Mumbai Terror Attacks and the Response
Written by Staff Writer
In the wake of Mumbai terrorist attacks, there have been lot of opinions, suggestions and call of actions from different people across various walks of life in India and abroad. Broadly speaking I have tried to classify these ideas and people into three categories :
The Nationalist - They favor attack of some sort on Pakistan and take out the terrorist camps and their hideouts.
The Should Gang - They place the blame squarely on Indian government which in all its glory of corruption and inefficiency failed to place any protective measures despite numerous previous terror attacks in the country. The idea is that we should take lesson from this tragedy, should start to change the society one citizen at a time, should become more law abiding, should try to take more active part in government machinery to make it better.
The Realist - They want the above two but are resigned to government's apathy and incompetency and don't believe that any action would be taken.
Okay so far so good. Now if I may, let us just remove ourselves from emotional roller coaster ride of the past few days and examine the three options strategically:
Attack on Pakistani soil
Whether in the form of surgical strike on a terrorist camp or an aerial attack or any combination thereof, no self respecting country will let an attack from a foreign military go unanswered. And if the countries involved are India and Pakistan with all their historical animosity then you can be as sure of a response as sun rising from east.
The fact that it was Pakistan where the terrorist originated and is at fault in incubating their camps, will have no forbearance whatsoever once an attack takes place and media and others will whip it to a frenzy. It will be very difficult for the Pakistani military high command to not to respond which takes us to the dreaded war - fifth, as it happened in last 60 years. Remember this is the same military which had to publicly explode the N-bomb after India's explosion back in 1998 even though it was a common knowledge that Pakistan had a bomb. Pakistan, unfortunately has become a society, which can unite only in opposition to India and like an attention starved younger brother, is always striving to match to the big brother in all its actions and evils.
Now the question for India is, is war a justifiable cost to pay for payback and making it difficult for the terrorist to strike again - and can a war even achieve that given how taggered and un-hittable terrorist camps are in terms of infrastructure. It is like accidentally loosing 100 dollars to your rival and then putting hundred thousand to recoup that money. However high the loses are currently, the war is just to going to augment it anifold. Moreover Pakistan is no pushover like Afghanistan was for US and is nuclear armed which means that any response has to calibrated carefully.
The Should Gang -
Of all the three ideas they are the most difficult to argue against - how do you argue against being a more law abiding citizen, being a better society and striving to root out corruption and corrupt politicians. The key here is not to look at the stated goals, instead how do you achieve those goals. Historically the communists and religious parties have used these ideas very well to further their power. The bourgeois want better wages - sure the Bolsheviks will deliver it, the masses want to be saved from Shah's tyranny and want a just society - no worries a certain ayatollah is to the rescue. What starts as a noble and just cause soon has a champion who eliminates all other champions and we know what happens next.
But wait a minute - it is not going to happen in India. After all it is a country of non meat eating and pious Hindus and didn't we had a non violent struggle under Gandhi to root out British. Much water has passed through Ganges since then and unfortunately the country has become more populated, polarized and resource scarce. Make no mistake, it could very well happen here - it is a very slippery slope from Gujrat anti muslim riots to a Hindu Saudi Arabia however much implausible it seems now.
prostitution has been around as long as mankind has been and so has the moral tirade against it, but the only thing that works in against it is the dis-incentive like fear of law or in some countries high taxation. Make prostitution cheaper and lawful and see how much the morality would work on most men!
infrastructure in police, judiciary and other checks and balances in the system which need to be independent. Once we have good people at the top everything else will follow. It is like if you remove foul plants from the lake, it automatically increases the good plants and lake is beautiful once again. Leave the foul plants in there and the lake is dirty and clogged.
The Realist
Yes you folks are right.
guise of Hindu fundamentalists and unlinked to any government apparatus which would be able to send equally or more violent suicide missions from India to Pakistan. Why should only they make use of the fact that we look alike.
importantly finding an alternative to gasoline - because once we kill the source of cancer the fight would be so much easier.
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