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tl;dr: Pakistan will fulfill Russia's long cherished dream of access to the Indian Ocean region through friendly states, if it manages to pull off CPEC.
Long story: The Partition of India, the sizes and shapes of the resulting nations, were a carefully crafted understanding between the British, Nehru, and Jinnah. The side-effect of the British Empire was a politically reunited Indian subcontinent, and that is something that spelled disaster to western interests. The west didn't want a second China. So it partitioned India in a way that makes India as large as possible, yet as benign as possible, to western geopolitical interests. One of the key considerations for this, was to prevent a vengeful India to be contiguous with the Soviet Union, and lend them access to the Indian Ocean region, as that would spell catastrophe for western sea lines of communication, oil routes, etc.
So Kashmir was thrown up for grabs, the India-Pakistan war of 1947 over Kashmir happened, and while the Indian Army was in a reasonably good position to recover all of J&K from Pakistani occupation, it was Nehru who applied brakes.
The British and Nehru go way back. Nehru's personal-life aside, he was groomed by the British to be an agent of chaos in Independent India, one that would keep it as benign as possible, so a western-dominated world order could take shape. One of the many deals of Nehru was to take British assistance in eliminating all his rivals in Congress, including Netaji Bose. Nehru reciprocated these little "favors" from the British by steering India to geopolitical disasters that would invariably benefit the west.
Nehru, and his daughter Indira, every bit the a daughter of her father, who redid a Bose by having the Soviets kill Shastri; continued to let Pakistan keep PoK, and reshape its demographics the way they saw fit, a way that would make any future recovery by India impractical and impossible. PoK comes bang in the middle of India and the Central Asian Republics.
Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) remained a stalemated region of no real value to anyone, until the Chinese became too heavy for the west in Central Asia. CPEC was drawn up, and suddenly Russia saw its quickest route to the Indian Ocean region take shape.
India isn't going to let this lying down. We were grudgingly consoled to see PoK be the "useless pile of rocks" that Nehru sourgraped to his people with. CPEC, if allowed to be implemented in letter and spirit, will diminish India's geopolitical and economic influence in this region.
The west isn't very pleased to see Beijing and Moscow having themselves a warp-drive to the IOR.
In an effort to restore the status-quo it so painstakingly built, the west is beginning to throw its weight behind India. Modi emerged as the perfect guy for the job. He's someone Pakistan and Pakistanis are programmed to hate, that China is weary of, and that Russia doesn't go way back with (and hence has no favors/leverage with).
The power-structures at the very top of the western world still have their own peaceful instruments of war (read: NGOs) to pass memos to. They want Modi around, they want him to feed the Indian growth story in a manner that makes it heavier in Asia, and have the ability to destabilize/derail CPEC.
Russia, choked by western economic sanctions, is probably the first player to figure out the short-term implications of its IOR ambitions by hitching a ride from the Chinese and Pakistanis; made the carnal mistake of [allegedly] offering Pakistanis their Sukhoi 35-BM fighter jets. These are as good, if not better than, the 300+ Sukhoi 30-MKI jets Russia sold to India, and would blunt India's tactical edge and ability to achieve quick air-superiority, in short conflicts with Pakistan. Russia's move is ballsy because they're willing to let it jeopardize the 200+ pending (unpaid) orders for more Su-30MKI jets, and a potential 40+ MiG-29K jets for India's two new aircraft carriers.
This shows that Putin has made up his mind. He wants access to IOR, and is willing to eat grass getting there.
Discuss.
Long story: The Partition of India, the sizes and shapes of the resulting nations, were a carefully crafted understanding between the British, Nehru, and Jinnah. The side-effect of the British Empire was a politically reunited Indian subcontinent, and that is something that spelled disaster to western interests. The west didn't want a second China. So it partitioned India in a way that makes India as large as possible, yet as benign as possible, to western geopolitical interests. One of the key considerations for this, was to prevent a vengeful India to be contiguous with the Soviet Union, and lend them access to the Indian Ocean region, as that would spell catastrophe for western sea lines of communication, oil routes, etc.
So Kashmir was thrown up for grabs, the India-Pakistan war of 1947 over Kashmir happened, and while the Indian Army was in a reasonably good position to recover all of J&K from Pakistani occupation, it was Nehru who applied brakes.
The British and Nehru go way back. Nehru's personal-life aside, he was groomed by the British to be an agent of chaos in Independent India, one that would keep it as benign as possible, so a western-dominated world order could take shape. One of the many deals of Nehru was to take British assistance in eliminating all his rivals in Congress, including Netaji Bose. Nehru reciprocated these little "favors" from the British by steering India to geopolitical disasters that would invariably benefit the west.
Nehru, and his daughter Indira, every bit the a daughter of her father, who redid a Bose by having the Soviets kill Shastri; continued to let Pakistan keep PoK, and reshape its demographics the way they saw fit, a way that would make any future recovery by India impractical and impossible. PoK comes bang in the middle of India and the Central Asian Republics.
Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) remained a stalemated region of no real value to anyone, until the Chinese became too heavy for the west in Central Asia. CPEC was drawn up, and suddenly Russia saw its quickest route to the Indian Ocean region take shape.
India isn't going to let this lying down. We were grudgingly consoled to see PoK be the "useless pile of rocks" that Nehru sourgraped to his people with. CPEC, if allowed to be implemented in letter and spirit, will diminish India's geopolitical and economic influence in this region.
The west isn't very pleased to see Beijing and Moscow having themselves a warp-drive to the IOR.
In an effort to restore the status-quo it so painstakingly built, the west is beginning to throw its weight behind India. Modi emerged as the perfect guy for the job. He's someone Pakistan and Pakistanis are programmed to hate, that China is weary of, and that Russia doesn't go way back with (and hence has no favors/leverage with).
The power-structures at the very top of the western world still have their own peaceful instruments of war (read: NGOs) to pass memos to. They want Modi around, they want him to feed the Indian growth story in a manner that makes it heavier in Asia, and have the ability to destabilize/derail CPEC.
Russia, choked by western economic sanctions, is probably the first player to figure out the short-term implications of its IOR ambitions by hitching a ride from the Chinese and Pakistanis; made the carnal mistake of [allegedly] offering Pakistanis their Sukhoi 35-BM fighter jets. These are as good, if not better than, the 300+ Sukhoi 30-MKI jets Russia sold to India, and would blunt India's tactical edge and ability to achieve quick air-superiority, in short conflicts with Pakistan. Russia's move is ballsy because they're willing to let it jeopardize the 200+ pending (unpaid) orders for more Su-30MKI jets, and a potential 40+ MiG-29K jets for India's two new aircraft carriers.
This shows that Putin has made up his mind. He wants access to IOR, and is willing to eat grass getting there.
Discuss.