Abstract:
For the past seventy years, nuclear non-proliferation has
been the top US foreign policy priority. Towards that end
America has been successful in keeping the number of
officially recognised number of Nuclear Weapon States
(NWS) limited to five. There are four more nations that
possess nuclear weapons outside the nuclear NonProliferation Treaty (NPT) including India and Pakistan.
Different non-proliferation standards have been applied to
these two South Asian rivals ever since they became de facto
NWS in the summer of 1998. India has been the recipient of
special favours, with the US signing a civil nuclear deal with
India in 2005 and helping it get a special waiver from the
Nuclear Suppliers‟ Group (NSG) in 2008. This set a
precedent for other countries seeking nuclear commerce with
India to grant similar favours. Pakistan has been mostly left
out in the cold. Sensing Pakistan‟s keenness to acquire
nuclear legitimacy, in August 2015 a joint study by two US
think-tanks set certain pre-conditions that would allow it to
become a „normal‟ nuclear state. These included inter alia
pledges to give up its Tactical Nuclear Weapons (TNWs),
not using the veto against the Fissile Missile Cut-off (FMCT)
Treaty at the Conference on Disarmament (CD) and not
letting its territory be used for terrorist attacks against India.
The reaction in Pakistan was predictable and there were calls
to reject such suggestions altogether. The purpose of this
article is to examine the US proposal with an open mind and
to determine if at all it represents a window of opportunity.
