ABSTRACT
In spring 1998, India and Pakistan jettisoned the officially preferred status of "nuclear ambiguity" and "recessed" (or "non weaponized") deterrence and became overt nuclear weapon states. India led the way with a stunning series of underground nuclear tests—the first since its 1974 "peaceful nuclear explosion"—that took the world largely by surprise. On 11 May, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee announced that India had successfully conducted three tests (of a fission, a low yield, and a thermonuclear device) at its Pokharan range in Rajasthan. Another announcement followed, on 13 May, of an additional two tests—both reported to be in the sub-kiloton range. Pakistan's response to India's action was both swift and predictable. Saying that Pakistan had "to restore the strategic balance" with India, 1 Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced on 28 May that Pakistan had conducted five nuclear tests of its own—like India's, said to be of varying magnitudes—at its Chagai test range near the Iranian border in Baluchistan. A sixth Pakistani test followed on 30 May.
