An Assessment Of Russia-Ukraine Tensions
Dear Reader,
Happy New Year! We hope 2022 brings prosperity and normalcy to our lives.
This week, our work at Takshashila included a review of 2021 from a public policy perspective, how India can deal with a third COVID-19 wave, and an assessment of Russia-Ukraine tensions.
An Assessment Of Russia-Ukraine Tensions
Our latest intelligence estimate, authored by Aditya Pareek, assesses the implications of the ongoing Russia-Ukraine tensions. Some of the key judgements identified in the document are:
•The recent Russian military build-up on Ukraine’s border is likely to be a coercive ‘threat in being’ meant to apply pressure on the US and NATO. An overt kinetic conflict involving Russian and Ukrainian forces is unlikely in the next 12 months.
• In the next 12 to 48 months, deployment of nuclear-capable missiles with ranges upward of 500 km by both NATO and Russia may be a possibility.
• Over the next 48 months, higher political tensions and military preparedness may become normal in Europe.
• Ukraine and Georgia are unlikely to gain NATO membership in the next 48 months.
• In the unlikely event of a major overt offensive by Russian forces into Ukraine within the next 1 to 12 months, the US, UK, Germany, and other NATO members are unlikely to do more than impose sanctions on Russia and supply war material to Ukraine.
• If imposed on Russia within the next 2 to 24 months, prospective sanctions will be aimed at inflicting economic pain, degrading President Putin’s power, and turning Russian public opinion against him.
• The prospective sanctions could specifically target the Nord Stream II gas pipeline and Russia’s access to the SWIFT fund transfer messaging service. They may also include individual sanctions against people seen as close to President Putin both in and outside Russia.
The Third COVID-19 Wave
In an article in The Wire Science, Mahek Nankani and Harshit Kukreja identify ten mistakes India must avoid to better deal with a third COVID-19 wave. These mistakes include conducting state assembly elections in an as-usual fashion; price capping of masks, hand sanitisers and PCR test kits; and the flagging pace of vaccination. On the latter, they write:
India missed its target to fully vaccinate all eligible adults in the country against COVID-19 by December 31, 2021; thus far, we have covered 65%. Data from the UK suggests 90% of hospitalised people are unvaccinated, iterating the importance of being vaccinated, especially in the face of more transmissible variants of the virus. Together with India’s poorer healthcare infrastructure, the number of daily new cases in the third wave could reportedly reach as high as 2 million.
To find out what other mistakes we must avoid to better deal with the third wave:
2021: External Challenges & Internal Disunity
Lt. Gen. Prakash Menon, in an article in ThePrint, analyses the year that was from a geostrategic perspective. On the health of India-China relations in 2021, he writes:
China’s aggression in Ladakh and its continued intransigence to restore the territorial status quo have provoked India to shift its weight towards the US. The resurrection of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) is a testimony to this fact. India has made it clear that it will not be a part of any military alliance but would instead prefer to sit in a common tent, depending on the issues at stake.
At a time of heightened geopolitical anxieties, India’s domestic disunity, Gen. Menon argues, has been laid bare. He writes:
As 2021 comes to a close, it is apparent that internal disunity is growing and has surfaced as a threat that can no longer be ignored in India’s management of its strategic affairs. The emergence of religion as the ideological horse to gain political power has ignited historic rifts. These are issues that modern India has been struggling to suppress in order to focus on what really matters to its citizens — poverty, illiteracy, and ill health.
If India’s political parties are so blinded by electoral calculations and are unwilling to act against assaults on the nation’s social cohesion, the threat to India’s internal unity is indeed grave. India cannot afford to alienate its religious minorities, as it will be giving way to exploitation by its adversaries due to its toxic communal soil.
Assessing India’s Semiconductor Ecosystem Schemes
The Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), GoI, notified four separate schemes for building a semiconductor ecosystem in India on 21st December 2021, six days after the union cabinet approved a ‘comprehensive program for the development of a sustainable semiconductor and display ecosystem’. Pranay Kotasthane and Arjun Gargeyas had analysed the press release after it came out here and here.
In his new article, Pranay analyses the four notifications systematically. First, he lists the schemes’ motivations and details. Then he assesses the schemes, listing down the positive aspects and highlighting a few concerns.
The Policy Hits & Misses Of 2021
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness...” If Charles Dickens were around, that’s probably how he would sum up the year that was 2021. But what did the policy wonks at Takshashila think about in 2021? And what’s their one big prediction for 2022? Watch our new video to find out:
Citizen’s Role In Availing Welfare Services
How do citizens navigate through the complex State apparatus to acquire welfare services? What factors can facilitate this process? What obstacles do they face? In the 5th January episode of All Things Policy, Apurva Kumar and Sarthak Pradhan discuss how citizens “claim the state”.
Why You Should Take Our Health & Life Sciences Programme
The Graduate Certificate in Public Policy (Health and Life Sciences) Programme is for those who wish to understand the political economy of public health and life sciences. Admissions for the next cohort, beginning 15th January 2022, are closing on 12th January. This new year, gift yourself and your friends an opportunity to learn Public Policy from some of the best minds in the country.
The programme traverses a holistic path, analysing the interplay between the healthcare system and policies. It includes webinars on Public Health, Gene Editing, Clinical Trials and Biobanking. The first five weeks focus on the core modules and are common to all GCPP specialisations. They cover the fundamentals of public policy, economic reasoning for public policy and effective communication.
The second half of the programme deep-dives into the Health and Life Sciences specialisation. The curriculum is carefully curated and vetted by Shambhavi Naik and her team at Takshashila to ensure relevant and engaging topics.
The highlight of the specialisation is the 2nd workshop, the Policy Simulation Exercise. It is meant to engage students in solving a real-life policy problem. During the three day workshop, the students are divided into teams that compete to propose viable policy solutions to pressing issues.
What We Have Been Reading
This week’s book is How Not To Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking by Jordan Ellenberg. Recommending it, Atish Padhy says:
It is a common refrain that most people never really need to use any of the mathematics they were taught in school. In How Not To Be Wrong, Jordan Ellenberg comprehensively refutes this claim, arguing that maths is merely common sense by other means. He illustrates how mathematical concepts are central to most aspects of our lives, and more importantly, to many of our fallacies and biases.
Using examples from bad journalism, faulty scientific research, election campaigns and gossip from the lives of famous mathematicians, Ellenberg, with great wit and clarity, introduces calculus, 3D geometry, probability theory, algebra and number theory. In the process, he justifies the title of his book, showing ways in which we can be more careful in our use of statistical data, and more informed in how we consume the news and the results of scientific research. You need to read this!
That’s it from us this week. Once again, we wish you and your loved ones a very happy new year. Take care and stay safe!