Geopolitical thread

rkirankr · Post by **rkirankr** » 28 Jan 2011 11:14

kmkraoind wrote:Rs 3.5 cr seized in raid on Karmapa monastery

According to polticsparty guys' assessment there seems to be a systematic plan to remove Sonia (call it US puppet) that is why there is Q's case, black money thing, etc. Now raid on Karmapa's home, that too a government in exile. Am I paranoid or India has became a turf ground for US and China to score their points. Sudden bursts of some section of media on UPA, now raid on Karmapa, there seems to be fishy going on. Worst we have incompetent Vidhur like PM and unaccountable powerful Sonia and her coterie.

Small nitpick and OT. Please do not compare MMS with Vidhur. Vidhur opposed wrongs without fear. He was instrumental in saving pandavas. Remember Lord Krishna chose to stay at Vidhur's humble abode than the rich palaces because he was the only guy who voiced opposition when a woman was being disrobed in front of many warriors.As I said it is OT. However I agree that there seems to more than that meets the eye in all these sudden news about scams of high and mighty

kmkraoind · Post by **kmkraoind** » 28 Jan 2011 11:25

rkirankr wrote:Small nitpick and OT. Please do not compare MMS with Vidhur. Vidhur opposed wrongs without fear. He was instrumental in saving pandavas. Remember Lord Krishna chose to stay at Vidhur's humble abode than the rich palaces because he was the only guy who voiced opposition when a woman was being disrobed in front of many warriors.As I said it is OT. However I agree that there seems to more than that meets the eye in all these sudden news about scams of high and mighty

Slighly OT. Probably MMS is a mix of Vidhur and Shakuni. Probably he wants to teach Gandhi's clan a lesson so that they behave well with personalities like LBS, PVNR and MMS (not to use as paper napkins or care takers till a person from their clan is matured). Probably he does not want to give RG an India with rose petals, rather want to remove RG prospects to become a PM. One of biggest blunder done by Congress, Sonia and its coterie to PVNR will be paid back (probably by MMS as a tribute to his political guru) or will karma will take its own action.

chandrabhan · Post by **chandrabhan** » 29 Jan 2011 18:47

Deleted and posted in Strategic leadership thread..

SwamyG · Post by **SwamyG** » 29 Jan 2011 19:06

Acharya wrote:Americans are embracing the Jacksonian principles (Paul Rand) and Jeffersonian model of US engagement with the world after the financial collapse.

That is a big leap. A few support the utopian libertarian principles and party, that is it. Not the bulk of the population.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 29 Jan 2011 23:00

Chandrabhan the post should be in Strategic leadership thread and not here.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 30 Jan 2011 01:58

SwamyG wrote: Americans are embracing the Jacksonian principles (Paul Rand) and Jeffersonian model of US engagement with the world after the financial collapse.

That is a big leap. A few support the utopian libertarian principles and party, that is it. Not the bulk of the population.

Those are the red states which are moving towards US centric principles. The main change is their engagement with the rest of the world is losing support in the red state.Libertarian principles turn towards republican support during war times.

chandrabhan · Post by **chandrabhan** » 30 Jan 2011 18:01

Sorry Ramana Sir, Shall post it there. May I request you to delete it on this thread?

Rony · Post by **Rony** » 17 Feb 2011 08:49

Do we have a Taiwan watch thread ?

Good and comprehensive summary of the position of Taiwan vs ROC vs PRC

A shocking political event took place recently when the Philippine government deported 14 Taiwanese fraud suspects to China. The Philippine government treated the Taiwanese as Chinese, and this is a serious mistake. According to the principles of the San Francisco Peace Treaty and international law, Taiwan is not part of China. Sovereignty over Taiwan does not belong to China.
On Dec. 12, 2006, Shigeru Oda, a prominent jurist and former international court of justice judge, published a paper in the Japan Academy in which he wrote: “Taiwan is not part of the PRC [People’s Republic of China] in the past, and is not part of the PRC right now either.”
He also said that “beyond verbosity, the so-called ‘Taiwan Independence’ is Taiwanese becoming independent from the Chinese Nationalist Party [KMT] of the Republic of China [ROC], and has absolutely nothing to do with the Beijing regime.”
My late husband, C.C. Yang (楊建成), a former vice minister of economic affairs, published an article entitled “I am Taiwanese, not Chinese” in the Liberty Times on June 27, 1997, and also held the same view.
The origins of this incident can be traced back to April 28, 1952. When the San Francisco Peace Treaty came into force, Taiwanese officially lost their Japanese citizenship. According to the Treaty of Peace between the ROC and Japan, which came into force on Aug. 5, 1952, Taiwanese were forced to accept ROC citizenship. At that time, the advanced “nationality option” was not offered to the residents of Taiwan and Penghu.
The Treaty of Peace was abrogated when Japan established diplomatic relations with the PRC on Sept. 29, 1972, but the citizenship of the Taiwanese was not re-assigned or even mentioned.
On April 7, 2009, a US court ruled that the “People of Taiwan are stateless.” For the past 60 years, Taiwanese have been living in political purgatory. This is the tragic fate of Taiwanese. Currently, Taiwan is ruled by the exiled government of the ROC, but the whole world has the false impression that Taiwan is part of China. This is totally inconsistent with the historical facts and principles of international law.
If the Philippine government’s actions become a model for how the international community treats Taiwanese, this will result in overseas governments threatening to “repatriate” Taiwanese to China if they breach local laws. That will create a major threat to the safety and dignity of Taiwanese.
Faced with this, it is time for the people of Taiwan to wake up.
Many Taiwanese consider -themselves citizens of the ROC, but no one else in the world agrees with the existence of the ROC. That’s the reason the Philippine government sent the Taiwanese suspects to the PRC. Currently, the US refers to “Taiwan” as the “Taiwan authority,” not as a country.
The people of Taiwan need to unite, identify with Taiwan, draw a line with the ROC and declare to the world their desire to establish an independent state according to international law.
This is the only way to preserve our dignity and maintain our international status.
This is the only way Taiwan will ever have the authority to negotiate with other countries’ governments, and finally, dare to hope that the US under international law and the Taiwan Relations Act will lead the way for Taiwan to become a true nation.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 18 Feb 2011 23:34

A bum in very pocket,ICBM in every backyard
And AOA on every lip,keep the WASP sick!!

The Perils of Nuclear Peace
http://www.cato-unbound.org/2011/02/17/ ... ear-peace/

Erik Gartzke raises a terrific question concerning nuclear peace. If more countries acquire a second-strike nuclear capability, fewer pairs of countries will fight. Russia has such a capability; China probably has one; India might attain one as its rise continues. If we treat the European Union as a sort of superstate, it has a robust nuclear deterrent as well (in the form of the British and French arsenals). Does this not bode well for the future? As we know, Kenneth Waltz answers in the affirmative.[1]

But I’m not sure optimism is called for. First, one can acknowledge (as I do) that nuclear deterrence has worked without accepting that it must always work. Perhaps a desperate nuclear-armed leader will lapse into irrationality; before committing suicide the (instrumentally) rational Hitler ordered that Germany be destroyed in punishment for its not being worthy of him. Perhaps a failure of command and control, such as that immortalized in Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove, could take place. Picture Slim Pickens riding that Bomb as it falls out of the B-52. The rub is that if nuclear deterrence fails only once, the consequences could be unprecedentedly catastrophic. Perhaps there is only a 0.5 percent chance of a failure of deterrence over the next century, but in the case of nuclear weapons we need to distinguish that low figure from zero.

Second, there is the question raised by Bartosz Stanislawski of non-state actors getting hold of a nuclear weapon. Scott Sagan and others have written about the problem of loose nukes – weapons, fissile material, and so on being insecure in some states such as Pakistan or Iran. These could get into the hands of terrorists who are hard to find and hence hard to deter. We know that al Qaeda wants a nuclear weapon. We know about the A.Q. Khan network run out of Pakistan. In other words, I think that Professor Stanislawski’s basic point that catastrophes can happen even during virtuous trends is a good one, especially as concerns nuclear weapons.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 24 Feb 2011 12:59

Hitler vs. Stalin: Who Killed More?

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archive ... lled-more/

abhischekcc · Post by **abhischekcc** » 24 Feb 2011 16:29

Q. Hitler vs. Stalin: Who Killed More?

Churchill.

rsingh · Post by **rsingh** » 24 Feb 2011 16:52

Mao is all time record holder.
http://www.scaruffi.com/politics/dictat.html

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 24 Feb 2011 21:45

Folks still working for:

Elusive goal of nuke free world

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 25 Feb 2011 00:05

http://fletcher.tufts.edu/forum/archive ... rciari.pdf

JLN spoke too quickly before independence. It is also the time when the direct action was started.

. In 1946, amid
the struggle for independence, Jawaharlal
Nehru invoked the concept of a great
power in an apparent effort to boost
the confidence of his audience of Indian
army officers. He declared that “India is
today among the four great powers of the
world: [the] other three being America,
Russia, and China.”

That statement, of
course, was more rhetorical than realistic.
India had a large army and population
but was far from possessing the material capabilities or political influence to fit under any reasonable definition
of a great power. Even after breaking free of British rule, India’s new government was militarily and economically weak, confronted daunting domestic
challenges, and faced the real possibility of continued external domination.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 25 Feb 2011 00:09

Actually K.M. Pannikar wrote about the four natural great powers:America, Russia, China and India. All others are leaching on to these four.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 25 Feb 2011 02:17

Rony wrote:Do we have a Taiwan watch thread ?

Some time ago there was an informal understanding amongst some BRFites to post Taiwan News in "Managing Chinese Threat Thread"! Or you can try the "India and ASEAN / East Asia Thread"!

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 25 Feb 2011 08:26

ramana wrote:Actually K.M. Pannikar wrote about the four natural great powers:America, Russia, China and India. All others are leaching on to these four.

Nehru made the statement in 1946 and Panniker published his book in 1957. Nehru made the statement before the partition and then partition happened.

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 25 Feb 2011 16:12

Nehru may have spoken about it, but the reality of the inherent power of India was never lost on the Brits. This was, among other things, why we were "the Jewel in the Crown" - so to speak... They did not need any Indian to articulate our hopes of becoming a future power to instigate the partition of India.

Nehru should get neither the credit for partition (from those who, like myself, think it was a blessing in disguise) nor the blame from those who think otherwise. Ultimately, before we got independence, he was a powerless man with little more than his rhetorical skill, his negotiating and networking abilities and the support of a great many Indian people who were themselves enslaved.

He was an imperfect man, no doubt, but given the choice between Nehru (or Gandhi for that matter) and virtually any person around at the time in India or elsewhere - to gather the bulk of Indian people under him, I'm not sure who any other sane person would opt for - with the exception of Sardar Patel, who was himself by no means a perfect man. I'd be curious to hear an option, if there are any.

The times were different, mistakes were certainly made, but the clarity of these errors are evident now only because we look with 20/20 hindsight.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 25 Feb 2011 20:54

Nobody is going to fault India or JLN for the vision or the destiny.
Churchill and British had already been working on India since 1905.

The last stretch was crucial and JLN had to ensure the territorial integrity of India proper and ensure orderly consolidation. The partition was the biggest obstacle to the big vision of India as a geography and blunder as a geopolitic strategy.

Ravi Karumanchiri · Post by **Ravi Karumanchiri** » 25 Feb 2011 21:10

^^^

JE Menon wrote: ...
I'm not sure who any other sane person would opt for {other than JLN} - with the exception of Sardar Patel, who was himself by no means a perfect man. I'd be curious to hear an option, if there are any.
...

Subhas Chandra Bose

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhas_Chandra_Bose

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 26 Feb 2011 07:55

from those who, like myself, think it was a blessing in disguise

No it wasn't.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 26 Feb 2011 09:22

The 9 most annoying sky-is-falling clichés in American foreign policy.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2 ... ken_little

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 26 Feb 2011 18:21

D Roy

>>No it wasn't.

Like I said above, there are those who think otherwise. I guess you are stating your opinion, not a categorical fact. Thanks.

It may be that there is some confusion here: by saying that partition at that time was a good thing, I'm not suggesting that re-integration in future is a bad thing. I think the diseased appendage needs to be isolated and cured before it can be reattached.

Ravi,

Certainly, I think SCB was an option, but less of one than the Sardar even. Too polarising, which hindsight suggests would not have been best at that time... Good fortune there in many more ways than we care, or dare(?), to recognise.

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 26 Feb 2011 19:58

Like I said above, there are those who think otherwise. I guess you are stating your opinion, not a categorical fact. Thanks.

No Thanks.

It may be that there is some confusion here: by saying that partition at that time was a good thing, I'm not suggesting that re-integration in future is a bad thing. I think the diseased appendage needs to be isolated and cured before it can be reattached.

The "it gets much worse before it gets better" argument. Well, let's see. The appendage is more gangrenous than ever before.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 26 Feb 2011 20:23

D Roy wrote:
The "it gets much worse before it gets better" argument. Well, let's see. The appendage is more gangrenous than ever before.

It never had to get this worse first of all if the region was under India's control
That is the basis of avoiding partition. Once it has happened then now it is to cure it.

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 26 Feb 2011 23:12

D Roy

>> No thanks

You mean it's a fact?

Acharya,

Boss, does anybody remember what state India was in when we got independence. Does anybody realistically think that these same powers would not have played a far more vicious game had the country been infested with these Talibanic types from day one? It was the cold war era, we could well have been turned into a civil war battleground from hell... we were a fledgeling state.

It's anybody's guess of course. But I think we would not have been able to get where we were with that "gangrenous" appendage attached to us. Maybe a poll on this would be nice... I am really curious on BRF opinion on this issue.

I see a lot of writing about the injustices suffered under centuries of Islamist rule, and at the same time an expectation somehow that magically this impulse to rule and dominate would disappear into the democratic spirit.

One may ask, why then, did the Muslims who remained in India accept democracy like Muslims have in virtually no other country in the world... Hard to say, truly, but I suspect it is a combination of the fact that many of them chose to stay back, many of them felt they could not "claim" for any more now that Pakistan was created and the option of a state for Muslims was no longer open (although that magic box has been re-opened since), and many simply did not feel that impulse to dominate as strongly as they began to get a vested interest in the survival of local systems and upward to the Indian state....

Does anybody seriously think things would have panned out this way had we started of with the "gangrenous" appendage (I love this analogy) that comprises Pakistan today?

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 27 Feb 2011 07:48

But I think we would not have been able to get where we were with that "gangrenous" appendage attached to us. Maybe a poll on this would be nice... I am really curious on BRF opinion on this issue.

Herein lies the essential problem. You know quite well that the real demand for Pakistan came from the muslims of the gangetic belt and not from what now constitutes Pakistan. If these parts had stayed with India they would not have become what they are now because administration/ overall governance framework does matter.

Partition was a disaster and one should admit that. All this - "blessing in disguise" is denial. And we haven't fixed that part yet. far from it. Au contraire it continues to be the biggest impediment to westward trade and interaction. from pipelines to railroads we are getting screwed for having lost that piece of real estate. None of this not known to you and others here. there's a lot more.

But "blessing in disguise" it is not. Period.

And you can go on about your "fact" not "fact" sarcasm/debate tactic trail, it doesn't matter. I mean what did you expect me to write -

"Sir, I don't think it was..." and add a pretty please for good measure? Pffftt...

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 27 Feb 2011 12:48

Frankly boss, I did not "expect" you to write anything... You just gave your opinion, but couched it "no it wasn't" as fact. It may not matter to you, but that does not change it. In my original post I had mentioned that others thought differently from me, in other words those with your opinion.

We all know the facts of partition. I agree only that it was indeed a disaster on a human level (whether "one should admit that" - or anything more than that - or not is questionable as some have a different opinion, at least that it was anything more than a human disaster) but:

"If these parts had stayed with India they would not have become what they are now because administration/ overall governance framework does matter."

Of course admin/governance does matter; never claimed otherwise. But we have an example in J&K to some extent. I'm not talking now about Pakistan's "claim" to J&K but the Muslim Kashmiris expectation and demand that they be treated differently because they are Muslim... and the acquiescence in that of successive governments. I'm not at all confident that the Muslims in the rest of Pakistan would have behaved any differently from the Kashmiri Muslims. (And remember these chaps are walking around, still, with the notion that they should be ruling ALL of India). Now remember also that we are not talking just about how the people there would behave in the absence of outside influence... If I remember, the whole discussion began about how the US and Britain were playing a game there. I don't suppose they would have waited on the sidelines waiting for us to fail of our own accord. They didn't even after partition!

Of course, we on BRF often forget the little question of Bangladesh. If you tell me that East Bengal should not have been partitioned, I might agree more readily with that.

(BTW, you detected sarcasm in my post somewhere above... I looked but could not detect anything objectionable except the "thanks" - based on your response. It was not intended, nevertheless I apologise unreservedly for that).

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 27 Feb 2011 13:15

I'll give a rest to the personal edge to this discussion as well. Fine.

However what you have written about J&k is exactly the point. J&K wouldn't have been in this muck had their not been a nice training factory next door. even if we discount external influence for this particular case, we cannot ignore the launchpad factor i.e geographical proximity. and partition was about geography at the end of the day.

And even after all that its still way better than the SWAT valley or even neighbourhoods in Karachi. And there is this counter-current which leads people to rush to army training camps. they realize "bhai jihad vihad theek hai lekin rozgaar to chahiye naaa"? the same crowd in pakistan has no place to turn to, such is the horrendous state of affairs.

Ditto for Bangladesh. if the intervention in 71 had not been undertaken we would have pretty much seen the same situation there as well. But that isn't the case. and neither the bangladeshi army nor a large mass of the body politic would let it be so. The fact that East Pakistan was surrounded by India did help matters then.
Pakistan managed to become what it is because of nukes and yamrika. but had there been no partition the question would have not been moot. The so called nuclear derived terrorism/fanaticism would not have been there.

An undivided India would pretty much have been like the India of today- A 'secular' country with special personal laws for Muslims.

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 27 Feb 2011 13:32

Given the situation at independence, I can't see that having happened. My point is that India is like it is today because it was partitioned, not in spite of it. And J&K Muslims, irrespective of Pakistan, have claimed a special separateness because they are Muslim, not because of Pakistan.

So I disagree entirely with your view on that. I see little point in taking this discussion further as we will simply repeat the same.

Others can make up their, most probably already have, based on their observations of the reality - and perhaps a point or two in our arguments.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 28 Feb 2011 01:44

D Roy wrote:An undivided India would pretty much have been like the India of today- A 'secular' country with special personal laws for Muslims.

Undivided India will be the India of Sultanate time, rountinly going through genocide every couple of years with all the global players happily supplying appropriate weapons to facilitate such glorius events.

Hari Seldon · Post by **Hari Seldon** » 28 Feb 2011 04:16

^^^Undivided Yindia would be harmonious and peaceful only. Much like Malappuram in Kerala is harmonious and peaceful today (community supremacy within is not contested) with neighboring distts (Kannur, anybody?) quite literally a house of conflict (dar-ul-harb).

Fundamentalism rears its ugly head even in places like Indonesia today. Somehow, I seriously doubt that even with decent, secular governance also, we could have produced secular folk out of the momeen once they reached majority or close levels in an area. I doubt 'em Indics could have competed with much less beaten back the graphic demographic advances made by the non-Indics anyway. And lawd knows demographic and piskological thresholds are all-important in the numers+power game. Just ask folks over at Deganga in WB or Dhubri in lower Asom only. AM under no illusions besides. The Indics are playing a losing game here. Its an uphill battle. Slowly, inch by inch, the tide is rising or so I fear.

Oh, sure, I would love for Yindia to have access to some of the real estate lost - PoK/NA, Balochistan, Chittagong, Sylhet. Those should have been ours and integrated fully into the union. But the rotten core - Pakjab+sindh+pakhtunkhwa I'd rather do without.

Perhaps OT here. Mods, pls delete if inappropriate.

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 28 Feb 2011 19:35

Negative Naysayers...

Harrumph.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 01 Mar 2011 02:53

Hari Seldon wrote:But the rotten core - Pakjab+sindh+pakhtunkhwa I'd rather do without.

Sindh (minus Karachi) should be considered retrievable and redeemable. It is key to escaping our strategic straitjacket.

SwamyG · Post by **SwamyG** » 01 Mar 2011 03:43

Hari Seldon wrote:Oh, sure, I would love for Yindia to have access to some of the real estate lost - PoK/NA, Balochistan, Chittagong, Sylhet. Those should have been ours and integrated fully into the union. But the rotten core - Pakjab+sindh+pakhtunkhwa I'd rather do without.

pssst. pssst. You left Srilanka, Nepal and Bhutan too. And parts of Burma, please.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 01 Mar 2011 04:09

From Lhasa to Lanka,From Burma to Bukhara
Thaa kabhi hamara, Hogga bhi phir Hamara .
Koi aisa karr Jugaada.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 01 Mar 2011 07:56

G-Zero: gee, another idea with zero to support it

http://rothkopf.foreignpolicy.com/posts ... support_it

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 01 Mar 2011 21:43

^^ In above picture while all the world leaders are looking here and there only MMS is looking ahead!

I like that picture. Shows India's confidence in itself.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 02 Mar 2011 09:40

How Rumsfeld misleads and ducks responsibility in his new book

http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/20 ... s_new_book

Rumsfeld spokesman: Woodward practices “access journalism”

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts ... journalism

SwamyG · Post by **SwamyG** » 09 Mar 2011 23:32

China and India's Battle for Influence in Asia

For the moment, India and China will continue their respective economic and political ascent relatively harmoniously, as there is plenty of scope for both countries to flex their muscles in their own neighborhood. China's main allies in the region have been ill-chosen, with North Korea, Myanmar, and Pakistan all being perceived as bad boys for one reason or another. India on the other hand, has aligned itself with countries where it appears to have more to gain than lose (Japan, Indonesia and Vietnam, amongst others). India also appears to be making more headway than China in the battle for hearts and minds, which bodes well for the long-term future of Indian relations throughout the region. This suggests that India has the upper hand in the medium-term. However, while China's rise has been met with suspicion and in some cases alarm, it remains many Asian countries' largest trade partner, donor, and source of investment.

Anyone who underestimates China's ability to learn quick lessons and adapt to dynamic investment climates will be disappointed. China has proven itself to be a shrewd and cunning competitor in the global economic and political landscape, and its ability and willingness to hurl money at countries yearning for assistance will continue to enhance its influence throughout the region for many years to come.