National Security and Strategic Studies

What Terrorists Want: Understanding the Enemy, Containing the Threat by Prof Louise Richardson, Publishers: Random House/New York, 2006, USD 25.95

Anurag Sharma, Research Associate, VIF

Professor Louise Richardson’s book “What Terrorists Want” is one of the primers on the study of terrorism. The book is organised in two parts— 1) The Terrorists, consists of five chapters and 2) The Counter terrorists which consists of remaining...

May 24, 2020

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Irish Republican Army, LTTE, PLO, Social life, Terrorism, Terrorism

In The Name of the Nation: India and Its Northeast by Sanjib Baruah, Stanford University Press: Stanford, 2020, 297 pp, ISBN: 9781503610705

Hirak Jyoti Das, Research Associate, VIF

In the Name of the Nation: India and its North East, authored by Sanjib Baruah interrogates the interaction of North East India with the territorial conceptions of the post colonial nation-state and state sovereignty. The North Eastern Region...

May 23, 2020

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Assam, India and Its Northeast, Nation, North Eastern Region, Sanjib Baruah

In their Own Words-Understanding Lashkar-e-Tayyaba by C. Christine Fair, Second Edition; By Christine Fair; India: Oxford University Press, 2019. 303pp. ISBN 10: 0-19-949521-1

Soumya Awasthi, Associate Fellow, VIF

The goal of every state is to survive. Many countries adopt various kinds of strategies to achieve their ends. The strategies are a mix of military, economic and diplomatic ways and means to realise their policy goals. However, in the case of...

May 20, 2020

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, C. Christine Fair, Lashkar, LeT, Understanding Lashkar, Terrorism

This is the way World Ends : How Droughts and Die-offs, Heat Waves and Hurricanes Are Converging on America by Jeff Nesbit, Thomas Dunne Books, St Martin’s Publishing Group, 2018, United States, 336 pp, ISBN: 9781250160461, price-$29.99 (2,257.17 Rs)

Heena Samant, Research Assistant, VIF

We all have heard of climate change and its impact now and of future time and again. So much so, that it has now become the new normal. But it doesn’t really get the mind space that it needs, for various reasons. Then comes a book like Jeff Nesbit'...

May 13, 2020

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Climate Change, Earth’s ecosystem, Geopolitics, Impacts of climate change

K File:The Conspiracy of Silence By Bashir Assad (New Delhi, Vitasta Publishing Pvt. Ltd., 2019. 237pp)

Prof K Warikoo

Bashir Assad’s book comes at an appropriate time, as it provides an insider and subaltern view of Kashmir. He has firsthand experience of the developments in Kashmir for the past 30 years. In his own words, he has lived the ideology of Maududi...

April 20, 2020

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Ahl-e-Hadis, Bashir Assad, Islamisation, Jamat-e-Islami, Kashmir, Kashmiri Muslims, Kashmiris, Maududi Islam, Nizam-e-Mustafa, Jammu & Kashmir

Kashmir: Beyond Article 370. By Bashir Assad. New Delhi, Pentagon Press, 2020. 177 pp. Rs. 595/-

Prof K Warikoo

Bashir Assad, the Kashmiri writer has come out with yet another interesting and insightful study of Kashmir following the abrogation of Article 370. To quote Bashir, he has brought out the “bitter truth following his inner voice” underscoring the...

March 18, 2020

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Article 370, Bashir Assad, Kashmir, Kashmir: Beyond Article 370, Kashmiri Muslims, Jammu & Kashmir

Cultural Heritage of Jammu and Kashmir, Edited by K. Warikoo, Pentagon Press, 2009, Pages: 338, Price: Rs. 1750, ISBN: 978-81-8274-376-2

Prateek Joshi

Much has been written about Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) by the virtue of its disputed status. The ever growing literature by leading scholars and legal experts has continued to emphasize either on the legal aspect of the Kashmir dispute or has...

September 12, 2018

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Buddhist, Cultural Heritage, Islamic influences, Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Socio-cultural, Jammu & Kashmir

‘Strangers No More’, by Sanjay Hazarika, Aleph Book Company, pp. 413, Price Rs 799/-

Pinaki Bhattacharya

Book Review

There are three kinds of media people who travel to the North-East of India: the north-easterners who have had to desert the sylvan vales of their region as economic refugees; career adventure journalists who like to get stellar roles in their...

April 13, 2018

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Act East, Act Fast, Armed forces, Government, North-East, North-East Insurgency

‘Sharpening the Arsenal: India’s Evolving Nuclear Deterrence Policy’, Gurmeet Kanwal, Harper Collins Publishers Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India, 2017, pp 268, INR 599

Maj Gen (Retd.) P K Chakravorty

Book Review

The book deals comprehensively with India’s nuclear arsenal and finally suggests as to what must be done to sharpen it in the current environment.

February 9, 2018

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Defence technology, Nuclear Deterrence Policy, Nuclear Power, TNWs, Defence

India’s National Defence; Gautam Banerjee, Pentagon Press, New Delhi, 2017, pp 278, INR 995

Maj Gen (Retd.) P K Chakravorty

Book Review

The book India’s National Defence defines India’s Defence Reforms and Military Modernisation which it must undertake to meet the strategic challenges of the 21st Century. The book lucidly brings out India’s inability to optimise its military success...

September 26, 2017

Tags: National Security and Strategic Studies, Defence reforms, DRDO, military modernisation, NSCS, R&D, Defence