The Indian air strikes penetrated deep into Pakistan, and the retaliatory shelling across borders put the subcontinent on the edge again, and many feared further escalation between the two nuclear neighbors.
According to Pakistani authorities, at least 26 people were killed by missiles launched by India on May 6, 2025. India said it was targeting the "terrorist infrastructure" location in response to the April 22 attack that left dozens of tourists killed by gunmen in Kashmir, which was managed in India.
Pakistan warned that it will respond “at the time, place and method of choosing.” Meanwhile, Pakistan's "line of control" separated in Kashmir and Pakistan-controlled areas was bombarded, killing 15 people.
It represents the worst battle between the two countries in decades. But, as explained by the article in the Dialogue Archive, Kashmir has long been the source of tensions between India and Pakistan.
1. The root of conflict
The dispute in Kashmir is located on the northern end of the Indian subcontinent and the western border of Pakistan, dating back to the Indian division in 1947 and the policy of colonial British rule before that.
As Sumit Ganguly, an expert in Indian politics and foreign policy, explained, the British gave nominal autonomous rulers, and the prince ruled the choice of the country they wanted to join: Pakistani Muslim-majority Pakistan or India - Modi India India. This puts Jamu and Kashmir's monarch Maharaja Hari Singh in a tricky position - he is the Hindus' ruling on a predominantly Muslim population.
“India was created as a secular state and he wanted to include Kashmir in the Muslim region to prove that a region that is primarily Muslim region can thrive in the Hindu majority committed to secularism. Pakistan, on the other hand, seeks Kashmir because of its physical proximity and Muslims,” exerted the carnival. ”
While Singh was still in deliberation, Kashmir was insurgents and the newly independent Pakistan gave the insurgents support. India sent troops with Singh's official joining India, while the first of the four Indian-Pakistan wars began in 1947. Finally, Pakistan gained one-third of the control over the disputed area.
“Neither country is fully aligned with Kashmir’s status. India claims that the state’s overall claim is part of its territory. However, Pakistan has always believed that Kashmir was ceded to India by Kashmir by a ruler and whose majority Muslim population does not represent the power of the two nuclear forces.
Read more: 75 years ago, Britain's plan to independence against Pakistan and India was unresolved in conflicts - especially in Kashmir
2. Not just a border dispute
But seeing Kashmir through the lens of Indian-Pakistan competition creates complex conflicts. Often overlooked in this reading are the views of many Kashmiris themselves, many of whom prefer independence.
Chitralekha Zutshi, a history professor at William & Mary, noted that the desire for autonomy in the region's groups has led to many independence movements and recurring.
Zutshi wrote that Pakistan supported some of these movements, the fact that India captured “the cancellation of unrest in the Kashmir Valley, a byproduct of its territorial dispute with Pakistan”. However, in doing so, the scholar continues to be dissatisfied with the “whole young Kashmiris” who think India is an “occupation force”.
She concluded: "The Kashmir dispute cannot be resolved both sides by India and Pakistan - even if the two countries are willing to work together to resolve their differences. This is because there are many aspects to the conflict."
Read more: The Kashmir conflict is not only a border dispute between India and Pakistan
3. A water battle?
Supporting the statement: The fact that Kashmiris are often overlooked is that the Indian Water Treaty (a crucial agreement that allows Pakistan and India to share water use from rivers in the region) is largely the investment of Fazlul Haq, a research scientist at Ohio State University, without Kashmiris.
Hak, who helped run the university’s Indus Water Project, explained that even before the latest violence broke out, the dispute over the treaty sparked tensions between India and Pakistan. The problem is that the original treaty has been praised as a success for many years without taking into account the effects of climate change. Melting glaciers put the long-term sustainability of the treaty at risk, endangering water supply to more than 300 million people.
"Although it is the main source of watershed, the Kashmiris have no role in negotiations or decision-making under the treaty," Hak wrote. It also does not provide a mechanism for any regional disputes. "Teniority in Kashmir's hydropower project brings India and Pakistan into a diplomatic stalemate before the recent attack," Hak said.
"The treaty is now in a difficult situation. Although technically the treaty remains in effect, India's formal review notice introduced uncertainty, halted key cooperation mechanisms and raised doubts about the long-term durability of the treaty." Pakistan said any attempt to supply water under the treaty would be considered an "act of war."
Read more: Tensions in Kashmir and the Warm Planet have put Indian Water Treaty on Life Support
4. On the cliff of the new war?
Four comprehensive conflicts occurred between India and Pakistan: 1947, 1965, 1971 and 1999.
But since the turn of the millennium, the cross-border skirmishes in Kashmir have been largely curbed, partly due to external pressure from the United States and other concerns about the economic and regional consequences of the conflict between nuclear-weapon neighbors.
Ian Hall, an international relations expert at Griffith University in Australia, wrote that calculus has changed. He noted that the economic cost of upgrading was almost no, and “there is little trade between India and Pakistan”.
Hall added that the main concern of both sides is “the political costs they will suffer if they do not take military action”.
Read more: India and Pakistan have fought many wars in the past. Are we on a new cliff?
5. Need Pakistan-India Hotline
Washington has played a major role in pulse tensions in the past crisis between Pakistan and India.
U.S. President Donald Trump's recent comments said he believes Pakistan and India will "figure it one way or another" suggesting it is a chance the United States may sit down.
But, as Syed Ali Zia Jaffery of the University of Lahore and Nicholas John Wheeler of the University of Birmingham, UK, pointed out, this creates problems.
They wrote: "The lack of trusted confidential communication lines between leaders of India and Pakistan is a major obstacle to communication. It prevents the appropriate appreciation of common vulnerability between the two, which is crucial for lowering the crisis," they wrote.
Their article uses examples of the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 to illustrate the importance of what the two scholars call "a channel of understanding communication." U.S. President John F. Kennedy and his Soviet rival Nikita Khrushchev "exchanged a series of letters, who acknowledged and expressed their common vulnerability to nuclear wars," said that building a bond of mutual sympathy and trust was crucial for a peaceful resolution of the crisis.
"The hotline between the highest levels of diplomacy in India and Pakistan will be an important step in preventing these crises from getting out of control. More importantly, in the event of a crisis, it may play a key role in managing the crisis, creating an important channel for the crisis and providing an important channel for the reduction and downgrade," added Jaffery and Wheeler.
Read more: Why a hotline is needed to help bring India and Pakistan back from the brink of catastrophic war