India
A May 15 test of India’s anti-ballistic missile system fanned the flames of a nuclear standoff 45 years in the making. Pakistan voiced “serious concern” over the test that it believes could nullify its nuclear deterrent against its long standing enemy. Of the nine nuclear armed states, Pakistan and India ...
The adversarial history between India and Pakistan is compounded by each nation’s firm stance on the possession of nuclear weapons. As each country moves to expand its capabilities, it has become more important than ever before to bring both countries into agreement with international arms control norms. The Cipher Brief ...
South Asia is the region of the world at highest risk of suffering a nuclear crisis due to an explosive mixture of unresolved territorial disputes, cross-border terrorism, and growing nuclear arsenals. While the Middle East will remain a focal point for international nonproliferation efforts for the foreseeable future, the United ...
Defense Secretary Ash Carter left India on Tuesday after a three-day trip focused on deepening ties to the country that has been eyed as the significant counterweight to China in the region. With the US and India agreeing to strengthen maritime security cooperation and in principle to share military logistics, ...
Sri Lanka’s many harbors and its location amidst major shipping routes bestow strategic importance on the island nation and have also made it one of the many sites where India and China are competing for influence. In an effort by Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena’s government to increase cooperation with ...
As China, the current economic superpower of the East, becomes increasingly unstable and its markets unpredictable, many are focusing newfound attention southward on India. With its economy growing at a rate of seven percent, India is poised for an economic surge similar to that of China, with the benefit of ...
Recent efforts by Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi have resurrected the idea of rapprochement between India and Pakistan. So successful were these efforts that Pakistani militants felt compelled to stage an attack on an airbase in Indian Punjab early last month to derail them. ...
Former Ambassador to Sri Lanka, Teresita Schaffer, discussed with The Cipher Brief the continued importance of a close U.S.-India relationship. Schaffer explained India’s tenuous security dynamic with China and Pakistan, and emphasized the importance of continuing active U.S.-Indian consultation and cooperation on East Asian security issues as India shapes its ...
China and India are gradually assuming leading positions at the global and regional levels, with over $11 trillion and $2 trillion in gross domestic product respectively. China initiated a comprehensive plan for expanding its footprint in Asia, Europe, and Africa through its Silk Road and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. China’s ...
The Himalayan mountain range separates the world’s two most populous states, India and China, whose rapidly expanding economies are instrumental in the ongoing shift of the global balance of power towards the East. India and China have many things in common: both are developing Asian countries struggling to compete in ...
India and China agree that the global political architecture is undergoing a fundamental transformation with gravity increasingly shifting from the Atlantic to Indo-Pacific. Both have pronounced the 21st Century as India’s, China’s or Asian Century. However, the fate of this century will be determined by the relationship between the two, ...
India and China, two of the oldest civilizations, had friendly relations and learned from each other in history. As Rabindranath Tagore put it, “China and India are very old and beloved brothers.” The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, or Panchsheel Agreement of 1954, was a milestone of India-China brotherhood and ...
At least since the end of the Cold War, U.S. policymakers and analysts have devoted considerable thought to the dissonance between existing international institutions and the shifting global order. It is now widely recognized that the emerging powers of the 21st century—such as China and India—have yet to be accommodated ...
It’s one of, if not the most, dangerous border in the world. Nuclear-armed powers, India and Pakistan, have a history of strained relations since their independence from Great Britain in 1947, fighting three wars and regularly exchanging fire across their heavily militarized border. Two of the wars were over their ...
Even though both India and Pakistan are members of the South Asia Free Trade Area (SAFTA), established in January 2006, trade between them is strikingly small. Total trade (exports plus imports) between the two countries in the last few years has been averaging only a little over $2.5 billion. Currently, ...
Nowhere on earth is an act of terrorism more likely to spark a nuclear war than in South Asia. This is by no means a unique or recent observation. In early 2010, I wrote a “Contingency Planning Memorandum” for the Council on Foreign Relations suggesting that in the aftermath of ...
Born from the territorial splitting of British India in 1947, India–Pakistan relations have been historically beset by disagreements, pressure, and conflict over the status of Kashmir on India’s north-western border but also issues of regional pre-eminence. With the dispute over Kashmir leading to direct war between the two sides in ...