Azeem Gul, Munawar Hussain, Sumeera Imran, Ashfaq U. Rehman, Syed Arslan Haider
In the post-Cold War period, the US and India established a strategic partnership in line with their domestic and international political environment. Most of the literature on the subject covered the converging points of their strategic partnership without giving much attention on their differences. In this backdrop, the focus of the study is not only on the opportunities and prospects of Indo-US strategic partnership but would also identify challenges. Thus, the study covers both converging and diverging points in the forging of their strategic partnership. The first part of the paper discuses Indo-US strategic cooperation vis-à-vis China in the Indo-Pacific region. In the second part the study probes challenges associated with the US contentions vis-à-vis Indo-Russian strategic partnership in defense sector and also highlights the implications of Indo-Russia joint venture in the Arctic region for the US. Furthermore, the paper also covers other independent variables such as Iran and Pakistan factors having implications for dependent variables of Indo-US strategic partnership. The study finds out that some of the main challenges to US strategic cooperation with India include: Russia’s domination in Indian defence and commercial market and cooperation in the Arctic region, Indo-Iran cooperation, and Pakistan factors. The study concludes that due to the challenges, the Indo-US Strategic cooperation have not developed into a comprehensive strategic partnership, however, they would continue their cooperation to contain the rise of China and maintaining balance of power in the Indo-Pacific region.