India and Iran’s Nuclear Issue: The Three Policy Determinants Three broad policy determinants can be discerned in Indian reactions to the Iranian nuclear issue. These include: ‘strategic autonomy’ as it relates to Indian foreign policy decision making S. Samuel C. Rajiv | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
The Party: The Secret World of China’s Communist Rulers by Richard McGregor Harper Collins, New York, 2010, pp. xvii+302, US$ 27.99, ISBN 9780061708770 Rukmani Gupta | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
China’s ‘Military Diplomacy’: Investigating PLA’s Participation in UN Peacekeeping Operations The central focus of this article is to understand the evolution of the Chinese People's Liberation Army's engagement with UN peacekeeping operations in the light of China's military diplomacy. The article underlines that the PLA works as a foreign policy instrument in UN peacekeeping operations and furthers China's foreign policy agenda in many ways. Prashant Kumar Singh | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
India’s International Relations: A Systems Approach The national security of India rests on two basic and mutually supporting premises. The first, of course, is the internal strength, cohesiveness, and firmness of purpose of the nation. The second is the ability of the country to exist and develop in a changing international environment, the hostility or friendship of which is rarely certain and never absolute. It is with the second aspect that we concern ourselves in this article. K. Saigal | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
China’s ‘Aggressive’ Territorial Claim on India’s Arunachal Pradesh: A Response to Changing Power Dynamics in Asia The Chinese territorial claim on the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh has negatively affected India–China relations for many decades now. In recent years, China has become visibly aggressive with regard to its territorial claim by denying visas to Indians from Arunachal Pradesh travelling to China, claiming that they are Chinese citizens and hence do not require visas. China also tried to block ADB aid sought by India for the state. Namrata Goswami | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
The Asian Balance of Power in the Seventies: An Indian View There is general agreement among those concerned with international relations and strategy that for the next fifteen years Asia is more likely to be an area of tension and conflict involving major powers than any other part of the world, now that detente has stabilised the situation in Europe. There is further agreement that China and growing nationalism among the Asian societies will be the foci around which tension and conflict are likely to build up. K. Subrahmanyam | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
Prospects for India–US Cyber Security Cooperation Cyber security cooperation should be a natural area of cooperation between India and the United States for a number of reasons; both countries are democracies, with similar values and economic systems, and both have also been severely affected by threats emanating from cyberspace. The structural complementarities between the two economies, especially in the services sector, which is a major user of cyber networks provides further motive for the two countries to cooperate in this sector. Cherian Samuel | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
India and Pakistan: Continued Conflict or Cooperation? by Stanley Wolpert University of California Press, 2010 Beginning with partition of the subcontinent in 1947, this book by renowned scholar Stanley Wolpert provides an account of one of the oldest political crisis/conflicts in the world. He simplifies 63 years of complex history, tracing the relationship between the two antagonists. This book is an outcome of his extensive work on South Asia over the last 60 years. In this book, Wolpert explores historical roots of the conflict, assesses different phases of it and the attempts made to resolve it, before recommending potential solutions to it. Anwesha Ray Chaudhuri | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
Can the South Asian Gas Pipeline Dilemma be Resolved through a Legal Regime? South Asian countries, and particularly India, are hydrocarbon-deficient, and given the pace of economic growth in many of these nations, all of them need huge energy resources to sustain their growth. In accordance with their diversification strategies as well as to enhance energy security they are considering alternate sources and means of imports, including via land pipelines. Shebonti Ray Dadwal | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
Mawlana Mawdudi and Political Islam: Authority and the Islamic State by Roy Jackson Routledge, New York, 2011, 202 pp. The religious and political ideas of Sayyid Abdul A'la Mawdudi (Mawlana Mawdudi) provide the ideological current to groups contending for the supremacy of Islam (rather than Islamic Revivalism). Mawdudi's brand of political Islam has gained widespread acceptance in South and South East Asia as well as the Middle East. His influence on Hassan al-banna (better known as ‘Salafis’ and the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt), Palestinian scholar Abdullah Yusuf Azzam (believed to have taught the Islamic values to Osama bin-Laden) and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini bear testimony to it. Anshuman Behera | September 2011 | Strategic Analysis
