In its latest annual report, this year, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which monitors international arms control and disarmament, has stated for the first time that India has "deployed" 12 of its 190 nuclear weapons. This involves mating nuclear warheads to delivery systems, a dangerous escalatory step of vertical nuclear proliferation that impacts deterrence dynamics in South Asia and undermines regional strategic stability.

As the Foreign Office correctly stated, this development is not surprising for Pakistan which has closely monitored irresponsible Indian behaviour ever since it conducted its first naval deterrence patrol in 2019 with canisterised nuclear war heads i.e. placed these weapons in missile tubes on its nuclear-powered submarine, the INS Arihent. The purpose of this naval exercise with operational nuclear weapons was to demonstrate India's credible sea-based second-strike capability. Now, India has gone further by deploying up to 12 nuclear warheads, possibly on all 3 of its nuclear-powered submarines, which is contrary to India's self-proclaimed deterrence posture based on "recessed" or de-mated nuclear capability.

Ironically, such nuclear escalation collides with claims by Indian and western defence "experts" that the relevance of nuclear deterrence in South Asia has reduced since India has been able to exploit space below the nuclear threshold to conduct military operations against Pakistan – as in February 2019 and May 2025. Resultantly, it is alleged that India has called Pakistan's nuclear bluff and rejected its nuclear "blackmail".

Such assertions are consistent with India's search for space for conventional war below the........

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