ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses India's regional policy perspective and strategic thought by investigating India's historic and regional foreign policy, security policy, security strategy, and war fighting doctrine. It examines the historic roots of Pakistan's threat perception as well as the contemporary strategic determinants of its insecurity dilemma. Reflecting simultaneously both satisfaction and insult, many Indian policymakers openly suggest that Pakistan is the only other truly sovereign state in South Asia. The continuing dispute over control of the territory of Kashmir, having sparked wars between the two neighbours in 1947 and 1965, remains—from Pakistan's standpoint—the single biggest contributor to mutual suspicion, bitterness, and hostility between Pakistan and India. The deputy secretary went to argue that Kashmir was perhaps second only to Israel/Palestine in being 'the most dangerous place in the world.' The chapter concludes with a discussion of the likely consequences of India's policy responses to recent events in the subcontinent given the central role of nuclear weapons in Pakistan's security strategy.
