I think Pakistan was not a factor in terms of decision India to obtain nuclear weapon. Because there was no talk of Pakistan having any capability. The main factor was China. And the international prestige that China was getting as a consequence of having its own nuclear weapons.

I certainly think the antagonism came out of a mistaken notion amongst the Indian people that the Chinese aggressed on us, and they thought, Indian people

I think Pakistan was not a factor in terms of decision India to obtain nuclear weapon. Because there was no talk of Pakistan having any capability. The main factor was China. And the international prestige that China was getting as a consequence of having its own nuclear weapons.

I think there is a misunderstanding about Indians' traditional views. India did send army into Goa, India did send an army into and fought a war in Kashmir in 1948, India did get Hyderabad by force... I think the narrow projection on the international... arena distorted India's image.

India was not a pacifist country at all. India placed great emphasis on the higher value on... on violence. But it was never a substitute for not doing anything, or for cowardice.

We [India in 70s] certainly were capable of producing eight to ten bombs, at a cost of about $250,000 each; and we had Boeing 707s to deliver them if we needed it, so I think we had a crude capability already at that time.

The traditional Indian view was to protect our independence; it was therefore quite consistent with the requirements of the time and the feeling of the people. The world may have been misled by Jawaharlal Nehru's own international projection, which in fact had no reality on the ground.