The nuclear arsenals of China, India and Pakistan are growing But the countries are not in an arms race—yet For most of the 75 years since India and Pakistan became independent states, at midnight on 15th August 1947, nuclear weapons have cast a shadow over South Asia.China got the bomb in 1964, two years after thumping India in a border war and forcing its policymakers to confront their country’s vulnerabilities.The combined arsenals of China (350 warheads), India (160) and Pakistan (165), though modest by American and Russian standards (several thousand each), now exceed British and French stockpiles in Europe (around 500 in total).The Pentagon says that China’s arsenal could expand to 1,000 warheads by 2030, as it seeks to overwhelm American missile defences and narrow the numerical gap with its chief rival.That, in combination with more warheads and more accurate missiles, might enable China to “hold at risk almost every Indian nuclear-storage site”, a prerequisite of counterforce."