[url]www.janes.com[/url]

Following December 2001's audacious attacks upon the Indian parliament large numbers of Indian and Pakistani troops have massed on or near the frontier dividing the two countries, and the contested province of Kashmir has been placed on high alert.

The two sides appear to have painted themselves into a corner, seemingly unable to extricate themselves from an exceptionally dangerous situation without losing face and risking the collapse of their governments and, in the case of Pakistan's General Musharraf, assassination.

There are, however, some grounds for hope that the worst can be avoided. First, India and Pakistan will be constrained by the near certainty that if one side uses nuclear weapons against the other, the victim will retaliate. It was such a 'balance of terror' that kept the peace between the USSR and United States in the Cold War years.

Second, the two sides may be deterred from launching a land war against the other for at least a few months because the temperature in the potential battle areas is fiercely hot - up to 50 degrees centigrade.

Third, it takes time for hundreds of thousands of soldiers to organise themselves on a war footing. . . .

Fourth, the two sides may wish to imitate the US taste for avoiding ground wars and concentrate on domination of the skies, but this may be easier said than done. . . .

Fifth, the two sides may try to strike some geostrategic blows on the other before considering the nuclear option.

Sixth, the Western powers and Russia can be expected to apply ever stronger pressure on the two sides to desist from war preparations. These countries know how to apply pressure. It could work.

Nonetheless, danger looms. India has demanded that Pakistan hand over some 20 fighters/terrorists and stop its support of the Kashmiri Muslim fighters. If Pakistan bowed to Indian pressure, General Musharraf, the military head of government, would run the risk of being assassinated. Meanwhile, if India fails to achieve its goals, the government of Atal Behari Vajpayee would be in danger of collapse.

The prospects? No war for a few months, but a lot of bellicose rhetoric and more low-level actions.

Honestly, I think they will

Part 2

With war clouds looming low and all sides painting themselves into a proverbial corner, no one faces a more difficult choice than Pakistan's president Musharraf.

Musharraf is caught between India's threats to go to war over Islamabad's continued support for Kashmiri militant separatists and his own public, which strongly supports the Kashmiri Muslim separatist cause. Meanwhile, the USA, which both sides hope will help them out of the current crisis, is quickly losing patience with Musharraf for not containing the violence and increasing pressure on the militants.

However, to do so would be a difficult, dangerous task for the president, whose political support at home is dropping and who faces challenges from religious groups over previous moves to end support for the Taliban and his work to bring Islamic fundamentalists in the country under control.

It will be no easy task for Musharraf to rein in the Pakistan-based Kashmiri militant groups, who enjoy strong support among the public and lesser, but still important, backing from the army and intelligence services. The recent crisis began on 14 May when Kashmiri militants attacked an Indian Army camp, killing 32 people. With tensions high and over a million troops of the nuclear-armed neighbours on the border, the situation deteriorated further following days of heavy artillery shelling across the Line of Control (LoC) that divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan.

New Delhi increased its war preparations, sending five warships into the western Arabian Sea to threaten Pakistan's primary port of Karachi. Pakistan responded by saying that, if needed, it would recall a brigade serving with the UN peacekeeping force in Sierra Leone and shift troops supporting the USA's Operation 'Enduring Freedom'on the Afghan border and send them to the eastern border with India.

To make matters worse, Kashmiri moderate political leader Abdul Ghani Lone, who supported dialogue rather than a military solution to the Kashmir problem, was assassinated by unidentified gunmen - an act for which both sides blamed the other. US officials called Lone's death "a huge negative" and said it was probably perpetrated by Kashmiri militants with Pakistan's backing. Mirroring a growing clamour for war at home, Indian officials started to turn up the pressure, with Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee saying New Delhi would wage a "decisive battle" against terrorism. Indian officials were busy telling journalists they intended to launch military strikes across the LoC, sooner rather than later, if Pakistan did not take strong and immediate steps to end its training and equipping of the Kashmiri fighters.

US officials believe those strikes would initially be against training camps across into Pakistani-controlled Kashmir, but also fear that once a war begins, it would be difficult to contain. In a letter to US President George Bush, Vajpayee said India had completed all necessary preparations for a military strike and urged Bush to convince Pakistan to end its support for the Kashmiri fighters before it was too late. While US officials are sympathetic to India's complaints - they noted, for example, that training and equipping of the Kashmiri fighters on Pakistani territory is continuing - they are also fully aware of the difficult steps Musharraf has already made. Moreover, they said, Pakistan's continued support of OEF is vital, a point not lost on the Pakistani side.

How many troops do they have?

India's Socialist political leaders have finally given up on being able to make their country into a real global economic and political player as long as they have that enormous and rapidly increasing population.

The Indians have been SO agressive even before the attack on their Congress, its clear that they really want War and they aren't deterred by the idea of it going nuclear. The human cost means NOTHING to them. The Pakistanis would, under normal circumstances, be happy to oblidge but they have US on their backs.  And I think they also have discovered that they have been suckered. They wanted to use nuclear weapons the offset India's manpower advantage, now they have discovered that India doesnt give a rats ass about how many they loose plus have nukes of their own..

I'm not so sure I agree with this assessment based on the following:  

1) Part of the Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) deterrence strategy was based on both the U.S. and Soviet Union possessing a nuclear triad (you can knock out my missiles and/or bombers, but my sub-launched missiles will still get you). Pakistan and India do not possess this.  Does one side believe that there is a possibility of successfully achieving a first strike kill?  

2) The Pakistani/Indian fingers on the button will be much more twitchy due to a lack of response time to a perceived first strike threat.  It is one thing to be able to have 30 minutes to react to a launch from the other side of the planet as opposed to having a bare, few minutes to respond to a launch from just across the border.  Is that a MIG-21 approaching our border with a 1,000 pound bomb or is it a nuke?  How close do we let it approach before we take a chance at losing our chance to respond?

3) General Musharraf controls the Pakistani button - or does he?  His position is tenuous at best.  He is the leader of Pakistan only because he led the military coup which overthrew the previously elected leader.  A good portion of his military isn't pleased at all with him because of his support for the US war on terrorism/Afghanistan.  What happens if the Pakistanis lose ground to India?  Will there be demands from his Generals to go nuclear?  If he doesn't, will he be tossed out in another coup? What if India perceives that he is about to be overthrown?  Should they launch a preemptive first strike to save themselves from radical Pakistani elements?

4) The dangerous part here is the uncertainties for both sides.  The US and the USSR understood each others nuclear systems very clearly and had decades to war-game their MAD scenarios to the ultimate and logical conclusions.  I'm not confident that either Pakistan's or India's military is professional enough to understand all of the nuances that are necessary to handle these additions to their arsenals.  

Time will tell and I pray that I'm very, very, very wrong.

Johnny

While on the other hand, India has much to fear from China to the East.

One of the more dangerous things about this conflict is the Military relationship between China and Pakistan. Most of that IRBM missle technoligy, that Pakistan is testing right now, came from CHINA. China see's India, as both a cross boarder military threat and a economic competitor, and is thus, willing to fund Pakistan, in the hope, that the Paki's will destroy most of Indias Economic and Military Strength, Before India burns Pakistan off the face of the Earth.

China feels that it can step in after the first Strike Nuclear Exchange, in which Pakistan is virtualy destroyed and India finds itself with four or five of its major cities badly damaged or destroyed, and hold the ChiCom nuclear gun to a battered India's head. Thus becoming the Nuclear Strong man of Sino Asia.

Pakistan does not win. India does not win. CHINA WINS!!!

China feels that there is little risk from the United States in this, believing that the U.S. would down play China's nuclear ultimatum to India, and try to save diplomatic face by claiming, that the Indo/Paki Nuclear war ended after only one round, due to U.S. Diplomatic Efforts. Rather than Risk a Nuclear Confontation with China, In which, China could well threaten to attack the Continental United States with Nuclear Weapons.

There is no one in the present U.S. Goverment, Democrat or Republican with the guts to call China's bluff on such a ultimatum, So we would send Massive aid to both Destroyed Pakistan and Ravaged India.

WHILE CHINE TAKES ITS PLACE AS THE NEW MASTER OF ASIA!!!

No.
(Pakistan and India will not go to war.)

It's like LA street gangs. Let them kill each other, what do we lose?

Our troops in Pakistan and a land/air corridor  into Afghanistan.

You are describing a revelation of common sense coming to Moslems and Hindus. We are kind of getting the idea these Moslem freaks will keep on coming until we nuke them all. They will, and we will. Your basic Hindu drinks his own piss for purification and worships a cow in a country of 980,000 starving people. Where is the footing for sanity with these folks? Yes, they will fight.

I'm thinking this is by far the best chance for a nuclear war in a long, long time...  I think they will both go to some kind of war, whether or not it's nuclear remains to be seen I guess.

Well they're shelling each other and shooting at each other to some extent in the Kashmir region already.  So I guess they pretty much ARE at war, and it's a question of how far it will escalate.

I think there are many dangerous of this proliferating to nuclear war.  As has been touched on, their proximity is what really makes this dangerous.  Any mistake (aircraft off course, problem with one of their missile tests, etc) could cause the other to push the button.  

One reason pakistan is so happy about having nukes is the fact their army is so outnumbered.  If large scale conventional fighting breaks out and Pakistan loses a bunch of troops, or India gets too far in they will be painted into a corner...a good motivation for using nukes.

I don't know how good their detection systems are, but I'm guessing that a decisive first strike by one side is probably possible.   What are we talking, maybe five minutes of flight time for the nukes?  I think one side could probably deliver nukes on target before the other side could respond.  As long as they could get all of the other guys nukes and/or enough of their command and control, I think it would be possible.  

As was also mentioned, we're not exactly dealing with the most rational or refrained people here.  I wouldn't put it past some of the extremists to go ahead and do the unthinkable.

Mike

[url]http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/south/05/28/india.pakistan/index.html[/url]

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistan has conducted a new test of a short-range missile hours after President Pervez Musharraf told the world his country does not want war.

Pakistani television announced the successful testing Tuesday of a 180-km (110-mile) range missile, the third and last in a series which began over the weekend.

Contrary to its muted reponse to earlier tests, India has stepped up its rhetoric against Pakistan.

"This is highly irresponsible behaviour and displays the political and military brinkmanship of the Pakistani leadership," a spokesman told CNN.

India's defense minister has said that following the missile tests and 'harsh words from Pakistan' India's options are narrowing.

Pakistan denies the tests are linked to the military confrontation with India, describing them as routine missile tests.  

In a televised address late Monday, Musharraf said Pakistan would respond [i][b]in full[/b][/i] if war broke out over the disputed region of Kashmir.

(emphasis added)

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So is it just good ol' fashioned saber-rattling or just the beginning of something very disturbing?

The estimate is that 12 million people would die in a nuclear war.  That really surprised me, because that's maybe 2% of the population at most.  The Indian population is about 1b or so.  It might be worth it just because it'll mean one less muslim-run country on earth, and all the dangers and destabilization that entails.

This is delusional... China's nuclear arsenal is a barely creadable deterrant... at the present it poses little threat to the US. And if we decide to act first it poses no threat at all.

China poses little threat to India also. China would have to use nukes agaist India because they are both so well matched in size. And also because China has no really accessable way of getting its ground forces into India, even if they broke Nepals neutrality. It doesnt take much to hold those mountain passes.

And if China uses Nuclear weapons in sufficient quantity to break India- all they will inherit is a barren wasteland and a even bigger popuation to feed.  Its the same reason that the Soviets never attacked the west- though they could have badly used the resources in Western Europe they concluded that any military attempt to seize them would have in the process destroyed so much of the infrastructure as to make the new conquests worthless.

India and Pakistan are different cause theirs is a RELIGIOUS conflict. Even if Kashmier becomes independant Pakistan gains NOTHING tangable, just perhaps the goodwill and money of the Saudis and the gulf sheiks for liberating another part of the old Islamic empire.

I find it difficult to beleve that China helped Pakistan for anything other than cash. Cause if Kashmier goes to the Muslims, the next place to fall will be Xinjang province and its mostly Muslim ethnic Uigiur population.

The interesting thing is: what if India or Pakistan wins?

It's a convienient (for us) truism that "no one wins a nuclear war". But what if, say, India is on the ball, and does a pre-emptive attack on the Pakistani nuclear force and wipes it out. Or what if they fight a tactical nuclear war and one side comes out decisively ahead?

The incentive in the aftermath would be for everyone to get nukes, since they would self-evidently work. Which would be bad for us, since the mystery around them serves our interests well.

BTW, the Indians seem to have a much more sophisticated nuclear arsenal. They're using plutonium implosion bombs, and boosted fission bombs which probably range up to at least 40KT. They claim to have tested a two-stage thermonuclear device (an H-bomb) but others say their test fizzled, with only the fission primary going off, and not the second, fusion stage. The Pakistanis seem to be relying on U-235 bombs of around a 10KT max yield. The Indians seem to be at about the early 1950's stage, while the Paks are still in the mid 1940's range of technology.

Grimshaw, comments like this would make even an ignorant white cracker blush with embarassment.  My wife is an Indian Hindu, I have spent a lot of time in India, and you don't know what the F you are talking about.  You best get back to marrying your sister or whatever stupid white trash does.

GunLvr