The Team House - India vs Pakistan War | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

Episode Date: May 2, 2025

Today we discuss the brewing conflict between India and Pakistan over the attack in Kashmir last week that killed 26 people and how a nuclear exchange will effect the US.New merch, patches, and stickers! ⬇️https://theteamhouse-shop.fourthwall.comSupport the show on Patreon:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseFind Mick Mulroy here: Fogbow ⬇️https://fogbow.com/Lobo Institute ⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/Twitter ⬇️https://x.com/mickmulroy?s=21&t=-Ze3F_Ix2vlJ18KFvORTCALinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-patrick-mulroy-31198b52/Bluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/mickmulroy.bsky.socialMick’s publications ⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/publications/publications-of-michael-mick-patrick-mulroy/Find Andy Milburn here: Twitter ⬇️https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8LinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023Substack ⬇️https://amilburn.substack.com/Andy’s book ⬇️https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-OperationsBluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/andy-milburn.bsky.socialFind Jason Lyons here: LinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-lyons-666873316?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_appBluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/bgsilverback73.bsky.sociBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Aizan Geopolitics. I'm here with a very special one. Louis Rita, Jack Murphy. Lewis, of course, past guest of Aizan, past guest of the Team House. So if you haven't checked out his team house episode, it's a great one. One of my favorite ones in the last couple of years, check it out there. Lewis, of course, was a former CIA officer, chief of station of New Delhi. so he's got a really interesting and interesting perspective of what's going on today with

Indian Pakistan. Last week, of course, attacking Kashmir. I think 26 people died and things are popping off all over. So temperatures are being risen everywhere. So Lewis, thanks for joining us today. Really appreciate it. Hey, my pleasure. I've taken time out for my campaigning to be Pope.

and came back here. Hey, look, I've got 13 votes lined up, so pray for me. Not bad. Not bad. Yeah. I just finished watching that movie Conclave D that you recommend. What did you think? I liked it.

It was good, right? Yeah, that's a good movie. I'm bringing back the Renaissance papacy. Oh, you're going hardcore, huh? Hardcore. I respect. Wait till you see the papal army. Start invading, start invading like...

The Ottoman Empire. Yeah. I'm starting small. Florence is first on the list. Okay. Build up some momentum. Yeah. So, Lewis, what the hell's going on in India and Pakistan?

It seems like Pakistan and India are both gearing up for a bit of a conflict. And when that happens, people seem to get pretty worried because they're both nuclear powers. Yeah, it's, you know, this sort of tension and cross-border activity, flares every few years or so. And I guess for the audience to just understand, the obvious and

the really overt reason for this is the territorial dispute over Kashmir, most of which India occupies Pakistan occupies a small strip, but India occupies the most. It's got a heavily Muslim population, so Pakistan claims that it's their own.

But the problem, I think, lies in internal Pakistani politics. The Pakistani military has built up India to be a major threat, and that justifies the size of the Pakistani army. It justifies the money that a relatively poor country like Pakistan pours into the military. It justifies the military's political and economic power. and for them to sort of back away from India as a threat, we'll raise a question on the part of the Pakistanis,

and why the hell do we have this military? Let's back down. And now Pakistan is in pretty severe economic straits. They're having trouble importing, paying bills, things are going bad, and it tends to be a tried and true method to provoke border tensions, low-level conflict with India to unite the Pakistani people behind the military and look at the India threat. And that's possibly one of the reasons why this is sparking. But the concern that most people have is that there is always a possibility of this escalating to something

more. India and Pakistan have had three wars, pretty sizable wars and pretty sizable border clashes without being an actual war. And the concern now is that India is faced with the situation that they feel they have to respond. Remember, this is not an isolated incident. This has been going on for, I don't know, nigh on 50 years or so. And Pakistan has had a, I don't know, I wouldn't call it a tradition, but it has had a habit of using terrorist attacks as a policy tool. The fact that they allow these organizations to abide inside Pakistan and launch attacks. And the Indians have sufficient, in their view, evidence and intelligence that Pakistanis are behind most of these attacks, though you have to allow that every now and then some of these groups will exceed their authority.

But they provide support and the stuff. And domestically, the Indian government feels it has to do something. I can't just let multiple people be killed and not take action. The question becomes what action are they going to take and what will they be satisfied with? You know, it's interesting to see some of the responses in the Indian media. And, I mean, of course, some of it is rhetoric, but you also get the impression, much like America after 9-11 or the Israelis after the recent October 7 attack. very emotional views being represented in public. Yeah, and frankly, that's the danger when emotion takes over from logic.

Indians are, they're fed up. You know, there's been thousands of people killed in India over the years through terrorist attacks. Mumbai some time ago being one of the biggest ones. but it is constant. It is like a drip. And, you know, some days it's two or three. Some days it's 10 or 12. And so there is a significant amount of motion involved in it.

In this case, Indians were mostly the ones killed, and Indians now expect some kind of action. In the past, the Indian government, the Indian people have been satisfied with, Indian military strikes against terrorist training camps. They pretty much know where they are. They take them out. There's no direct action against Pakistani forces.

Sometimes the Pakistanis will respond with something moderate, you know, shelling across the line of control or try to intercept Indian jets and this sort of stuff. And then they step back and call the quits. The concern always is will they call it quits? Is that enough? If the emotions are running high and domestically it becomes a problem for the government, are they going to want to do more? Is it enough to hit terrorist camps or do they hit Pakistani military?

Do they indeed go after the water supply? Because that's one of the big things that they suspended the water treaty. A significant amount of Pakistan's water flows out of the water. India. And it's debatable whether the Indians can actually stop the flow of water, but they can affect it. They can affect it through a whole bunch of different mechanisms. And the Pakistanis has said, this is war. So how will they respond? Will they respond with a military incursion into Kashmir or into parts of India? Nobody's sure about that. If you've been watching it, enjoying it, but you'd like to get a little bit more involved and help us continue to do this,

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continues to help this thing going even as we navigate the turbulent world of YouTube advertising. So we really appreciate all of you guys. There's going to be a link down in the description to that Patreon page. And there is also going to be a link to our new merch shop. So if you guys want to go and get some Team House merchandise, we got stickers. And we also have patches. And I should mention, if you sign up for Patreon at $10 a month, we will mail you this patch as well. So we really appreciate that. But they're also for sale on the merch shop. And additionally, they got T-shirts up there, water bottles, tote bag, coffee mugs, all that good stuff.

So please go and check them out and support the show. We really appreciate it, guys. Thank you. I'm also reading that they shut down, like, they completely shut down the border to India for Pakistani people. And also they cut off, announced that we were suspending the Indus Waters Treaty, a 1960 agreement, which feeds 80% of Pakistan's irrigated aquaculture. Yeah, that's what I was talking about with the Water Treaty. again, India doesn't have the physical ability to shut it all down, but it does have the ability to impact the water flow, and that would come at a time when the dry season is coming. And Pakistan already faces economic problems and negatively impacting the water flow is going to be a disaster for them.

There's a lot of economic things. I just read an article today that airlines flying out of India, have added four hours of flight time if they're going west because they're circumventing Pakistan. So they're flying down into the Indian Ocean and then going up the Persian Gulf. And it's adding time, et cetera, because they're trying to avoid crossing Pakistani airspace, which is the shortest route. There's a whole lot of economic impacts that this is having. but unless India impacts the water, this is economic impact that both countries can absorb without much problem.

I think the question is who, in this case, probably India, who wants to ratchet up the pressure? There's already border skirmishing, fighting across the line of control. They're shooting each other, which is not uncommon, even in times of relative peace without any attempt. there's always a little skirmishing and firing across the border. The question becomes, does this blow out into something more? And the Indian plan, which the Indians have advertised over and over again, is this cold start where they do not require a military buildup to take military action against Pakistan. For years, they have developed this capability to launch from right now immediately

with a set number of divisions that are already pre-positioned and can launch. So it wouldn't give the Pakistanis much warning or much time. And as everybody knows, I think the elephant in the room what's hanging behind them is the nuclear problem. Both countries are nuclear states. Nobody's 100% sure. But they probably range in 60 to 100 nuclear weapons each side, mostly air delivered and missiles. and there is the significant problem, and there is where everybody should be concerned.

Let's get into that a little bit. I mean, I think you did a good job outlining, you know, the underlying conflict and where it comes from. You mentioned that it's already kind of like in a sort of low boil because of these border skirmishes. How do you see this conflict potentially becoming a large-scale convention? conventional conflict. And then how would it make the jump from conventional to nuclear? How do you see that taking place? If it does, hopefully not. Right. Yeah. I mean, it's it's it's it's one of multiple scenarios and and both sides. I don't think either of them wants a major conflict or a nuclear war. It's it's not good for anybody. But a lot depends on on reaction and emotion. Best case scenarios like they've done in the past. A few strikes on terrorist training camps.

Both sides flex a little bit of muscle, and they all back away and feel good. Worst case scenario is an Indian strike intentionally or by accident against Pakistani military facilities, personnel, or whatever, and the Pakistanis feel they have to respond. At that stage, if you've got a full-blown war, one side or the other, if they start to feel they are losing. And in this case, I would look at Pakistan as being the one who feels losing because, you know, there's not a lot of physical strategic depth to Pakistan as compared to India. And an Indian incursion could pretty much go into, you know, pretty deep that the Pakistanis feel threatened.

And then they allow the launch of nuclear weapons. India will have to retaliate, of course. And that on one scale is a disaster for the subcontinent. You're talking, assuming, say, a 25% use of 25% of their nuclear warheads, you're talking 20, 30 million dead initially on both sides because we're talking heavily populated countries, very congested. I mean, New Delhi is over 25 million people. and that's well within striking distance of Pakistan's abilities.

So you're going to have a lot of dead. But what a lot of people are concerned about and what Americans should be concerned about is the modeling that's been done in various places on what would happen with, say, a nuclear exchange using 25% of each side's warheads. Radiation is a significant byproduct of a nuclear exchange. and it's going to form in the atmosphere. And depending on the time of year, the season, and the wind pattern, there is a significant, better than 50% chance that that nuclear cloud,

that contamination is going to be whisked across the Pacific. And at that point, it becomes a matter of wind pattern, whether it goes in a southerly route through Australia into Central American and swing back up into the southern U.S., or across the Central Pacific hitting Hawaii, California, and then moving into the American heartland, our food, basically contaminating grain production, fruit and vegetable productions,

and a nuclear cloud of that nature is going to lead into millions of Americans developing illnesses from radiation poisoning. long term, not necessarily dying in days, but maybe, depending on how big in exchange, how much of it is carried by the winds, but over time developing cancers and things. And our food supply poisoned. So, you know, we're concerned about tariffs raising food prices. You imagine what happens when a significant part of the U.S. food supply is contaminated with radiation. And that has always been in the back of the U.S. government's mind if an Indian-Pakistani war turned nuclear.

And that's why you see many times American diplomats shuttling back and forth trying to calm both sides down and push toward some kind of measured response. Again, remember, they've gone to war, serious war three times at least now with lots of casualties. a lot of shooting. And this was before they were nuclear powers. Now it's not so easy. What steps is the U.S. government taking, State Department, whatever, to kind of ease tensions and kind of bring this back to, you know, neutral? That is a damn good question. And I don't have an answer. I don't know. In the past, we have seen senior state departments. Department officers, National Security Council, you know, people, the National Security Advisor, that sort of thing, flying out and doing shuttle diplomacy between New Delhi and Islamabad

and trying to negotiate a settlement. I don't get a sense that this administration is doing that. I do get a sense that they've cut back on diplomatic activity, diplomatic representation, pulled back from a lot of what we used to view as our foreign national security interests. So I don't know what they're doing, frankly. I would feel a little bit more comfortable if we can see it. And part of this negotiation has to be done in the open because you've got to allay people's fears and say, look, we're on this, we're working this. you have to put political international pressure on both sides. And if we're not doing that, if we're not out there, I don't know how much this is going to have an impact.

The U.S. used to be viewed as a fairly honest neutral broker. We were a little less so neutral when we were doing that whole G-WAT global war and terror because we were cozing up to the Pakistanis because we needed them to support operations in Afghanistan. And, you know, the Indians always looked at that askance, and, you know, you guys can't be trusted. But in general, we were viewed as, hey, we're sincere that we don't want this to happen and we're going to help both sides resolve the problem. I don't think we're there now.

I don't think we're viewed as a fairly neutral arbiter in this problem. I have images of somebody showing up in New Delhi and say, hey, we'll solve this problem for you for, you know, $3 billion. If you buy this, we'll do this. You know, very transactional, which is not going to work in this case. We have to appeal to the logic, to the interests on both sides and get them to see that this is not going to be a good thing if they both went to war. So, you know, my less than satisfying answer is, I don't know. and I am worried that we're not there. Yeah, I mean, you're not really seeing it in the press.

The only thing I've seen is like that U.S. is urging restraint. It's like, cool, no shit. Yeah, everybody's urging restraint. Yeah. Yeah, you got to do more than urge. You just can't sit there and say, oh, we want peace. You got to get your ass out there and work for it. And you've got to send people and you've got to convince them.

And you may have to offer up some benes. some benefits out there. Look, you know, well, this trade deal, we'll do this. You guys got to stop here. Here's what's going to happen. It's not happening. You see the Chinese trying to, but, you know, China is not viewed as a helpful partner in India, and it is viewed as very heavily aligned with Pakistan.

And it is. Right now, it's pretty much the U.S. that could sort of straddle both sides or used to be. I don't know what it's like now. I got a question. whenever like, because, you know, we cozied up to Pakistan during the GWAT, and whenever we would hear about like the ISI doing, like doing fuckery and working with the Taliban and stuff, would India be like, see, I told you guys.

Oh, yeah. When I was there, I used to get slapped around all the time by the Indians. They're like, what the hell are you guys doing? These people are supporting people who are killing your troops. And, you know, you don't have a good response. that at least that they will be happy with. You can kind of nod, say, I understand, but there are bigger geopolitical strategic issues

we've got to deal with. Like, you know, if they cut off the roots into Afghanistan, we can't supply our people. But yeah, the Indians, the time and time again, were dumbfounded by how cozy we got with the Pakistanis, who they view rightly or wrongly as a personification of evil in the subcontinent. You know, but at the same time, the Indians were so cozy with the Russians that we viewed them very suspiciously.

So, yeah, it's, it's, and I would argue that probably still our image is tainted by how close we were to Pakistan during the G-WAT. Yeah, the Indians sure don't trust us. The two sides, I mean, the paranoia is also, I sense a bit through the roof, like the conspiracy. conspiracy theories and like if something, you know, if it rains out that day, they're like, oh, well, the Pakistanis did that. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's actually, it's, we're very much like that now, too.

Yeah. But yeah, there is, you know, there are a lot of regions throughout the world where conspiracy theories override truth, logic, policy. And there is a, there is a, there is a. tendency for both sides to blame the other for a significant amount of evil that goes on in their countries. You know, it's like one of the big things I remember during our involvement in Afghanistan is as we are trying to cozy with the Pakistanis and, you know, because we needed them for the support. diplomatically we were urging the Indians to get economically involved in Afghanistan to help rebuild the country. We didn't want to do it all by ourselves. And the Indians were like, okay, we'll see.

And they up their presence in Kabul and sent aid and stuff. The Pakistanis hit the roof. They went high paranoid and said, look, that's the Indians trying to surround us and get behind us. And what they're doing is building influence inside Afghanistan so that the next war, they invade us from both sides. And they started taking, you know, all different kinds of actions against India, especially in Afghanistan, because they thought, here they come. Here the Indians are going to try to overthrow us and do this kind of stuff.

So it's one of those, you know, damned if you do, damned if you don't. And it makes trying to bridge the gap between India and Pakistan very difficult. Because as soon as you come in with anything that looks like as part of a deal, there's a slight benefit to the other side, they're starting to point the finger. Aha, you're working them. You're in cahoots with these guys and you're going to try to overthrow our governments. You're like, oh, shit, no, we're just trying to prevent nuclear holocaust. So yeah, paranoia is, it goes, it doesn't take much to get them over the top.

It doesn't even take putting the match to the, to the fuse. What you can do is strike the match and they're gone. It's it. That's it. There it is. There it is. That's what you're going to do. Wow.

Lewis, can you give this like an insight of what it looks like, obviously without giving classified information away, what it looks like at a station or being the station chief in New Delhi and something like this is like brewing and about to pop off. Like what does it they look like for a station chief or even like, you know, somebody in the embassy who's a, you know, state department? It's a good question. And, you know, it's one of the things I loved about the job. job. When you say, what does a day look like? I don't know, because every day is different. And every day starts out quiet and turns into a shitstorm by one o'clock. Right now, you've got the embassy and everybody, not just the station, but the State Department, the Defense Atchay's office, the

middle group, everybody, going out to their contacts and trying to get a sense of what's happening How does India feel? Not what's in the press, whatever, but what do the upper echelons of their national security apparatus feel about this thing? Think about this thing. Ideally, what are the options on the table? Are you going to escalate? How high are you going to escalate? So you've got an embassy that's got everybody running around, on top of which you've got the Indian IB, the Intelligence Bureau, monitoring everything you do.

and they're all over your ass, everybody, and trying to find out, you know, somebody's leaking information, somebody's doing got to stop it. You got, you know, and they're telling their people, don't talk to the Americans. So you're coming up against walls. And you're trying to keep the policymakers in Washington informed so they can make rational decisions. Hopefully, if they're going to get engaged, they're going to get engaged with an understanding. And this is happening in Islamabad, too, an understanding of what each side is thinking, how they view this. are there points where they can de-escalate and back down with their honor, their dignity intact? What pressures are they facing?

Because, you know, India being a democracy, it's going to be faced with a lot of pressure. You've got your own political party, people who are running for election, and it mirrors what we go through here. A lot of your decisions are made based on domestic policies and politics and staying in office. what are the economic sectors saying because they're losing money. So how much pressure are you facing? What is the military saying? Because the military, I'm sure, is rattling sabers and, you know, we need to do something. We have been insulted.

But from the Indian perspective, you know, India's had some significant problems with their military. Not enough ammunition and equipment to sustain a long war. and by that I mean more than two or three weeks. A lot of obsolete equipment. They've got some new stuff, some good stuff, but a lot of stuff that should have been retired decades ago. So a lot of it is based on what can you do? I know what you want to do, but what are your capabilities?

And you've got analysts back here at the CIA, at the State Department, at DOD, trying to figure out what can India do? What are they capabilities? You've got people in New Delhi trying to figure out what are their intentions, which is probably more important than their capabilities. But if an Indian response or a Pakistani response is going to be based on what they can do, maybe you can moderate that response. As you tell, look, you can't go beyond two or three weeks before it all starts to come undone. So why even start?

And that sort of thing. So you've got people running around trying to meet contact, sources, individuals, and try to get a sense. I don't know if Washington has sent out instructions to the embassy to get involved in mediating at this stage, but at least in pressuring or discussing. with each government the benefits of not escalating, of responding in a measured way. Because that would be the next step. You get your information, you figure out what's going on, what they want to do,

and then you go out and say, okay, maybe it's not a good idea to escalate. So it's probably, it's pretty busy. You're probably looking at 18, 20-hour days. Yeah. Fun fact, there's no ambassador to NDRPAC. Pakistan. Yeah, excellent. Yeah, just, and it's exactly where you want to be when a nuclear war is looming. And again, that's what that's, you know, it gets back to, to the point I make that I don't get a sense that Washington is actively involved in trying to de-escalate the situation. And if we're not involved, I don't hope. I don't have a lot of hope that, that anybody else.

else who's going to try to get involved is going to have much success. God. Why do I never feel better about these conversations we have on eyes on, geopolitics, not just for you, Lewis, I'm just generally. Oh, I like maybe making people uncomfortable and unhappy. It's one of my main charms. Yeah. Because, look, to be honest, the world is in, and I apologize to all the people all

insult and everything, but the world's a piece of shit. it is a mess. It is driven by human beings with all their flaws and greeds and the miscalculations that go on and that lead to disaster are pretty significant. And when you start looking at these things, it doesn't make you feel good. If you ever watch the government in action, it spends a significant amount of time behind the scenes putting out fires overseas. And it is.

It's like a fire brigade. There's shit happening out there so often, so bad, so much. And, you know, Americans don't know it. You don't realize that you don't pay attention. But you've got a lot of diplomats out there banging on doors and trying to calm things down before it gets to the point that it's a problem for us. You know, people look at it and say, it's out there. It's not on our shores. There's a reason it's not here.

And that's because you have people out there in uniform. the form in civilian clothes on the front lines, keeping it out there and stopping it from coming here. It doesn't succeed all the time, but it succeeds 90% of the time. And if you don't have an active effort to keep things from going out of hand or being worse than they are, don't get me wrong, it's not pretty out there, it's bad. But if you don't have an active effort to keep it from getting worse, you don't know how it's going to end up in here.

Yikes. Now it'll be okay. Do you have any inkling of how you see this one turning out, this particular, you know, dust up? Do you think this is going to be like the others? Is it going to be like the other border clashes where there's some sort of a conventional conflict? And do you have any thoughts about, you know, what makes this one different or why it might turn out differently? Oh, that's good. And I'll tell you, I'm reticent to answer.

because I feel every time I give an answer, the opposite happens. Yeah, I'm predicting the future is pretty difficult. I mean, we all get that part. Yeah, look, I think there's a better than even chance that this will end up like it usually does. You're going to have the first week or two. And again, you know, you can apply the U.S. model to that. We get upset about something,

oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, and then the next crisis comes and we forgot about that. And we're on to something else. And India is very much that way. Right now, emotions are high. This is a terrible thing. They are justifiably pissed off.

But I think, and I sort of, there's a little bit of hope, take some comfort in that they haven't acted yet. And the fact that they haven't acted yet, because they could, you know, they can pretty much launch something relatively quickly. But the fact that they haven't acted yet is a sign that maybe they are giving everybody time to calm down. Get this out of your system.

They're evil. They're bad. Oh, my God, we're going to do something. And then when emotions are not as high as they are, they will respond, but maybe respond in a more measured way. You know, the Indian intelligence services have a fairly robust covert action capability in the subcontinent. Maybe they could do something to that effect where there is deniability, there is a response, everybody winks, the Indian public is happy, and the Indian government denies it.

It could be enough, as I said before, some strikes on terrorist training. training camps, which allows for a limited Pakistani response, which is acceptable to India, and then everybody goes back to negotiations. The thing is that that always happens, not always, but majority times it happens when the U.S. is involved in negotiations and creating that bridge between them. And where the U.S. can say, okay, okay, you guys did this, they did that. Here's, let's wiser heads prevail here and they go back and forth. Without somebody backing both sides up like that, there is a potential for it to escalate.

Now, right now, I think there's probably a 60% chance that that's how it's going to end up. An acceptable response from India and acceptable response from Pakistan, and everybody goes their merry way. and then we have another year or two of not talking at the dinner table between each other and back to negotiations and et cetera, et cetera. But as you said, predicting the future is hard and we should never rule out miscalculation on either side. We should never rule out a mistake. And the way the Pakistani system is structured, there's nothing to stop a core command.

commander from saying, you know what, I'm pissed off. Who do these Indians think they are and taking it up a notch? And at that point, the Indians are going to say, well, you know what? We got to respond and then things start to get out of hand. Cargill in 99 was an example of that. We got a little bit out of hand. And it could have gotten worse. And I think the U.S. should be ready in case it starts to get out of hand to step in and say, okay.

this is a somewhat unrelated question but as we're talking it brings up something that you know i've just been interested in about the relationship between the united states military and the indian military um and you know i've talked to a guy who's a special forces dude um and maybe this is going back more than a decade probably at this point they did a j set in india and like the indians wouldn't let them leave the barracks like that's how constrained and how paranoid they kind of were about it. But now you see press release reports where it seems like the United States and India does pretty normal routine military training exercises together, special forces or conventional in India itself. I was just wondering if you had any thoughts

about kind of how that relationship plays out against India's, you know, historic non-alignment policy. Yeah, that's that's a good point. The relationship between the U.S. overall, and it includes the military, and India is horrendously complicated. And it is, it is bipolar. You know, yeah, India's had a history of non-alignment, but that non-alignment has somehow always been aligned with Russia. And India hates to be pulled into any kind of alliance. And this is one of the things I think we're never going to get to the point with India that we want to get to.

Like, say, in the past, where we were with NATO countries, with certain countries in the Middle East. No, they don't want that. The Indians and elements within the Indian government are either very anti-American. having been raised during the nine-line movement pro-Russia, pro-Soviet Union time, or very suspicious of American intentions. Part of it is our close relationship with Pakistan at one time. Part of it is, you know, they see what we do and what we want,

and it's not what they want. So they're very suspicious. They are concerned with, you know, U.S. influence. And that don't mean, you know, necessarily political influence. But, you know, hell, you send out 300 guys to do joint training with the Indians. And then you let them out in the evening and the afternoon. You know, American culture is addictive. You know, the average American soldiers, you know, guys, I would even say to some extent naive.

But they're very open, very friendly. They're very welcoming. And the Indians are going to say, hey, these guys aren't bad. I kind of like these people. And for the Indians, that's like, oh, that's not a good thing. You've got to stay with your Indianness and not trust the Americans because the Americans want something. And we do. Everybody wants something.

So we're going to see, I mean, the Indians have seen the American military machine in action. They have made the conscious decision to say, that's where it is. That's what we need because nobody else's system works. American system works wonderfully. Even with the whole of things that happen, it works wonderfully. We need that system. How do we get that without landing in the American camp? Because we don't, you know, we want India as a counter to China.

And India's like, well, we don't necessarily want to be the same counter to China as you want us to be. We want to go our own way. But how do we get your thing without having to be part of it? of your alliance. So you're going to see a lot of that interest in, there's a lot of interest in American tactics, American logistics, American operations, and they want that. They know they can't get that from just reading books.

They need to work with the U.S. and they need to work with American troops. But at the same time, man, the paranoia runs so high. The Indian security system looks at every American soldier and it's like, okay, who's an intelligence officer? Who wants to recruit our guys? And they're like, no, that's not where it is. But you can't convince them of that. So it's it's bumping heads. I want this and I don't want you.

But for the U.S., it's a package deal. You get this, but you get us. Does the Indian intelligence apparel, like service look at Russia the same way? No, no, no. Not even close. The Indians have, I won't call it a list, but that's probably the easiest way describe it, a list of

national security threats. As you can imagine, number one is Pakistan. You know who number two is? United States. Really? Not China. China's three. Why, though? Because we present the biggest counterintelligence threat to them in their view. And this is what I'm talking about,

counterintelligence threats. The security apparatus looks at, you know, Pakistan, obviously, it's for obvious reasons, but the U.S., all the U.S. is there. You guys are insidious. You're trying to spy on us. You're trying to steal our secrets. And you kind of tell them, you know, who is?

The Russians are. It doesn't sink. You've got generations of Indian security officers who have had training in Russia, have had Russians come and train them, they've had relatively good relations with them. So it's harder for them to view Russia as a big threat as opposed to the U.S.

And you see that with Western allies of the United States. We're not high on their list as a threat because we've had decades of relations and sharing information, that kind of stuff, joint training and these sort of things. And that's how India views Russia, the way Europe views the United States. Wow.

Do you think that's sort of a generational thing, Lewis? Because I'm just a little interested in this topic. You know, like some people have said that, you know, sometimes the former British colonies are more British than the British themselves are today. And I don't think anyone would. say that about India, maybe New Zealand. But anyway, friends of mine from India have told me, like, the younger generation sees themselves, like, as more Western than we here in the West do. That, like, total acceptance of that culture to the point of, like, kind of ridiculousness

with consumption, consumerism, etc. Do you think that's, like, a generational thing, tilting more towards Russia versus the United States? Most definitely. And that's an excellent point, because you have the older generation who are still in charge, still in power, who grew up under the non-aligned movement, who grew up under a socialist system, and who have those views toward Russia and toward the U.S. The younger generation that's coming up now is extremely interesting. This is the first generation, and this is going to sound funny, but it's the first generation that's had credit cards and are now sucking up dead like nobody's business. It is an informational generation.

They are on, you know, everybody is, but they are heavily into social media on the internet and are seeing culture outside, the non-traditional culture. There are, as a generation where a lot of them have been to the U.S. and Europe, for work. Many of them have come back. Many of them gone. You know, I had, when I was in, in India, I had, I had my in-laws at the time, they needed to get a medical checkup, so I took them to a hospital. And it was, it was interesting. The hospital looked like a resort in the Caribbean, the building itself. It looked like something from what, that Atlantis, group or whatever they put up all these things.

And you walk in and it was high end. Oh, my God, was at high end. At that time, India had two of the world's 10 best microsurgery hospitals in the world. The hospital we went into was started by an Indian doctor who had practiced in the U.S. for 20 years and come back and started this hospital to give back to. to the Indian people. And you see a lot of that. And these people who have spent decades out in the West come back.

And they come back very Western. They're still Indian and they still have a lot of the Indian culture and everything ingrained in them. But they've also added on another strata of Western culture. And this new generation is much more accepting of the West. They view them something. Look, you look at the IT industry in America. It's 60% Indian, 70% Indian. And they go back and forth.

And their families come back and forth. And this is one of the things why it kind of pisses me off in part about the immigration thing. Dudes, this is the greatest American empire building you can have where people come in here, get Americanized and go back home and Americanize their countries all willingly. no coercion. Hey man, America's great. When I was in Latin America, the U.S. Embassy everywhere I've been to was always

battling to get rid of pirating, because everybody was pirating U.S. cable television. And I used to say, that's a stupid idea. These people are sucking down American programming, American commercials,

American shows all the time. You know what that does? Americanized them, and they like America and they like the West, and they like this, and American culture, for one of a better word, you're subverting them. You're making them part of the American Empire, and you cut that off, and you cut that off in total. So, yeah, you have a generation of Indians who, and this troubles the older generation, who are very Americanized, and you see it as an example. The Indian Civil Service has been, until recently,

the most prestigious job you can get in India. I mean, it's hard. You've got to go through the Indian Civil Service college. It's like four years of training. And, you know, it comes with a lot of perks, a lot of benefits, a lot of stuff,

and you climb up. But that was seen as this is the premiere. This is where you want to go. That's flipped. And now it's business. It's IT, it's call centers, it's all this thing. That's what's become prestigious.

The Indian security services used to complain to me that they cannot hire people because they're competing with people who work in, you know, with the IT industry. And I don't know the actual number, so I'm just going to throw out a number. But an Indian civil servant is making $500 a month. They get housing. They get a car and a driver. The guy in IT is making $2,000 a month. He says, how can we compete? and they were they were always short-handed because they couldn't they couldn't do that so now you've got you've got a younger generation that is reaching out doing business with the West living with the West traveling out there more often they're changing and they're coming up and they're budding up against the older generation and saying whoa whoa whoa no this is not what we understand and how we grew up and this is where we don't think so it's I think you

you've got probably another 10 years before that old generation, enough of it is gone that the new people coming up are going to have a significant impact on attitudes. That's interesting. Yeah. Hopefully. Talking a country of what, 1.3 billion people now? Yeah.

Hopefully there's no nuclear war between this now and 10 years from now. Oh, I'm not a betting man, but I would not take that. wager. That there would be or it wouldn't be? Look, someone's going to fuck up. I have undying confidence in the human race

fucking up. That's just, it's yeah, look, 28 years dealing with people professionally someone's going to fuck up. It is a bit scary that they give command of control over to like generals.

Yeah. The Indians don't of nuclear weapons. All right, Pakistan. Yeah, I agree. It's, it's, you know, it, one of the things that the U.S. had looked at, and I don't know if it's ever gone anywhere,

is, is to sit down and work with the Indians and maybe the Pakistanis on, on developing a sound command and control of nuclear weapons. You know, look, de facto, they have nuclear weapons. We're not going to,

they're not going to get rid of them. We're not going to make them, get rid of it. The best thing to do is give them, help them with a system that gives them some positive control that this does not get out of hand. I don't know if that's ever gone beyond the drawing board or just discussions, but that would be extremely helpful to give both sides the ability of civilian leadership control of nuclear weapons. And not because, you know, the military is a terrible thing. In both these countries, the military tends to be the organization that can get shit done.

But, you know, it's the old saying. When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And everything looks like a conflict. Well, that's just another great, wonderful weapon that will help us win the conflict. Whereas civilians who are not the brightest crayons in the box, but have a lot of other shit they got to worry about like, well, you know, I got to get reelected, so I got to keep the people happy. The people aren't going to be happy if they get blown to smithereens. So maybe I don't want to have a nuclear exchange.

Will in the end decide, yeah, this is not a good idea. So a positive command and control of nuclear weapons, decision making is probably a good thing. And if anything, the U.S. should invest in that effort in both India and Pakistan to say, you don't want this stuff lying around. Lewis, this is always a pleasure. Jack, you got anything else? No, I don't think so. I mean, that's a pretty good, you know,

thumbnail sketch for a very complicated topic. I really appreciate your insights. My pleasure. We got to get you back on the team house as well, one of these days, too. Might as well, like crack into stuff. I'm sure there's things we miss, too, during your career.

I'd love to hit up. Literally one of my favorite episodes in the last couple years. guys do us a favor check out jack's new book we defy secret history of special forces out now it is a it is a very good book very good yeah yeah i read it's good oh thank you um lewis where can people find you i'll throw some links down in the description for you link no i don't i don't want people to find me okay uh yeah um i'm i'm hiding out i am leading a contemplative peaceful life If people need to get a hold of me, they get a hold of me through you. All right, fine.

If you need something from Lewis, hit me up. And guys, best way to support the show is patreon.com slash the team house. You get the team house ad free. You get eyes on geopolitics ad free and early access to you. You get a few days before. 10 bucks. For $10, you can get a patch as well, including all that stuff. So help support the show, Patreon.com.

slash the team has all links will be in the description thanks guys this is awesome