Indo-Pak: Nuclear Cold War

America, with its nuclear arsenal capable of destroying the world several times over, could not defend itself against the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, that paralyzed the nation. The erstwhile Soviet Union, another superpower with equal quantity of nuclear weapons, could not survive the crisis that splintered it into several countries. India, instead of becoming more powerful by declaring itself a nuclear weapon state after the 1998 tests, has been powerless to pursue the militants across the border in Kashmir for fear of Pak nuclear capability. More than Kashmir and cross-border terrorism, the nuclear arms race in the sub-continent is the menacing danger to the millions in India and Pakistan. A nuclear arms race and a possible nuclear war would ruin both countries. Those who point to the US-USSR cold war that did not break out into a nuclear exchange, as an example of successful deterrence, should know Indo-Pak hostility is a different matter. Muslim fundamentalism and Hindu fanaticism do not work rationally. The Indo-Pak nuclear cold war should end here and now by making South Asia a Nuclear Weapon Free Zone (NWFZ).