[JumpCrisscross]

> Pakistan-India conflict is orthogonal to America and China's

India is negotiating trade deals and weapons purchases with the West. (Historically, Moscow was its security source.) Pakistan got some F-16s in 2022, but otherwise has been deepending ties with Beijing. It's wild to suggest America's cold war with China is orthogonal to this conflict.

[sandspar]

Ask a random Indian in India whether he'd be willing to die for the US. The US and China have interests in the area, so maybe I shouldn't have said the word "orthogonal". But the original commenter said a conflict between India and Pakistan would be a "US-China proxy war". Come on. India and Pakistan have enough reasons to hate each other. They don't need America or China's goading. And neither India nor Pakistan would accept their conflict being characterized as a US-China war.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Ask a random Indian in India whether he'd be willing to die for the US

Not how proxy wars work.

> India and Pakistan have enough reasons to hate each other. They don't need America or China's goading

Not how proxy wars work. The backers enable. The proxies fight.

> neither India nor Pakistan would accept their conflict being characterized as a US-China war

This is how proxy wars work. They literally don’t if the proxies realise they’re fighting a foreign war on their homeland.

[air3y]

>This is how proxy wars work. They literally don’t if the proxies realise they’re fighting a foreign war on their homeland.

India and pakistan have contested boundaries and their hostilities doesn't depend on foreign powers. Interestingly, when the hostilities between china and india flared up in 2021, and india moved many divisions from its pakistan border to its chinese border, pakistan didn't change its posturing to put pressure on india. This was acknowledged by indian army during a press briefing. Both so far have never fought against each other for foreign powers, but have fought against each other for their own reasons. So no proxy wars so far.

[JumpCrisscross]

> India and pakistan have contested boundaries and their hostilities doesn't depend on foreign powers

Yes? That’s what lends it proxy war potential. An endemic war. Like, there were actual conflicts in e.g. Vietnam and Afghanistan before they became proxy wars. Those same risk factors are present today.

[random42]

It’s not a proxy war. Not every world event is about the US.

Source: I am an Indian.

[JumpCrisscross]

> It’s not a proxy war. Not every world event is about the US

Nobody said as much. The original comment described how this can escalate.