China in India’s Post-Cold War Engagement with Southeast Asia: Chietigj Bajpaee, Routledge, Abingdon, UK The commemoration of 2022 as the ‘ASEAN-India Year of Friendship’ marks thirty years of the partnership between India and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Beginning in 1992 with India’s ‘Look East Policy’ (LEP), renamed ‘Act East Policy’ (AEP) in 2014, India has progressed from being a Sectoral Partner of ASEAN in 1992 to a Dialogue Partner in 1996 and a Summit-level Partner in 2002. Amrita Jash | November 2022 | Strategic Analysis
India–Africa Relations: Changing Horizons: Rajiv Bhatia, Routledge, New York India’s partnership with Africa has come into the limelight in recent years. Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his Address to the Ugandan parliament in 2018 reiterated that Africa is a high priority for India’s foreign policy. India-Africa Relations: Changing Horizons by Rajiv Bhatia is a welcome addition to the literature on India’s engagement with the African continent. In this volume, Bhatia has put to good use, the insights gained during his 37-year innings in the Indian Foreign Service (IFS), particularly his term as India’s High Commissioner to Kenya, South Africa and Lesotho. Ruchita Beri | November 2022 | Strategic Analysis
Debating the Past: Nehru, China and Lessons from 1962 War The year 2022 marks the 60th anniversary of the 1962 Sino-Indian war. Fought over a period of one month, the war is seen as one of the watersheds in the history of India–China relations. Besides creating a considerable dent in bilateral ties, it also led New Delhi to revamp its defence and military infrastructure. Incidentally, in terms of research on China studies in India, the war proved to be a defining moment of transition. Mayuri Banerjee | November 2022 | Strategic Analysis
A Decade of US ‘Pivot to Asia’ The Biden administration has further reinforced and strengthened US strategic priorities towards the Indo-Pacific, a decade after the ‘Pivot to Asia’ by the Obama administration. Anushka Saxena | October 27, 2022 | IDSA Comments
The Reality of AI Drones: Are they Overhyped? Drones, often referred to as ‘dull, dirty and dangerous’, are fast becoming crucial to militaries around the world as a force multiplier Kritika Roy | October-December 2022 | Journal of Defence Studies
Drone Warfare: History, Evolution and Future When Tesla and SpaceX Founder Elon Musk, in a room full of US Air Force personnel, asserted that autonomous drone warfare is the future and will replace fighter jets, it sparked a controversial but crucial debate.1 The decade post 9/11 saw the proliferation of drones in the military domain. Drones and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been used extensively to disable conventional weapon systems in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya and Ukraine. Hence comes the conundrum of replaceability and disruptiveness of conventional warfare vis-à-vis drone warfare. Krutika Patil | October-December 2022 | Journal of Defence Studies
Counter-Unmanned Aircraft Systems (C-UAS): Future of Warfare The history of war is replete with instances where a nation that has effectively, and innovatively harnessed technology has been victorious. From innovations stem revolutions in military warfare, and the current world order is witnessing a very profound and rapid revolution through the employment of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), be it in conventional conflicts such as Nagorno–Karabakh (Azerbaijan–Armenia), the current Russia–Ukraine conflict or the unconventional ‘Global War on Terror’ in Afghanistan. Apratim Sharma | October-December 2022 | Journal of Defence Studies
AI and the Future of Air Combat in India In his autobiography Hawkeye, Israeli fighter ace Giora Even-Epstein recalls flying the Fighting Falcon F-16, and comments that “Flying an F-16 was different than any other plane I’d ever flown. It felt like it was the computer more than the pilot that was flying the plane.” Bulbul Prakash | October-December 2022 | Journal of Defence Studies
Maintenance Ecosystem of Small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS) in Military Aviation India’s commercial drone industry is growing and the drone market is expected to become a multi-billion-dollar industry over the next decade. In this drone era, the smaller drone systems, that is, small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS) are also gaining traction in Indian armed forces for use in Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance (ISR) and as armed sUAS for kamikaze role. A. Karunakaran | October-December 2022 | Journal of Defence Studies
IADD Reinvigorates India’s Defence Cooperation with African Countries The second India–Africa Defence Dialogue at DefExpo 2022 at Gandhinagar, Gujarat has opened multiple pathways for defence cooperation between India and Africa. Ruchita Beri | October 18, 2022 | IDSA Comments
