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uclear risk reduction during the Cold War was a high priority and constant preoccupation of US and Soviet leaders. Over the course of three decades, Washington and Moscow worked hard to put in place nine key elements to prevent the use of nuclear weapons. Despite sustained, high-level efforts to prevent a nuclear exchange and reduce nuclear dangers, US and Soviet leaders experienced several close calls and barely avoided potentially catastrophic accidents. In vastly different circumstances, India, China, and Pakistan are now at the early stages of developing or modernizing nuclear weapon and ballistic missile capabilities. While recognizing the obvious differences between the US-Soviet experience and the India-China-Pakistan triangular relationship, it might nonetheless be useful to consider whether the key elements of nuclear risk reduction developed elsewhere might also apply in some fashion to southern Asia. KEY ELEMENTS OF COLD WAR RISK REDUCTION The first key element in the US-Soviet context was a formal agreement not to change the territorial status quo in sensitive areas by military means. The most sensitive Cold War fault lines were divided Germany and Korea. Tacit agreements not to seek changes in the status of Berlin came after the Berlin blockade in 1948-1949, when the Kremlin stopped re-supply by land of the western sector of the city, and in 1961, when the Kremlin built a wall to stop emigration from East to West Berlin. The status quo in Korea was tested and restored only after a lengthy and costly war. The nuclear shadow hung over the Korean conflict, which erupted in 1949, the same year in which the Soviet Union detonated its first nucle ar device. The use of nuclear weapons to end this conflict was advocated by some, but rejected by

Preface Ellen Laipson Dear Colleague, I am pleased to present the latest publication of the Stimson Center's South Asia program. This report, by former government expert Polly Nayak and the Stimson Center's cofounder, Michael Krepon, tells a tale about recent history in South Asia that has important and broad foreign policy salience. The authors examine the interactions between India and Pakistan during a tense period between December 2001 and October 2002, when war was a distinct possibility. It is a compelling story about the enduring dispute over Kashmir that has become more consequential with the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Islamabad and New Delhi. The report focuses on how Washington coped with a crisis of potentially catastrophic proportions. Polly Nayak and Michael Krepon offer keen insight into how policymakers in Washington "managed" a crisis half a world away in capitals where American influence might not have been sufficient to determine the outcome.It provides a window, through valuable interviews with senior policymakers and US embassy officials implementing policy in the field, into how Washington receives information and develops its responses to foreign policy emergencies. It reminds us of how differently Washington and the field sometimes perceive US interests and how difficult it is to capture and learn the lessons of regional crises.The South Asia program at the Stimson Center, which is directed by Michael Krepon, focuses on regional stability, nuclear stabilization, and Kashmir. The Center has promoted confidence-building and nuclear risk-reduction measures in South Asia through workshops with knowledgeable and well connected Indian, Pakistani, and US participants; private meetings with key officials and field work and in all three countries; research and publications; public forums in Washington; and a Visiting Fellows program. Whatever form the Center's programming takes, its function is the same: to encourage the consideration of useful ideas that could provide short-term relief from potential dangers and the long-term basis for a durable peace.

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