 1,000 Warheads um and so therefore I think this is something that is going to stay with India and will continue to monitor for a while before it actually takes a clear position on the expansion and how it should respond uh let me stop there and I look forward to hearing others thoughts and comments thank you thank you rajie uh great start and definitely set the table for lots of questions and uh and thoughts uh and you also captured a lot of what was in the report but not everything um and we'll leave it uh to our to our other discussants uh to draw you out on certain points so on that let me first turn to Bob great thanks and you know rajie thanks for writing the the great report I I thought there's a lot of really critical insights there in so congratulations to you and thanks to usip for having me um you know what strikes me is that India today um has a strategic dilemma um it's facing two nuclear armed actors that are capable of holding key atrisk population centers in India with little to no tactical warning um and and given the partnership between Pakistan and China it's very possible that a conflict with with one could drag the other into a war forcing India into not only deterring two actors simultaneously which is its challenge today it's so more challenge that the United States has with with with China and Russia but potentially War fighting on multiple fronts simultaneously with nuclear weapons and so I think this is going to be the challenge for India's strategic policy makers to really grapple with over the coming 10 decades um rajie correctly pointed out that China's the fastest great nuclear power on the planet today is unlikely to change over the next 5 years given their trajectory um we the United States are grappling with what do we do in response to this Chinese nuclear breakout but the other big question is what will India do in response giving the growing partnership between Beijing and Islamabad and the fact that the lack of action in the Strategic sphere whether that's lack of action in the United States or in Europe or in India is causing the world's democracies to incur greater amounts of strategic risk as we see the rats increasingly investing in both long range fires that is ballistic missiles that can carry nuclear warheads rajie you mentioned China's no first use policy in place today um I would offer that in American defense policy circles it's increasingly a held belief that China's no first use policy um is not issued in good faith that where it may have had some Merit six decades ago um most defense policy makers in DC dismissed the the Chinese no first use policy out of hand as being non-credible um when you look at where is China going to be investing in the systems I think they're going to continue to invest heavily in landbased systems but still retain a submarine Force that's designed to be more of a secure second strike system than an actual nuclear war fighting capability but even as a secure second strike system I think that's at risk and the reason for that is because of us dominance in anti-submarine Warfare to be honest we are the best in the world at anti-submarine Warfare and the Chinese know this and they likely know that the Americans have the ability to sync almost every submarine in the Chinese Fleet on order their bomber the Chinese bomber capability is still nent in comparison to American bomber capabilities so for these reasons I think China will continue to invest heavily in missile capabilities it's a default and that has obvious uh implications for India that's that deli's going to have to Grapple with so so for me the bottom line is we in Washington and Delhi have to engage in discussions about the Chinese breakout because the same attributes that impact one nation is also impacting the other a few other points I'll make before I turn over to Samir um we as well as the Indians should be learning from the recent air defense performances of various us Russian and even Israeli systems we've seen a number of recent missile engagements in the Ukraine war and Israel and the gulf theaters or the past couple years and what we've seen is is um basically uh the the russian-made systems and the Russian knockoff systems are basically trash and the Western made systems are excellent and um and so for India given the air threat that's that it's going to be facing that will be increasingly challenging in the coming years I think India really needs to think hard about where it's going to put its investment dollars given the performance of the various systems um rajie you wrote in your report um quote a more strategic reason for reducing the size disparity between Chinese and US nuclear forces is the difficulty that the US ballistic missile defense systems create for China's retary forces especially in the context of the US withdrawal from the anti-ballistic missile and the intermediate range nuclear forces treaties and its developments of missile defense systems and Global strike capabilities I would just say that current American ballistic missile capabilities are not optimized to engage Chinese missile threats certainly not intermediate range or InterContinental range missile threats But the irony is that the current Chinese nuclear breakout is to my mind the primary driver for why the United States is going to build a missile defense architecture that I.E the Iron Dome for America that will be in fact optimized to neutralize Chinese missile threats in that sense if the Chinese missile nuclear breakout is because of fears of the US missile defense architect cure then they themselves the Chinese have created a self-fulfilling prophecy you also write that the assumptions here appear to be that a larger nuclear Arsenal comparable to that of Russia or the United States will we China to adopt nuclear strategies similar to the Russian or us strategies I would offer that Russia and the US have radically different strategies today which is part of the reason why there's so much turmoil in the American nuclear field today Russia is seeks to deploy a nuclear war fighting capability that is all these of Baroque systems that can or land attack systems anti- ship capabilities um nuclear Torpedoes all this kind of like crazy stuff that the Russians have been flouting for the last 15 years whereas we in the United States have largely divested of nuclear war fighting capabilities and just retain a nuclear deterrence Arsenal and we in Washington are paying the cost for this and this is why we're having these discussions in DC do we need to expand a non-strategic nuclear Arsenal um and and so finally um I'll just on you have this line in this report however most interviewees held to the view that China sees nuclear weapons as political not military weapons it would be foolish to use them even in a Taiwan scenario because doing so could potentially force a US intervention broad consensus among not only the interviewees but also other Indian analysts is that the main concern for India is not Chinese tnws tactical nuclear weapons but the increase in intermediate medium and short- range missiles that Target India I would just offer look if they were only p iCal weapons China would not be building tactical nuclear weapons that are optimized nuclear war fighting as they're doing now with the df-21 and df-26 that have land attack and nuclear anti- ship capabilities and so I look at it I I put on my old um DOD bureaucrat hat and I look at the Arsenal that they're Fielding it's not only deterrence Arsenal but it's actually a nuclear Warf fighting Arsenal and those are two very different things and so for me the bottom line is that India is actually underplaying the Chinese nucle threat and the Chinese nuclear intentions and I'll just close there W fantastic you put a lot of good stuff on the table too I'm sure rajie will want to respond to uh so rajie I hope you're taking good notes uh but we're going to move over to Samir first and give him the floor and then and then we'll come back to you so you can respond Samir thanks danan uh and thanks rajie for a great paper I really enjoyed reading it uh and I I came away with I thought I sort offer three observations based on reading the report that you know might sort of result in some questions but then also maybe two uh suggestions for where you can take this you or other Scholars can take this next um in terms of both research but also sort of policy implication so the first observation um is actually about sort of collection and assessment and you you write in the paper uh that one former military official said that India does not have the means to monitor China's nuclear force modernization on its own and that was really striking to to me um you know sort of for for uh both it's an understandable uh you know concern and but I also was puzzled as sort of what exactly are the are the shortfalls and means are we talking about actual collection capabilities and assets are we talking about the assessment process or is it that both of those are present but it's just not prioritized relative to other threats uh that India has to deal with whether it's on its Western Borders or internally but I do recall this is a familiar refrain we heard this a lot in 2020 uh when India you know faced off against the Chinese On the Border uh and there were you know significant casualties for the first time in 50 years um and then coming out of that uh discussion that event there was a lot of discussion about uh India's uh intelligence failures right and again there was a little bit of debate between whether this was again collection persistent uh you know observation or whether this was an assessment failure uh but still one that I think if it's recurring is one that in would probably want to think about remedying um you know for the United States I I recall there's probably sort of many moments of this but maybe in B we'll have through other ones but I I recall the fractional orbital bombardment system launch test that the Chinese did I want to say in 2021 was kind of like referred to as a Sputnik moment for the US and I wonder what would precipitate sort of a similar effect for for India both in terms of prioritization of collection um but then s of focus on on the challenge uh and you know I'd be interested to if you have thoughts on sort of uh what the people in Indian's intelligence Community um you know what they're what they are seeking to do to to remedy this if they are looking for more means of collection um if they if they even sort of just are pursuing more classified assessments of Open Source materials and sort of what uh what possibilities are for India to sort of get ahead of that curve um the second point I thought I'd make is kind of related uh and it's that that sort of the broad conclusion of India uh not being overworked about s of Chinese nuclear developments is actually I think kind of consistent with a number of other uh patterns in Indian uh assessment of of China right so like I think that this this relates to some level of Indian defense discourse focusing on platforms rather than uh campaigns or military effects uh I see a lot of an analysis of you know what Chinese systems they have the quanti of them the quality of them in terms of sort of different Generations uh but not really sort of like how they play in an actual military conflict and you know I think sort of like some examples that come to mind are like on the space counter space uh debate um on Chinese sort of anti-ship ballistic missiles but also short-range ballistic missiles that I think can have profound effects uh in a in a border conflict with India even Bob refer to that long range Precision fires and sort that combination with drones like that there doesn't seem to be sort of a whole lot of diagnosis of like what that means for a Chinese campaign specifically against India uh there's possibly a couple hypotheses that's still sort of why I think there's some sort of shortfall in that discourse I mean one of it one might be that just the lack of jointness within the services or within the military and the lack of theorization means that you sort of just think of things uh on a service by service basis platform by platform basis rather as an integrated military effects um but I also wonder if the other explanation could be uh that there's some level of thinking that the India China contingencies that are plausible for most Indian strategist and policy makers are really limited to skirmishes On the Border like the ones we saw in 2020 like consequential um casualty inducing uh but not the level of war and therefore not getting to a strategic level uh or strategic duration and so those are just sort of hypotheses as to what why that might be the case but be interested in your thoughts on that the third point is sort of maybe builds off something that Bob mentioned um there's a really interesting line that you you referred to of the China Russia relationship uh you said the Chinese buildup of forces is presumably happening with Russian assistance um and you know I think that sort of comports with the dod China military power report talking about Cod developments or or sort of you know Russian support for uh Chinese missile early Warning Systems uh for enrichment and reprocessing for hu nuclear fuel for high uranium nuclear fuel uh so all these areas are areas where you see sort of the the the Chinese nuclear Arsenal developing out of uh Russian support and I wonder I mean for the United States I mean there's a clear you know logic to this or a clear sort of implication for this but as the India China relationship grows more competitive if not more adversarial what does this mean for India China cooperation sorry uh India Russia cooperation right there was like a period of time when that may have been a little bit Rocky it seems like you know given in the last year you've sort of had a Rejuvenation of that strategic relationship um referred to the sort of the Russian air defense systems the s400s are still being on boarded by the Indians um you know some new Surface combatant ships uh just got U delivered uh there's talk of India leasing another Russian nuclear submarine for you know attack submarine so um does the the Russia China relationship give any pause to the PACE or scope of the India Russia relationship or are these two things sort of like operating interdependently uh independently um you know I can think imagine like sort of some strategic systems where you could uh could see direct transmission from the Russians to the Chinese that would have an aders adverse impact on on India's defense and security on air defense systems or the vulnerabilities baked into them uh on submarine Co technology development or Cod development uh that has been least reported um in in the open source domain so those two areas I'd be interested to sort of see you know what um whether if at a minimum sort of the the um uh halo effect of sort of the Chinese nuclear developments are having an impact on Indian strategic planning when it when it comes to its other partners and allies the last point I make is about sort of future directions I think you could take this um one is sort of a research question uh I noticed in the sampling of your interviews it's it's concentrated on you know retired uh senior military retired senior uh Foreign Service National Security officials uh really invaluable sources of technocratic sort of assessment uh information but I'd be interested as to what civilian political view of China's nuclear buildup is right because at the end of the day they're the ones in charge uh India U you know for all it sort of challenges has a you know very sort of dominant civilian architecture over uh all policymaking and National Security decision- making so uh and they're also more sensitive to public opinion so this also brings in the question of what is Indian public opinion um on China broadly and it's its nuclear buildup specifically so uh I think that would be a fruitful area of further research to see whether the same uncertainties or hesitations forward to the civilian um uh take on on China's nuclear buildup so the second um implication I think that interesting is is a policy one which I think you're alluding to but it seems that there maybe there's we're at a point where we need a US India nuclear deterrence and proliferation dialogue I think it's typically been T you know done either sort of as a as a sort of finger waving like you know um non-proliferation exercise but I wonder if we should be having something on the order of what we have with the British and the French um which you know is a sort of a strategic deterrence dialogue that may be less relevant to the indopacific our indopacific sort of allies that we talk to on this stuff like Japan and and rock like South Korea um we have advanced dialogues but they're also very asymmetric relationships so I wonder if it like the time is right for uh kind of a a dialogue between the US and India both on assessment as well as sort of planning and strategy uh but I'll leave it at that thank you so much excellent uh thanks um great points as well um rajie I will let you pick up on the pieces of their comments that you would most like to tackle but I would observe that across the board what I hear is a message uh fairly loud and clear that perhaps your Indian interviewees uh and others in New Delhi and elsewhere need to be taking this uh threat from China a little bit more seriously and and more urgently um and consider ing some of the specific ways that maybe right now they have greater confidence about their ability to handle uh China deter China uh that their read on China is um uh too sanguin um by maybe a lot um and so I wonder what you make of that and and whether you could imagine that um you know if you were to conduct these interviews again now or in a couple of years whether you see this shifting um but I'll leave it to you to pick up on what you'd most likely to cover thanks thanks Dan and thanks Bob and Samir for I think excellent um questions comments your thoughts on the on the broader subject of China's nuclear expansion and where we are how we are dealing with it how we are responding to it um it is the most significant threat and I think we everybody has been underestimating um including the US in public debate but also certainly uh India has been under uh underselling this whole point about China becoming much more aggressive much more adopting much more riskier options riskier um sort of options in terms of the threats in terms of how um and I think I take the point first on the whole U uh the Chinese rational for at least how the Indians uh Indian interviews talk to me about how China uses the missile defense the US missile defense Shield as a sort of a logic for China's nuclear expansion because it complicates their own second strike capability I think China uses it as a it's an excuse it's a it's a logic that China has conveniently found it's you know um it finds certain amount of legitimacy in using that particular US missile defense as as an excuse but otherwise China is hellbent on moving forward uh in terms of the uh growth of its Arsenal uh again comparable to uh comparable to um us Russia and so on and so forth and I think that's precisely the reason why in the last several years uh there has been calls on there have been calls on uh on China to join some of the arms control processes bilateral or trilateral fashion involving us and Russia uh but China has always um walked out walked away saying that that is not going to happen because China doesn't have China's nuclear Arsenal is fairly small and that it is not in a position to join any of these kind of uh some sort of an arms control or even sort of a nuclear dialogue in a sense uh and one key question that comes out of that is okay if China is looking at as some sort of a parity uh with the US and and Russian forces in terms of the size maybe not for a number one for one kind of thing but somewhat the size is some comparable that kind of a parity would China also walk away again that relates to the point that uh uh Bob said about the um Russian and the US nuclear strategies are very different but even so my bigger question that I want to POS is is China also going to adopt similar posture in in in a in a sense uh would it walk the China had a smaller Arsenal China had an nfu has an nfu policy but all of these policies came about at a very different time when China had a very small Arsenal and they wanted certain amount of um sort of luxury and comfort in knowing that adopting this nfu policy gives me that kind of security so from the US or others or Russia's um and so on and so forth but today I don't know whether the same logic should continue to explain uh the um Chinese Arsenal and us trying to make sense of the Chinese nuclear expansion I don't think those logic that applied in the70s and ' 80s and 90s should hold us today as well we need to we need to move forward in this particular report that I did I think I was trying to get most of the other IND Indian interviews um how they perceived this expansion uh not a lot of my own inputs I did bring in my inputs by my own thoughts in this but I think it was primarily I was trying to um sort of convey as to how um much of the Indian military officials as well as um Indian civilian officials who are former diplomats and others and some some members of the Indian strategic Community thought about these issues in a sense but I do agree that we are not um sort of uh giving it uh the kind of attention that it requires the kind of importance uh we are still and uh um sort of uh yeah it it needs uh immediate and Urgent attention serious attention but I don't think we are we are giving that uh we are too sanguin about uh this in a sense uh a lot of the logic that I heard from the Indian side whether it a US pulling out of the ABM but the Chinese have been developing the short and medium- range missiles for a longer time in a sense in fact that is that is one of the first developments that actually pushed India to do its nuclear test in 1998 so in a sense China has been progressing on those uh missile developments much faster in recent years so I think that's a uh that's an issue that we need to continue um I think India Japan and countries like Vietnam are also concerned about the I agree again entirely with the uh how the short range uh uh intermediate range palis missile ibms for the regional contant purposes that China has developed the df-21 df-26 that continue to be serious uh raising serious questions for India um again I don't have uh any um sort of a disagreement with that but I agree with the um the point that we need to be taking the Chinese uh nuclear expansion and modernization a lot more seriously and not to take uh the chines some sort of a uh um their explanation or or some sort of a the uh the logic that manyan interviews found in Chinese literature or in their conversation that this is because the US has done this that we need to respond to it um it is this uh particular us activity or this particular issue that's kind of so I think there are um there are I think India needs to get more realistic about um how it looks at the Chinese nuclear modernization and so on and so forth um on some of the sues points yeah the first question I think that's a legit very important one uh is the collection of information in issue or is it an assessment failure that we continue to see um again you related to the 2020 development again 2020 development also I think we are we are looking when we look at CH or any of the threat scenario we look at things in a very linear fashion and say okay this is the usual pattern that we see nothing unusual is going to happen which is what exactly happened with the 2020 galwan crisis uh the Chinese were uh engaged in the their annual exercise in that particular part of the Tibet autonomous region but very quickly they were able to move away from there to the Galan because they already had the US um the pla Army Navy Army and the Air Force in the region they were able to quick and this given the covid-19 pandemic and uh India did not have adequate number of forces On the Border to monitor that on a continuous basis they did see them immed initially but then they said okay this is the part of their annual exercise nothing more so we can move on they dismissed that as just a normal annual exercise and nothing more and I think that's again so would it is it a part of a failure in terms of um collecting that continuous having that continuous vigilance continuous monitoring and coming to the correct um assessment uh I think it's a mix of both in a sense both the collection but specifically on China's uh nuclear modernization again India I think continues to um rely on Western assessment Western sources of information uh which are credible um if you go by the bulletin of atomic scientists and others that are also especially in the recent some of the um recent revolutions about China's missile silos these are all also based on the satellite IM injury and so on and so forth so Indian assessment also has looked at other uh us um sources including the dod um U military China military power report and others uh reports but I think uh India has always felt a lot more comfortable looking at uh uh reports like the that comes from the bulle of atomic scientists has taken them as much more credible much more authentic in a sense uh but having said that I would say um during the interviews I did um uh at least from a couple of uh two different officials I also heard about the Indian assessment that uh that India had developed internally uh which talked about the um which referred to some of the Chinese debates about the need to expand China's nuclear forces um so this was well before the um the US Reports started talking about the Chinese military modernization so in a sense I would think generally when I talked to the interviews I got the sense that they all continue to rely on the US and the Western sources for information on China's nuclear modernization but at the same time at least two officials were able to talk so I don't know whether that was a period there a there's a periodic exercise within the Indian government to uh monitor come up with these kind of reviews of where China is heading or was it a sort of a one-off kind of an exercise that they did at some point uh because there was a you know there was a good Intel report or somebody who was based in China um I I I don't know maybe a combination of factors provided for that um for that government to come up with that kind of an assessment internally at that point of time but because I have not heard of similar such similar reports on a regular basis within the Indian establishment so I'm not uh and I've been part of the system for a very relatively short time but for about 5 years and I really did not see a lot of that um coming through a seriously uh well considered uh assessment uh on the Indian side in a sense so I'm not sure very we um so I would think uh India needs to step up its kind of capabilities in in uh cating monitoring this on a regular basis and coming up with the assessment and that's also that actually ties up with the that other point about your last point would you have is it time for a US India nuclear and deterrence kind of a dialogue yes and I think this again came through the um interviews as well who very clearly said that uh and many actually said that we already have maybe not a separate dialogue but part of the US India strategic dialogue is possibly where this is being addressed but apparently we do Indian side does kind of Engage The us on these issues on a fairly regular basis but I think this needs to be um sort of institutionalized more in terms of having a separate dialogue format I think that's that's something that we need to do I um yeah um and have we reached in terms of uh is it comparable to the kind of uh dialogues that you have with the UK and France I don't think so so I think that's where we you need to look at where we go but I think that's something we need to kind of work on in a sense um uh again this your second point I'm again I'm not in disagreement uh that India focus on you know what systems that have been developed systems and platforms that have been developed but how it is going to play out in a particular during a conflict and how it is going to be uh how how integration of multiple uh systems uh come together to have a much more cumulative much more impactful um sort of an effect uh I don't think India is looking at um that sense in a sense and I again not you know again India and South Asia southern Asia very well um so again um sort of a um generally India believes that whatever threat um and challenges that China POS for India India can manage on its own and India has all the capabilities that is required uh but I think that's um that's very um self-fulfilling prophecy that yeah India has everything in place we know what the threat is we know how to how to manage them how to address them uh part of the problem maybe uh the lack of military civilian interface um so how much of the military inputs do come and I think uh this has been a complaint um at least since the late '90s I've been hearing especially during the kaggle War uh then chief of mil Army General VP Malik um talked about it a lot and he wrot wrote a book about this many of highlighting many of these issues the lack of um uh sufficient conversation dialogue between the Civil military uh I think that's continues to be an issue it has improved to some extent but I think there is still under appreciation for that military perspective to come through uh for Indian government the Poli civilian leadership to understand the gravity of the situation the gravity of the threats that are uh coming from China in a sense very interesting points on China Russia relationship and the kind of assistance that Russia provides uh China especially the early warning systems and I think that's the that's where China comes with C amount of confidence to say that we can move on to an early launch on warning posture or launch attack posture all of that is com from the fact that they of course they do have um developed a series of um satellite um sophisticated um satellite imagery um satellite based sources as well as sensors um they have strengthened all of that but it also comes from the fact that Russians are providing CH Chinese with excellent assistance in terms of early Warning Systems um that is um India should be again in uh I wish uh India would look at this in a bit much more uh clinical fashion a much more uh practical um sort of pragmatic fashion in a realistic um way but uh I think when it comes to Russia India seems to be looking at it from a very um sort of a historical historically how things are played with between India and Soviets and therefore there is certain amount of comfort level that is kind of driving the uh Indian approach when it comes to um comes to dealing with Russia because otherwise going by a lot of the developments I would not continue to rely on Russia today um to give you at least since 2013 2014 when the Crimea Invasion happened since then I can see a lot many a lot many more strategic developments that are that has direct implications for India it has affect it does affect India the India China military balance for instance at the border and elsewhere um the fact that India has bought the su3 uh platforms and from Russia and is deployed on the India China border but the fact that the Russians have supplied China with even more sophisticated Advanced platforms like the S35 has direct implications for India India's um military um equations with military balance with China um similarly selling the Chinese with Advan uh so advanc kilo class submarines all of that has implications on the border and Elsewhere on the maritime front as well so it's it see and it seems unclear as to why India would continue to rely on Russia and then especially after the uh Ukraine uh the Russian invasion has started on Ukraine uh there has also been the uh the military officials in the Indian armed forces are really unhappy with the Russians because they have faltered on all the spares um supply of spare parts supply of the um S400 air defense system on all of those things there have been delays and there is not even a timeline as to when Russia would be able to provide these to the with these to India because whatever they're producing that's that goes into the Russian military um despite that um India has gone and signed more military deals even in recent months to me seems like um Russia is a card that they would like to play when things get difficult with with the us or with the Western General uh this again I would say for instance the the issue with the nja killing in Canada and the panon issue in the US which led to uh sort of a an indictment uh in New York and putting India uh essentially India's engagement in extr territorial killings and such kind of um such kind of activities has led to Serious difficulties between India and the US in the last few months um the fact that Biden cancelled uh former President Biden canceled his trip to India for the India's Republic Day Celebrations a couple of years ago now uh last year um again let to some very uh difficult moments for India to kind of you know um sort of understand and immediately India's reaction was to send uh um a foreign its foreign minister Dr J shanka to to Russia and and uh where he had a meeting with Putin and he actually tweeted out to say I had a greatest honor to meet with President Putin who uh guidance and I took his guidance and so so it seems like the role that Russia will continue to play Russ I I don't think India is going to abandon Russia because this is the value that it is going to play it may not be so much in other terms in materials material terms like in in terms of Defense capabilities there may be things that come will not come there in terms of nuclear subin all that may be possible may not work out but I think the value that Russia provides to India is oh um you want to play difficult with India when in terms of the US or other Western Partnerships they can it'll always say oh we have Russia one of our oldest strategic continued reli reliable partner in a sense so I think that's a strategic value that Russia will continue to play in India's uh National Security um approach in a sense so it's not going to give up on that but if I were if I were a national security official in the higher realm I would I would think uh twice about twice 10 times about how I would how much I want to engage um Russia in a sense um so it does not really because um things are not in working in my favor so I I don't know I'm not very clear as to why I would want to continue to uh kind of rely um again no disagreement on the next point about um um doing maybe a followup study at some stage in terms of understanding the civilian perspective persective um but I think uh that's yeah that's for the future and I will continue to look at that I take maybe too much time let's go back there no no was great and of course yes there is more work to be done and perhaps by you rajie so um we'll keep that in mind um I wanted to uh first remind our online audience uh that you're welcome to write questions in in the chat section uh we're already starting to receive some of those and I'm going to Pivot to those very soon um but I did want to uh pick up on at least two or three uh specific issues and uh give give each of you a chance to respond um the first one of these has to do with the interconnectedness of uh various nuclear developments and capabilities but the specific thing I wanted to probe is the question of nuclear testing um something that comes up in the report the number of questions about whether India would in fact uh determine that it needed to conduct nuclear tests um whether uh what it anticipates might be a reaction to that and so on and so forth and Bob uh you've written uh recently about um concerns that you actually have about um where the United States may be under some pressure um to use nuclear tests uh particularly uh in a in a crisis uh type of scenario an attempt at deterrence um so you've obviously given a lot of thought to uh the role utility down side risks um and consequences of testing so how did you interpret um how India sees nuclear tests um how do you imagine say the United States might actually respond if India were to go ahead with tests uh and how might others respond if India were to do so yeah thanks so I mean in the American context I mean we conducted over a thousand tests during the Cold War and so we basically got all the data that we need to ensure that that we have an Arsenal that's safe secure and reliable um for the old Warheads now there's some discussion as to whether or not as we build new Warheads for the 21st century whether or not we'll have to restart testing or whether or not we have to test some Warheads because we have not done is tested Warheads that were assembled 35 years ago to see if their performance is affected simply by degradation and over over time you know what I've said is there could come a day in which an adversary in Beijing or pongyang or or Moscow tries to engage in nuclear coercion against the United States or an American Ally and even employs a nuclear weapon to to include an explosive nuclear yield an American president may say I want to respond in kind um in order to show that the United States will not be coerced and will not back down and that the adversary can't escalate their way out of a crisis or an acute conflict and in that sense you want to give the president the option no matter who's in the Oval Office of being able to conduct a new nuclear explosive test and according to Gio it's going to take us about three years in order to get the Nevada Test Site ready to rock and roll and so so my view is if you actually want to optimize the the president's ability to respond you actually have to give him or her all the tools that they need some people say well then you could have other countries say well since the United States is testing we've got the ability to we've got the ability to test our ourselves I'm not sure that's the case like I'm not sure that XI Jim ping or vitomir Putin you know really want to test and and and and boy howdy they would but we're not for those darn Americans but once the Americans tested then they'd feel the ability to to go and test without having World appr Priam come down upon them um I just don't think that's the case I think if they see that it is in their benefit to test that they will do so you know India um and Pakistan tested in the late 1990s um without really paying much of a cost right I don't think that they would pay much of a cost if they were to test again I could understand if India decided to test as well because they need to get the data to ensure that their Arsenal is safe secure and reliable or to ensure that they've got Warheads that achieve the military requirements that are laid out by their leadership um there would be some finger wagging um there may even be some modest sanctions but I think at the end of the day the United States will look at it and say India is doing what it is what it deems to be within their National interest and it'll say are we really going to walk away from a potential partnership with the world's largest democracy on the continent of Asia because they conducted some nuclear tests now all that's going to be dependent upon who's sitting in the Oval Office at that moment who's in Congress and so forth but I I don't see that as being like you know a hard break between Washington and Delhi if if India decided to test if India did decide to test would would China test maybe but again I go back to like the autocrats are going to do what they deem is in their interest and they don't much care what the Democracy say or do great thank you um rajie I see your did you want to jump in or yeah if I can make a quick uh Remar comment on that of course um uh if an odd country like North Korea or uh Iran is going to make a um do a test I think India India will not respond but if there is going to be a nuclear test done by China Pakistan or even the US I think it would give India an opportun to uh validate um or put to rest some of the controversy within India on India's nuclear test in 1998 especially the hydrogen bomb testing in a sense um so it might take that as an opportunity but India I don't think will be the first to start nuclear testing at all but I think if there is a momentum that comes from China Pakistan the US I think that would provide India with an opportunity to validate um its hydrogen bomb test um and credibilities in credentials in a sense yeah right yeah no that supports the distinction that Bob's making between India and the United States where the United States may not need it technically in the same way that India May um I want to shift over to Samir I don't know if you have thoughts on this particular issue but I also wanted to give you the floor again to speak a little bit more about what you might have in mind for the US India relationship you talked about a dialogue um on these issues so talk would be good and seems like it would make a lot of sense we have a lot of common concerns and probably have some questions we'd like to raise but you've done a lot of work on the conventional uh defense cooperation between the United States and India I wonder you know if you wanted to to think maybe expansively push the envelope a little bit if you were beginning to to think about ways in which India and the United States saw the nuclear threat from China similarly are there things that U might be worth considering there Beyond just talk or steps after talk yeah I I think um there's a lot of scope for these kinds of conversations to happen and R you you pointed out that they do happen uh certainly at track two level even some some track 1.5s that I'm not sure they're as advanced at the gov toov level including like strategic forces command and um you know stratcom and others and so um I guess I'm suggesting though I think it would be useful to elevate this a little bit uh and one way to do that is you know we have this this upcoming bilateral uh defense framework uh that's going to be that is in the process of being renegotiated and signed uh hopefully this year it'll be a 10-year framework I mean that covers the the gamut of um uh you know sort of like defense Technical and Technology relationships uh it's sort of a high level political framework it's got Maritime security elements there's um sort newer ones that have come along uh I seen a reason why you can't put a strategic uh component in there and strategic meaning you know nuclear capabilities uh and maybe even sort of you know um Advanced domains right there's even an advanced domain dialogue maybe that sort of it's integrated and we started talking about uh space and undersea and ASW but also um sort of Nu capabilities and I think the use utility here would be uh would be a combination of uh sharing with each other our assessments of adversary capabilities and your Trends um but also talking through scenarios right I think um For Better or Worse like the the nuclear dialogue sort of tend to sort of force like force the issue of you know considering a scenario and how it all plays out because you have to look to escalation Dynamics and how it sort of pushes up against Ric threshold so I think it's a uh even there's some sensitivities on on sort of the nuclear uh discussions and sort even areas like testing I think there's utility in at broader strategic framework for for discussion um you know on space for example uh again I I worry that there's not an advanced enough thinking I mean I think the United States is catching up on this I'm not sure where India is on like Chinese counter space capabilities not just like you know um kinetic uh direct descent you know kill like ASAP kills but U also uh we're talking about sort of on orbit uh satellites that can um take out sort of communications or pnt satellites um you know uh electronic warfare directed energy uh sort of attacks so I think all those things would be could be critical if a war but also in peace time um for for India and so uh those kinds of conversations I think would be that would be a lot of utility in an exchange at track one level rajie I want to give you a chance to respond to that just in terms of what you think the the market would bear back in New Delhi in other words what what's the appetite among Indian policy makers for having what are obviously pretty sensitive conversations uh that would be layered a top already uh somewhat more advanced convers ations in uh us India defense cooperation um and but would enter a space where you know historically uh We've rarely dared to to go um so I want to hear that and then I also have a a way I want to push this conversation a little bit which is Samir just used the word scenarios um you know our entire conversation so far and really your report is driven by the logic of capabilities more than the logic of scenarios um and I think you make the point that you know most Indian policy makers most US policy makers and analysts don't see an India China conflict as a high probability at least one that escalates to the nuclear level as high probability even though the relationship has seen some pretty Rocky times uh over the past few years so I guess I'd like to know as you or others think about how you might get from you know people using bats and hitting each other in the high Himalayan ranges how that somehow gets us or some other Conflict at sea or in space could ever actually get us to an escalation um that brings nuclear threats to the four uh yeah fantastic uh points uh again are we there at in terms of uh releasing the kind of conversation that we have at the government to government level uh involving at some some of the sensitive departments and strategic forces uh command statcom uh maybe this is it's time for us to socialize the idea um at a fairly senior level I think there are some conversations that happen between us and India at a track 1.5 level I think it's time to socialize these these ideas in those kind of platforms to see I think India is warming up to those ideas uh I I think again a lot of what India does uh India's Comfort level has grown enormously when it comes to how much it deals how much and which are the what are the areas that it deals with in terms of uh in in with uh its new security Partners the US uh Japan Australia and so on and so forth um so I think uh I think India is warming up to that possibility very uh very rapidly and I think it all again thanks to China U mainly because uh India China relations like you said have been uh through some uh Rocky patches and uh it does not seem like it is going to improve significantly we may see a temporary sort of an arrangement uh of course in October you did see some uh border petrol management agreement but that is not suggesting to me that things are changing fundamentally between India and China the fundamental nature of the relationship the conflict conflict oriented the adversarial nature of India China relations is not changing for the better anytime soon because I think there are serious difficulties uh that uh both sides are unable to deal with and this itself has not that even the Border petrol management agreement has not really led to disengagement of forces or redeployment of forces and so on and so forth there are still something like 60,000 troops on each side of the Border it is still we are still talking about uh fairly risky sort of U uh scenarios when you look at it um having said that yes scenarios we have been still looking at capabilities but I think we need to look at um uh scenarios in which these capabilities will play out and I think that's something uh that India has not been very adap at but I think that's a us that has always been doing the scenario playing um through a multiple simulation exercises tabletop exercise to see various contingencies various scenarios to play out and see how you might respond what are the kind of capability requirements that you need I think that's a great way to kind of uh gain better understanding of at least having a realistic sense of how these threats play out but I think India India hasn't done that kind of an exercise on a regular basis I would say uh maybe doing it uh off and on within the Indian army or the military forces may be doing it uh amongst themselves uh I don't know with how what periodicity but I think they do that but I think again having a much more um sort of a holistic sense of the all of government approach I don't I think that is somewhere something that is lacking on the Indian side um that is that needs to happen and I think uh we have been um some folks have talked about it um sort of written about these things that saying that uh India needs to um sort of uh get ahead in terms of gaining a better understanding of these issues and that can only be done through uh TTX and simulation exercises but I don't think there has been much of an effort from the Indian government side um looking that in a big way but I think very quickly on the on China's Cloud space capabilities again I entirely agree the much of the focus has always been to the world itself is been on the kinetic ASAT test anti-satellite test because you see that playing out uh out out there uh but what China has been able to do in terms of on orbit satelliting capabilities recently knocking if you're developing even you know purely defensive Technologies if you're developing a particular technology to remove a satellite and space junk a junk that has been floating around and you want to clean up Spa out of space in a sent what is the guarantee that the same technology that cannot that can be used to remove a piece of debris is not going to be used to remove one of your knockout one of your satellites uh or other even simpler ways simpler ways are electronic warfare in space um cyber means all of this have been on a rise have been have seen exponential growth in the last I think 15 years or so in fact I did a uh in fact one of the longest paper reports for the UN Institute for disarmament research precisely looking at China's um no not China but focusing on the electronic and cyber warfare in space precisely to understand because everybody talks about as anti satellite capabilities but below that is less expensive cheaper options easy to access Technologies electronic warfare jamming a satellite uh or using laser this don't take a money but it's easily available is cheap you can uh you know you can knock out a satellite with related and so on and so forth um India I think on the counter space front I think um it's beginning to catch up there's a lot of conversation that is happening uh I was for a very long time um I had the fear that India might not catch up to that debate at all in fact Indian military seem to have gone the other way around now suddenly in the last 5 years or so there is so much of focus on the air force keeps talking about they keep talking about space so it's a war fighting we aren't there yet and I hope we don't go that that particular path but there is certainly a sort of a a greater momentum at least in terms of the conversations and in terms of the awareness of the threats that are playing out uh in a sense um Dro capability to develop all of these I think that I will take with a um spoon of salt when they make these tall claims after the ASAT test the dro chairman at that time came out and said we are we are developing an array of cter space capabilities including electronic warfare directed energy weapons and so on and so forth but that I would be I would be a little bit more sort of careful in analyzing and seeing you know are we there it because it could be done with um sort of inter service rivalry get more money from the government there's a whole range of reasons as to why Dro would make that claim but uh but I think the Indian government uh certainly the Indian Armed Forces seem to be much more into um sort of how the Chinese counter space capabilities are playing out and that is going to but I think again this there's been a lot of talk how that's converting into you know you playing out various scenarios one of your your satellites get knocked out and kind of thing and that has direct military operational implications I don't think they are making that connection in terms of uh and playing out scenarios I think scenario playing is such an important exercise to have get a realistic sense of how these capabilities play out for you rajie we're we're coming up on the end of our time um but I did want to get a question in from the audience um and this is specific specifically uh having to do with what might uh be red lines that you could see for India in China's growing nuclear arenol this relates very directly to the questions that have been raised already about you know what would really um push India into taking more rapid responses um is there anything that you heard from your interview ease uh that was an obvious Redline so to speak or something that they'd really be watching or would be alarming uh in a way that what's already happened maybe wasn't sufficiently alarming uh or would lead them to to see the necessary need for a change um again uh I think uh by and large the Indian um strategic Community which in includes also the former officials they seem to be they seem to have certain amount of comfort that it is not going to go China is not going to go overboard China is a you know somewhere a responsible power responsible state stakeholder that label is still being attributed to China which I'm not entirely comfortable with and I don't think that is really China is playing all of us and I think we need to get more serious about what the Chinese are doing in terms of capability but it does China's nuclear expansion from, to 1,500 uh by 2035 I think that is going to be uh putting a lot of enormous pressure on India in terms of what it might do because it's not just about nuclear at that point of time even even thousand nuclear warheads on on the on on CH for China that already builds in certain amount of pressure in terms of even conventional capabilities it might get India to think twice about what how it might respond to a conventional scenario if there is an uh if there is been an offensive from the Chinese side how India might respond that will also get um sort of India will play a much more careful a restrict in a restraint manner even on the conventional front if there is a significant expansion of China's nuclear Arsenal to even thousand Warheads so I think those are that's going to be that's because that's we not talking about nuclear uh because at least in the India China context we seriously have not really brought in the nuclear element in any of our conversation even when there's a border confrontation that is involved casualties um in about after 50 years and kind of thing we still don't bring in the nuclear element uh but again there have been um uh the I think um it how it might play out even in the conventional uh scenario uh how it might um sort of close India's many of India's options even in the conventional front I think that's a serious concern for India I think it's already beginning to have that effect in terms of how much India can play uh how much India can respond um in a conventional fashion um as as sort of a limited offens if India wants to do in terms of an air operation now today India might think twice um but I think it's going to bring in a a lot more pressure on India if China where China's nuclear Arsenal comes to, and of course later on 2,500 right yeah well thank you for that and that brings us back of course to to something that Bob was talking about about the extent to which China may be developing uh as he put it a war fighting capability uh and Arsenal rather than uh a deterrence one and uh ABS that India wakes up to that um and sees that as a concern it will change plan yeah that's a that's an extremely valid point I forgot to mention in the beginning um yeah it is not exactly the political instrument that India generally aders to or China talks about as well it is it's becoming China may have used that rational at a very different point and it made sense at that point but today that is not really the case and I think India needs to wake up to that reality thanks Bob and yeah sorry to intervene there yeah Bob we're we're basically over time but yeah please jump in no no no so that so that's why I don't believe they have a no first use policy right because if you have a no first use policy you don't need nuclear armed anti-ship cruise missiles right I mean right well on that note um I want to thank all of you um especially rajie uh for your great report I want to commend it to all of our viewers uh and I want to also U make a special thanks to all of the other my other colleagues at usip our editors um brigita shukert who helped out um extensively to bring this project to fruition um as I hope all of you know usip continues to be a resource on all of these topics and related questions of peace and security so again please check out Raj's report on our website take a look at the other type of work that we're doing there and uh one last time thanks to all three of you uh for a fantastic panel and I'll look forward to seeing you all in person very soon thanks thank you for listening to this event if you'd like to listen to more events or explore our other podcasts visit usp.org SLP podcasts