Perhaps more importantly, the risk of Pakistani ASAT attacks would create the same escalatory incentives for India that the United States faces in the second scenario. U.S. war games suggest that future conflicts in South Asia may not be very stable. A contractor who has conduct more than two dozen war games for the Pentagon and other military-planning centers told the Wall Street Journal that the India-Pakistan scenarios usually escalate to the use of nuclear weapons "within the first 12 'days' of the war game." "It's a scary scenario," said one participant. Anti-satellite weapons would reinforce the strong escalatory dynamic that many war games have revealed. For example, war games that quickly escalate to nuclear use are often restarted to allow the Indian side to reconsider some of the moves that lead to Pakistani escalation. The Indian side, however, generally learns the opposite lesson and attempts a "lighting strike" to destroy the Pakistani nuclear stockpile. When asked if the Indian Armed Force could really execute a preemptive strategy, one participant noted, "Probably not, but they believe they could."

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Lewis, Jeffrey. What if Space Were Weaponized? Possible Consequences for Crisis Scenarios. Washington, D.C.: Center for Defense Information, July 2004. [ 16 quotes ] [ page 31 ]