Goodness Gracious Me and kiss my chuddies, but just as the world was getting used to the omnibus term 'British Asian' and all its newly-cool, over-curried cultural connotations, Brown Britain is calling time on it and asking to be labelled Hindu, Sikh or Muslim instead. Indians, who constitute more than half of the UK's 3.5 per cent 'British Asian' population, are leading the charge towards separate lives. Hindus are in the forefront, Sikhs just behind them and Pakistani and Bangladeshi Muslims are being forced into a default acceptance that they can no longer shelter under the convenient cover-all term 'Asian'.
These are the conclusions of a much-hyped new BBC programme 'Don't call me Asian' and its writer-presenter Sarfraz Manzoor told TOI , the three-year-old move towards separate labels may have huge implications for British government and society. "No longer can we say the interests of Sikhs and Hindus are the same as those of all British Asians. The government, will, at some point have to formulate more specific and targeted legislation, not just for all Asians but for specific strands within," he said.
Commentators agree that the overwhelmingly well-educated, prosperous and well-integrated Indian community's needs are deeply divergent from the comparatively provincial, poor, insular and failing Pakistani and Bangladeshi. Add to that a growing assertiveness by British Hindus and Sikhs and the term 'Asian' seems clearly inadequate. Says British-born-and-bred London college student Neeta: "Asian is not a term I use for myself at home or with my friends. I don't feel Asian, I feel British and Indian and Hindu."
Manzoor and many others believe, the move towards clear labelling may be positive. "Till now, Britain's Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims were defined by others by what they were not — not white, not black," says Manzoor. Now, they are choosing their own definitions. Arguably, it all started after the British Pakistani rioting that set north-west Britain ablaze in the long, hot summer of 2001. British Indians were alternately intimidated and indignant about being linked with the unprovoked mob violence by uneducated, unemployed Pakistani Muslim youths. Says Manzoor, who spent several months making the BBC programme: "Many of the young Hindu women I spoke to said they saw no reason to be lumped with the rioters."
Race relations experts say the quest for separate public identities escalated after 9/11, when British Hindus further sought to put a safe distance between themselves and Muslims. Earlier last year, the Indian High Commission here significantly began to speak in much the same language. Sections of the several-hundred thousand Sikh community, meanwhile, began a parallel attempt to be labelled 'Sikh' and not 'Indian'.
The ironic result, points out Manzoor, is that just as it has become increasingly cool to be British Asian with all the hip, world-beating music, food, fashion, films and television sitcoms, Asians themselves have moved away from racial to religious affiliation. Manzoor said his conversations with women activists of Britain's largest Hindu youth group and parallel chats with young Pakistani Muslim men underlined the extent of the divide. "The young Hindu women were incredibly well-spoken. The Muslims were really rough. They didn't really have anything in common at all." Except, of course, the colour brown. Till the UK's 2001 census, the demographics of Brown Britain were officially labelled 'Asian', with the add-on explanation that it was a reference to "the most widely accepted current use of the word.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/11/2005 20:22 Comments ||
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After the Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 A.D. the Christians insisted on differentiating themselves as separate from the general group of Jews. Its hard not to notice what changes that decision has wrought over the years since! ;-)
On December 31, 2004, terrorists belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a group on the U.S. State Department's Foreign Terror Organizations (FTO) list, ambushed Turkish security officers in the Sirnak province in southeastern Turkey, near the Iraqi border. Although the PKK declared a unilateral ceasefire after Turkey captured its leader Abdullah Ocalan in February 1999, in June 2004 the organization renounced its ceasefire. The PKK, which caused over 35,000 casualties between 1984 and 1999, has once again come to the foreground. Today, the organization has an estimated 1,850-1,950 terrorists in Turkey and another 5,500-5,800 in areas of northern Iraq controlled by two Iraqi Kurdish parties, the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). Since the U.S. military and the Iraqi government exercise nominal rule over these parts of Iraq, continued PKK activity in northern Iraq constitutes a threat to Turkish-Iraqi/Kurdish as well as Turkish-U.S. relations, and therefore bears the potential of undermining U.S. interests. The question is: will the PKK, which has been moving between violent and peaceful facades, be able to maintain its campaign against Turkey? And if so, what should be done against this organization in the global war on terror?
...
Why Should the United States Act against the PKK?
An increase in PKK-led violence in Turkey, creating political chaos that would stop the country's EU accession process, would be a serious threat to Turkey's stability. Besides, since the PKK's main bases are in northern Iraq, most Turks would blame the United States and the Iraqi Kurds for any PKK-led violence. (As was the case after the killing of five Turkish diplomatic security officers near Mosul on December 18, 2004, an incident which, though clearly a doing of the Iraqi insurgents, was initially blamed on the United States, the PKK, and the Iraqi Kurds in the Turkish media.) Washington's reluctance in taking action against the PKK has already created much distrust toward the United States among Turkish policymakers, especially the security elite (see PolicyWatch no. 839). Action against the PKK, such as capturing the organization's remaining captains (see PolicyWatch no. 877), would help the United States establish bridges with Turkey's military security elite, with whom relations have been hampered since the Iraq war. Such a step would also allow Washington to establish a more positive image within the Turkish public, among whom anti-Americanism has become a potent force since 2002. Action against the PKK would be a first and necessary step in rebuilding U.S.-Turkish relations in the post-Iraq war environment.
Soner Cagaptay is a senior fellow and director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute. Emrullah Uslu, a Turkish counterterrorism intelligence expert, is a visiting fellow at the Institute.
Looks like the Turks are figuring out that "War on Terror" is a mis-nomer, as has the IRA and the ETA. It sounds like the whole reason for the US to squash the PKK is to keep the Turks as friends even though they double cross us. The Turks have been drinking too much French Kool-Aid. We don't need friends like that.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/11/2005 10:22:29 AM ||
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most Turks would blame the United States and the Iraqi Kurds for any PKK-led violence.
Because the Turks control the world market in taffy and towels? Ok, not exactly Strategic Materials. At the risk of being called for piling on, let me add another Me Too! I don't think the world realizes how far the attitudes described in the VDH article have spread throughout the US.
Development is not a "soft" policy goal, but a core national security issue, says Colin Powell, as he draws the main lessons of his four years as U.S. secretary of state. However, contrary to what critics say, the best way to lift millions out of poverty is not to increase levels of foreign aid. Instead, the United States must engage in tough love and demand that corrupt, autocratic regimes change their ways.
As the first George W. Bush administration moved toward its conclusion, many people asked me to sum up the president's foreign-policy record of the last four years. Almost invariably, their questions focused on September 11 and the war on terrorism, developments in Iraq and Afghanistan, the state of trans-Atlantic relations, or the difficulties of the intelligence craft. Almost invariably, my answers have keyed on distinguishing between issues such as these that tend to dominate the headlines, and issues of equal or greater long-term strategic significance that rarely generate as much interest.
Among these latter issues, none is more important than economic development in the world's poorest societies. As the president wrote in the National Security Strategy in September 2002, "A world where some live in comfort and plenty, while half of the human race lives on less than $2 a day, is neither just nor stable." No issue has consumed more of the administration's concern and energy. And now that George W. Bush has a mandate for a second term, he intends to pursue his goals for economic development with the same determination that made possible the liberation of Iraq and Afghanistan. The president has said that he intends to spend the political capital he earned in winning the trust of the American people, and the world can be assured that much of that capital will be spent helping the poorest of its citizens.
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Posted by: tipper ||
01/11/2005 2:23:46 AM ||
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Go Colin. That's a fair statement, especially since it's not about pity or more aid. We've done a good job of managing wealth distribution in our own country, better than any one else has ever accomplished on such a large scale, but the world has become a much smaller place.
If Bush can use economic development to improve the standards of living among the poorest of poor - he could be vying for position with leaders such as Alexander. If Bush really arrives, Stone could write a screenplay about him, centering the entire movie on a homosexual-like event that Bush might have had during a Skull and Bones hazing.
#2
Among these latter issues, none is more important than economic development in the worldâs poorest societies.
If plans are afoot to allow U.S. companies to set up shop in these countries and employ the local labor force, the usual groups are going to do their damndest to either quash the effort or hobble it by making demands that companies adhere to unrealistic guidelines.
Whatever the administration has up their sleeve, there's going to be reflexive opposition, and the President and his team had better be ready to counter it.
http://intellibriefs.blogspot.com/2005/01/collapse-of-pakistan-geo-strategic.html
By N S Rajaram
Geo-strategic reality
The first point to note is that Pakistan will not crumble quietly. It is too steeped in hate and violence to disappear like the Soviet Empire. More likely, it will be like former Yugoslavia. Eventually the land beyond the Indus will return to being the frontier that it has always been, and the Punjabi-Mohajir colony calling itself Pakistan will be struggling for survival. Its enemy will not be India but the Talibanized network of 'schools' and its hate-filled 'students' trying to undermine and even destroy the Punjabi elite. To see what will be like, one has only to look at what happened to the Afghan elite after the Taliban took over. And in Punjab the hostilities are infinitely greater. They are rooted in the historic hostility of the frontier nomads towards the settled people of the plains. Appeal to Islam will not save them, for what the Punjabis are up against is the geo-strategic reality of the region. And this is what has shaped their history. And they have made the situation worse by creating and sponsoring the Taliban.
Here is the historic pattern previously alluded to. Whenever there was a weak state in the Punjab region, it has fallen before invaders from the northwest. This was the case when it was invaded by Darius, Muhammad of Ghazni, Timur, Babar and Nadir Shah. On the other hand, whenever the Punjab was part of a powerful state, it has turned back the invader. This is what happened when the Greeks, the Huns and Afghans in the time of Ranjit Singh tried to invade the planes. (Incidentally, history books are wrong in claiming that Alexander was victorious. It was as much a disaster as Napoleon's march on Moscow. This is clear from early accounts. But British controlled textbooks presented it otherwise, to emphasize European superiority. The correct perspective was provided by the great Russian general Marshal Zukhov. Alexander's troops mutinied, and he himself died a year later broken in health and spirit.)
To save Punjab
Saving Punjab is as much India's responsibility as it is Pakistan's. India cannot let these invading forces cross the Indus and turn West Punjab into a wasteland. The only way for Punjab to survive is to let the frontier be frontier and rejoin India— its natural home. But is the Punjabi ruling elite capable of such vision? As one Pakistani (Punjabi) journalist told Kaplan, "We have never defined ourselves in our own right — only in relation to India. That is our tragedy." This attitude represents a historic truth: Punjab is India or it is happy hunting ground for the frontier tribes. If the Punjabis do not cure themselves of their hatred, it may soon lead to an even greater tragedy— of Afghanistan consuming Pakistan itself. Punjabis should see for themselves that Pakistan is a fantasy that died the day Bangladesh broke away. They should also recognize that the Punjabis never asked for Pakistan; the people who planted that poison seed remained in India. And the same people — of the Deoband School of Lucknow — planted also the poison seed that grew to be Taliban.
The choice for the Punjabis of Pakistan is clear. Forces of history and geography are against them. They can return to their natural home in India as the proud citizens of a great power or continue their sordid existence as a client state that can be hired by a patron whenever a dirty job needs to be done. But even this is precarious and short-lived existence. For all its bombast, Pakistan — its Punjabi core at least — is today little more than a buffer state between India and the violent frontier. Once they become part of India, they will have a great power to defend them against the hordes. One hopes they recognize the inexorability of the logic: it is India or oblivion, there is no middle ground.
For India the option is clear. Pakistan as it exists today is facing a meltdown. Changes of government and leaders will not turn back the elemental forces now in play. And negotiations and treaties with a melting state are meaningless. As India becomes a great power, the Pakistani Punjab and the land east of the Indus River will inexorably be drawn into India. And the Indus River will again be its natural boundary. There will be many challenges, but the goal is clear: to minimize the damage and destruction during this historic reunion, which I now feel is inevitable. In summary, India can no longer afford the luxury of being a soft state, continuing to avoid hard decisions and actions. A soft state at this critical juncture in history may also face a meltdown like Pakistan
There is a new strange mood of acceptance among Americans about the world beyond our shores. Of course, we are not becoming naïve isolationists of 1930s vintage, who believe that we are safe by ourselves inside fortress America — not after September 11. Nor do citizens deny that America has military and moral obligations to stay engaged abroad — at least for a while yet. Certainly the United States is not mired in a Vietnam-era depression and stagflation and thus ready to wallow in Carteresque malaise. Indeed, if anything Americans remain muscular and are more defiant than ever.
Imagine a world in which there was no United States during the last 15 years. Iraq, Iran, and Libya would now have nukes. Afghanistan would remain a seventh-century Islamic terrorist haven sending out the minions of Zarqawi and Bin Laden worldwide. The lieutenants of Noriega, Milosevic, Mullah Omar, Saddam, and Moammar Khaddafi would no doubt be adjudicating human rights at the United Nations. The Ortega Brothers and Fidel Castro, not democracy, would be the exemplars of Latin America. Bosnia and Kosovo would be national graveyards like Pol Pot's Cambodia. Add in Kurdistan as well — the periodic laboratory for Saddam's latest varieties of gas. Saddam himself, of course, would have statues throughout the Gulf attesting to his control of half the world's oil reservoirs. Europeans would be in two-day mourning that their arms sales to Arab monstrocracies ensured a second holocaust. North Korea would be shooting missiles over Tokyo from its new bases around Seoul and Pusan. For their own survival, Germany, Taiwan, and Japan would all now be nuclear. Americans know all that — and yet they grasp that their own vigilance and military sacrifices have earned them spite rather than gratitude. And they are ever so slowly learning not much to care anymore.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/11/2005 11:36:17 AM ||
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The democrats have become the de facto party of isolationism. A great irony, in that they consider themselves internationalist; it is because they have no grasp of foreign, economic or military policy in international affairs. A good example of this are those chosen as cabinet officers in these areas. The "empty suit", William Christopher; Madeline Albright, whose foreign policy was to send small contingents of unsupported soldiers to every country on the planet; draft-dodging Harold Brown as SecDef, etc.
These are not wise choices--even leftist academicians could be expected to perform better. Instead, they show an indifference, perhaps the idea that "they do it better", or "they have their own way, and we shouldn't interfere". It is as if the democrats try to obey the Star Fleet Prime Directive with other nations, but not so as to not influence the development of their culture, but on the assumption that their culture is somehow better than ours.
#3
Americans...grasp that their own vigilance and military sacrifices have earned them spite rather than gratitude. And they are ever so slowly learning not much to care anymore.
VDH is just the best. Every time I read what he has written it gives me some new angle to think about. Still, I don't think it's that Americans don't care that the rest of the world is spiteful and ungrateful--rather, Americans have had it with being used like the host for a league of life-destroying parasites and, in increasing numbers, are openly contemptuous of helping those who work to harm us.
Posted by: Dr. Jules ||
01/11/2005 14:29 Comments ||
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Ask, and ye shall receive, DB:
All this hypocrisy has desensitized Americans, left and right, liberal and conservative. We will finish the job in Iraq, nursemaid democratic Afghanistan through its birthpangs, and continue to ensure that bandits and criminal states stay off the world's streets. But what is new is that the disenchanted American is becoming savvy and developing a long memory â and so we all fear the day is coming when he casts aside the badge, rides the buckboard out of town, and leaves such sanctimonious folk to themselves.
Odds are, George W. Bush will soon appoint a new Chief Justice. More Supreme Court appointments will follow, along with hundreds of lower-court judges. The federal judiciary will soon be Bush Country, a fact that could have larger long-term effects than Social Security reform and the war in Iraq. Unless something changes, the effects will be bad. Not because Bush's judges and Justices will be too conservative, but because they won't be conservative enough. Most conservative judges today believe in a theory that leads to very un-conservative results -- law that amounts to little more than judges' opinions, concentrated power in the hands of an allegedly all-knowing Supreme Court, and legal rules that reinforce the power of liberal interest groups like teachers' unions. The right has the wrong legal theory.
The theory boils down to three "isms": federalism, originalism, and formalism. The unifying theme behind this trinity is that all are things Earl Warren wasn't. Warren believed in broad Congressional power to regulate the economy and protect civil rights. Modern-day federalists believe in states' rights. Warren believed in a living Constitution that changes with the times. Originalists think the Constitution means exactly what James Madison thought it meant when he wrote it. Warren cared about the consequences of his decisions. Formalist judges follow legal forms and procedures and believe that worrying about consequences is a job for politicians. All these theories are supposed to limit judges' power, so they can't "make law from the bench," as the President likes to say. But the holy trinity of conservative legal thought does not cabin judges' power so much as hide it. Judging, Scalia-style, is a little like a card trick: the audience's attention is drawn to one hand while the other does all the work.
Take the three isms one at a time. The basic idea behind federalism is to avoid concentrated power -- to give more authority to Austin and Boston, and less to inside-the-Beltway power brokers. Actually, judicially enforced federalism does the opposite. In a world with strong constitutional lines between the federal government and the states, the greatest power is held by whoever draws those lines. That power goes to nine unelected Supreme Court Justices, answerable to no one. So much for limiting the influence of Washington power brokers. If state and local governments desperately needed the Court's protection, that might be an acceptable price to pay. But they don't. Over the last half-century, state and local governments have grown faster than the federal government. Remove Social Security, and the growth gap widens. States and localities are doing fine, without the help of the Justices. The pull and tug of politics protects state prerogatives a good deal better than Sandra O'Connor or Anthony Kennedy could.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: tipper ||
01/11/2005 10:14:56 AM ||
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January 11, 2005: Can the anti-government forces in Iraq win? Some pundits think so. But do you really think the Shia and Kurds will allow Saddam's thugs to bully their way back into power? The Kurds and Shia Arabs have 80 percent of the population, control of the oil, and American troops to back up their efforts. Iraqis indicate, to anyone who will listen, that they have no intention of folding under Baath pressure, and a growing desire to come down hard on the Sunnis who support the violence. The Kurds and Shia have names, because Saddam's thugs didn't wear masks when they ran things for three decades. Guess who is going to lose? But that thought is what is driving the resistance. The Baath Party thugs know what they will have to face eventually, if they don't regain control of Iraq.
The Baath and al Qaeda campaign against the police and government officials results in spectacular and newsworthy attacks each day. But there are still 7,000 new police and National Guard undergoing training, and another 25,000 waiting to start their training. The attacks are concentrated in two provinces; Anbar (where Fallujah is) and Nineveh (where Mosul is). Because the attacks are killing mostly Iraqis, the attackers are not very popular, even among Sunni Arabs. The police are getting more tips about anti-government activity. This includes information about where roadside bombs are planted, or where gunmen are hiding out. Although the Arab media makes a big deal about how impossible it will be to run the elections, the Iraqi people don't think so. To the average Iraqi, the elections mean the difference between a free and prosperous future, or more Baath Party tyranny. Candidates for the new parliament have the most to lose, especially in Sunni areas. Baath and al Qaeda have threatened these candidates with death, and in Sunni Arab areas, there are plenty of Baath Party gunmen to carry out the threats.
The war in Iraq is a routine of patrols, raids and intelligence collecting for American and Iraqi forces. The Baath Party and al Qaeda fighters scout targets, recruit new fighters (using money, threats or the promise of rewards if Baath gets back in power) and carry out attacks. There are dozens of little battles each day that you never hear about, but this is where the war is being fought, and decided. When the histories of the Iraq campaign are written, it's these raids, patrols and intelligence collecting efforts that will be recognized as the "battles" that decided the outcome.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/11/2005 9:24:27 AM ||
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In a macro sense, the war is already over. The majority of the Iraqi people want to and are willing to vote. In order to reverse this, these baathist remnants would actually need to take over the government - with Syrian and Iranian help. And once these elections are over, that would mean that Syria and Iran would have to go to war with "Iraq".
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I wish the positive results of these small battles would be posted. All we here about is the Iraqi NG and civilian casualties along with US and coalition dead and wounded. I guesstimate we have over 10,000 hard boyz locked up. That's all fine but this is a war of attrition. We need to kill the enemy since "reconciliation" is not an option. How many have we killed? Any ideas? The number I've come up with is 8,800.
#3
I wish the positive results of these small battles would be posted. All we here about is the Iraqi NG and civilian casualties along with US and coalition dead and wounded. I guesstimate we have over 10,000 hard boyz locked up. That's all fine but this is a war of attrition. We need to kill the enemy since "reconciliation" is not an option. How many have we killed? Any ideas? The number I've come up with is 8,800.
#6
Good upbeat post. The MSM and even Fox dwell on the terror and not the good things going on. It is as George Bush the elder said: "No one cares to read about crime that is prevented (although I'm not so certain)." The media dwells on what is sensational and is a "news alert." Three weeks after the tsunami, we hear less and less about it. Elections will occur in Iraq and these elections will reshape the mideast. That is the story. The stakes are high. Freedom is very powerful. It is difficult for a country that has been under the boot of Saddam for 30 years to move towards independence. The former Baathists sense they are losing power. The jihadists sense they are losing their opportunity for a Taliban like terrorist regime.
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2b I guess we'll have to disagree ... at centcom.mil I read articles about weapons caches recovered , terrorists detained and I see pictures of troops doing great things ... sure there is some bad news mixed in ... that is the nature of war.
#8
legolas - well not really - because you are right when it comes to centcom.mil. I was just touching on a pet peeve of mine, that the e-mail updates only focus on death and deployment. Whey not an occassional story about a hero or school built or a job well done. You know the reporters subscribe to it too.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
