A New Equation: U.S. Policy toward India and Pakistan after September 11

Publication Date: May 2002

Publisher: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Author(s): James Clad; Lewis Dunn; David Albright; Feinstein Lee

Research Area: Government

Type: Report

Coverage: Pakistan India

Abstract:

For much of the past half century, U.S. relations with India and Pakistan were perceived in the region and by Washington as part of the same equation. Improvements in U.S. relations with one were generally perceived (and sometimes intended) to come at the expense of the other. Since last September's attacks, however, the United States has found itself in the unaccustomed position of having good relations with India and Pakistan at the same time. The Afghan crisis is testing whether Delhi and Islamabad can adjust to this new reality. It is also a test for Washington and whether it can leverage its new position to address core concerns, including the dispute over Kashmir, Pakistan's crisis of governance, and the evolving nuclear and missile rivalry in the region.

These essays focus on the interconnected challenges for U.S. policy in and around the subcontinent in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. Yet they address longstanding concerns which, in light of the current crisis, may now get the attention they require.