The dust might have settled on the US Elections with Barack Obama ensuring a place in history as the first African American President to occupy the White House. The moot question now is whether the dust will begin to fly in South Asia as the new Administration begins to formulate new policies with regard to the region. It is also inevitable that existing policies would also be modified to bring them in synch with the substantially different worldview of the Democratic Party which has reclaimed the White House after eight years.
This paper is an endeavour to appraise the importance and 'value' of India-US defence exercises for Indian policy makers. It examines their dividends, costs, and pitfalls. The paper argues that such combined exercises are not only useful in functional terms but are also necessary. While such exercises are invariably embedded in inter-state relations and grand-strategic issues, in this case the paper confines itself to operational and military-strategic issues.
Many scholars assume that the European model of Realpolitik will prevail in Asia as the dual rise of China and India reorders regional politics. Others predict that Asia's China-centric tradition of hierarchy will reassert itself. But Indians look as much to 19th century US history as to any European or Asian model. Indeed, successive prime ministers have explicitly cited the Monroe Doctrine to justify intervention in hotspots around the Indian periphery. The Monroe Doctrine, however, underwent several phases during the USA's rise to world power.
The two recent glorious achievements - the Olympics and spacewalk mission – seem to have transcended China to a new global height with wide implications for the world’s strategic balance. From all accounts, analysts suggest that China will not only survive but has also gained from the recent global financial meltdown.
The military commander most associated with executing President George Bush’s ‘troop surge’ in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, handed over command of US forces to Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno on September 16, after completing nearly 18 months of duty at the helm. He had taken over from the then commander Gen. George Casey in early February 2007, at a time when rising American and Iraqi civilian casualties threatened to engulf the whole region with its attendant negative consequences.
After prolonged political and diplomatic negotiations between Iraq and the United States, President George Bush announced on September 9 the decision to withdraw around 8000 troops by the end of February 2009. The withdrawal would be done in a phased manner - a Marine battalion by November 2008 and an Army brigade by February 2009.
Africa is no longer a distant region that can be ignored by the United States. As articulated in the US National Security Strategy, the need to expand and ensure America's access to energy resources, prevent the spread of terrorism in weak states, and address transnational health and environmental concerns has transformed Africa from a strategically remote part of the world into a priority region for US economic, political, and military interests.
Obama and the Special Envoy to Kashmir
The dust might have settled on the US Elections with Barack Obama ensuring a place in history as the first African American President to occupy the White House. The moot question now is whether the dust will begin to fly in South Asia as the new Administration begins to formulate new policies with regard to the region. It is also inevitable that existing policies would also be modified to bring them in synch with the substantially different worldview of the Democratic Party which has reclaimed the White House after eight years.