THBT a Nuclear India should be feared. Australia vs Singapore WSDC 2001 Prep.

CONTENT: OK, Im judging this debate on the behalf of the 2 criteria set up by the Australia first, since ultimately, the team which better proved their case with regard to these yardsticks should have won.

1) Is India a reasonable threat to peace and security? SUMMARY OF WHAT HAPPENED SPEAKERWISE IN THIS CLASH:
1st PROP: Kashmir: A conflict which could destabilize the world Consistently re-engage into conflict. Major flare-ups in the war recently, Kashmir has been full of in-fighting. Thus, Kashmir is a pressing issue. Religious Ideology dividing the 2 countries- impossible to come to agreement between 2 countries. Also, through POI answers, he proved that negotiations have happened in the past, not worked and thus, there is no assurance that they will work this time. India wont agree to this, neither will Pakistan. This is because there are Islamic zealots who will withdraw support if Pakistan concede Kashmir. India- Have a largely Muslim population. Dont want to set precedent in other states due to Kashmir. Vajpayee refused tri-partite talks. In addition, he talked about how the countries were largely divided, with groups that would want launch of nuclear weapons. China: India views china as its most major military threat. 1st OPP: What is a REASONABLE threat??? There has to be clear and concrete potential for use of nukes and this isnt true. 1) History of conflict: a) Mutually assured destruction, a continuing check and balance in the region. b) Token gestures, meeting in Jammu, allowing Muslim rebels to talk without confirming to Indian constitution, all show that situation has greatly improved and India and Pakistan are going to negotiate.

2) Also, groups dont matter, because government controls nukes, and there are only 2 people who can actually launch these nukes, plus security to these nukes is very good.

India using its nukes will causes retaliation, mutually assured destruction. This is true of Pakistan as well. Thus they wont use these nuclear weapons. Increasing reconciliation, meaning no real threat. India and the international community: against Indias diplomatic interests, because of the kind of reprisals that would happen as a result. International community- praised Ukraine, outcry against North Korea. There is a negative example that India doesnt want to follow. Doesnt want to hurt itself in the international community. Other ways that India can assert itself, doesnt need nuclear weapons. Diplomatic ties with UK and USA, wont want to sacrifice it. Indian official in UN 5th committee, part of diplomatic club, and other important organizations, doesnt need nuclear weapons as a means of leverage. 2nd PROP: 1) : A very big issue, even if there are attempts at reconciliation, conflict hasnt been solved. Has happened 2 times before, this big part of issue. These attempts may fail again. 2) Not in Indias interests: Many groups, corruption within govt., terrorist groups, many different groups with different ambitions, and its not just the governments interests which matter.

3) How much control does India have? Many fundamentalist Pakistan groups who may start this conflict on India, India must retaliate, controlling regimes is very difficult.

Indian Nukes into terrorist hands: Presence of terrorist groups, Tamil tigers. Fund a new nuclear arsenal, with corruption in Indian government, means that Nukes go to terrorists. These terrorists will use these weapons causing problems across the region. 2nd OPP: Clarification: We arent talking about fearing zealots and fundamentalists, we are talking about India.

1) Conflicts: Unsolved conflicts not equal to using weapons. Talks have been about stopping the use of nuclear weapons. Governments have stated that nuclear weapons will not be used. 2) Zealots: Forcing the govt. into using nukes: Prime minister and military head have keys to nuclear activation. Zealots cant force them. Security is very high. (Safety procedures)

Economic imperatives: Rapid economic growth, there will be no usage of weapons because of these developmental interests. 6% growth every year. They want to safeguard these economic interests. If it uses its Nukes aggressively, this will happen. INVESTOR STABILITY: Investor stability will be affected if they use nuclear weapons, raising fear and hostility in the country. It has already happened in 1997. An other example in the Cuban missile crisis. Thus, the indian government will safeguard its own interests.

3rd PROP: 1) India isnt in control. a) Terrorist groups. b) Pakistan isnt stable. They said that this isnt about Pakistan, but it is. It is about the Indian Pakistan relationship. c) Pakistan and India have historical rivalries, ideological rivalries, thus full capability of nuclear weapons. (One under a military dictatorship)- reasonable chance of warreasonable threat.

1) Economic imperatives: In 1998 tests, Pakistan always was the aggressor, and India responded. In nature of politics to protect their own countries.

2) Mutually assured destruction doesnt stand because of historical rivalries, because we arent talking about 2 rational parties. International relations arent a problem.

3rd OPP: 1) Power parities in the region. None of them want to lose this power parity. Concrete movement towards diplomacy. Kashmir: Jammu summit, other efforts as well to ensure peace. Those kind of grudges dont exist anymore, it has been more than 50 years since the Indian-Pak conflicts, or India-China conflicts. 2) Economic dependency between countries meaning Pakistan will not launch weapons because its in its own self-interest. 3) Prop never showed how an escalation of conflict would necessarily cause the use of nukes. 4) Retaliation: Attack wont happen, since there have been negotiations, as well as the fact that we havent seen a nuclear attack in 50 years of nukes. Pakistan wants to validate itself before an international community which will frown on such acts. Musharraf wants to protect his own interests, meaning that they wont pre-emptively attack. 5) Splintered groups that are the problem: Musharraf is a military strong man: meaning that he has strong control over military arsenal over Pakistan. 6) China: India was talking about China as a threat to economic development, NOT military threat 7) Govt. structure: Corruption: Getting kickbacks from international conglomerates to get monopoly. Much better source of funds than selling arms to terrorists. (Which is why it hasnt happened before) Responsibility for government has increased, and governments are greatly checked, meaning corruption is reduced. (A lot of corruption scams brought about) Thus, terrorist groups will not be given these nukes.

WHAT I THOUGHT:

I thought ultimately this clash went to Team Singapore. This is because Australia seemed a little bit confused about their stance on this until the 3 rd speech. They started out saying that Kashmir was a major issue, and China-India relations were tense. HOWEVER, as the 3rd opp aptly said, they never proved until 3rd (Which I thought was too late) how or why this would cause usage of nuclear weapons. Finally when it did come out that they were talking about PAKISTAN using nuclear weapons, and India defending itself, and the harms that that would cause, 3rd opp dealt with it aptly as listed above. I thought the idea of negotiations was fairly evenly fought. Australia never dealt with this idea of economic interdependency

well enough, and though they talked about Islamist fundamentalists, they never went far enough to show how these people actually exerted influence over the government, meaning that Singapores response about how it was 2 people who controlled these nukes was good enough, because Australia never talked about this influence beyond just to say that it existed. Australia ultimately did respond to mutual destruction by proving how Pakistan was irrational in their 3rd, which once again I thought was way too late to be proving something of that magnitude. I thought that Singapores saying that fearing India and fearing fundamentalists were 2 different things was simply untrue, especially considering the context in which 1st prop set the debate up, making it largely about relations between India and Pakistan. BUT, because of the lack of analysis about how an unsolved conflict will necessarily mean use of nukes, I though this went to Singapore. I thought the idea of arms struggle was also evenly fought with a slight edge towards Singapore as Australias idea was well responded to by Singapore when they said that Nukes cost a lot to maintain, and thus, international trends were towards decommission. I also thought Australia never talked about why this Arms struggle was something to really fear, something which was a problem throughout 1st. I also thought that Australias responses in 3rd to Singapores arguments about international recognition, and economic development revolved too much around Pakistan being unstable, something which was dealt with by 3 rd opp when he said that Pakistan wasnt that irrational and that it was in its own vested interests to not launch nukes. Though this sounded a little idealistic, it wasnt responded to and thus didnt matter. On the issue of terrorists, I actually gave the edge to Australia because it wasnt responded to until the end of the 3rd opp, which is a bit late to respond to something which came on 2nd prop. But overall, I thought that Singapore were more clear on the issue from the outset, and thus, SINGAPORE WON THIS CLASH As Australia, I think it was necessary to make it clearer how unsolved conflict equates to use of nukes, and how this is worsened when India gets nukes, and why this is really something to fear. In addition, I thought they could have made additional changes as Ive said above. I also thought their analysis wasnt fully done at times, and many links were missing, as detailed above. I thought Singapore could have prioritized responses better, and I thought they were very idealistic at times. I also thought their idea of fear against India and fear against Pakistan and China being different was ridiculous.

Is India a reasonable threat to Environment & economies? SUMMARY OF WHAT WAS SAID: PROP:
1) Public concerns: Not A grade top notch weapons. Old weapons need to be disposed off. These threaten public safety. Public suffers. Fears for countries like Bangladesh suffering in water supply, as effects of radiation from Chernobyl spread as far as Scandinavia. 2) Waste of resources: India is poor, high population. Has an external debt standing at 98 billion dollars. Has to provide tons of cash to help India out. (Because of disease and famine.) to stop people dying.

OPP: 1) Environmental problems: Scientists have talked about how radioactivity from nuclear reactors isnt more than our microwaves. 2) Money: Precisely because of their lack of money why they arent going to build too many weapons and more over use them. 3) Responsibility for government has increases, and governments are greatly checked, meaning that they have to be careful about disposal of nukes. 4) International checks will exist, meaning standards have to be maintained. Finally, economic interests, Vajpayee is also aware of all this, meaning that he will not use these nukes. I gave this clash to Singapore as well as I thought Australia failed to respond to this idea that Vajpayee was aware of the economic problems and thus would not build too many nukes. I thought Environment was fairly even. I also thought Australia saying they are scared because of the economic bailouts that the international community will have to take the burden of, was not necessarily in the purview of the debate, since it isnt something you normally associate fear with.

SINGAPORE WON THIS CLASH

Style: I thought stylistically, all the speakers were good. I thought the 1st prop stuttered a bit at
times, and could have used a more concerned tone when speaking about the Kashmir issue, instead of being as casual as he was. I also thought team opp could have shown more variation from their standard style of strong and angry, though their style suited the debate more than Australias casual style.

STRATEGY: I thought that Australia needed to make their stance a lot clearer from the front, and
their first speaker needed to time himself a LOT better in terms of the way he structured his speech. I also thought the 3rd prop was a bit reply-ish towards the end. I thought Singapores third could have prioritized some of his responses a bit higher considering that 2nd props idea of terrorist groups hadnt been responded till then. With regard to POIs, I thought that they were asked at the right times, though I thought that the POIs asked during the 3rd props speech werent the best as they needed a lot more explanation, which couldnt be fitted in 15 seconds, and thus were pretty easy to respond to.

FOR ALL THESE REASONS, I GAVE THE DEBATE TO TEAM SINGAPORE.