The
following KHALISTAN CALLING newsletter has been published in the leading
Punjabi-English newspaper of the Sikh diaspora,
Surrey Canada-based CHARHDI KALA, (Issue of January 01-07, 2002 : Vol.
17 ; No. 52). (http://www.khalistan-affairs.org/)
It was also published in the first week of January, 2002, in the
Vancouver-based PUNJAB GUARDIAN, Toronto-based SANJH SAVERA,
Calgary-based SIKH VIRSA and numerous other Punjabi/English weekly and
monthly publications which cater to the three million strong Sikh diaspora in
Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia. It can be viewed on the Khalistan
Affairs Centre web site: (http://www.khalistan-affairs.org/main/k_calling/kc01092002.htm) The Overseas Sikhs,
unlike their 20 million compatriots captive in India, are free and prosperous
and they are determined - as they believe it is their destiny and pray for it
every day; Raj Karay Ga Khalsa; Sikhs will rule - to carve
a sovereign, democratic, egalitarian Sikh buffer state of KHALISTAN in
South Asia, stretching from the Jumna river on the East to the Pakistan
border on the West, China on the Northeast and Kashmir on the North.
Khalistan
Calling newsletter dated
January 09, 2002.
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INDIA, PAKISTAN AND THE 'BOMB'
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What happens when a small 15K nuclear bomb
goes off in anger?
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A tutorial for the Sikhs about NO WAR in S. Asia
BY
Dr. Amarjit Singh
956-National Press Building, Washington DC
20045 USA
Tel: 202-637-9210 ::
Fax: 202-637-9211
INTERNET
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Washington DC: January 09, 2002:
'Field Marshal' George Fernandes, India's goofy Defence minister (named 'coffin
chor' by some Indian newspapers as a fallout of the recent $. 2,000 a piece
imported coffin scandal) spelled out India's nuclear doctrine (which was
ridiculed by us very briefly in last week's Khalistan Calling. Some
nuclear doctrine! (see: http://www.khalistan-affairs.org/main/k_calling/kc01032002.htm
. George Fernandes, the dunder-head, claimed in a December 30 interview with
the Hindustan Times that, "India could take a nuclear strike, and survive - Pakistan
won't",
which stupid statement showed the man's illiteracy on matters nuclear and total
lack of concern for the safety of Sikh Punjab, which is right on the
Indo/Pakistan border with the holy city of Amritsar situated 20 miles from
Pakistan. As far as George Fernandes is concerned India's Sikh population is an
expendable pawn and Punjab with its holy shrines is just a battlefield for his
employers, the morally repugnant Brahmin-caste hegemonies, who day dream about Akhand
Bharat after a thousand years of slavery under the Imperial rule of the
Muslims and the British.
Today's (December 08, 2002) the
Times of India has joined the South Asian Nuclear debate by reprinting a
'Washington-datelined', New York Times News Service article (written by
one David Goldstein, which is headlined: "If India-Pak tensions end
up in nuke war...") which paints a scenario of what would happen to Mumbai
(India's major seaport formerly called Bombay) if it were struck by a very
small 15-kiloton nuclear weapon which can be delivered by plane or submarine or
missile or artillery gun, or truck or train. Goldstein quotes from a 1998 case
study of a hypothetical South Asian nuclear explosion conducted by a physicist
now at the Princeton University.
A vivid scene of a nuclear
explosion is described in Goldstein's New York Times article, as follows and
should give pause to think to Sikh compatriots in Khalistan:- "It would
begin with a flash of light, brighter than a thousand suns. Then would come the
firestorm engulfing a one-mile to two-mile radius around the explosion, accompanied
by a shock wave and winds flattening everything within the circle. Between
150,000 and 800,000 people would die quickly from the blast, burns and
radiation. Others would die days, even years, later. That's what could happen
to Mumbai, if it was struck by a 15-kiloton nuclear weapon. The tragedy would
continue to unfold for years in India already hamstrung by inadequate health
and emergency services. The Mumbai scenario is a cautionary tale as tensions
mount between India and Pakistan and as the rest of the world watches nervously
to see whether the half-century-old taboo against nuclear warfare is broken.
The 15-kiloton bomb described in the Mumbai study is the same size explosive
that leveled much of Hiroshima, Japan, in World War II. India and Pakistan are
thought to have similar weapons in their respective nuclear arsenals."
Goldstein quotes one Joseph
Cirincione, director of the nonproliferation project at the Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace as saying that, "If there is a nuclear
war involving an exchange of dozens of nuclear weapons in south Asia, the
fallout would spread around the world, but it would have a long-term impact
that would increase the cancer-related deaths. The result would be similar to
the many atmospheric nuclear tests conducted by the US and Soviet Union early
in the Cold War."
"This (nuclear conflict)
would be an unprecedented, historic catastrophe," Cirincione is quoted as
saying; "I don't think we have ever seen the number of immediate
casualties that would result from such a conflict. It would be truly horrific.
Because one-fourth of the world's population is on the Indian subcontinent the
humanitarian consequences could be devastating and the economic and political
outcome would have global implications." Several other experts are
reported to have said that, "if a nuclear exchange occurred, it might be
the result of either an accident or a 'warning shot' strategy. This is when one
side detonates a nuclear device in either a remote area like the Arabian sea -
essentially a nuclear test - or over enemy troops, but not near civilians, as a
kind of blackmail to force a resolution."
Goldstein quotes, David
Albright, a former UN nuclear weapons inspector and president of the
Institute for Science and International Security as saying that "The
problem is, that's not usually how humans react. If either side hits the other
with nuclear weapons, it might as well be full-scale nuclear war, at least
their version of it." He also said that unlike the Cold War when the US
and Soviet Union each had more weapons than targets, the opposite is true for
India and Pakistan. He said that since they have such a limited number of
nuclear weapons, it might be a question of "use them or lose them."
That is why the Israeli and Pakistani nuclear doctrine states that they won't
be the first to use nukes but they won't be the second either.
The December 2001 issue of Scientific
American carried an article headlined; "India, Pakistan and the
bomb," written by a physicist, M. V. Ramana, who conducted the Mumbai case
study, in which he writes that; "With missile flight times of three to
five minutes between the two countries, early-warning systems are useless.
Leaders may not learn of a launch until they look out their window and see a
blinding flash of light."
Goldstein quotes other nuclear
experts as saying that;"the degree of radioactive fallout and how it might
spread would depend on several factors. Wind patterns would determine where
and how far the fallout would go. Another factor would be whether the blast
was detonated above or on the ground. In an air explosion, radiation stays in
the upper atmosphere where, propelled by air currents, it can travel the globe.
But it gets diluted. A surface explosion causes dirt and debris from the ground
to get mixed with the radiation. The particles become larger and travel
faster."
We have selected the subject of
Nuclear weapons, and the scenario that will emerge if they are used, for this
week's Khalistan Calling and have repeated the New York Times article so
that the 3 million strong diaspora Sikhs, and the twenty million Sikhs captive
in India since 1947, are alert, and are made aware, of the great danger that
confronts our homeland, its holy shrines and our relatives living in Sikh
Punjab, if war breaks out between India and Pakistan. We Sikhs should do our
best that war does not break out.
As there is a lot of loose talk
among India's Brahmin-fundamentalist and Swastika-worshipping Hinduvta crowd
(which has infiltrated the Indian armed forces) about a preemptive strike to
disable Pakistan's nukes (a casus belli - cause for war if there is any)
we Sikhs everywhere should make it a point to cool the ardor of these cowardly
Hindu fascists with a question. What happens if Pakistan after the preemptive strike saves
one nuke? Which direction do they think it is
going to travel immediately? They also ought to know that during the winter monsoons the wind
directions favours Pakistan (and China) as India's geographical depth becomes
fatal for New Delhi. Even during the summer monsoons, the wind direction, the
Himalayan mountains and Pakistan's lack of depth, according to I. K . Gujral,
restricts use of nuclear weapons by Delhi as India cannot destroy Lahore or
Karachi without destroying Indian population centers like Amritsar, Jullundhur,
Ludhiana, Patiala, Chandigarh, Jammu, Delhi, Jodhpur, Jaipur, Surat, Ahmedabad
and Bombay.
'Field Marshal' George Fernandes,
according to Indian media reports, is due to visit the United States on
Tuesday, January 15, 2002 - a week from now - on an official visit. We hope the
Pentagon will hold a tutorial for India's defence minister who is totally
ignorant about nukes - having spent his life in the Indian railways organizing
labor rallies. The man out of sheer stupidity and lack of know how could
provoke a nuclear war in South Asia which could destroy Sikh Punjab. We Sikhs
should therefore, hound him and ridicule him about his December 30 interview
wherever he goes in these United States next week.
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