It is now a truism among foreign and defense policy practitioners that the post Cold War nuclear buildup in the India Pacific region constitutes the drawn of the "second nuclear age." From the 1990s onward, China's decision to stir out of its strategic languor and modernize its nuclear arsenal, along with the resolve of India and Pakistan to deploy operational nuclear forces, and, more recently, North Korea's sprint to develop reliable long range nuclear capabilities that can credibly threaten the continental United States, has led many to aver that the "second nuclear Age" will rival the worst aspects of the first.
