What Francois Hollande Learned from George Bush and Obama Did not

It took a terrorist carnage in Paris to make the French discover the wisdom in US actions post 9/11 and for their president Francois Hollande to discover his inner George W. Bush. When a socialist French president echoes words used by a Texan Republican American president we can be sure we are living in a new era of common sense prevailing over pompous platitudes. On the other hand when an American president nonchalantly says, after a carnage in California, that he misjudged how anxious his citizens are because he does not watch cable TV, we can be equally sure that the desire for a moral halo is outstripping a dire need of sense of urgency. Amidst these two scenarios stands the divisive figure of George Bush.

The Bush that Hollande discovered and echoed was the post 9/11 but pre-Iraq war Bush. That sunny fateful Tuesday morning is etched in my memory. It was a morning when the words "the world will never be the same again" stopped being a trite cliche and became a new emphatic reality. It was the day when an age of American innocence ended. Bush who had assumed office under a cloud of derision and lack of mandate became the voice of America in a moment that he certainly would not have wished nor hoped for but he rose to the occasion. Nancy Gibbs of Time magazine wrote archly that history came down in a fell swoop and lifted him. When Bush left office with his legacy in tatters as the nation reeled under the greatest recession since the Great Depression he and many of his supporters felt that history will judge him kinder with the passage of time as it has done to Harry Truman. Their hopes were answered, sadly, when Paris felt the sting of terrorism.

Image from http://www.usnews.com/cmsmedia/3e/d07fa8ab4e693d9657bcc69b7223dd/40985FE_DA_130425bush2001.jpg 

Bush said "we are at war" and many guffawed pointing out that it was impossible for a nation state to be at war against a rag-tag motley group of non-state actors. Theoreticians trotted out to chortle that it was neither a war and even if it was war it cannot be won because it lacks a definition of what would constitute a 'win'. The Bush doctrine has now been vindicated by Hollande.

It is fully to George Bush's credit that he recognized that 9/11 was indeed war. Osama Bin Laden had indeed declared war against the US, only thing is unlike Clinton now the US had a president who understood that Bin Laden meant business. That a motley group of religious fundamentalists with an amoeba like structure spread across the globe could be considered an entity and waged war against was the recognized with an instinctive genius that Bush was never recognized for.

Bush, unlike Obama who needs to watch cable TV to learn what his citizens felt, channeled the rage of Americans and gave expression to the resolve that the country wanted to see in it's leader. With his arm slung over a fireman, standing over the rubble of World Trade Center, with a bull horn Bush declared "I hear you, the world hears you and those who did this will hear from us". Asked what his aim was he bluntly said, in Churchillian manner, "there's a poster out west in Texas 'wanted dead or alive'". There was no waffling, no lecturing, no elaborate reasoning just a blunt statement of the desired outcome. Time magazine columnist Lance Morrow was searing in his column calling for a 'purple rage' and advising grief counselors to stay away.

On a day when the fires were still smoldering in New York City and Washington D.C. Bush said America was attacked by those who detested her for her way of life and what she stood for. The naysayers chuckled that the attacks had nothing to do with the terrorists antagonism towards American ideals. Tellingly Hollande used those same words and said Paris was attacked for what she stood for.

Bush understood keenly that this was a different war and that the usual paradigms of war, valid for several millennia, will not suit this new war, this new manichean struggle of the 21st century. "There would be no surrender or signing aboard a ship" predicted Bush. Unlike Obama who needed a do-over of his Oval office speech against ISIS Bush delivered a new doctrine speaking from Oval office saying "we'll make no distinction between terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them". He called it a "war on terror".

Bob Woodward quotes at length Bush's speech to the Congress and the nation. Watched by "80 million" Americans Bush declared "our grief has turned to anger and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done". As for the new nature of the conflict Bush advised Americans that they "should not expect one battle bust a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have seen. It ma include dramatic strikes visible on TV, and covert operations, secret even in success". Where Bush was quick to identify the nature of the enemy and help the country resolve itself for a lengthy conflict Obama was keen to ridicule the nature of ISIS by calling them a 'varsity JV team'.

Brussels and Europe at large have recognized that their cities have become sanctuaries for terrorists. It is not without reason that Hamburg was were the 9/11 plotters gathered to plot their heinous crime. A bin-Laden could not have operated without impunity but for the sanctuary provided by Kabul.

Hollande, learning from Bush, has vowed that France will cut off the oxygen for terrorist operations by choking the money flow. America due to its pre-eminent position in the world of finance could leverage institutions at its command to identify and stifle the flow of money that financed terrorist operations. When treasury secretary announced the presidential proclamation Bush flew into a rage because he wanted to make the announcement himself in order to impress upon everyone the central role money plays in terrorism and by making the announcement himself he wanted to show the world that he was deathly serious. Again, this was Bush's own idea with an instinctive realization of what the country was against and an awareness of the tools available at his disposal.

In response to the racist bigotry that is being unleashed by Donald Trump and Ted Cruz in the crazed GOP primaries both Obama and Hillary Clinton have discovered the virtues of how Bush faced the conflict by demonizing the terrorists while consciously and steadfastly refusing to demonize an entire religion or an entire people. Woodward points out how Bush repetitively emphasized that it was not a war against the Afghans or Islam. Bush, Woodward says, wanted the first bombs to dropped over Afghanistan to be food packets. Outreach to children and women of Afghanistan were key elements of Bush policy. Bush even made it a point to invite a Muslim cleric to the memorial service at the National Cathedral.

Americans have forgotten how ill organized the country was just before 9/11 and the changes that Bush ushered in. The FBI and CIA were prevented by law from exchanging intelligence, the president could not make a secure telephone call from Air Force One, while Bush Sr could go to war in 1991 with off-the shelf plans there were no off-the-shelf plans for this war, the military had been under equipped, human intelligence sorely lacked, the laws for snooping were outpaced by technological advances that the terrorists took advantage of and much more. Make no mistake Obama has retained many of Bush's security policies and has actually took the drone warfare policy to levels that even Bush demurred to do.

Bush gathered an international coalition before he went to war, something that even the French have no bothered to do with their air strikes. As much as Bush wanted to present a globally united front in the war against terror he was aware that there will be a day when the US will carry the burden alone as it does now. Obama cried from rooftops that the US lost international prestige under Bush's watch but he has been both unwilling and incapable of stitching together any meaningful coalition to carry on the Afghan operations that he found himself necessary to continue with a troop addition.

While Hollande learned from the Bush who went after bin-Laden Obama is eager to avoid being the Bush who went after Saddam Hussein. Unfortunately Obama took his caution to such an extreme that even his own Secretary of state blithely told an interviewer that "do not do stupid stuff cannot be the organizing principle of a great country". This week yet another former Secretary of defense who served under Obama went on the record to say what a detached war time president Obama is. Apparently during cabinet meetings to discuss the threat of ISIS Obama would get busy checking messages on his blackberry. Talking to left leaning public broadcaster PBS Obama blamed media coverage of the attacks in Paris and California for fueling anxiety amongst the public. 'Media coverage' is what Obama thinks is responsible for citizens feeling anxious after two brazen and heinous attacks. Thank god he was not in the presidency when Pearl Harbor was attacked.

A former administration official went on record to say that Obama dithered on cutting off the oxygen of money supply to ISIS, the oil wells, worrying about the damage to the environment. Finding political courage to kill bin-Laden, while commendable, does not compare to doing what it takes to win a war against a merciless enemy. Obama, it is now becoming increasingly evident, is no war time president. I shudder to think of what an Obama would have done before D-Day or at Stalingrad or before Hiroshima.

Obama, like many in America and elsewhere, saw Bush exclusively through the prism of the Iraq war and the mistakes of the doctrine of pre-emptive war. That is a sad mistake for even in a war as plagued by mistakes as the Iraq war was there came a moment when Bush discovered leadership, albeit much belatedly. While everyone including his own 'Iraq study group' advised Bush to cut and run from Iraq he resolved that he will not abandon Iraq to chaos and announced the surge under David Petraeus. The Iraq 'surge' was a success that Obama threw away and yielded a vacuum that ISIS was only too glad to fill in.

It is still too early to say who will take over from Obama but I'm sure that at this point anybody but Obama would prosecute the war against ISIS much better. Hillary Clinton may even be a better Commander in Chief than Obama himself.

A Tragedy In Wisconsin And Some Debates

On Aug 5th Wade Michael Page, a member of a White supremacist group, went to a Gurdwara in Oak Creek, WI and killed, in cold blood fueled by racism, 6 people. He would have killed more but for a timely alert by kids aged 4 who saw him first. Page terrorized a group of peaceful worshippers until SWAT teams took him down. The Sikh community and Indian-Americans at large are still reeling from  the emotional aftermath. President Obama ordered a national day of mourning and assured India's Sikh Prime Minister that all will be done to protect Sikhs in America. Wisconsinites and Americans at large poured forth their sympathies. Rev Paul Armstrong of United Methodist Church in Oak Creek told Time "we are in this together..the community is saying we hold the Sikhs in high regard". A year ago Rev Armstrong had taken members of his church to the Gurdwara and was "totally impressed by their hospitality and their tales faith". (Below picture is of the community in Oak Creek mourning, courtesy Time magazine, more pictures at the bottom of the blog, also from Time )

The tragedy in Wisconsin took place within a month of another mad guy (now, medically mad) taking an assault rifle to a Batman movie and mowing down tens of moviegoers. That triggered a debate about America's vexing issue of gun control. Fareed Zakaria argued, correctly, in Time that America has a gun problem and really needs to look at the issue disappasionately. Zakaria went so far as to say that Americans who do not support gun controls are doing a disservice to the famous 'second amendment' which is cited for the 'right to bear arms'. The Wisconsin shooting took on another layer of controversy viz. 'racism'. Sikhs have been targeted, 700 times according to Sikh associations, since 9/11, being mistaken for Muslims. Some of those incidents were fatal.

Wade Page was a racist, pure and simple. He was a member of white supremacist gang and had an application for KKK, the most notorious racist organization in USA. Page, reports now reveal, was an avid listener to a certain genre of pop music that, NYT called, 'fueled hate'. Even music can be used to fuel hatred. Two op-eds appearing in Washington Post and NYT, by Sikhs, amongst others, have taken this racism angle head on.

Arjun Sethi, writing in Wash.Post, recounts painful incidents like being bullied in high school (pushed into girls toilet), profiled at courts, where he appeared professionally. Sethi points out how FBI for reporting hate crimes does not have an option for Sikhs to record. MLK Jr scolded America that its promissory note returned "insufficient funds". Sethi called for America to live up to its promise of equality for its diverse population since that is 'what drives immigrants here and what makes USA the envy of the world'.

Bhira Backhaus, writing in NYT, celebrated the century old Gurdwara in Stockton. Backhaus, like Gogol in Jhumpa Lahiri's 'Namesake', recalls growing up amidst a culture clash. He had married 'outside the Sikh community' causing a 'painful breach' with his parents until their last days. Backhaus is comforted that when his parents reached out to him at last he understood that he still "belonged to the community". Then he raised the question if the devotees would have been spared had they 'dressed' like the rest of Americans (almost all women folk in that Gurdwara were in Salwar) or talked like Americans.

That the victims were brown skinned was the only reason they were killed. No matter what dress they wore or what accent they spoke Wade Page would not have spared a single one of them. Backhaus concludes by saying "to wipe away what has come before, who we have been over the centuries, also means to forget who our own mothers and fathers were". This is where I differ. This is moment of great tragedy and the cause is clear, racism, hence I tread carefully on this 'assimilation' debate.

Active discussions are taking place on the fact that Sikhs, unlike other Indians, wear a visible sign of their religion. The turban and a beard for the menfolk. It is their religious precept and they should be free to do it without prejudice like a pastor wearing his cassock or a Jew wearing his yarmulke. Assimilating does not mean forsaking all that.

Backhaus would love for Americans, of all races, to respect his faith, his values and whatever goes within the amorphous term 'culture'. But he has no word to say about the fact that his parents, RIP, thought it was sacrilegious to marry outside his community. His parents had lived in US for decades and I am sure expected to be treated as equal human beings. Should not Indians show the same acceptance towards American culture? Why do Indians look at American girls as something less? Why do Indians advertise for their girls "need groom for Indian born American girl, BUT brought up with Indian values". What does THAT mean?

When I saw 'Bend it like Beckham' I was indeed thinking 'are Sikhs in UK that insular from their fellow British'. Acceptance is a two way street. I understand that the community is anguished and very angry but how come nobody thought it proper to even mildly acknowledge the fact that the country has rallied around them unlike their mother land whose leader, in response to 3000 sikhs being killed, said "when a huge tree falls the earth is bound to shake".

I've been shocked to hear Indians carelessly use derogatory words referring to Afro-Americans. The term 'racism' is loosely used and often refers to whites as the perpetrators. Afro-American council members in DC spoke in blatant racist terms about 'Asian groceries'. Criticizing media adulation for South Asian basketball sensation Jeremy Lin an Afro-American athlete spoke in racist terms.

I am a strong supporter of being assimilated into the local culture. America's prosperity, its secular fabric, its openness etc are all the result of American 'culture'. Indians should learn to become Americans. A woman of Sikh origin is the governor of a Southern state (South Carolina). Preet Bharara, Manhattan Attorney, featured on the cover of Time and listed by Time as one of the '100 most influential, is the scourge of Wall Street.

Many Indians wonder why not US ban hate speeches. White supremacists are often monitored by FBI but America's vaunted 'first amendment' protects a lot of speeches including some abominable ideas. Hate speech is protected speech too. FBI or Department of Justice usually act with care when they prosecute for hate speech. This political correctness and respect for constitution is hotly debated. Before Indians accuse US of racism in turning a blind eye to white supremacist hate groups let us remember the Fort Hood shooting. Maj. Nidal Hassan killed 13 people in an army base. Nidal Hasan was flagged for provocative ideas but was given a pass.

When a person wags his finger at Americans and asks "why should I forget my language, my culture, my homeland etc" it would be fair to be asked back "so why bother to come here". An H1B guy who sends an email 4 days after landing saying "the common man on the road has no morals in USA" I am appalled. Why do Indians, who desire to be treated as equals and as 'Americans', at the first available instance ready to look at America like they were guests examining the country seeking to pass judgments? Indians need to first look at themselves as Americans and not as 'visitors' with a smug look of ' I love your money as long $1=Rs50 and I hate everything else'. If they think so it is ok except when they eagerly seek green cards or citizenships. There are millions of Indians and other countrymen who would love to become Americans for the love of American culture and they deserve that green card more than the smug Indians. Weeks after 9/11 I was at a party where a Sikh, a millionaire franchisee owner of Pizza Huts, declared solemnly "America is a terrorist country". This, from a person whose motherland is yet to prosecute, let alone convict, 28 years later, a single person for a pogrom that killed 3000 Sikhs. He did not even demur that 3000 of his fellow countrymen were killed just weeks back. As much as we want Americans to accept us it is high time we thought about how accepting we Indians are of Americans.

I disapprove of Indians celebrating India's independence day in USA complete with a flag march and, of course, a Bollywood actress. Those celebrations in NJ/NY are a shame both for India and USA. There is place for only one flag in US, the stars and stripes. That Empire State building lights up in tri color is the magnanimity of Americans. That Diwali is celebrated in the White House is a sign of arrival for Indian-Americans. Schools in NJ and even offices elsewhere celebrate Diwali. the Aug 15th celebrations, rediff.com points out, is strongly Hindutva in character pushing away other Indians. North Indians do not treat South Indians, especially Hindi illiterate South Indians, as fellow Indians. An advertisement for A.R.Rahman concert in NJ states "there will be as few Tamil songs as possible". When ARR first visited US North Indians booed him when he played Tamil songs. Then Tamils returned the favor for Hindi songs leading to that kind of advertisement. Indian Americans are a fractious lot. Instead of this useless Independence Parade if Indians organize symposiums on India's greatest achievement, its Freedom struggle, it would make Americans proud of India.

America can certainly do better and it is my wish to continue to hold America to its promise but we also need to remember that Americans are human beings too. 19 hijackers belonging to one religion declared a religious war killing 3000 Americans and the story continues till today. The Times Square bomber, a Pakistani, was even made a citizen. Yet he chose to kill fellow Americans on American soil. In this climate very regrettable acts of profiling and hate crimes occur. To be fair they have not proliferated. Bush's Secret Service agent was asked to get off a plane because he was a Muslim. Later Bush appeared on live TV with the agent beside him to condemn that incident. Bush, it should be noted, invited a Muslim cleric to offer prayers in the National Cathedral along side members of other clergy in the wake of 9/11. America has actively prosecuted hate crimes.

Today a Wisconsin teacher says he will learn more about Sikhism and teach his students. We wish a tragedy does not have to be the reason for that learning but this is the only sane redemption a society can strive for.

9/11 And The Vietnam Albtaross: The story of George Coker

America's engagement in Vietnam is a sordid saga of venality and war crimes. It was an age and time that makes current partisan discord look like exemplary brotherhood. The civil rights struggle, the anti-war movement, military drafts, a president assassinated, the air thick with conspiracy tales, America was a cauldron. When many rushed to scold US on 9/11 with a thinly disguised criticism of its foreign policy what drove most were the memories of Vietnam, especially of a little girl running naked, screaming, when her village was napalmed. 

Nothing has weighed heavily on US foreign policy as Vietnam. The nation's psyche was wounded for decades. US never again got into a full fledged war until the Gulf War of 1991. In fact Saddam had calculated that America with its aversion to seeing soldiers return in body bags would not venture into a war. That US had scurried out of Somalia in between Vietnam and Gulf War emboldened not just Saddam but Osama too.

Robert McNamara, LBJ, Nixon are the three most culpable individuals in what turned out to be America's shame ranked probably only next to the original sin of slavery. That they were not indicted as war criminals is not indicative of any exclusive power of America but symptomatic of how weak the world bodies are in prosecuting any such person. If those deserved to be prosecuted they should very well be along with so many others.

While most of the above is common knowledge what is less known is how America got dragged into this body quagmire. Eminent historian and two time Pulitzer winner Barbara Tuchman, author of bestseller 'Guns of August', traces how America slid into this mess that was not of its making in 'The March of Folly". During the days of World War II the Allies had an uneasy relationship which on some counts was even blatantly hypocritical. Churchill was calling for the defense of liberty while he jailed Gandhi and declared that he had not become "his majesty's first minister to preside over the liquidation of the British empire". De Gaulle while mourning the loss of France and yearning to be its leader again was clear that France will remain a colonial power. Stalin, as historian Robert Conquest labeled him, was the 'breaker of nations'. The least guilty in this was US led by FDR. FDR would plead with all three, Churchill, Stalin and De Gaulle to be fair to nations in their post war plans.

What is now known as Vietnam used to be Indo-China. It was the playground of the French, the Japanese and Chinese. The French ruled Vietnam with an iron fist and in true colonial fashion. Try watching the movie "Battle of Algiers" to get a sample. With Ho-Chi-Minh in saddle North Vietnam slid into the deadly embrace of communism. In a conflict that drew a wide array of nations and competing agendas Vietnam became America's "Bloodland", to adopt the phrase of a historian. America went headlong into Vietnam when the French sowed chaos and sought to exit out. With the passage of time what remains in most  people memory is only the carnage that US left behind and that is married to notions of a superpower trying to bludgeon a country of bicycle riders under the pretext of saving them from Communist stranglehold.

If one traces the role of countries in Vietnam its mindblogging to separate friend from foe. In what is characteristic of wars at various junctures both US and China had allied with the murderous regime of Khmer Rouge in the background of the Vietnam war.

With such stories to be told Hollywood was not far away. The anti-war movie "Hearts and Minds" was highly critical of US policy in Vietnam. A scene featured a Vietnam veteran,  George Coker, saying "If it wasn't for the people, it was very pretty. The people there are very backwards and primitive and they make mess out of everything". The movie in Hollywood style omitted to mention who Coker was. Wikipedia notes aptly that this was a propaganda movie. Not surprisingly it garnered an Academy Award. What the movie omitted was George Coker has been prisoner of war in the notorious "Hanoi Hilton". Coker had suffered inhuman torture that would make water boarding and Guantanamo look like five star facilities. Wikipedia details:

"While in a facility on the outskirts of Hanoi known as "The Zoo", he was forced to endure a torture called "the wall", in which he, as well as other prisoners, was forced to stand facing a wall in his cell with his hands above his head from the time a gong sounded at 5:30 in the morning until it sounded again at 10:00 at night. After two weeks, the knee injury he suffered when he ejected had worsened, and he was taken to a hospital where the infection was drained. After a two day respite while he recuperated, "the wall" torture continued for two more months. Coker called this "probably my worst experience in Vietnam".^[1

Another Prisoner of War who was famously incapacitated due to torture in Vietnam is Arizona Senator and former GOP Presidential candidate John McCain. While critics of US foreign policy breathlessly recount tales of My Lai and napalming of villages the narrative becomes too stilted and blatant propaganda when it completely ignores the brutal realities of tortures by Vietnamese.

In what can be the very epitome of irony today US and Vietnam are close allies. John McCain and Hillary Clinton have visited Vietnam. Vietnam is a major outsourcing hub for software. Ultimately it was the market that triumphed. The victorious North Vietnam gobbled the south and the united country plunged into socialist abyss until recent times. The US failed to save South Vietnam unlike South Korea. South Korea under American tutelage (or hegemony as the critics remind us) became an economic power house. TOday South Koreans, thanks to American soldiers still dying in the DMZ ( I met a veteran wounded recently in South Korea), enjoy a free society that they can organize marches decrying US hegemony. The icing on the Vietnam-US detente is Vietnam requesting US help to stave of Chinese threat in the seas, New York Times, reports, quoting Nguyen Manh Hung, director of the Indochina Institute at George Mason University in Virginia, "Vietnam worries about Chinese in the South China Sea and America worries about interference in freedom of navigation,” Mr. Hung said. “Because of this, the strategic interests of Vietnam and the United States converge.”


The more and more I read on US foreign policy the angrier I get at the shibboleth of citing US foreign policy as reason for 9/11. That girl running naked with burning skin from a Napalm attack had more reason to be angry at US than the polygamist turned fundamentalist Osama Bin Laden and his thugs ever had. China, Japan, all of Western Europe, Philippines, India, Simgapore, Vietnam, South Korea are all beneficiaries of US economic policies and many owe their prosperity to US. It was US leadership, or hegemony, that saved Western Europe from Stalin. Communism laid waste continents and impoverished millions and it was US to the rescue almost always. What prompted Bin Laden was not any articulation of high liberal principles but sheer religious fundamentalism that was unique in that region. After the July 2004 London subway bombings Granta magazine ran an issue titled "the rise of British Jihad". That and about the apologists for terrorism in my next blog.

Road to 9/11: Harold Pinter's Anti-Americanism

On September 11th 2001 while America mourned several parts of the world mourned and in the same breath muttered "you had it coming". Sujatha wrote that the days USA's "gun boat diplomacy" are over and like a good father sent his son to USA to live and become, I guess, an American citizen. Aijaz Ahmed, living in USA, writing for Frontline divined that the 19 hijackers were thinking of the so many past injustices of USA.

When people complain of US foreign policy I hear the usual litany starting with Vietnam meandering through the past as far their erudition goes, perhaps the coup Teddy Roosevelt engineered to build the Panama Canal, to every present day conflict weaving an ugly tapestry of a hegemony run amuck. Yes, as in Vietnam, there are very justifiable blemishes on US foreign policy. No country in history with the economic and military size of USA could have an unsullied record. But to place America in the company of Nazi Germany or malign the US army like they were murderous blood lusty terrorists alone only betrays the pathological hatred of such opinion holders.

In spring of 2002, while the fires were barely put out and WTC was just mangled steel with 2500+ bodies still buried, Granta magazine asked eminent intellectuals across the globe to share their thoughts for an issue titled "What We Think of America". Orhan Pamuk, Ramachandra Guha, Amit Chaudhuri and many more including Harold Pinter.

Orhan Pamuk and Harold Pinter, both Nobel Laureates, perfectly bookend the range of emotions most feel about America. Pamuk, coming from Turkey, has a gentle portrait of USA told through a story of his childhood involving an American boy. Pinter's essay was an address he delivered On Sep 10th 2001, a day before 9/11. Pinter said the address is still relevant. Pinter eviscerates USA for the NATO bombing of Serbian forces of Milosevic. Pinter called the USA a 'rogue state', 'a fully fledged, award-winning gold plated monster...it knows only one language-bombs and death". Doris Lessing, another Nobel Laureate, wrote a meandering piece, "America, it seems to me,has as little resistance to an idea or a mass emption as isolated communities have to measles and whooping cough".

Harold Pinter scolded the USA for the NATO bombings in Bosnia and went on to organize funds for Slobodan Milosevic, need I add a word after that. Doris Lessing was a communist, a typical worshipper from afar who never lived under communism.

It is this 'gold plated monster' that sent thousands to the beaches of Normandy. Flagging off the D-Day landings Eisenhower said "half of them will not come back alive". America, Lessing says, allows ideas and emotions to wash over with little resistance like a populace stricken by measles. Sure, is that why America put its money and men defending Western Europe and her own beloved England. Referring to FDR's 'lend lease program' to England, Presidential historian Robert Dallek, chuckled, "what lend lease, there was no collateral to be lent against. FDR basically hoodwinked the people and supplied Churchill". Lessing jeers that Americans have short memories. She with a long memory forgot that US had to be dragged into both World Wars. It is a matter of conjecture that had US entered, what was seen as European conflict, earlier in WW-II much loss of life could have been stopped.

Torn between two wars, a terrorist attack that reshaped the psyche of a country and an economic recession, it was only USA that rushed its C-14 helicopters across the globe to save the thousands battling for life in Tsunami stricken Banda Aceh in Thailand. Note, there was no oil or any strategic advantage in Banda Aceh.

George W. Bush hiked the aid given to Africa to combat AIDS. A 2006 Washington Post article says he tripled the aid. Bill Clinton, through his 'Clinton Global Initiative', has negotiated with drug companies to supply AIDS drugs at a fraction of their prices. Why should American companies sacrifice their hard earned profits?

"Black Hawk Down" is a famous blockbuster that portrayed the infamous incident in Somalia. UN aid to famine stricken impoverished Somalis was being hijacked by war lords. US decided to take out one notorious war lord and the ensuing scuffle was absolute humiliation. The black hawk helicopter was shot down, the soldiers were killed and their bodies were dragged in the streets. This is the incident that is said to have crystallized Osama's vision that America could be hit. 1993 America was a different place. Cold War was won. NASDAQ and DOW soared, American economy was overheated. Clinton was battling for re-election. America was in no mood for war in a war ravaged Africa which had nothing to offer. Today millions of children face near certain death in Somalia due to continued famine.

When Russia imploded after the failed coup by the hardliners again it was America that rushed in to prevent USSR from self-incinerating. Yet again during a recession precious money was funneled to USSR to secure the nuclear war heads. David Hoffman, Pulitzer winner for his portrayal of Cold War arms legacy in 'Dead Hand', writes scathingly 'not one of USSR nuclear facilities met Western standards".

The Marshall Plan, Reagan's "Mr Gorbachev bring this wall down", Nunn_lugar aid for USSR, saving South Korea, rebuilding Japan, rebuilding Western Europe, saving millions in Bosnia and much more was all America.

Indira Gandhi came running to LBJ for wheat to feed India. USSR too, depended on US for food. Yes, the dictatorship of the proletariat could not feed itself. Well after the bloody collectivization drives in Ukraine and killing millions of Kulaks it was the Yankees to the rescue. By the way but for US Zhou-En-Lai would have marched to Delhi and given a Bhai-Bhai lesson to Nehru.

Ask anybody today, including most Americans, who started the Vietnam war. The answer would be America. Truth, of course is different. America was dragged into it by France and brought itself great shame by its conduct. However here too a wrinkle is often ignored. We only hear how USA napalmed villages. We never hear how American GI's were brutally tortured by Viet-Cong, torture that makes Abhu-Ghraib, however shameful, look like picnic. Google the words "Hanoi Hilton". I'll blog on this separately.

Every international institution owes its independence (however arguably) and robustness to American taxpayer money. USA pays more than 60% of UN's bills. No other country comes close. IMF and World Bank, both born out of US leadership, have saved millions across the world, unarguably unless  you are a bleeding heart liberal and a closet communist.

Hearing criticisms of inciting a coup in order to build Panama Canal Teddy Roosevelt reminded his critics that the coup he  incited were only 51st in a steady stream of coups. The canal helped world trade for 100+ years and was recently turned over to Panama. For over 200 years it was dream and TR, in what would be the 'American Century', turned it to reality. Of course one could argue over the morals of the coup. What would miss the point is that coups were par for the course and TR's coup, not entirely engineered by him but only aiding what was already underway, helped world trade and millions.

The Granta issue highlighted a critical dichotomy. Those from erstwhile communist countries were more sympathetic to USA than those from well heeled western democracies. Only a pathological hater like Pinter could call NATO bombings as evil and fund raise for Milosevic. He and others like him are beyond the pale of reason.

An American GI was distributing sweets to children in a street side in Iraq. They were ambushed in a terrorist attack. When Time magazine interviewed an insurgent and referred to the incident asking "what about the many children", the insurgent replied "Allah will understand, we had to get that one soldier". To equate both is not just fallacious reasoning but a very facetious reasoning.

So was really US foreign policy the angering element in fashioning the ghastly attacks? Osama had zero interest in anything as remote as articulating an alternate world vision or in standing up for some high liberty. He launched a religious attack, pure and simple. One can keep papering over it but thats what it is. One crude question to puncture the logic would be this:"If US foreign policy begets terrorism then how come it was not the Vietnamese or Filippino's or Grenadans or Haitians or heck even Panamanians or Cubans, why was it only the Saudis?". A peek into Osama's persona and his evolution into a jihadist is for another day.

Road to 9/11: Hamburg and the Patriot Act

As I wrote earlier 9-11 was just a murderous attack by fundamentalists and their supposed causes were nothing but fig leaves to disguise a murderous ideology. Not many realize that the attacks themselves were made possible by the freedom's enjoyed by the murderers in USA.

Terrorists used the freedoms of US and other western countries to hurt us. To be blunt, a 9/11 kind of attack was possible only in USA, a July 2004 attack was possible in UK. Neither of these would have been possible in xenophobic, illiberal regimes across the middle east from which the attackers mushroomed. Only in USA protected by freedoms given to all who are in its soil could the thugs execute such a dastardly act.

The 9/11 plotters were drawn from a group that is now referred as the "Hamburg Cell". Why did they choose Hamburg? Lawrence Wright, in his Pulitzer awarded and well researched book "The Looming Tower", provides a stunning insight. Germany in it is desire to redeem itself for the Nazi era excesses of curbing freedoms lurched to the other extreme. Hamburg, Wright says, became a sanctuary city, "Acknowledged terrorist grouse were allowed to operate legally, raising money and recruits-but only if they were foreign terrorists, not domestic. It was not even against the law to plan a terrorist operation so long as the attack took place outside the country".

A phrase that became famous in the aftermath of a colossal failure of US intelligence community was the "failure to connect the dots". To use a word that is common place today, there was too much "chatter" after the U.S.S.Cole attack. Today on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 NYC and DC are on heightened alert due to "chatter". Americans were infuriated to learn that CIA and FBI had so many clues. A very famous memo was the one given to Bush in August outlining exactly Osama Bin Laden's resolve to strike USA. Little mention is made of the fact that US laws prohibited sharing of information across agencies and even within agencies.

Wright says that FBI took Rule 6E - of the Federal Rules of Criminal procedure- as absolute. Rule 6E prohibits revealing any information arising from a grand jury testimony. Added to that was a new Justice Department policy in 1995, Clinton era, "that regulated exchange of information between agents and criminal prosecutors, but not among agents themselves". Wright says that FBI took it as holy writ to mean no exchange of information. The CIA too in turn had its own self imposed barriers on sharing information with FBI agents.

When I came to USA in 1998 all that I needed to get a driver license in USA was my social security number and proof of residence. I got a drivers license that was in no way different from a US citizen though I was on H1B. The drivers license renewal date was beyond my H1B visa date. In fact my immigration status was not even inquired about. In US other than for international travel nobody uses a passport for anything. Waving a drivers license for a curb side check in was routine. A driver license, as government issued ID was on par to a passport giving access to many things. Airlines would not share information on passengers to FBI that easily. The drivers licenses were not even tamper proof. my NJ license just had a photo stuck on a card and laminated. Post 9-11 all that changed. Patriot Act and its concomitant sentiments changed it all.

The cost of 9-11 operation to Bin Laden is estimated at $500,000. Half a million dollars!!! That's it. How as money funneled to the conspirators? Some through Hawala some through very legitimate means. Banks would not ask about immigration status for opening accounts, invasion of rights!! It was easy to open accounts with little and sometimes no information. Patriot Act put a stop to that. I work for a major retail bank in US and I've seen the transitions. Again not many know that as a country that welcomes immigrants by the thousands these supposedly lax procedures have made life easy during the initial struggling days for immigrants. Also those, now extinct, freedoms to open an account easily was good for many illegal immigrants from Mexico who come to US, though illegally, only to make an honest living and for the sake of their families.

When the Radia tapes were released most Indians were interested only in the gossip. Nobody, at least not most, batted an eyelid that a government department was eavesdropping on telephones used by people who posed zero threat to the government and as yet no case was made against them. Its impossible to do that in USA. Even if its done such evidence will be thrown out of the court. Obama, as candidate and as President, has repeatedly renewed the FISA act that governs wiretaps.

Americans, especially pre-9/11, are a very open and trusting people. States like NY, NJ, VA, CA and FL, with heavy immigration, are very accepting and hospitable to immigrants. When would-be hijackers told flight instructors that they did not need to learn how to land nobody's radar went up. As recently as 2009 political correctness prevented timely action in preventing a massacre. The Fort Hood Texas shooting suspect (he is no suspect actually, it is him) Nidal Malik was an American born Muslim who served as psychiatrist. Post 9-11 there were many warning bells about him. Political correctness trumped any attempt to dismiss or take any action. The result was a ghastly day that left 13 innocent men dead. This from a guy who was treated honorably as a citizen without any discrimination.

Lawrence Wright who interviewed hundreds to write his book and is very well aware of how rotten the real world nevertheless is uncomfortable in how US is balancing liberty and security. In his column he wonders, "is this the country we want to be". While I understand his concerns I am perplexed at what kind of policy prescriptions are available to combat this hydra headed monster.

America cherishes freedom of  opinion like anything. One could say the most despicable stuff and still strut about safely protected by the First Amendment. Pre-9-11 another issue tested the limits of free speech. Instances of hate crimes against homosexuals brought attention to what came to be labeled as 'hate speech'. US courts have ruled that hate speech is not free speech. However the bar is set pretty high. This problem reached its acuity in the July 2004 bombings in London. Mosques in an around London indulged in unbridled hate speech calling for Jihad against England by its own citizens who have enjoyed liberties not given to anybody in lands from which they came from.

Barack Obama, who sailed to the US Presidency on the power of rhetoric, recognizes what a potent weapon speech is. Nidal Malik was radicalized by listening to YouTube videos of Anwar Al Awlaki. Obama has issued an unprecedented kill order against Awlaki, a US citizen residing in Somalia. Ever since the botched CIA attempts on Fidel Castro, overt and not-so-overt, Congress has passed laws prohibiting the US President from issuing such orders. The Obama administration made out a case that Awlaki, by virtue of his preachings, is an imminent threat to US national security. Again, an act made possible, only in the backdrop of the Patriot Act.

Yes its easy to quote Ben Franklin who said "people who sacrifice a little liberty to secure a little security deserve neither". Ben Franklin would not have imagined the savagery of Al Qaeda. Ben Franklin or Jefferson could not imagine, with all their erudition, the vicious rationalizations of Qaeda. Who can understand  the murderous sophistry behind 'takfeer', declaring ones own coreligionists with whom one disagrees, as "un-Islamic" and hence OK enough to be killed?

America is a very dynamic and resilient country. We shall find our balance in due course. A recent PEW global survey reports that most American Muslims feel good about being in USA post-9/11 despite the harsh light that shone on the community as a whole.

American foreign policy is blamed for 9-11 by its apologists. Anybody who starts of condemning the attacks and then adds "but" to tag on their own prejudices against America is an apologist for terrorism. Let us not forget that Bush came to office vowing to pursue a more humble and withdrawn role, especially, militarily. Al Pacino, the aging Godfather who yearns to get out of the mafia business would get drawn back in after an attack on him. Pacino would curse "just when I want to get out, they pull me back right in".

As for those who continue to beat USA with the Vietnam stick, the napalm bombings and of course Palestine etc, I can only say, "none of the 19 hijackers were from Vietnam or Palestine". USA today shares a very good relationship with Vietnam.

On this day, the 10th anniversary of 9-11, a word of tribute to US armed forces. From the beaches of Normandy to Tsunami stricken Banda Aceh to the sands of Libya its US Army that often stands as a force for good. In human history if any army had the record of US Army, its blemishes and My-Lai notwithstanding, they can be proud.

Road to 9/11: Fundamentalism Run Amuck

In the days after 9/11 it was fashionable to say "we condemn the atrocity but..." and then lecture down to America that America practically invited the attack. The reasons offered were projections of each persons own animosity towards America. Ranging from Sujatha Ranagarajan writing for a South Indian vernacular magazine to Noam Chomsky, considered the greatest genius in Cognitive psychology, the advices were variations of a meme: America's super power attitude, propping up dictatorial regimes, middle east policy, military adventurism etc. That the 19 suicide attackers left no note made it convenient for each person to trot out his or her own theory as to why they did it. Recently I finished reading Lawrence Wright's Pulitzer winning "The Looming Tower:Al Qaeda and The Road To 9/11". Around the same time Osama's killing happened and Washington Post published an article titled "Five Myths about Osama Bin Laden". The first myth was that Osama was trained by CIA.

A columnist for Frontline, a fortnightly from Chennai, helpfully wrote about the possible motivations of the hijackers, "Betrayal of the Palestinians, the destruction of Iraq! One can reasonably assume that these two great devastations of the Arabo-Muslim world were vivid in the memory of those 19 hijackers on September 11 this year". (Note the Iraq war the author refers here is the 1991 Gulf War that was fully supported by UN, Gulf States etc). Palestine. Iraq. Support of US to middle east potentates were all the most repeated reasons.

Lawrence Wright, based on extensive interviews and deep research, unravels the puzzle of who the actors and what were  their 'possible' motivations. As the 10th anniversary of 9/11 approaches I thought I shall write a few blogs on this topic and allied issues not just as a book review but as a history that not many are aware of and would lack the patience to accumulate by reading a 600 page book (its a page turner).

The suppression of free speech, the military state etc are offered as reasons that fueled terrorism since legitimate expression of dissent was prohibited. The support offered by US to such middle east oligarchies notably the Saudi Royal family is cited as cause. Bollocks.

Anger at suppression of democracy or democratic processes was the least of concerns for the hijackers or Al Qaeda. In fact Bin Laden, Zawahiri, Azzam all pay fealty to fundamentalist Wahhabi sect that was founded by US educated Sayyid Qutb. Sayyid Qutb quit USA only because he was disgusted that USA was un-Islamic. Most left wing people who espouse social justice, affirmative action etc decried what they called US hegemony and used 9/11 to pillory US. What is worse is that they did not realize that Al Qaeda'a intellectual godfather Sayyid Qutb,Wright notes, hated egalitarianism. Qutb used to quote the Koran, "we have created you class upon class".

Sayyid Qutb rebelled against Nasser, not for more democracy, but because he said Nasser's Egypt was not Islamic enough and required to be overthrown. Sayyid was arrested, tortured and finally hanged.

Anwar Sadat is supposed to have told Golda Meir, "if you make peace with me you will go back to Israel a hero. If I make peace with you when I go back to Egypt I will be assassinated". Sadat's wife had made it easier for women to get divorce. Sadat, after the Yom Kippur War, made historical peace with Israel. His prophecy came true tragically. Sadat was assassinated. How was his killing justified? How did they justify killing a fellow Muslim? Sayyid Qutb's ideology of 'takfir' helped. By declaring that a muslim has become un-islamic by his/her acts, a takfir, the respective person is removed from being protected as a fellow muslim. Wright acidly notes, "the pious Anwar Sadat was the first pro-medern victim of the reverse logic of takfir".

Democracy was repugnant to the followers of Qutb. "Democracy was un-islamic. Therefore anyone who voted was an apostate and forfeited his life". Naguib Mahfouz, Egyptian Nobel laureate, was declared an 'infidel' and suffered a near fatal knife attack.

Often the apologists for terrorism speak fondly of how youth get attracted to terrorism due to lack of education and opportunities in life. Wright quotes a study of political prisoners in 1970's Egypt, "majority were sons of middle-level government officials, educated in science and engineering,...,They were not the alienated, marginalized youth that a sociologist might expect. While tomes are written excoriating the CIA coup in Iran to install the Shah as examples of US hegemony and US support of totalitarian regimes little have we heard on how Islamists engineered a coup in Sudan to install a Islamic regime. It is Sudan that was home later to Bin Laden before he ventured to Afghanistan.

In the murky world of middle east the attempt on Mubarak was another watershed event. Egyptian police abused a thirteen year old boy and blackmailed him into infiltrating Zawahiri's organization that was suspected of a hand in the attempt on Mubarak. The boy and another friend were used by Egyptian agencies to kill Zaawahiri and his associates in Sudan during a meeting. Sudanese intelligence discovered the plot and the boys were abandoned by the Egyptians. Many members of Al Qaeda objected to putting the boys on trial. Zawahiri, to prove that the boys had attained manhood, stripped them and then shot them. The boys confession and shooting was videotaped. The outrage infuriated the Sudanese government which chased Zawahiri out.

Bin Laden's own journey was an odyssey that culminated in 9/11. Incidentally, Wright says, Bin Laden hated Yasser Arafat. In Bin Laden's opinion Arafat was a secular and not islamic enough.

The presence of American troops in Saudi after the 1991 Persian Gulf War is cited consistently by Bin Laden as something that offended him. It did not matter that American army was stationed in Suadi at the behest of the government which feared Saddam more. Bin Laden loathed the fact that the gulf states took US help to stop Saddam Hussein. Incidentally Bin Laden hated Saddam (Iraq was more westernized than any other gulf state). Bin Laden tried convincing the Saudi king that he would stop Saddam with his mujahideens from Afghanistan. By the way nowhere in the book Wright establishes any link between CIA and Bin Laden (a fact confirmed by Peter Bergen, the only US journalist who interviewed Bin Laden).

What not many lay readers know is that Americans troops stationed in Saudi, not anywhere near Mecca, is nothing compared to how French troops entered Mecca itself at the behest of Saudi king. In 1979, yet another Islamist group, took Mecca by siege during Haj period. It shook the Islamic world. Saudi King after vacillating and unable to clear the holiest shrine invited French troops who then entered Mecca where no non-Muslim could ever go. (Saudi Arabia denies this happened). For something that the US had nothing to do with Khomeini blamed US and for good measure blamed Israel too. Needless  to say Anti-American demonstrations including burning down of an embassy ensued. It was the Bin Laden family that provided vital clues to the French on the building details.

An event that crystallized Al Qaeda as a terrorist organization was, according to Wright, the botched bombing in Amen on Dec 29th 1992. The bombing was supposed to kill American soldiers going to Somalia as part of an international relief effort to that impoverished country. The bomb went off but killed no American. A Yemeni and and and Australian had died. Bin Laden's deputy and mentor, Abu Hajer, justified it based on a fatwa by Ibn Tamiyyah. In a chilling rationale that defied any sane logic killing of innocents was justified. Wright, ends the chapter with a ominous note, "Al Qaeda would concentrate not on fighting armies but on killing civilians".

The last chapter, titled, "Revelations" rounds it all of. On 9/12, the day after the carnage, Soufan a Muslim FBI agent went to interrogate Abu Jandal who was apprehended for the Nairobi Embassy bombing. Abu Jandal, Wright says, 'was confounded by Soufan and what he represented: A Muslim who could argue religion with him, who was in the FBI, who loved America'. Sofan asked about the innocent women and children who died in that bombing. In particular Soufan asks about a woman on a bus 'who was clutching her baby, trying to protect him from the flames. Both had been incinerated'. Jandals reply was "God will give them rewards in the Hereafter". About them being innocent he reasoned cruelly, that the bombings took place on a Friday when Muslims were supposed to have been in mosques. If she was not in a mosque what was she doing on a bus. She was not a Muslim then but a 'takfir' and deserved to die.

Time and again the recurrent theme in the biography of each actor is a fiendish fundamentalism that cloaked itself in causes that were never consistent or helpful to the people they were supposed to help. Palestine, American imperialism etc were all fig leaf causes only to hide their desire of establishing a Caliphate. Re-establishing an Ottoman style Caliphate was their desire. In a post cold-war world the only remaining obstacle was USA.

No wonder Lawrence Wright got a Pulitzer for a landmark book. Wright patiently pieces together the jigsaw puzzle and leads us through the twisted world of terrorism. I shall continue with a couple more blogs. The 9/11 hijackers chose to meet in Hamburg for a reason. After 9/11 US citizenry was aghast at how agencies did not share information. The reasons for that and more await a little.

America's and Obama's Moment of Glory

Its Diwali time in America. Its the one metaphor that can capture the mood of the country. America has slain a beast that had brought unfathomable destruction to lives and the American way of life. 9/11 has a very personal meaning for me. Our family, my wife in particular who worked in Wall Street, endured unspeakable horror and anxiety. That was a day, as an Indian, I felt comforted that I was in America. I was sure that my wife would reach home safely. Volumes have been written about that day, Giuliani becoming America's mayor, the steely resolve of New Yorkers, civilians committing suicide to foil the plans of barbarians and so much more. I shall not rehash those now.

My favorite columnist Lance Morrow wrote a vitriolic column in Time laying out the "The case for rage and retribution' . "A day cannot live in infamy without the nourishment of rage. Let's have rage. What is needed is a unified, unifying, Pearl Harbor sort of purple American fury, a ruthless indignation that doesn't leak away in a week or two" and Morrow asked Americans to "relearn why human nature has equipped us all with a weapon (abhorred in decent peacetime societies) called hatred". In prescient words he closes, "the worst times, as we see, separate the civilized of the world from the uncivilized. This is the moment of clarity. Let the civilized toughen up, and let the uncivilized take their chances in the game they started".

All these years many have mocked that America, with all its technical glitz and unparalleled power, could not bring to justice one individual. Not many realized that the America we see in movies is not the America in reality. This escapes even the well informed many times. Very coincidentally Time magazine's cover story for this week is Robert Mueller, chief of FBI. The story highlights that  prior to 9/11 FBI did not have agents devoted full time to gather intelligence. Today there are 580 in a new category devoted for intelligence. Now consider tracking a fugitive like bin-laden (in the domain of CIA) who does not use any modern amenities that can be tracked or hacked. Add to that the fact that he lives amidst his fellow tribesmen of undying loyalty. Now compound it with other bizarre facts like not having, almost nil, 'humints' (human intelligence agents), zero agents who even knew rudimentary Pashtun, the language of the fugitive. On 9/11 Bush realized the archaic nature of communications equipment aboard Air Force One. After the demise of communism America took a well deserved holiday and basked in the glory of being not just the super power but a hyper power where the second in line was so far behind that it did not matter. 

Americans are fast learners and learn from mistake so learn we did. America cultivated humints, prosecuted a just war, reshaped a country and then got distracted in an unwise war of choice. No wonder Osama was free for close  to 10 years. The details of his capture are now common place and any reader can find it himself/herself.

This is Barack Obama's moment of glory. While candidate Obama, like any politician, adopted lofty sentiments to shine himself up, President Obama has been a hard nosed realist. Much to the frustration of his voters time and again Obama has reiterated or continued many of Bush's policies that he once decried. What amazes me in the continuity in officialdom despite the fact that key positions are political appointments. When Bush took over he retained George Tenet, a Clinton appointee, as head of CIA. After 9/11 many thought Bush would fire George Tenet as a scapegoat. Bush did not. Obama retained Robert Mueller, a Bush appointee, as head of FBI. Obama literally angered his voters by retaining Robert Gates, another Bush nominee, as secretary of Defense. When Obama got elected but was still yet to assume power he started communicating with Robert Gates. Gates acknowledged that if he got calls from both Bush, his then current boss, and Obama, the president elect, he would give higher priority to Obama as  the incoming CEO. Today when Obama has won a richly deserved glory not one of his republican opponents demurred in praising him. Heck even Rush Limbaugh praised Obama.

While the groundwork for killing Osama began in Bush's tenure Obama deserves all credit for what is a very perilous mission. We are told that for 40 tense minutes anxiety, to put it mildly, hung in the air in the situation room at White House. Any misstep could have landed in a diplomatic hot water or could potentially have crippled Obama's re-election. Like Truman said, "the buck stops" at the President's table. Across the spectrum there was lavish praise for Obama. Krauthammer too. 

It was a week that started with political theater when Obama appeared almost a weakling stooping to disprove Trump's, a republican candidate to be, racist ridiculous charge that Obama was not born in USA thus constitutionally illegitimate. Then he went on a road trip to carry on his battle with republicans over deficit control. On Saturday, in the White House correspondent's dinner, he joked and laughed at Trump and at himself too. All this while he was contemplating an operation that could redefine his presidency. During the campaign when John McCain in a very stupid maneuver suspended campaigning Obama chided him saying 'a president should be able to multi task'. 

Hollywood has a despicable habit of caricaturing CIA as trigger happy thugs, bumbling idiots, insensitive boors, oil hungry organizers of coups and so on to everything except honorable, intelligent officers in the service of their country. Whether its dismantling A.Q.Khan's nuclear bazaar or capturing Al Qaeda operatives or this phenomenal feat CIA has time and again proved that its an organization that keeps America safe. 

Now there are those who rush to say, "we condemn Osama BUT..." and then launch into broadsides on American foreign policy plainly frustrate me. This is the real world there are no angels in the world. Starting with Noam Chomsky down to Tamil bloggers I've heard enough of this moral equivocation. Is American foreign policy completely benign? Of course not. Nor do I wish it to be. Has America made completely egregious condemnable crimes? Yes it has. There is My Lai. Then depending on how much one hates America one can have his or her pick from justifiable to the patently unfair listing of imagined crimes. Chile, the Shah of Iran, Grenada, Haiti, Philippines, VIETNAM then there is Iraq. 

Lets sample Noam Chomsky. Chomsky is considered the greatest genius on cognitive psychology and linguistics yet he is mostly known for his perpetual vitriolic and acerbic criticism of USA and Israel (he is a Jew). Every book store will have some screed of Chomsky's, invariably 100% the blurb on the jacket would declare "Chomsky, the man whom New York Times, calls 'arguably the greatest intellectual alive'". 

Chomsky draws a contrast between Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the US led war in his interview to Frontline, "This is quite different from the Soviet invasion. The Soviets were facing a major mercenary military force, backed by the United States and other powers. They also had additional constraints: they never bombed cities or destroyed them, and they never used what amount to weapons of mass destruction, like carpet bombs or daisy-cutters". A very specious distinction to put it mildly. Soviet Union destroyed civilians as policy unlike US. The civilian casualties in Soviet repression ranged from 1-2 million. If this is not intellectual dishonesty pray what else is?

Nothing angers me more than the tongue in cheek condemnations of 9/11 which are laced "yet did not US bring about the attacks due to its policy". The 19 hijackers came from well heeled families who were not even remotely touched US policies. If even one hijacker was a Palestinian or a Vietnamese or a Chilean or a Filippino or a Haitian I could remotely understand. Those 19 thugs had nothing but hatred fueled by religious fundamentalism.

Krauthammer in a searing column in Time eviscerates these foreign policy clingers, "Al-Qaeda always invents some excuse, some historical injury to justify its barbarism. Today Iraq, yesterday Palestine and, when all else fails, Andalusia, a bin Laden staple that refers to the Muslim loss of Spain to Ferdinand and Isabella (in 1492!). Various casus belli are served up as conditions change. Only the gullible and the appeasers buy them. Now we're told that the Iraq invasion has increased al-Qaeda recruiting". He adds damningly, "In fact, the 1990s was the decade of Muslim rescue: the U.S. intervened militarily, and decisively, to save three Muslim peoples--the Bosnians, the Kosovars and the Kuwaitis--from conquest and catastrophe. Yet it was precisely during that era of good feeling that al-Qaeda not only recruited for but also conceived, planned and set in motion the worst massacre of Americans in history. So much for the connection between American perfidy and anti-American terrorism." Only a conservative columnist can provide that crystal like clarity in brief passages. The entire column is a compelling read. 

"Oh was not Osama America's Frankenstein?". "American recruited fundamentalists to defeat communism unmindful of long term consequences". Both only carry a shade of truth but serves as convenient mental constructs to simplify a world thats labyrinthine. 

New York Times, in a manner that only the Times can do, published a nice section called "A survey of Books on Osama" has highlighted some good books on Osama that were reviwed in the Times. Choose especially Lawrence Wright's Pulitzer winning "The Looming Tower". Wright painstakingly lays out the winding roads that map out Osama's radicalization from Holywood watching anti-communist to jihadist anti-American. The crystallizing event for Osama is the stationing of US troops in Saudi after Gulf War-I. A war that US fought, mostly at the behest of Saudi and other Arab nations which were shivering to their boots lest Saddam run over them.

I am sick of hearing complaints about US unilateralism. Western Europe was resurrected after the ravages of war by unilateralism on the backs of American taxpayers. Hundreds of billions of dollars under the Marshall Plan stabilized western Europe. When a Libyan town faces genocide from its ruler only American cruise missiles and American tax payer money rush to its aid. Oil, Oil, Oil, Oil. Yes there is oil involved but did pontificating France put its money and weapons on the table. As a commentator observed US is NATO and NATO is US. Nicholas Kristof, resigned to pragmatic real world, wrote,"Critics argue that we are inconsistent, even hypocritical, in our military interventions. After all, we intervened promptly this time in a country with oil, while we have largely ignored Ivory Coast and Darfur — not to mention Yemen, Syria and Bahrain.We may as well plead guilty. We are inconsistent. There’s no doubt that we cherry-pick our humanitarian interventions.But just because we allowed Rwandans or Darfuris to be massacred, does it really follow that to be consistent we should allow Libyans to be massacred as well? Isn’t it better to inconsistently save some lives than to consistently save none?". Arguments anyone. Today in Iraq and Afghanistan women go to schools, vote in elections and even contest elections. In the entire Middle East today Iraq is the only country to hold a democratic election, even the ever waffling UN certified that the elections were fair and free. 

Vietnam is another albatross. Who went there first and instituted a regime of terror? Who terrorized Algeria? Which country treated North Africa as its foot stool? The lover's of liberty and egalitarianism the preening French. The conduct of France in African colonies would make American imperialism look like picnic. Vietnam is a blot on America. 

When Soviet Russia marched into Afghanistan Margaret Thatcher asked Indira Gandhi, as key member of NAM, to condemn it. Indira refused saying it was not aggression. This same India today rushes to condemn US. Non-Alignment. Bollocks.

When America gets attacked the custodians of human rights and flag bearers of anti-imperialism smugly lecture us about our evil ways. We never hear such lecturing when Russia is attacked as a direct consequence of its brutal suppression of Chechnya. I love to see Hindu N.Ram tie himself up in knots condemning US imperialism while being palanquin bearer for Russia's state sponsored terrorism. 

After 9/11 N.Ram worked himself up into a lather foaming at the mouth advising America to "go all out to bring its authors to stern justice - justice under the rule of law and through the law courts, by marshaling and laying out evidence to convince the world, through the collective agency of the United Nations, and through pro-active international diplomacy". The title of that editorial in the Frontline Issue dated Sep 29th 2001 is "Dangerous implications of America's unjust war". Remember it was referring to the Afghan War not the justifiably contentious war of choice that Iraq was. Not content with his pontificating he orchestrated a scolding of America by Noam Chomsky at Chennai. What could be better than having a white American, that too Jewish, to scold America.

On Jan 24th 2011 Chechen rebels attack Moscow airport and kill 35, here is N.Ram's editorial in HIndu dated 26th Jan 2011, "in recent years, the virus of terrorism has spread to other predominantly Muslim territories in Russia's south and mutated to patently jihadist insurgency, which has joined hands with al-Qaeda to create an ‘Islamic caliphate' across the Caucasus...Monday's atrocity should serve as a wake-up call for Russia to curb terrorism in the Northern Caucasus as it prepares to host the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics and the 2018 World Football Cup".

Russia should curb terrorism so that Winter Olympics could go on unimpeded. That when the casualty was 35. When America is attacked in the most stupendous manner killing 2600 any declaration of war is unjust we must supplicate the UN, marshal evidence, wait for a constable to serve summons to bin-laden. Today Barack Obama served the summons as bullets to bin-laden. A Fox news viewer aptly summed it, "I am happy to know that the last man Osama saw before dying was an American".

Incidentally NYT asked Chomsky as to whether he ever thought of renouncing his American citizenship given how much he hates America. Chomsky replied, airily with no hint of sounding hypocritical, "America is the greatest country on earth". 

As the news broke out around 10:30 PM EST crowds gathered in front of White House and Ground Zero in NYC. Today as I was speaking to my father the metaphor of Diwali struck me as appropriate

I found the picture above (From NYT) very interesting. Its a photo of the scene in the situation room at the White House. The President of USA is sitting on the side while some military person is sitting at the head of the table and conducting the operation. Malcolm Gladwell in his book "Outliers" talks about America has one of the lowest "power distance" equations where people are more comfortable approaching or challenging a superior. This is important when results matter.

This killing does not mean that the hydra headed terrorism is finished. Far from it. This is a pivotal turning point. A powerful symbolism but only a symbolism. It is elementary knowledge that Al Qaeda has many local variants across the globe and they are still very much alive or awaiting to come alive. Obama reiterated that. Every sensible columnist has cautioned on triumphalism. 

The picture below says it all. I pass through this place every week. 

A passerby at Ground Zero in NYC

Near White House.

Conversation with A Syrian Muslim

Two days back I had to head to work at Jersey City and as per company policy I hired an executive cab. It was a crisis day at work. I normally strike up a conversation with the drivers, it is often interesting. This driver I learned was a Syrian Muslim and was very chatty. When we the talk veered to elections and eventually Bush he became animated. He let loose a tirade on the Bush years. Talking of 9/11 he repeated well known calumnies, a plot by CIA and Israel, US etc. He then curiously cited Michael Moore's documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" as offering proof. Moore, a veterate Bush hater, did not do that at all in the documentary. Then the cab driver went into full praise mode of Yasser Arafat. He seemed to be well read for a cabbie. I asked him about Arafat refusing to compromise on Jersusalem during Camp David talks. That was non-negotiable for a muslim he said. Arafat should not have negotiated peace with Rabin (both got a Nobel for that). Saddam had given security to his people compared to today's chaos. I asked him about women voting in elections in Iraq, a first in the entire Islamic middle east. He claimed the US had no right to impose Western style democracy.

This guy had emigrated from Syria in the 80's. It was during that time that Assad, President of Syria, obliterated an entire town of Sunni's killing 30,000 and torturing hundreds more. The tortures would make medieval European menthods appear quaint. Assad was of the Allawi sect. Those killed were Sunni's. The Sunni's, a minority in Iraq, returned the favor to Shia majority, under Saddam, a Sunni. The cabbie, living in US for 22 years, was proud of his business, he loves Bill Clinton, more importantly the prosperous years. Note that in the 90's when money was rolling in executive cabs like he has made a windfall ferrying not just executives but even mid level employees and consultants who stayed late after 8 PM. Remember those were the heady Y2K days when tech consultants laughed their way to the bank clocking devilish hours every day. It was never to be the same again after 9/11.

It is more than ironical that while enjoys the fruits of Western liberal democracy he does not like it being "imposed" elsewhere. Let the people make the choice he said. Kurds made that choice and learnt a bitter lesson in Halabja. By the way nobody tires of mentioning that US armed Saddam. Guess who armed theSyrians. It was Soviet T-62 tanks and MiG fighters that flattened Hama in Syria.

Now, for a moment I thought "well he is a Syrian Muslim, not surprisingly he thought thus". But I remembered books by white Americans, actor Martin Sheen, Professor Ward Churchill, an ex-colleague have all shared various views of this cabbie. His being a Muslim and emigrant lends itself to ready stereo typing but he is not alone.

I am reading Thomas Friedman's masterful "From Beirut to Jerusalem" and it provided some good backdrop of Syria, especially the massacre of the city of Hama by Assad. Many in India lionise Arafat, few know that Arafat was chased by one government after another of his own Muslim countries who saw him as trouble maker. The most famous chasing being from Jordan when the king cracked down on PLO. In fact many Palestinians settled in Jordan viewed him as upsetting a delicate balance and despised his faction ridden corrupt organisation. So much to share, let it wait for another day.