In his book Indian Foreign Policy: An Overview, Indian scholar Harsh V. Pant, arguing that Indian foreign policy has evolved because of the country's rising power, writes, “from the peripheries of international affairs, India is now at the center of major power politics.”Footnote ¹ Pant, an astute observer of New Delhi's foreign policy, is right in enunciating how India has, slowly but surely, tried to position itself as an actor relevant to the interests of the great powers, especially the United States. From Jawaharlal Nehru, toying with the idea of pan-Asianism, to his daughter creating the Indira Doctrine, typified by her approach to conflict in India's periphery, events outside India have shaped, and have been affected by, India's approach to foreign relations. Tapped by Washington as one of the net-security providers in the region, New Delhi's foreign policy outlook and the factors that could effect a change in it are important areas of inquiry. How India behaves in a region that is ripe for both cooperation and conflict will greatly impact regional stability going forward. In other words, looking at Indian foreign policy through a wider, more regional prism, is essential.

This effort has been undertaken by one of India's most experienced foreign policy practitioners, Shivshankar Menon, in his voluminous book India and Asian Geopolitics: The Past, Present. Menon, a former diplomat and national security advisor, narrates India's foreign policy journey and that of the wider Asian region. The book “examines Indian foreign policy, not as an autonomous activity driven by personality and domestic politics and reacting to external stimuli, but as part of larger historical shifts in Asia and world geopolitics, of which India is a significant constituent” (p. 2). In other words, Menon looks at how Indian foreign policy has navigated and responded to geopolitical vagaries.

A master raconteur, Menon looks critically at how India used its external environment to create space for strategic actions like the ones it took in erstwhile East Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Further, he recounts how, in the 1980s, India navigated unfavorable external conditions and accumulated capabilities that helped it take advantage of the openings provided by the post–Cold War milieu. While Menon rightly highlights how Indian policy makers adjusted their approaches in line with the systemic changes the world was undergoing, he downplays India's aggression and the far-reaching implications it had on the geopolitics of South Asia. India's blatant, massive intervention in the East Pakistan imbroglio, its 1974 nuclear test, its occupation of the Siachen glacier, and its 1998 nuclear explosions had deleterious effects on the strategic landscape of the region. For instance, because of India's assertiveness, Pakistan was forced to take steps to redress an unfavorable strategic picture. Absent New Delhi's brazenness, Islamabad could also have found space to garner more benefits from globalization rather than focusing on securitization. That said, South Asia can still become an example of cooperation and strategic connectivity given that a more integrated, economically developed region would be a boon for every country, including India.

Menon is cognizant of all this in the second part of the book, in which he engages with India's China conundrum. While his characterization of China's behavior is problematic and simplistic, his acknowledgment that New Delhi must deal with an ascendant Beijing is only fair. Though Menon does a good job of identifying some of the structural challenges that impede improving Sino-Indo relations, his analysis suffers from an inability to recognize the many vistas that China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) opens up for everyone in the region, including India. As Menon rightly argues, India must look toward both the East and the West and stop wading into pointless conflicts with Pakistan. To achieve this, India must rethink its approach toward the BRI and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. Rather than sabotage the project through a bevy of proxies, India must look at it as a conduit for westward connectivity. Also, seeing it for what it is only seems logical and aligns with Menon's idea that economic integration must be the fulcrum of India's policy going forward. Doing so would also help India fight poverty, hunger, and illiteracy, which, according to Menon, are critical to transforming India.

It is important to note that while Menon's book gives a fairly comprehensive account of regional and global settings in which India must operate, it falls short in explaining why cooperation, not confrontation, is a must for India. As aptly identified by Menon, the real threat that India faces is from within. Therefore, trying to upset the developing mosaic of cooperation, ostensibly with a view to achieving the highly touted “lost glory,” will only hurt India in the long run.