By use of nonlocal polarizability densities, we analyze the intramolecular screening of intermolecular fields. For two interacting molecules A and B with weak or negligible charge overlap, we show that the reaction field and the field due to the unperturbed charge distribution of the neighboring molecule are screened identically via the Sternheimer shielding tensor and its generalizations to nonuniform fields and nonlinear response. The induction force on nucleus I in molecule A, derived from perturbation theory, results from linear screening of the reaction field due to B and nonlinear screening of the field from the permanent charge distribution of B. In general, at first or second order in the molecular interaction, the screening-tensor expressions for the force on nucleus I involve susceptibilities of one order higher than the expressions derived from perturbation theory. The first-order force from perturbation theory involves permanent charge moments, while the first-order screened force involves linear response tensors; and the second-order screened force depends on hyperpolarizabilities, while second-order induction effects are specified in terms of static, lowest-order susceptibilities. The equivalence of the two formulations for these forces, order by order, is a new illustration of the interrelations we have found among permanent moments, linear-response tensors, and nonlinear response. This work also provides new insight into the dispersion forces on an individual nucleus I in molecule A by separating the forces into two distinct terms—the first term results from changes in the reaction of A to the fluctuating charge distribution of the neighboring molecule B, when nucleus I shifts infinitesimally, and the second term stems from changes in correlations of the fluctuating charge distribution of A itself. Changes in the fluctuation correlations are determined by changes in the classical Coulomb field of nucleus I and by the imaginary part of the hyperpolarizability density of A. The full dispersion force on nucleus I in A is equivalent to the screened force of an effective fluctuating field due to B at imaginary frequencies.