Pakistan, India mulled nuclear option in Kargil

Accounts of former US, Indian officials claim all options were on the table

India and Pakistan came close to a possible nuclear exchange at the height of the 1999 Kargil war, a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) analyst and Indian broadcast journalist Burkha Dutt claimed on Thursday.

The two South Asian rivals, according to two separate accounts, were ready to risk the use of nuclear weapons. In his account former US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) analyst Bruce Riedel claimed in an interview with The Independent that the CIA had tipped off the intelligence to then president Bill Clinton.



Reidel made these claims in a written obituary for former US National Security Adviser Sandy Berger.

Another account came from Barkha Dutt in her new book. This time the source was India’s ex-National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra who was cited as saying that Delhi was considering the use of a nuclear weapon during the eight-week-long conflict in Kargil.

“The morning of the fourth (July 4, 1999), the CIA wrote in its top-secret daily brief that Pakistan was preparing its nuclear weapons for deployment and possible use. The intelligence was very compelling. The mood in the Oval Office was grim,” Riedel wrote.



“Berger urged Clinton to hear out Sharif, but to be firm.”

Clinton’s top security adviser went on to suggest that since Pakistan had started the crisis, it must end it and that only a withdrawal could avert further escalation.

On the other end, India’s former NSA Brajesh Mishra told Dutt that then prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had written a secret letter to Clinton warning him that India would use any means available unless Pakistan was not convinced to withdraw.

“Crossing the Line of Control was not ruled out, nor was the use of nuclear weapons,” said Mishra, who had handed Vajpayee’s letter to a top US official in Geneva, NDTV reported.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 4^th, 2015.