ABSTRACT
This book’s primary purpose is to demonstrate the negative ramifications of nuclear weapons acquisition for the India-Pakistan protracted conflict. However, it also aims to highlight the salient roles of actor attributes and situational attributes in resolving the conflict. The purpose is to illustrate that a conflict is likely to become protracted when the two sides acquire nuclear weapons, a unit-level attribute, unless there is a significant change in an actor attribute such as leadership or political/ economic capability, or in a situational attribute, such as third-party intervention in order to terminate the conflict. The chapter discusses whether there is still any possibility of terminating the conflict despite its crisis-prone environment. The roles of external powers, in particular the US, bold leaders, and political/economic capabilities are analyzed in this regard. The connection between all three attributes is also discussed.
