Introduction to Chapters 11 to 13

Summary

As previous chapters have revealed, the imposition of the global Cold War on Asia and the Middle East faced resistance – particularly in India, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. Even more, it provoked the creation of alternative visions for a world able to manage, contain, and possibly overcome the Cold War. Asian–African Internationalism emerged in the late 1940s as an early reaction to the unfolding post-war world, although it focused primarily on overcoming imperialism and colonialism. In comparison, Non-Alignment engaged with the Cold War while attempting to stay formally out of it as a third force. Various strands of pan-Islamism sought alternatives to the Cold War, and even worked to transcend it. Though the three offered different alternative visions to the contemporaneous Cold War world, they overlapped in terms of ideas and membership.