The India-Pakistan conflict continues for a third day. So does the possibility of nuclear escalation.

India and Pakistan continued cross-border military action against one another on Friday. The third day of hostilities apparently included drone and artillery attacks from both countries, but confirmation of details was wanting. As the New York Times put it, there was “a swirl of disinformation, and the governments made contradictory statements, making it difficult to verify the nature, location and toll of the attacks.”

The current round of fighting between the two nuclear-armed adversaries began on Tuesday, when India—in what it code-named Operation Sindoor—fired missiles at multiple sites in Pakistan, claiming that those sites were “terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir from where terrorist attacks against India have been planned and directed.” The operation came in response to a deadly militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir in April that killed 26 tourists, all but one of whom was Indian. India blames Pakistan for the attack; the Pakistani government denies complicity.

India and Pakistan have disputed control of the Kashmir region ever since they gained independence from Great Britain in 1947, engaging in four wars and other smaller cross-border attacks over time. The Bulletin has covered instability in South Asia for decades. The three stories below from our archives provide some historical context for a long-simmering conflict that has once again turned hot—and once again poses the possibility of nuclear war that could affect not just South Asia, but the entire world.

How an India-Pakistan nuclear war could start—and have global consequences

By Alan Robock, Owen Brian Toon, Charles G. Bardeen, Lili Xia, Hans M. Kristensen, Matthew McKinzie, R. J. Peterson, Cheryl S. Harrison, Nicole S. Lovenduski, Richard P. Turco   October 31, 2019

India, Pakistan, Kashmir: Taking the war option off the table

By Zia Mian, Abdul H. Nayyar, Sandeep Pandey, M.V. Ramana   September 23, 2019

Kashmir, climate change, and nuclear war

By Zia Mian   December 7, 2016