In 1998, after India announced that it had become a nuclear state, it moved its nuclear weapons to the Pakistan-Railway border, but three days later, Pakistan announced that it had picked up a nuclear weapons manual in the desert and accidentally built a nuclear bomb.
In May 1998, when a mushroom cloud rose over the Bokhran desert in India, the whole world trembled, not only signaling India's formal entry into the threshold of a nuclear-weapon state, but also transmitting an invisible pressure to its neighbor Pakistan, two bitter rivals on the South Asian subcontinent who have since been tied to an even more dangerous balance.
For Pakistan, India's nuclear explosion is like a wake-up call in its ears, as early as 1974, India's "Smiling Buddha" nuclear device test has alerted Pakistan, and this nuclear test completely broke Pakistan's strategic security barrier.
In the face of India's aggressive posture, a strong sense of fear began to spread within Pakistan, and the development of nuclear weapons became the only option for the country to survive in the cracks.
In fact, Pakistan's nuclear path began quietly after the 1972 India-Pakistan crisis, when Pakistan was deeply aware of the gap between its conventional military forces and India, and was determined to seek an "asymmetric" deterrent, so it established the National Institute of Atomic Energy and secretly launched its nuclear program.
However, this road is destined to be full of thorns, Pakistan's own economic foundation is weak, the level of science and technology is relatively backward, and the funds, technology, and materials needed to develop nuclear weapons are seriously scarce.
In order to break through the blockade, Pakistan began an arduous effort, sending a large number of scientists and engineers to Europe and the United States and other countries to study advanced technology, and at the same time, they also worked quietly at home, overcoming various difficulties and independently developing nuclear technology.
There were rumors that Pakistan had "picked up" the instructions for nuclear weapons, but this was just a ridicule of the country's survival in the face of adversity.
In 1979, when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, Pakistan, which was strategically located, became an important pawn of the United States to contain the expansion of the Soviet Union.
In order to win over Pakistan, the United States has provided economic and military assistance to Pakistan, and even turned a blind eye to Pakistan's nuclear program, during which Pakistan has received valuable financial and technical support and accelerated its nuclear program.
However, with the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan, Pakistan's strategic value rapidly declined, and the attitude of the United States changed, and they began to put pressure on Pakistan to abandon its nuclear program, and Pakistan was caught in a dilemma in the face of external pressure.
Abandoning its nuclear program would mean putting its own security in the hands of others, and continuing to develop nuclear weapons would mean facing isolation and sanctions from the international community.
Under the leadership of a group of top scientists such as Qadir Khan, Pakistan withstood pressure from all sides, broke through one technical difficulty after another, and finally mastered the key technology of nuclear weapons.
Less than half a month after India's nuclear test, in May 1998, Pakistan conducted a number of nuclear tests in the Chagai area of Balochistan province, declaring to the world that it is also a nuclear-weapon state capable of defending its own security.
Pakistan's nuclear test caused an uproar in the international community, and Western countries led by the United States have condemned and imposed sanctions on Pakistan, but Pakistan has not yielded, and in their view, nuclear weapons are the last line of defense for national security and a "talisman" that cannot be abandoned.
The nuclear tests of India and Pakistan have brought South Asia into an era of war, and although the emergence of nuclear weapons has maintained a terrifying balance to a certain extent, it has also pushed these two countries with long historical grievances to the brink of nuclear war.
Pakistan's path to nuclear weapons is a helpless choice made by Pakistan in the face of a complex international environment and a grim security situation, which is not only a manifestation of Pakistan's unremitting self-improvement in the face of adversity, but also reflects the cruel reality of international politics, and hopes that the Indian and Pakistani people can live a peaceful life in the future.
Reference: People's Information "Pakistan is poor and backward, where does nuclear weapons technology come from?" It turns out that there is a military power"
