Saga of India and Pakistan’s growing bombs and increasing poverty

In 1998 India and Pakistan agreed not to attack each other’s nuclear facilities for which the two sides exchange the respective lists at the beginning of every year. However, from the year 1998, the nuclear arsenal of the two countries has increased significantly, nearly on par with their population and the poverty within. In recent years, there has been a growing body of international opinion that holds that Pakistan has stepped up production of fissile material, and may just possibly hold more nuclear weapons than its much larger rival, India.  Not surprisingly, the same years have been a drastic increase in income disparity, economic depression and country wide failure of good governance.  It is amazing, how these two countries completely undermine the welfare of their population in the name of their wellbeing. Pakistani politicians and generals are pushing their fellow countrymen to the brink of bankruptcy, all-the-while maintaining they need to spend more money to safeguard their property, lives and future.

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists in a global report in August 2010 estimated that India had assembled 60 to 80 warheads and produced enough fissile material for 60-105 nuclear warheads. Pakistan is estimated to have assembled 70–90 warheads and produced missile material for as many as 90 warheads. However, when the combined total of Indian and Pakistan warheads are only be slightly more than the number carried by a single U.S. Trident submarine. In comparison, China’s arsenal was estimated at 240 nuclear warheads. 

While India’s growing conventional military superiority is backed by one of the world’s fastest growing economies, Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal is funded by one of the worst performing and most corrupt economies. While India is easily able to purchase latest planes, tanks and heavy artillery, Pakistan struggles even to maintain its military at current levels.

The accelerating nuclear arsenal, increasing political and economic instability in Pakistan – add to this the Taliban, al-Qaeda and Afghanistan. This is nothing but a recipe for pure disaster, not for Pakistan and India but the entire region, if not the globe.