Commendable article. So now that we know what is going on, how can the reader/ common man influence our ' representatives ' in the government to let go of their inferiority complex and start making demands? Any ideas?
Very good, parectical approach Indian politicians and strtegists should adopt. To start with, a clear punitive approach against Bangladesh and Pakistan is in order. Diplomacy is OK, but I think we are using diplomacy just too much, maybe we are really being a wimp. Thanks rediff for the article.
Thanx a ton to Arindam for bringing to light the devious plans of USA. These guys would do their best to arm twist us and in the process make sure that we are well under their control,both economically and militarily. Its true that our foreign policy lacks that extra bit of back bone to stand up against such evils. I really hope we dont cave in like the others.Nuclear and military assets are our own we have the ultimate say on its production,deployment and usage. I hope those in New Delhi realize this and act accordingly. The last thing i wld want to see is India on its knees infront of the US, begging for pardon. How dare the Americans talk about AQ Khan and our scientists in the same breath when they themselves have been guilty of arming the most dreaded terrorists on the face of the planet. Shame America!!!
How can we go against our culture of pleasing the gods? As you quoted somebody: the Americans are creating the reality. We ordinary creatures have to live it. We can be tough and heartless only to our own people, like in Delhi 1984, Gujarat 2002. Else we will release the terrorists ourselves, with cabinet escort, all they have to do is just threaten.
Kudos to Arindam for baring it all. The American foreign policy is at its nadir to say the list. It seems that Washington has chosen hard over soft power more aggressively. Initially, the struggle launched against terrorism enjoyed a welcome sign all over the world. Then those initial encouraging platform of global anti-terrorism lost its charm owing to the evolution of overt jingoism. Nations again reverted back to the bandwagon of century-old nationalism in the era of globalization. Ironically this counterproductive bandwagon was led by human rights champion, the US. It has again started its myopic world vision and in the process paving the way for an India-China-Russia-France-middle east-UN congregation. I failed to understand the underlying motive for such politics of alienation. It can be the best of times if American policy makers take notes of these facts patiently and devise out a strategy of winning friends, not creating enemies across the globe.
There is a much more fundamental problem that ails Bharat and its Hindu people. At its root Bharats Hindus have been inward looking, smug and even self-satisfied with the little that they have been allowed to keep. Orders as we know them in the way of the Romans et al has no meaning for Bharats Hindus based on ritual purity and pollution. This requires the parts to have a meaningful relation to the whole as caste and divisions have traditionally formed the basis of their separate political economy. The mindset of a people long accustomed to thinking in this way had not been shaken in the thousand years of rude hammering that has left Bharat battered, bruised and humiliated. Our experience and perspective that our lives gives us in the West is divorced from Bharats reality. Exhorting to be strong and shrewed has to achieve an awakening of which there has never been any sign. Up to now we may have been too blind to see the ugly truth, but now the nightmare begins.
Mr. Arndam Banerjee's article considerably raises the standard of debate on this issue.
The US perceptions, despite the bravado of 'realism' is likely to mutate in near future.
The technology edge, acquired via post WW-2 European influx is now dwindling, and India has already caught up in the number of technolgists, and likely to bridge the quality gap within a generation.
The safer option for these policy dictators is to work with all societies consistent with their Constitutional values. There is no way an Indian assertion can be clamped.
