India has effective command and control over its atomic arsenal but to ensure effective deterrence of adversaries, it will not reveal additional details on how the system would respond in the event of a nuclear attack, authoritative sources here have said.

The first high-level U.S. military delegation to visit Pakistan in four years to discuss security cooperation failed to address possible joint efforts in the area of nuclear security, despite concerns that the country?s small but shrouded nuclear weapons complex may be at risk of theft or leakage, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials.

India and Pakistan have imposed strict security at facilities that house their nuclear weapons, virtually eliminating the possibility of a nuclear theft, said a new US government-funded study.

Since Sept. 11, Western analysts increasingly have questioned whether Pakistan's weapons of mass destruction are secure. The fear is that even though Pakistan remains an important US ally in the war against Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda network, its nuclear arsenal could be tempting to rogue elements inside and outside Pakistan.

A new study from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace paper argues that the United States should expand cooperative threat reduction programs to other countries, taking advantage of the post-Sept. 11 focus on terrorism and a decade of experience securing former Soviet weapons of mass destruction.

The author, a former senior White House adviser, reveals that during the 1999 Kargil conflict between India and Pakistan, the Pakistani military mobilized its nuclear weapons in preparation for conflict with India in 1999 without the knowledge of the Pakistani prime minister.

Defense analysts caution that while recent U.S. proposals to expand post-Cold War programs could provide experience and technology to improve the security of nuclear arsenals in Pakistan and India, adapting the programs to circumstances in South Asia might be difficult.

Senator Lugar argues for expanding the nuclear Cooperative Threat Reduction program beyond Russia to newly emerging nuclear states like India and Pakistan.

David Albright argues that Pakistan's nuclear program is a security threat because the program has historically relied on "the program has relied on illicit procurement and deliberate deception." He warns that "many people in the Pakistani nuclear weapons program and the military could well be sympathetic to radical Islamist or anti-American causes."

The United States has offered to help Pakistan secure its nuclear weapons and nuclear facilities following the September 11 terrorist attacks and the start of the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan.