Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Wednesday hit back at his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, saying poverty cannot be eradicated by "driving tanks on farmlands" and once again needled India by calling Hizbul commander Burhan Wani the "valiant son of Kashmir".
While China's nationalistic tabloid Global Times said India should be taught a 'bitter lesson', another official newspaper, China Daily, said India should look in the mirror.
China has flight tested an upgraded version of its 10,000-km range Dongfeng missile which can reach most of the US and European cities, demonstrating its nuclear capability, media reports said.
An impressive array of warships, including nuclear capable submarines, and about 8000 men and officers of Indian Navy presented an exquisite display of operational capabilities in an exercise reviewed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi off the Kochi coast in Kerala on Tuesday.
'With the recent challenging of the notion of the Indian Ocean Region being India's strategic backyard, China is gradually upping the ante in the maritime realm around India.'
The majestic Rajpath saw a scintillating display of India's military might as the country celebrated its 69th Republic Day on Friday, with the leaders of all the 10 countries of the ASEAN attending the parade. Take a look here.
'Modi's decision to hold out an olive branch to Sharif within 48 hours of the 'surgical strikes' has been a timely move as it helps tensions to 'de-escalate',' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Indian ranks fifth in the world according to a report that ranks the strength of 20 countries according to weaponry, including tanks, aircraft, helicopters and submarines.
As the United States and China joust for supremacy, India might remain on the sidelines with its limited resources.
Leaders from 70 countries, including United States President Barack Obama and Arab politicians, gathered in Jerusalem on Friday to bid farewell to one of the last leaders of Israel's founding generation and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shimon Peres as his funeral began amid unprecedented security.
'Islamabad receives billions in aid from the US but continues to harbour terrorists,' he said.
Sneha Shekhawat is the 1st woman officer to lead a marching contingent twice on R-Day.
Support for the dreaded Haqqani network across the militant group's historical stronghold in eastern Afghanistan is gradually turning into "resentment" as local leaders say the Haqqani supremo's war is for "Pakistani rupees and power" and they cannot follow him "blindly".
'During his visit to Vietnam on September 3 -- the first visit by an Indian prime minister in 15 years -- Modi will notice the widespread anti-China sentiment in that country.'
Thinking big, China is changing the world order; with mixed priorities, we can but tag along, writes T J S George.
'She has to get the funds, cut through bureaucratic flab, speed up modernisation, ensure planned acquisitions stick to timelines, make organisational changes and ensure the military is capable of performing the task that it is given,' says Brigadier S K Chatterjee (retd).
'Ensuring through diplomatic means and in conjunction with strategic partners that India will not be required to fight a simultaneous two-front war with China and Pakistan.' Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd) lists what India must have in its national security strategy.
'What needs to be pursued as the operations progress is a degree of reconciliation amongst the other parties, less the more orthodox Al Qaeda affiliates.'
'China might soon have to seriously consider whether it prefers an Indo-US hyphenation to a Sino-Indian one.'
'The range of purchases throw a light on India's threat perception as also its perceived role of being a stabilising influence in the region,' says Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
'For its part, Pakistan often gives safe haven to agents of chaos, violence, and terror.'
Right from conducting nuclear deterrence patrols in 2015 to its destructive space programme, from its back-tracking on economic commitments to its hardened positions on Sino-India border deal -- its approach with India spells Adversarial with a capital A, says Shehzad Poonawalla
'If the dimensions of the strategic partnership worked out by India and the US seem like a grand alliance targeted at you-know-who, China had better realise that it has fathered it,' says B S Raghavan, a long time observer of China.
'I have yet to hear a public debate in which someone has not blamed women being out late for the unwelcome attention they get,' says Sherna Gandhy. 'Unfortunately, rape is not seen as the utterly heinous act it is. Not by large numbers of the public who think it is an occupational hazard of being a woman -- nor by the law enforcement agencies.'
'As in the Panchatantra tale of the cat and the monkeys, it is possible for the clever swing State to play off the two competing powers.'
India and Japan have a shared interest in countervailing China's hegemonic ambitions in Asia. Although neither has an interest in forming an overt anti-China alliance, Tokyo and New Delhi feel increasingly obligated to work together to find ways to guard against a muscular Beijing's power sliding into arrogance, says Brahma Chellaney.
On display was India's military might and cultural diversity.
A very delayed and subdued reaction, at a time when the non-aligned world had expected a big country like India to come out in support of rights and justice. It was yet another example of the mealy mouthed approach that has come to define Indian foreign policy, says Seema Mustafa.
Has New Delhi internalised the truth that it does not matter, asks Saeed Naqvi. Such deafening silence from the government, principal opposition, even the pundits!
'Vietnam has become an adjective as well as a verb -- the Americans, for instance, were driven by the passion to do a 'Vietnam' on the Soviet Union when that country invaded Afghanistan in 1979.'
'Elected representatives have won elections in the past on the basis of money power received from the central government.' 'This fact has been highlighted by former army chief V K Singh who boasted of crores of rupees being distributed to Kashmiri politicians in order to buy their loyalty and win votes.' 'All the Kashmiri politicians have been co-opted by the Indian State,' says separatist Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani.
Read the full transcript of President Obama's State of the Union address on Wednesday at the US Capitol in Washington.
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