US Strategic Propensity towards India in Perspective of Nuclear Bonding: Security Apprehensions for South Asian Region and Pakistan

Abstract

The Indo-US strategic bonding is shifting the security dynamics of the South Asian balance-of-power in Indian favour. From the signing of 123 US-India Nuclear Deal to the facilitation in becoming a member of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), the US has clearly designated India as an instrumental element in the American grand strategy of devising a ‘new world order’. As a result, India has grabbed the opportunity of alleviating its status as a credible regional and global power. In this regard, the US tilt towards India is significantly paving grounds for a strategic imbalance in the South Asian region, thus creating challenges for Pakistan. Therefore, this paper argues that the growing bonhomie between the US and India is a destabilizing factor in the region which reinforces Pakistan’s fast falling into the Chinese orbit; thereby cementing the old friendship into a new strategic partnership. This dynamic certainly gives China and Pakistan an incentive to work together so as to keep the value of Pakistan’s nuclear deterrence alive. In an effort to expand the horizon on the subject, the paper is dedicated to critically examine the existing cooperation between India and the US while equally foreseeing the possible implications for the region in the face of such destabilizing cooperation. More importantly, based on qualitative data, this paper explores how Indo-US strategic partnership is directly impacting Pakistan and its strategic partnership with China; thereby explaining how the growing relationship between the US and India has undermined the traditional balance-of-power in the South Asian region?