The Mumbai Blasts: Terrorists hide behind the Pakistani Common Man
Outlook Magazine writes an unabashedly pro-Pakistan piece. So much for the mole in the PMO.It appears now the terrorists in Pakistan are hiding behind the Pakistani "Common Man". The "Common Man" wants peace, the "Common Man" wants to travel to India, the "Common Man" wants to see Shahrukh Khan films, etc...
Maybe the Pakistani "Common Man" has realized that in Lebanon, Israeli bombs didn't distinguish between civilian and combatant? India's technology is so much inferior to Israeli technology, it isn't likely that Indian bombs will do what Israel's bombs did not. Somehow I doubt the Pakistani "Common Man" has the attention span to understand these things, but you never know.
The Musharraf regime's misplaced sense of strength vis-a-vis India is breeding a culture of poor strategic choice in Islamabad.
There was no provocation for Muslims in India to conduct the Mumbai blasts.
This was an act carried out by the Pakistani ISI and its Indian hirelings purely for monetary profit.
It is foolish for any Pakistani to believe that they can share what profits the ISI may have reaped by this act. It is even stupider for Pakistanis to enrage the Indians further by talk all this horseshit about Kashmir and peace. If the Musharraf regime finds it difficult to handle the peace process the Pakistanis should feel free to invest in someone who is up to the task.
Perhaps the Pakistanis should pay careful attention this little anecdote from a US hostage held by the Iranians in 1980.
The hostage (who I call Bob, because I don't recall his name) was being held at a small facility near Tehran. Bob had been captured during the embassy seige and was continously interrogated by his Pasdaran captors. Bob was suspected of being a CIA spy so the questioning was quite brutal and relentless. On late night Bob's Pasdaran interrogator woke him up from his sleep and told him that Iranian government had recieved news reports that Reagan was likely to win the US election. Perhaps to mock Bob, the Iranian asked him what he felt would happen if Reagan won the election.
With a moment of thought, Bob replied "He is a cowboy", and then very dramatically Bob held out his hand - his fingers folded into the shape of a gun - laying his index finger on the Iranian interrogator's forehead, Bob said "Bang!.. that's what will happen".
There are parallels to this in our present situation.
Much can happen when one is not paying attention.
posted by maverick @ 7:10 AM
8 Comments:
Maverick, Could you please elaborate on how monetary profit was the motivation for carrying out the blasts? Thanks.
hi maverick,
very sad that Indian technology is behind Israel.But hope we will catch up with them
Hi Anonymous,
The Pakistanis are more than capable of carrying out a contract on us.
All this stuff appearing in the Indian Express about the Saudi NRIs funding the bombing to avenge gujarat riots is bullshit. Saudia based funding channels are a part of Pakistan's network in India. Those channels release funds when the ISI tells them to and they won't release money unless the ISI compensates them.
The more I look at this, the more I am convinced that someone in the ISI was paid a huge sum of money to do this.
Hi Mukunda,
Please remember at all times the following:
1) 30 year old American technology is far superior to anything made by the Soviet Union. By induction anything Israeli is superior to anything Indian or Arab.
2) Chinese clones of the Soviet Union technology are far far superior to the original Soviet technology that they were copied from.
3) All Pakistani pilots are superior to everyone else because the Pakistani pilots train with the Turkish pilots who train with the Israelis. The Israelis have the best technology in the world (as proven in point (1)) and the Pakistanis are the most superior breed of Muslims in the world that drive superior Chinese clones of Soviet airplanes (as proven in point 2) so they are the best pilots in the world.
4) India and Israel are coming together as part of a Jew-Hindu consipracy and even Mel Gibson will agree that this is true. Field Marshall Charles Yeager will definetely agree that India and Israel are coming together and that though Indians may have superior weapons but they are fundamentally lacking in faith, they rice and are short and dark so the performance of their weapons will always be inferior to anything Pakistani.
5) USAF has all kinds of advanced weapons but their pilots are not Pakistani Muslims and so they can't possibly be the best in the world.
Mukunda, you have know all these basic facts if you want to be a South Asian Security Expert.
:)
hi maverick,
what you wrote sent my mind into a spin for a moment, then understood the spin.The skills of the pakistani pilots was for everone to see on the day of september 11.Impressive flying skills. Can teach a trick or two to the USAF also.
P.S:- was expressing my genuine dissapointment at the various technology denial regimes that has affected us.
mp,
I feel that the Mole affair has obvious security implications however Moles aren't a new thing.
The impression that the BJP seems to be keen to put out is that the UPA is penetrated by US agents of influence and cannot be trusted to make a rational calculation of national interest.
The Congress(I) has prided itself with attracting some of the finest and most capable people in the country. What the BJP seems to be intent on saying (based on how Jaswant Singh's comments are being portrayed) is that the Congress (I) may have capable people, but the pantheon has been compromised and they cannot be relied to make a policy that benifits the nation as a whole.
I cannot say if the Indian people will buy into that notion, and I do not know if the machinery of government will accept that argument, but from an American perspective, the mere possibility that Jaswant Singh's allegations may adversely impact perceptions of the US in India, is likely to cause considerable worry.
I anticipate that US friendly media channels in India will downplay or obfuscate the role and identity of the mole. This may appear to be playing the UPA's favor right now, but in fact it only serve to further lull the Indian establishment to the dangers of an engagement with the US.
I remain convinced that presently the UPA control over the media is an illusion. Ultimately the money speaks for itself, and we are all getting a deeper appreciation of where most of the money is coming from.
Let me give a crude thought problem. Lets say there is a really popular news channel in India. The channel is owned by a Indian who is related to an extremely high ranking functionary of a major political party in India. All the major equipment used at this TV station is purchased from a foreign country, and almost all high ranking editorial and technical staff are all trained in the same foreign country.
Now how does this play out?
Does the news coverage slant towards the political party that the owner's relative is a member of? or does the news coverage slant towards the editorial staff and the ideological moorings?
This is not an easy question to answer. The only way to answer this is to conduct a test, if a powerful politician from owner's relative's party calls up the editors of the channel in a time of need and asks them to slant the coverage and they obey, then it suggests that the political party has a greater control over the channel. If the editors disobey and put out material conducive their ideological moorings, then it suggests that the foreign country has a greater influence on their actions.
It seems to me that recent events have yeilded a clear answer to who has a greater influence. This goes beyond omlette slurping antics. This is the heart of psywar and perception management.
mukunda,
Those are just the fundamentals of being a south asia expert. Per the PAF's latest technology antics, I understand that their GCI system is going to be replaced with an airborne radar platform of Chinese origin, that is going to be able to communicate with their American supplied F-16s. If like everything else, the F-16s were actually made in China and then marked up with the Made in USA label I would not be worried, but from what I understand, the F-16s are actually indigenous US technology so I don't know what will happen if a Chinese AWACS can talk to them.
I am aware that you were concerned about the technology denial, but I think of it as a blessing in disguise, I think it prompts us to innovate ourselves.
I strongly welcome the Americans supplying the Pakistanis with all sorts of Elint, AEW etc... aircraft and then denying in the same technology to India. This will force the Indians to innovate and we will finally get that microwave engineering program off the air. For the past two decades we have been half heartedly trying to get semiconductor and microwave related manufacturing and engineering started on a large scale in India - I think an huge American arms sale to Pakistan will have an electrifying effect in India - our pussyfooting will turn into a full fledged crusade to indigenize all aspects of microwave and semiconductor related technology.
Maverick, semiconductor manufacturing may be something that will come to India in the future and our defence forces will benefit from it. As a step towards that goal, India needs to woo private investment - maybe Japanese semiconductor companies who are on the lookout for cheap labor or even American semiconductor companies who would be happy to set up shop in India provided they are given tax and monetary incentives. Firstly it would create a labor force and over years this labor force could be expected to diversify into other non-silicon based microelectronics for microwave applications.
On the other hand if India's defence sector is opened up to private players, American Defense companies set up shop in India and could supply the hardware.
Currently ISRO and DRDO have manufacturing capability on paper but unless there is a huge capital investment it is impossible for any sort of semiconductor manufacturing activity to thrive.
Also under the current nuclear deal if dual use technologies can make microwave circuits accessible, then India would prefer to buy than to mnaufacture - which would be sad in a way.
Working in defence and weapons sector in Britain for long long time, when I read the comments on this blog about weapons and all, I can only laugh. It takes a lot lot lot than just few outsourced jobs in high-tech sector to get hold and master the defence/weapons high end technologies.
I will say one biggest factor that helps most... it is called POLITICAL WILL and VISION.
In India, we have none of it.
Anonymous,
I know it requires a lot of investment.
Rama S,
Well, its a good thing you live in Britain where great leaders with vision like Blair can get "help" from Pakistan to arrest would be terrorists.
I guess even 50 years after independence some Indians are far better placed to serve Blair sense of vision.
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