Indian Strategic Studies

7 December 2024

The Geopolitical Crossroads Of Bangladesh – A Looming Threat To India

South Asia stands at a pivotal juncture, where shifting geopolitics and internal upheavals could significantly impact regional stability. Among these, the current situation in Bangladesh demands India's urgent attention. What may appear as a domestic crisis in our eastern neighbour has broader implications, creating potential opportunities for Pakistan and China to intensify their strategic footprints in the region.

Bangladesh’s Internal Turmoil

Bangladesh, historically a bastion of stability in a turbulent region, now faces growing political unrest, economic challenges, and discontent among its population. With elections on the horizon, the political landscape has become highly polarised. Protests and violence are escalating, testing the resilience of its governance and institutions.

The chaos risks fostering an environment ripe for external manipulation. Pakistan, which has long sought to undermine India's eastern borders, and China, with its expanding Belt and Road ambitions, are likely to see this as an opportunity to exploit Bangladesh’s vulnerabilities.

The China-Pakistan-Bangladesh Triangle

China's growing influence in South Asia is no secret. With infrastructure investments under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has made significant inroads in Bangladesh. Ports like Chittagong are critical to China's "String of Pearls" strategy, aimed at encircling India with strategic assets.

How the Cold War Forged India’s Intelligence Setup

Sushant Singh

When Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina resigned under pressure amid mass student protests in August, some of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist supporters were quick to blame—without much evidence—the CIA.

Labeling Hasina’s forced resignation a “color revolution,” these Indian conspiracy theorists suggested that something similar could be attempted in New Delhi. They aimed to discredit India’s political opposition and possible protests against Modi; the alleged role of the United States in destabilizing Hasina’s government made the United States a convenient scapegoat.

Trump inherits a Middle East in flux

Colin Demarest

The greater Middle East is erupting, and in just six weeks — tick tock, tick tock — it's Donald Trump's problem.

Why it matters: For all the attention paid to technological face-offs with China and measurements of military might in the Indo-Pacific, it will be the pressures of the Middle East that dominate the early days of Trump's Pentagon.

That puts a premium on drone and counter-drone tech, which evolved in the post-9/11 world, as well as air defenses.
In turn, the teeth of American forces posted in China's backyard could be dulled, as Navy Adm. Samuel Paparo cautioned days ago.

Between the lines: Some of Trump's picks for key government posts are global war on terrorism veterans. Their experience and potential disillusionment will color, not determine, the administration's approach.

Task and Purpose explained it expertly this week.
"The worldview of these veterans has largely been shaped by more than two decades of war," Jeff Schogol wrote. "[Pete] Hegseth, [Tulsi] Gabbard, and [JD] Vance in particular have shown a deep distrust for the foreign interventionalist ideology that underpinned the start" of the war on terror.

Our thought bubble: Squaring much-debated MAGA isolationism with the dangers of the Middle East, including continued assaults on U.S. warships, is difficult.

Protecting U.S. Allies and Partners from Chinese Economic Coercion

Elliott Abrams Ezra Hess and Joshua Kurlantzick

Even as China’s economy faces massive domestic problems, from sluggish consumer demand to industrial overcapacity, its leadership, headed by the increasingly assertive and nationalistic Xi Jinping, has continued a strategy of applying intense economic coercion to countries it feels have disregarded China’s major interests.

As the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) and others have noted, Beijing usually applies economic coercion—while consistently denying it is doing so—when it feels its core interests in international relations are threatened. Those core interests can sometimes be blurry, but tend to encompass

isolating Taiwan from the world;
ensuring that China is not deprived of what it needs to continue long-term economic growth;
preventing other states from threatening the power of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), for example, through criticism of its human rights record and authoritarianism;
preventing threats to China’s security, as in the case of states, particularly in Asia, signing new defense arrangements with the United States or agreeing to play larger roles in patrolling the South China Sea; and
delivering a message to the world that China acts peacefully in international affairs.

Xi Jinping Doesn’t Have an Answer for China’s Demographic Crisis

Lizzi C. Lee

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recent article in Qiushi, the Communist Party’s flagship journal for outlining core ideology and policy, frames China’s demographic challenges as a strategic opportunity. It offers Xi’s most detailed vision yet for addressing the country’s aging population: shifting from a labor-intensive, population-driven economy to one powered by innovation, education, and productivity. Yet beneath the lofty rhetoric lies a familiar and contentious concept: renkou suzhi, or “population quality.”

The notion of suzhi has long been a cornerstone of Chinese policymaking, shaping debates on everything from education to health care. On the surface, it advocates for cultivating a healthier, better educated, and more skilled population. But its implications run deeper—and are more divisive. Historically, suzhi has been used to draw lines between urban elites and rural or migrant populations, carrying connotations of class bias and, at times, embracing eugenicist thinking. Implicit in calls for a “high-quality population” is the judgment of a “low-quality” counterpart, reinforcing societal divides in a way that is rarely acknowledged outright.

China hits out at latest US effort to block Beijing’s access to chip technology

Juliana Liu and Sean Lyngaas

The Chinese government has slammed America’s introduction of fresh export controls on US-made semiconductors that Washington fears Beijing could use to make the next generation of weapons and artificial intelligence (AI) systems.

The new measures, unveiled by the outgoing Biden administration, have raised the political temperature between the world’s top two economies ahead of the imminent inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has made self-sufficiency a major pillar of his economic strategy to make China a tech superpower.

On Monday, the US Commerce Department announced curbs on the sale of two dozen types of semiconductor-making equipment and restrictions on numerous Chinese companies from accessing American technology.

The goal of the new controls, US Commerce Department officials said, was to slow China’s development of advanced AI tools that can be used in war and to undercut the country’s homegrown semiconductor industry, which threatens the national security of the US and its allies.

China’s Commerce Ministry condemned the move, accusing the US of “abuse” of export controls and posing “a significant threat” to the stability of global industrial and supply chains.

Pentagon Confirms Centcom Destroyed Weapons Systems In Syria

Matthew Olay

U.S. Central Command on Tuesday successfully engaged and destroyed several weapon systems that posed a threat to U.S. and coalition forces in Syria, the Defense Department announced.

The weapons destroyed — which included three truck-mounted multiple rocket launchers, a T-64 tank and multiple mortars — presented a “clear and imminent threat” to U.S. and coalition forces in the vicinity of eastern Syria’s Mission Support Site Euphrates, Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder told the media.

“The self-defense strike occurred after the mobile multiple rocket launchers fired rockets that landed in the vicinity of MSS Euphrates, and mortars were fired toward U.S. forces,” Ryder said.

He added that, while DOD is still assessing who was operating the weapons, Iranian-backed militia groups are operating in the region that have attacked MSS Euphrates in the past.

Tuesday’s incident was the second time in less than a week that Centcom forces were used to neutralize a hostile threat in the region.

On Nov. 29, Centcom employed A-10 fighter aircraft to successfully engage a hostile target that imposed a threat to U.S. and coalition forces at MSS Euphrates.

Iran’s strategic limbo

John Raine

Israel’s war on Hizbullah and its strikes against Iran have left the leadership in Tehran in a strategic limbo. Weakened both by its inability to project power through its partners and by damages to its air defences, the leadership’s long-standing strategy, championed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), of fighting Israel below the threshold of war has lost credibility. That strategy has resulted in the destruction of Iran’s air defences, damage to its missile capability and a devastating blow to the capabilities of Hizbullah, the strategy’s keystone. The leadership must now face up to a renewed threat to Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, its key state-level ally and protégé that it cannot afford to lose.

However much revolutionary zeal and rhetoric it may be displaying, the parameters for Iranian strategy and ambitions will be constrained by new, and difficult, operational realities.

Four problems

Firstly, Israel’s ability to acquire and attack targets at pace and with accuracy, including individual leadership figures within Hizbullah and the IRGC, has effectively demonstrated that the IRGC’s battlespace is now transparent.

The 2004 EU Enlargement Was A Success Story Built On Deep Reform Efforts – Analysis

Robert Beyer, Claire Yi Li and Sebastian Weber

Poland is one of the success stories of European economic convergence. The country, which in January takes the reins of the Council of the European Union (the decision-making institution representing the Union’s member states) is now the EU’s sixth largest economy. This convergence process was driven by the 2004 EU enlargement, which also welcomed the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Slovenia, and Slovakia into the Union, expanding the EU’s population by about 20 percent.

Twenty years later, as new EU accession discussions are underway, it is worth looking at how much the earlier enlargement benefitted new members and the whole Union, and reflect on the economic returns of broadening the European single market. The current accession candidates, in different stages of the process, are Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova, Ukraine and Türkiye. In October, the European Commission issued a new report with detailed assessments of the state of play and the progress toward EU accession made by each candidate.

A new note by the Regional Economic Outlook for Europe shows that the 2004 EU enlargement brought substantial income gains. These gains were particularly large in the new member states: after 15 years GDP per person was on average more than 30 percent higher than it would have been without EU accession.

Earth's magnetic North Pole is shifting toward Russia

Devika Rao

The planet's magnetic North Pole, where compasses point, has been unexpectedly moving toward Russia. While shifting is not a rare occurrence, the pole is moving both faster and differently than it was before, raising questions about the planet's magnetic field. If the Earth's field is disrupted, it may cause problems in technology and navigation, as well as expose the planet to unwanted radiation.

Moving the poles

There are two types of poles on Earth: the geographic and magnetic poles. The geographic North Pole "stays at the same place, as it is where all lines of longitude converge," while the magnetic North Pole is where a compass points, which "changes from time to time as the contours of Earth's magnetic field also change," said USA Today. Because of this, scientists have long tracked changes in the magnetic pole. "For centuries, the magnetic North Pole steadily tracked along Canada's northern shore," but in the past few decades, it has "taken a new path, accelerating across the Arctic Ocean toward Russia's Siberia province at varying speeds that have puzzled scientists," said Newsweek.

Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire cause for celebration, but situation ‘highly fragile’: Experts

Jennifer Bell

A ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah took effect on Wednesday, but regional and global security analysts warn while the agreement should bring celebration the situation remains “highly fragile” as both sides navigate the delicate truce.

The agreement marks a tentative pause to more than a year of conflict that has claimed the lives of thousands and displaced tens of thousands in Israel and hundreds of thousands in Lebanon.

Raphael S. Cohen, senior political scientist and director of the Strategy & Doctrine Program at RAND’s Project AIR FORCE, told Al Arabiya English that the news should be a cause of celebration - and caution.

“First and foremost, the ceasefire is obviously good news both for the people of southern Lebanon and northern Israel,” he said. “For 14 months now, tens of thousands of Israelis and - by some estimates - over a million Lebanese civilians have been displaced from their homes; this ceasefire is the first step in allowing them to return home,” he said. “Second, the ceasefire came about because both sides wanted a deal.”

Beyond Deterrence

Lawrence Freedman

The concept of ‘deterrence’ has dominated strategic discourse in the West for some 75 years. It describes the supreme quality that western governments expect from their military establishments, and in particular from their continuing investments in nuclear capabilities. The fixation with deterrence began during the Cold War when it was hard to think of any other role for nuclear weapons. It now continues because it was judged to be successful then, only with the expectation that somehow it can be made to work on a wide range of contemporary security threats that may be quite unrelated.

It is also discussed as an effect that can largely be achieved simply by being strong enough. The result is that when things happen that we don’t like this is described as a failure of deterrence even if nobody had previously suggested that there was anything that needed deterring. This encourages a relatively passive approach as if sufficient strength and a demonstrated readiness to use it will mean that deterrence occurs naturally.

There is a real life Star Wars happening - and the UK isn't ready - OPINION

Fiona Hill

Space Odyssey and dozens of other sci-fi stories set in space have delighted us for decades. What’s really happening in space right now, though, should worry us.

It is part of the great power competition that is going on across the world. What’s going on up there can no longer be divorced from terrestrial geopolitics, geo-economics and statecraft.

So, as the UK Government works on its upcoming strategic defence review, which was launched by Prime Minister Keir Starmer with the aim to make Britain secure at home and strong abroad for decades to come, policymakers will become increasingly aware that to omit space would be a mistake.

To stay ahead of strategic competition we must look at space as a crucial part of our defence and security thinking. Ships, aircraft and tanks tend to dominate the debate and headlines, yet none of those things will operate effectively without assured access to space capabilities. Nor could GCHQ function without the satellites in space, a strand of our intelligence gathering that will arguably become more important in the modern world.

To understand just how much we need protection in space, we must recognise that what goes on above us impacts everyday life on earth.

South Korea’s sloppy coup attempt: Why’d Yoon do it?

Bradley K. Martin and Uwe Parpart

Journalists going after a story traditionally focus on answering the “five Ws” but that has often been difficult in South Korea.

That certainly was the case during a period of martial law in the 1970s and 1980s when the military-backed government had all the tools needed to intimidate Korean journalists. Government agents were known to spy on foreign journalists using wiretaps and even blackmailed some after catching them in honey traps baited with supplied sexual partners.

The country has become more transparent since becoming a democracy in 1987 and a sloppy attempt at a coup d’etat by President Yoon Suk Yeol failed before any censors in the coup plotters’ group could keep the world from learning the pretty fully available answers to four of the five W questions regarding the incident: the who, the what, the when and the where.

It looks like Yoon colluded with elements of the military by appointing General Park An-su, the Republic of Korea Army’s chief of staff, as martial law commander. But, in the National Assembly in Seoul on Tuesday (December 3), with soldiers in battle gear trying to get in and shut down the country’s parliament, Yoon’s own civilian party leader turned on the president.

The Lebanon ceasefire alone won’t bring regional peace. The Gaza war must end

Mohamad Bazzi

Joe Biden stood in the White House Rose Garden last week to announce a ceasefire deal, but it wasn’t the one he has been desperate to secure for months. Biden confirmed that Israel and Hezbollah had accepted a US-brokered agreement to stop a war that has devastated large parts of Lebanon. But the deal does nothing to end Israel’s calamitous war on Gaza, where Biden and his administration had purportedly been pushing for a ceasefire – while enabling Israel with US weapons and political cover for 14 months.

Biden could have achieved a ceasefire in Gaza months ago if he had truly applied pressure on the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. On 26 November, Netanyahu made clear the importance of an uninterrupted flow of US weapons to Israel, saying the 60-day truce with Hezbollah would give Israeli troops “a breather” and provide time to replenish arms supplies from Washington.

5 Places World War III Could Break Out in 2025

Robert Farley

World War III in 2025? The year 2024 is promising to leave a dangerous legacy for its successor. Not in decades has the world witnessed a more dangerous international environment, with unsettled, ongoing conflicts in some of the world’s most critical regions. It will take deft, mature statesmanship to avoid even greater conflict in 2025, but the situation that we find ourselves in demonstrates that deft statesmanship is in short supply.

5 Places World War III Could Start in 2025

No one wants another global conflict, but in some ways we are already in a potential World War III. The Russia-Ukraine War, one of the largest conventional conflicts that the world has seen since World War II, has had far-reaching global effects. These have necessarily touched upon the parts of the world where Russia, China, the European Union, and the United States have interests, which in effect is the entire international system. None of the conflicts discussed here are separate from the others; just like the different theaters of WWII, they each have an effect on the balance of power and threat in the other regions.

The UK is preparing for a cyber war with Russia - The Guardian

Details

Richard Horn, Head of the UK's National Cybersecurity Center, said that the serious risks that his country may face due to Russia and China are extremely underestimated. This statement was not groundless, because the British National Cybersecurity Center (NCSC) recorded a significant increase in cyber attacks over the past 12 months, the newspaper writes.

For example, last week, British minister Pat McFadden noted the potential consequences of extending Russia's already active cyber operations to more serious areas.

"China can be destabilized by that kind of pressure. For an additional cyberattack, Russia can shut down millions of people," says Pet McFadden.

In addition, all countries affected by the upcoming conflict have begun to urge their citizens to prepare for power outages. For example, a Swedish brochure reprinted this month contains links on how to deal with power outages, as well as the Norwegian government's Emergency Preparedness Guide. A report from the Finnish government refers to cyber attacks that cause "prolonged power outages", while Denmark refers to various crises, including a digital attack that causes "loss of utilities".

South Korea’s Standoff Over Martial Law

Antonia Colibasanu

South Korea’s president took the extraordinary step on Dec. 3 of declaring martial law. In announcing the move, President Yoon Suk Yeol accused the opposition Democratic Party of “anti-state activities” and efforts to block the operation of government. Within hours, 190 of 300 lawmakers convened and voted unanimously to demand that Yoon revoke the martial law declaration – an order that the president must respect, according to South Korea’s Constitution. A few hours later, Yoon relented on what was bound to be a test to Seoul’s democratic institutions, the regional geopolitical order and the strength of South Korea’s alliances.

South Korean leaders have invoked martial law several times in the nation’s history, typically during turbulent times and often coincident with military coups, but the last time was in 1979. In the latter case, the ensuing pro-democracy backlash eventually led to the country’s complete adoption of democracy in 1987.

A Weak Assad Benefits Turkey—and Is a Headache for Trump - Analysis

Jeremy Hodge and Hussein Nasser

After nearly five years of being written off as a frozen conflict, a new and unprecedented chapter was written over the weekend in Syria’s 13-year civil war. On Wednesday, rebels in the north of the country launched a lightning ground offensive against regime forces and managed, within 72 hours, to take over the major metropolis of Aleppo.

A day later, rebels captured Tal Rifaat, the last major stronghold in northwest Syria that had been held by a third group, the Kurdish-dominated and U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Why these Israeli men volunteered to fight - but now refuse to return to Gaza

Fergal Keane

Every single person in his platoon knew someone who was killed. Yuval Green, 26, knew at least three. He was a reservist, a medic in the paratroops of the Israel Defence Forces, when he heard the first news of the 7 October Hamas attack.

“Israel is a small country. Everyone knows each other,” he says. In several days of violence,1,200 people were killed, and 251 more abducted into Gaza. Ninety-seven hostages remain in Gaza, and around half of them are believed to be alive.

Yuval immediately answered his country’s call to arms. It was a mission to defend Israelis. He recalls the horror of entering devastated Jewish communities near the Gaza border. “You're seeing… dead bodies on the streets, seeing cars punctured by bullets.”

Back then, there was no doubt about reporting for duty. The country was under attack. The hostages had to be brought home.

Then came the fighting in Gaza itself. Things seen that could not be unseen. Like the night he saw cats eating human remains in the roadway.

“Start to imagine, like an apocalypse. You look to your right, you look to your left, all you see is destroyed buildings, buildings that are damaged by fire, by missiles, everything. That's Gaza right now.”

Eighteen ways Palantir wants the Pentagon to change

LAUREN C. WILLIAMS

The Defense Department is a sclerotic monopsony whose communist approach to acquisition has the United States on a precipice, writes Palantir’s chief technology officer, who prescribes a “painful” but “necessary” reformation based on competition and software.

“I think we're just scratching the surface,” said Shyam Sankar, whose company calls itself the first software prime contractor. “The other huge opportunity is really on using AI to drive efficiencies,” including using technology to supplant human workers and processes that slow innovation and adoption.

Sankar recently penned 18 theses that could reform how the Pentagon does business, in explicit comparison to Martin Luther’s criticisms of the Catholic Church. He highlights several well-documented problems often studied by congressionally mandated commissions—such as a belabored budgeting-and-planning process, the perils of requirements, and how cost-plus contracts remove incentives to innovate.

The 18-page document also manages to say the quiet part out loud, demanding the Pentagon and Congress to change its practices with colorful curtness. One of Sankar’s main themes is the need for competition—whether it’s companies vying for Pentagon contracts or customers in the Defense Department looking for solutions.

Coming Full Circle on Semiconductor Deterrence

Jared M. McKinney

In November of 2021, as the world faced semiconductor shortages due to fragile supply chains and just-in-time business practices, a colleague and I proposed an idea intended to reduce the risk of war in the Taiwan Strait: Taiwan should threaten to self-destruct its prized semiconductor machinery in response to a People’s Republic of China (PRC) invasion.[1]

The idea, as originally conceived, was inspired by two sources.

The first source was the longstanding idea of a “Silicon Shield in Taiwan,” which suggested that semiconductors were to Taiwan what oil was to Kuwait: something so important the United States would intervene to see the resource protected.[2] However, by 2021 it was not just the United States that was dependent on Taiwan’s chips, but China too. The problem had become one of interdependence, with Taiwan as the critical node.

The second source was a Chinese novel series, the Three-Body Problem, which introduced the idea of “dark forest” deterrence.[3] The dark forest described a structural condition of hostility among civilizations across the universe. Could understanding this “cosmic sociology” allow Earth to deter an invasion? This was to be done by threatening to reveal the location—to the universe—of both Earth and the Trisolaran home world, which would result in the destruction of both. The trick was: could such a threat be credibly made?

How Henry Kissinger foresaw the power and potential of AI

Niall Ferguson

When the late Henry Kissinger — who died a year ago, on Nov. 29 — published his essay “How the Enlightenment Ends” in June 2018, many were surprised that the elder statesman’s elder statesman had a view on artificial intelligence.

Kissinger had just turned 95. AI was not yet the hot topic it would become after OpenAI released ChatGPT in late 2022.

As Kissinger’s biographer, however, I wasn’t surprised that AI gripped his attention.

He had, after all, come to prominence in 1957 with a book about a new and world-changing technology.

“Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy” was a book so thoroughly researched that it won the approval even of Robert Oppenheimer, director of the Manhattan Project.

Contrary to his unwarranted reputation as a warmonger, Kissinger was strongly motivated throughout his adult life by the imperative to avoid World War III.

He understood that the technology of nuclear fission would make another world war an even greater conflagration.

A testing time for telcos: analysing the cyber threat landscap

Simon Viney

As integral enablers of a digitalised society, the telco sector faces a unique blend of threats. For example, state-sponsored threats are extremely prevalent, with hostile nations deploying telco-specific malware and carrying out disruptive campaigns to support military operations – as has been seen recently in Ukraine.

Cyber-criminal ransomware threats are also commonplace, while changing laws and regulations around network equipment and the evolving nature of the physical and cyber threat to both subsea and space communications are providing further challenges for today’s telcos.

State-sponsored threats

In our tracking of state-sponsored threat activity, the telco sector has historically been the second-most targeted after government. In our most recent statistics, telco has dropped to third place (after academia) but the sector clearly remains a high priority for state-sponsored threat groups with the advanced techniques and lengthy timescales for attack execution.

New USAF Foci: Fighter-Like Drones and Electromagnetic Warfare

Bill Sweetman

‘Listening to new options’, according to a senior civilian advisor, is a key piece of the U.S. Air Force process of force redesign.

One of those options is using the fighter-like drones that will come from the Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) program, which was central to a panel discussion at the U.S. Mitchell Institute’s Air Power Futures Forum in November. Another is a tighter focus on electromagnetic spectrum operations (EMSO), the currently favored term for electromagnetic warfare (EW) and related activities.

CCAs, formerly called loyal wingmen, will be much cheaper than crewed fighters and are intended to work with them and enhance their value—for example, by moving forward to detect targets. EMSO encompasses such decisive effects as seeing what is going on in a battle while blinding or deceiving the enemy’s sensors, foiling the guidance of its weapons, and disrupting its communications while preserving one’s own.

Both designs chosen for the CCA program’s Increment 1, from General Atomics and Anduril, have passed critical design review, according to Colonel Timothy Helfrich, cyber systems lead in Air Force Material Command. The project is ‘ahead in some areas’ of an overall objective to achieve initial operational capability by the end of the decade, he said—because demands had been relaxed where necessary. ‘We need to be able to know when good enough is enough. Instead of adding features, we have made tough decisions.’

6 December 2024

India-China: Tactical détente, strategic differences

Shibani Mehta & Saheb Singh Chadha

A new phase of high-level India-China dialogue has been unlocked following the October 21, 2024, agreement on border patrolling. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping, along with both nations’ foreign and defence ministers, have held meetings since then, with the ministers’ talks concluding just last week. The two sides have also agreed to resume dialogue at the Special Representatives and foreign secretary-vice minister levels. These developments signal long-awaited progress in a prolonged border standoff, breaking the diplomatic ice that had frozen ties between Asia’s largest neighbours since the summer of 2020. Behind these positive steps lies a carefully orchestrated diplomatic manoeuvre, revealing much about the evolving dynamics of one of Asia’s most complex bilateral relationships.

Breaking the Ice

The path to this moment began seven months earlier, in April 2024, when both nations began taking careful steps toward finding common ground. Prime Minister Modi’s characterisation of the relationship with China as “important and significant” served as a clear diplomatic signal from the very top level of Indian decision-making. While maintaining India’s firm stance on the border standoff, these words offered an olive branch to Beijing. China’s response came in May with the appointment of an ambassador to India after an 18-month vacancy, reopening a crucial channel of communication.

The real momentum, however, built after India’s June elections with an intensive period of diplomatic engagement. The Foreign ministers met twice in July. The Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination on Border Affairs (WMCC) held two meetings barely a month apart between July and August. The national security advisors met on the sidelines of a BRICS gathering in September. Most significantly, corps commanders from both sides engaged in discussions spanning ten days in October to hammer out the details of the agreement.

What Does India’s Hypersonic Missile Test Mean?

Diya Ashtakala

On November 16, India announced the successful test launch of its first long-range hypersonic missile. The missile, developed by India’s Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO), was intended to carry “various payloads for ranges greater than 1,500 kms for the Armed Forces.” The test makes it one of the few nuclear-armed countries to develop these missiles, including the United States, China, Russia, and North Korea. Defense Minister Rajnath Singh on X (formerly Twitter) termed it a “historic moment” for India, putting in a “group of select nations having capabilities of such critical and advanced military technologies.” The missile test occurred only days after China showcased a new hypersonic glide vehicle, the GDF-600, at its flagship Zhuhai air show.

India’s test highlights the intensifying global race for hypersonic, including India’s growing maturity in developing hypersonic systems, which it has invested in since the 2000s. It warrants further analysis of what this means for regional stability, particularly India’s precarious relationships with China and Pakistan. Recent developments also indicate bilateral and regional approaches for the next U.S. administration to consider in an intensifying global race for hypersonic weapons.

Q1: Why is India testing its hypersonic missile now?

A1: The recent test represents a public culmination of India’s multi-decade research into hypersonic systems. India’s hypersonic ambitions began far before 2007 when it first took delivery of its BrahMos missile, a joint venture with Russia. In 2004, India first publicized its indigenous development of the Hypersonic Technology Demonstrator Vehicle, demonstrating its scramjet engine in a 2020 flight test.

The timing of India’s test comes alongside rapid developments in the global hypersonic arsenals. The test occurred days after China showcased the GDF-600. India finds itself in a global environment marked by rapid developments in the hypersonic space. Most recently, the United States tested its hypersonic missile in the Pacific as part of its Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon program. Over the past year, Russia loaded its Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) with nuclear-capable Avangard HGV and was alleged to have used its Zicron hypersonic missile in its ongoing war in Ukraine. North Korean state media reported a test of the Hwasong 16B hypersonic missile, described by President Kim Jong Un as a “key piece of the nuclear deterrent.”

The United States and the Democracy Question in South Asia

S. D. Muni

The police assemble during anti-quota protests in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on July 19, 2024.Credit: ID 337716121 © Mamunur Rashid | Dreamstime.com

Ideologically, the United States is a self-proclaimed promoter and protector of democracy in the world. Its democracy policy has evolved over the past century. The U.S. fought World War II, in part, to defend democracy against fascism and waged a three-decade-long struggle during the Cold War against communism.

Soon after the Cold War, U.S. President George H. W. Bush proposed a “New World Order” based on “freedom, peace and democracy.” His successor, President Bill Clinton, said at the United Nations on September 27, 1993, that the “overriding purpose” of U.S. foreign policy was to “expand and strengthen the world’s community of market based democracies.”

In order to advance this purpose, Clinton’s Secretary of State Madeleine Albright took the initiative of establishing a Community of Democracies (CoD). At the first meeting of the CoD in Warsaw in 2000, 106 countries promised to advance democratic norms and institutions. The United Nations endorsed this intergovernmental organization and later raised a “U.N. Fund for Democracy,” with contributions from members.

In more recent years, President Joe Biden convened the “Summit for Democracy.” The first such summit was convened in a virtual form on December 9-10, 2021. Its objectives were “defending against authoritarianism, addressing and fighting corruption, and advancing respect for human rights.” The second summit was hosted by the United States in collaboration with Costa Rica, Zambia, the Netherlands, and South Korea in March 2023, and the third summit was hosted by South Korea in March 2024, in a hybrid format.

Biden promised at the second Summit for Democracy that he would work with the U.S. Congress to “commit $9.5 billion across all our efforts to advance democracy around the world.”

How to Beat China in the Quest for AI Dominance

Jack Burnham

In August 2023, the Biden administration restricted investments in countries of concern and cracked down on illegal trade to stop U.S. emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) from bleeding at the hands of foreign adversaries. However, an attempted hack of OpenAI by the Chinese-based hacker group SweetSpecter last month indicates that the incoming Trump administration will need to reinforce and expand efforts to ensure the United States wins the AI race.

AI will be “a crucial component of economic and military power in the near future,” Stanford University’s AI research center succinctly stated in its 2023 AI index report. AI tops both the White House’s list and the Defense Department’s list of critical and emerging technologies necessary for U.S. national security. China, likewise, recognizes AI as one of the “future industries” that will power its economy.

Today, China exports AI technology to nearly twice as many countries as the United States, focusing on autocracies and weak democracies. In doing so, China will spread its ideology and facilitate the adoption of techno-authoritarian practices, enabling state control over its population and undermining democracy around the world. Likewise, China has begun exporting facial-recognition AI—technology it uses to support its own surveillance state. Beijing’s authoritarian-minded partners also want to use that technology to control their populations in the face of historic unrest and low economic performance.

While most assessments place the United States ahead in the AI race due to its superior workforce and data processing infrastructure, China could quickly close the gap through well-manufactured, well-executed, and state-sponsored intellectual property theft. Indeed, SweetSpecter’s attempted hack of OpenAI is no surprise, given China’s long history of cyber-enabled economic warfare to steal strategically valuable commercial technology.

Cyber theft allows China to leapfrog U.S. innovation and circumvent market competition despite its own deficient research and development capabilities. In a dramatic case uncovered two years ago, Chinese state-backed hackers stole up to trillions of dollars worth of intellectual property on pharmaceuticals, solar panels, advanced manufacturing, and cutting-edge technologies in a years-long campaign. In the case of AI, successful cyber-enabled economic warfare will propel China forward to dominate this emerging technology.

‘Great Game On’

John West

Over the past decade, a major power shift has been taking place as China has advanced in displacing Russia as the dominant power in Central Asia, according to Geoff Raby in his new book, Great Game On: The contest for Central Asia and Global Supremacy. And this power shift has only accelerated since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as Russia has been depleted militarily and lost prestige and influence.

Raby is a well-known former Australian ambassador to China. His previous book, China’s Grand Strategy and Australia’s Future in the New Global Order, focused on another power shift, involving China’s rise, the emergence of a multipolar world order and the passing of America’s post-Cold War ‘unipolar moment’.

According to Raby, it used to be said that China and Russia had a division of labour among the five stans of Central Asia, namely Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Russia provided military assistance and security, while China’s role was economic. But the rise in China’s power has brought it much closer to these countries.

It is significant that China’s Belt and Road Initiative was launched in Astana, Kazakhstan in 2013. The initiative has played an important role in elevating China’s power and influence in Central Asia. China has become the region’s biggest source of infrastructure construction and is the biggest creditor of the region. In 2023 Chinese President Xi Jinping hosted the inaugural China-Central Asia Summit in Xi’an, a historic Chinese city. The heads of state of the five stans attended, but Russia was not invited.

Raby sees in China’s emergence as the preeminent power in Central Asia an uncanny historical analogy with the US. By the end of the 19th century, the US had consolidated its territory and secured its borders, and by the early years of the 20th century had established hegemony over the Western hemisphere. It was then free to project power globally, which it did. China’s historic security concern has been its western, inland frontiers. By becoming the dominant power in Central Asia, it is similarly freer to project power globally.

Germany’s China Challenge: Security Versus Business as Usual

Antonia Hmaidi

It looked like a turning point.

In August, the German Foreign Office summoned the Chinese ambassador to Germany, accusing Beijing of conducting a cyberattack against the state cartography agency. It was the first time that Germany had summoned China’s ambassador since the Tiananmen Square crackdown in 1989.

Germany has woken up to the China challenge. The current government demonstrates a new understanding and willingness to act against Chinese threats. And yet, many decisions continue to reflect a business as usual – and business first – approach. New elections planned for February are unlikely to lead to a significant course correction, even if Donald Trump will be impatient with Berlin’s meandering.

German intelligence agencies have broken with their insular and reticent tradition and are now confronting China. At a 2022 parliament hearing, German spy chiefs warned that while everyone is paying attention to Russia’s disinformation, hacking and espionage, the much greater long-term challenge comes from China. Russia represented “the storm,” they said. China is “climate change.”

Leaked data from a Chinese cyber-attack contractor confirmed this year for the first time that Chinese government contracts sustain a dangerous hacking-for-hire industry. The Chinese government collects weaknesses in code and funnels them to hackers. Before publishing the data,the domestic Verfassungsschutz intelligence agency shared the story in German media.

Iran targeted senior Israeli figures with over 200 cyberattacks

Emanuel Fabian

The Shin Bet security service said on Monday that it had identified more than 200 Iranian phishing attempts against senior Israeli officials in a bid to secure their personal details.

Among those targeted were senior security officials, political figures, academics, media personnel, journalists, and others, the Shin Bet said.

The hackers approached Israelis via WhatsApp, Telegram and email, and tried to get them to download an app that would grant access to their devices and share their personal details such as home addresses and frequent locations.

The agency said that the information would then be used by Iran to carry out attacks against individuals in Israel, “through Israeli cells they have recruited within the country.”

The Shin Bet said the targets were approached with an “individually tailored cover story for each victim according to their area of work, so the approach doesn’t seem suspicious.”

In one example shown by the Shin Bet, the hacker posed as Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs and told the target he was trying to coordinate a meeting with him and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Syria’s Assad and Iran Face Tough Choices as Rebels Advance Story

Sam Dagher

(Bloomberg) -- Syria-based rebel forces are seeking to build on recent gains and capture more territory controlled by the government, raising the question of whether President Bashar Al-Assad can hold onto power.

There are a lot of unknowns in how the latest twist in Syria’s 15-year conflict will play out, and much depends on the agendas of powerful external actors as much as the internal enmities that have influenced events. For Assad, 59, that means Iran, which considers Syria part of its so-called axis of resistance against Israel and the West and has for years provided the bulk of ground forces, and Russia, an old Cold War-era ally that stepped in to save him in 2015.

A major game changer would be if Russia, which has an airbase in the country, commences a sweeping aerial bombardment against the rebels like it did nine years ago. The difference this time is that Russia is occupied with its war in Ukraine.

Syrian Rebels Take Over Aleppo, Control Airport | Rebel forces — Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a breakaway faction of al-Qaeda — push toward Hama after taking Aleppo© Bloomberg News

Assad has ground Syria down with its population struggling with poverty, shortages and power outages. The conflict so far has left between 300,000 to 500,000 dead, more than 7 million internally displaced, at least 6.4 million refugees and caused almost half a trillion dollars of damage, according to United Nations agencies and Syrian NGOs.

Here are some of the key questions:

Tough Diplomacy, Not Invasion, Is the Way Forward With Iran

Mike Fredenburg

Back in September, Israel successfully destroyed a bunker buried 60 feet underground, killing virtually all of Hezbollah’s senior leadership. Executing the operation involved about a dozen F-15s, each carrying six 2000-pound GBU-31v(3) joint direct attack munitions (JDAMs) bunker-buster bombs. First the residential high rises over the underground bunker were systematically destroyed. Then a brilliantly planned operation was executed, involving dropping dozens of bunker-busters in a precisely timed pattern that eventually blasted through 20 yards of soil and rock to destroy the bunker. Only a few militaries in the world could have executed such an intricate and complex operation.

The point of the above description is not to praise Israeli military competence, but to show just how hard it is to destroy a bunker. This sheds concerning light on analysis by the Institute for Science and International Security that finds that two of Iran’s most important nuclear weapons facilities buried under at least 80 to 145 meters of rock (262 to 475 feet), with further protection from reinforced concrete that is very resistant to penetration and the ground shockwave produced by a bunker buster’s explosives. This makes taking them out problematic; the world’s most powerful conventional bunker buster, the United States’ 30,000-pound GBU-57 bunker buster can penetrate only about 40 meters of moderately hard rock.

Still, multiple precision strikes by massive ordnance penetrators delivered by our B-2 stealth bombers could almost certainly severely damage or destroy Iran’s less deeply buried facilities. Even the more deeply buried facilities could be crippled by collapsing their main entrances, although such facilities almost certainly have backup entrances that would allow them to continue with some level of function.

But even if our B-2s can evade Iran’s Russia-supplied anti-stealth radars and deliver enough GBU-57s to damage or destroy all the known facilities involved with nuclear weapons production and delivery, we still don’t really, truly know how much weapons-grade enriched uranium or plutonium—which can be quickly made into implosion-type fission bombs—the Islamic Republic has been able to acquire and hide away in secret locations.

The South Korean president's martial law gamble backfired: What was he thinking?

Laura Bicker

One of the biggest questions on people's minds in Seoul on Wednesday is: what was the president thinking?

In a late-night address that threw South Korea’s parliament into chaos and tested the country’s commitment to democracy, President Yoon Suk Yeol declared that he was imposing martial law.

Less than 24 hours later, his political future is on the brink, with protests on the streets and impeachment proceedings against him under way.

So, what happened?

What is martial law and why was it declared?
Woman who grabbed South Korean soldier's gun speaks to BBC
How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

Martial law was last introduced in South Korea in 1979, sparked by the assassination of the then-military ruler in a coup. Today's South Korea, however, is a far cry from that, and the repressive years that followed.

It is a stable, prosperous democracy - yet Yoon claimed he was introducing military rule to save the country from dark forces. He called the opposition-controlled National Assembly a “den of criminals” that was “attempting to paralyse” the government.

Hours later, he was forced to back down as furious protesters and lawmakers gathered outside the National Assembly - the MPs made it inside and voted down the order.

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