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Since FA didn8217;t have an issue in the wake of Mumbai, it offered as backgrounders two seminal essays it had published earlier...

Foreign Affairs Journal

Since FA didn8217;t have an issue in the wake of Mumbai, it offered as backgrounders two seminal essays it had published earlier: Dennis Kux8217;s India8217;s Fine Balance May/June issue, 2002 and Sumit Ganguly8217;s Will Kashmir Stop India8217;s Rise? July/August issue, 2006. Kux praised the then government8217;s decisiveness in bringing India behind the US over the war on terror and studied the consequences of the December 13, 2001 Parliament attack. A positive appraisal of India and its future, it cautioned the government to settle domestic issues first, such as the legacy of the Gujarat riots. Ganguly8217;s piece admits the problem of Kashmir as a hindrance for India and Pakistan, but rules out its potential to destabilise India8217;s economic and political rise. Nevertheless, Kashmir could cause a nuclear war and the US must use its influence in Islamabad to bring about an agreement on Kashmir.

The Atlantic Monthly

The Atlantic introduces Robert D. Kaplan8217;s Behind Mumbai as offering 8220;insight into the Hindu-Muslim tensions festering within India8221;. Kaplan8217;s main article will appear in the next issue January 2009. In a short piece, Kaplan analyses the name 8220;Deccan Mujahideen8221;: how the Deccan was one area the Mughals never dominated. This Mughal history 8220;has taken on heightened symbolism in India in recent years precisely as a result of electronic communications and education, all of which have sharpened the country8217;s religious divide8221;. What follows is more of the history of the 8220;home-grown8221;.

The American Prospect

A.J. Rossmiller8217;s Will the Mumbai Terrorists Get What They Wanted? paints one of the worst doomsday scenarios. Rossmiller seems convinced that 8220;the goals of the terrorists8212;destabilising India and strengthening extremists in Pakistan8212;will have some success8221; 8212; India8217;s government is weak and won8217;t be able to ignore 26/11 8220;even if it wanted to8221;. Unable to get its demands met, India will send troops to the border. Sectarian violence within India will follow and a hard-line government come to power. A frustrated and fractured India in war posture, a US in a tight corner, a Pakistan moving troops away from the Afghan border to the east is a recipe for catastrophe, he concludes.

City Journal

Guy Sorman8217;s The Mumbai Strategy begins with an academic pretence: that Islamist terrorists owe more to Leninist thinking than the Quran nothing new there. Mumbai, 26/11 happened during crucial elections, exposing its links to Al-Qaeda8217;s global ambition8212;to conquer a country for its military base and create a model for a future Caliphate. In India, the Internet and the globalised city are destroying the million local, syncretic Islams and converting migrant Muslims to a global Islam. The Indian leadership should acknowledge that with the shift in its economy and urbanisation, 8220;India has become the perfect hunting ground for Islamist recruiters8221;.

Der Spiegel

Two Spiegel articles deserve particular mention 8211; In the Triangle of Terror by the Spiegel team and Claus Christian Malzahn8217;s opinion India is pointing in the Right Direction. India is 8220;an outpost of the West in the East8221; and globalised Mumbai is the city that obviously attracts Islamists8217; fury. Spiegel makes no secret that it suspects Pakistan. Referring to Carl von Clausewitz, Malzahn says that it is 8220;difficult to win a war when one side refuses to accept moral, military, or state boundaries while the other is permanently bound by them8221;. This, in brief, is the story of the war against the jihadis. Despite the odds, the Indian and Pakistani regimes can 8220;agree to a marriage of convenience8221; since they have the same enemy