Geopolitical thread

brihaspati · Post by **brihaspati** » 22 May 2010 20:30

JE Menon wrote
As such the multi-layered Indic ethos allowing unbounded intellectual freedom, especially in the sphere of inquiry on faith, apart from political and economic affairs, is the strongest and most flexible system that I can see in the world today.

Where do you see it really as existing in India! It can be applied to a certain faith system only. All others cannot be explored if anyone deems such inquiry to hurt the sentiments of one or more people and if it can be seen as potentially disturbing law and order. How can you have open inquiry when the highest court of the land has already unilaterally defined and characterized only one faith system on behalf of that faith system? Are you not implicating the rashtra and society of India then as anti-Indic - for it does not support (and in fact goes against) unbounded "intellectual freedom" - especially in the "sphere of inquiry on faith"! Surely if this qualified and restricted or selective alowance of inquiry is part of the Indic system, why challenge it - and include this "selective procedure too as part of Indic!

svenkat · Post by **svenkat** » 22 May 2010 20:54

Bji,
Thanks for summing up the views of many.You have 'ignored' one aspect in the present reply.States which dare to critically inquire about anti-rashtra tendencies are by default anti-national in the estabished paradigm.

Some seem to think that 'production' of SS Menon/GK Pillai types (without in any way questioning their contribution) to be the ultimate ideal/goal of the Indian civilisational state.

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 22 May 2010 21:25

>>Where do you see it really as existing in India! It can be applied to a certain faith system only.

Maybe so, but it is the vast majority. Secondly, it is not only. The other faith systems are not monolithic in India. People have varying opinions, even within the majority.

>>All others cannot be explored if anyone deems such inquiry to hurt the sentiments of one or more people and if it can be seen as potentially disturbing law and order. How can you have open inquiry when the highest court of the land has already unilaterally defined and characterized only one faith system on behalf of that faith system?

Then isn't this what we ought to change? Rather than accusing people fairly arbitrarily as being non-consciously obeying the diktat of some all encompassing Western agenda?

>>Are you not implicating the rashtra and society of India then as anti-Indic - for it does not support (and in fact goes against) unbounded "intellectual freedom" - especially in the "sphere of inquiry on faith"!
Surely if this qualified and restricted or selective alowance of inquiry is part of the Indic system, why challenge it - and include this "selective procedure too as part of Indic!

As far as I can tell, i have neither said, nor supported any selective allowance of inquiry or anything of the sort. And certainly have not implicated anyone or anything. All I'm saying is, if someone, anyone, has a grand vision for India, it would be nice if it were articulated in something other than 500 year spans, and in terms of opposing Western agenda (is it written down somewhere, or is it in someone's non-conscious too I wonder). Why only Western? No one else has a negative agenda against India?

We need to have good and the broadest possible relationships with every one, have the strongest possible trade ties with everyone, and be prepared nuke the whole world out of existence if necessary. Everyone is a friend. Everyone is an enemy.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 22 May 2010 21:41

JE Menon wrote: >>People like Swapan or C Raja Mohan probably do not consciously want to subordinate India.

So it is known what these people want to do non-consciously (or is that sub-conscious, or unconscious? ) and they can be judged for it?

Who precisely are these people who can pick out the non-consciously influenced individuals, and what are the methods used to suss them out? Who belongs to this special group who neither consciously nor non-consciously want to subordinate India?

Anybody has the right to interpret the data points that are available, and others are free to disagree. For example, if somebody were to call themselves an Anglophile, sing praises of Curzon, and declare that curbing Chinese influence is a "primary objective", while aggressively deriding those who are not happy about EVMs with their foreign-installed binaries, then that sends certain signals. You may interpret them in a different way.

These rather oracular proclamations seem to me rather the expression of a singular lack of confidence in the people, and a desire (not new, nor certainly unique) to take charge of a particular vision of India and make it the dominant one.

It is not a lack of confidence in the people; it is a lack of confidence in our corrupt political class. Take a look, for example at this article by Subramanian Swamy: http://www.janataparty.org/sonia.html . Then consider how most of our political class genuflects before the "High Command". Anybody who does not have a healthy skepticism about our political class would be quite credulous, IMHO.

This is alright, but the manner of going about it - with dark hints of century-spanning designs, and intricate multi-layered conspiracies - is not going to withstand rigorous inquiry. Nor will it attract a sufficient number of rational people - elite and non-elite - to have any sustainable impact on the Indian polity. At best it will remain a hobby of sorts for people with time and money on their hands.

Some people may say a person like Carroll Quigley is not worth knowing about "because he is from Bangalore, Kerela". These folks may find some ideas quite outlandish. Others, perhaps with more data, may feel that these folks are living in a terribly circumscribed world.

Indeed, as was aptly put by J Edgar Hoover, director of the FBI: "The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent." The Elks Magazine (August 1956)

Don't know about you guys, but it seems to me we have the makings of our own little inquisition here... Who wants to be the chief inquisitor?

Nothing wrong with people giving their interpretations of data, and in others giving different interpretations.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 22 May 2010 21:42

JEM, in 1905 WS Churchill at the inaugural speech at Commonwealth Club, San Francisco gave that number as the goal of the Anglo Saxon dominance. Will post the links once I get them.

Others just because we don't know doesn't mean it doesn't exist!!!

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 22 May 2010 21:46

And what about Swapan Dasgupta? Is he non-consciously a supporter of the "Western agenda" against India, and "mentally colonized"? This was the allegation.

Now of course, we have another couple of bugbears - "SS Menon/GK Pillai types" - since it is off season on Kakodkar, Shyam Saran and MKN I suppose ...

Never mind...

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 22 May 2010 21:53

>>JEM, in 1905 WS Churchill at the inaugural speech at Commonwealth Club, San Francisco gave that number as the goal of the Anglo Saxon dominance.

Ramana, so what? All kinds of people have said all kinds of things. And if he didn't say it, he would be a fool. This is the same sort of thing the Americans say in their Quadrennial Review. Nothing surprising or unexpected about it. Nor extraordinarily important. He was a colonialist mofo, who won a war for his country - maybe THE most important war it fought. He was a British patriot. I have no special regard for his words.

My argument is not that there is no anti-India agenda (FWIW, I strongly believe that every country on the planet would like to see India cut up into more easily digestible pieces - I mean that), but that our policy towards these countries has to be on the basis of cost-benefit calculations, reasonably well calibrated to absorb unpredictabilities on an ongoing basis without affecting the fundamental interest - that is to increase our strategic space and autonomy (through the digesting of others if necessary) to the maximum possible - and by "our" I mean India, including all its components and in every sense, which can only co-exist and thrive under a confident Hindu majority. That's my view.

That confidence will not come overnight in historical terms. But it is coming. It is inevitable, and I am quite certain it will be awesomely transformative - for the world. And America in particular, because of what it is, will be vital to this transformation. It is delusional to think otherwise.

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 22 May 2010 22:10

To me a tragedy of India has been that the language of knowledge has not been the mother tongue for long periods of time.

e.g., as Sanskrit fell out of use but remained the language of learning; then Persian and then English.

Maybe Inglish will become India's mother-tongue. But until then, in a sense, we are all colonized.

Complaining about Swapan Dasgupta seems trivial in comparison. Being able to access the world in the language you first learned, now that I think is important.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 22 May 2010 22:13

The language may be alien but our thoughts are our own.

One of these days we will own Inglish. For that we need to create content and empathy for that content.

Carl_T · Post by **Carl_T** » 22 May 2010 22:14

I think we need to be more patient, as a free nation, we are still in the baby stage. The order of the day should be in building pan-indian institutions and indigenous political ideologies and perhaps half a century later we will start seeing results.

AnimeshP · Post by **AnimeshP** » 22 May 2010 22:20

JE Menon wrote:And what about Swapan Dasgupta? Is he non-consciously a supporter of the "Western agenda" against India, and "mentally colonized"? This was the allegation.

Now of course, we have another couple of bugbears - "SS Menon/GK Pillai types" - since it is off season on Kakodkar, Shyam Saran and MKN I suppose ...

Never mind...

JEM saar ... you are a forum moderator but still don't know that it is only on BRF that true nationalists reside ... everyone else is out there to implement a western agenda at some point or other in their life ... Those damn westerners have such a cunning brain

... They have defined such a broad agenda that us poor Indics (even the uber-nationalist ones) always end up supporting it whether its consciously or sub-consciously ...

Now you see ... those westerners have landed troops dressed up as chinese on our border so that they could convince us Indics that the Chinese are threats ... they want to use us as a counter-weight against China .. we should not fall for that ... after all Hindi-Chini bhai-bhai ..

But wait .. what is it that you say ... the Chinese are also sending troops dressed as their own soldiers inside our border (as per the westeren agenda ... damn those westerners are everywhere)and some nationalists say we should counter that... yep they are propogating the atlanticists agenda ... On top of that we have MMS/Maino cabal who got elected by manipulating all the EVMs (again a western agenda) who are busy gifting Kashmir to Pakistan (as per western agenda). Then there are the Maoists who are busy trying to implement another western agenda by aiming to topple the MMS govt (put there by ... you guessed it .. western agenda).

And don't even get me started on the Divided Indian elites ... they are the worst scum on this earth who are selling this country down the river to implement a western agenda ....

The country can only be saved bythe netizens (apologies for using a non-Indic non-nationalist word here ... damn those evil "Westerners"

) of BRF who are saving the country by exposing the western and atlanticist agenda by going undercover and infiltrating their societies...

svenkat · Post by **svenkat** » 22 May 2010 22:34

I got irritated when a stalwart like JEM Saar was 'defending' Swapan.In the evolution of India, Swapans dont matter.

Unqualified apologies for my remarks on GK Pillai 'types'.There is a difference between Acharyaji and Swapans.At least in the culture I come from,a disciplined educated person who earns a honest living is different from superficial journalist types.

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 22 May 2010 23:15

svenkat,

It is not about Swapan. BTW, who matters in the evolution of India? It is terrible that you can write stuff like "Swapans don't matter". If Swapan, or Jasbir, or Krishnan, or Abraham, or Rauf don't matter for the evolution of India, who does? Do you? I think you do. So do I, so does Swapan. No one should face a random allegation like that with no real supporting evidence - except something as vague as "mentally colonised" and doesn't even know it sort of thing...

>>There is a difference between Acharyaji and Swapans

You mean the one on BRF?

Ramana is right. We will own English. A language becomes the property of those who can use it best. England doesn't own English, any more than America Airlines owns air. But it gave the world English. Sometimes it was forced down our throats. But hey, what the hell. Now we've swallowed it. That's the reality. Face it. Don't repeat it. And move on, with whatever we can get from it.

sanjaykumar · Post by **sanjaykumar** » 22 May 2010 23:27

Outstanding posts Menon saar.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 23 May 2010 01:03

JEM is false argument about resentment of English language. The last sixty years have settled the question abut English in India. The process is underway to Indigenize (pun intended) it.

As for those who think there is no master plan/conspiracy or a drive why don't they let the "fools" chatter away confident in their superior knowledge? Why intervene with messenger bias?

Churchill was no grea thinker but he sure was the spokesperson of a clique and he was confident of the clique's goals that he didnt hesitate to articulate it.

The 500 year goal is from him and when he is identified its dismissed!

I need more to get evidence of his articulation.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 23 May 2010 01:07

ramana wrote:
Churchill was no grea thinker but he sure was the spokesperson of a clique and he was confident of the clique's goals that he didnt hesitate to articulate it.

The 500 year goal is from him and when he is identified its dismissed!

I need more to get evidence of his articulation.

There should be a quote in this book by Kissinger

Diplomacy (A Touchstone book)
Henry Kissinger (Author)

http://books.google.com/books?id=tquxD6 ... 20&f=false

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/kenanderson/ ... ealth.html

The Colonial Conference of 1897 which Chamberlain summoned had another important outcome. It was attended only by representatives of the colonies with responsible government. A clear line was now drawn between them and the colonies, principally in West and East Africa, which did not govern themselves. Two distinct empires came into existence almost unperceived - the self-governing colonies or Dominions as they came to be called, voluntarily co-operating with Great Britain, and the true colonies, administered in authoritarian fashion by the Colonial Office.. There was of course a third Empire, as there had been in practice since the middle of the 18th Century and in law since 1858.
India, ruled by a Viceroy and directed from London by the India Office, not by the Colonial Office. Strictly the King of Britain was Emperor only in India, a title he lost when India became independent in 1947. The British Empire was an Empire without an Emperor so far as the colonies and the self-governing Dominions were concerned.

http://www.mutanteggplant.com/agog/2007/07/23/

Throughout the war, British leaders had no intention of losing India as a colony. The British leaders perhaps foresaw a gradual transition over forty or fifty years, of India into a Commonwealth nation like Canada or Australia.
By 1944 Wavell came to the conclusion that the best way forward was to build up Jinnah and create a British dominion, Pakistan, where British forces could maintain bases including the ports at Karachi and Dacca and from which it could continue to recruit military forces.

After the war much had changed. An Indian scholar writes:

The growing role of strategic air power and the vital importance of Middle Eastern oil had transformed British policy in Asia. For over a century, British policy in the Gulf had largely been shaped by the strategic interests of her Indian Empire. This was no longer the case… By 1947, the tables had been turned – Britain’ s strategic interests in the Gulf and Middle East had become a major factor in her South Asia policy.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http ... 11_354.doc

brihaspati · Post by **brihaspati** » 23 May 2010 01:48

JE Menon ji,

My post was in response to what you wrote :

As such the multi-layered Indic ethos allowing unbounded intellectual freedom, especially in the sphere of inquiry on faith, apart from political and economic affairs, is the strongest and most flexible system that I can see in the world today.

You are saying here, that unbounded intellectual freedom, especially in the sphere of inquiry on faith - is currently the Indic ethos, and is apparently the strongest and most flexible system. I pointed out that this freedom is extended only if you "inquire" and "construct" one particular faith system. Yes it happens to be the majority. So what, surely the Indic ethos - if it is an ethos - must be allowing such unbounded "intellectual" freedoms to inquire into other faiths also? If India does not allow it on excuses of "hurting sentiments" or "law and order situation" highly selectively, then by your own logic - India is not currently Indic.

It is not a question about whether "other" faiths are monolithic or not, it is about whether it is allowed to explore even intellectually all and any aspects of their faiths? Also if they are not monolithic, exactly what are the issues that the different interpretations differ on? Do they differ on issues vital to "non-faiths" like proselytization, or ultimate establishment of their respective "faith" based rashtras in India?

Regarding an Anglo-Saxon "Plan" for India, it is worthwhile to explore. It never hurts to be paranoid about forces that have proved themselves violently opposed to Indian civilization, and with openly declared aims of "converting" the people and destroying the pre-existing culture/religion, and covert aims of looting both material and biological resources. It does not necessarily mean that the Brits or the Americans have a consistent century long "plan". Such plans are problematic, because most things are unpredictable in long term international posturing.

But neither does it mean that we wish away a basic mindset of "imperialism" that is self-justificatory based on racial and religious constructs and therefore focused on particular regions/communities/faiths as absurd.

csharma · Post by **csharma** » 23 May 2010 02:09

Robert Kaplan on China and India. Says China will be a superpower and India will be great regional power.

That does not make sense to me. If China is a superpower and India is an autonomous regional power from Persian Gulf to SE asia, then what kind of supoerpower is China. If India manages to build a multipolar Asia, then what does the talk of Chinese superpowerdom mean.

But I would say it remains to be seen if India will be able to thwart China in its areas of interest. The record of last few years with China making inroads in South Asia as well as Indian Ocean does not bode well for India.

http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201005210394.html

Interview with Robert Kaplan/ YOICHI FUNABASHI, Editor in Chief: China, India to compete over various interests in Indian Ocean

Question: Many people are increasingly concluding that China will become a superpower this century and will deal with the rest of the world on its own terms. What do you think about the prospects of China becoming a superpower?

Answer: China will be a great continental power in the Eastern Hemisphere. It will combine two things. Firstly, it will reach deep into Central Asia, with all of its mineral and hydrocarbon wealth. And it will also have a long coastline on the Pacific in the temperate and tropical zones.

China will be a major Eurasian power, with a very usable coastline. So it's very geographically blessed in a way that the Soviet Union was not.

Q: What do you think of the prospect of India becoming a superpower?

A: India won't become a superpower. India will become a great regional power.

China is expanding south toward the Indian Ocean. Just look where China is giving so much of its military aid--Burma, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka--and look where those countries are on the map. They're all along the Indian Ocean.

India is expanding east and west. It's expanding horizontally, not vertically. India seeks an expansion much like the India of the British viceroys in the late 19th century, where you had an Indian subcontinent that included Pakistan and Burma and Bangladesh, and also with spheres of influence in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. That was the India of the British viceroys, of Lord Curzon and others.

That's India's goal, I think, when India thinks of its strategic policy.

Q: But that is precisely the reason why Indians really feel hurt and wounded--because they are a declared nuclear power. Perhaps to the west, India can reach out to the east coast of Africa, which is becoming increasingly dynamic and regionally influential. And to the east, Myanmar will perhaps someday become democratic, and then India's influence could increase further.

Although India may become a "great" regional power, Indians seem to aspire to become a global power on a par with China.

A: First of all, a word about Africa. Keep in mind that one of the greatest ironies we're seeing is that Africa is finally really developing when you look at its growth. And what's causing that is not foreign aid; it's investment from China, India and the Persian Gulf. So it's the former Third World investing in what is still the Third World.

It's true, a freer Burma or Myanmar would increase India's influence because India is the proximate next door democratic power.

India clearly can become a great Indian Ocean power. But remember that the problem India has when you compare it with China is that the government doesn't function well in India.

You can see this when you fly into Mumbai and you have to get to your downtown hotel. You have to go through some of the worst slums because there is no airport road linking the airport with Mumbai. Why? Because they tried to build a road and all these people along the way can hire lawyers and disrupt the project. In China, that doesn't happen.

His points about the efficacy of the Indian govt are valid.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 23 May 2010 02:29

csharma wrote:Robert Kaplan on China and India. Says China will be a superpower and India will be great regional power.

That does not make sense to me. If China is a superpower and India is an autonomous regional power from Persian Gulf to SE asia, then what kind of supoerpower is China. If India manages to build a multipolar Asia, then what does the talk of Chinese superpowerdom mean.

What he does not say is that India will be under the dominion of China since the Indian leaders have shown that way.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 23 May 2010 08:06

JE Menon wrote: That confidence will not come overnight in historical terms. But it is coming. It is inevitable, and I am quite certain it will be awesomely transformative - for the world. And America in particular, because of what it is, will be vital to this transformation. It is delusional to think otherwise.

I don't know what role you expect America to play in the hoped-for "awesome transformation". But the reality is that the elites that control the US govt cannot be separated from the policy decision of creating and sustaining the Paks.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 23 May 2010 11:24

Pranav wrote: Swapan was talking about curbing the influence of China being a "primary objective", and was speaking approvingly of Curzon.
.

I am sorry Swapan does not do anything you have said, he has only said that some of the strategems of the British times are still valid. Period.

I fail to see the great anxiety of turning friends into enemies.

JEM excellent sets of post -- no one is friend no one is a enemy -- we need to articulate our interests gather the flock around it and charge.

The same view is expressed by nearly everyone here -- the problem is if we start throwing people like Swapan Dasgupta into dustbin instead of supporting them based on our -- interpretation of their sub-conscious thoughts -- we are really losing the few friends we have.

(to mods Pranav and others, this is a illustrative example alone, not personal attack)
Is this what we want? Off hand I would say that it appears to me (/CT hat on) that Pranav is actually a agent of western interest who is trying to break the Indian solidarity by mixing truth (western agenda) with fiction (interest of some Indians) and create confusion (/CT off)

Is this the way to go? Seriously?

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 23 May 2010 11:41

>>But the reality is that the elites that control the US govt cannot be separated from the policy decision of creating and sustaining the Paks.

Therefore?

What decisions would you take (or not take) that the Indian government has not taken (or taken) with regard to the US?

Or let's put it like this, on a practical level - given the perfectly "nationalistic" (I suppose, but insert whatever descriptor you want here) government you desire in New Delhi - what sort of relationship would you like to see between India and the US?

Now tell me, has the transformation in the last two odd decades (compared to say 1989) been fairly awesome, given the situation then? Do you think this transformation will not continue, and that in another 20 years the situation will not represent an incredible change from what it used to be in 1989? Do you think the US (and other countries but primarily the US) has not had a positive role in this? Sure, it had a negative role as well (remember what I said about digestible pieces). In the coming years, as we grow rapidly, do you think the US will cease to have a key role in our changing economic and strategic reality? I think it is fairly obvious that it will.

So what do we DO, in practical terms, that is different from what we are doing now? I mean fundamentally, not just in terms of gestures and protocol observation.

As for me, I don't "expect" America to play any role apart from that of trying to screw us at every possible opportunity. I do expect our government to tailor its policies of ever-tighter economic linkages, strategic interconnections, and intermeshing every sphere of activity so that in another three decades, the US will not be able to distinguish where its interests finish and ours start. Then our interests will be its interests and vice versa for the most part. And I expect that Indians with their capacity to generate innovative ideas and argue their case indefinitely, to propose and promote and eventually change America such that (fundamentally) it becomes more like India in the way it thinks (that is almost inevitable anyways) and articulates its value system. And, inevitably, we will become more like them as well.

There will be things people like about that situation, and things people don't. Just like now.

@the rest of the guys who have posted responses - I will try to answer a bit later. Will continue to respond as long as I can, but next week is a pretty busy one. I will try though.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 23 May 2010 13:13

Sanku wrote:
Pranav wrote: Swapan was talking about curbing the influence of China being a "primary objective", and was speaking approvingly of Curzon.
.
I am sorry Swapan does not do anything you have said, he has only said that some of the strategems of the British times are still valid. Period.

Well, let's say he calls it a "prime objective", and that he speaks approvingly of Curzonian strategies, if that makes you happier. Let's not quibble over minor wording differences.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 23 May 2010 13:25

Sanku, JEM, perhaps we are not on the same page. First consider this proposition:

A fundamental goal, vis-a-vis India, of the elites that control the US (and UK) is to usurp Indian sovereignty, to reduce India to the status of a colony.

Once we are clear about the basic goals of the people we're dealing with, then we can proceed further.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 23 May 2010 16:55

Pranav wrote:Sanku, JEM, perhaps we are not on the same page. First consider this proposition:

A fundamental goal, vis-a-vis India, of the elites that control the US (and UK) is to usurp Indian sovereignty, to reduce India to the status of a colony.

Once we are clear about the basic goals of the people we're dealing with, then we can proceed further.

Only to reduce India to a level of Japan and other such countries. Yes they would like that and would work towards that.

But Pranav, I have been one of the few who advocated this on BRF when it was not fashionable (it is far more accepted now) -- so clearly you do not understand the basic premise of what I am saying.

Well, let's say he calls it a "prime objective", and that he speaks approvingly of Curzonian strategies, if that makes you happier. Let's not quibble over minor wording differences.

Oh please, he merely says that we need to look at some British strategies. Whats wrong with that? The Brits played/play a mean game, we can surely take a leaf from there book. Does not make anyone a anglophile.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 23 May 2010 17:55

Sanku wrote:
Pranav wrote:Sanku, JEM, perhaps we are not on the same page. First consider this proposition:

A fundamental goal, vis-a-vis India, of the elites that control the US (and UK) is to usurp Indian sovereignty, to reduce India to the status of a colony.

Once we are clear about the basic goals of the people we're dealing with, then we can proceed further.
Only to reduce India to a level of Japan and other such countries. Yes they would like that and would work towards that.

Well, let's just say that they want to enslave as much as possible. Japs are smarter than we are. Corrupt, incompetent and credulous peoples would deservedly get subjected to deeper and more vicious forms of enslavement, even to the extent of genocide.

Oh please, he merely says that we need to look at some British strategies. Whats wrong with that? The Brits played/play a mean game, we can surely take a leaf from there book. Does not make anyone a anglophile.

He calls himself an Anglophile, he is happy to call himself one, let's just leave it at that, not beat the dead horse etc.

The deeper issue we should try to get at is Indian perceptions of national interest, and the dealings of the corrupt political class vis-a-vis the western elites.

JwalaMukhi · Post by **JwalaMukhi** » 23 May 2010 18:04

Pranav wrote: A fundamental goal, vis-a-vis India, of the elites that control the US (and UK) is to usurp Indian sovereignty, to reduce India to the status of a colony.

Once we are clear about the basic goals of the people we're dealing with, then we can proceed further.

Here is swapan dasgupta's twitter account link. Hopefully, this may be the same gentleman discussion is going on. Self description is good commentary.
http://twitter.com/swapan55
# Bio Politically conservative; socially Anglophile; I belong to 1930s.

The goal of usurping Indian sovereignty is desirable outcome. But the fundamental goal is not about sovereignty per se. The fundamental goal is to reduce/constrain India to be bracketed as a country (whose size can be reshaped). While in reality India is a mighty civilization in its own right and denial of that is the key. Many would like to see India as risen from the ashes of Indian civilization. Final rites of Indian civilization are sought with eagerness. While India as a country is a mere manifestation of the unique civilization (India).
Swapan dasgupta's writings and many more like him find it convenient with that kind of arrangement where India as civilization is denied. i.e., bells and whistles take center stage, and the foundations and superstructures are wished that they be invisible, because it does not socially make it acceptable to Anglos and hence to anglophiles.

Sanjay M · Post by **Sanjay M** » 23 May 2010 19:37

As per investment guru Mark Faber's comments that even China's uber-state would be unable to control its national economy on its whim, likewise the Chinese state will suffer increasing difficulties in being able to control society whose people are being increasingly empowered by all sorts of technologies. Eventually, the cost of policing internet communications, cellphone communications, PDA communications, etc, will incur an excessive overhead that their country/society/state cannot meet. What happens if/when communication devices go peer-to-peer? How will Chinese police be able to stop people on the street to check which cellphones route through their central switches, versus which ones communication directly to each other at short range without any way to block them? How will they sift through ever larger amounts of data to see which might contain encrypted steganographic messages?

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 23 May 2010 19:42

brihaspati,

>>So what, surely the Indic ethos - if it is an ethos - must be allowing such unbounded "intellectual" freedoms to inquire into other faiths also? If India does not allow it on excuses of "hurting sentiments" or "law and order situation" highly selectively, then by your own logic - India is not currently Indic.

I would phrase it differently. India is not currently as Indic as I would like it to be, and then I would ask you the same question I asked before: Then isn't this what we ought to change? Rather than accusing people fairly arbitrarily as non-consciously obeying the diktat of some all encompassing Western agenda?

>>Regarding an Anglo-Saxon "Plan" for India, it is worthwhile to explore. It never hurts to be paranoid about forces that have proved themselves violently opposed to Indian civilization, and with openly declared aims of "converting" the people and destroying the pre-existing culture/religion, and covert aims of looting both material and biological resources.

Why not take it further? I personally believe India should operate under the assumption, essentially, every significant power on the planet is out to cut us up into more digestible pieces, the core of divide and rule - in one way or another (if not statewise, then caste, language, water, you name it - and the signals are already there).

>>It does not necessarily mean that the Brits or the Americans have a consistent century long "plan". Such plans are problematic, because most things are unpredictable in long term international posturing.

Fully agree. No it does not necessarily mean that. But it also does not mean such a plan does not exist. However, to allocate such a plan to the "Anglo Saxons" alone is frankly, beyond ridiculous. Why? Because we cannot read original Russian and Chinese? or for that matter Arabic or Spanish?

>>But neither does it mean that we wish away a basic mindset of "imperialism" that is self-justificatory based on racial and religious constructs and therefore focused on particular regions/communities/faiths as absurd.

Who is wishing away that here? My point has been, and is, that allocating everything to some kind of ridiculous notion such as multi-century social-engineering (20-20 hindsight in other words), which apparently is an exclusive Anglo Saxon prerogative, while ignoring others and - most importantly - not saying what we should actually DO about it different than we are doing now - is absurd (especially if you bring in notions like "mental colonisation" which only a select few apparently can detect).

My questions, if you will note, have not been answered. I will ask another couple: What is NOT part of the Anglo-Saxon conspiracy? What is NOT psy-ops by these colonostalgic

gents who now guard and guide this plan?

I fear I know the answers. And that is what I fear. What these sort of theories do is create a sort of environment where responsibility is abdicated because, you know, they control everything. It also limits the room for analysis and action based on what we actually know, what is actually said by these countries and elites. It is, essentially, a diversionary mechanism. It is, subtly, also a mechanism to usurp power through the creation of fear - in the manner of the Islamic Buffet (i.e. take it or leave it). Yet, if you simply assume that, whether there is a plan or not, they are out to get us - and then act on the basis of reality and the actions of other key players - where can you go wrong?

I CANNOT believe people are sitting here and judging Swapan Dasgupta - not because he is some paragon of nationalistic virtue, or because he is primus inter pares among centre-right journalists, or even among those with some sense of integrity - but because if Swapan is a non-consciously mentally colonised individual, who on this forum is not? And, as I asked before, who is to be the judge of this? Hence my comment on the inquisition.

Sanjay M · Post by **Sanjay M** » 23 May 2010 19:49

Sanku wrote:Only to reduce India to a level of Japan and other such countries. Yes they would like that and would work towards that.

"Reduce India to a level of Japan"

Japan is the world's second-largest economy. While we were pathetic slaves of the gora sahibs, the Japanese were fighting them full-on in WW2.
There are plenty of parts of India which look like sub-Saharan Africa, and yet you are cribbing about being "reduced" to comparison with Japan. If we should only be so lucky to progress as far as they have, but unfortunately we don't have their collaborative temperament.

We are like that onlee - preening about victories which have not yet occurred. Is it guaranteed that they will occur? I can't help but feel reminded of our recent bragging that the GSLV launch would give a fitting reply to Western sanctions regimes, only to later see people looking shaken and crestfallen when the much-touted victory did not occur, even while mumbling lamely that ignition must have occurred for ~1s or some such.

Perhaps if we keep chanting the word "Indic" while flapping our lips fast enough, it will help us take flight?

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 23 May 2010 19:55

Guys, I would suggest to go easy on the sarcasm and personal hints (and if I myself have been so inadvertently, I apologise now). A fairly reasonable debate is going on, and no one has a monopoly on what is right or wrong. There is no need to spice up a cogent post with a bit of flamebait. It may seem nice and satisfying momentarily - but you'll end up replying to tens of posts in response, and us admins will have to work more than we would like to ordinarly on a Sunday afternoon

). No particular post is targeted here. Just a cautionary note.

JwalaMukhi · Post by **JwalaMukhi** » 23 May 2010 21:13

Ah, the argumentative Indians. Just as when there are two Indians, there will be three opinions; or as when there are two Indians there will be four jatis.

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 23 May 2010 21:40

I'm reproducing here an article from the NYT, 1981, on China. I don't think anyone really foresaw China's trajectory. The extrapolation to the future based on past and current trends is a mostly futile exercise.

CHINA, TO RELIEVE UNEMPLOYMENT, GIVES PRIVATE SECTOR MORE LEEWAY

By CHRISTOPHER S. WREN, SPECIAL TO THE NEW YORK TIMES
Published: November 24, 1981

PEKING, Nov. 23

China today moved closer to becoming a mixed economy by formally acknowledging a need for more private enterprise to alleviate its chronic unemployment problem.

The country's two top policy-making bodies, the Communist Party Central Committee and the Government, proposed in a joint decision that new jobs be created increasingly by private businesses as well as by collective, or cooperative, enterprises.

The decision, reached Oct. 17 but made public only today, signaled a change in the Communist Chinese position of the last three decades that the state owes every able-bodied adult a job.

''Under the state's overall planning and guidance,'' the joint decision said, ''people get jobs arranged by labor departments or get organized on a voluntary basis or find jobs themselves.''

Details of New Program

In the decision, China's leadership asserted that the state-run and cooperative sectors would still constitute the basic form of economic activity in the nation but said they needed to be supplemented by self-employment ''within a certain limit.''

To encourage private enterprise, every self-employed person in China will now be permitted to have two helpers and five apprentices, according to today's announcement.

Originally, upon the Communists' takeover of China in 1949, private enterprise was permitted on a very small scale. An entrepreneur was allowed to employ only members of his family. About a year and a half ago, an entrepreneur was permitted to add two apprentices and later five apprentices in certain trades. The new decision, by allowing a total of seven employees, will help Chinese to set up larger retail businesses.

''Private business has resumed and expanded, but it still does not meet the needs of the country's national economy,'' said the decision, which was circulated today by The People's Daily and the New China News Agency. Extent of Unemployment

Although the precise extent of urban unemployment is unclear, previous articles in the ideological journal Red Flag and elsewhere have suggested that about 10 million Chinese were unemployed at the end of last year, out of an urban work force of approximately 115 million.

The Chinese authorities had hoped to find 10 million new jobs this year, which would still leave about 4 million unemployed because that many people are expected to finish school and seek jobs. But indications are that there will be no more than 7 million new jobs.

Only 10 of China's 29 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions have managed to find jobs for all those who left high school before 1979. Of the remaining 19, there are 14 that hope to reach that target by the end of the year, according to a report last month.

Facing a wait of several years for jobs, some young people have started devising their own work, initially by repairing bicycles, tailoring, taking photographs and other relatively simple neighborhood trades. Preference for State Jobs

At the end of last March, more than 1.26 million Chinese had registered as self-employed, according to the General Administration for Industry and Commerce. Just over half of these were in the major cities. Canton, for example, has reported having 14,000 self-employed persons, 48 percent of them youths.

But more young Chinese seem to prefer jobs in the state sector, where they are guaranteed a job for life without having to work very hard. Recognizing this preference for what is nicknamed the ''iron rice bowl,'' the decision that was announced today urged that the new approval of private enterprise be widely publicized ''to allay people's misgivings.''

Private businesses have proved useful for China's leaders because they not only reduce the pool of unemployed but also provide services that state-owned businesses have been too inept or unwilling to provide.

The new decision also envisions a ''significant expansion'' in the number of cooperatives, in which workers form an enterprise and split the profits. These function much like cooperatives in freeenterprise countries. But young Chinese have sometimes been wary of joining cooperatives because their job tenure and pension benefits are not assured. Helping People Find Work

According to the State Bureau of Labor, there are now 2,300 labor service companies helping young people in China to find temporary jobs in state factories or to set up their own cooperative enterprises. The new decision today proposes that more of these offices be encouraged.

A Chinese labor specialist, Kang Yonghe, reported last month that the labor service companies had found jobs for 2.35 million Chinese in more than 32,000 cooperatives.

In the joint decision, the Government and Communist Party leadership said that restrictions on private and cooperative enterprise should be changed and that self-employed people should be treated with as much political respect as workers in state enterprises.

But the decision added that self-employed and cooperative workers should accept state supervision and abide by the state's policies and laws. There was no mention of whether such workers would be included in the social welfare benefits that state-employed workers enjoy. Peasants' Separate Status

The announcement does not appear to affect China's 800 million peasants, who live on communes and state farms, although Peking has also encouraged them to take more responsibility in the last few years.

China's leadership has attributed the unemployment problem to the radical leftist rule of the Cultural Revolution. During this period, from 1966 to 1976, schools were closed and millions of young people were sent off to work in rural areas. This created a tremendous labor surplus when they later returned home to the cities, and some have been sent back to the countryside.

In the last three years, Peking says it has found jobs for 20 million people.

csharma · Post by **csharma** » 23 May 2010 23:12

Acharya wrote:
csharma wrote:Robert Kaplan on China and India. Says China will be a superpower and India will be great regional power.

That does not make sense to me. If China is a superpower and India is an autonomous regional power from Persian Gulf to SE asia, then what kind of supoerpower is China. If India manages to build a multipolar Asia, then what does the talk of Chinese superpowerdom mean.
What he does not say is that India will be under the dominion of China since the Indian leaders have shown that way.

Wouldn't a nuclear armed country of 1.2 billion people with Agni-V and Arihant etc be a little hard to reduce to dominion status.

Contained probably but not reduced to vassalage.

Maybe the gurus can provide their critique of Lee Kuan Yew and Robert Kaplan's views. In my view the biggest problem India has is lack of access to Central Asia. India can project power in SE Asia, Persian Gulf and IOR but Central Asia is where it is the weakest owing to lack of land routes or reliable allies that can provide land routes.

Also what are the strategies and chances of India becoming a player in the Pacific region. Both Kaplan and LKY don't think it will happen. Definitely it is lower on Indias' priority.. But can India sustain military operations in South China sea from the Andamans.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 23 May 2010 23:18

csharma wrote:

Wouldn't a nuclear armed country of 1.2 billion people with Agni-V and Arihant etc be a little hard to reduce to dominion status.

Contained probably but not reduced to vassalage.

There are different varieties of dominion status

Maybe that is the strategy of the Indian govt.

brihaspati · Post by **brihaspati** » 24 May 2010 00:07

Sanjay M wrote

"Reduce India to a level of Japan"
Japan is the world's second-largest economy. While we were pathetic slaves of the gora sahibs, the Japanese were fighting them full-on in WW2.
There are plenty of parts of India which look like sub-Saharan Africa, and yet you are cribbing about being "reduced" to comparison with Japan. If we should only be so lucky to progress as far as they have, but unfortunately we don't have their collaborative temperament.

It is actually a matter of perception. People who try to flap their lips as quickly as possible while pronouncing "Indic" probably have a one track mind. They only see that a whole regime in Japan changes by popular vote with among others in the agenda - promising to remove an American military base from Okinawa. However, once in power, the regime has to renege on this promise because somehow this wonderfully progressed nation cannot go against US wishes as regards military presence.

On second thoughts, when lips are rapidly flapping, we need a lip-reader to accurately identify the words being pronounced. Obviosuly, such immense efforts of concentration on only one aspect of any articulation does not allow following up on what is happening outside the lips.

I think both sides of the argument are logically consistent. But the the problem is one of "values". For the lip-readers progress==material prosperity only - no matter if it means not having the power to remove a thorny foreign power's military base from whom periodic predatory forays have to be suffered by the local women. So for this side, which is a classic "Indic" strand too (unfortunately), everything is less important compared to wealth and profits. In fact such thinking also makes an == with such small things as in the Okinawa base dispute of local fury and indignation/humiliation to "wealth" prosperity and "progress". This is logically consistent with putting a monetary price on everything in life. Everything is tradeable - if it allows a profit or growth in prosperity - your land, your people, their suffering, their pain.

On the other side of this debate, the lip-flappers, put non-monetary weights on such nebulous concepts as "honour", "culture", "nation", "identity", etc. They refuse to only strictly look forward into the "nebulous" future, and look back into history to compare and find patterns in the way imperialism actually spread. They see similarities in methods applied then and those applied now, and jump up and down in panic.

This debate is never going to end, because it looks at two completely antagonistic values systems.

Anyone here cared to follow how or when and whether, Japan eagerly compromised on its "ancient" cultural aspects, identity aspects, religious aspects, to jump on to the "prosperity" bandwagon. I think those interested can start with the small investigation into the revival of the Japanese chop-stick post WWII, and the issue of changing menu in the school lunches. It would be nearly impossible to find a Japanese writing about how rapidly the lips of certain Japanese may flap in pronouncing "Nipponic", for it appears that the Japanese have an obstinate obsession and regard for their ancient customs, culture, and identity - even religious rituals.

I think, India has an advantage here - because of the long existing line of "everything goes" in the name of "all encompassing tolerance", the mercantile line of everything being up for sale if it derives profit has necessarily to be tolerated as a mark of "progress". So there does not have to be any guilt feeling about upholding that line.

sanjaykumar · Post by **sanjaykumar** » 24 May 2010 00:29

Unfortunately, to the neophyte a universalism rather than the semitic parochialism is tantamount to not having one's own culture ie it is seen as a deficit of a quality rather than the essence of quality. Of course I mean to extend this observation to Indians.

Jupiter saab, your observations on Japan seem authentic-I can picture us in animated discourse in a study somewhere reeking of single malts and perhaps sake.

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 24 May 2010 02:46

Let's not get Okinawa wrong.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 24 May 2010 05:14

JE Menon wrote: Why not take it further? I personally believe India should operate under the assumption, essentially, every significant power on the planet is out to cut us up into more digestible pieces, the core of divide and rule - in one way or another (if not statewise, then caste, language, water, you name it - and the signals are already there).

So far so good.

However, to allocate such a plan to the "Anglo Saxons" alone is frankly, beyond ridiculous. Why? Because we cannot read original Russian and Chinese? or for that matter Arabic or Spanish?

Who is wishing away that here? My point has been, and is, that allocating everything to some kind of ridiculous notion such as multi-century social-engineering (20-20 hindsight in other words), which apparently is an exclusive Anglo Saxon prerogative, while ignoring others and - most importantly - not saying what we should actually DO about it different than we are doing now - is absurd (especially if you bring in notions like "mental colonisation" which only a select few apparently can detect).

My questions, if you will note, have not been answered. I will ask another couple: What is NOT part of the Anglo-Saxon conspiracy? What is NOT psy-ops by these colonostalgic gents who now guard and guide this plan?

Agendas of nations can often take more than one century to work out. Why Anglo-Saxon? It may in fact be more accurate to call it Sabbatean-Frankist rather than Anglo-Saxon. Why not anybody else - because there is no evidence for any other entity pursuing a similarly active and successful program.

I fear I know the answers. And that is what I fear.

Consider the possibility that you may be just as unaware of the answers as you were of Carroll Quigley. Just because you are unaware of something, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I CANNOT believe people are sitting here and judging Swapan Dasgupta - not because he is some paragon of nationalistic virtue, or because he is primus inter pares among centre-right journalists, or even among those with some sense of integrity - but because if Swapan is a non-consciously mentally colonised individual, who on this forum is not? And, as I asked before, who is to be the judge of this? Hence my comment on the inquisition.

One has to make judgments about various entities based on information available. If interpretations of known data points are given, it need not lead to anguish and wailing. People are perfectly free put up their own interpretations.

Anyway, let's move beyond Swapan, and analyze the role of our corrupt political class, in connection with interests of western elites.

Nobody here seems to dispute that a basic agenda of the western elites vis-a-vis India is to reduce India to a vassal status.

Let us also recognize the law of nature that corrupt, incompetent and credulous nations are the "low-hanging fruit" for other powers to pick off and wipe out.

Then we can discuss what we should be doing about it.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 24 May 2010 05:25

csharma wrote:
Wouldn't a nuclear armed country of 1.2 billion people with Agni-V and Arihant etc be a little hard to reduce to dominion status.

Contained probably but not reduced to vassalage.

The normal way this is done is through infiltration and subversion. Events are manipulated so as to make a controlled proxy the leader of the target nation.