Russia, Japan, and India act as swing states between West and challengers.

Evidence

By adopting Western ideology and using it to challenge the West, Russians in a sense became closer to and more intimately involved with the West than at any previous time in their history. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 387 (#complicates, via linked claim)

During the Cold War, India, the third “swing” core state, was an ally of the Soviet Union and fought one war with China and several with Pakistan. Its relations with the West, particularly the United States, were distant when they were not acrimonious. In the post-Cold War world, India’s relations with Pakistan are likely to remain highly conflictual over Kashmir, nuclear weapons, and the overall military balance on the Subcontinent. To the extent that Pakistan is able to win support from other Muslim countries, India’s relations with Islam generally will be difficult. To counter this, India is likely to make special efforts, as it has in the past, to persuade individual Muslim countries to distance themselves from Pakistan. With the end of the Cold War, China’s efforts to establish more friendly relations with its neighbors extended to India and tensions between the two lessened. This trend, however, is unlikely to continue for long. China has actively involved itself in South Asian politics and presumably will continue to do so: maintaining a close relation with Pakistan, strengthening Pakistan’s nuclear and conventional military capabilities, and courting Myanmar with economic assistance, investment, and military aid, while possibly developing naval facilities there. Chinese power is expanding at the moment; India’s power could grow substantially in the early twenty-first century. Conflict seems highly probable. … India will strive to emerge, not only as an independent power center in the multipolar world, but as a counterweight to Chinese power and influence.” — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 675 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Regime actors divide into members, challengers, and outsiders by access.; A state can become a proxy battleground between rival great powers; Post-Cold War global conflict centers on the West versus challenger civilizations — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 654 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Adopting Western ideology drew Russia closer to the West than ever #complicates (0.76) — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 387
• India and China are on a collision course as competing Asian great powers #complicates (0.75) — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 675
• Pakistan, Iran, and China formed a de facto anti-Western axis by the mid-1990s. #complicates (0.73)
• A state can become a proxy battleground between rival great powers #complicates (0.72)