OPINION: For A Change, Looking West

I have a small dog that, for some reason, has always wanted to attack and prove itself against big dogs. Unfortunately, it did try once and I had to rescue it from being mauled and hurt. I say this because I see a similar complex, the Napoleonic Complex, with India’s neighbor to the West. Unlike my dog, the neighbor has tried this FOUR times and has been badly mauled all 4 times. Given the mauling they’ve received, one would expect them to have learned a lesson and desist from these unadvised ventures. Alas, that’s not a trait they seem to have learned.

An India-centric policy is not advisable, but this shouldn’t be construed as negative. After all, this is one way of keeping an eye on the neighbor as well as any impending threats. However, this is now turning into a pathological obsession, which would require psychiatric help. The Prime Minister of the western neighbor definitely qualifies in that category. Obsessing about the goings-on in the neighboring country, while ignoring the goings-on within his own country is not good for the country nor for his political future, but who wants to tell him that?

Churchill is credited with a statement, “Success is about going from one failure to another without losing enthusiasm”. If one were to use Mr. Churchill’s statement here, the neighboring country’s PM is very successful, since he has gone through so many failures that it is difficult to understand what success he has actually had in his political life! It is said, he was selected as the country’s PM by the military establishment. Over the past few years that he has been the Prime Minister, his favorite phrases, you hear them a few times every day, are “BJP”, “RSS” & “Why doesn’t Modi answer my call?”. One could be forgiven for smiling at this, after all this shows the level of political maturity of this gentleman, but when one thinks about the protocol or the lack of, in this case, one shudders.

Prime Ministers, especially of hostile nations, are not expected to call each other breaking protocol, but who’s to teach this to the PM to the neighboring country? Apparently, his knowledge of protocol has not matured beyond high school politics. Contrast this with the Indian PM’s enthusiasm about the development of India, his vision and you see a marked difference! Rarely does he say a word about the western neighbor!!!

While this has been playing out, to everyone’s amusement, what transpired after August 5, 2019 (the day articles 370 and 35a were abrogated) has been, to put it mildly, amusing. Starting with the PM of the neighboring country making statements that bordered on nuclear threats to those made by hooligans, this has been one of finding laughter in tense situations, after all. One of his ministers, not surprisingly of Science & Technology, mentioned having nuclear devices weighing 250-500 GRAMS!! No kidding!!!

Making trips around the world, the neighboring Prime Minister has been looking for sympathetic shoulders to cry on; unfortunately, there’s not too many of those available. While he is looking for a shoulder to cry on, the PM of India seems to be on a high. He seems to have his share of detractors, but who doesn’t, but for the most part, he has the whole-hearted backing of over 1.25 Billion people. In addition, the support rolls in from countries around the world, that have indicated their unwillingness to support Pakistan’s stand in the United Nations. Any wonder, when the PM of the western neighbor addressed the UN, not too many brows were raised.

Media, in the western neighbor, has for the most part been as upset as their PM and has taken to attempts at minor swipes at India. The high-schoolish attempts at proving their country’s superiority has really not worked. Economy is what makes a country run and definitely not an army. Unfortunately, this country’s PM has been making amateurish attempts and threats about being nuclear-armed which really haven’t garnered sympathy from countries around the world. And, so it came to be, that Saudi Arabia withdrew it’s support to the neighboring country and asked for it’s money back, causing the country to panic. The foreign minister ran to their trusted friend, China to bail them out; China did but what troubled the neighboring country was that while they were groveling for money from China, Saudi Arabia stopped shipping oil to the country; how’s an army and an airforce expected to run without oil/petrol?

This is the current predicament that this country finds itself in! How it finds its way out of this is anyone’s guess. We’ll probably have another part, to this article, which would have an ending to this ongoing saga of one country politically imploring another, for it’s own survival.

जय श्रीराम। जय सीयाराम। उत्तिष्ठ भारत। जय माँ भारती

God Bless the USA.