India’s vaunted strategic autonomy is a mirage
The country remains economically and militarily dependent on outsiders
IN THE EARLY evening of March 9th a supersonic cruise missile blasted skyward from a site in northern India. Within 200 seconds it had streaked across the Pakistani border. When it smacked to the ground just minutes later, it was 124km inside the territory of India’s nuclear-armed enemy. Luckily no one was harmed. Lucky, too, that Pakistan did not respond to the intrusion, except to ask an embarrassed India what had gone wrong.
This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline “Enmeshed”
From the April 9th 2022 edition
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