Does nuclear weapons proliferation cause ongoing conflicts to diminish or to intensify? The spread of nuclear weapons to South Asia offers an opportunity to investigate this crucial question. Optimistic scholars argue that by threatening to raise the cost of war astronomically, nuclear weapons make armed conflict in South Asia extremely unlikely. Pessimistic scholars maintain that nuclear weapons make the subcontinent war-prone, because of technological, political, and organizational problems. This book argues that nuclear weapons have destabilized the subcontinent, principally because of nuclear weapons' interaction with India and Pakistan's territorial preferences and relative military capabilities. These findings challenge both optimistic and pessimistic conventional wisdom and have implications beyond South Asia.

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Contents

1. The Problem of Proliferation
2. Militarized Behavior During the South Asian Proliferation Process
3. Territorial Preferences and Military Capabilities
4. The Nonnuclear Period
5. The De Facto Nuclear Period
6. The Overt Nuclear Period
7. Beyond South Asia
8. Dangerous Deterrent