ABSTRACT
The first five years the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in May 1998 were tumultuous, particularly with the fourth India Pakistan War of May June 1999 in the Kargil sector of their Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir. This was their first war after both had formally declared themselves nuclear weapons powers and they did resort to brandishing nuclear threats raising serious concerns among major world powers. In the context of East West nuclear stalemate from 1949, the Kargil conflict is often compared with the famous Cuban Missile Crisis. For India, the first five years (1998-2003) were to lay the foundations of its formal and explicit nuclear doctrine. India's NFU doctrine has created tremendous controversy and it continues to remain a subject of fierce debate and speculation. India's nuclear doctrine permits the first use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states allied to a nuclear power.
