India's regional foreign policy, largely underscored by confidence in a relationship with the United States that has now been usurped by Pakistan, is at a crossroads. A high-level visit by Indians to Afghan President Hamid Karzai is recognition that new thinking has become necessary, though it might be too late as Karzai looks to forge an alliance with Islamabad. - M K Bhadrakumar (Mar 11, '10)

During his flying visit to Kabul, President Mahmud Ahmadinejad trumpeted the fact that Afghan and Pakistani intelligence had cooperated with Iran in the capture of militant leader Abdulmalik Rigi. Iran wants to extend this multilateral cooperation to the fight against terrorism and drug trafficking. This would involve closer cooperation with the United States and foreign troops in Afghanistan, and therein lies the problem. - Kaveh L Afrasiabi (Mar 11, '10)

This week's United States House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing over the Google incident in China has shed much light on the conventional logic that has kept Washington and Beijing engaged in recent decades. The issues now facing the US and China are straining relations like never before, leading many Americans to wrestle with whether it makes sense to even be in a relationship with Beijing at all. - Benjamin A Shobert (Mar 11, '10)

Indonesia is weighing the benefits of a new strategic partnership with the United States ahead of President Barack Obama's visit later this month to his childhood home. While deepening economic and security ties could put Jakarta at the forefront of the US's re-engagement with Southeast Asia, many Indonesians fear the US has a "predatory" agenda. - Sara Schonhardt (Mar 11, '10)

Despite being a software superpower, India lags behind nations such as China in the security needed to protect critical networks from a cyber-warfare strike. An attack could cripple government offices and disable India's electrical and communications grids, while dealing a blow to a myriad of internationally outsourced operations and a corporate sector that has yet to wake up to the threat. - Indrajit Basu (Mar 11, '10)