http://www.youtube.com/embed/NrcbGIs_k0s?start=337&end=552
The potential for war is real' – Prof Mearsheimer on India, this is a very dangerous situation. these are two nuclear armed countries that have a history of fighting wars And in the past the United States has intervened in crisis between these two countries to go to great lengths to shut them down .Mainly what we've tried to do is make sure that the Indians didn't launch a major attack against Pakistan which would then leave Pakistan maybe to use nuclear weapons. but you don't have the sense that the Trump administration is paying careful attention to this conflict or that President Trump will intervene in a major way to dampen down the tensions the way previous presidents have because he's so busy on so many other fronts .
so it could be the case let's hope this is not the case that this one could spin out of control and you could have a real war and nuclear weapons might even be used because you want to remember the conventional balance of power between Pakistan and India greatly favors the Indians And we've always feared that a conflict that started off at the conventional level would escalate to the nuclear level because the Pakistanis would feel compelled to turn to nuclear weapons if they were losing conventionally which we expected to happen.
None of this is to say that in the past or even now a war will happen and nuclear weapons will be used. But the fact is there is real potential for a real war and there is real potential for nuclear use And in that kind of situation you want President Trump you want the United States to be deeply involved in trying to settle this short of a shooting match
But I don't have the sense that that's what we're doing. Maybe we are and I'm just not reading about it Let's hope that's the case . But uh this is just another example of another ball in the air.
Well I wonder if this is an area where tariffs can give America a substantial negotiating leverage. I mean JD Vance visited India last week . yet last night uh Trump suggested that a free trade deal was on the horizon I don't know whether the situation in Kashmir has been part of those discussions. I don't think anybody has said so publicly but surely America could say you might want to hold off retaliating or you might want to do what we want in this conflict or this free trade deal that we are now in the process of agreeing will be out the window. I don't think we would do that. I think relations between the Trump administration and the Modi administration are very good and we're not likely to play hard ball uh with Modi in the way you just described. but uh maybe maybe that's the case. I do agree with your general point that although I think that tariffs uh the way they were implemented made no sense uh I I do think that uh the possibility of walking back the tariffs does give us leverage over allies uh and adversaries alike
Uh so I think that we do have some leverage there. h maybe Trump could tell the Indians that he'd give them a real sweetheart deal uh if he felt they were on the verge of going to war and Trump didn't want them to go to war. But just hard to say what's going on with regard to US Indian relations uh over the Kashmir at this point in time