To: MythMan who wrote (212850 ) 1/7/2003 4:03:55 PM From: Lucretius Read Replies (3) | Respond to of 436258 can you believe this guy? ====================================================================== DJ India Min: In A Nuclear War, "There Will Be No Pakistan" NEW DELHI (AP)--India's defense minister warned Tuesday that Pakistan would cease to exist in the event of a nuclear war with India, according to the Press Trust of India news agency. "We can take a bomb or two or more ... but when we respond there will be no Pakistan," PTI quoted Defense Minister George Fernandes as saying. Fernandes described as irresponsible comments by Pakistan's president implying his country was prepared for a nuclear confrontation when tension flared between the hostile neighbors last month, PTI reported. "They (Pakistan) should not make such irresponsible statements," Fernandes was quoted as saying. "They don't help them, don't help us, don't help the world." Fernandes was speaking at an economic summit in Hyderabad, the capital of southern Andhra Pradesh state. Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf said in a speech on Dec. 30 that he personally sent a message to Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee warning that India "should not expect a conventional war from Pakistan" if Indian troops moved across the border of disputed Kashmir province - an apparent reference to a nuclear confrontation. Two days later, Musharraf clarified that he did not mean to imply that his country had warned India it was prepared for a nuclear confrontation. He said he had meant that some 150,000 retired Pakistani military personnel living in the disputed Himalayan province would have risen up against any Indian aggression. Tension between India and Pakistan increased last year, following an attack on India's Parliament in December 2001 that India blamed on Islamic militants it says were supported by Islamabad. The two nations have fought three wars in 50 years, two of them over control of Kashmir, and another conflict seemed imminent until intensive international diplomacy brought the neighbors back from the brink. (END) Dow Jones Newswires 01-07-03 1553ET- - 03 53 PM EST 01-07-03