Comment & Briefs

Although the ideas of nuclear arms control, nuclear security and nuclear disarmament have featured in several US official statements and joint statements with other countries, will US adopt the ‘No First Use’ policy, remains to be seen.

With few convergences among partners, the path of the “traffic light coalition” headed by Olaf Scholz is laden with challenges, but also offers spaces for positive action. With several new faces in key positions, its success would lie in maintaining continuity, and tweaking it to accommodate necessary changes when required.

President Putin’s short but highly consequential visit to India and the launch of the 2+2 format have imbued new dynamism into the bilateral partnership. There might be a few areas of divergence between the two sides but spheres of convergence are much greater.

The rapid increase in the nuclear forces of China, as revealed in the 2021 Pentagon Report, is a matter of serious concern. Several countries are undertaking exercises to ascertain the strategic and security implications of the feared expansion of the Chinese nuclear stockpile.

Considering that the year 2021 marks the fifth anniversary of the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between India and Vietnam, the upcoming visit of Mr Vuong Dinh Hue, the current Chairman of the Vietnam National Assembly, to India is likely to strengthen India–Vietnam relationship further.

Nord Stream 2, a Russian undersea gas pipeline project that intends to deliver natural gas from Siberia to Germany, currently sits at an intersection of several geopolitical and geo-economic cross-currents that determine the economic security as well as the geostrategic balance of Europe.

Showing readiness to sign the SEANWFZ treaty seems to be a low-cost, high-return proposition for Beijing. It could be a calculated symbolic gesture having no bearing on the region’s precarious security situation.

India–Russia cooperation in the Indian Ocean and the Arctic, including the Russian Far East, could give strong thrust to their deepening engagement. However, there is a need for heavy lifting from both sides to achieve the desired potential.

As the civilian political space shrinks and the capacity of the state gets hobbled by political dissension and internal resistance from forces armed with an alternate blueprint for action, Pakistan is likely to rely more on its anti-India stance to build national unity, seeking especially to suck in the militant religious groups into its orbit.

Defence procurement in India needs to adopt a mix of procurement avenues in which the indigenous solutions, foreign equipment and futuristic R&D continue together in a balanced manner. Considering that piecemeal solutions are not effective in the long term, there is a need to adopt a ‘Systems Approach’ to come up with a holistic solution which is enduring and progressive.