It would be interesting to read some of last year's dire forecasts just for the sheer pleasure of seeing how silly they sound now. The Indian economy will suffer, some former finance ministers had shouted then. Today, India is one of the world's few real growth spots. Will Manmohan Singh, Pranab Mukherjee and P Chidambaram apologise to the nation for their scaremongering last year?

India will be isolated from the world community, yelled the moral-objectors. Well, the initial isolation -- which was only to be expected -- has now more orless ended. All major western powers have resumed near-normal relations with the country. Kashmir will become a nuclear flashpoint, predicted the western media. Well, the Prime Minister's bus journey to Lahore changed all that.

Not only that, but with both Pakistan and India going nuclear, there is now no real possibility of a war between the two. A side-result of this stalemate: neither India nor Pakistan have any option but to accept the line of control as the real border between the two countries. This is a good enough outcome from India's point of view, though the problem of insurgency will continue for a long time to come.

We have alienated China, screamed the card-carrying Communists of India. Actually, after much growling and snarling, India and China have resumed their dialogue at the Joint Working Group level. This proves, once again, that once you are a nuclear power, the world learns to live with you. You cannot be pushed around too much.

The purpose of this rather lengthy I-told-you-somessage is to emphasise that but for the providence of having had the right government at the right time, India might have missed going nuclear -- and lost whatever room it needed for manoeuvre when powerful global forces start moving against national interests. For example, what if India had not gone nuclear and the US decided that it would focus on Kashmir after Kosovo?

Around this time last year, the fashionable view was that focusing on economic reforms would have brought India greater clout than exploding a few bombs. A strong economy is no doubt a prerequisite for sound defence; but the reverse is equally true: when it comes to the crunch, it is might that counts. When it comes to tackling crises like Kosovo, the European heavyweights cannot do anything despite their obvious economic strengths. On the other hand, it is a relative economic weakling like Russia that is battling the world powers on Yugoslavia's behalf. And China too -- again by virtue of being a nuclear power. Without Pokharan, it isdoubtful if India would have found enough voice to condemn Nato's criminal air strikes in Yugoslavia.

The ultimate reality is that today the nature of war has changed -- to the advantage of the western powers. While conventional weapons, tanks and soldiers are important for wars between Third World nations, they no longer have a relevance in Third World-First World conflicts. As the Iraq and Yugoslavian experiences prove, technology can neutralise all the advantages nations with strong armies have -- because the objective often is not to hold territory, but to destroy the war-making capacities of the enemy. Today, without losing a single soldier, the US and Nato can reduce your industrial infrastructure to rubble with new war-making technology. Your media can be obliterated, and you will not be able to talk to your own people about your war aims. Cyber wars and carbon showers can cripple your telecom and power systems; deadly modern weapons launched from unmanned aircraft can kill and maim soldiers by thehundred.

In this scenario, less powerful nations can have only one countervailing strike capability: nuclear-tipped missiles which can reach the First World. This is precisely the reason why the west wants CTBT and NPT wrapped up -- to restrict the ability of countries like India to be able to defend themselves or stand up to coercive tactics. Seen in this light, Pokharan II and Agni II are just the beginning. India needs to go the whole hog and develop accurate nuclear-tipped missiles that can target the US. Pakistan is practically irrelevant in this calculus.