"Stanley Wolpert's new book, India and Pakistan, represents another major contribution to his analysis of the subcontinent. In this work, he provides a hopeful yet realistic solution to the tensions between these two neighbors." MICHAEL D. INTRILIGATOR, University of California, Los Angeles, and the Milken Institute --

Solving Kashmir is a treatise on the Kashmir imbroglio that gives a deep insight into the myriad facets of the dispute in the State of JandK. It brings into focus the historical perspective, the geo-strategic and geo-political imperatives, as also the interests of the world powers and other regional players especially Pakistan and to an extent China. This vital piece of real estate located in the under belly of the CARS and Russia gives access to Tibet, Afghanistan and Pakistan. JandK is strategically significant to India's existence as a nation. Historically, Kashmir has been an important gateway for marauders entering the country. Losing control of JandK would open up the floodgates again. Kashmir gives India access to the strategically significant countries around JandK. It is our jewel in the crown. The main players in the dispute namely, India and Pakistan have gone to war four times over the issue with Pakistan enduring humiliating defeats, including its partition with the creation of Bangladesh. Having failed in its conventional attempts to wrest Kashmir and still in search of its identity, Pakistan has exercised the low cost/ no cost proxy war option, exploiting the ethnic and religious sentiments of the local Kashmiris, as also drumming up support from religious fundamentalists internationally. The nuclear dimension adding to the tinder box forces the international community of nations to concentrate efforts to bring the two nations to the negotiating table and resolve the problem bilaterally in accordance with the Shimla Agreement, however, with no significant success. How long will India continue to bleed? and "Where do you go from here?" are questions that willcontinue to haunt India for years to come.

India, which had been created as a civic polity, initially sought to hold on to this Muslim-majority state to demonstrate its secular credentials. Pakistan, in turn, had laid claim to Kashmir because it had been created as the homeland for the Muslims of South Asia. After the break-up of Pakistan in 1971 the Pakistani irredentist claim to Kashmir lost substantial ground. If Pakistan could not cohere on the basis of religion alone it had few moral claims on its co-religionists in Kashmir. Similarly, in the 1980s, as the practice of Indian secularism was eroded, India's claim to Kashmir on the grounds of secularism largely came apart. Today their respective claims to Kashmir are mostly on the basis of statecraft. This title provides a comprehensive assessment of a number of different facets of the on-going dispute over Kashmir between India and Pakistan. Among other matters, it examines the respective endgames of both states, the evolution of American policy toward the dispute, the dangers of nuclear esculation in the region and the state of the insurgency in the Indian-controlled portion of the disputed state.

Exploring the legality of the accession of Kashmir to India, this title looks to the history, ethnology and geography of the region in order to find a political solution. The author provides a true and factual account of the state's eventful past.

Seminar paper from the year 2002 in the subject Politics - Region: South Asia, grade: 2,0, University of Münster (Institute for Political Science), course: Is all theory grey?, language: English, abstract: After the dreadful tragedy that happened in New York on 11 September, the world had to redefine the extent of terrorism. In this context there is one conflict that is gradually turning over to be an explosive powder keg. It is the Indo-Pakistan conflict about the area called "Kashmir". Ever since the British colonial power ended in 1947 and the Muslim League demanded the partition of India and Pakistan, there has been a smouldering conflict between Pakistan and India about ′the bone of contention′ Kashmir. Pakistan and India have always been irreconcilably divided in the most important aspects such as religion, culture, economic interests and the social system. From neo-realistic point of view, this conflict bears numerous factors that gave rise to it and influenced its development. The underlying assumption is that the problems at issue were predictable and, hence, maybe could have been fought against earlier and more determined. Having a look at the common history of India and Pakistan, it has obviously always been a conflict between Muslims and Hindus and, on the other hand, between different cultures within these confessions. It just all turned out to be explosive when, they had to decide about India′s independence in 1947. Although these negotiations were without doubt a risky question of gaining and loosing power, the negotiation partners found a reasonable and ostensibly peaceful solution by splitting British-India in the Hindu part of India and the northern, Muslim part, from then on called Pakistan. However, they could not have suspected that they sowed the seed of a terrible future conflict between the two powers-to-be.