The new minister must commit himself to supporting long-term defence plans or else defence modernisation will continue to lag and the growing military capabilities gap with China will assume ominous proportions, warns Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
The United States has urged countries near North Korea against developing nuclear deterrents despite the threat posed by the impoverished hermit nation's growing missile and nuclear prowess.
The spread of the Taliban in Pakistan has senior American officials concerned about the safety and security of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, including the potential for terrorists to get their hands on a weapon in transport or to infiltrate laboratories and nuclear fuel-production facilities.
Sanctions against North Korea following its H-bomb test could have serious repercussions and may prove disastrous for all the players involved, says Debalina Ghoshal.
Deployment of THAAD in South Korea could unfold a new cataclysm in the Korean Peninsula with unwelcome prospects.
The noted physicist said that climate change was as great a threat to the world as terrorism and nuclear war, and ought to be tackled urgently.
In a letter to the North Korean dictator, the US president says talks are 'inappropriate' based on the open hostility displayed in the recent statement.
After Pyongyang tests a missile potentially capable of reaching the US, Dr Rajaram Panda explores the realistic -- and peaceful -- options before Donald Trump and the international community at large.
Sanjay Gupta, author of The Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and the Indian Riposte and deputy executive editor with the Hindustan Times, talks to Rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa on Chinese incursions, Beijing's worrying defence budget, the curiosity generated over ties with our neighbours and more.
'Despite much hype of optimism, everyone went home empty-handed without a clear picture where they are heading in the future,' notes Dr Rajaram Panda.
Rediff.com brings you photographs of daily life from inside the world's most militarised country.
Find out how you can pursue a career in International Relations and travel the world as part of the job.
With increasing terror attacks in Pakistan raising concerns over the safety of its nuclear arsenal, Defence Minister A K Antony said the threat of these weapons falling in wrong hands was an "area of serious concern" and its consequences would be "unimaginable".
Acknowledging that it is clear to all that many terrorist groups operate in Pakistan, he said the US continues to work with the Pakistani government in this regard.
At present, India's focus has been on making the US co-operate against the activities of the anti-India terrorist groups and their infrastructure in Pakistani territory. This should continue, but this should not be the only subject of co-operation between the two countries. It is necessary to expand it to cover likely threats to Pakistan's nuclear establishments.
The US dismissed a report suggesting that India is covertly enriching its nuclear weapons capabilities, describing it as "speculative".
India was continuously keeping an eye on the movement of the Pakistani military but after Indian Air Force hit the Jaish terrorist factory in Balakot, one of the most advanced Pakistani Agosta-class submarines - PNS Saad - vanished from the Pakistani waters, a senior government source said.
The subcommittee met for the first time on Wednesday for a classified briefing focusing on the prevention of nuclear terrorism.
Both statesmen possess a cultivated pugnacious style which they keep in reserve and can at will bring into play, and despite the mutual distrust in Russian-American relations, they are proponents of detente, quintessentially, who take their mission deadly seriously, points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Modi will embark on a three-nation tour beginning March 30 during which he will attend the crucial Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, India-EU Summit in Brussels and travel to Saudi Arabia, a key partner of India in the sensitive Gulf region.
Chinese nuclearisation of Tibet endangering ecosystem, says new book
However, the WH Press Secretary says that the right circumstances for a meeting between the two leaders does not exist right now.
'New Delhi showed itself willing -- at least for a period -- to tolerate the risk of conflict and to withstand Beijing's implicit and explicit threats.' 'But it also continued to try to cut some kind of deal with China to reduce tensions.'
Asserting that a nuclear-armed North Korea is a "profound threat", United States President Barack Obama on Tuesday asked Pyongyang to denuclearise and join the international community.
'The Kashmir issue has become internationalised after nearly half a century.' 'India, not Pakistan, has done so pro-actively,' says Shekhar Gupta.
Pakistan would want to take full advantage of the situation to direct Taliban trained terrorists into the Kashmir Valley, alert Lieutenant General Ashok Joshi (retd) and Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
President Asif Ali Zardari will leave on a day-long visit to Iran on Monday to formally inaugurate work on the Pakistan-Iran gas pipeline despite the US threat of possible sanctions over Tehran's nuclear programme.
Israel has said that an Iranian nuclear bomb is a great threat to the entire world.
Each Bhabha Kavach has four hard armour plates, which protect the wearer from the front, back, and either side. It can protect CAPF personnel from 7.62 mm bullets fired from AK-47 rifles -- the chosen weapon of terrorists from Kashmir to Bastar.
The country's institutionalised command and control systems includes 10,000 soldiers who are guarding storage and production facilities for nuclear weapons, said Lt Gen (retired) Khalid Kidwai, the chief of the Strategic Plans Division that is responsible for the security and development of the arsenal.
'The travesty of recent Indian strategic thought is it emerges not from our brains, but from whatever part of the anatomy that secretes the prickliest hormones,' says Shekhar Gupta.
China has started the construction of at least 13 entirely new military positions including three air bases, five permanent air defence positions and five heliports near the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the aftermath of the Doklam standoff in 2017, according to a report by global security consultancy Stratfor.
"There is no denying the fact that we voted against Iran at IAEA. The intention was to ensure that its nuclear issue does not go to the Security Council as it would entail sanctions and more problems," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said while rejecting allegations that India's foreign policy was being affected by the Indo-US nuclear deal.
'We rarely choose to fight when the threat is still a nascent threat. When we do fight, we fight when the invaders reach Panipat and are preparing to knock on the gates of Delhi.'
The delegation led by Qasemi arrived on Sunday with the aim of persuading New Delhi to step up both oil imports and investment in the OPEC-member's oil and gas sector.
Manmohan Singh is a nice man but India needs an effective prime minister. May be it is time for him to stand down.
India has said it is committed to implementing the highest safety standards at its nuclear power plants as it seeks to harness the benefits of atomic energy to meet its growing energy requirements.
'We have here the world's largest economy and dominant superpower thrashing about as it wrestles with its own decline.' 'It has become everything that China was supposed to be: A threat to the world order, and as a country that is not playing by the rules on trade, on climate change, international commitments and nuclear deals,' says T N Ninan.
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