Global News Journal
Beyond the World news headlines
from Pakistan: Now or Never?:
Winning the battle, losing the war; the US and Pakistan
When former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said this weekend that Pakistan's nuclear weapons are not safe under President Asif Ali Zardari, he almost certainly did not mean that the nuclear arsenal is not secure. The nuclear weapons have little to do with the civilian government; they are guarded ferociously by the Pakistan Army both against terrorist attacks and any foreign or U.S. attempt to seize them, and, as a matter of pride for Pakistanis chafing at any American suggestions otherwise, safeguarded to international standards.
Rather it was a rhetorical device to attack the government at a rally where Qureshi announced he was joining the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) , the party of former cricket star Imran Khan, a rising force in Pakistani politics. Qureshi's assertion tapped into growing anti-Americanism, and a populist view that the civilian government led by the Pakistan People's Party, to which he once belonged, had somehow sold the country's honour - in this case symbolised by nuclear weapons - in return for American aid. (Pakistan first agreed its uneasy alliance with the United States under former military ruler Pervez Musharraf.)
Yet it is a measure of how distorted and narrow political discourse has become within Pakistan that Qureshi might use the safety of nuclear weapons to attack the government. That political discourse, difficult even at the best of times, is likely to become even narrower in the fury which has followed the NATO airstrikes which killed 24 Pakistani soldiers on the border with Afghanistan on Saturday.
The attack, which Pakistan says was unprovoked and NATO described as a "tragic, unintended incident", has outraged Pakistanis who have already endured thousands of casualties in a war they believe was forced on them by the United States.
Underneath the confusion about the aims and course of the Afghan war, lies a deep sense of hurt that Pakistani lives are somehow less valued than American lives, and a painful loss of pride over the country's inability to defend its territory from attacks by a foreign, and apparently hostile, power - whether from airstrikes, drones, or even the May raid by U.S. forces who killed Osama bin Laden.
The result is a society which is being shaped by the Afghan war in ways which neither Pakistan's neighbours, nor western powers, would choose. The airstrikes, coming soon after the forced resignation of Pakistan's ambassador to Washington Husain Haqqani for allegedly seeking American help to curb the power of the military, have added fresh oxygen to a combustible mix of anti-Americanism and religious nationalism enveloping Pakistan. Haqqani denies the allegation, but the so-called "Memogate" scandal has badly weakened the civilian government, while the airstrikes have rallied the country behind the army.
In such an environment, there is little room for a discourse that might suggest Pakistanis should also be outraged at the deaths of civilians blown up by suicide bombers sent by the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and therefore discuss ways to turn decisively against Islamist militants. Nor is there space for a realistic political debate on how Pakistan should manage its foreign relations that goes beyond a hatred of America and an illusory faith in China's readiness to ride to the rescue.
from Pakistan: Now or Never?:
Capturing the Punjabi imagination: drones and “the noble savage”
Pakistani novelist Mohsin Hamid may have captured something rather interesting in his short story published this month by The Guardian. And it is not as obvious as it looks.
In "Terminator: Attack of the Drone", Hamid imagines life in Pakistan's tribal areas bordering Afghanistan under constant attack from U.S. drone bombings. His narrator is one of two boys who go out one night to try to attack a drone.
"The machines are huntin' tonight," the narrator says. "There ain't many of us left. Humans I mean. Most people who could do already escaped. Or tried to escape anyways. I don't know what happened to 'em. But we couldn't. Ma lost her leg to a landmine and can't walk. Sometimes she gets outside the cabin with a stick. Mostly she stays in and crawls. The girls do the work. I'm the man now.
"Pa's gone. The machines got him. I didn't see it happen but my uncle came back for me. Took me to see Pa gettin' buried in the ground. There wasn't anythin' of Pa I could see that let me know it was Pa. When the machines get you there ain't much left. Just gristle mixed with rocks, covered in dust."
It is powerful stuff, told in the language of a black American slave in the style of Toni Morrison's "Beloved". It vividly captures the terror inspired by drones, and the helplessness of the people who live in the tribal areas. But is it true? And does it matter?
In a discussion on Twitter, literary critic Faiza S. Khan, who tweets @BhopalHouse, argued that the story should be judged as a work of fiction rather than taken as reportage. A fair point. But what if we turn this around and consider the story as reportage, not of the tribal areas and the drones, but of the way these are imagined in Pakistan's Punjabi heartland? As a writer who spends part of his time in Lahore, capital of Punjab, Hamid can be considered representative of at least part of that Punjabi imagination.
We will return to the short story later, but first step back a bit and consider that the narrative gaining traction, at least in urban Punjab, is that the people of the tribal areas have been radicalised by American drone attacks. Pakistan's rising political star, Imran Khan, attracted tens of thousands to a rally in Lahore last month with a version of this narrative. Stop the drones, and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Pakistani Taliban, can be engaged in peace talks to end a wave of bombings across Pakistan.
@True North
Do not make antisemit remarks! Jews have regarded themselves as the victims right from the time of Moses and even prior to Moses. They are real victims in this world regardless.
Now to Pashtuns, have you ever heard a Pashtun complaining about the raw deal they are receiving from the Americans or the Pakistanis? Nope! Though some have shown surprise at Americans attitude? They told France 24 reporter that during day time the Americans pay them money, help them with minor to heavy tsks and at night time visit their houses and enquire from the old and children about the whereabouts of those that they had seen during the day? “Make my day” is the cry when they get hold of a foreign soldier. Pashtuns are the most treacherous people, brutal and a bloody good snipers, these were the words of the british military commander whose several thousand troops were cut down one by one along the khyber route of snow covered mountains.
Obama has nothing to loose, once his term is at end, he is going to return to his ancestor’s land to spend his retirement life far away from chicago and washington.
Rex Minor
from Afghan Journal:
India-Afghan strategic pact:the beginnings of regional integration
A strategic partnership agreement between India and Afghanistan would ordinarily have evoked howls of protest from Pakistan which has long regarded its western neighbour as part of its sphere of influence. Islamabad has, in the past, made no secret of its displeasure at India's role in Afghanistan including a$2 billion aid effort that has won it goodwill among the Afghan people, but which Pakistan sees as New Delhi's way to expand influence.
Instead the reaction to the pact signed last month during President Hamid Karzai's visit to New Delhi, the first Kabul had done with any country, was decidedly muted. Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said India and Afghanistan were "both sovereign countries and they have the right to do whatever they want to." The Pakistani foreign office echoed Gilani's comments, adding only that regional stability should be preserved. It cried off further comment, saying it was studying the pact.
It continued to hold discussions, meanwhile, on the grant of the Most Favoured Nation to India as part of moves to normalise ties. Late last month the cabinet cleared the MFN, 15 years after New Delhi accorded Pakistan the same status so that the two could conduct trade like nations do around the world, even those with differences.
And on Thursday, Gilani met Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh on the margins of a regional summit in the Maldives and the two promised a new chapter in ties, saying the next round of talks between officials as part of an engagement on a range of issues will produce results. Afghanistan or the pact, was scarcely mentioned in public, although it is quite conceivable that the two would have talked about it.
Is there a shift in the ground, in both India and Pakistan ? Pakistan is battling multiple crises, including ties with the United States that at the moment certainly look worse than those with India. It is also struggling to tackle a melange of militant groups that have metastasized into a mortal danger for the Pakistani state itself and a deep economic downturn that a nation of 180 million people can ill-afford at this time. While it continues to invest time and energy in Afghanistan, a large part of the war has come home too and it is struggling to enforce its writ on its side of the Pasthun-dominated lands that straddle the two countries. A lessening of tensions with India can only help at this point.
India, meanwhile, has shot out of the blocks building a trillion-dollar economy that dwarfs everyone else's in the region, not just in size but also growth rates even if it is slowing down now. It still has a long way to go to meet the aspirations of a billion plus people and realise its own potential, though. It needs peace within and on the borders and it needs closer economic ties with all its neighbours. Its economic stakes are rising across the region including Afghanistan where Indian firms, along with the Chinese who preceded them, are the only ones prepared to risk blood and treasure to exploit its mineral resources. Conversely if a pomegranate farmer in southern Afghanistan- the Taliban heartland - wants to sell his produce to the booming Indian market, New Delhi wants to do whatever it can to try and make that possible.
@josokutty
Well said! Just do it, if not at the govt. level, then at citizen levels. Here is a suggestion, each village of a country should initiate to engage with a village of the other country, in partnership and friendship; cooperative joint civic projects and trade. People must develope themeselves to regain confidence and trust which has gone lost in history.
Rex Minor
Europe can’t put out the blaze
If the world thought that Europe’s finance ministers were running in to put out the blaze spreading through Athens and Rome this week, it might come as a surprise to learn they still don’t agree on the size of the fire or how to deal with it.
Any training course will tell you that if a small fire isn’t tackled quickly, it could make things a lot worse. The Greek crisis is like a small electrical fire that has grown into a dangerous inferno now threatening to gut Italy.
But ministers meeting in Brussels have clearly not been on any fire extinguisher training courses lately — they don’t know their water from their foam and their dry powder. In fact, they appear to be pouring oil on the fire.
Belgium’s Finance Minister Didier Reynders says it is best to try to smother the blaze with a small cloth soaked in a chemical called a financial transaction tax, while Sweden’s Anders Borg and Austria’s Maria Fekter say they can’t spare any of their CO2 extinguishers.
“Italy can achieve a lot from its own doing,” Fekter told reporters who were watching the fire grow closer. Borg, Fekter and others are sure the Italians in the burning building down the street will be able to sort things out themselves.
Spain’s Elena Salgado is meanwhile clearly upset that the smoke from that fire is billowing into her garden, but France’s Francois Baroin says there was no need to reach for a fire hose: “Tout va bien” (Everything’s going well), he said, wiping his brow from the heat. A combustible mix of hot air and faulty wiring seem to be one assessment of the causes of the euro zone flames, which no one is really willing to consider. But as the sound of emergency sirens grows louder, it may be time to remove the safety pin from the extinguisher marked “European Central Bank” — it may be the only way to remove all the oxygen feeding the fire.
Hmmmm… how to summarize these things? “Rome fiddles while Europe burns?”
from Jeremy Gaunt:
Democracy and Chaos are both Greek
It seems as if almost everyone was surprised by Prime Minister George Papandreou's decision to hold a referendum on the euro zone's bailout package for his country. At the very least, it can probably be said that he is weary of being hammered from all sides -- his own party, the opposition, the people on the street, Germany, the tabloid press, you name it.
A lot will obviously depend on what question is asked. Do you want an end to austerity, would get a clear yes vote. Do you want to leave the euro zone -- perhaps not.
Financial markets, however, do not initially appear content to wait. Talk of an end-of-year rally is off the table (at least for now). It's not exactly χάος (chaos) out there, but Papandreou's experiment in δημοκρατία (democracy) has sent the whole euro zone project into a new, risky phase.
It was a typo, but RBS's take on the Greek referendum this morning will have had some resonance:
"We view this as a major negative for Greece and the rest of the momentary union".
LOL. Umair talks about nuking India like he is the COAS himself. It’s nonsense. Nobody knows Pakistan’s nuclear redlines. Least of all some random internet poster named Umair.
Pakistan is not going to nuke anybody. Under what scenario is it even possible? Let’s take a look at some here:
1) Balochistan breaks out into full blown insurgency and some Indian involvement is found. Let’s say this happens (although it’s implausible given the size of the Balochi population), there would still be no credible excuse for Pakistan to nuke anybody. Or by Umair’s logic, India or the US would have every right to turn Lahore or Islamabad or Karachi into a glass parking lot for every Pakistan-linked terrorist attack.
2) India conducts air strikes or even limited military incursions into Pakistan in response to a terror attack. Again. No excuse. With such a massive conventional army, the world would not tolerate any slight incursion as an excuse for nuclear retaliation. Least of all when the Indian attack is in response to a Pakistan-originated terror attack. And this scenario excludes the high likelihood of foreign nationals also being targetted, drawing in US, UK, European involvement as well.
All that is setting aside the fact that most Pakistanis aren’t as moronic or as suicidal as some of the posters here. That Umair talks so casually about employing nukes, shows that he’s utterly ignorant on the topic of military affairs. I suggest that other posters start treating his posts on nuclear escalation with same credibility most of us accord to Rex Minor and his routine warnings for the imminent (in the next 5 minutes) demise of the USA.
You can save this forum for serious discussion or start trading yelps and squeals with monkeys who have a limited knowledge base and intellect. Your choice.