Seminar Abstract

Twenty years since India and Pakistan tested nuclear weapons, every new crisis between them brings with it the risk of escalation. The Balakot attack in February 2019, which saw India launch a retaliatory air strike inside Pakistan, triggered new concerns and debates regarding the escalation ladder in South Asia. Added to this mix is the evolving nature of conflict and emergence of new technologies, including the new reality of sea-based deterrence in the Indian Ocean region. The speakers will delve into these critical aspects of escalation and examine prospects for stability in South Asia.

About the Speakers

Feroz Hassan Khan is Research Professor at the Department of National Security Affairs, Naval Postgraduate Academy. He a former Brigadier in the Pakistan Army, with experience in combat action and command on active fronts on the Line of Control in Kashmir and Siachen Glacier and Afghanistan border. He has worked on numerous assignments in the United States, Europe, and Asia. He served as Director Arms Control and Disarmament Affairs, in the Pakistan’s Strategic Plans Division, Joint Services Headquarters. Khan had been a key contributor in formulating Pakistan’s security policies on nuclear and conventional arms control and strategic stability in South Asia. Brigadier Khan holds an M.A. International Relations from the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), John Hopkins University, Washington DC. He has held a series of visiting fellowships at Stanford University, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars; the Brookings Institution; Center for Non-Proliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies and at the Cooperative Monitoring Center, Sandia National Laboratory. He also taught courses as a visiting faculty at the Department of the Defense and Strategic Studies, Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad. He has published widely most famously his book Eating Grass: The Making of the Pakistani Bomb.

Sameer Lalwani is a Senior Fellow and Director of the South Asia Program at the Stimson Center where he researches nuclear deterrence, interstate rivalry, national security decision making, crisis behavior, and counter/insurgency. He is also a term member with the Council on Foreign Relations, a Contributing Editor to War on the Rocks, and a 2019 National Asia Research Program Fellow. He has been an Adjunct Professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs and was previously a Stanton Nuclear Security Postdoctoral Fellow at the RAND Corporation. His work has been published by Security Studies, the Journal of Strategic Studies, The Washington Quarterly, Small Wars & Insurgencies, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and the New York Times. Lalwani completed his Ph.D. from MIT’s Department of Political Science, where he was an affiliate of its Security Studies Program.