India, Pakistan, Iraq, USA, gooooo Wikileaks! *

Finally got to a mirror site to read some Wikileaks. For some reason the links would not work on the sites or Firefox would scare me. Tonight the stars aligned and this site let me in..

This was nice reading. Was hoping to have a laugh at what came out of Delhi but found this one from Islamabad and it was interesting..

These two paragraphs really made it interesting..

Pakistan/India
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¶8. (C) Petraeus said the most important threat to Pakistan was on the western border and internally. Terrorists were an existential threat to Pakistan. Kayani agreed. However, Kayani observed that he had postponed a missile test. The Indians, he said, in contrast, had conducted one just a few hours before. Kayani said he had no intention to resume missile testing as long as the current tensions persisted. He promised to be transparent with allies about his plans and had briefed us about his move of 6000 troops to the Indian border. Kayani said he was determined to exercise restraint in his actions with India. He recounted that he had taken no
ISLAMABAD 00000155 003 OF 003
action the evening that Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee had supposedly called President Zardari and threatened to declare war. Kayani asked to be alerted if the U.S. had any warning of another attack - he understood that the Indians had been warned about the Mumbai attack. He mentioned that discussion of the consequences of a follow-on attack made both India and Pakistan hostage to extremists and increased the likelihood of an attack. “If there is any clue about another attack,” he said, “please share it with us.”

and

Swat Valley
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¶5. (C) Kayani was clear that the GOP had lost control of the Swat valley. He said the police had no ability to come in after the army to “hold” territory. He recounted that half of the 600 police officers, supposedly from the NWFP’s elite police units, destined for Swat had deserted, largely because there was no command structure. Petraeus replied that the U.S. had confronted this same issue in Iraq, describing it as a “clear and leave” strategy, requiring the retaking of the same ground multiple times. Petraeus observed that the police are the most vulnerable, since they are exposed in communities. Petraeus noted that increased measures to control population movements would probably have to be put in place throughout the country, which would require considerable manpower.

Pakistan has similar issues like Iraq when it comes to controlling extremists.

The military leadership is patient enough to not go for war. That is great. Maybe, maybe there will be a lasting peace when India and Pakistan jointly fight extremists.

The USA for its part is playing both sides. Well, that is to be expected!

India could have hastily gone to war and would be in the same boat as the USA. Thankfully there was no war. Looks like India was warned by the US about the attacks and the Pakistanis could not do anything about it either.

Just go through this stuff.. you might even find out who in India was warned about the attacks and what they did when they were warned!

This is one treasure trove of information which shows you that inspite of all that press and google and facebook being ubiquitous and in our face.. the hows and whys are always wrong!

Educated folks react to information thrown at them by the "in your face" media. We assume so many things, sway to popular opinion or in cases where we think we are better than the person who gets their news from facebook friends because we read and read a lot.. well, we read garbage!

If the press did what Wikileaks exposed on a daily basis, a lot of war, bloodshed would have been averted! A lot of politicians would have been exposed and their true colors come to light. People, countries might be more civil towards each other...

Well, maybe..

Go read it!

*.. this one is equally interesting..

A few thoughts....

Here are some thoughts, that spring to mind after reading the news today.

The American view of a tolerant country is equated with "loser" or "pushover". That is the reason why they really don't understand the concept of Non-Violence.

In America, guns settle things. Be it in old westerns, Chuck Norris movies or the real world, the Marines will take on any problem and where they land, there will be order established! This thought seems to be deeply implanted into most young Americans that I know (not that I know a lot of them, but the statistic is showing high probabilities!).

Also, anyone who suggests taking to guns in haste is not a good thing gets branded as a "Pu$$~", "Wimp" etc. That is the same reason why Obama gets negative ads. when he suggests diplomacy and is exactly the same reason why India is dished out crap by the US Government and there is all this "Pakistan is a victim" stuff we see in the US Media.

There is also a tremendous positive bias for Pakistan in the US Media and at best a feeling of neutrality towards India. The people we interact with daily seem to share a better sentiment of India than the media. Do not understand this.

There is also a TV program that played here every saturday, Namaste America! We stopped watching that a long time ago, because we seriously thought it was funded by Pakistan. It would always put India in bad light to an American audience. No Indian channel worth its salt would put out a "news" program that ran like an ISI infomercial!!

It is a free country out here. Except the microphones are placed in front of certain folks and of course, the loudest voice wins!

It would be really ironic that these "American Voters" would be talking to their representatives to "do something" about "India Vitimizing? Pakistan" in a few months.

When it is time to sell the next load of B15's C15's or F15's or whatever as part of the next wave of improving the American economy, downloading unnecessary weapons to unstable nations and making new foreign policy to strengthen America's ties with "its allies", killing all birds in one stone, the "informed voters" will support the worthy cause, eventhough they don't get 70 virgins for their actions!

Now,that was the cynic in me rearing his ugly head again.

What every Indian or Indian supporter needs to do right now is to undo what the media is doing. If you are an Indian go take over the press! Be a fresh voice. Go do the Mera Bharat Mahan thing, for real!

If you support India, spread awareness on what the real India is like, what real Indians are like, tell people what it meant, means and possibly will mean to be part of the Indian experience.

There are a lot of people I deal with everyday who associate India with the following words:

India =
(
East;
Taj Mahal;
elephants;
british;
rope trick;
raj kapoor;
Gandhi;
Delhi;
himalayas;
poor;
hindoo language;
religious tension;
)

That is their sum total understanding of a country of a billion plus people who have been around in that location for 4000+ years!

So, please sit with the folks and add more words to their idea of what is India. You will be doing the country a great service, and India needs more of this, now more than ever!

A country with a billion plus Ambassadors to the world, with the right message can drown out any, if not all of the negative smear tactics that the media can come up with.

Just my two cents...

ps. We were actually out in Sacramento, spending time at the zoo. The kids were promised a trip for the last two weeks and it was high time we made a trip, to anywhere! Will post pictures tomorrow. The animals co-operated very well for the photos, when the kids disappointedand vice versa, and it was a great day to be outdoors in the Sacramento area...but the thoughts kept going back to Mumbai and Chennai where my parents have to pretty much row out of their house.

pps. In case you haven't heard it in the news, (I am sure you haven't) Chennai is the new Venice!

ppps. Found Sidin's post very touching, very fateful!
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Interesting view of things

Today in the letters to the newsdesk section of the news on public radio, a listener had pointed out an interesting fact.

The student who went on a rampage at Virginia Tech., was being showcased as a "Korean kid"! What is interesting is that he was born in Korea, but he lived his entire life here, went to school here, went to college here, was raised as an American and for all practical purposes was predominantly exposed to American culture.

The newscasters are trying to imply that his actions have something to do with his "Koreanity". Scary part is that, it is simply a question of time before someone in the media actually publicizes the word "Koreanity" and someone else misspells it as "Koranity" and before you know it you have the President triumphantly declaring that he has found the connection between the shootings and the Koran!

The USA today is scary. Over the years I have spoken to many teenagers and college students here, from the time I came here as a graduate student to the the present day. I just thank my stars that I managed to grow up in India in the eighties, an environment where students focused on their studies, were too young to chase the other sex when they were in high school (had no peer pressure to lose their viriginity before graduation !) or had to work and study at the same time.

Kids in this country have a tough time for the most part because they share the financial burden of their education (partially or completely), have peer pressure to do things that distract them from their studies and their future, do not have good examples and role models to keep them focussed and have a system that is more than happy to dole out overpriced student loans, condoms and depression pills to school kids as solutions to their problems as opposed to getting to the root cause.

The lucky ones do get to have role models, parents or relatives that support them during their education process and have the ability to focus and prioritize their goals. It is a fact that the most brilliant and creative people I have met over the last decade are of American origin. If a person has to succeed in spite of all these distractions and responsibilities, they have to be really good. Maybe that explains that creativity!

I have already written many a post on raising my kids here. I can only hope that if I support their education, keep them focussed , put them with kids whose parents share the same hopes and fears (yes, fear works at a lot of levels here) , then they will succeed!

Time and place do play a part in how people grow and develop, probably more than their birthplace or nationality. The media has a lot of growing up to do!

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