The Brahmaputra is the oldest antecedent and the widest braided river flowing through China, India, and Bangladesh. It is known as Tsangpo in Tibet, Siang in the hills of Arunachal Pradesh, Dihang in the plains, Brahmaputra in Assam, and the Jamuna in Bangladesh. In The Braided River: A Journey along the Brahmaputra, Samrat Choudhury, a journalist and author, elucidates on the life around Brahmaputra in Assam and Bangladesh.

• Hassan Momin |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

No one better than a representative assigned the task to put the wheels of the Abraham Accords in motion could give a bird’s eye view of the events leading to signing the Accords and the aftermath. Aryeh Lightstone’s narration of the story surrounding the Accords gains credibility as he was part of high-level discussions on the ‘Peace to Prosperity’ vision. Lightstone was Chief-of-Staff to David Friedman, who served as US Ambassador to Israel between 2017 and 2021. He was the liaison between the States parties to the Accords and was in charge of facilitating the Accords’ implementation.

• B. Poornima |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

In a country like Pakistan, where none of its Prime Ministers could ever complete a full five-year term in office, the role of the so-called ‘deep State’ — a term used as a euphemism for its Army—in exercising disproportionate control over the affairs of the country—has often been highlighted.

• Adil Rasheed |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

The two authors of the book under review are academics at separate campuses in the United States, with the first having to his credit previously published books in international and strategic affairs. In their collaborative effort, the authors have chosen to draw attention to the perceived challenge being posed to the existing world order—a creation of the Western alliance led by the United States. Important members of the alliance—Britain, France, Germany and Japan—favour continuity of the existing order. They have been labelled as status quo powers.

• Sunil Khatri |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

The outcome of the 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, held in October 2022, was on predictable lines. It was no surprise that President Xi Jinping was chosen CPC supremo for an unprecedented third time, defying the two-term limit set by Deng Xiaoping to prevent a single person from gaining absolute and autocratic power like Mao Zedong. Xi, considered the most powerful leader in China since Mao, is determined to put China on the ‘rejuvenation’ path and attain superpower status for the Middle Kingdom by mid-century.

• Laxman Kumar Behera |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

Large-scale disasters have far-reaching impacts that transcend national borders, making a coordinated, “one region-one response” approach essential, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Bay of Bengal region has recognized this need and is actively developing structures for regional cooperation, including in disaster management.

• Rajat Mohan Bhatt , Deepali Garge |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

On 5 August 2019, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi took a bold decision and made drastic changes to Article 370 of the Indian Constitution, thus changing the legal status of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. This further sparked a debate over the real architect of the Article. There has been a lot of debate and discussion around Article 370. Article 370 provided a special status to the state of Jammu and Kashmir. The debate around Article 370 is highly political, biased, and targeted.

• Pavan Kumar |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

The Governments of India and Sri Lanka signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to build a bridge across the Palk Strait in July 2002 to join the island nation with the mainland of South Asia by road and rail. The objective of this article is to highlight the likely impact the proposed bridge would have on trade in goods and services and travel between the two countries and beyond.

• Gayasha Sathsarani Samarakoon |
• January-February 2023 |
• Strategic Analysis

The history of colonialism normally focusses on the socio-economic losses of colonies, and the benefits of metropoles are a much less-studied field. Our study indicates that the flow of resources, rent and personal wealth should not be downplayed as factors of economic growth in the key Empires, although information on most subjects is limited. This importance could be demonstrated (although not fully quantitatively evaluated) by India–United Kingdom relations before 1913.

• Leonid Grigoryev , Alexandra Morozkina |
• November 2022 |
• Strategic Analysis

The article analyses the ongoing Russia-West confrontation manifested mainly in the armed conflict in Ukraine, the world’s largest war of sanctions, a growing confrontation in cyberspace and politics, the erosion of the system of arms control treaties and a sharp reduction of cooperation in the humanitarian sphere. Russia and the West are fighting not only for influence in Ukraine but also over the future of international relations on a global scale in the coming decades.

• Konstantin Khudoley |
• November 2022 |
• Strategic Analysis