When China’s
People’s Liberation Army (PLA) holds a grand military parade in Beijing’s
Tiananmen Square on October 1 (expected to be the biggest in China’s history) showcasing some of its most advanced weapons to mark the nation’s 70th
anniversary, one of the most eagerly awaited weapon systems to look out for will
be the PLA Rocket Forces’ (PLARF) long-range multi-barrel rocket launchers (MBRL)
that care meant for firing guided rockets containing low-yield tactical nuclear
warheads (TNW). In fact, such 400mm MBRLs have already been exported by China to
both Pakistan and Democratic People’s Republic of Korea since 2011.
While in Pakistan this MBRL is known as
the Hatf-9/Nasr, the North Korean MBRL’s name has yet to be revealed. The
latter was first test-fired on July 31, followed by additional firings on August
2, August 24 and again on September 10, 2019. According to the Republic of
Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, the rockets were fired from Sondok in South
Hamgyong Province into the East Sea at around 6:45am and 7:02am local time.
They flew around 380km at an apogee of about 97km, with the maximum speed
reaching more than Mach 6.5. Two rockets were fired each time and flew around
220km (on August 2) to 250km (July 31) at an apogee of about 25km (August 2)
and 30km (July 31), with the maximum speed being more than Mach 6.9 for the
August 2 test-firing.
Exports of such long-range MBRLs have so
far been conducted by both the China Aerospace Science & Technology Corp
(CASC), also known as the 4th Academy; and the China Aerospace
Science & Industry Corp (CASIC). The production authority has been the Chengdu-based
Sichuan Aerospace Industry Corp (SCAIC), also known as Base 062.
The maiden test-firing of the
Hatf-9/Nasr took place on April 19, 2011, while a salvo-firing of all four
rockets took place on October 5, 2013, following which formal service-induction
with the Pakistan Army took place. Each rocket weighs 1,200kg and contains a 400kg
warhead-section. Contrary to its declared range of 60km, the rocket is estimated
to travel as far as 380km. The conventionally-armed variants of this MBRL are
known as the WS-2 or WeiShi-2 (Guardian-2) and WS-3, with the former being exported
to Morocco and Sudan by China National Precision Machinery Corp (CPMIEC).
Soon after May
1998, the chances of an all-out conventional war breaking out between declared
nuclear weapons-armed states like India and Pakistan across the 2,175km-long
International Boundary (IB) became nil, and since mid-1999 (following OP
Vijay and OP Safed Sagar) there have been greater prospects of limited
but high-intensity wars being fought along both the Line of Control (LoC) and
the that part of the IB that Pakistan refers to as the Working Boundary (WB).
India’s Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir (J & K) has 734km of
LoC running through Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh regions from Kargil to Malu
(Akhnoor) in Jammu district, while it has 190km of IB from Malu to the Punjab
belt running through Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts.
The WB, spanning
202km and including the Chicken’s Neck area, lies in Jammu Division between
Boundary Pillar 19 and Sangam i.e. between Jammu and Sialkot), which was part
of the erstwhile princely state of J & K. It is this stretch that Pakistan
refers to it as the WB, since it maintains that the border agreement (the
so-called standstill agreement) was inked between the princely state of J &
K and Pakistan, and not between India and Pakistan. Given the fact that India maintains
a near-foolproof anti-infiltration grid along the LoC, Pakistan has since
mid-2013 focussed its terrorist infiltration efforts (via underground tunnels
dug throughout the Chicken’s Neck area) along the WB.
Chicken’s Neck is the name given to the territory lying between the two
branches of the River Chenab and it is a dagger-shaped salient in J & K
that allows the PA an easy access to the bridge at Akhnoor in Jammu, as well as
to the Chhamb-Jaurian sector. Measuring about 170 sq km, it is bound by the
River Chenab in the west, and by the River Chandra Bhaga, or Ghag Nala in the
east. Ferries in Saidpur, Gondal, Majwal and Gangwal areas connect it with the
Sialkot sector. Being an open area in the plains, it is excellent for the conduct
of swift, offensive manoeuvre warfare by the Indian Army. However, for Pakistan, this area is indefensible by conventional means,
as it is surrounded by India from three sides and back in December 1971, was
captured by India within a 48-hour period. Consequently, if the IA were to opt
for a high-tempo but limited land campaign (under its Cold Start doctrine),
with the objective being a piece of Pakistani real-estate stretching all the
way out Chhamb, then the only available option for the PA is to exercise its
right to self-defence by using TNWs against invading IA formations within the
Chicken’s Neck salient, i.e. inside sovereign Pakistani territory.
It is for this reason that the PA between 2012 and 2015 constructed a
purpose-built cantonment at Pasrur (southeast of Sialkot) for housing its 18
Hatf-9/Nasr multi-barrel rocket launchers (MBRL), each of which can salvo-fire
four 400mm rockets. The rocket is 7.5 metres
in length, can carry a TNW with a yield of 3 Kilotons out to a distance of up
to 150km, and has a 300-metre circular error probable.
In such a scenario, where
India will find herself extremely hard-put to justify a second-strike
retaliation with nuclear weapons, the only available option then—in order to
retain moral ascendancy—will be to resort to a doctrine of pre-emptive but
conventional first-strike against the PA’s stockpile of deployed TNWs both at
Pasrur and within the Chicken’s Neck area.
