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What can be expected from a Trump-Kim meeting?
In keeping with his reputation as the global disrupter-in-chief, US President Donald Trump’s unprecedented acceptance of a face-to-face meeting with North Korea’s strongman Kim Jong-un in May has created a political whiplash. While most experts have only focused on the nuclear dimension, this initiative, if it is to materialize, is likely to ...The year of being in denial
The act of denial is a psychological defence used by humans to reduce anxiety when they feel particularly disturbed by events. Nowadays, this phenomenon, where even seemingly rational people will vehemently deny truths, is exacerbated by the advent of alt-facts, which sometimes make the gap between reality and unreality difficult to discern. ...China’s Frankenstein: ‘Rocket Man’
The successful test of the Hwasong-15 missile by North Korea has triggered several consequences, intended and unintended: First, Kim Jong Un has demonstrated the capability to potentially strike the US mainland with nuclear weapons. Second, the achievement has made the moniker of ‘Rocket Man’ (disparagingly used by US President Donald Trump) a ...The emerging Indo-Pacific architecture
The term “Indo-Pacific” has long been in vogue among marine biologists and ichthyologists to define the stretch of water from the tropical Indian Ocean, through the equatorial seas around the Indonesian archipelago, the South China Sea, and to the western and central Pacific Ocean. The term entered the geopolitical lexicon only in ...Warring over disarmament in the UN
For most people the UN is the venue of an annual kabuki theatre where world leaders come to make sonorous speeches and snipe at each other to score points with populations back home. While these theatrics, played out every September from the UN General Assembly (UNGA), make for high entertainment, they do ...Donald Trump’s Iran folly and India’s dilemma
On 13 October, US President Donald Trump, in a much-anticipated move, declared Iran a “rogue regime”, a sponsor of terrorism, and an aggressor in the Middle East. Although none of this relates to the hard-negotiated Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on Iran’s nuclear programme, Trump announced that he would no longer ...Can insecurity in Asia be managed?
Since the end of World War II, Asia-Pacific has been the locale of direct and indirect military confrontation (in Korea and Indo-China, respectively) between the two superpowers; experienced unprecedented economic growth, which did not translate into closer integration (particularly among the countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations or Asean); witnessed ...Enhancing the India-Japan partnership
There has been much ado about the advance in India-Japan relations following the recent summit between Prime Ministers Narendra Modi and Shinzo Abe, which the India-Japan joint statement heralded as a “Special Strategic And Global Partnership”. Doubtless, the relationship has evolved to a level that might have been unimaginable just a few ...BRICS: From a big bang to a whimper
The 9th Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit in Xiamen began dramatically with a big bang, but it was not the kind of noise that host China would have wanted: the unannounced sixth and biggest nuclear test by China’s enfant terrible ally, North Korea. This test literally and politically ...Afghanistan and a new hyphenation
US President Donald Trump’s much anticipated speech outlining his administration’s approach to the quagmire in Afghanistan was uncharacteristic. It was cogent, coherent, logical, even compelling, and stayed on message. It was what one would expect of any significant foreign policy initiative but unlike most of the speeches that have become the hallmark ...For a greater global role, here’s why India should take SDGs...
On 19 July, India presented its first voluntary national report on the implementation of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the UN. Although India was just one of 43 countries to do so this year, it was, doubtless, the most anticipated report; there is broad consensus that the success or failure of the ...The birth of the new Nuclear Prohibition Treaty
The 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is based on three myths: first, that nuclear weapons are an entitlement bestowed upon only a handful of countries that had tested a nuclear weapon before the treaty entered into force in 1970. Second, that the security of most of the world’s nations indeed world order ...When Narendra Modi played the Trump card
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first meeting with US President Donald Trump was, by most accounts of Raisina Hill and Washington, DC beltway watchers, a success for both countries. From an evenly matched handshake to the deft signature Modi baby bear-hug (a notable feat given Trump’s germ phobia) to the joint statement, the ...Narendra Modi goes to Washington, again
As Prime Minister Narendra Modi plans for his fifth visit to the US in just four years and his first face-to-face meeting with President Donald Trump, there is a perception that the two polarizing and uber-nationalistic leaders could determine the future course of India-US relations in two diametrically opposite ways. On the ...Donald Trump’s friends and foes: a role reversal
Since the US took to the global stage during World War I, two categories of countries have mattered to its world view: allies and adversaries. Both sets of countries garner great attention from Washington, though sometimes the latter commands even more consideration than the former, who are often taken for granted. Countries ...Donald Trump’s friends and foes: a role reversal
Since the US took to the global stage during World War I, two categories of countries have mattered to its world view: allies and adversaries. Both sets of countries garner great attention from Washington, though sometimes the latter commands even more consideration than the former, who are often taken for granted. Countries ...‘Vasudhaiva kutumbakam’ for the 21st century
From Jawaharlal Nehru to Narendra Modi, India’s leaders have often evoked the phrase vasudhaiva kutumbakam (the world is one family), taken from the Maha Upanishad, to elucidate the country’s global outlook. While the term has become a mantra of India’s diplomatic lexicon, it has remained ambiguous and rarely elaborated. Indeed, despite their ...Should India Inc. bid for Westinghouse?
George Westinghouse and the company he founded in 1886 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, pioneered the commercial production and transmission of a scientific marvel called electricity, which has since powered and revolutionized the modern world. With the dawn of the nuclear age, Westinghouse Electric Company went on to develop pressurized water reactors (PWRs) for ...Donald Trump’s tumultuous 100 days
As Donald Trump lunges towards 100 days of his presidency with the elegance of a raging bull in a china shop strewn with nuclear trip wires, he has notched up several dubious “firsts” in this brief period: the first to lose a hand-picked national security adviser to scandal in a mere 24 ...Can unarmed states prohibit nuclear weapons?
Guess what terrifies nations armed with the most powerful weapons ever invented? Believe it or not a mere UN conference to ban them, which began on 27 March in New York. This gathering of nations without nuclear weapons to negotiate a “legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total ...Can unarmed states prohibit nuclear weapons?
Guess what terrifies nations armed with the most powerful weapons ever invented? Believe it or not a mere UN conference to ban them, which began on 27 March in New York. This gathering of nations without nuclear weapons to negotiate a “legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total ...China benefits from nuclear disorder
The rise in global nuclear disorder and its increasing disconnect from world order is epitomized in the nuclear weapon programmes of two weak and potentially failing states Pakistan and North Korea. While both these countries might understandably perceive some advantage to having acquired nuclear weapons, the real beneficiary is China. Beijing’s ...North-East Asia goes dangerously ballistic
If there was any doubt that North-East Asia has become the most dangerous place on earth, with the prospect of a nuclear exchange, then recent events provide ample evidence that the region has attained this dubious distinction. Additionally, a new UN report, which went practically unnoticed, revealed that North Korea has continued ...Indo-US naval cooperation: steady as she goes?
The US and Indian navies could carry out ‘benign naval and maritime activity’ during periods of diplomatic strain. In the ever-expanding universe of Indo-US cooperation, perhaps the brightest and most alluring star is the deepening partnership between the Indian and US navies. Consider two recent pronouncements: First, admiral Harry Harris, the commander ...A disrupter’s guide to India’s defence budget
While India’s defence budget is now the fourth largest in the world, it is not providing adequate bang for the buck The latest Union budget unveiled on 1 February by finance minister Arun Jaitley has been widely commended as a “defining” and “watershed” moment, as providing “stability and predictability”, and as being ...Global trends: discontinuity and disruption – risks and challenges...
Key global trends include rising income, climate change, growing cyber dependency, ageing population, artificial intelligence, and the changing nature of conflict Last week, two events held the world spellbound: one featuring outgoing US President Barack Obama was a cerebral, dignified and solemn affair while at the other guttural, farcical and burlesque circus, ...Brics Summit overshadowed by “how to isolate Pakistan” agenda
Instead of using the Brics summit to push for greater economic growth and a greater global governance role, India sought to use it more for dealing with Pakistan Hosting international summits inevitably offers a country the opportunity to lead the agenda and provide leadership to the meeting; enhance the institution’s role in ...China’s reaction to Hague ruling could have negative impact on other...
China’s shrill and bellicose response during and after the ruling has only served to heighten alarm over Beijing’s intentions and behaviour among all the major powers, including India The ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague against China’s claim on the South China Sea in a case brought ...Brexit, missile control and India
A diminished England, sans nuclear weapons, coupled with a fragmenting Europe, is unlikely to play its traditional role of shaping norms Two recent though unrelated events are likely to significantly impact the evolving global order and India’s role in it. The first was the unfortunate and histrionic referendum, which will lead to ...India’s underpowered foreign policy
Narendra Modi government needs to work with several other constituents, including state governments, corporate sector, think tanks and civil society writes WPS SIdhu At the end of its second year in office, the foreign policy performance of the Narendra Modi government resembles that of a gleaming Ferrari powered by a frugal Ambassador ...What the Nuclear Security Summits mean for South Africa
WPS Sidhu provides an in-depth analysis of South Africa’s nuclear position and the ramification of Nuclear Security Summits on South Africa The Nuclear Security Summit (NSS) process – to prevent non-state actors, particularly terrorists, from acquiring nuclear material – was launched with fanfare in 2010 by US President Barack Obama with a single ambitious objective ‘to ...The Brussels syndrome
There needs to be an international consensus on zero tolerance for all terrorism, as advocated by India and several other countries writes WPS Sidhu. “What we had feared has come to pass,” said Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel on 22 March. Like the Stockholm syndrome a phenomenon in which hostages express sympathy ...Dr Barack versus President Obama
Barack Obama’s foreign policy reflects a moral duality that has befuddled friends and enemies alike Barack Obama’s foreign policy, like the main character in Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novella The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, reflects a moral duality that has befuddled friends and enemies alike and will complicate ...A tale of an election and a selection
Unless the P5 recognize that a weak and inept leader challenges their own legitimacy, the UN will be encumbered by a powerless leader writes WPS Sidhu This year will witness at least two leadership transitions of great international significance, including for India. The first is the election of the 45th president of ...Xi Jinping’s strategic Middle East gambit
The Chinese president’s visit to Iran (after summits in Saudi Arabia and Egypt) is of strategic significance. What is the difference between India and China’s strategic partnerships with Iran? Over $35 billion per year (the gap between India’s and China’s annual bilateral trade with Iran, which stands at $15 billion and $50 ...The global implications of Barack Obama’s speech
The US president’s swan song has eloquently, though incompletely, spelt out an ambitious but essential vision for a new world order The annual state of the union (SOTU) address by the sitting president to the US Congress is invariably a laundry list of the government’s legislative agenda aimed primarily at a domestic ...What drives South Asians to peacekeeping?
Germany’s international broadcaster, Deutsche Welle (DW), quotes Brookings India Non-Resident Senior Fellow WPS Sidhu extensively on how Bangladesh, Pakistan, India and Nepal are among the top contributors to UN peacekeeping missions across the world. What are the factors driving these “relatively poor” nations to send troops to work under the UN flag? Waheguru ...India has played a significant role in shaping 3 key deals in 2015
2015 will be remembered for bold initiatives at the bilateral, plurilateral and multilateral level As 2015 draws to an end, it will be remembered for bold initiatives and done deals at the bilateral, plurilateral and multilateral level, which will flourish or flounder depending on how successfully they are implemented. Almost all of ...Avoiding a cop out in Paris
Three of the most exciting initiatives have emerged on the sidelines of the official deliberations, and Indians have played a prominent role in all of them Ever since Charles Lindbergh landed at Le Bourget Field at the end of his epochal maiden solo, non-stop transatlantic flight between New York and Paris in ...Cities become battlefields of terrorism as world continues to urbanise
The recent series of dastardly and heinous attacks in places as dispersed as Baghdad, Beirut, Bamako, Kabul and Paris by myriad terrorist outfits ranging from the Taliban to Islamic State and al-Qaeda hold several important lessons for international efforts to counter terrorism. First, cities, especially those with a significant international presence (such ...Africa: The indispensible continent for India?
Despite the Narendra Modi government’s foreign policy hyper-activism, Africa has remained a neglected continent for India. When the India-Africa Forum Summit (IAFS), originally scheduled for December 2014 in New Delhi, was postponed ostensibly on account of the deadly Ebola crisis sweeping West Africa, this perception was confirmed for many Africa-watchers. However, the ...Private sector, state government, civil society can take India-Africa...
With over 40 African heads of governments and states attending, the third India-Africa Forum Summ (IAFS) being held in New Delhi is the biggest foreign policy event hosted by India in more than three decades. While this process was partly in response to initiatives by other emerging powers, particularly the Forum on ...Africa, the indispensable continent for India
Four ways in which India and Africa matter to each other The third (IAFS) in New Delhi this week, with over 40 African heads of governments and states attending, will be the biggest foreign policy event hosted by India in more than three decades. While this process was partly in response to initiatives ...Great power dance at the United Nations
Coupled with the re-engagement of existing and emerging powers with the proceedings, the UNGA is becoming an important venue for a great power dance Time was when the annual United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) jamboree in New York was an entertaining but worthless talkfest used by leaders such as Hugo Chavez, Muammar ...SGDs: India’s potential path to global power
Fact: India is home to more than 30% of the world’s extremely poor people Fact: Uttar Pradesh accounts for 8% of world’s population living in extreme poverty Fact: 8 Indian states have more poor than 25 of the poorest countries in Africa Fact: There are 66 million poor people in UP alone, more ...Space: securing India’s final frontier
The launch of the GSLV–D6 powered by an indigenous cryogenic engine is a game-changer Even as the country was agog with a salacious society murder and an indefensible regional protest over reservations, which hogged the electronic bandwidth and the print media, an event of strategic import crucial to secure India’s space frontier ...All eyes on Pakistan’s commitment to peace in the region
WPS Sidhu argues that Pakistan walking away from the Ufa Agreement talks will be seen as Pakistan walking away from terrorism talks This interview first appeared on CNN-IBN channel. Watch the full discussion here. Key highlights This government is not going to allow Pakistan to meet Kashmir separatists on its own Pakistan pulling ...Watching how Modi’s UAE visit translates on ground
WPS Sidhu outlines important issues to watch in India-UAE relations, from investments to countering terrorism, Indian workers rights and diplomacy in the Middle East region. Watch the full interview on CNN-IBN here. The bottomline is, first, the amount of investment that comes into India. We know the UAE has one of the biggest sovereign ...UAE visit part of Modi’s Look East, Link West strategy
WPS Sidhu would like to wait and watch out the India-UAE cooperation on counter-terrorism is actually going to play out This interview first appeared on 17 August 2015 on CNN-IBN. Watch the full interview here. What is your assessment of the India-UAE counter-terrorism cooperation talks? In many ways it is unprecedented but ...UNSC: Misreading an opportunity
Recent news reports would have us believe that India’s chances for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) have been scuppered even before they began by the very countries that promised to support its case when the reality is the other way around. This is tantamount to reading a ...Revealing the real strategic significance of BRICS
The recently concluded twin summits in Ufa – the summits of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) grouping and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) – are a strategic milestone for the emerging global order. The outcomes of these summits also hold significance for India’s future role in it. While ...Strategic Importance of Ufa Summits
The recently concluded twin summits in Ufa, Russia of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) grouping and the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) are a strategic milestone for the emerging global order and India’s role in it for several reasons. First, host Russia sought to use the summits to vindicate ...Brics: Shaping a New World order, Finally
From the 6th Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit at Fortaleza to the forthcoming seventh Brics summit in Ufa this week, this unlikely grouping first conceived as an investment portfolio is increasingly reflecting the desire and limited ability to shape a new world order. This is a significant feat ...Keeping peace among peacekeepers
The word peacekeeping does not appear anywhere in the Charter of the UN. Yet, ever since the first peacekeeping operation was launched in May 1948 in the Middle East, that one word evokes the very raison d’etre of the world body. Since then the UN has deployed 70 peacekeeping operations with some ...Looking ahead: The next 365 days
By most accounts Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has notched up a good year in the foreign policy realm, with Modi himself being the principle planner and implementer of the most significant initiatives. Even his most ardent political critics have acknowledged the energy and vigour he has displayed while globetrotting around capitals ...India-U.S. Relations: Repaired, Revived, Revitalized
In the foreign policy arena the biggest accomplishment of the Narendra Modi government has doubtless been the evolution of relations with the United States. During his first year Prime Minister Modi has almost single-handedly repaired, revived, revitalized, and re-energized relations with the United States from one that was either hopelessly adrift or, ...Bold Initiatives Stymied by Systemic Weakness
While Mr. Modi’s foreign policy objectives are the same as his predecessor, what has changed is the implementation and operationalization of these objectives. During the hustings last year foreign policy was barely mentioned in Narendra Modi’s campaign. However a year after his stunning victory, which gave India its first majority government in ...The Iran deal: Implications for U.S.-India relations
Should the deal with Iran on nuclear non-proliferation be concluded this summer, it would also vindicate India’s preference for diplomacy over military action to address contentious issues, particularly in the Middle East.India: Building the Foundations for Robust Global Engagement
While Mr. Modi’s personal world view and its effect on India’s foreign policy is difficult to discern, India has considerable potential to establish itself as a more influential player on the world stage. In order to prioritise India’s contribution to developing international regimes related to climate, cyber, energy, food, outer space, trade, ...What the Iran nuclear deal means for India
The Iran deal or the “Parameters for a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) Regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Nuclear Program”, to use the wordy official moniker has been evaluated by most experts in only nuclear terms and measured in the number of centrifuges and Tehran’s break-out timeline to build a ...The Big Deal
This column first appeared in the Indian Express, on January 29, 2015. Like other products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are those of the author. Nuclear cooperation between the United States and India, starting with the July 18, 2005 ...Operationalizing India-U.S. Civil Nuclear Cooperation
U.S.-India civil nuclear cooperation, starting with the July 18, 2005 nuclear agreement and culminating in the formal 123-agreement bill approved by the U.S. Congress on September 28, 2008, was expected not only to become a springboard for extensive bilateral nuclear cooperation, including the sale of U.S. reactors to support India’s ambitious nuclear ...Learning the art of deal-making
This column first appeared in Mint, on December 8, 2014. Like other products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are those of the author. Three recent bilateral agreements have the potential to dramatically change India’s relations with major powers and ...Saarc: building a constellation of stars?
This column first appeared in Mint, on November 23, 2014. Like other products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are those of the author. With squabbling members and embarrassingly poor integration there are few expectations for the 18th summit of ...War, peace and international order
This column first appeared in Mint, on November 9, 2014. Like other products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are those of the author. The eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of this year will mark ...Modi’s delivery challenges
By all accounts Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US was triumphal: both in purely investment terms and in terms of the lofty rhetoric and unprecedented public buzz that his outings generated. The former, according to the US-India Business Council, will yield an investment of over $41 billion over the next ...Modi’s prayer at the multilateral altar
This column first appeared in Mint, on September 29, 2014. Like other products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are those of the authors. The inevitable hype over Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US, particularly the impressive line up ...India-U.S. Relations: The View from New Delhi
There was a time when India-U.S. relations were summed up in platitudes like “world’s largest democracies,” while seasoned pundits lamented that they were in fact “estranged democracies” that had very little in common. Today, with nearly 30 separate dialogues, the India-U.S. agenda involves issues ranging from the TTP (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan) to the ...The merits of going nuclear with China
This column first appeared in Mint, on September 15, 2014. Like other products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are solely those of the author. The maiden visit of Chinese President Xi Jingping to India this week, following close on ...Lessons not to emulate from Japan
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s maiden visit to Japan coincides with his 100 days in office and underlines his foreign policy emphasis on deeds (particularly deliverables) rather than words or highfalutin rhetoric (without concrete results). Predictably then the focus of the Japan trip has been on specific deliverables in trade, investment, energy and ...Re-energizing India-U.S. Civil Nuclear Cooperation
India-U.S. civil nuclear cooperation, starting with the July 2005 nuclear agreement and culminating in the formal 123-agreement bill approved by the U.S. Congress and signed into law in the autumn of 2008, was the poster boy of bilateral relations; it was expected to mark an end to decades-old strategic mistrust between the ...India’s Foreign Policy Priorities and India-U.S. Relations
There is broad consensus in India that the country’s single most important objective is to become the world’s third largest economy by 2025 and, concurrently, also emerge as one of the key global political and security actors in the evolving multipolar world. As a corollary, there is growing appreciation that India’s foreign ...A brave new nuclear deterrence world?
Since the dawn of nuclear weapons in 1945 two axioms have dominated the discourse: one, only nuclear weapons could deter other nuclear weapons. Two, as conventional conflict would inevitably escalate to a nuclear level the primary objective of the military in nuclear-armed states was to avert wars. Thus, Cold War relations were ...A transformative India-US dialogue?
This column first appeared in Mint, on August 4, 2014. Like all products of the Brookings Institution India Center, this is intended to contribute to discussion and stimulate debate on important issues. The views are solely those of the author. Opinion on the recently concluded fifth India-US strategic dialogue ranged from it being a dramatic “transformative ...Just another set of BRICS in the wall?
There is supreme irony that the genesis of the self-consciously anti-western BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) grouping came from the most evocative symbol of the western liberal economic world the head of an investment bank’s asset management unit, Jim O’Neill of Goldman Sachs. This underlies, on the one hand, ...Just Another Set of BRICS in the Wall ?
Waheguru Pal Singh Sidhu outlines how due to inherent contradictions within the group and open competition between China and India, BRICS might not be the ideal vehicle for the five countries to become part of and shape the emerging world order.
Why multilateralism matters for India
Conventional wisdom suggests that great powers and aspiring great powers prefer bilateralism to multilateralism or plurilateralism; they consider the former a characteristic of the strong and regard the latter only as the privilege of the weak. India is no exception. Yet, multilateralism offers a useful path for countries to emerge as great ...Iraq: Modi’s black swan moment
In the grand scheme of candidate, and now prime minister, Narendra Modi ‘Iraq’ never featured either benignly or as a potential cause of concern. Yet, these four letters, coupled with the dreaded acronym ISIS (variously elaborated as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria or the Islamic State of Iraq and the ...Iraq: Modi’s Black Swan Moment
In this article, W.P.S. Sidhu talks about the crisis in Iraq and how the kidnapping of the Indian hostages by ISIS caught the Modi administration off-guard. He concludes, however, that this crisis might provide just the right incentive to rework India’s policy to the Middle East.US & India: Hope of deliverance
Initiatives by US President Barack Obama and Prime Minisiter Narendra Modi, leaders of the world’s biggest democracies, last fortnight evoked dramatically contrasting reactions: it appeared that the former could do no right while the latter could do no wrong. Obama’s major foreign policy speech at West Point Academy; the Taliban prisoners for Sargent Bowe Bergdahl exchange; the ...Narendra Modi’s Foreign Policy
*This column first appeared in Mint, on May 25, 2014. All views are personal. Brookings India does not hold an institutional view on any subject. Narendra Modi’s ambitious development plan, anchored in investment, infrastructure and job creation, requires two fundamental external conditions. First, ensuring a no-war environment, particularly in India’s immediate neighbourhood ...Foreign policy: continuity, not change
On the last day of polling in India’s 16th general elections the final phase of which witnessed vicious, communal and extremely local campaigning in one corner of a single state one could be forgiven for concluding that foreign policy has no role in India’s future direction. Nothing could be further from reality. ...The Concept of Strategic Balance: Relevance and Reality – An Asian...
Introduction: The concept of strategic balance was developed by the two superpowers in the context of East-West nuclear contestation during the Cold War. It was primarily inspired by the advent of nuclear weapons, though it also drew on the unique history, particularly of the two world wars and the massive destruction suffered ...Updating India’s nuclear doctrine
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will “study in detail India’s nuclear doctrine, and revise and update it, to make it relevant to challenges of current times.” (Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat, BJP’s 2014 election manifesto). Unsurprisingly, these words have perturbed international strategic experts. Everyone remembers how the party delivered on its 1998 manifesto ...Contemporary Geopolitics
Senior Fellow WPS Sidhu made presentations at The Université Paris I (Panthéon-Sorbonne), as part of the teaching and research multidisciplinary project set up around the “Institut des Etudes sur la guerre et la paix,” an international Chair devoted to the study of contemporary geostrategic issues. The three lectures focused on: Nuclear Disorder ...Saudi Arabia, Iran and a three-way tango
If India is serious about being everyone’s ally in the Persian Gulf, it will have to engineer a rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran In a deft diplomatic dance last week India simultaneously hosted Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the defence minister of Saudi Arabia, and Mohammad Javad Zarif, the foreign minister ...Perils of preserving the ancien régime
The old order changeth yielding place to new… (The Passing of Arthur) Despite the veracity of this maxim, existing members of the old nuclear order, which is closely intertwined with the world order even today, are challenging the inevitability of this line from Alfred Tennyson’s classic poem. In doing so, the original ...India’s travails when peace talks fail
The spectacular failure of the Syrians on both the political and humanitarian fronts has put India’s objectives in jeopardy and reflects the perils of failed negotiations We all came out to Montreux, on the Lake Geneva shoreline, to make records with a mobile, we didn’t have much time… Deep Purple, “Smoke on ...Hearing echoes of 1914 in 2014
The spread of power centres all over the word (rather than its concentration in Europe as was the case in 1914) may prevent global war Noted Oxford historian Margaret MacMillan in a thoughtful essay titled The Rhyme of History identifies several worrying trends from the eve of the First World War in 1914, which ...