The Kashmir Question: Retrospect and Prospect

India's 'Potential' Endgame in Kashmir
by Amitabh Mattoo

This article presents an Indian view of the endgame in Kashmir. It seeks to answer two essential, if prosaic, questions: Does India have a plan for the final settlement of Jammu and Kashmir? If so, what are its essential elements? While there may not be a publicly discernable Indian game-plan, there is the possibility of durable peace in Kashmir. Events subsequent to the Kargil war of 1999, the terror attacks against America on September 11, 2001, and a shift in international public opinion regarding Kashmir all provide an opportunity for India settle the Kashmir question. These factors are, however, rooted in deeper changes within the Indian polity, including the growing consensus on economic and political decentralization and an ambition to increase India's international influence, which may increase India's willingness to commit itself to a potentially more long-term and imaginative course for its Kashmir policy. Pakistan's Endgame in Kashmir by Husain Haqqani. Although Pakistani leaders often describe the dispute over Kashmir as the "core issue" between India and Pakistan, Pakistani policy is driven by a deeper fear of India and about Pakistan's national identity. Pakistan's approach to the resolution of the Kashmir dispute has been characterized by a series of tactical moves, lacking a coherent strategy or a planned end game. Only a sustained peace process can address the multiple factors that give rise to Indian and Pakistani suspicions about each other's intentions and Pakistani tactics designed to prolong the conflict in the hope of eventually altering the status quo. Pakistan does not have a clearly thought out endgame in Kashmir and attending to its insecurities could be one of way of ensuring the emergence of a realistic endgame without violence.

Terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir in Theory and Practice
by Preveen Swami

This article argues there is a need for a more nuanced analysis of terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir than has been available so far. First, the popular legitimacy of violent groups has little bearing on their operation. Rather, the keys to the intensity of terrorist activity are held by Pakistan's military establishment. Second, the supposedly secular-nationalist movement of the early 1990s was in fact deeply Islamist in character; there has been a greater unity of thought underpinning terrorism than the literature admits. Finally, the article argues, the operation of terrorism needs to be read not simply in the limited context of Jammu and Kashmir, but as part of a larger South Asian crisis of identity.

US Policy and the Kashmir Dispute: Prospects for Resolution
by Devin T. Hagerty

Washington refuses to chart a roadmap for peace in Kashmir. Although the chances for resolving the dispute are low, the probability of failure should not inhibit the US government from pursuing a more proactive role in resolving the conflict. The United States is the "sole pole" in a unipolar international system; regarding the world's thorniest disputes, it either leads or bears the brunt of its own passivity. Leadership requires more than devising policies that are guaranteed to work; it also involves taking risks on bold initiatives that may fail, but whose unlikely success would produce greater stability in global affairs. This article examines the admittedly slim prospects for settling the Kashmir dispute and the role Washington might play in such a process. It argues that only one conflict-resolution option seems even remotely viable: a phased conversion of the existing Kashmiri Line of Control into an internationally recognized Indo-Pakistani border.

Politics, Proximity and Paranoia: The Evolution of Kashmir as a Nuclear Flashpoint
by Timothy D. Hoyt

This article traces the evolution of Kashmir as a "nuclear flashpoint" and the relationship between Kashmir, nuclear weapons, and regional security. The first section discusses the concept of a geopolitical flashpoint, providing a definition and a series of historical examples. The Kashmir issue and its role in the broader Indo-Pakistani conflict fit reasonably neatly into this definition. A second section briefly traces the history of nuclear weapons programs in the region, as the potential for nuclear escalation by competing promotion of the Kashmir issue and successive Indo-Pakistani crises within a nuclearized regional environment - roughly 1984-2003. The final section assesses the prospects for Kashmir in the near future, and concludes that due to underlying political factors, Kashmir will remain a nuclear flashpoint for the foreseeable future.

Kashmir and Tibet: Comparing Conflicts, States, and Solutions
by Carol McGranahan

Five decades of conflicts in Kashmir and Tibet continue into the twenty-first century without clear signs of resolution. In this article, I focus on issues of collective rights, national identity, and state sovereignty in these two conflicts to ask what political recourses exist for Tibetans or citizens of Jammu and Kashmir in today's changing world? As citizens of differently organized states and subjects to dissimilar conflicts, what methods and types of conflict resolution might Tibetans and Kashmiris have shared access to? Both of these post-WWII conflicts have been framed and defined by the two core states involved, India and China. Analytically, therefore, I draw on anthropological and political constructivist work on the state to suggest possible non-violent, community-oriented solutions to these conflicts.

India, Pakistan and Kashmir
by Jonah Blank

Despite a recent deescalation of military tensions and the fairest election in more than two decades, Kashmiris do not express much optimism about their future. If this skepticism is justified, perhaps it is due to a near-universal emphasis on short-term tactics at the expense of long-term strategy. Virtually all parties to the conflict in Kashmir - whether based in New Delhi, Islamabad, Srinagar or Muzaffarabad, seem to be thinking tactically rather than strategically. The one notable exception is the most implacable segment of the jihadist militants: all the more reason to be pessimistic.