Bharat Karnad

May 03, 2012

Bharat Karnad is professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

For US, India is doormat to Asia

Assuming the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) has done its job, the government must by be aware of the fact that North Korea is preparing to conduct its third nuclear test, this time of a Chinese-designed boosted fission device.

Mission Taliban

There are certain immutable laws of military history that repeated attempts at disproving them only end up confirming their veracity.

Brothers-in-arms

The test-firing of the Agni-V intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) on April 19 was greeted with a heartening absence of official bluster in Pakistan.

India’s missile bamboozle

There has been needless confusion and obfuscation about the Agni-V missile test-fired on April 19. First was the delay in the launch by some 11 hours.

Cosmetic diplomacy

How many times have we seen Indian and Pakistani leaders meet, say nice things, pledge their efforts to peace, and witness little change on the ground? There is cricket diplomacy initiated by Gen.

To tackle piracy, go on the offensive

Large navies with great deal of capital invested in them these days prepare not for great fleet battles but for the infinitely less taxing anti-piracy operations. When this role is devolved by governments to shipping companies who, in turn, pass on the authority to privately-owned vessels guarded by naval commandos, what you get is the incident off the Kerala coast. A couple of Italian Navy master sergeants on-board Enrica Lexie took pot-shots, it would seem, at medium range, slightly mobile, targets bobbing on water they identified as pirates.

Tricky waters

The open attack on the Israeli embassy official in highly-policed Lutyens Delhi may be the harbinger of the Israeli conflict with Iran, and the Islamic world generally, extending to Indian cities. Whether this is a like Iranian response to the plastique-killings of a couple of its nuclear scientists on Tehran streets in recent years is not germane to India’s diplomatic predicament. India is in no position to alienate Iran, even less, Israel.

Art of deal-making

India and the United States resemble an old, estranged, couple who are too irked by each other’s frets and foibles to stay together but aware of too many shared interests to live apart. Their relations reek of familiarity even in their differences. These impressions are reinforced every time one engages with official Washington as happened last week whilst attending a conference as part of which I, along with three other Indian invitees, had the opportunity to discuss issues currently troubling bilateral ties with Republican congressman Steve Chabot, chairman of the sub-committee on West Asia and South Asia of the House Foreign Relations Committee and his staff, and separately with senior advisers to several US senators.

Looking West, as far as Israel

The Indian minister for external affairs, S.M. Krishna, is visiting Israel starting January 9.

A few fatal flaws

When does a flawed system of government become a threat to the security of the state and the wellbeing of the people? This is a question that must now concern all citizens witnessing the country’s dangerous decline in certain salient aspects, even as those at the helm, far from taking corrective measures such as the Lokpal Bill with teeth, are worsening the situation.

Horoscope