India-US News and Discussion

Rudradev · Post by **Rudradev** » 27 Mar 2010 23:01

shiv wrote:
Rudradev wrote: Bombast cloaked as piskology is still bombast onlee. Rhetoric about "fear of cutting deals with the big boys" may well persuade kindergartners, but doesn't really make the grade as substantive argument anywhere else.
Saar the above paragraph occupies about 25% of your reportedly well argued post and is not an argument at all. It is merely verbose rhetoric adding no information of value. It could have been left out but its inclusion suggests that you needed to fluff up you post.

Saar, what to do. As a leading light of BRF from whose posts we have all learned so much over the last decade, you are surely entitled to couch your arguments in any type of rhetoric you like.

For example in the post of yours to which I was specifically responding:

shiv wrote: will admit that this argument is pretty flimsy rudradevji

The comparison with China is meaningless. China bought nothing from the US and reactors and weapons are not on offer. China however bandwagoned with the US against the Soviet Union and used its workforce to produce goods that the US bought. With China now sitting on a load of US$ - It suits them both to cooperate. China has a grip on US testimonials. The US is capable of returning the compliment.

India is a joke. We have no influence on the US. Indians are too scared to deal with the US. The US can still screw us via a condom.

What would make the US cooperate with India? Not the spirit of panchsheel surely? More paranoia? More pointless whining and asking Botswana and Lesotho for support for high seat at high table? "Taking out" Pakistan? Growing spine? Steel knees? PM with haircut and no bangles? Firm stand? Deep voice? More sleep? More fear of cutting deals with the real big boys?

The italicized portion accounts for 53 out of 171 words. By your own standards, this is equally "fluff" and comprises about 31% of your post.

So I have merely deferred to your prerogative as a luminary of this forum by couching my responses in the same rhetoric. Please take it for the compliment it is.

shiv wrote: But I am not about to be diverted into tearing down analogies. We will continue to disagree on this point.

That is a good example you are setting saar, and I continue to learn from you in that. When for instance you make statements like "India is a joke" I am not about to write reams of matter explaining why India is not a joke. Better IMHO to explain why, even accepting the assumption "India is a joke", bandwagoning with the US does not make it any less of a joke.

Rudradev · Post by **Rudradev** » 27 Mar 2010 23:15

Amber G. wrote:
shiv wrote: Saar the above paragraph occupies about 25% of your reportedly well argued post and is not an argument at all. It is merely verbose rhetoric adding no information of value. It could have been left out but its inclusion suggests that you needed to fluff up you post.

Well said. But if it makes you feel better, at least there are no "Is it your birthday Madam" type queries.
.

AmberG Madam, aapka to jawaab hi nahin.

You butt into a discussion with the sole purpose of picking a fight with me in shrill, jalebi-flavored tones.

But of course, if I were to respond in kind you would instantly start bawling: "Admins! What is this equal-equal! I demand an apology" etc. etc.

You might want to consider what this does for your credibility when you make sagacious pronouncements about "self goals" and so on. Have a good day.

csharma · Post by **csharma** » 28 Mar 2010 02:28

KS has spoken. Essentially saying that US has to develop close relations with Pakistan to dismantle terror infrastructure. But it has to take India into confidence. Otherwise India might take action after a terror attack in India.

So one has to wait and watch to see how this is playing out.

K Subrahmanyam: Sleeping with the enemy in order to disarm him

The US may need to develop a closer relationship with Pakistan to deal with Pakistani state-sponsored terrorism, but it should take India into confidence

http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... im/389903/

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 28 Mar 2010 02:38

Not a bad one from Vir Sanghvi talking about Masa p!ssing on India these days. But I have some disagreements.

Few countries are as fiercely patriotic as India is. (Well, actually, perhaps America is too.)

Absolute unadulterated rubbish. US is a hard-core, right wing nationalistic country, bordering on xenephobia. Vir Sanhvi should read more of US media rather than taking at face value, the pronouncements of snake-oil selling US diplomats and elites. In contrast, Indians have no sense of nationalism, except some unity when it comes to food, cricket, and to a certain extent Bollywood. I might ruffle a few feathers here, but how difficult would be for CIA to get access to Indians just by dangling a "green card". Just white skin can take you deep. A savage TFTA David Headley could get access to the high and might from Bollywood. So much for Indians' patriotism.

There are two traditional irritants in the relationship between Washington and Delhi.

The first is what India sees as America’s desire to order the world according to its own best interests.

You loose the plot Sanghvi. America is very rich, very resourceful, fiercely nationalistic etc to bring about "universal justice", rather, it talks and acts in its best intrests. In contrast, India doesn't have much to offer US except lectures on morality.

The second is Pakistan, a small country of no great consequence that has always made itself valuable to Washington by serving US interests in third countries.

From an American perspective, this is invaluable. Not only is the Pakistani government facilitating a face-saving exit from a deeply unpopular war but the Pakistani military seems at last to have found the will to take on Islamists. This accounts for the US’s current love for Pakistan, for the pictures of Hilary Clinton posing cosily with Mehmood Qureshi and for Washington’s praise of Pakistan’s army.

I thought only Sarmila Bose types would be jealous of Hilary cozying up to TFTA Quereshi. Looks like Vir Sanghvi is jealous too. Perhaps he is jealous of Quereshi.

Naturally Islamabad wants payment in return: an India-style nuclear deal, arms to use against India, an ejection of Indians from Afghanistan, some resolution of the Kashmir dispute etc. Washington cannot give the Pakistanis everything they want. But equally, Pakistan has to get something as payment. And that will be at India’s expense.

You fail to point out that the biggest concession US has made to TSP is taking out India-specifioc terror apparatus likke LeT out of the so called "global war on terror". And part of US's ambivalence in disallowing access to Headley is to protect TSP. Not that India can do much with whatever revelations DH makes, but thats a different story.

Finally, I am still waiting for a day when some Indian elite like Vir Sanghvi will not be coy in pointing out a key reason why US molly-coddles TSP no matter what its crimes are: containment of India.

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 28 Mar 2010 02:53

csharma wrote:KS has spoken.
http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... im/389903/

Good stuff, and he articulates India's leverage on US quite well:

But since India is the primary victim of Pakistani terrorism, if India is not taken into confidence in regard to their broad strategy vis-a-vis Pakistan, in the absence of cent percent trust and communication India may be compelled to act, in case there is another major terrorist provocation in ways that may not be entirely in alignment with US strategy. US authorities should bear this in mind.

If this has substance and India will and more importantly, can follow through, it is some leverage India has. However, if its just an empty threat, US will just laugh and say be my guest. They might very well know that with all the military goodies they have doled out to TSP, then if India actually carries through on its threat, TSP might very well give India a bloody nose and force a stalemate, and India might indeed seek US intervention. From Af-Pak, it could become Af-Pak-India which US wanted right from the beginning, a formulation that suits TSP just fine.

csharma · Post by **csharma** » 28 Mar 2010 03:12

Exactly, KS has spelt out Indian leverage in unambiguous terms. Requires political will to use the leverage.

muraliravi · Post by **muraliravi** » 28 Mar 2010 03:16

CRamS wrote:
csharma wrote:KS has spoken.
http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... im/389903/
Good stuff, and he articulates India's leverage on US quite well:

But since India is the primary victim of Pakistani terrorism, if India is not taken into confidence in regard to their broad strategy vis-a-vis Pakistan, in the absence of cent percent trust and communication India may be compelled to act, in case there is another major terrorist provocation in ways that may not be entirely in alignment with US strategy. US authorities should bear this in mind.

If this has substance and India will and more importantly, can follow through, it is some leverage India has. However, if its just an empty threat, US will just laugh and say be my guest. They might very well know that with all the military goodies they have doled out to TSP, then if India actually carries through on its threat, TSP might very well give India a bloody nose and force a stalemate, and India might indeed seek US intervention. From Af-Pak, it could become Af-Pak-India which US wanted right from the beginning, a formulation that suits TSP just fine.

That will never happen. They have tried and failed miserably before and just tried with the joker holbroke again and he got rebuffed again. Some sense will always prevail even in this dumb UPA govt. Af-Pak will vacillate between Af-Pak and Pak-Af, period

asprinzl · Post by **asprinzl** » 28 Mar 2010 03:45

Doc,
Your posts in the recent past have been very thought provoking. I think you should gather them all into a new book on the US-India-Pakistan triangle. It would make very interesting reading.
Avram

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » 28 Mar 2010 04:30

CRamS wrote: if India actually carries through on its threat, TSP might very well give India a bloody nose and force a stalemate

I don't think KS was referring to direct military action

in case there is another major terrorist provocation in ways that may not be entirely in alignment with US strategy. US authorities should bear this in mind.

Karan Dixit · Post by **Karan Dixit** » 28 Mar 2010 04:47

This was a point driven home at various meetings by foreign secretary Nirupama Rao during her recent trip to Washington, particularly with the US NSA. In fact, sources said, her visit focused heavily on Af-Pak, Rao articulating India’s concerns and interests. Thus far, the US appears to continue to view events in Afghanistan pretty much the way India does. That, sources said, could change. But on the issue of weapons supplies to Pakistan, Indian objections aside, US is set to deliver F-16 combat aircraft to Pakistan as soon as in the next few months. The new aircraft are expected to have BVR (beyond visual range) capability, and would essentially be force multipliers for the Pakistan military.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 733426.cms

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 28 Mar 2010 05:34

One needs to keep the three things in perspective:
- Stopping the troop movements out of J&K
- The recent spate of missile tests
- KS garu articulating the options for India

All related to David Headley perfidy and keeping India out of Af-Pak resolution meetings

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 28 Mar 2010 06:31

IF we are to believe in the "joint statement" (whatever that is with a failed and propped state!) it is not bad.

However, India NEEDS to do a few basic things that she needs to do - without bothering about what others (as in anyone) thinks of it.

IF that, for some reason, is not possible, then India should push a few buttons just for that reason alone.

Venn diagrams?

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 07:14

We have here some "truths" based on observations made by various people and those truths make a good starting point to build a model and see if all the observations can be made to fit together.

We have the observation that the Pakistan army is the US's whore and the US will do anything to protect that whore. The assumption here is either that whore is doing everything the US wants, or that the whore is generally (if reluctantly) doing enough to keep the paying customer happy. Either way the US needs that whore, and to that extent will protect her against her enemies.

Who are the whore's enemies? Primarily India. But there are some minor enemies - people and groups in Pakistan who are opposed to the whore. The US actually fights the latter directly - using Bredator djinns, or alternatively generously funds and arms the whore to fight them.

As for India - we know that the US has, In the past armed Pakistan to the teeth - making Pakistan almost win in 1965. The main loss of 1965 for Pakistan was the fact that its aims were not achieved, From 1965 to 2010 India has worked to get military (and economic) superiority over Pakistan despite the US. The current "balance of power" between the Pakistan army and India is such that the US can certainly help it give India a "bloody nose" but that is not counting what India can do - i.e to sew up the whore's orifices so the US finds difficult to use the whore.

Let me expand on that. What India can do in a short war is to damage the assets and echandee of the Pakistani army perhaps at the cost of a bloody nose to India (assuming the war does not go nuclear). In other words the US's whore, which the US seeks to protect will be hurt. How will a hurt whore affect the US? So what if the Paki army is hurt? Why should that affect he US?

The Pakistani army is clearly not doing "enough" as per most US accounts. Other acounts say that the Pakistan army has 80,000 or so troops in the region and has brought Waziristan back from the brink - and is doing a marvellous job. If the Paki army is doing nothing, then the US loses nothing if it is damaged. Clearly the Pakistani army must be doing something. Doing enough to be politically useful to the US to tell Americans that "Pakistan is an ally". And the Pakistani army is doing something cheaply (for the US) that the US itself is unable or unwilling to do - probably putting in men in areas where the US won't put them in large numbers

The corollary that follows from this is that is that if the Pakistani army is useful to the US any serious damage that the army experiences will reduce its usefulness. This corollary fits in with the premise we started with i.e "... the Pakistan army is the US's whore and the US will do anything to protect that whore. "

The whore in turn seeks from the US an ability to keep on fighting India, the ability to keep LeT working and intact. The US of course is not totally dumb. Ideally, from the US's viewpoint anything that keeps its whore happy and working for the US is OK as long as the whore does not work against US interests.

For the US the LeT is both a threat and an opportunity.

The "opportunity" offered by the LeT to the US is the happiness and joy that the whore army gets from keeping its anti-India arm alive and healthy. By allowing that the US is possibly having its work "subsidized"

The threat from the LeT to the US is twofold

a) The LeT itself can shield anti-US interests in the guise of a "specific anti-India" army. The LeT is an Islamist army ally of the whore and the US is not too popular in Pakistan
b) If the LeT goes too far - India may be force to hit the whore. The US can bribe the whore - but an India that is pushed enough will hit back, damaging the whore. The US can control the whore, but the US does not control the LeT.

So what can the US do about the LeT that is in "US interests"? They can avoid putting too much pressure on the whore to wind up the LeT. The whore will not wind up the LeT. But at the same time they will have to pressure the whore not to allow the LeT to work against US interests. The US interest is to keep the whore intact. So any anti-US actions by the LeT are out.

What about anti-India actions by the LeT? Now here the US is willing to let some anti India actions occur as long as India is not provoked into war. This offers a very interesting opportunity because the US is playing a double game without direct control on the game.

1) The US has no direct control on the LeT. The US must pressurize the whore to control the LeT
2) The US has no direct way to control India. The US cannot stop India from hitting the whore and a damaged whore is deemed costly for the US
3) India cannot control the LeT or the Pakistani army. But India can threaten the Pakistani army and make the US react to stop that.

These points can pan out into various conflict scenarios. Every conflict scenario is costly to India, the whore and the US. The assumption I am going to make here is that every party will seek to avoid what is most costly. With this kind of balance the "cheapest" option is for a subtle cooperation between the US and India where India promises not to hit the whore if the US can make the whore control the LeT.

We go right back to the question" Does the whore control the LeT?". My belief is yes the LeT is under control of the whore. So a possible future (maybe current) scenario is a behind the scenes cooperation of the US and Pakistan where the LeT is kept intact but pressure is applied on the whore to stop the LeT from doing all that it can

This is clearly an unsatisfactory situation for India, but I think that "winding up the LeT" has no meaning looking at the close links between the whore and the LeT. India may have to play an indirect game of getting the US to keep the whore and LeT under control by being threat to the whore, but without actually carrying out that threat. I haven't put this down in gaming terms but there seems to be some sort of Nash equilibrium here. Need to work on that to see if I can validate that.

Perhaps this explains the uneasy stalemate that we are seeing today. How this stalemate can be upset (if it becomes cheap for any party to upset it) and who might upset it - I will leave for another time. This is already too long.

Rudradev · Post by **Rudradev** » 28 Mar 2010 07:50

shiv wrote:
negi wrote:Now what , are we gonna count remittances from US based NRIs as an example of Indo-US cooperation ?
Isn't it "cooperation" of a very skewed sort - exactly like the skewed relationship we have now?

Advancing this as the perennial high-point of a US-India relationship, as another poster has done with the example of an IIT alumnus' giving the Vinson lecture, is probably accurate. The achievements of NRIs, plus trade in non-strategically-sensitive sectors, plus a few limited ventures against piracy or under the UN banner... is about as far as US-India cooperation has any hope of going.

The US also had a structured plan to absorb them and never placed restrictions on the repatriation of funds to India. (via legal routes anyway - but hawala was active for decades)

This is inaccurate. Just one example: ask any US NRI who has returned to India whether he will ever see a cent of the thousands of dollars he paid in "Social Security" taxes, ever again. Even though he will never need any "Social Security" from the GOTUS for the rest of his life.

I think it would be wrong to consider NRis in the US as some special group who have nothing to do with good India-US relations. Throughout the years when India US relations were strained neither country fiddled with NRIs (except for India saying, we'll take your dollars, but no sending them back). Both countries saw gain from that community. The US got skilled and loyal people. India had too many educated who could not get jobs anyway. And India benefited from the money

By this token, NRIs in any country of the world represent "cooperation" between those countries and India. NRIs in Gulf countries provided those countries with much-needed labour and services. Their numbers are several times greater than those of US based NRIs and their foreign currency remittances, also "benefit" India in the same roundabout manner.

But what has that meant in terms of strategic cooperation? Did the "cooperation" represented by NRIs in the UAE prevent them from recognizing the Taliban or harbouring the nerve centre of the D-Company? Did the Saudi NRIs prevent Saudi Arabia from financing Wahhabi terrorism within India?

A section of NRIs in the US... though definitely not all or even a majority of NRIs... have been trying to gain influence in Washington to advance India's case. In this way it is possible for US NRIs to do more for their parent country than for their counterparts in the Gulf who will never have any political voice.

But it must be noted that for every US-NRI who attempts to advance India's case in Washington, there are a lot more who are indifferent (indeed, almost embarrassed to be identified with anything but American interests). And then there are the Gurmeet Singh Aulakhs, Farooq Kathwaris, Angana Chatterjis and Fareed Zakarias as well.

So your statement "I think it would be wrong to consider NRis in the US as some special group who have nothing to do with good India-US relations." does not imply an equivalence between NRIs and US-India "cooperation", even the vast majority of the time.

NRIs in the US are not one but many special groups, and while several of them have contributed to the welfare of their families or alma maters, only a small fraction of them have devoted any time and effort towards building better US-India relations.

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 28 Mar 2010 08:44

shiv:

Good analysis on whore, LeT, and US. But I am not too sure about our (mine included) basic premise. And this is that US actually requires the whore to keep the "bad terrorists" at bay. I think TSP's help in Af-Pak is not so crucial as it is made out to be. If that were so, why did, Jin Jones or Adm Mullen whoever banged his fist on the table and told whore'in'chief Kiyani that if he doesn't go after "bad terrorists", then US will? Point being that US needs the whore for a lot more, even after Af-Pak that is. You gussed it, what to do about those uppity SDREs who are already thinking they are a "global super power".

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 09:11

Rudradev wrote: By this token, NRIs in any country of the world represent "cooperation" between those countries and India.

Let me state my view on NRIs in general. I was an NRI myself and I request current NRIs or their kin not to be offended by my views. NRIs were always paid slaves, gong abroad for personal profit, not conquest. Before independence, and long before the term NRI was coined, Indians were mainly imported laborer. This is true of the UK , South Africa, Canada and many other nations - including Fiji. Those Indians who went to the US are only a subset of that by and large. Indian who went abroad for their own personal benefit and not for any patriotic reasons. They were absorbed into the countries that they migrated to because they provided what the country wanted - it was usually cheap labor.

Indians degraded themselves in every country in the world for their own benefit. They did that in the US as well. The Indian degrading and demeaning himself was "selfish" not in terms of "self" but in a typically Indian way the self degradation was to help the family. Every Indian who went abroad and degraded himself in some way was doing it for family. But emigrants to the US (and Canada and the UK) fared far better than emigrants to the Gulf because of several reasons

1) The degradation in the Gulf was extreme. Many Indians in the Gulf would rather have been in the UK or the US, but did not have the skills. they were only willing to degrade themselves to help their family financially.

2) The "degradation" in the US was the least. The money was the highest. The right to repatriate earned money was the highest, And unlike the Gulf, people were allowed (via a time bound plan) to bring family into the country.

The effect this had in India was great. While every Indian slobbered after every foreign country for the money - where they could go and live crap lives for the money the US was the pinnacle in that list. Indian went to Iraq, Iran, Nigeria and the Gulf. But the US prize was highest and it required the highest education.

Now the US was not importing historians or lawyers. They were importing doctors and engineers at a time when the same doctors and engineers were needed in India too. This led to a positive feedback where India built up huge capacity to produce doctors and engineers but never once made it difficult for Indians to go and make money abroad. In fact the UK and US, inundated by Indians made it increasingly difficult for Indians to go. At one time there were exam centers to go to the US in Karachi, but nowhere in India. The next closest was Manila. But still Indians went to extraordinary lengths to get to the UK and US.

India has a deep feeling of empathy and affection for the US. The US has given a huge number of Indians (in India) better lives - even if their policies were flawed towards India. You and I may develop some temporary anger towards US policies. But if I am an Indian in India and my son is in the US (which is true for a huge number of middle class Indians) any anti US feelings are trumped by the cash cow that my son is, and his welfare and therefore the welfare of the US is important.

India's unwilingness to take drastic measures against the US (where that is clearly possible) is IMO prevented by a groundswell of pro-US sentiment that exists among the ruling classes - the bureaucrats and politcians - many of whom are of a middle class background. It exists among armed forces personnel as well.

I believe this has had a profound impact on the way the US sees India. With India voluntarily behaving like a doormat (choosing to maintain US interests) despite those interests being Anti-India, the US sees no reason to disturb that relationship. So yes, it is my belief that the NRI factor in the US has an impact on India US relations. People who live in the US may perceive such Indian attitudes as unpatriotic. But they are helpless. If you live in the US you cannot influence Indian policy. But if you live in India the US is a current or potential family cash cow.

What is anyone going to do about it?

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 09:44

CRamS wrote:shiv:

Good analysis on whore, LeT, and US. But I am not too sure about our (mine included) basic premise. And this is that US actually requires the whore to keep the "bad terrorists" at bay. I think TSP's help in Af-Pak is not so crucial as it is made out to be. If that were so, why did, Jin Jones or Adm Mullen whoever banged his fist on the table and told whore'in'chief Kiyani that if he doesn't go after "bad terrorists", then US will? Point being that US needs the whore for a lot more, even after Af-Pak that is. You gussed it, what to do about those uppity SDREs who are already thinking they are a "global super power".

What you say has the following two premises

1) There is some threat to the US in Pakistan which the US can handle on its own without the help of the Pakistani army.

2) The US is supporting the Paki army with the sole aim of checking the SDREs

As I see it, US support for the whore is insufficient for the whore to stand up to India. It is enough to give India (as you say) a bloody nose. No more. Clearly the US itself can do a far better job of handling SDREs just as they can handle anti-US forces in Pakistan.

So what is the reason for this halfhearted support to Pakistan? The US could just demand, and get bases in Pakisatan and park themselves in Pakistan the way they are parked in Korea, Japan and Taiwan. Maybe that is what the US wants. But the US with its power over it whore, over its enemies in whore land and over SDREs should be able to overrule the whore's objections. In other words the US could choose to dump its whore the Pakistani army and develop one or more constituencies in Pakistan apart from the whore to get a much deeper influence in Pakistan. That would giive the US everything it needs

1) Freedom to take out anti US forces (for which it does not need whore aid)
2) Freedom to park in whore land and check SDREs
3) Freedom to liase with any group in Pakistan that will help - and not just the whore army.

Why should the US be hooked on the whore army and the whore army alone and still give it only half hearted support?

The only explanation I can find is the most often quoted one

1) The whoring Pakistan army is the single most influential group in Pakistan
2) The whore army is the only group willing to sell itself to the US and the US seeks to keep that whore army as the strongest group. No other group with similar power is available to sell itself like the whore army.
3) But the whore army does not cooperate fully with the US so the US is unwilling to give it unfettered power, because the US will have to take out that whore army if t threatens US interests tomorrow.
4) India could beat the whore army black and blue, so the US must keep the whore army protected, But again if the whore army gets too strong, it could pose a problem for the US. If it is too weak, the other forces of Pakistan who are not willing to sell themselves to the US will get control over Pakistan.

So the US is dependent on the whore army for more reasons than simply to keep the SDREs in check. That gives the SDRE's power over the US. Threaten the whore and the US will dance. Promise to leave the whore alone and the US is pleased, until the whore hits India at which time India threatens and the US dances. What a mellifluous opera.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 10:09

The other point to make about the US's "soft power" influence over India is something I have pointed out time and again on this forum. The US made NRI's in the US so wealthy, confident and happy that those sons of India always returned to India to lecture Indians on how good the US is, how fair it is, how efficient it is, how it rewards hard work, how wealthy it is and how India needs to become like the US. These lectures could not be countered - backed as they were by generous gifts of things unavailable in India, dollar clout, and passports stamped with visits to all sorts of countries and visible US influence in the world.

When generations of Indians have been brought up to see the US like this - it appears like unconvincing mealy mouthed bitching to hear any Indian say that the US is a double crossing power hungry nation. Especially if the words come from the same US based NRI group that previously praised the US as God. As recently as 20 years ago. Such words spoken by a resident Indian were often dismissed as "jealousy" at not having made it to the US or "left wing" Indian.

vera_k · Post by **vera_k** » 28 Mar 2010 10:53

^^^

There is a dynamic you are missing. Macaulay's children inhabiting Delhi have a stranglehold on power in India, and they are not shy of looking up to all things Western. US based NRIs are a particular thorn in the side of Macaulay's children because they have not been shy of their heritage. It is unlikely that the US poses a greater evil than these people in Delhi.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 10:55

vera_k wrote:^^^

There is a dynamic you are missing. Macaulay's children inhabiting Delhi have a stranglehold on power in India, and they are not shy of looking up to all things Western. US based NRIs are a particular thorn in the side of Macaulay's children because they have not been shy of their heritage. It is unlikely that the US poses a greater evil than these people.

If you sit in America they look like "Macaulay's children". In India they look like people who are doing the same things for their kids as you are doing.

vera_k · Post by **vera_k** » 28 Mar 2010 11:00

shiv wrote:If you sit in America they look like "Macaulay's children". In India they look like people who are doing the same things for their kids as you are doing.

I doubt it. No NRI here that I know of fights to get his or her kids into Catholic schools the way people do in India. Plus it is almost unheard of for this class in India to systematically study there own religion like people do in the US.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 11:15

vera_k wrote:
shiv wrote:If you sit in America they look like "Macaulay's children". In India they look like people who are doing the same things for their kids as you are doing.
I doubt it. No NRI here that I know of fights to get his or her kids into Catholic schools the way people do in India. Plus it is almost unheard of for this class in India to systematically study there own religion like people do in the US.

I think you misunderstood my usage of the word you". I did not mean "you" personally. By "you" I meant others in India. It just looks like "Macaulay" from the US and it may be true. But in India that is the right thing to do and what everyone else is doing.

Only in the US can you worry about Indians entering Catholic schools in India. Nobody in India is worried. And in India people will ROTFL if a person sitting in the US says "Don't enter Catholic school". They will say OK I will enter Protestant or Jesuit school.

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 28 Mar 2010 11:17

shiv/vera_k,

Its a love hate relationship that people, especially us NRIs have with US. Just as in India, even in US, foreign policy is run by an elite. Believe me, I have been in US for around 20 years now, and I can count on my fingers, the number of Americans with whom I can have an intelligent conversation on foreign policy. Most Amercians, except during a war care more about sports, entertainment, vacations, cars, latest thongs and assorted lingerie fashion etc than what US policy is between India and TSP.

Furthermore, given how vast US is, economywise, even though there is no great social camaradaries between whites and us SDRE NRIs, as long as us SDREs (or for that matter all people of color) don't threaten whites' hold on supreme power here in US, us SDREs are treated fairly well as long as we stick to driving cabs, writing C++/Java code, being creative technologists/scientists, good doctors etc. So as an NRI myself, its impossible and even immoral (without feeling the guilt of a Namakharam) to "hate" US for its deliberate policy of hurting and keeping India down by propping up that terrorist abomination called TSP. I am torn between the love hate sentments with US in every breath that I take. I wish I could align US and India, but its simply impossible.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 28 Mar 2010 11:24

CRamS wrote: So as an NRI myself, its impossible and even immoral (without feeling the guilt of a Namakharam) to "hate" US for its deliberate policy of hurting and keeping India down by propping up that terrorist abomination called TSP. I am torn between the love hate sentments with US in every breath that I take. I wish I could align US and India, but its simply impossible.

ioneer Op-Ed, 25 March 2010

For US, the world is a chessboard

Thursday, March 25, 2010

For US, world is a chessboard

Premen Addy

The Obama Administration is as much in need of healthcare as the American people. By supping with the Pakistani leadership without the prescriptive long spoon, the US President and his advisers are guaranteeing a mightier inferno for the AfPak landscape than the one consuming it. The price demanded by the Pakistani Government for past and present services rendered to the American imperium amounts to a brazen $ 35 billion, with a few nuclear power plants, squadrons of F-16s and other lethal weaponry thrown in for good measure.

How the discussions in the Oval Office of the White House pan out will be known soon enough, but the promised consummation of the India-US relationship is likely to remain the 21st century’s unfulfilled dream. Just as well, for tying the knot on the deck of another doomed Titanic — Pakistan in this instance — would hardly make good copy or a riveting film. However, the mystery of David Coleman Headley might, one day, do both, with its darkest secrets revealed and an Oscar to be won.

The world's ‘sole superpower’, the prayerful refrain of acolytes of the living Moloch, bears more than a passing resemblance to Gulliver trussed up and bound to the ground by legions of Taliban and Al Qaeda Lilliputians in Afghanistan and Iraq and the earth beyond. Superpower hubris is no assurance of second sight. Mr George W Bush proclaimed a famous victory in Iraq from the deck of an American battleship and the pronouncement, in due course, crumbled to dust.

Newsweek reproduced a picture of the former US President savouring his triumph in 2004 against its report of the recently deemed success of an Iraqi general election. What price such traduced freedom? A broken nation boasting multitudes of orphaned cripples, thousands of dead and millions living as insecure refugees abroad; a country gifted with intermittent power and water by its mendacious occupier, its innards torn out, its confessional communities at each other’s throats with bombs, bullets and anything else that came to hand.

Truth will out, but not clearly in the Anglo-American media. The fourth-rate estate has long been reduced to a complicit parody in a lacquered criminal syndicate. Their news coverage refracts the seamless engagement between what can be seen as the world’s second-oldest profession with the world’s oldest. Checks and balances are nursery rhymes for lulled innocents cutting their milk teeth at their mother’s breasts. Al Capone and Goebbels embodied fascism’s infancy, today’s finished product boasts a corporate face.

International alignments, once cast in stone, are in flux. Nato, like Shelley’s Ozymandias, could well become a half-buried trunkless head of stone in the sands of Araby. You wouldn’t have thought so leafing through the insouciance of Mr Zbigniew Brzezinski, the Polish American geostrategic guru hired by the Obama campaign team for the 2008 US presidential election, whose worldview may well be haunting the corridors of power in Washington, DC. As President Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser between 1976-80, his advice was inevitably coloured with the Pole’s primordial hatred of Russians.

Apropos of clandestine US activity in Afghanistan, which pre-dated the Soviet appearance in the country, he said: “This secret operation was an excellent idea. Its effect was to draw the Russians into the Afghan trap. You want me to regret that?” (Unholy Wars: Afghanistan, America and International Terrorism by John K Cooley). In his book, Cooley writes, “Brzezinski, like President Carter’s CIA director Admiral Stansfield Turner ... freely acknowledged that the possible adverse consequences of the anti-Communist alliance with the Afghan Islamists (and shortly afterward, with their radical Muslim allies around the world) — the growth of a new international terrorist movement and the global outreach of South Asian drug trafficking — did not weigh heavily, if at all, in their calculations at the time.”

Years later, March 20, 2010, to be precise, The Times correspondent, Anthony Loyd, in Peshawar, described how a motley group of jihadis — Arabs, Uzbeks and Pakistani Punjabis — were giving the American and their allies a particularly hard time in Afghanistan. The 1,500 Uzbeks, apparently the most formidable of the lot, usually fought to the last man.

Three days later, on March 23, came a front-page Daily Telegraph report, with the headline: “Dirty nuclear bomb threat to Britain”. Duncan Gardham’s opening paragraph set the scene: “Britain faces an increased threat of a nuclear attack by Al Qaeda terrorists following a rise in the trafficking of radiological material, a Government report has warned. Bomb makers who have been active in Afghanistan may already have the ability to produce a ‘dirty bomb’ using knowledge over the Internet. It is feared that terrorists could transport an improvised nuclear device up the Thames and detonate it in the heart of London” and other British cities.

“Lord West, the Security Minister, also raised the possibility of terrorists using small small craft to enter ports and launch an attack similar to that in Mumbai in 2008 ... The terrorist group since then had approached Pakistani nuclear scientists, developed a device to produce hydrogen cyanide, which can be used in chemical warfare, and used explosives in Iraq combined with chlorine gas cylinders,” the report says. Frankenstein’s monster is now stalking its creator. President Barack Obama and his aides will have much to discuss with their Pakistani guests. If only the fly on the wall could speak and write proper English what a tale it would have to tell. :rolleyes:

Following the demise of the Soviet Union, Mr Brzezinski, inebriated by the chaos of the Yeltsin dispensation in Moscow, issued his projection of the future, The Great Chessboard. Eurasia, the subject of his title, with its oil and geostrategic location was preordained to be a giant American bailiwick. Controlled tenancies for Russia, India and China, etc, would form part of the Pax Americana. The book’s sting came in its tail, the reference to “China’s support for Pakistan (which) restrains India’s ambitions to subordinate that country and offsets India’s inclination to cooperate with Russia in regard to Afghanistan and Central Asia”.

Mr Brzezinski confides in his Chinese interlocutors in 1996 — recalled in an extensive footnote in his book, published the following year — on a possible US-China condominium for the region, inspiration, possibly, for Mr Obama’s hint of G2 summits floated in Beijing last autumn. Its eccentricity is reminiscent of the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, whereby the Pope in Rome divided the newly discovered dominions of Asia and Africa between the Catholic Majesties of Spain and Portugal.

To George Nathaniel Curzon, player extraordinary of Kipling’s Great Game, belongs surely the final word: “Turkestan, Afghanistan, Transcaspia, Persia ... To me, I confess, these names are the pieces on a chessboard upon which is being played out a game for the dominion of the world.” This being 2010, checkmate, alas, it must be.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 11:29

CRamS wrote: I am torn between the love hate sentments with US in every breath that I take. I wish I could align US and India, but its simply impossible.

Let me express my admiration for you for being able to parse your feelings so honestly. Most people cannot even do that and don't realise when they do one thing and say another. But hey - its not the end of the world.

I believe it was only in the imperial era of European dominance that international alignments occurred on th basis of a marriage between two royal families. Those days are over and in modern nation states self interest rules.

We may not be able to sit here and predict it, but an India US will occur when it suits the self interest of both nations. If India had "allied" with the US in the past, that alliance would have demanded major anti-India actions from Indians, with little from the US other than sops for elites. And hey - India did keep away from an alliance.

I believe the future holds the opportunity for a meaningful India US relationship.

kittoo · Post by **kittoo** » 28 Mar 2010 14:29

Ex-post from TSP thread.

From Orbat.com-

Increased infiltration in Kashmir Indian troops on Saturday killed six militants trying to infiltrate Indian Kashmir from the Pakistan Kashmir side. This was the third incident this week; three infiltrators were killed in the first two. Also, four militants died in two encounters elsewhere in Kashmir; the Army says they belong to the LeT.
It isn't even proper spring and already Pakistan has started infiltrating - yet again - after a serious fall-off in incidents in 2009. Naturally the US will have nothing to say bar a few platitudes and pressure on the Indians not to retaliate. Since the US does nothing for India on the terrorism issue, we don't quite see the logic of India continuing to oblige the US by showing restraint.
Of course, this also gives the Indians an excuse not to do anything, because the simple reality is the Indians are scared out of their undies at the thought of actually taking action. As for the way the US treats India, seeing as the Indians go around with a big "Please Kick Me" sign attached to their butts, you can't blame the Americans. Patriotic Indians should oblige their government and also join in the Kicking.
The latest blowup between the two emerging allies is the US's great reluctance to even allow Indian officers to interrogate the convicted terrorist David Headly - he is a Pakistani originally, but changed his name to a Christian one to escape attention. He's one of the key people behind the Bombay 2008 attacks. Mr. Headly, we are told, began to sing entire operas after US agents told him his next stop was going to be India if he didn't cooperate. In return, the US has told him he will not be extradited to India. Aside from the months of torture that awaited Mr. Headly, at the end he also faced the 100% probability of an early morning date with the hangman.
Excuse us, please, this is how the US cooperates with others on the GWOT? How many Americans versus Indians have died thanks to Mr. Headly? 1 as to 200?
Again, we are not going to upbraid the US. If the Indians are so pathetic that they cannot force the US to hand over the man, then they deserve every bit of disrespect they get from the Americans.

I personally have no comment on this. I guess this has been discussed to death.

sum · Post by **sum** » 28 Mar 2010 14:34

Wow, was just about to post the same thing!!!

I couldn't have agreed more with the orbat editor. There is nothing better than self help instead of

about how Unkil is not helping us achieve our goals.

shukla · Post by **shukla** » 28 Mar 2010 18:23

India writing to U.S. Justice Department

India will write to the U.S. Department of Justice next week, making out the case for direct access to David Coleman Headley, Pakistani-origin American citizen, who has pleaded guilty to planning the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. A formal communication from the Home Ministry would be routed through official channels to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Top sources in the Ministry said on Friday that the government would wait for the Justice Department's response before sending a team of legal experts and police officials to question Headley, now in federal custody in Chicago. The team is likely to include National Investigation Agency (NIA) sleuths, legal experts and police officials.

According to the plea agreement, Headley has agreed, when directed by the U.S. Attorney's office, to fully and truthfully testify in any foreign judicial proceedings held in the U.S. by way of deposition, videoconferencing or letters rogatory. The sources said the NIA, which registered a First Information Report, against Headley in November last, was working on questions to quiz him.

“A lot of evidence of how Headley operated in India during his trips has been gathered by the investigators. We have got evidence of how he opened his e-mail accounts and how he operated them. All this evidence has been gathered painstakingly by the investigators. This can throw more light on several crucial aspects of Headley's operations and his training at Lashkar camps in Pakistan,” the sources said.

Giving access to Headley would be one way the US can gain lost ground with India and develop trust..or at least a start...

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Mar 2010 18:26

I suspect India should hire a good law firm in the US and let the lawyers earn some money in return for clinching a deal. The US world turns because of its lawyers.

tejas · Post by **tejas** » 28 Mar 2010 18:36

^^^^^ Unfortunately true.

shukla · Post by **shukla** » 28 Mar 2010 18:57

AfPak is one of extensive common interests of US-India ties

Noting that the influence of India at global stage attest to its pivotal role in shaping the regional security environment, a top US military official has said Washington must ensure that the US-India relationship remains rooted in their extensive common interests.

"Our nation's partnership with India is especially important to long term South and Central Asia regional security and to US national interests in this vital sub-region.

"India's leadership as the largest democracy, its rising economic power, and its influence across South Asia as well as its global influence attest to its pivotal role in shaping the regional security environment," Admiral Robert F Willard, Commander US Pacific Command, said in his testimony before the House Armed Services Committee.

We must continue to strengthen this relationship and, while our near-term challenges in Central Command are of great strategic importance, we must ensure the US-India relationship remains rooted in our extensive

common interests, of which the Afghanistan-Pakistan issue is only one, he said.

I think that the India-US relationship right now is stronger than I've ever enjoyed. As you know, because of our history, we've only been truly engaging with India mil-to-mil for about the last half a dozen years; and yet it's been pretty profound how far that's come, Willard said.

We are engaged with India now with regard to their counterterrorism challenges, particularly as it relates to Lashkar-e-Taiba, the terrorist group that emanates from Pakistan and attacked into Mumbai, and what we believe to be their presence in areas surrounding India, he said in response to a question.

Later in his interaction with foreign journalists at the Washington Foreign Press Centre, Willard said Pacific Command is now focused in and around India, specifically with regard to Lashkar-e-Taiba.

"Our relationship with India, a strategic partner and like-minded democracy, of great importance in south Asia," he said.

Earlier in his testimony, Willard said the US' relationship has grown significantly over the past five years as both countries work to overcome apprehensions formed during Cold War era, particularly with respect to defence cooperation.

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 28 Mar 2010 19:36

CRamS wrote:So as an NRI myself, its impossible and even immoral (without feeling the guilt of a Namakharam) to "hate" US for its deliberate policy of hurting and keeping India down by propping up that terrorist abomination called TSP. I am torn between the love hate sentments with US in every breath that I take. I wish I could align US and India, but its simply impossible.

The elites that run the show in the US do not necessarily act in the interests of the American people. Opposing those elites would not make you less loyal to the US.

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 28 Mar 2010 22:40

Pranav wrote:
The elites that run the show in the US do not necessarily act in the interests of the American people. Opposing those elites would not make you less loyal to the US.

I do. But the problem is that given the limited leverage India has over US, unless the general US public demand it, the elites won't face any pressure to change course (and even then as we saw during Iraq WMD fraud, the elites had their way).

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 28 Mar 2010 23:47

--Duplicate--
http://www.hindustantimes.com/Taking-us ... 24088.aspx
Will only quote the relavant part

The second emotion is a keenly developed sense of national pride. Few countries are as fiercely patriotic as India is. (Well, actually, perhaps America is too.) It could be the centuries of colonial subjugation that are responsible but Indians watch out keenly for our national interest and respond angrily to the merest slight or perceived injury to our country. We are nobody’s satellite and demand to be treated with respect.

Public suspicion of the US in India has now reached the stage where no matter what the government does — talk to Pakistan, for instance — it is accused of following orders from Washington. These suspicions extend to the ruling party: even Congressmen fear that America has too much leverage over India.

Washington’s behaviour suggests that it has forgotten that national pride and patriotism are non-negotiable for Indians.

India has to take care of its pride and build its own capabilities. It cannot depend on other countries to take care of its needs.
Indian peoples' emotions are to be taken care of by India only and other countries do not care about Indian people' emotions.

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 28 Mar 2010 23:52

Acharya:

This is a duplicate post. I posted Vir Sanghvi's article along with my comments. Looks like you have not read my post

.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 29 Mar 2010 06:25

shukla wrote:AfPak is one of extensive common interests of US-India ties

Admiral Willard is quoted as saying:

I think that the India-US relationship right now is stronger than I've ever enjoyed. As you know, because of our history, we've only been truly engaging with India mil-to-mil for about the last half a dozen years; and yet it's been pretty profound how far that's come, Willard said.

We are engaged with India now with regard to their counterterrorism challenges, particularly as it relates to Lashkar-e-Taiba, the terrorist group that emanates from Pakistan and attacked into Mumbai, and what we believe to be their presence in areas surrounding India, he said in response to a question.

Now why would a US admiral speak of relations with India and Lashkar e Toiba in the same breath?

He speaks of a "half dozen year" long engagement with India. BRFites will recall that anti-India focused terrorist groups like the LeT were "Kashmiri freedom fighters" for the US administration that moved from Reagan's hands to Clinton. That is ancient history now - but the period is 1992-1998 - the latter part being around the time when many of us old codgers came to BRF.

Why on earth would a US admiral convert a bunch of freedom fighters into a bunch of terrorists and admit they attacked Mumbai? What's in it for the US? Is this is US interests? Or is this Admiral a nobody about to fade into history and is merely shooting his mouth off.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 29 Mar 2010 06:32

shiv wrote:

Why on earth would a US admiral convert a bunch of freedom fighters into a bunch of terrorists and admit they attacked Mumbai? What's in it for the US? Is this is US interests? Or is this Admiral a nobody about to fade into history and is merely shooting his mouth off.

The real question is - Is some parts of LeT under the control of US mil

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 29 Mar 2010 06:35

Regarding Vir Sanghvi's views:

http://www.hindustantimes.com/Taking-us ... 24088.aspx

Pakistan, a small country of no great consequence

yes? no? We are sitting next to it an we don't seem to be able to ignore this country of no consequence. We can "learn to ignore it" under certain conditions. Have those conditions been eraches?

Pakistan has twthe Pakistani military seems at last to have found the will to take on Islamists. o uses. One: it can facilitate an understanding with Taliban leaders and offer some guarantees of stability once the US moves out

Really? I believe this statement is a "handwave" by Sanghvi. Pakistan itself is unstable. What guarantee can Pakistan offer of stability in Afghanistan? I believe Sanghvi is swallowing some cooked up American rhetoric about Pakistan.

the Pakistani military seems at last to have found the will to take on Islamists.

The LeT are secular peaceniks? This is ye olde America speaking.

CRamS I am unable to find your post about this article (and unwilling to go further than the brief search I did)

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 29 Mar 2010 06:37

Acharya wrote:
shiv wrote:

Why on earth would a US admiral convert a bunch of freedom fighters into a bunch of terrorists and admit they attacked Mumbai? What's in it for the US? Is this is US interests? Or is this Admiral a nobody about to fade into history and is merely shooting his mouth off.
The real question is - Is some parts of LeT under the control of US mil

This is an interesting possibility. The US controlling anti-India extremists in parallel with the Pakistani army.

No way of ruling out this possibility - but if TTP or some other group hit the LeT - then it would raise doubts that the US controls the LeT and the Pakistan army with the same dollar leash. Until then - this is a possibility to be kept in mind.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 29 Mar 2010 08:31

Acharya's linking of the LeT as a possible US puppet is an act of serendipity that I cannot get out of my mind. But I will treat the idea as I treat everything else - i.e look for many alternative explanations to fit existing observations until evidence turns up.

I have seen no "evidence" that says that the US is not linked with the LeT in terms of having infiltrated it, or bribed its way into its core. In fact the Headley trial indicates that the LeT may have been infiltrated by the US. But does that mean that the US is in cahoots with the LeT? What facts/hypotheses do we have regarding this?

One things is clear. India focused groups are having a free hand in Pakistan and either the US is unwilling or unable to do anything. I will not reach any judgment on whether the US is "unwilling" or "unable". But apart from this - for the first time the LeT has spoken with the Pakistan government's tongue and raised the water bogey.

I can think of several possible scenarios here. One is that the US has coerced the Pakis to get their dog the LeT to implement only an anti-India agenda. or that the US has enough evidence of links between LeT and army to blackmail/bribe them.

The other possibility is that alll rebel groups under pressure tend to coalesce. Many years ago (maybe 4-5 years ago) we on BRF started noting that the "Al Qaeda" - which had a purely anti US/West agenda started introducing anti-India sentences in its videos and messages. This indicated a link up between Al Qaeda and anti-India groups. There was no doubt whatsoever that the Al Qaeda was under much pressure at the time.

Now we find that the Al Qaeda is getting less attention but the LeT is in the news and suddenly - the LeT is picking up he Pakistan government agenda. I have no doubt whatsoever that both the LeT and the Pakistan (whore army) government are "under some pressure" even if it is only threats from Gen Deepak Kapoor types. Is this open coalescing of "Paki" interests with LeT an indicator of that pressure which may be forcing them to close ranks? I don't know. The water issue is hardly a Pakistani issue. It is a Pakjabi issue and the LeT gets its support from Pakjab and the whore army of Pakistan also gets its support from Pakjab.

So lets see - I will wait for more info..