Strategic Analysis

Qatar Crisis and the Deepening Regional Faultlines

In June 2017, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain and Egypt cut off diplomatic ties with Qatar. They accused Qatar of supporting extremist and terror groups in the region, having close ties with Iran, undermining the security and stability of the Gulf region, and using the satellite television network Al Jazeera as a propaganda machine. They also put up a list of demands before Qatar, to be accepted within 10 days in order to end the boycott.

Whither Oil Prices? India’s Choices

President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal has sent oil prices soaring again. Even prior to the May 8, 2018 announcement, after falling to below $30 a barrel in early 2016, oil prices were on the boil again, belying the projections of market analysts, including those of the respected International Energy Agency (IEA), that the era of $100 plus per barrel of oil was over. The projections were based on the assumption that nations would move increasingly away from oil—and coal—to meet their carbon mitigation commitments under the Paris Agreement.

Transforming Eastern South Asia: Relevance of BIMSTEC

Of late the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) is receiving sincere attention from its member countries as an organisation that has the potential to transform the region’s political and economic future. This is because there are several bilateral and sub-regional ongoing projects that are seeking to connect the region and bind them together into one economic whole. Apart from this, after the cancellation of the SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) summit in 2017, many would see the BIMSTEC as an alternative to SAARC.

Nuclear India and the Global Nuclear Order

The 1998 nuclear tests conducted by India heralded yet another nuclear age. The instant response of a section of the international community was highly pessimistic. It foresaw regional instability, collapse of the global nuclear order and serious crisis in the global nuclear non-proliferation regime. As a result, overlooking India’s security imperatives, a number of countries reacted with hostility against the Indian nuclear tests. Even international organisations were mobilised against India.

Post-Pokhran II: Emerging Global Nuclear Order and India’s Nuclear Challenge

Post-Pokhran II the global nuclear environment has changed both in terms of developing niche technologies as also the nuclear strategies. Apart from the traditional challenges, there are new threats emerging in the form of cyber, space, hypersonic glide vehicles, nuclear terrorism, etc. The development of multiple nuclear dyads and triads further makes the security environment increasingly complex, as nations now have to deal with multiple nuclear problems and adversaries.

Military Dimensions of a Multipolar World: Implications for Global Governance

For a decade after the Cold War it seemed that multilateral governance might take root under US leadership, including a reinvigorated United Nations and a strengthened international legal framework. The nuclear explosive devices tested by India in 1998 took place in a pivotal period when the so-called ‘unipolar moment’ of the US began to be challenged by states that were not satisfied such an arrangement could advance their national interests.

Pokhran 20 Years After: Did the World Change?

Was the 1998 Pokhran test a historical watershed as many contemporary observers believed? This article looks at its impact on the nuclear non-proliferation regime, regional security, India’s position in global institutions, and the ongoing global power shift: the non-proliferation regime continued along the old dispute lines; regional conflict behaviour did not change at all; India grew into global institutions not because of nuclear tests but because of her remarkable economic development; the re-arrangement of global power follows more basic trends as well.

Walking Back Delusional Nuclear Policies

India’s ‘dual use’ nuclear policy has been strung out from the beginning between the peaceful atom and military atom as illustrated in Jawaharlal Nehru’s use of the phrase for the country’s nuclear energy programme—‘Janus-faced’. However, the Indian Government has been too influenced by its own rhetoric of peaceful use to equally emphasise the security aspects that the phrase implied.

Indian Nuclear Policy—1964–98 (A Personal Recollection)

This is a personal recollection of the author on the evolution of the Indian nuclear policy and developments leading to the Shakti tests. Since it draws solely upon the author’s memory there could be errors and discrepancies in the account. This has been written in an effort to present a coherent and comprehensive account of the Indian nuclear policy, since, in the absence of an authoritative official document, there are considerable dissensions and misperceptions in the country.

Nuclear Arms Race in South Asia? – An Analysis

Ever since India and Pakistan conducted their nuclear tests in 1998, it has been the favourite pastime of many analysts writing on nuclear issues to cast the strategic stability in South Asia in dark tones. This urban myth is primarily a Western invention although at times writers in the subcontinent as well have taken some part in it.