the US would loan and eventually sell Pakistan some sophisticated AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) aircraft;

Pakistan may get a large number of M 1 tanks, the latest in the US armoury;

Pakistan had asked for 80 more F 16 aircraft of the advanced C version and an aircraft carrier; and more ominously,

the disclosure by an American newspaper, quoting secret US intelligence documents that Pakistan, having successfully tested the triggering device used for nuclear detonations, was only "two screw driver turns" from having a fully assembled nuclear bomb.

At the best of times the arms race between India and Pakistan is governed by a competitive hysteria; each side cries itself hoarse about the perceived threat from the military acquisitions of its rival. But never before did the balance of fire-power come so close to being upset as with the recent announcement that:



The most expected of these developments was the one on the nuclear front. The ominous military intent behind Pakistan's nuclear programme has, for some time, been clear to the world, so the news of the testing of the trigger came as no great surprise. The more worrying news, in the short term, concerned the expected arrival in south Asian skies of the AWACS - a force multiplier which radically alters the balance of power in the air and consequently on the ground. The Government made it clear that it took this development very seriously.



The Ministry of External Affairs called in the US Ambassador John Gunther Dean and told him so. In Washington the Indian Ambassador P.K. Kaul carried a similar message to the Secretary of Defence Caspar Weinberger who started the whole controversy in October by announcing, two days after he left Delhi, that he was convinced Pakistan needed the AWACS to monitor air intrusions from the north. Back home in Delhi Natwar Singh, minister of state for external affairs, told Parliament that the Government's fears had "not been allayed" by US protestations that the AWACS deal was only at an exploratory stage.



He said the mind boggling capability of the AWACS would make a qualitative difference to the country's security environment. While cautioning against a panic reaction, Singh said: "We will consult our friends (and) keep our powder dry". And Arun Singh, minister of state for defence, made the point equally bluntly to Robert Aldridge the visiting secretary of the US Air Force, who called on him in Delhi late last fortnight.



The plane's capabilities are truly awesome. Cruising at a height of 30,000 feet along the Indian border, the AWACS, a versatile spy-in-the-sky. can rip the veil of operational secrecy off three-fourths of the Indian Air Force's (IAF) main operational commands - Western and South-Western. According to present indications , the E-3 A AWACS planned to be flown over Pakistan is basically an electronic surveillance station mounted on a Boeing 707 jetliner.



Its most distinctive feature is a huge, rotating frisbee-like dish mounted on the rear fuselage. The dish contains a bristling array of antennae which allows controllers seated at 17 video consoles inside the aircraft to radar-scan the airspace below, around and above it up to distances of 700 km. During a war, the Pakistani AWACS would detect and track almost every single aircraft getting airborne from the IAF's forward bases. And controllers in the AWACS can warn their own aircraft of approaching IAF planes and eventually guide them into firing positions behind these planes.



The electronic counter measure (ECM) capability aboard the AWACS allows its user to jam radar frequencies and communications of the enemy radar. All this can prove decisive in a war and the outcome would "be almost disastrous for the nation without (an AWACS). An AWACS capability would provide Pakistan with a quantum qualitative superiority over the IAF, navy and army", says Air Commodore Jasjit Singh, deputy director of the Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses.



Military planners see a grim lesson in the losses that the Syrian army and air force suffered against an AWACS (Hawk-eye) aided Israeli Air Force in June 1982. The Israelis first knocked out the Syrian Air Force (shooting down 80 Syrian planes against the loss of only one of their own) and smashed hundreds of tanks of the Syrian 1st and 3rd armoured divisions. Our mechanised divisions are equally vulnerable to air attacks, says a seasoned IAF pilot. "One sale of four AWACS planes to Pakistan will nullify our Rs 8,000 crore defence budget. We will be naked to their surveillance."





The M1 Tank: exaggerated threat The M1 Tank: exaggerated threat

But other air force officials warn that there's no cause for panic, "AWACS is not the end of the world for the IAF but its presence up in the sky would definitely reduce operational and tactical flexibility, and decrease its options." said a senior official. The IAF would find it more difficult to fly deep-strike missions inside Pakistan and would probably have to limit its sorties to bases no deeper than 100 km inside Pakistan. This is why an AWACS is called a force multiplier; by limiting the effectiveness of the IAF, it increases the effectiveness of the Pakistan Air Force by a similar factor.What's more, the attrition rate of the IAF could increase by as much as 30 per cent. "We will have to accept greater aircraft losses if we have to send up a large number of fighters to shoot down the AWACS. " The war for control of the skies will be fought around the AWACS.Assuming that the US will allow AWACS planes to be deployed along the Indian border, what can India do to counter the threat? The immediate option that suggests itself is placement of Sam 5 missiles about 60 to 70 km behind the border. With a range of about 200 km, these missiles will ensure that the AWACS remains at least 150 km behind Pakistani lines.The other option is to get the MiG 31, the two seat Mach 3 intercepter which flies at heights up to 60,000 to 80,000 feet, hasaradar with a 200-km range and missiles which can be fired at unseen targets 70 km away. The IAF argues that a MiG 31 could streak in at Mach 3 speed at a height of 60,000 feet, fire its missile and pull away before the AWACS' fighter escort can climb from 30,000 feet to intercept it. Pakistan will have to dedicate up to two squadrons of fighters to protect the AWACS.The MiG 31 was offered to India by the Soviets two years ago, but at that time the IAF was more keen on acquiring the MiG 29, whose first squadrons are likely to be formed by early next year. The MiG 31, experts say, has been developed as the Soviet response to the AWACS. As an interim response to the threat posed by Pakistan's proposed acquisition of AWACS capability, the IAF will, most probably, equip itself with a couple of squadrons of the MiG 31 and also get some SAM 5s. These demands are bound to be raised during the forthcoming visit to India of the Soviet supremo Mikhail Gorbachev. Another possible option is to get the Soviet version of AWACS, an Il 76 aircraft fitted with a circular radoine similar to the one on the E-3A. At the same time the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is in the process of testing out an HS 748 Avro as a flying platform for a desi version of the AWACS which could be flying in four years, if all goes according to plan. The plane's cruising speed, altitude ceiling and area coverage is bound to be much less than that of the E-3A, but once the indigenous technology passes the test it can easily be mounted onto a larger aircraft like the Airbus. The DRDO is now likely to get the Rs 300-crore it has been demanding to develop the plane.Of course the actual deployment of US-owned AWACS planes along Pakistan's lndia border is yet far away, and the sale of such planes to Pakistan as mooted by Weinberger, even farther. Both these proposals will have to cross the obstacle of Congressional approval and this could take at least a year, now that the Democrats have a majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. It is also open to debate, says one lobby in the Defence Ministry, whether the US will allow the AWACS to be flown along the Indian border in case of a war between Pakistan and India.An opposing point of view, however, holds that the AWACS deal is part of a larger US plan to involve Pakistan in the Central Command and its defence concerns in the Persian Gulf. One aim of the US in sending AWACS planes into Pakistan, say experts, could be to peer into the Tashkent region where the Soviet Air Force has located a large number of its training establishments. As aPakistan will eventually get its own AWACS which it can use against India.As far as the prospect of Pakistan receiving the M 1 tanks is concerned, Indian defence officials are not unduly worried. The M I is a good tank but it enjoys no great superiority over the Russian T 72 which has laser range-finders, and in fact, boasts of a more powerful 125 mm gun compared to the M 1's 105 mm gun. Even the Main Battle Tank (MBT) under development in India matches up to the M 1 fairly well and the programme will continue unchanged, say DRDO scientists.The Pakistani demand on the other hand for the F-16C looks sinister because this version can provide Pakistan with a delivery system for the nuclear bomb it is on the verge of assembling, (). An AWACS in the air will ensure that the F-16Cs get through. India's initial reaction to all this, said a seasoned diplomat, would be to try to prevent the sale of this hardware from going through, especially the AWACS. A diplomatic offensive is already underway and a Democrat-controlled Congress in the US may be more inclined to listen to India's protests than Reagan's hawkish hardliners. But till a decision is finally taken, the decibel level of the debate on the rearming of the subcontinent is bound to register another hysterical upswing.