Alternate Futures after the South Asian Nuclear Tests: Pokhran as Prologue

Abstract

India's and Pakistan's May 1998 nuclear tests sparked fears not only of a new nuclear arms race in South Asia but also of rising security tensions in Asia more broadly and the collapse of nuclear nonproliferation efforts at the global level. Statements by Indian officials identifying Chinese threats as a principal justification for the tests and the expressed intentions of both India and Pakistan to become full-fledged nucleararmed states did nothing to assuage these fears. Such gloomy prospects are by no means inevitable. Indeed, some developments in the year since the tests-such as new progress in India-Pakistan relations and direct engagement on nuclear issues between the U.S. and both India and Pakistan-augur well for stability in the future. Yet, at the same time, both India and Pakistan continue to assert their intentions to establish minimum deterrence nuclear capabilities and proceed with missile development programs.1 Hence, the future remains highly uncertain. This article offers a conceptual framework within which the uncertainties as to the long-term implications of the South Asian nuclear tests may be systematically assembled and assessed. It first outlines the background and context for the nuclear tests, summarizing some of their causes and consequences and highlighting in particular the links between the tests themselves and circumstances elsewhere in Asia. It then presents a set of scenarios describing a range of possible courses of events in Asia in the wake of the