Shreya Margale
For decades, the uneasy peace between India and Pakistan has been held together by mutual restraint rather than trust. This fragile equilibrium is now under severe strain. On April 22, an attack in Pahalgam — located in India-administered Kashmir — was claimed by The Resistance Front (TRF), an armed group seeking Kashmiri independence. This incident once again reignited tensions over the region’s unresolved political status. In rapid succession, the Indian government suspended the Indus Waters Treaty, breaking with more than sixty years of cooperative water-sharing with Pakistan. On May 6, the Indian army followed with Operation Sindoor, a targeted cross-border strike framed as a response to the attack. India alleges that TRF is a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a Pakistan-based militant group. India targeted what it called “terrorist infrastructure,” naming LeT and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) among the targets. JeM, also based in Pakistan, had claimed the 2019 Pulwama suicide bombing that killed 40 Indian paramilitary personnel.
In retaliation, on May 7, the Pakistani government authorised artillery shelling in Poonch (another area in India-administered Kashmir), escalating conflict along the Line of Control. Since this article was written, military exchanges between the two nations have continued, with most recent developments detailed here. India and Pakistan have agreed to a tentative ceasefire along the Line of Control, offering a fragile pause in hostilities, though recent allegations of violations by both sides have cast doubt on its durability. Both nations have asserted their own version of these later events, while independent confirmation is still pending. There are, of course, multiple fiercely contested positions on Kashmir, ranging from the claim that it rightfully belongs to Pakistan, to India’s assertion of full sovereignty, to the demand by many Kashmiris for complete independence. While these events are all grounded in this question of Kashmir, this article does not attempt to untangle that deeply complex history. Instead, it turns the lens inward, examining how the domestic political landscapes of both countries are shaping their foreign policy decisions. Both India and Pakistan have long utilised mutual hostility as a political tool, with leaders on both sides turning to nationalist rhetoric during periods of domestic strain. In India, for instance, heightened tensions with Pakistan have often coincided with contentious elections. Similarly, in Pakistan, political actors have invoked anti-India narratives amid economic crises and military-civilian power struggles, using external threats to consolidate internal unity and deflect criticism. These gestures are often reactive and symbolic, aimed more at shaping public perception than addressing the root causes of conflict. Far from being rooted in coherent strategies of deterrence and diplomacy, the recent actions of both states reflect an increasing dominance of internal political incentives: performative nationalism, institutional weakness, and the steady collapse of strategic restraint.
Pakistan’s capacity for diplomatic engagement is hampered by its internal political fragility. Pakistan’s recent governments have operated under the shadow of a powerful military establishment that retains stringent control over foreign policy and national security. The military has cultivated a narrative positioning itself as the guardian of national interest, often portraying civilian politicians as corrupt or inefficient. The military's involvement in politics has often destabilised democratic institutions. Elected governments have been dismissed or weakened, and political leaders have been marginalised when their agendas conflicted with military interests. The military has consistently held sway over Pakistan's foreign relations, especially concerning India, Afghanistan, and the United States. Civilian governments have therefore had limited autonomy in shaping foreign policy decisions. This entrenched civil-military imbalance discourages long-term reconciliation with India, as perpetual hostility justifies the military’s dominance, expansive budget, and political influence.
Periods of civilian rule, from Nawaz Sharif to Imran Khan, have repeatedly seen peace overtures toward India either blocked, undermined, or reversed by the security apparatus. For example, Prime Minister Sharif’s attempt at rapprochement following Narendra Modi’s 2015 visit to Lahore was quickly derailed by the 2016 Pathankot attack, which was attributed to JeM. While Pakistan did form a Joint Investigation Team (JIT) that visited India to collect evidence, there was little progress in terms of concrete action against the perpetrators. Although JeM’s leader, Masood Azhar, was reportedly taken into “protective custody,” he was not formally charged, and the group's activities continued with minimal disruption. Pakistan’s tepid responses to the attack have undermined mutual trust and goodwill with India.
Meanwhile, political actors across the spectrum rely on anti-India sentiment as a rallying cry during times of domestic crisis, whether during economic downturns, corruption scandals, or popular unrest. For example, during the 2019 economic crisis and IMF bailout negotiations, Prime Minister Imran Khan's government frequently escalated rhetoric against India, particularly over Kashmir, to deflect public attention from domestic economic grievances. This created a political environment in which advocating diplomacy became not only unpopular, but actively dangerous. Engagement with India is frequently portrayed as a betrayal of national honor or submission to a hostile power. Compounding this is the state’s long-standing tolerance — and in some cases, implicit endorsement — of militant groups operating under the banner of Kashmiri freedom. Organizations such as LeT and JeM, which have been linked to major terror attacks including the 2008 Mumbai attacks and the 2019 Pulwama bombing, continue to operate within Pakistan with varying degrees of restriction. While Islamabad has periodically banned or sanctioned these groups under international pressure, enforcement has been inconsistent, and their ideological infrastructure (Kashmir-focused aggression, drive for control in Afghanistan, sectarian violence) remains largely intact with strategic rebranding. This ambivalence undermines Pakistan’s diplomatic credibility and reinforces India’s perception that there can be no negotiation while cross-border terrorism persists. As a result, even in previous moments of relative calm, genuine diplomatic engagement with India is treated with suspicion. This combination of institutional mistrust, militarised nationalism, and tolerance for proxy actors has made diplomacy not only politically risky but structurally unsustainable. This deep-seated fragility prevents Pakistan from articulating and executing a coherent long-term peace strategy.
In India, domestic political narratives also drive the securitisation of foreign policy, albeit through the ballot box rather than the barracks. India’s foreign policy posture toward Pakistan has grown increasingly reactive, with decisions framed as justified responses to provocation but rarely embedded in a coherent strategic doctrine. The recent suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty, long considered a pillar of regional cooperation, was presented by the Indian government as a necessary countermeasure to the Pahalgam terror attack. Rather than advancing any long-term diplomatic or security objective, such gestures often serve to project resolve to a domestic audience. In this context, national security has ceased to function as a sphere of policy and has instead become an instrument of political spectacle.
This pattern was also evident in Operation Sindoor, a retaliatory military strike publicised by Indian authorities. Its tactical scope was limited, but its political utility was immense. Echoing previous operations such as Surgical Strikes (2016) and Balakot (2019) — both widely promoted as triumphant assertions of Indian military prowess — Operation Sindoor fits a well-established script. These operations allow the government to claim decisive action against Pakistan-based threats without engaging in protracted conflict, while dominating news cycles and social media with highly controlled narratives of retaliation and deterrence. The actual strategic gains of these operations, however, are questionable. Pakistan’s capacity and willingness to retaliate, as seen most recently in the shellings of Poonch, Rajouri, and Jammu City, underscores that such strikes do little to deter future escalations.
This reactive pattern is not new. India has long cast itself as the victim of asymmetric warfare emanating from Pakistani soil, citing a long history of cross-border terrorism. Although it is true that India’s military actions often follow Pakistani provocations, media framing has helped Indian governments portray their foreign policy as purely defensive and reactive. But this defensive posture masks a deeper failure: the absence of a proactive and consistent vision for regional peace. Indian foreign policy rarely initiates long-term diplomatic engagement with Pakistan. Instead, it responds, often performatively, after each crisis, thereby reinforcing a cycle in which diplomacy is perpetually deferred. While some argue that a forceful response is necessary, a military strike unaccompanied by sustained diplomatic engagement amounts to no real response at all. Even India’s Cold Start Doctrine—conceived to allow swift and limited conventional responses below the nuclear threshold—reflects a posture that is reactive in design but symbolic in its strategy. As Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal notes, while Cold Start aims to deter proxy conflict by enabling punitive action, its implementation risks provoking instability, undermining the very strategic restraint India claims to uphold. Without accompanying diplomatic frameworks, doctrines like Cold Start may reinforce the perception of assertiveness without yielding durable peace.
Moreover, the domestic political utility of hostility toward Pakistan cannot be overstated. In recent years, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has repeatedly fused national security with electoral strategy. The Pulwama-Balakot episode in 2019 was followed by a significant surge in public approval for the ruling party, which it capitalised on during that year’s general election. The political calculus is clear: aggressive posturing against Pakistan pays dividends at the ballot box. As a result, foreign policy decisions are increasingly shaped not by sober strategic assessments, but by the imperatives of domestic electoral cycles. This shift has eroded India’s capacity to act as a regional stabilising force. By turning national security into political theatre, the Indian state sacrifices long-term stability for short-term spectacle. It may succeed in projecting strength domestically, but it does so at the cost of a sustainable diplomatic approach to one of the world’s most unstable bilateral relationships.
Neither India nor Pakistan appears to be operating under a coherent doctrine of deterrence. What we are witnessing is not strategic calculation but symbolic tit-for-tat behavior, now extending beyond security matters into trade. Recent restrictions imposed by both countries on shipping routes and cargo handling reflect a growing pattern of economic retaliation replacing diplomatic engagement. These measures are reactive and performative, intended for public spectacle rather than long-term regional stability. Domestic politics remains the dominant force behind foreign policy in both states. Nationalist sentiment, electoral incentives, and military interests have overtaken the logic of restraint. In India, legal and economic instruments are increasingly used to project strength rather than fulfill regional responsibilities. In Pakistan, persistent political infighting and a lack of action against certain terrorist establishments make sustained policy development nearly impossible. In this environment, bilateral treaties, security frameworks, and confidence-building measures are not just neglected but increasingly dismantled. What is urgently required is not further escalation, but a return to classical diplomacy grounded in mutual dialogue and negotiated agreements.
Conclusion
Both sides continue to suffer casualties not just of violence but of political pride and paralysis. Before the Partition of 1947, India and Pakistan were one people, bound by shared languages, cultures, and histories. Though the borders on maps have changed, the threads of those communities still endure. To ignore them is to forget that what remains is worth preserving. The most serious threat to South Asian stability today is not war by design, but a war ignited by political myopia. Pakistan’s military has long cultivated legitimacy through external confrontation; India’s civilian leadership is increasingly doing the same through electoral nationalism. In both cases, fear becomes a tool to preserve authority. When national interest is defined through the lens of political expediency, even peace becomes suspect. The steady unraveling of diplomatic norms, combined with the performative demands of domestic politics, makes miscalculation more likely than ever. In the absence of renewed commitment to regular dialogue and principled diplomacy, the subcontinent is at risk of entering a prolonged period of volatility. If the region is to avoid a future shaped by fear, both India and Pakistan must begin by rethinking the internal political incentives that drive their foreign policies. Until then, the collapse of restraint will not be a failure of security, but a failure of statecraft.
Shreya Margale is currently pursuing a Juris Doctor at the University of New South Wales. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Barnard College, Columbia University. Her academic interests lie in international politics and the doctrinal evolution of international law.
