Pokhran-II and Pakistan's nuclear tests

On May 11 and 13, 1998 India carried out five underground nuclear tests at Pokhran in the Rajasthan desert, in Operation Shakti. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, whose Bharatiya Janata Party-led government had been in office only since March, announced that India was now a nuclear weapon state. Seventeen days later, on May 28, Pakistan announced five tests at Chagai Hills in Balochistan, and a sixth on May 30. Pakistan calls May 28 Youm-e-Takbir.²³

India had exploded a device in 1974, which it called a peaceful nuclear explosion, but had not weaponised. It had refused to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty and said the world's nuclear powers, including its neighbour China, which had tested in 1964, kept an unequal system. Pakistan, behind its programme led by the scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, had been working on a bomb since the loss of East Pakistan in 1971, and for years was believed to be capable. India's announced yields, including a claimed thermonuclear device, have been questioned by outside seismologists, who estimated lower figures.²

The United States, Japan and others imposed sanctions on both countries, and the UN Security Council condemned the tests in Resolution 1172. India announced a doctrine of no first use and credible minimum deterrence, while Pakistan did not. Sanctions were largely lifted after 2001, when the two countries became useful partners to the United States after September 11, and a civil nuclear agreement was signed between India and the United States in 2008.¹