Some Pakistani commentators have argued that Indian leaders specifically rejected the notion of such a confederation during the early years of the Cold War, when Pakistan attempted to covertly contact India to outline the possibility of Indo-Pakistani defence cooperation in Kashmir against growing Chinese ambitions in the region, which was rejected by India with the reasoning that the entirety of Kashmir is an integral part of India alone which shuts down the question of any Pakistani presence in the region. Others have contended that two nations did not necessarily imply two states, and the fact that Bangladesh did not merge with India despite the cultural similarities (especially with Indian Bengal) after separating from Pakistan supports the initial two-nation theory professed by the Pakistan Movement.