The hostilities between India and Pakistan over the contested territory of Kashmir are igniting fears that a localized skirmish could boil over into a wider conflict and threaten the stability of the region.

Watching closely is China and President Xi Jinping, a party to the Kashmir dispute with a stake in the outcome.

“For China, the stakes are high. Pakistan is its closest ally, and Beijing would not like to see it humiliated,” Sadanand Dhume, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), told Fox News Digital.

“Seen through the prism of U.S.-China competition, each country has a ‘side’ in this conflict. China is joined at the hip with Pakistan, whereas the U.S. and India have grown increasingly close over the past two decades,” Dhume added.

Chietigj Bajpaee, senior research fellow for South Asia at Chatham House, said that India will try to ensure that the conflict remains limited and focus its efforts on targeting terrorists, avoiding civilian casualties. 

Bajpaee told Fox News Digital that maintaining an anti-Indian stance is important to the legitimacy of the Pakistani military and intelligence establishment, and adopting an assertive military posture will be necessary to assuage domestic pressures.

Paramilitary soldiers stand guard near Pahalgam in India on April 22. (Waseem Andrabi/Hindustan Times via Getty Images)

“Although I don’t see an imminent possibility of Pakistan breaking up or a spillover of the conflict into Iran or Afghanistan, the conflict could fundamentally alter the relationship between the military and the civilian government and population, which has already been in decline,” Bajpaee said.

The fear for many experts and policymakers is whether the clashes lead to inadvertent escalation between two nuclear-armed powers. India and Pakistan have an estimated combined 342 nuclear warheads, according to the Arms Control Association, and their nuclear doctrines are motivated by their mutual enmity and desire to deter the other.  

President Donald Trump has not yet engaged directly with Indian or Pakistani officials, but said Wednesday he wants to see them “work it out” and that “if I can do anything to help, I will be there.”