India Archive

With the global spotlight unwaveringly focused on the momentous changes in the Arab world, subtle shifts taking place in another strife-torn Muslim-majority region in Asia have escaped the world’s attention. Jammu and Kashmir, the object of a longstanding territorial dispute between India and Pakistan, has been ravaged for the past two decades by a violent, Pakistan-backed Islamist insurgency that has exploited popular grievances among Kashmiris. But almost a year after turmoil in urban Kashmir led to the deaths of 112 unarmed civilians in police actions last summer, the situation has been completely peaceful this year. But there is more to […]

The second India-Africa Forum summit, held in Ethiopia last week and attended by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh along with the leaders of 16 African states, set out a fresh roadmap for further consolidation of the strategic partnership between India and the African Union (AU). Addressing the summit, Singh emphasized clearly, “Africa possesses all the prerequisites to become a major growth pole in the world. India-Africa partnership is unique and owes its origins to history and our common struggles against colonialism, apartheid, poverty [and] disease.” With globalization increasingly shifting the international distribution of economic power in Asia’s favor, India has […]

Nuclear Pakistan, we are often told, is the Islamic-state equivalent of a Wall Street firm: In geostrategic terms, it is too big to fail. That explains why, even as the Obama administration begins preparing for modest troop withdrawals from Afghanistan this July, it dispatched Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Islamabad last week to smooth over bilateral relations with Pakistan’s paranoid regime, which were strained even before the killing of Osama bin Laden. But Clinton’s trip and the Obama administration’s instinctive embrace of Islamabad is a fool’s errand, doomed by history, geography and globalization itself. In fact, the U.S. should […]

Soon after U.S. special operation forces killed Osama bin Laden in a raid deep into Pakistani territory, a journalist asked India’s army chief, Gen. V.K. Singh, whether his nation’s armed forces had the capability to carry out a similar operation. The military man gave a straightforward answer. “If such a chance comes,” he said, “then all the three arms [of the armed forces] are competent to do this.” The domestic and international reactions to his statement exemplify the paradox of proximity: Having a fragile state in the neighborhood makes the capability to intervene important, but puts structural constraints on a […]

Amid raging controversy over India’s land acquisition plan, rights activists accuse the government of offering a raw deal to the poor.

On Jan. 31, 2011, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs, Robert O. Blake Jr., told the Indian press that the United States is hoping to become India’s “close partner” in space exploration. Blake’s comments reflected a major tenet of the Obama administration’s 2010 National Space Policy (NSP): partnerships in space exploration with more nations. Although the global future in space may well be characterized by countries both cooperating in some areas and competing in others –what some have called “coopetition” — U.S. National Security Adviser Tom Donilon has been clear that Washington wants a […]

The 21st century’s great shift of power from West to East is not limited to China alone. The Asian century also belongs to India. Already the world’s fourth-largest economy, India has continued to grow swiftly even after the financial crisis, expanding at 8-9 percent annually. With more than 60 percent of its population younger than 35, it possesses the world’s most potent demographic dividend. Its recent affluence has also increased India’s appetite for military power. India’s annual defense expenditure stands at $30 billion today, or 2 percent of global defense spending, making it the world’s biggest importer of arms. From […]

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh landed in Kabul last week amid renewed interest in India’s trajectory in Afghanistan following the death of Osama bin Laden. Singh, in Afghanistan after a six-year absence, announced a fresh commitment of $500 million for Afghanistan’s development, over and above the $1.5 billion in aid India has already allocated. New Delhi and Kabul agreed that the two neighbors’ “strategic partnership” will be implemented under the framework of a partnership council to be headed by the countries’ foreign ministers. It will entail cooperation in security, law enforcement and justice, including an enhanced focus on cooperation in […]

Much has been written about the potential impact that the demise of Osama bin Laden and the possible disintegration of al-Qaida will have on U.S. foreign policy, beginning with the question of whether this will trigger a more rapid disengagement from Afghanistan. But bin Laden’s death could also change the foreign policy calculus of other states, notably Russia, which for the past 10 years has promulgated its own version of the global war on terror as a central organizing principle for international affairs. Even before the Sept. 11 attacks, Moscow had already seen bin Laden as a threat to the […]

In what was described as a major milestone in the six-nation Multirole Medium Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) tender, the Indian Ministry of Defense announced the final contenders for the $10 billion, 126-plane purchase in April. Only the Dassault Rafale and the Eurofighter Typhoon were left in the fray, while Boeing’s F-18 E/F Superhornet, Lockheed Martin’s F-16, Saab’s Gripen and UAC’s MiG-35 were all eliminated. The selection of aircraft offered only by European manufacturers has been seen by many U.S. commentators as a political snub to the Indo-U.S. strategic partnership, despite the Indian government’s great efforts to frame the decision as a […]

India’s policy of continued engagement with Pakistan took a blow in the wake of Osama bin Laden’s killing in Abbottabad, barely 100 yards from the gates of a Pakistani military academy. Islamabad’s alleged role in shielding bin Laden — and perhaps other terrorist organizations that pose a direct threat to India — has driven calls to modify New Delhi’s outreach initiative toward its South Asian neighbor. It has also resurrected the question dogging Indian policymakers since the 2008 Mumbai massacre: Should India continue to engage with Pakistan even though Islamabad cultivates terrorist groups as a strategic option and harbors some […]

India and Pakistan recently renewed their dialogue over the countries’ moribund trade relations, with Pakistan indicating it is considering extending most favored nation status to India. In an email interview, Mohsin S. Khan, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and a former director of the Middle East and Central Asia department at the International Monetary Fund, discussed India-Pakistan trade relations. WPR: What is the status quo of trade relations between India and Pakistan? Mohsin S. Khan: Trade between India and Pakistan is negligible, amounting to only $1 billion to $2 billion a year, reflecting very poor […]

India and Kazakhstan recently signed a series of energy deals during a visit to the Central Asian country by India’s prime minister. In an email interview, Emilian Kavalski, a lecturer at the University of Western Sydney, discussed relations between India and Central Asia. WPR: What is the recent history of India’s relations with Central Asia? Emilian Kavalski: In a nutshell, India’s recent relations with Central Asia have been motivated by a search for influence in what New Delhi considers to be its strategic neighborhood. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, India has pursued strategic depth not only to secure […]

The pro-democracy uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East have moved crisis-ridden Pakistan out of the global spotlight. This is unfortunate, because Pakistan’s timid democratic resurgence faces a variety of obstacles, and its stability is more uncertain than ever before. To expect that Pakistan may soon experience a similar democratic transformation is not only excessively optimistic, but also ignores recent history: Pakistan exhausted its own “Arab Street” moment in 2007, when Gen. Pervez Musharraf was forced to resign following demonstrations by a diverse and vibrant civil society movement led by Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. That was […]

With the weeks grinding on in an intervention that no one anticipated, the West finds itself increasingly embroiled in Libya’s civil war. In this special report, World Politics Review explores the strategic and diplomatic fallout of NATO’s intervention in Libya through articles published in the past two months. Below are links to each article in this special report, which subscribers can read in full. Subscribers can also download a .pdf version of this report from our document center. Not a subscriber? Subscribe now, or try our subscription service for free. U.S. Leadership Obama Abdicating U.S. Leadership in LibyaBy Thomas P.M. […]