Strategic Analysis

American Strategy in Afghanistan: Dilemmas, Miscalculations and Outcomes

The war on terror, often described as ‘the longest war’ or ‘the wrong war’, is approaching its pinnacle. In this context, 2014 has been the centre of gravity while formulating strategies, framing policies and executing actions to ensure an honourable exit for the international forces led by the United States from Afghanistan.

A Reviving Continent?

As a trial ground for humankind’s quest for betterment, India can be reckoned the next frontier. The scale and complexity of India’s problems are every policy maker’s nightmare. For a social scientist, India is a laboratory to test new ideas. As India’s colonial encounter fades from public memory, social science research in India has moved on to address the concerns of ordinary citizens. The euphoria of 1947 has ebbed, and the reticence and anxiety of the 1970s is gone. With the promised economic surge slowing down, millions of Indians continue to be trapped in neediness.

Restrained and Strategically Effective—The 2011 Aerial Campaign over Libya: An Indian Perspective

The winter of 2011 was a dramatic period for air power in Mediterranean Europe and India. Operation Unified Protector (OUP), the successful North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) offensive aerial campaign that paved the way for a regime change in Libya, involved two platforms that had been shortlisted for the largest fighter aircraft deal of recent times.

Politics and Perceptions of Indian Aid to Nepal

India has significantly invested in Nepal’s development through economic assistance since 1952. Despite deploying aid to win the hearts and minds of the people of Nepal, India has not entirely succeeded in doing so. Paradoxically, an analysis of Indian aid and gaps in the planning, processes, modalities and perceptions of India’s motivation shows that it has possibly contributed to the fuelling of anti-India sentiments among the Nepalese population.

Issues in the Management of the India–Pakistan International Border

A discordant political relationship, three and a half wars and Pakistan’s material support for secessionist militants in the border states of Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir compelled India to harden its international border with Pakistan. An inward-looking economy and the absence of an imperative for regional economic integration also resulted in restricted movement of people and goods across the border. However, in the past decade or so, an emergent Indian economy coupled with both countries’ desire to engage themselves constructively have paved the way for softening the border.

Emerging Powers and Global Financial Governance

The traditional mode of governance of national and global monetary and financial markets was obviously too weak and piecemeal to hinder the recurrent outbreak of regional and worldwide crises. The latest and gravest in this series triggered a massive institutional and operational overhaul, achieved both by the creation of new institutions and also by old and new ones being made stronger and more inclusive, foremost by introducing major emerging countries into their steering and oversight bodies.

Maritime Security Trilateralism: India, Sri Lanka and the Maldives

India has stepped up its efforts to cooperate on security issues in general and on maritime security in particular with its island neighbours in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR). At the core of this lies the initiative to build a trilateral maritime arrangement with Sri Lanka and the Maldives. It is in this larger context that the second National Security Advisors’ (NSAs) meeting took place in Colombo in July 2013.

State, Secularism and Democracy

Democracy has spread spontaneously and swiftly in an area of the world generally thought to be immune to political changes: West Asia and North Africa (WANA). An incident of common occurrence in Third World countries—a policeman extorting money from a fruit vendor—sparked this surge for democracy, which spread rapidly from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea in some two months. On December 17, 2010, a fruit vendor, Mohammed Razzack, set himself on fire to protest against a policeman extorting money from him.

Northern Provincial Council: What Does it Mean for Tamil Political Aspiration in the Post-War Context?

Elections for the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) of Sri Lanka were held on September 21, 25 years after they were first held in 1988 under the Thirteenth Amendment (13A) to the Sri Lankan Constitution, which formed part of the Indo-Lanka Accord. It was, however, the first election since the demerger of the Northern and Eastern Provinces in 2006.1 With the end of 30 years of war that had culminated in the elimination of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), election to the NPC was politically crucial for the Tamils, especially in the post-war context.

China Unplugged! Poised to Reshape the Geopolitics of the Asia-Pacific

Within the first year of Xi Jinping’s elevation to the presidency, China has moved further ahead on its path to achieving primacy in the world. In the last week of November 2013, Beijing imposed an Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ) over the conflicted Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, much to the consternation of its feuding neighbours such as Japan and South Korea. Their howls of protest found expression in the US attempt to challenge China to promulgate what it has done in deed.