Paul M. McGarr, "Spying in South Asia: Britain, the United States, and India's Secret Cold War" (Cambridge UP, 2024)

Spying in South Asia: Britain, the United States, and India's Secret Cold War (Cambridge UP, 2024) is the first comprehensive history of India's secret Cold War. It examines interventions made by the intelligence and security services of Britain and the United States in post-colonial India and their strategic, political, and socio-cultural impact on the subcontinent.

It showcases how the interventions of these intelligence agencies have had a significant and enduring impact on the political and social fabric of South Asia. The specter of a 'foreign hand', or external intelligence activity, real and imagined, has occupied a prominent place in India's political discourse, journalism, and cultural production. The book probes the nexus between intelligence and statecraft in South Asia. It analyses how the relationships between agencies and governments helped shaping Indian democracy. Through a lively cast of characters and an analysis of covert operations, the book explores Western (US and UK) as well as Soviet perceptions of India during the Cold War. At the same time, it points to India’s agency in plying the Cold War game. The book also moves beyond the Cold War to explore Indian intelligence in the post-Cold War years and in the aftermath of 9/11.

Looking at the relationship between intelligence, politics, society, and (pop)culture, the book asks why, in contrast to Western assumptions about surveillance, South Asians associate intelligence with covert action, grand conspiracy, and justifications for repression. In doing so, it uncovers a fifty-year battle for hearts and minds in the Indian subcontinent.

Paul McGarr is a lecturer in intelligence studies at King’s College London. He has published over two dozen peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters on South Asian security and intelligence issues

These have appeared in Intelligence & National Security, The Journal of Strategic Studies, Diplomatic History, The International History Review and many other journals and edited collections.

He is also the author of two monographs, The Cold War in South Asia: Britain, the United States and the Indian Subcontinent, 1945-1965 published by Cambridge University Press in 2013 and Spying in South Asia: Britain, the United States and India’s Secret Cold War published by Cambridge University Press in 2024.

Mentioned:

• The Church Committee Report (Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities (1976),
• Paul Mc Garr, The Cold War in South Asia (2013)
• Luca Trenta, The President’s Kill List (2023)
• Hugh Wilford, The CIA: An Imperial History (2024)
• JFK Assassination Records

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