Fareed Zakaria advises the US to keep pressing on Pakistan.
Fareed Zakaria hails the only foreign policy success of Obama administration, Pakistan. But ends his piece with a huge warning and a friendly advice.
There are some who believe that Pakistan has changed its basic strategy and now understands that it should cut its ties to these [...]
Only one reason — ensure the security and well-being of its citizens, thereby providing them with a better life.
Amidst all the hype over Indian involvement in Afghanistan and lamentations over declining India influence in that country, here is a quick check of the possible reasons that drive India’s continued interest in Afghanistan.
Let us start with [...]
Some gaps in the understanding are filled, but more questions emerge.
Too many trees have been felled and much ether used to debate the Indian offer to recommence peace talks with Pakistan. Most of the sensible debate — not the jingoistic bit of how we have been shamed by Pakistan cocking a snook at us — [...]
The calls for recommencing talks with Pakistan do not stand to logic and are not grounded in reality.
There are periods in history in which it isn’t enough to say you’ve done your best, when the only test is whether you have done what is necessary.~Churchill
It seems that the wonderfully efficient marketing machinery at an Indian [...]
Pratap Bhanu Mehta makes a valid case for engaging Pakistan, but there have to be other prongs in the strategy.
In today’s Indian Express, India’s foremost columnist Pratap Bhanu Mehta makes a case against Indian military involvement in Afghanistan. He instead asks India to make bold attempts to engage larger Pakistani public opinion to meet Indian [...]
Differing outcomes to similar importance of Russia and India to US interests in Afghanistan.
Well, Holbrooke might not have been welcome in India for some months now but he and his team have been in Beijing and Moscow in buildup to the Obama announcement. Russia’s importance to the US efforts in Afghanistan is not limited to [...]
Two sensible answers. Counter China with open-minded caution. Look at China as an opportunity.
It is for good reason that K. S. Bajpai has been a huge favourite of the INI bloggers. Although his pieces appear rather infrequently in the media, Bajpai’s perceptive analysis and clarity of thought always shines through. So it came as a [...]
A must read monograph tracking India’s defence relations with the world.
From the brilliant monograph at the Strategic Studies Institute of US Army War College titled India’s Strategic Defense Transformation: Expanding Global Relationships by Lieutenant Colonel Brian Hedrick of US army:
India’s interests have changed over the past decade or more, taking it from a position of [...]
Sending troops to Afghanistan is a valid strategic option for India.
There’s a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot. ~Steven Wright
In two separate op-ed pieces today, former army chief General Shankar Roychowdhury and defence analyst Ajai Shukla try to find ways for India to influence the events in Afghanistan. Roychowdhury [...]
If this is India-friendly opinion, what is the centrist view in Pakistan.
When he was a young officer with the Pakistan army, he believed — till the mid-1970s — that the only good Indian is a dead Indian. Then, as a serving and a retired general, he was associated with a Indo-Pak Track-II diplomatic initiative called [...]
One possible explanation for its allegations against India.
Pakistani military-intelligence combine is crying hoarse about Indian support to Baloch rebels, which is faithfully parroted by the Pakistani media. The Indian economic and reconstruction support to Afghanistan also attracts the ire of Pakistani strategic community and its media. Meanwhile, some of the most notorious Pakistani Taliban leaders [...]
Yes, it can work.
Yesterday, Indian government handed over the fifth dossier containing evidence about the 26-11 Mumbai terror attacks to Pakistan. And today, the Indian Foreign Minister said that “It is an ongoing exercise between India and Pakistan. So, as and when, we collect more evidence we will keep sending it across to Pakistan.”
Most astute [...]
China is worried about the Pakistan connection of Uighurs.
As far as the trouble in Xinjiang province goes, here is what the Communist regime in China expects from its neighbours.
China expected cooperation from neighbouring countries to safeguard peace and stability in the region, Qin said replying to a question on whether Beijing has asked neighbours [...]
Not merely how India should do UN peacekeeping.
Conventional wisdom is often long on convention and short on wisdom. ~Warren Buffett
While the IAF Chief releases a coffee-table book so gushingly titled Indian Aviation Contingent: An indelible odyssey in UN peace keeping — chronicling the activities of the IAF contingent with the UN mission in Congo — [...]
From the Afghan ambassador’s memo.
Cribbing to Kabul about inadequate funding for hiring lobbyists in Washington to further Afghan interests in the US Congress and administration, Afghanistan’s ambassador to the US, Said Tayeb Jawad gives out the details of his competitors, embassies of Pakistan and India. Here is the list of India’s lobbyists in Washington from [...]
India pushing more military resources to counter the Chinese threat.
Recent press reports state that Indian army is raising two more divisions to be stationed in Arunachal Pradesh. The IAF is also moving its Sukhoi aircrafts to the North East and reactivating old airfields in the region. This is ostensibly being done to counter the Chinese [...]
Smart idea from Washington. Will it succeed?
Other than the US, there are three other countries that Pakistan considers its foremost allies: China, Saudi Arabia and Iran. While the US is directing all its energies on to Pakistan, it is also looking at these countries for asking Pakistan to do more in its fight against the [...]
UPA can start with these during the swearing-in.
1. A new Cabinet Minister for internal security. Or at least, a new Minister of State under the Home Minister dedicated to the job.
2. An MoS in the MEA, exclusively loooking after the SAARC region. Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar… India surely needs a dedicated hand for [...]
US must link aid to Pak nukes, not just to action against jehadis.
In response to the previous post about the options available to the senior officers of Pakistan army to exhort their soldiers to fight the jehadis, this response came from an Indian defence analyst [via email].
I am in xxx attending xxx Forum — a [...]
India must avail of this opportunity.
This blogger’s take on India not striving hard enough to find common ground with Iran and the US, and facilitate a rapprochement between the two countries, has got a boost from an unlikely source. Osama bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri has posted a video to mark the sixth anniversary of [...]
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