Managing Pakistan's failure

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shiv
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by shiv »

Pranav wrote: All Kayani's Men
by Anatol Lieven

This article shows calculations of the western elites with respect to Pakistan. They realize that this Frankenstein has to be supported and kept oriented against India otherwise it will turn on its creators as it goes down.
Thanks for posting this very interesting article.

In fact I have been saying what this guy has said.But he gives a lot more detail about the internal pisko of the Paki army than I knew - so the article is valuable to me

See this:
But whether or not the ISI is involved in future attacks, India will certainly blame Pakistan for them.

This creates the real possibility of a range of harsh Indian responses, stretching from economic pressure through blockade to outright war. Such a war would in the short term unite Pakistanis and greatly increase the morale of the army. The long-term consequences for Pakistan's economic development would, however, be quite disastrous. And if the United States were perceived to back India in such a war, anti-American feelings and extremist recruitment in Pakistan would soar to new heights. All of this gives the United States every reason to push the Pakistani military to suppress some extremist groups and keep others on a very tight rein. But Washington also needs to press New Delhi to seek reconciliation with Islamabad over Kashmir, and to refrain from actions which will create even more fear of India in the Pakistani military.

IN THE end, Washington must walk a very fine line if it wants to keep the military united and at least onboard enough in the fight against extremists. If it pushes the army too far by moving ground troops into Pakistan proper, the consequences will be devastating. The military-and therefore the state of Pakistan-will be no longer.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Sanku »

SSridhar wrote:
RamaY wrote:Sanku>>We can not bring down the number of Pakistani's by cruel act, however if natural forces, such as poverty lack of fertile land, low international help gradually turn it into a Somalia with a low life expectancy, surely no one can blame us?

I disagree Sanku-ji.

I recommend India does what Pakistan wants. Pakistan is established as the Islamic Heaven in this world. India should support Pakistan turn into purest-islamic-land (whatever that means).
RamaY & Sanku, both must be done. Why only one approach ? Let us fire on all cylinders. But, that could be done only after realization dawns on powers-that-be that Pakistan is our mortal enemy and Pakistan has absolutely no intention of developing friendly relationship with us and that we are on our own to slay this monster. We know that here on this forum perhaps, but is not otherwise widely known in India.
Sir me -- advocate inaction?
:-o :eek: :shock:

Merely saying that nature is more powerful than humans. We should be in sync with it, and go with the flow, be one with it, let our actions be in consonance.

Very peaceful and Gandhian no?
svinayak
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by svinayak »

Sanjay M wrote:
This article shows calculations of the western elites with respect to Pakistan. They realize that this Frankenstein has to be supported and kept oriented against India otherwise it will turn on its creators as it goes down.


Anatol Lieven = extremely Atlanticist = extremely biased

This is a guy who insists that Russia provoked war with Georgia. He's just throwing up a word salad.
But he gives real thinking behind the scene
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

Altair wrote:
RamaY wrote:I recommend India does what Pakistan wants. Pakistan is established as the Islamic Heaven in this world. India should support Pakistan turn into purest-islamic-land (whatever that means)
Do you want want to live in a neighborhood which stinks? Do you like people referring to your house as "the house adjacent to the stinky dumpster"? No matter how much cool and rich your house looks like,it will still be referred as such.
Well... if one is not interested-in/capable-of cleaning up the shit (a.k.a military action resulting in massive human losses) then one has no other option but to wait till the shit dries-up and becomes compost.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by ramana »

Do read the Anatole Lieven article. This guy knows his Pakjab and its Army.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

^ I am sorry Ramanaji. Which article you are talking about? Could you pls give me some reference?

Do you mean this? A Tale of Two Client States

TIA
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

So when it comes to choose between Pakistan and Afghanistan US chose Pakis. Fair enough.

The need of hour is to create a bigger choice in front of US in islamic world I guess....
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

Very interesting... posting it so people can make a case for Pakistan...

A Tale of Two Client States

Anatol Lieven wrote this article on 11.14.2007 where he said
The risks for the U.S. in Georgia are essentially twofold. The first is already occurring: the Saakashvili administration could become so authoritarian at home that it will reduce the entire U.S. democracy promotion agenda in the former Soviet Union to a farce. The second is much more serious: It is that faced with growing domestic discontent, Saakashvili will seek to rally the nation behind him through an attack on one of the two Russian-backed separatist territories, Abkhazia or (more likely) South Ossetia. The president could gamble that faced with the humiliation of seeing a favored client crushed by Russia, the U.S. will feel impelled to come to Georgia’s aid.

If Saakashvili ever does make that grave decision {which he did in Aug'2008}, it will be the last one he makes as Georgian president. For in practical military terms, there is almost nothing that the U.S. could or would do to help Georgia in these circumstances. Nonetheless, this would indeed represent a humiliation for the U.S., as well as a very great and totally unnecessary crisis in U.S.-Russian relations. It would also have serious implications for Russian behavior in other areas of truly vital U.S. interest, like Iran.
Saakashvili's blunder in Aug'2008 from wiki..
On August 10, 2008, the war in South Ossetia spread to Abkhazia, where separatist rebels and the Russian air force launched an all-out attack on Georgian forces. Abkhazia's pro-Moscow separatist President Sergei Bagapsh said that his troops had launched a major "military operation" to force Georgian troops out of the Kodori Gorge, which they still controlled.[14] As a result of this attack, Georgian troops were driven out of Abkhazia entirely.

So there we go folks... India should show it's muscle when TSP makes the right mistake, and offer other areas of mutual-interest/conflict to unkil to make him let TSP go from his geopolitical grip.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

From the same article
In the case of Pakistan, the U.S. needs to maintain its influence by increasing but redirecting its aid, as recommended in an interesting paper last week by Senator Joseph Biden. If necessary, Americans need to be asked to make the kind of sacrifices to help Pakistan that they made to strengthen European and Asian states against Communism. In the case of Georgia, U.S. policymakers should take a hard look at what aid and influence in that country really bring to the U.S. at all.
What is TSP fighting against, Terrorism or Radical Islam?
ramana
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by ramana »

Neither. Its fighting India.

I was referring to Anatole Leiven's article in this post

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 38#p896438
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

Thanks Ramana garu for the link. The farticlel I posted gives a glimpse into the other American client state Georgia and its story. We can see how it unraveled...

From that "All Kayani's Men" article
However, for Islamist terrorists who wish to carry out attacks against India, ISI help is not necessary {Distance ISI from the blame-game} (though it has certainly occurred in the past). The discontent of sections of India's Muslim minority (increased by ghastly incidents like the massacres of Muslims in Gujarat in 2002, and encouraged by the Hindu nationalist state government) gives ample possibilities for recruitmentUse Indian Media to blame Hindu majority for all the attacks. Babri-Masjid is old, use Gujarat riots as the new root-cause. Blame BJP/RSS for this and destroy political-right; the sheer size of India, coupled with the incompetence of the Indian security forces, give ample targets of opportunityBlame it on Indian armed forces; like in maoist attacks; and the desire to provoke an Indian attack on Pakistan gives ample motive. But whether or not the ISI is involved in future attacks, India will certainly blame Pakistan for them.

This creates the real possibility of a range of harsh Indian responses, stretching from economic pressure through blockade to outright war. Such a war would in the short term unite Pakistanis and greatly increase the morale of the army {Good for TSPA}. The long-term consequences for Pakistan's economic development would, however, be quite disastrousUse increased AID to sustain this. And if the United States were perceived to back India in such a waravoid this impression in TSP public NOT TSPA, anti-American feelings and extremist recruitment in Pakistan would soar to new heights. All of this gives the United States every reason to push the Pakistani military to suppress some extremist groups and keep others on a very tight rein. But Washington also needs to press New Delhi to seek reconciliation with Islamabad over Kashmir, and to refrain from actions which will create even more fear of India in the Pakistani military.
In summary
- US Needs TSPA
- Keep it Happy and Strong. But TSPA will continue to cause trouble in India.
- Increase economic Aid to compensate for Indian responses
- Use Indian media/WKKs/Left to push the blame of terror attacks on nationalistic right
- Once the nationalistic right is sufficiently undermined, ask for compromises on Cashmere
- Refrain India from actions which will create even more fear of Inda = no role in Afghanistan or west-asia
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Lalmohan »

so really far from being reisen d'eater, cashmere is the pistol TSP holds to its own head to convince unkil that more baksheesh is required or he'll blow his own brains out

so, maybe its time to call unkil's bluff?
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by ramana »

Lalmulla, Read the whole "All Kiyani's Men" article again and see for yourself a solution is there.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by svinayak »

ramana wrote:Lalmulla, Read the whole "All Kiyani's Men" article again and see for yourself a solution is there.
That article is the most important article and has to be read many times.

The US army is having less option and is losing support at home creating a dangerous situation.
But the situation is being deliberately let loose and war like condition is being prepared within the next 2-3 years.
http://www.clicker.com/tv/morning-joe/A ... 67392.html
Afghan war is not getting public support. Obama obsession about troop withdrawal

There is debate going on and how to make sure that pro war congress can continue the war. More money and more purchase - when the deficit is really biting


Morning Joe: Afghanistan 'Worse Than a Nightmare'
Air Date: Mon, 06/28/10
Season 610: Episode 0628

The Morning Joe panel discusses the top op-eds, including Bob Herbert's June 25 New York Times article, "Worse Than a Nightmare," on the war in Afghanistan.

RajeshA
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RajeshA »

The BRF thinking on Pakistan is of course known to BRFites, but there is little appreciation on BRF for the thinking in the corridors of power in Delhi.

The question is, can one explain the inability of the Indian Establishment to confront Pakistan head-on, other than using theories like pseudo-secular, votebank politics, obliging Americans, wimps, etc.

What are the constraints, what is the policy and what is the Weltanschauung behind it all?

I'd like to give benefit of the doubt to those, whose policies have been for me incomprehensible till now, and look at what is causing them to stay their hand.

Anatole Leiven's article puts some things, at least for me, in a different perspective.

Let's assume that the working policy of the world powers has been:
a) The Muslim World is useful to keep other powers in check.
b) The Muslim World is a pressure cooker and needs a pressure relief valve.
c) The Muslim World should always be kept dependent.
d) The Muslim World's resources should be readily available.
e) The Muslim World is to be appeased.
f) Playing the game scars the players.

a) The Muslim World is useful to keep other powers in check.

The West (Britain, USA) have often used the Muslims:
1) The Muslim League in India to keep the Congress in check.
2) Pakistan-backed Mujahideen to push Russia out of Afghanistan.
3) Exaggeration of the danger posed by Iran to keep Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries under American control.
4) Saddam Hussein's Iraq to keep Iran in check.
5) Hosting of Chechnya insurgents in UK to keep Russia on the toes.
6) Unrest in East Turkestan to put pressure on China.
7) Pakistan to keep India in check.
8) The West has always seen Central Asia to be Soviet Union's soft underbelly.

UK still hosts a large variety of Islamists from all over the world, including from Hizb ut-Tahrir. Why

China too has bolstered Pakistan to keep India down. Something we know all too well. Now the Chinese have expanded their relations with a host of Muslim countries for several reasons.

b) The Muslim World is a pressure cooker and needs a pressure relief valve.

US has made the rich Sheikhs dependent on American security umbrella and have a deep strategic cooperation, something which does not appeal to most Salafists. They have invaded Iraq, Afghanistan. The British intervention in the region is legendary.

And still one sees it is the British, who push for Mid-East Talks. The British Liberals often show sympathy to the Palestinian cause. The Americans highlight the Chinese crackdown on East Turkestan. Even though according to international law, Jammu & Kashmir belongs to India, the British would push for plebiscite, they would continuously question Indian position on Kashmir. We all remember David Muli-in-Bund. The Americans keep on calling on the Gulf countries trying to incite them against Shia Iran. Chechnya has always been under media spotlight, and calls of human-rights violations by the Russians have been aplenty in Western press.

The Chinese have their problems in East Turkestan, but have extended Pakistan full support to go after Kashmir.

So all powers **** the Muslims, but want the Muslims to let off their steam in some one else's yard. They do everything to keep sores on the far shores fresh and open. It is not in their interests that the conflicts die down. Everybody keeps on telling the Muslims where their biggest enemies lie.

This is what I read in Anatole Leiven article.

That is why a strategic partnership between India and USA will be difficult. This is also the reason why India will hardly find a sympathetic ear in London. We may all have a commonality in our 'democratic values'. But the valve has to go somewhere. So as long as the Americans feel the pressure by Muslims in Afghanistan, America would try to deflect it towards India. So long as Britain feels pressure from the Muslims residing in UK itself, they too would try to deflect it towards India. As such a partnership in the real sense of the meaning may not be possible. India is simply a very convenient and inviting pressure relief valve to let go of.

c) The Muslim World should always be kept dependent.

The richest Muslims are kept dependent on America's security umbrella. It is the same thing as hafta.
Most Muslim elite have their homes in America, Britain and France. The Pakistani Power Elite all have their homes in London. When West's beachhead in Mid-East, Israel, tighten the screws on the Arabs, they all run to America. When India gets mad at Pakistan, like during Operation Parakram, Pakistan finds some comfort from their patrons, the Americans. Egypt, Jordan, Gulf countries, Maghreb countries, Pakistan all get their military hardware from USA. Moreoever West gives the rulers of these countries international legitimacy through International bodies the West has put up after the Second World War.

d) The Muslim World's resources should be readily available.

Either the Oil-rich Muslim countries sell their Oil at a reasonable price to West and West's friends, or they would be threatened and invaded, like it happened with Iraq, and why Iran and Sudan is under constant pressure.

One has see, to what lengths the Americans have gone to, in order to get control of Central Asian resources, all Muslim lands, and how China and Russia have tried to keep them out.

e) The Muslim World is to be appeased.

This is the corollary of the above realities. Every country knows that they can be made a pressure relief valve by the other powers. Some have less to fear, while others a lot more to fear.

f) Playing the game scars the players.

This is the second corollary. Today UK is infested by the Islamists, extremists and other Islamic Terror groups. USA is one of the most hated countries in the Muslim World.

India has a lot to fear. With around 170 million Muslims within India and surrounded by other Muslim and Islamic countries in the neighborhood, India has the most to fear. We have a Muslim-majority region with a strong secessionist tendency. The problem does not end there. We have a serious enmity with one, Pakistan and baseless hostility from the other, Bangladesh in whose freedom struggle we even helped.

So in the Muslim roulette amongst the world powers, we are stuck with the most bullets in the gun. When the sharks start to encircle the sinners, the crusaders, it is Indian meat, that they are going to throw at the sharks to keep them at a distance.

And even as the world powers keep on throwing bones at the mad dog and shooing it to go bite somebody else, the mad dog is becoming a bigger and bigger mad monster.

This is the world we have inherited.

It is in these rocky waters, that Indian leaders are being asked to steer our ship. We on BRF say, let's slam our ship against the rocks and the rocks will make way. Our leaders on the other hand are cautious while they steer, but so inept at steering that the ship could break apart nevertheless.

What to do? What to do about Pakistan? More thoughts on this, some other time!
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Rudradev »

Shiv had posted recently about the fact that an anti-Taliban constituency exists in Pakistan, but currently only the US is benefiting from engagement with it, so (even as we advance the cause of a Taliban takeover of Pakistan on one hand), we should also engage with the anti-Taliban constituency and benefit from it just as the Americans are. I can't find that post of Shiv's to quote from, but I think this was the gist of part of it.

The problem, of course, is the nature of the beggar. The American might see a Paki beggar covered with sores, missing limbs, blind in one eye, and throw him a couple of coins to go and bother other people in the neighbourhood. An Indian might see the same beggar, and be stirred to welcome the beggar into his house for a hot meal and a comfortable bed.

The Paki beggar will happily accept the American's coins. However, from the Indian he will demand the right to sleep in the Indian's own bed with the Indian's wife. That is the delusional entitlement that even the anti-Taliban constituency in Pakistan has, and it stems from the catastrophic failure of subcontinental Islamism to recover its alleged supremacy for more than half-a-century since the British departed.

I believe that, (throwing PC caution to the winds) it is important to see the exercise of managing Pakistan's failure as one part of a holistic project of managing the failure of subcontinental Islamism... specifically the sort of Islamism that Maudoodi and co. espoused.

The Congress' management of Islamism (and the repercussions of that management on Muslim society) in India since 1947 has resulted in essentially two Categories of Indian Muslims. One is the pure, Islamic type who remains in ghettoes, marries four wives and studies nothing but the Quran, and consequently is a failure in terms of social and economic development. He is uneducated, unemployable, and isolated from the mainstream. The further India as a whole progresses along the path of development, the further behind the pure Muslim is left.

The second Category of Indian Muslim follows the Azim Premji/APJ Abdul Kalam/A.R. Rehman paradigm. He is educated, successfully integrated into the Indian mainstream, and makes the most of the opportunities afforded by social and economic development. This is not an all-elite group, but includes a vast middle-class with elite aspirations. The interesting thing about this kind of Muslim is that his Islam has become very personal, something observed for spiritual benefit and as a family tradition, with little social or political repercussion beyond this... in much the same way as the vast majority of Hindus revere their religious traditions. Allah, in fact, has become the bhagwan for such Muslims... and in a word, their Islam has become very Hindu. There is nothing pure about it.

Yes, I am aware there appear to be many exceptions to these two broad paths that Islam in India has bifurcated into. There are pure Muslims who were at the forefront of the national movement, such as Maulana Azad, and their legatees who still retain a strongly Muslim identity while espousing the Congress-vision, such as Rafiq Zakaria. There are rich criminals of the Dawood Ibrahim and Abu Asim Azmi ilk who hype the alleged grievances of the Pure Muslim as a means of achieving their economic and political agendas. And there is a Muslim clergy which also hypes the alleged grievances of the Pure Muslim to enhance their own power, some of them financed by external actors.

But these apparent exceptions are actually not large social Categories of Muslims... they are Agencies pursuing specific political, religious, economic and social goals.

The vast mass of Indian Muslim janata falls into one of the two broad Categories... Backward Pure Muslim, and Advanced Integrated (dare-I-say Dharmic) Muslim.

The extent to which Indian Muslims of either Category become influenced by the Agencies... be it a software engineer inculcated into Jihad or a slum dweller who plants car-bombs at Gateway of India or Javed Jaffrey making comments about Gujarat one day after the Mumbai attacks... is a measure of the degree to which bifurcation into the two broad Categories is incomplete. If bifurcation were complete, and the interference of foreign interests ruthlessly eliminated, the two Categories would represent a fairly stable model of Muslim integration within India.

Either have your pure Islam and be guaranteed lose the race, or embrace Dharmic Islam and have a fair chance of winning... that is the broad choice with which Indian Muslims are confronted today, not because of any malevolent social engineering by Hindus, but because of the failure of Islamism on the subcontinent and the concurrent advancement of secular Indian society with its inalienably Hindu ethos. The bifurcation represented by these two Categories is of course, still a work in progress, but the momentum of Indian society brings it ever closer to completion with each passing year.

The middle-ground between these two broad Categories, is essentially occupied by the categories of Muslims who went to Pakistan. These include: Educated but Islamist (if not pure) RAPE Muslims, the elite of Pakistan. The landowners of Pakistan who have bought into Pakistani Islamism as a means of protecting their feudal interests. A petit-bourgeouis of shopkeepers and tradesmen whose biggest aspiration (according to Anatol Lieven) is to advance their family's fortune by getting a son into the Pakistan Army officer corps. The Pakistan army itself, pure and impure by varying degrees. These are unique Pakistan-type (P-type) Muslim social groups.

Of course, the one type of Muslim common to both India and Pakistan (and Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, and Nepal) is the Backward Pure Muslim. The other classes of unique P-type Muslims in Pakistan are diametrically opposed in worldview to the Dharmic Muslims of India.

I say all this because in the final analysis, if Pakistan fails, its Muslims will have to be accommodated by India somehow... either in a successor state of their own, or in several fragmented successor states, or within the Indian Union. The only model India has for the partially successful (if sub-optimal) integration of Muslims in its society, post the failure of Islamism, is that of bifurcation. Free choice between pureness/backwardness, or Dharmic Islam and a stake in the nation's progress.

This model must be somehow extended to Pakistan as we manage its failure. What happened in India by accident must be replicated in Pakistan (or post-Pakistan) deliberately and systematically. If we fail to extend the model, we will have no choice but to kill all the P-type Muslims of all ages and both genders... because they will forever remain the beggar who insists on sleeping with our wives as a condition of accepting our charity. Whether they are pro-Taliban or anti-Taliban, pro-US or anti-US, they will continue to be resolutely anti-India, and anti-Hindu; there is no possibility of accommodating them whatsoever. They must be compelled to choose one road or the other that three generations of Indian Muslims have taken.

How to accomplish this is, ultimately, the question we must answer for ourselves. Jihad, Taliban, and all these other influences are simply Agencies that arise and fill the vacuum in the cracks between Categories. It is only the degree of our failure to manage subcontinental Islam, beginning in the 1940s, that gives space to these Agencies to flourish. The nature of Pakistani society, with its P-type Muslims and their contradictions, has provided ample space for these Agencies to establish themselves. Only if we can shape the equation of accommodation for ourselves, and seal all the cracks tight, channeling the Pakistani population into one of the two Categories with no middle ground... can we manage the failure of Pakistan without being sucked into failure ourselves.
Last edited by Rudradev on 30 Jun 2010 04:10, edited 5 times in total.
karthik
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by karthik »

RajeshA wrote: UK still hosts a large variety of Islamists from all over the world, including from Hizb ut-Tahrir. Why?
Thoba thoba, i remember i typed something critical about islam in 2002 and i was warned for being instigating! May be they had the hope back then that many Muslims may join the forum and if they read it they may get offended! I guess this is not a bollywood forum! B.R sure has changed!! :D

Back to the topic. The UK claims its freedom of speech that prevents them from arresting them but in reality all of them are under very strict secret surveillance by the MI-7! Why would you stop the enemy from speaking in front of you? Would you rather let him talk where you cant hear him. Thats why they have not pushed them under ground. The recent arrests of muslims youths plotting terror attacks shows how they have been played and monitored by the intelligence bureau in US and UK! Its as if to say keep your friends close and your enemy Closer!!

What to do? What to do about Pakistan? More thoughts on this, some other time!
I think it would be nice to see a vote on this! Would people here like to see Baluch separatists funded heavily and some how split pakistan or would we like to see it come back some sort of stability? It would be interesting to see the vote on this, although i doubt it could be one sided!

Today Bangladesh is more peaceful towards India than Pakistan so splitting the Punjab and Sindh clan will definitely be more peaceful!
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by ramana »

SSridhar, Rangudu, et al, What in your estimation are the costs to India due to TSP's overt and covert actions?
Add costs of deployment in J&K, extra security all over the country, costs due to alienating parts of the Indian population etc.

List those which cant be ennumerated.

Thanks,
ramana
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by shiv »

Rudradev if you visit Arun Gupta's blog:
http://observingliberalpakistan.blogspot.com/

You will find links to Pakteahouse - a Pakistani "liberal" site that has a sizeable proportion of anglophones who profess opposition to the Taliban.

On that site I have tried to point out (not as a challenge, but as a point of fact) that opinion polls of Pakitanis see the US and India as a bigger threat than the Taliban. But yet we are seeing some anglophones and western media people saying that Pakistanis have become anti-Taliban. Lieven is particularly unconvincing in saying "They were pro in 2007 but anti after 2008". I had a crap yesterday but none today. Does that mean I have stopped crapping for the rest of my life? Sadly proctologists cannot help us or Pakistan here.

There is a definite anti-Taliban constituency but its shape and size are unclear to me.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by shiv »

Anatol Lieven's article makes some things very clear.

The Pakistanis are successfully making a demand that America honor its commitments to the Paki army by ensuring that the army does not collapse, and that if the army collapses, Pakistan collapses. The main commitment that the Paki army is asking for is Kashmir.

Lieven contradicts himself by first saying that the only force that can break the Paki army is the US, but later says India can do that too and India might do that if there is terror pressure from Pakistan. He takes a side swipe at India but anyone who is befriended by the Pakistan army and PakRAPE do that. This is a great strength that the Pakis have. They make people get a warm fuzzy and feel like Pakis are their real friends. Lieven is no exception and is only one of a long line that includes Fricker, Cloughley and others. But I digress.

Basically Lieven confirms what I have suspected and stated on here time and again. The US is looking to support the Paki army to survive. India wants that army taken down. That makes this as much an India versus US game as a US-Pak or India Pak game.

The following is what I meant when I said that India and the US are like two people walking together where each guy has a finger up the other's backside. If the other guy misbehaves, you wiggle your finger. If you misbehave the other guy wiggle his finger. If you take your finger out of his backside, you lose.

The US can break the Pakistan army, but is supporting it. That is the US's finger up India's backside.

India can break the Pakistan army but because the US desires that army to survive, India has got a finger in the US's backside. India can demand that the US pressurizes the Pakis not to conduct terror against India. The US in turn asks India to talk so that the US does not appear "pro-India" which would itself break up the Paki army.

But this 3 way drama is betwen India, US and Paki army.

What abut the rest of the Pakis? Is Pakistan guaranteed to succeed and stay intact if the US keeps the Paki army intact? Can India be guaranteed no terror if the Paki army is kept in check?

Clearly there are no guarantees. But experience shows that exerting pressure on the Paki army slows down or temporarily stops terrorism.It is therefore essential to keep pressure on the Paki army. Pressure on the Paki army also keeps them scared and spending huge percentages of the budget on arms, leading to an increase in illiterate, desperate population who cannot be fully controlled by the army.

If you ask me "What is good for Pakistan? " I would say "Wind down Paki army power. Bring in democracy and allow Abdul Pakis to decide if they want the US sitting in Pakistan"

However democracy and loss of Paki army power will not suit the US which is essentially an occupying colonial power acting via its vassals - the Paki army as indicated by the Lieven article.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

RajeshA garu,
The question is, can one explain the inability of the Indian Establishment to confront Pakistan head-on, other than using theories like pseudo-secular, votebank politics, obliging Americans, wimps, etc.

What are the constraints, what is the policy and what is the Weltanschauung behind it all?
My 2 cents...

The inaction (instead of inability) of Indian establishment stems from its lack of acceptance (and understanding) of Bharat that is India. Let us explore this in detail.

First and foremost, the post-independence leadership does not understand and accept what its cultural and historical heritage is. It takes the transformation to be real, instead of the subject that is transforming. Instead of viewing Bharat for what it is, this leadership thinks Bharat is all about the transformation. The problem with this world view is that it accepts whatever transformation that is applied to it - be it an invasion, colonization, social engineering, secularism etc.,

Secondly, the objective of Independence movement is to get rid of British rule. Everyone who contributed in that struggle deserves a sashtanga pranamam for that. Unfortunately this objective is just one step in reestablishing Bharat. The structure, organization and movement that brought Bharat independence from GB will not be useful in taking the next step. This is what Sri MKG, in my opinion, thought and is why he wanted to disband Indian National Congress. Unfortunately his protege JLN believed in the incorrect definition of Bharat, as explained above, and compromised on reestablishment of Bharat.

That is the main reason why most of post-independence leadership accepted the logic behind a separate Pakistan. They accepted is yet another transformation of Bharat.

Thirdly, the current/continued inaction of Indian establishment (not just political leadership) is the confusion about "To What End?. What would I do with a defeated Pakistan? Would it make me a better human after I destroy a whole nation, even if they are my mortal enemy?" (One can see this dilemma in Dharmaraja/Yudhistira after Mahabharata war)

Finally, the false sense of self-restraint. Who am I to help the other person? If I can better myself, that itself is a great service to humanity. Combined with self-doubt, "In what way I am better than my neighbor?", this is recipe for national inaction and disaster.

A cursory and logical glance at Pakistan origins, history, and mis-adventures will make one understand the artificial nature of the Idea of Pakistan. Historically, culturally, civilizationally it is a part of India for time immemorial. A group of individuals seeking a separate nation in the name of a foreign religion is absurd given the additional information that majority of that religions followers live and prosper in hindu-majority Bharat.

This brings us to the creators of Pakistan, UK and USA. Anatol Lieven's article explains their interests and game plan very clearly. I posted another article by the same author where he compares two Client States of US, Georgia and Pakistan. His "prediction" comes true in case of Georgia. His latest article summarizes their Pakistani options.
Every empire—indeed, every state that wishes to project dominant influence beyond its borders—sooner or later runs into the question of how to manage client states: states which imperial powers can closely influence without having to incur the expense, risk and unpopularity of occupying and ruling them directly.
Now, what is the utility of Pakistan for USA? Pakistan is useful for USA against multiple geopolitical competitors Russia, China, KSA and India.

1. Russia - Used Pakistan to unwind USSR. Now USA has other client states against Russia.
2. China - Used Pakistan to get access to China. Has Taiwan, SK, and Japan to counter China if/when needed. Taiwan is a near-client state.
3. Iran - Has alternative client-states in KSA and Israel to undermine Iran's interests.

This leaves India. USA will not and cannot lose Pakistan as a client state unless USA loses its imperial-core OR India itself becomes USA's client state. US's long-term interest would be to earn this crow-jewel - India as a client state to US empire. When that happens USA itself will initiate the process for pakistan's merger with India, not only because united-India would be a more useful client-state but also to have an internal leverage over united-India.

Does India have any options?

1. Become an empire on your own - India has the civilizational ethos, natural/human resources, and intellectual momentum to become an empire on its own. Such an India would pay US in kind. Initiate the process to create separate client states carved out of USA and its neighborhood. This is the most difficult approach of all but will ensure civilizational success/progress for few centuries at minimum. We would need a spiritual+civilizational+economic+social+military revival to achieve this goal. Requires a leader like Sri Krishna.

2. Create a coalition of willing - align with other civilizations to destroy USA/West's client states in the immediate neighborhood. This is a difficult task and would require civilizationa+economic+military revival. Requires a combination of leadership like Chanakya+Chandragupta

3. Become a client-state of a suitable empire - align with one of the empires that suits your political needs. This is easiest of all from a leadership perspective because it benefits only the leadership-layer. As a client state India would be expected to do the dirty work of the empire so the society will have to pay for all those mis-adventures. The highest bidding empire wins this race. All India needs is "wrong leadership".

just my humble thoughts...
Last edited by RamaY on 30 Jun 2010 18:11, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by ramana »

Anatole Lieven is British.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Pranav »

ramana wrote:Anatole Lieven is British.
Yes, but the "empire" transcends nation-states, no?
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by KLNMurthy »

RamaY wrote:RajeshA garu,
...

This leaves India. USA will not and cannot lose Pakistan as a client state unless USA loses its imperial-core OR India itself becomes USA's client state. US's long-term interest would be to earn this crow-jewel - India as a client state to US empire. When that happens USA itself will initiate the process for pakistan's merger with India, not only because united-India would be a more useful client-state but also to have an internal leverage over united-India.
...
This part rings less true to me than the rest of your very interesting analysis. I don't see a "fit" between the USA as patron and India as client, and I don't think the US does either. For one thing, India is too vast and unwieldy, and has multiple centers of power (unlike Pak) so it cannot be captured and maintained as a client; for another, any historically-aware American decisionmaker has to be aware that India has fought to throw off the yoke of its British imperial predecessors. It would be simply too costly and too uncertain for the Americans to graduate India into a proper client state.

Instead, look for more of what we are seeing today--a mix of some genuine friendship, mixed with American prevarication and flattering of the Indian elite (which seems to simply blind their intellects with giddiness), plus some genuine bones thrown their way, all adds up to a huge amount of low-cost influence over India, and the neutering of any Indian aspirations to attain its proper place in the world.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

KLN Murthy garu,

Isn't that exactly what this quote says
Every empire—indeed, every state that wishes to project dominant influence beyond its borders—sooner or later runs into the question of how to manage client states: states which imperial powers can closely influence without having to incur the expense, risk and unpopularity of occupying and ruling them directly.
Added Later

The fit is being created very carefully -

US/West - thru excess focus on materialism, individualism, secularism, EJism = destroy Varnasrama (will write on this later in GDF), Media, humiliation & politicization of local customs/traditions, Education, Governance structures, calling second largest party as terrorist-organization and so on...

For China this fit is completely different - It is more about class struggle, armed revolution, atheism and so on...

***

Bringing back all this discussion to this thread >>

Pakistan's failure has to be seen from the POV of empires that use Pakistan as their client state and how far they go to protect their client state. Multiple levers are nurtured by various empires and wannabe-empires

TSPA - Is funded by TSP budget and Unkil. What is the price unkil is willing to pay for this client state, $5B/$10B annually? Destroy the TSP budget component if possible, making Unkil sole fund-raiser. At the same time strengthen western defenses forcing TSPA to maintain parity. Even if you take PPP conversion a $5B annual Indian defense budget in western sector would require at least $15B investment by unkil.

TSP Political parties - Encourage local power centers. No political party can win/rule more than one state/region. Try to make individual deals. Build a dam/canal/power-project and what not that can be used by only one state. {This looks difficult at the outset but very easy if one is creative}

Jihadi Infrastructure - Discretely destroy their logistic/infra structures. Make it more expensive (financially) for them to sustain. This will put added pressure on the society, as they have to give funds or buy drugs. Divert their focus to right places {They will not get any shade purer, no matter how far and wide they move east; they should move towards center of the universe}.

People - Make the Indian side of border lands visibly prosperous and green. Use all propaganda techniques that are available.

Alternative Client-state - Find/explore the opportunity to hire the opponent as your client state {again please look at the definition}
Last edited by RamaY on 30 Jun 2010 18:31, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RajeshA »

RamaY wrote:RajeshA garu,
See RamaY ji,
in your first line itself, I find fault!

With no white hair as yet, limited knowledge and still even less modesty, I would say 'garu' is the last thing that deserves to stand by by my name! :)
RamaY wrote:
The question is, can one explain the inability of the Indian Establishment to confront Pakistan head-on, other than using theories like pseudo-secular, votebank politics, obliging Americans, wimps, etc.

What are the constraints, what is the policy and what is the Weltanschauung behind it all?
My 2 cents...

The inaction (instead of inability) of Indian establishment stems from its lack of acceptance (and understanding) of Bharat that is India. Let us explore this in detail.
  • The structure, organization and movement that brought Bharat independence from GB will not be useful in taking the next step. This is what Sri MKG, in my opinion, thought and is why he wanted to disband Indian National Congress. Unfortunately his protege JLN believed in the incorrect definition of Bharat, as explained above, and compromised on reestablishment of Bharat.
  • The current/continued inaction of Indian establishment (not just political leadership) is the confusion about "To What End?. What would I do with a defeated Pakistan? Would it make me a better human after I destroy a whole nation, even if they are my mortal enemy?" (One can see this dilemma in Dharmaraja/Yudhistira after Mahabharata war)
  • The false sense of self-restraint. Who am I to help the other person? If I can better myself, that itself is a great service to humanity. Combined with self-doubt, "In what way I am better than my neighbor?", this is recipe for national inaction and disaster.
Thank you RamaY ji, for your thoughts.

There is little there, I'd disagree with. I find the heritage vs. transformation theory very interesting and apt.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RajeshA »

Rudradev wrote:One is the pure, Islamic type who remains in ghettoes, marries four wives and studies nothing but the Quran, and consequently is a failure in terms of social and economic development. He is uneducated, unemployable, and isolated from the mainstream. The further India as a whole progresses along the path of development, the further behind the pure Muslim is left.
Rudradev wrote:The vast mass of Indian Muslim janata falls into one of the two broad Categories... Backward Pure Muslim, and Advanced Integrated (dare-I-say Dharmic) Muslim.

The extent to which Indian Muslims of either Category become influenced by the Agencies... be it a software engineer inculcated into Jihad or a slum dweller who plants car-bombs at Gateway of India or Javed Jaffrey making comments about Gujarat one day after the Mumbai attacks... is a measure of the degree to which bifurcation into the two broad Categories is incomplete. If bifurcation were complete, and the interference of foreign interests ruthlessly eliminated, the two Categories would represent a fairly stable model of Muslim integration within India.

Either have your pure Islam and be guaranteed lose the race, or embrace Dharmic Islam and have a fair chance of winning... that is the broad choice with which Indian Muslims are confronted today, not because of any malevolent social engineering by Hindus, but because of the failure of Islamism on the subcontinent and the concurrent advancement of secular Indian society with its inalienably Hindu ethos. The bifurcation represented by these two Categories is of course, still a work in progress, but the momentum of Indian society brings it ever closer to completion with each passing year.
Rudradev ji,
As I see it, you are saying that a class of '{poor} Backward Pure Muslim' can be fairly stabilized, if we can eliminate the interference of foreign interests through the 'Agencies'.

But isn't that the nature of the beast!

Poor means susceptible to handouts, financial support, dependence, from any willing donors.
Backward means susceptible to unfiltered propaganda, from the above mentioned donors.
Pure Muslim means especially open to donation and propaganda from donors, with whom one shares a cultural context, in this case Pure Islam, e.g. the Saudis.

I don't see the problem lying in the incompleteness of the Bifurcation; except that there is perhaps an ensuing unclarity in the choice in front of the individual; as much as the problem that one category of Muslims would stabilize in such a way, that the elimination of foreign interest Agencies cannot be implemented.

Perhaps the way out, is if India can establish either an 'Agency' or a 'System of Agencies' attending to "Backward Pure Muslims", which ascribe to pure Islam, possess the capacity to finance the welfare programs in the community, pursue no anti-Constitutional political agendas, and furthermore strictly reject interference from outside agencies.

That of course, is something which, to a limited extent, already takes place in India and comes under the heading "Muslim appeasement"! Would a richer India be willing to finance the "Backward Pure Muslim" to an extent, building up the capacity of the local "Agencies" which enable them to break free of dependence on foreign donations?

I think, previously I have once or twice advised on banning all direct foreign donations to religious bodies inside India, on the grounds that religion is a very impressionable social activity, and foreign donations and involvement in this domain make it susceptible to being hijacked by foreign agendas not in conformance with the Indian ethos and can result in disturbance of communal harmony and in anti-national activities. As such all foreign donations should be channeled through the Indian Govt. which would distribute the the money amongst the community as it deems fit. Nor should individuals or organizations act as middlemen for channeling of foreign donations.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RamaY »

KLN Murthy garu,

X-Posting Rudradev-ji...
Rudradev wrote:
dingyibvs wrote: However, don't expect them to be so quick in admitting conventional defeat. If the situation is indeed as you stated, which I think is ludicrous BTW given current day Chinese attitudes, that a weak Chinese leader managed to piss off the people and lose a significant border conflict with India, then you can expect a conventional escalation. Just as you had assumed, he will have no room to back down, so expect something just short of total war from China to take back any lost territory. That is the only way for the CCP to preserve itself since either admitting defeat or going nuclear means self-destruction. Manufacturing capabilities will be important then, as well as wealth. So once again, I ask, is India up to the task?
Dingyibvs, for a student of Sun Tzu, you easily forget the Far Emperor :)

China doesn't have infinite resources. If it is facing a conventional loss in Aksai Chin or Tawang, and decides to go for total war against India to save its face... what a golden opportunity that will provide for the United States. While China pours billions into its total war effort, the US will be overjoyed, and encourage them to spend more and lose more in the easiest way possible... by supplying India with everything it needs to prolong the war for as long as China tries to fight it.

You hype the economic clout of China with Western powers and claim they might engage in "war profiteering" with India in case of an India-China war. No doubt China's production capacity will exceed India's... but the United States' exceeds China's. And the United States continues to supply even little Taiwan with the latest weapons in its arsenal... despite all the fuss and noise about China's economic clout, Beijing hasn't been able to do a thing about that.

Do you really think the US will pass up such an opportunity to set China back by many, many decades as a strategic competitor? What better opportunity for the Americans to achieve this, than to arm and aid India to retaliate pound for pound against China's "total war?" It will boost the American economy and not one American life will be lost. The Americans will get to see all their latest weapons systems in action against the much-vaunted Chinese military machine. By the end of it China's economy will be depleted to exhaustion. And there will be no superpowerdom for China for another century to come, at least.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by ramana »

Rudradev, Regrading Indian Muslims the dichotomy is between Unionist Deobandi and Salafis/Wahabi strain growing stronger in TSP and thus infecting Indian Muslims. Whether backward or rich if the person adheres to Salafist doctrine they gets radicalized.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Rudradev »

RajeshA wrote: Rudradev ji,
As I see it, you are saying that a class of '{poor} Backward Pure Muslim' can be fairly stabilized, if we can eliminate the interference of foreign interests through the 'Agencies'.
Rajesh A-ji, that's not quite what I'm saying.

What I'm saying is that bifurcation exists. Most Indian Muslims fall into the two Categories... Pure and Backward, or Upwardly Mobile Dharmic Muslims. Between these two exists a more-or-less stable dynamic, a gradient if you will, along which Pure and Backward Muslims can migrate to the Upwardly Mobile Category, and as an ancillary effect, become less pure and more Dharmic in their Islam. It is this gradient that is stable, and contributes to the relative stability of the two Categories.

The causes of this dynamic are manifold. Among them are the accommodationist Congress management of the Muslim polity, from the Khilafat movement to Shah Bano and onwards; the nature of Indian society at large, with its Hindu ethos; and the universal laws of economics and sociology.

Is this stable dynamic an optimal solution, a guarantor of peace and harmony? No. But under the circumstances, given India's limited resources and democratic ethos, it is a reasonable approximation of the best we can do. What counts is ensuring that Agencies (as I have described in my earlier post) are not able to interfere with it. Otherwise, the equilibrium is one that has come about almost naturally... not as a result of some forced social engineering as we might see in say China.

So: as long as bifurcation and its associated gradient are allowed to continue without interference, we are on as good a wicket as we can be, internally in India. Abrogating interference is a big caveat, but interference by Agencies is the only source of instability.

But isn't that the nature of the beast!

Poor means susceptible to handouts, financial support, dependence, from any willing donors.
Backward means susceptible to unfiltered propaganda, from the above mentioned donors.
Pure Muslim means especially open to donation and propaganda from donors, with whom one shares a cultural context, in this case Pure Islam, e.g. the Saudis.
I don't think it is quite that simple. If you look hard, the myth of poverty being directly linked to Islamic extremism doesn't really apply to many Muslim societies, and applies even less in India's case. It is not the poorest, most backward Muslims who are necessarily the jihadis. No doubt the poor backward Muslim will come out and fight in riots and so on, but on the whole, his lot is so wretched that he has other priorities than going to Pakistan and becoming trained as a suicide bomber. In fact, most Indian Muslim jihadis have been tapped by foreign Agencies by coaxing them along a diversionary path between the two Categories. En route from pure backward Islam to advanced Dharmic Islam, it is a proportion of middle class Muslims that end up going the jihadi way. Mahdani for instance was not from a poor background, neither are the Bhatkal brothers. It is Muslims on the way up out of poverty... be they the Ashraf Ansaris responsible for the 2003 Gateway of India blasts, or the Kerala/Konkan Muslims who have gone to the Gulf... that are targeted by jihadi recruiters.

This is with good reason. It is en route between the Categories that Muslims are most vulnerable to jihadi recruitment... because that is where their Islamic identity and their economic aspirations come most violently into conflict. The Muslim who goes to jihad is compelled by his frustration at not reaching his economic goals fast enough, possibly, but also by the guilt he feels at shedding the pure Islamic identity for a more dharmic one.

There is a connection between poor, pure backward Muslims and jihadi recruitment, but it does not stem directly from economic hardship. Jihad is not an economically-engendered mass struggle movement among pure backward Muslims of India like it is among Muslims of Pakistan. Rather it stems from the recruitment in poor neighbourhoods by gangsters of the Muslim underworld, the temptation of quick riches, and the connections of that underworld to Islamist politicians and ultimately the ISI. But that again is the diversionary work of an Agency. And it is systemic dysfunction and corruption in India that makes this possible... not the poverty of pure backward Muslims per se.

The pure backward Muslim has a way out (difficult though it is, in a country with such few resources, large population and desperate competition as India.) He can eschew the madrassa for his children and send them to a municipal school. Muslim children going to government schools may still get a bit of that pure-ness, of the "us-vs-Kaffirs" worldview at home and in their mohallas; but every day at school, they recite a pledge which says "India is my country and all Indians are my brothers and sisters." As they proceed through their education they socialize with Kaffirs and make friends. All these things influence them as well, and finally they graduate equipped with the resources to make it in Indian society... but in the process, the pure Islamic worldview has become tempered into a more personal, spiritual, Islam that is consonant with Dharma. That is the gradient which Agencies are trying to divert.
I don't see the problem lying in the incompleteness of the Bifurcation; except that there is perhaps an ensuing unclarity in the choice in front of the individual; as much as the problem that one category of Muslims would stabilize in such a way, that the elimination of foreign interest Agencies cannot be implemented.
The existence of a diversionary path, leading off from the gradient between the two Categories, which can be utilized by Agencies inimical to India, is the problem. Bifurcation implies two ways... the third way leads to jihad. That is why I bring up the completeness of the bifurcation.
Perhaps the way out, is if India can establish either an 'Agency' or a 'System of Agencies' attending to "Backward Pure Muslims", which ascribe to pure Islam, possess the capacity to finance the welfare programs in the community, pursue no anti-Constitutional political agendas, and furthermore strictly reject interference from outside agencies.

That of course, is something which, to a limited extent, already takes place in India and comes under the heading "Muslim appeasement"! Would a richer India be willing to finance the "Backward Pure Muslim" to an extent, building up the capacity of the local "Agencies" which enable them to break free of dependence on foreign donations?
You are right here, to some extent. What has to happen is that the gradient has to be "helped along", by social and economic means. It is difficult to do this without being hijacked by yet more Agencies that serve narrow communal, and in-effect anti-national agendas, but it can and should be attempted, even while the activities of local and foreign Agencies inimical to the gradient are ruthlessly and immediately suppressed.

But I agree with you that some amount of positive social engineering to stabilize the gradient is a good thing. A stable gradient that has been established more or less by accident and by the laws of nature, represents the natural tendency of a system in equilibrium; so that is indeed a strength of Indian society that should be augmented.
I think, previously I have once or twice advised on banning all direct foreign donations to religious bodies inside India, on the grounds that religion is a very impressionable social activity, and foreign donations and involvement in this domain make it susceptible to being hijacked by foreign agendas not in conformance with the Indian ethos and can result in disturbance of communal harmony and in anti-national activities. As such all foreign donations should be channeled through the Indian Govt. which would distribute the the money amongst the community as it deems fit. Nor should individuals or organizations act as middlemen for channeling of foreign donations.
I could not agree with you more on this. After all, Hindu temple trusts are government managed, and welfare funds collected by Muslim socio-religious organizations should be as well. In fact, such a ban will cause the employees of Agencies to stand up and show themselves in the clear light of day when they howl in protest.

The reason I posted all this on this thread here, however, is the question of how to extend this dynamic to Pakistan. Ultimately it is the only solution, whether Pakistan remains one state or splits up into several successor states or folds back into the Indian union. We have to do something about all those people.

The pure-backward Muslim of Pakistan actually becomes an asset here, because he already has a counterpart in India, one of our two Categories, and can be co-opted into the Gradient with relatively less resistance.

It is the other categories of Pakistani Muslims... the P-type Muslims as I have referred to them... who pose a problem. They are the ones who deliberately opted out of India, and the inchoate bifurcated system which was already beginning to establish itself, at the time of independence. Pakistan gives them an option of rejecting the gradient which, in the absence of partition, would have applied to all subcontinental Muslims. As I have explained, the third way beyond Bifurcation is Jihad... and Pakistan is that third way, Jihad, manifested in the form of a State. And true to its nature, it has spawned Agencies like the Taliban and the Lashkars for whom jihad is an agenda that threatens to dominate Pakistan to the exclusion of everything else.

P-type Pakistani Muslims thought they could have their cake (hold on to the ideals of Islamism and Islamic supremacism, even if not "pure" in their own lives) and eat it too (maintain a status of wealth and power.) They wanted to be rich, socially advanced and yet Islamist. But the dream is blowing up in their faces, quite literally.

When we look at Pakistani "liberals" , as Shiv ji and Arun Gupta ji have been doing, we identify a curious phenomenon. We see P-type Muslims who regret the catastrophic failure of Pakistani Islamism... in other words, Indian Subcontinental Islamism of which they are the legatees. They fear the pure radicals who have transformed jihad from a neat little weapon they could turn on unbelievers to an ogre that looms at their very doorsteps. Yet these same P-type Muslims cannot reconcile themselves to the idea that the two-nation theory was wrong... they spend reams and reams of webspace in intractable sophistry trying to justify that what Jinnah wanted was really not what he said, which was not really what he meant. To me this is a symptom of their resistance to the inevitable bifurcation and gradient dynamic to which Indian Muslims have naturally adjusted. In India it is possible for a pure, backward Muslim to become an advanced Muslim by shedding his pure-ness for a more Dharmic Islam. In Pakistan, the only thing possible for a pure, backward Muslim is to become a jihadi. At least in an India-like system he would have another option, a gradient to lift him out of his lot.

Ultimately, the process of managing Pakistan's failure is not going to be determined by the tactics of politics and diplomacy, or military operations of war and counter-insurgency. Those are important steps towards an ultimate goal, but when discussing them we should not lose sight of the goal itself. That goal is to bring Pakistani Muslims within the Indian system... impose upon them, willingly or unwillingly, the dynamics of bifurcation and a stable gradient which enables the poor to become better off while simultaneously shaping their religious identity into one more consonant with Dharma.
Last edited by Rudradev on 01 Jul 2010 02:55, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Rudradev »

ramana wrote:Rudradev, Regrading Indian Muslims the dichotomy is between Unionist Deobandi and Salafis/Wahabi strain growing stronger in TSP and thus infecting Indian Muslims. Whether backward or rich if the person adheres to Salafist doctrine they gets radicalized.
I agree... Salafism is an example of an external Agency taking advantage of Indian Muslims en route from the Pure Backward (many of them Deobandi) Category to the advanced, relatively Dharmic Category. It is not Indian at all. No wonder so many of those Indian Muslims who get converted to Salafist jihad are inculcated while in the Gulf.

The recruitment to Salafist jihad occurs primarily along that path. I don't think there are as many truly poor or truly rich Indian Muslims who get inculcated into Salafist jihad as the ones who are diverted while progressing along that gradient... varying degrees of middle-class, from small landowners in southern Konkan to migrant workers in UAE to software engineers in Pune.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Rudradev »

shiv wrote:Rudradev if you visit Arun Gupta's blog:
http://observingliberalpakistan.blogspot.com/

You will find links to Pakteahouse - a Pakistani "liberal" site that has a sizeable proportion of anglophones who profess opposition to the Taliban.

On that site I have tried to point out (not as a challenge, but as a point of fact) that opinion polls of Pakitanis see the US and India as a bigger threat than the Taliban. But yet we are seeing some anglophones and western media people saying that Pakistanis have become anti-Taliban. Lieven is particularly unconvincing in saying "They were pro in 2007 but anti after 2008". I had a crap yesterday but none today. Does that mean I have stopped crapping for the rest of my life? Sadly proctologists cannot help us or Pakistan here.

There is a definite anti-Taliban constituency but its shape and size are unclear to me.
Shiv, I have visited the Pakteahouse... and very much enjoyed your (and Arun-ji's) posts on there, as well as the reaction to them, by the way. The sudden, vehement hostility your posts arouse are indicative of the degree of discomfort that those "liberals" feel with the consequences of what true liberalism would imply. They remind me of the US, which won't finish off the Pakistan Army despite its complicity in terrorism against Western interests. They are Pakistanis who won't eschew the Islamist core of Nazariya-e-Pakistan despite its engenderment of all the terrorism at their doorsteps. Despite their horror and disgust... which may even be real... somewhere deep inside they still believe they can rein in the old friend and use it as an empire-building tool.

As an aside, one lawyer fellow who posts on Pakteahouse, used to post in the Kargil-IC814-9/11 days on the long-gone CNN and CSPAN web forums. You would not have known then that he was a liberal. The Taliban were the greatest thing since sliced bread, Pak-KSA-USA alliance was the best hope of democracy in the Middle East, India was a Terrorist State, blah blah blah.

He would habitually post under "American sounding" alternative handles, claiming to be a USAF officer who had served in Pakistan and extolled the TSPA as America's best friend etc. etc. Unfortunately he neglected to note that, in those early days of internet forums, viewers could see the email addresses of any user just by clicking on the profile. And the email address associated with this "USAF Major" was "pakistanijeet@hotmail.com" :mrgreen:

A few greenhorn Desi web warriors, including one Narayanan, soundly thrashed him and he was banned from those forums while flaming out spectacularly in full Fizzle-ya style. Many of his compatriots went downhill skiing soon thereafter.

I wonder if he really could have changed his spots. He had a groupie then, one Ayesha, who seemed to offer no original opinions but provided "moral and diplomatic support" by posting "what a brilliant viewpoint YLH! You are right, YLH!" I see she is still doing the same at the Chai Shop.
RajeshA
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by RajeshA »

Rudradev ji,

thank you for the clarifications. As always you are a pleasure to read!
Rudradev wrote:What has to happen is that the gradient has to be "helped along", by social and economic means. It is difficult to do this without being hijacked by yet more Agencies that serve narrow communal, and in-effect anti-national agendas, but it can and should be attempted, even while the activities of local and foreign Agencies inimical to the gradient are ruthlessly and immediately suppressed.

But I agree with you that some amount of positive social engineering to stabilize the gradient is a good thing. A stable gradient that has been established more or less by accident and by the laws of nature, represents the natural tendency of a system in equilibrium; so that is indeed a strength of Indian society that should be augmented.
It is to be expected that any socio-economic agenda, that the Government brings out to help the Muslims to move along the gradient, would inevitably become a target of various Muslim clerics who would consider it as undue interference on the one hand, and of the Indic nationalists who would consider it as another sign of Muslim appeasement. It could become another burden on the Indian Taxpayer and a temptation for the corrupt in the bureaucracy and rest of the distribution channels.

One effective way to control the gradient is influence the marriage market. If the Muslim Women of India are educated, employable, money earning, cosmopolitan, than the Muslim Men in India would have to keep up. I guess this is also the reason why girls education in Islam is discouraged.

If the GoI can bring education to the Muslim girls, it would be a huge achievement. Perhaps India too is a laboratory for Islam!
Rudradev
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Rudradev »

RajeshA wrote:
If the GoI can bring education to the Muslim girls, it would be a huge achievement. Perhaps India too is a laboratory for Islam!
You are right. And let's remember that Pakistan, equally, can be a laboratory for India :)
brihaspati
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by brihaspati »

Rudradev ji,

Just consider one aspect of your model. You have asssumed that the nature of the gradient and its impact on Jihadism is independent of the sizes at each end of the gradient. Maybe we should consider the possibility that the upper end of the gradient [prosperity] appears to be neutral towards Jihadism because the density at the top is low - there are not as yet a critical mass that can ignite a much more intense Jihadism.

There are two more of a dilemma: first, in those Islamic countries where they have no non-Muslim claimant to power of any significance, and a basic level of prosperity - oil or labour - KSA/Malaysia, exists, Jihadism has and is growing more roots. The more "violent" aspects are kept in "violent" check by other Muslims in virtual absolute power as an ordinary totalitarian factional power struggle. But in India, when all IM travel up the gradient to reach the plateau at the top - which faction of the Muslim will check the others, given that they are all likely to share in the perception that they are being deprived from their legitimate privilege of "subjugation" of the non-Muslim in any region?

Second, economic empowerment in its early phase typically also generates hunger for political power - directly or indirectly. How will that translate in case of Jihadism in your gradient model?

I am rather inclined to be cautious about this. The identity itself is based on concepts of power and subjugation of others - by any means - pretension of submission or aggression or varying proportions of both is applied.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Manish_Sharma »

ramana wrote:Lalmulla, Read the whole "All Kiyani's Men" article again and see for yourself a solution is there.
Ramana I read the article but was not able to make out the solution. :oops:

Could you please point out.
Guddu
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Guddu »

manage the puki army...and you manage pukiland
Pranav
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Pranav »

ramana wrote:Neither. Its fighting India.

I was referring to Anatole Leiven's article in this post

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 38#p896438
That is why the economic crisis is, in some respects, a good thing. If western elites cannot rid themselves of their compulsive need to support Paki beggars, then they should join the object of their affections in the pig-sty.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Karna_A »

Rudradev wrote: What I'm saying is that bifurcation exists. Most Indian Muslims fall into the two Categories... Pure and Backward, or Upwardly Mobile Dharmic Muslims. Between these two exists a more-or-less stable dynamic, a gradient if you will, along which Pure and Backward Muslims can migrate to the Upwardly Mobile Category, and as an ancillary effect, become less pure and more Dharmic in their Islam. It is this gradient that is stable, and contributes to the relative stability of the two Categories.
Good analysis Rudradev. However I don't agree with the use of the word pure in the above context.
Its a self defeating argument to say that somehow Kalam and Abdus sattar Edhi are less pure Muslims and the pure muslims means backwardness. Self defeating because the goal of most religionists is to become purer, but people like Edhi have defined what being a pure muslim means which is at variance with other thinkings.

It's better to think of Muslims as 2 types.

Type 1 (Traditionalists) who think of Koran as equivalent to the roof of a house and everything has to be under it and cannot be beyond it. These are the backward types, as they are handicapped in their interpretation of book.
Type 2 (Originalists) who think of Koran as equivalent to foundation of a house.(which is what it was supposed to be) Here their potential is unlimited as they can build on the foundation anything they want and these are the people like Premji, Edhi and kalam who take the basic tenets of humanity and build a castle on top. They invariably are successful in modern life and would be in future.

Both types are pure muslims in their own way. So instead of saying that Pure Muslims need to become Dharmic muslims which almost is like a religious conversion and is nearly impossible, what is required is for Indian Traditionalists to become Originalists i.e. instead of taking the traditional interpretation, think of the original interpretation.

A very simple example of this is say Koran says that this is 30th November 700 AD.
If you ask a Traditionalists what's the date today, he'll still answer 30th November 700 AD.
If you ask Originalists the same question, the answer would be 30th June, 2010.

To manage Pakistan's failure, the Traditionalists in TSP need to look eastward and the Originalists in TSP need to look westward.
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Re: Managing Pakistan's failure

Post by Rudradev »

brihaspati wrote:Rudradev ji,

Just consider one aspect of your model. You have asssumed that the nature of the gradient and its impact on Jihadism is independent of the sizes at each end of the gradient. Maybe we should consider the possibility that the upper end of the gradient [prosperity] appears to be neutral towards Jihadism because the density at the top is low - there are not as yet a critical mass that can ignite a much more intense Jihadism.
Brihaspati ji, it is certainly possible that a certain proportion of Muslims, once economically empowered will drift towards jihadism.

The gradient, however, is not only about prosperity. It has naturally occurred that a large number of Muslims who travel from Pure Backwardness to Upward Mobility, become of necessity subject to influences beyond the Pure Islamic. This is a result of the free marketplace of ideas, traditions and ethos that Indian society is. A Muslim, like anybody else, is subject to the pressures and imprecations of his environment. If that environment is essentially a Dharmic and tolerant one, and most importantly is responsible for affording him prosperity, that alone is a countervailing force to the compulsions of an atavistic religious identity that demands domination, subjugation etc. If integration becomes a necessity for advancement, the countervailing force becomes increasingly powerful; and if the crucial importance of such integration for advancement is made even more emphatic by subtle and deliberate means, then the countervailing force has a chance of dominating the identity equation.

Will some Muslims who climb to the top of the plateau, diligently nurse the dagger of jihadist identity in their hearts? Very likely. The point is to ensure that the critical mass of the Advanced Muslims, however, has too much invested in an essentially Hindu-defined status quo, in economic and social terms, to want to rock the boat. Jihad is after all a choice, and it comes with an opportunity cost. If that opportunity cost is maximized for the overwhelming number of Muslims ascending to the top of the gradient, the chances of Jihad are minimized, and the transformation of Indian Islamic identity into something more consonant with Dharma is advanced.

It is not a perfect solution by any means. As I have said it is sub-optimal. But what are the alternatives? 170 million Indian Muslims cannot be wiped out, and cannot be directly compelled to abandon their faith; neither can they be brainwashed out of it. These are simply not practical choices. The only option, as I see it, is manipulation of the social, political and economic environment in such a way that economic and social advancement for Muslims becomes inextricably linked to adopting a more Dharmic vision of Islam, and distancing oneself from the atavistic Islamic identity. Syncretion defined in Dharmic terms and pursued by Dharmic means.

Is it impossible? I don't think so. Within a few decades, a mere handful of Britishers managed to successfully create a dominant class of Indians who were " Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, words and intellect." If a Dharmic civilization vastly more learned and experienced than the Anglo Saxons, completely outnumbering and encompassing Indian Muslims, cannot accomplish this type of goal, do we really deserve to survive?

No doubt there will be difficulties to overcome, mostly posed by such Agencies as I have mentioned. These Agencies must be ruthlessly and relentlessly crushed even as we help the Pure Backward Muslim to improve his lot. As Rajesh A-ji has mentioned, the education of Muslim women will have to be advanced and control over the finances of "charities" and "social welfare concerns" that serve Indian Muslims will have to be concentrated in Indian hands. The Muslim criminal underworld, its ties to politicians and jihadi interests locally and abroad, will have to be exhaustively eliminated. Many battles will have to be fought, but the carrot... promise of ascension through the gradient, will always have to be held out convincingly enough that the majority of Indian Muslims continue to buy into it.

In the case of integrating Pakistani Muslims, again, this appears the only viable option. Since the centre of mass of Pakistani Muslim population is of the Pure Backward Variety, similar in many ways to the Pure Backward section of our own Muslims, we are offered an opportunity for sociological jiujitsu. If the Pure Backward Muslims of Pakistan (or POGWI, or ex-PO WI, in the future) buy into the gradient, the recalcitrant P-type Muslims above them will be marginalized, and can be dealt with by harsher means. The alternative is that this overwhelming mass of Pure Backward Pakistani Muslims becomes the footsoldiers for the recalcitrant P-type Muslims in resisting Syncretion on Dharmic terms. It is just that many more we will have to fight.

The Bifurcation that created these two Categories of Muslims, and established the Gradient between them, has taken shape in a self-evident manner, mostly without deliberate interference by any social or political power in our land. However, it must now be nurtured and strengthened so as to make it profound and definitive. All Agencies and interest groups that threaten to disrupt it must be deliberately and systematically suppressed. It has to become an overwhelmingly stable working model for the Muslims of India, because we may not have much time before it also has to accommodate the Muslims of what is now Pakistan.
There are two more of a dilemma: first, in those Islamic countries where they have no non-Muslim claimant to power of any significance, and a basic level of prosperity - oil or labour - KSA/Malaysia, exists, Jihadism has and is growing more roots. The more "violent" aspects are kept in "violent" check by other Muslims in virtual absolute power as an ordinary totalitarian factional power struggle. But in India, when all IM travel up the gradient to reach the plateau at the top - which faction of the Muslim will check the others, given that they are all likely to share in the perception that they are being deprived from their legitimate privilege of "subjugation" of the non-Muslim in any region?
Many may share in the perception that they are being deprived from the legitimate privilege of subjugating the Non-Muslim. But that number will decrease as long as ascent along the gradient is systematically coupled with erosion of the atavistic, pan-Islamic identity that nurtures this perception.

Today we live in a world of pan-Islamic global jihad. We are trying to plug the bursting dike one finger at a time, busting that particular terrorist cell, engaging in XYZ talks with Pakistan, accommodating US concerns in PQR ways, building bridges in Afghanistan, allowing this Mahdani or that Dawood Ibrahim associate to walk free because of political patronage or votebank compulsions. If we keep this up, exerting our efforts in a random and ad-hoc manner, we don't stand a chance.

We urgently need to organize our efforts towards the accomplishment of an overarching strategic goal. That goal must be to redefine, for the Indian subcontinent, the entire paradigm of what it means to have an Islamic identity... to shape that identity into something consonant with Dharma... and to defend it from the assaults of global pan-Islamism.

To do this the Indian subcontinental Muslim must become a partner in the project with a real stake in its success. The Indian subcontinental Muslim defined by this means will himself be the faction of Muslim standing against the adharmic, atavistic Muslim who seeks to disrupt the system.

Our best chance of achieving the goal is to find our strength and play to it. The strength exists in the stable dynamic of Muslim bifurcation and the gradient that has naturally evolved.

On a separate but related note: I don't believe that the picture of global pan-Islamism that exists today, is going to remain unchanged permanently. It has had its heyday in the previous decade, and that heyday might last for a while longer, especially if the US withdraws in a shambles from Afghanistan. But it is not permanent. Nothing is.

Consider this post that I made in the West Asia thread. http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 90#p894290 It may be fanciful, and represents only one possible shape of things to come. But ultimately I believe that the various strata of identity subscribed to by the world's Muslim population, particularly in West Asia where all the trouble comes from, will collide catastrophically in the not too distant future. The scenario I posted on the West Asia thread depicts a WWI-type situation of conflicts between two alliances in numerous theatres, ultimately leading to all-out war. Like the Great War did for Europe, it will have profound impact on the nature of Islamism as we know it today. Maybe the implications will not be suddenly felt or realized in the immediate aftermath of such a war... there may need to be another war before that happens completely. However, I sense the denouement is beginning.
Second, economic empowerment in its early phase typically also generates hunger for political power - directly or indirectly. How will that translate in case of Jihadism in your gradient model?
In an ideal situation: the Dharmic Muslim will have equal opportunity to seek political power as any other citizen of the subcontinent, and the nature of the polity itself will require him to emphasize his Dharmic identity in order to secure it; meanwhile, he will find (because of our systematic elimination of the Agencies inimical to the Gradient) that emphasizing an atavistic "subjugate others" Islamic identity is a liability rather than an asset. Unlike today, when such an atavistic Islamic identity can count in one's favour in vote-bank politics.

I realize how far away, even far-fetched this vision seems. But again, what is the alternative?

You are absolutely correct that economic empowerment in its early phase generates hunger for political power, and it is this dynamic that the Agencies take advantage of when siphoning off Muslims from the gradient and sending them along a diversionary path of Jihad. The answer is, of course, ruthless suppression of those Agencies and those who follow that path. Opportunity cost must be maximized for those types of activities, even while rewards are maximized for following the gradient.

I am rather inclined to be cautious about this. The identity itself is based on concepts of power and subjugation of others - by any means - pretension of submission or aggression or varying proportions of both is applied.
You are right. What I am proposing is a social engineering project to reshape that identity, not only within our borders but in a manner that can be extended to occupied Western India as well. To achieve syncretion with subcontinental Islam on Dharmic terms. If any civilization in the world can pull off something like that, it is ours. But given the scale and degree of ideological commitment and organization required, it will have to be handled as no project has been handled in independent India to date.
Last edited by Rudradev on 01 Jul 2010 08:35, edited 9 times in total.
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