Thursday, November 22, 2007

Outstanding Contribution on Climate Change

We, the Hansen Fellows, appreciate and congratulate the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Mr. Al Gore for their contribution significantly to elevating public attention on the issue of global warming while outlining the enormous risks but also the enormous opportunities confronting the world.



Over a decade ago, most countries joined an international treaty -- the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) -- to begin to consider what can be done to reduce global warming and to cope with whatever temperature increases are inevitable. Recently, a number of nations have approved an addition to the treaty: the Kyoto Protocol, which has more powerful (and legally binding) measures. The UNFCCC secretariat supports all institutions involved in the climate change process, particularly the COP, the subsidiary bodies and their Bureau.

The average temperature of the earth's surface has risen by 0.74 degrees C since the late 1800s. It is expected to increase by another 1.8° C to 4° C by the year 2100 -- a rapid and profound change -- should the necessary action not be taken. Even if the minimum predicted increase takes place, it will be larger than any century-long trend in the last 10,000 years.
The principal reason for the mounting thermometer is a century and a half of industrialization: the burning of ever-greater quantities of oil, gasoline, and coal, the cutting of forests, and the practice of certain farming methods.

These activities have increased the amount of "greenhouse gases" in the atmosphere, especially carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide. Such gases occur naturally -- they are critical for life on earth; they keep some of the sun's warmth from reflecting back into space, and without them the world would be a cold and barren place. But in augmented and increasing quantities they are pushing the global temperature to artificially high levels and altering the climate. Eleven of the last 12 years are the warmest on record, and 1998 was the warmest year.
Climate change can be difficult -- you could ask the dinosaurs, if they weren't extinct. The prevailing theory is that they didn't survive when a giant asteroid struck the earth 65 million years ago, spewing so much dust into the air that sunlight was greatly reduced, temperatures plummeted, many plants didn't grow, and the food chain collapsed.

What happened to the dinosaurs is a rare example of climate change more rapid than humans are now inflicting on themselves. . . but not the only one. Research on ice cores and lake sediments shows that the climate system has suffered other abrupt fluctuations in the distant past -- the climate appears to have "tipping points" that can send it into sharp lurches and rebounds. Although scientists are still analyzing what happened during those earlier events, it's clear that an overstressed world with 6.3 billion people is a risky place to be carrying out uncontrolled experiments with the climate.

The current warming trend is expected to cause extinctions. Numerous plant and animal species, already weakened by pollution and loss of habitat, are not expected to survive the next 100 years. Human beings, while not threatened in this way, are likely to face mounting difficulties. Recent severe storms, floods, and droughts, for example, appear to show that computer models predicting more frequent "extreme weather events" are on target.

The average sea level rose by 10 to 20 cm during the 20th century, and an additional increase of 18 to 59 cm is expected by the year 2100. (Higher temperatures cause ocean volume to expand, and melting glaciers and ice caps add more water.) If the higher end of that scale is reached, the sea could overflow the heavily populated coastlines of such countries as Bangladesh, cause the disappearance of some nations entirely (such as the island state of the Maldives), foul freshwater supplies for billions of people, and spur mass migrations.
Agricultural yields are expected to drop in most tropical and sub-tropical regions -- and in temperate regions, too, if the temperature increase is more than a few degrees C. Drying of continental interiors, such as central Asia, the African Sahel, and the Great Plains of the United States, is also forecast. These changes could cause, at a minimum, disruptions in land use and food supply. And the range of diseases such as malaria may expand.

Global warming is a "modern" problem -- complicated, involving the entire world, tangled up with difficult issues such as poverty, economic development, and population growth. Dealing with it will not be easy. Ignoring it will be worse.

Over a decade ago, most countries joined an international treaty -- the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change -- to begin to consider what can be done to reduce global warming and to cope with whatever temperature increases are inevitable. Recently a number of nations have approved an addition to the treaty, called the Kyoto Protocol, which has more powerful (and legally binding) measures emission reduction targets for industrialised countries. The Protocol’s first commitment period begins in 2008 and ends in 2012. A strong multilateral framework needs to be in place by 2009 to ensure that there is no gap between the end of the Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period in 2012 and the entry into force of a future regime.

What Can Be Done?

Measures - heavily dependent on teamwork and political will -- can slow the rate of global warming and help the world cope with the climate shifts that occur.

Reducing emissions - Burning oil and coal more efficiently, switching to renewable forms of energy, such as solar and wind power, and developing new technologies for industry and transport can attack the problem at the source.

Expanding forests - Trees remove carbon dioxide, the dominant greenhouse gas, from the atmosphere. The more we have, the better. But deforestation -- the current trend -- liberates additional carbon and makes global warming worse.

Changing lifestyles and rules - The cultures and habits of millions of people -- essentially, whether they waste energy or use it efficiently -- have a major impact on climate change. So do government policies and regulations.

Coping - Steps have to be taken -- and the sooner the better -- to limit damage from consequences of global warming that are now inevitable.

LET US JOIN HANDS TO EDUCATE THE WORLD ON THE DANGERS POSED BY RISING GREEN HOUSE GAS EMISSIONS !

Friday, October 5, 2007

HANSEN DISCUSSION - The Running CPI And Panic investment in China

Since last November, the rising percentage of China’s CPI (consumer price index) reached 1.9%. It was the highest rising percentage in the recent 20 months. In 2006’s December, the CPI rising percentage was 2.8%, almost reached the inflation line of 3%. With a couple of measurements, CPI seemed to be stable for the first six months in 2007. However, since this June, the rising rate of CPI speeded up again and reached 4.4% in June and 5.6% in July, the highest in the recent 10 years. The actual rising rate of China’s CPI, most of the scholars believe, is much higher than the reported data from government. Because the counting of China’s CPI only includes food, clothing, medicines, transportation and communication, entertainment, service, living fees(like electricity and water), these fees take up only very little of Chinese daily consumptions. Currently, most of Chinese citizens’ money goes to real estate and the rising of the price of house is out of imagination these two or three years (price of the houses and flat, in some part of Shanghai, is higher than the price of Tokyo, one of the most expensive places in the world), so if the counting of China’s CPI include personal housing consuming, the inflation rate of China will be much higher. But no matter what kind of CPI counting system we are using, inflation is happening China, this is without any doubt. The reasons for inflation, may be the huge amount of China’s foreign exchange reserve, may be the expectation from outside of appreciation of RMB (Chinese currency) against US dollar and may include the excessive liquidity of RMB. I will not discuss the reasons in this article but what citizens choose to do in the inflation.

In China’s history of inflation, people used to buy and store lot of “daily” things. Because before 1990s’, Angle modulus in China was very high, most of the money was spent on food, food related facilities and basic life necessities. Take the inflation in 1988 as an example, people withdrew their money from the bank and rushed to the shops and bought everything they could buy. Rich men at that time, bought televisions, fridges, washing machines, poor people bought rice, salt, matches. A colleague of my mom bought 10 rice-cookers at that time and she is still using them now. In a word, Chinese people used to buy things, esp. things for daily usage, as their way of protecting themselves from inflation. However, the Angle modulus reduced to less than 50% in 2006, which means that these daily used things are not very important and cannot take up a big percentage in a family’s spending, so no one will go to shops and buy 10 cookers these days as a way of keep their money valuable. What can Chinese do in order to protect ourselves from inflation?
How to prevent our money from depriciation? One thing is for sure, keep money in the bank is no longer a good idea, although People’s Bank (central bank of China) announced three times the interest’s increase in just 2 months, the interest is still below the increase of CPI, which means an actual depreciation if you continue keep your money in the bank. You may say that we can buy some “hard currencies” such as gold or precious gems, or as some rich men in China is doing, buy houses and lands to keep their treasures. But most of the people have too little money to do these things. At this time, the fast growing stock market—which was stimulated by the hot money from outside—become the best place for ordinary people to “protect” their money.

The investment of individuals to the stock market starts at the beginning of this year, the index of Shanghai Stock Market went up from 1000 points to 3000 points in just 2 months from January to March. Lots of scholars and experts made the comment that there must be foam in China’s stock market, and this bull would end by government’s policies and interventions like the one in 1997, before the return of Hong Kong. As expected, Chinese government has released several policies, like increasing the loan and deposit interests, in order to warn the investors. However, the zeal for stock market from Chinese was out of control. Those policies had no power at all and the index of Shanghai Stock Market went up to 4087 at the end of May in another 2 months without any proper adjustment. There are more than 500 billion RMB (around 65 billion US dollars) of tradings and 90 thousands of new investors entering the stock market everyday ever since February, 2007. If at the very beginning the hot stock market was stimulated by money from other countries because of their expectation for RMB rate to increase, the unusual shooting up in China’s stock market afterwards should be the result of pushing from individual investors: at the end of April, 2007, China’s residents deposit shrank more than 22 billion RMB. Stock market becomes the most popular topic for Chinese people. This zealous and irrational action of Chinese is called panic investment by the some scholars because all this investment was driven by the fear of turning poor after the inflation.

On 30th of May (5.30), government suddenly increased the Stamp Tax for Securities Trading (just two days before May, 30th, the representative of China Securities Regulatory Commission made the promise to all the investors that the government will not increase the stamp tax recently…), Shanghai stock market reacted to this policy by a continuous drop from 4087 to 3670 in just 4 days until 4th of June. There were more than 800 stocks reached the Limit Down. The incident of 530 was a warning from government to the individual investors and also a measurement to cool down the over-heated stock market. Out of government’s expectation, after 5.30, the index of Shanghai Stock Market went on the way of shooting up. The currently index is around 5200. (Another increase of 1000 points in 2 months.) The only change after the incident of 530 is lots of people who directly invest in stock market turn to Funds.

But most of the funds now invest highly on stock market. During this two or three months, most of the scholars turn to be quiet comparing with their active comment at the beginning of 2007, because no one can predict if the China stock market will collapse and when will it collapse. All the citizens are enjoying the benefit brought out by the shooting stock market and there are more and more people jump into this pool. Especially facing the opening of 17th National Meeting of China Communist Party, the most important event deciding the future development of China, and the opening of 2008 Olympics, citizens have the strong belief that even the stock market will collapse, Chinese government will save it. I think the government is facing a big problem: on one hand, government wants to keep the society stable; on the other hand, stock market should perform according to the market, so the government does not want to interfere with it directly. But there are so many people involved the stock market and the whole society is staring at it, if the stock market collapsed, there will certainly be instability.

Although stock market provides a possibility of catching up the running speed of CPI, the investment is not releasing our panic, we have to pay the returning of worrying about the stock market. Actually, many of Fudan students put some money in stock market or funds market, most of we are not expecting earning more money or become wealthy, but just want to be able to pay our tuition fee one or two years later, instead of the problems in the future, we are now worrying about the unpredictable trend of stock market. I am wondering if there is a strong and stable system of social welfare, if we are confident about our future living standard, there will still be such a zeal for investment. In my opinion, it is more accurate to say the instability of China’s economy and people’s future, rather than the inflation itself, drive us into the panic investment.

Monday, October 1, 2007

Hansen Report - LEWIS KASINDI (Africa)

SPECIAL THANKS & A WORD OF APPRECIATION TO Mr. LEWIS KASINDI WHO HAD CONTRIBUTED THIS ARTICLE. HE WAS SELECTED TO ATTEND THE INAGURAL HANSEN SUMMER INSTITUTE, BUT DUE TO UNFORTUNATE SITUATIONS HE COULD NOT TAKE PART IN THE PROGRAM. WE MISSED A FRIEND FROM AFRICA THROUGH OUT THE PROGRAM.

Best regards to all of the Hansenian fellows. I wish I met all of you guys on the inaugural HSI program but…! Anyways, hope to meet you some day in the future.

Thanks a lot for this opportunity the Hansenian team offers me to say a word on the conflict situation in Africa as well as in my region, (The African Great Lake Region).

Recent years have seen many regions of Africa involved in war and internal or external conflict, from the seven or so countries directly involved in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to the Sierra Leone crisis and the war in Ethiopia/Eritrea and the various other civil wars.

There have been over 9.5 million refugees and hundreds and thousands of people have been slaughtered in Africa from these conflicts. If this scale of destruction and fighting were in Europe, then people would be calling it World War III with the entire world rushing to report, provide aid, mediate and otherwise try to diffuse the situation.

According to me, the major root cause of conflicts in the whole African continent is the legacy of European colonialism that had a devastating impact on Africa. The artificial boundaries created by colonial rulers as they ruled and finally left Africa had the effect of bringing together many different ethnic people within a nation that did not reflect, nor have (in such a short period of time) the ability to accommodate or provide for, the cultural and ethnic diversity. The natural struggle to rebuild is proving difficult.

Some have commented that pointing to colonialism is not an excuse as many African countries have had decades to try and resolve this. The implication of the argument is that the effects of centuries of colonialism, in effect, are supposed to be overcome in just a few short years. Yet, as Richard Robbins, professor of anthropology suggests, if countries like Canada have been struggling with accommodating different groups, then in Africa the problem is more complex:
We must remember that the European agreements that had carved up Africa into states paid little attention to cultural and ethnic boundaries and ethnic groups had little opportunity or need to form political alliances or accommodations under repressive colonial rule.… Think of countries such as Canada again, which has been trying for hundreds of years with mixed success to accommodate only two linguistic groups — English and French — and you get an idea of the problems of African states with far greater cultural and linguistic divisions.

(My country, the DRC has four official languages and over 430 dialects; I know for sure this is a source of many conflicts inside the country.)

The African Great Lakes Region has experienced prolonged instability, thus lack of peace and justice for quite some time. This is now engulfed in a war that has drawn in other countries for a number of complex reasons, including conflicts over basic resources such as water, access and control over rich minerals and other resources as well as various political agendas. This has been fueled and supported by various national and international corporations and other regimes which have an interest in the outcome of the conflict.

Since April 1994, the DRC has been rent by ethnic civil war, touched off by a massive inflow of Rwandan refugees fleeing the genocide. These refugees were a mix of civilians, Interahamwe (the militia largely held responsible for the genocide and members of the defeated Rwandan army [FAR]). The refugee camps quickly became controlled by the Interahamwe and FAR. Over the next few years, these groups (with the blessing of Mobutu’s central government and regional strongmen) reorganized and rearmed. Soon they began launching attacks from the camps into neighboring Rwanda and Uganda.

This is why the Rwandan and Ugandan regimes began looking for a Congolese face to put on their intervention into Mobutu’s Zaire in order to aim at delivering what they hoped would be a deathblow to their respective rebels buy cutting off their supply lines, driving them out of their Zairian rear bases and ousting their longtime benefactor, Mobutu.

When Laurent Kabila came to power in May 1997, toppling Marshall Mobutu, with the aid of Rwanda, Uganda, Angola, Burundi and Eritrea, it was hoped that there was going to be peace and stability in the region.

In stead, these hopes were quickly dashed when the situation deteriorated. Kabila had been accused by rebels (made up of Congolese soldiers, Congolese Tutsi Banyamulenge, Rwandan, Ugandan and some Burundian government troops) of turning into a dictator, of mismanagement, corruption and supporting various paramilitary groups who oppose his former allies.

Since the second outbreak of fighting in August 1998, at least 3.3 million people, mostly women, children and the elderly, are estimated to have died because of the conflict, most from disease and starvation. More than 2.25 million people have been driven from their homes; many of them beyond the reach of humanitarian agencies
The main fighting has been on the eastern side of DRC and over three quarters of the estimated number of killings have taken place there, with approximately 90 per cent of the DRC’s internally displaced population having fled violence from that region.
This was the beginning of a terrible hatred between eastern Congo’s population and all the countries involved in the rebellion. Almost each family was victim of this conflict by having lost at least a member.

That’s why in North and South Kivu Provinces, the many people terribly hate Congolese Tutsi Banyamulenge and all Rwandan people (especially Interahamwe militia who are still carrying out most of massacres in South Kivu Province). They are accused of being responsible for the havoc in the mentioned provinces. In Province Orientale (Bunia, Ituri, etc.) many people are hostile to Ugandans, also held responsible for many crimes committed there.

The hard task we have in order to cope with this dangerous situation is to keep the new generations out of it.

For this aim, I recently created a youth Association named « League de la Jeunesse pour la Paix et le Développement dans la Région des Grands Lacs ». It’s dealing with peace and reconciliation in different Countries of the region.

This association has already some members in Kigali/Rwanda and Bujumbura/Burundi. My vision is to spread it over the whole region (DRC, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and Tanzania) in order to have all the youth of the respective countries participate actively in the reconciliation, peace and development of the Region for a more peaceful future.

Is there any Hansenian who can suggest another way to keep future generations out of this situation for the more peaceful African Great Lakes Region?

Thanks you, guys!

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Resources


As I was doing research for some papers I am writing I came across a lot of good resources that I thought might be useful for some of you who are continuing to pursue International Relations/Conflict Resolution studies.

HEIDELBERG INSTITUTE FOR INTERNATIONAL CONFLICT RESEARCH (HIIK)
2006 Conflict Barometer: An annual report of all Crisis, Wars, Coups d’état, Negotiations, Mediations, and Peace Settlements of that year.
http://www.hiik.de/konfliktbarometer/pdf/ConflictBarometer_2006.pdf (See page 4 for a map with a listing of all conflicts from that year).

The Ibrahim Index of African Governance
Released approximately every 2 years and measures the progress or failures of the 48 Sub-Saharan African countries on categories such as:
-Safety and Security
-Rule of Law, Transparency
-Participation and Human Rights
-Sustainable Economic Opportunity
-Human Development
They average the ranking from these categories to reach the ranking on the Ibrahim Index. The 2007 report (from the data of 2005), lists Somalia as the worst governed nation in Sub-Saharan Africa.
http://www.moibrahimfoundation.org/index/overall.pdf


United Nations
And last, there is more information that you can ever possibly read available on the UN Website through their database. Just do a simple search for whatever document you are looking for at, http://documents.un.org/simple.asp

For example, there are a number of committees that release annual reports on the signatories to the respective Covenant and list that country's progression in these areas, and what still needs to be done.

Here is a report from 2007 on the Civil and Political Rights in the UK.
http://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G07/411/99/pdf/G0741199.pdf?OpenElement
(see page 42 for the committee’s responses)

Other committee include:
-Right to Development
-Sovereignty on Natural Resources
-Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries
-Convention Against Genocide
-Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
-Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination
-Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities
-Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief
-Rights of indigenous peoples
-Race and Racial Prejudice
-International Law Concerning Friendly Relations Among Nations

Hope this helps in your research whether personal or academic.

Friday, September 21, 2007

Hansen Celebration - WORLD PEACE DAY (21 SEPTEMBER)

WORLD PEACE DAY

In 1981 the United Nations General Assembly passed resolution 36/67 declaring an International Day of Peace. In 2001, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a new resolution 55/282 declaring 21 September of each year as the International Day of Peace.

The resolution: "Declares that the International Day of Peace shall henceforth be observed as a day of global ceasefire and non-violence, an invitation to all nations and people to honour a cessation of hostilities for the duration of the Day...

“Invites all Member States, organizations of the United Nations system, and non-governmental organizations and individuals to commemorate, in an appropriate manner, the International Day of Peace, including through education and public awareness, and to cooperate with the United Nations in the establishment of the global ceasefire.”


Ban Ki Moon’s Message:

Peace is one of humanity’s most precious needs. It is also the United Nations’ highest calling.

It defines our mission. It drives our discourse. And it draws together all of our worldwide work, from peacekeeping and preventive diplomacy to promoting human rights and development.

This work for peace is vital. But it is not easy. Indeed, in countless communities across the world, peace remains an elusive goal. From the displaced person camps of Chad and Darfur to the byways of Baghdad, the quest for peace is strewn with setbacks and suffering.

September 21, the International Day of Peace, is an occasion to take stock of our efforts to promote peace and well-being for all people everywhere.

It is an opportunity to appreciate what we have already accomplished, and to dedicate ourselves to all that remains to be done.

It is also meant to be a day of global ceasefire: a 24-hour respite from the fear and insecurity that plague so many places.

Today, I urge all countries and all combatants to honour this cessation of hostilities. And I ask people everywhere to observe a minute of silence at noon local time.

As the guns fall silent, we should use this opportunity to ponder the price we all pay due to conflict. And we should resolve to vigorously pursue ways to make permanent this day’s pause.

On this International Day, let us promise to make peace not just a priority, but a passion. Let us pledge to do more, wherever we are in whatever way we can, to make every day a day of peace.

http://www.un.org/events/peaceday/2007/sgmessage.shtml

NOTE: Special Thanks to RAMONA DRAGOMIR for sending us wishes on "World Peace Day" (and ofcourse for reminding us)

Monday, September 17, 2007

Is there a Solution to Iraq War?

I just went and saw the documentary “No End In Sight” about the war in Iraq and would recommend to anyone else, who is able, to go and see it. This film was well made and I was stunned at times of how poorly some decisions were made. However it ended rather ambiguously merely stating that things looked grim and offering little in way of suggestions as what to do next.

Thinking back to our 3 weeks in the Hansen program I realized we really didn’t talk about the use of force or war as a method of conflict-resolution, but indeed it is a tool of conflict-resolution and one that must always be considered. When trying to create a policy proposal for a suggested method of resolution all options must remain on the table even if one is to simply rule out methods of force as too costly or impractical in each instance.

As our program was focused on peaceful methods of conflict-resolution, which are largely preventative methods to conflict, we did not have the chance to review methods of conflict resolution during and particularly post-conflict. I know that particularly with my intended career path, and maybe with many of yours as well, these methods will be highly relevant.

As was seen with the war in Iraq, the decision to go to war is not always democratic, but its repercussions always are. Whether or not you like the concept of warfare as a tool for diplomacy, chances are you won’t have a say in whether or not to begin a war. But, as possible future governmental employees, we will likely have a say in how to end it. Considering this I began to question what I would do differently to resolve a war like Iraq once others had already decided to begin it.


The first step would be to undo those three fatal mistakes made by Paul Bremer (former administrator of the Iraqi Coalition Provisional Authority). One, immediately set-up an interim government. Following the end of combat operations, Iraq was left in limbo. Bremer decided he did not want an interim government immediately set-up, but at the same time martial law was ruled out. This left a void for authority and accountability and that’s when the looting began. The governmental ministries were ransacked (further complicating measures later when they were brought back), the national library was burned to the ground, and the national museum with some of the earliest artifacts known to man was emptied overnight. Some went even as far as to chip away at these concrete buildings just the pull out the steel re-bars inside. The complete lawlessness from the looting left the Iraqis feeling abandoned and humiliated.

Bremer’s second step was the de-Baathification of governmental employees. This step was like permanently banishing anyone affiliated with the Communist part in China from governmental employment. Many of these workers joined the Baath party just to get a job and overnight hundreds of thousands of professionals were left unemployed and the fragile remnants of the political system completely collapsed.

Bremer’s third and worst decision was to completely disband all branches of the Iraqi armed forces and police. In a matter of days, General Hughes had compiled a list of 127,000 Iraqi military officers willing and ready to assist the American forces in restabilizing Iraq. This list was ignored by Bremer, Walter Slocombe and the other officials in charge of the DoD, and everyone in the Iraqi Armed Forces were told to go home and not to come back. This left Iraq’s most skilled fighters (and their weapons) unemployed, humiliated, and looking for revenge.

Originally, it was this displaced force of veteran fighters that formed the backbone of the insurgency. Then, as personal ideals took a back-burner to need for a source of income, these fighters became mercenaries, offering their services to local militias in exchange for a monthly stipend.

The next step would be to immediately withdraw all security contractors from Iraq. The majority of the wars questionable killings have come at the hands of these largely untrained security guards with a license to kill. The damage they have caused to the U.S. image with Iraqi citizens is perhaps irreversible. These fatal flaws only succeeded in alienating (and really pissing off) both the professional elite and common Iraqis.

The main problem was with US leadership. Those in charge of decision-making in the war had little to no military experience. Bush and Cheney were notorious draft-dodgers and had no military experience (the Texas National Guard does not count), Slocombe and Bremer had no military experience whatsoever, and Rumsfeld (the chief architect of the war) had only a brief and limited stint in the armed services. The problem with this is they didn’t know how to interpret the current conditions on the ground (also partially because they remained in Washington D.C.) and they didn’t have an understanding of the past.

A better understanding of the past could have provided them with better answers to this quagmire, answers that the military had learned in past wars. In the 1930’s, the Marines wrote The Small Wars Manual, a compilation of tactics and wisdom learned through their years of fighting guerrilla warfare and other forms of insurgencies. Unfortunately, despite containing insightful and helpful information, this manual has been largely ignored. One lesson states that it is the duty of the military “to establish law and order by supporting or replacing the civil government,” not stand by and watch lawlessness and looting consume the country. Also, contrary to the initial approach of Shock and Awe, the manual calls for a minimum use of firepower, “with the minimum of troops, in fact, with nothing more than a demonstration of force if that is all that is necessary and reasonably sufficient.” Apart from maintaining peace through the status quo, the manual also calls for a proactive approach simultaneously by the State Department in close coordination with the military and understands that “peace and industry cannot be restored permanently without appropriate provisions for the economic welfare of the people,” so rendering the majority of the country unemployed by mass dismissals, as ordered by Bremer, is in fact not advisable.


The most notable flaw in the current war strategy is the complete lack of any elements from the Combined Action Program. CAP began in 1965 in Vietnam and was one of the few successes in the war. Each Combined Action platoon had a marine rifle squad under the command of a sergeant (and all members were chosen exclusively for their ability to work with the local population). These 12-15 marines were paired with a platoon from the South Vietnamese forces (about 30 local men). The marines provided military knowledge and the Vietnamese provide an intimate knowledge of local conditions and the two groups would be encouraged to bond by sharing the same sleeping quarters, eating the same food, and working the same patrol assignments. This combined force made up a CAP and were responsible for maintaining control of a village.

One of the dilemmas of the current war in Iraq is that forces constantly have to reconquer cities as they do not have enough troops to maintain a foothold in all the cities at once. Instituting a CAP system would allow the US to provide a presence in all cities at once with a minimal amount of troops and the support of the local military, and thus likely the local populace who can provide invaluable information. The number of soldiers in each CAP could be adjusted according to the specific priorities of each city and would receive air reinforcement from attack helicopters if they should find their selves over-run.

“The Village” by Francis J. West Jr. recounts one of these CAPs in action at Binh Nghia following a devastating attack in which six of the twelve marines were ambushed and killed. The six remaining marines presented with the option of being evacuated, stated “we couldn’t leave. What would we have said to the PFs (S.Vietnamese Force) after the way we pushed them to fight the Cong? We had to stay. There wasn’t one of us who wanted to leave.” The positive effect from such a mutual respect on public opinion should not be underestimated. Nor should the experience gained; the marines learned the area from the PF and the PF learned proper military tactics, each becoming more productive fighting units and able to spread their knowledge to other adolescent CAPs exponentially.


It took several years, but yesterday I saw an article which showed the first signs of CAP tactics within Iraq. It is being called the Anbar Model, which might seem to indicate a novel concept but it is actually just a primitive form of the same strategy employed by CAP in Vietnam. The Anbar Model combines US military forces side by side with local Sheiks and their Sunni clansmen against their mutual enemy, and also Sunni, Al-Qaeda forces. This movement was spearheaded by Sheik Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha, who was subsequently killed by an IED attack that Al-Qaeda has claimed responsibility for. Rather than crippling the movement, the attack has created a martyr out of Abu Risha and reports are now stating that the Anbar Model has spread to the Shiite south where Sheik Majid Tahir al-Magsousi is providing his Shiite clansmen to receive training by the US forces and to work in conjunction with them to help patrol the Iranian border and bolster local security against Shiite militias. These elements clearly draw their roots from the aforementioned Combined Action Program; however there is one important element which has adapted specifically for the conditions of Iraq. The Sunni clansmen are only being used to fight fellow Sunnis and the Shiites other Shiites, as to prevent stoking further ethnic tensions between the two groups. If there remains any hope for Iraq it lies with the support and expansion of such programs country-wide.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MdU09oD-OU
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070916/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_shiite_sheiks



DAVE (18 September 2007)
Ha-ha-ha, well I doubt it'd shock or surprise you that I'm against the bloody thing, but I initially was actually for it after Colin Powell helped Bush's media blitz in Oct-Dec 2002 enamored Americans of war once again.

I changed my mind, however, after the invasion shortly once I saw all my worst fears and predictions beginning to come true, not the least of which was suppressed evidence of transmitted/destoryed cold-war era WMD programs and quieted journalists on stories of the immediate failure of the country, esp. military on civilian atrocities, (i.e. the Haditha killings last year).

Where are these guys at today? Hard to say, it's such a chaotic environment it's hard from this perspective to see the Iraqis keeping their country together another year, much less to say in five. Most likely it'll be a quick, violent civil war in about a year after which the stabilizing effects of truncated war will cause the country to trifurcate into a confederalist arrangement with Baghdad as a nominal center of gvt., but rest assured the provinces will all be highly impassable as Shiitistan and Sunnistan will give way to regional war as Saudi, Syria and Iran arm all sides. Expect immensely high Sunnah civilian castualties as they're the smallest and poorest organized without a political arm to get them in line. As we see in Pakistan and Afghanistan, problems of ethnic, tribal, and intereligious violence remain at all-time highs are are a strong cause for future violence. Cause for these conflicts are many, but foremost amongst them is a resource-driven battle. As you know Iraq has one of the last large natural reserves of crude oil left in the world, the money to rebuild and rearm their country lies underneath their feet, it just takes stabilization and organization to reach down and get that black gold.

The big operating characters in the country are getting clearer as old alliances give way to new ones. The Badr Brigade is a serious force to deal with, and their current stance on the future of Iraq is uncertain. As Abu Risha, the top Sunni tribal leader (and a pretty scummy guy in his own right) got assassinated over last week, we see up close the cost of anyone in that region even -shaking- hands with President Dubya.

Al-Sadr's Mahdi Army is currently at low-level intensity as they use the Ramadan holiday gathering force in southern Iraq. Many of his forces indeed gain help from Iranian Shiite sympathisers but for the most part they operate in broad daylight, executing their own countrymen for violating their very narrow Salafist interpretation of Koranic law. This may be a function of their undoing, much like Hamas ruined their reputation for going after their own, Al Sadr's overconfidence may be his undoing.

Al Maliki is much stronger than the U.S. media gives him credit, and the sheer distrust of the man over here is baffling. He is the leader of the Iraqis, and our only way out. Without someone to blame, someone to praise, someone to look up to, the future of the political situation in the congress is impossible. Iraqis respect force, they like overconfidence, they like someone who'll rile things up when the time calls for it. They love that shit. Remember when they won the Asian Football conference two months ago? Felt good, huh? Iraqis dig that shit no mattter what. Let's hope in a few years they'll actually be able to come home and play officially for a standing crowd. Iraq needs leaders who can manipulate emotions that effectively. Right now, most of their politicians double as informants, illicit market operators, etc.. Necessity may invent the next Saddam, however, and a lot wish for the dictator's return from the grave.

Central Baghdad's a mess, even parts of Kurdistan are beginning to destabilize. Sunni militia in the center are redoubling their efforts for the oncoming war over Baghdad. The biggest situation right now is whether the U.S./Coalition forces are even going to function like yet another militia in an ever-scattered factionalized country. Pulling out now is impossible, it takes six months just to line up the troop carriers into the Gulf to get the boys and equipment out. The troops remain positive, but confused. Most don't spend time thinking about why they're over there (what soldier likes to think of such things when bullets and bombs loom overhead?), but most are coming back with less and less enthusiasm. The military right now is buying our troops off, paying them an extra year's pay to bring them back... though much of that money is promised to first-time recruits, but seldom delievered.

Indeed it looks like our forces are committed for the long-term, possibly with this thing winding down after one last big operation like in Korea. As you may remember in '52, U.S. forces were pulled back out of North Korea after the UN mandated a resolution to the situation (without convincing the generals on the ground!). We're looking at a familiar situation today, the U.S. will continue arming the Sunni insurgency to fight "Al Qaeda" (even though less than 10% of attacks in the last year on coalition forces were waged by known operatives for Al Qaeda. The vast majority are co-conspiracists and unemployed/able young Iraqis who're shit-tired of five years of occupation now. There are solutions, but they'll never take the hard way out, they always are going to take the quick and bloody way out if it guarantees keeping their families alive, etc..

In the U.S., the media campaign to stay in the country has faltered and swayed. President Bush has lost almost his entire cabinet of neo-khan supporters (Rummy, Rove, and now Gonzales are all out!), though this last week he had a mini-blitz over public consciousness as he, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker, and General Petreus (sounds like a Roman general...) once again retread the reasons for going in, the reasons for staying, and the consequences if the U.S. drawdown. Cheney isn't leaving his side, and Americans are getting a taste for their blood. I would be surprised if the calls for their resignation or impeachment don't get louder next year as the really painful shit begins to sap our forces. As pundits in Washington proclaim Bush's "victory" over the anti-war left and congressional Democrats, the rest of the country isn't a bit impressed. Public dissatisfaction with his job performance is way down, though his general approval rate bumped up about 2% because of demonstration effects by the recent strength Petreus/Crocker report. Time has a way of forgetting, however, and I think the U.S. will, in fact, begin the draw down next year.

One last big thing this week, the Iraqi judiciary ordered that all activities by Blackwater LLC. be suspended from Iraq until the most recent killing of eight civilians by Blackwater PMC employees over the weekend is better investigated. As you know, Blackwater's a subsidiary of Cheney's Halliburton, originally as a weekend warrior sportsman's paradise in South Carolina, now it's the home to one of the fastest growing agencies in Iraq. Last year, they made over $800 million and have over 10,000 employees working on the ground as security forces, translators, and intel officers detatched to IA and coalition forces. Because the company exists in a legal grey zone depending on the topic their employees may or may not be subject to uniform military codes of justice, hence they can kill and get away with it. Well, it looks like someone has had enough and put an end to their business relationship. At the same time, Blackwater has immensely powerful friends in Washington, Baghdad and even Tel Aviv, as some of their officers get training from former Israeli and Chilean special forces. They've got the dough to spend to make the best mercenary army money can offer.

What will this do for the security situation? Well, if the reports I read were true (although never entirely -accurate-), this shows that the Iraqi government may find it's national calling by kicking out, removing the problem rather than solving it directly. It's shoddy, but it works. If the Iraqi government can successfully remove Blackwater, they'll be much closer to forcing the U.S. to capitulate and remove their forces quickly, much like the British just did in Basra as promised by Premier Gordon Brown. This is all highly contingent on the circumstances, and right now it looks like as much as the country can't physically withstand occupation (well over 90% blame the coalition as an "occupying force" rather than as a liberator of tyrrany). It makes sense that it would begin all now, as a confluence of events and extenuating coping mechanisms has been unleashed since Al Maliki's government began to collapse as chairs of regional-ethnic parties all reduced support in May.

This takes me to my final, darkest warning: Iran. Though I don't believe the U.S. is in a position where it can wage an effective, defensive ground war, we still have a -lot- of bombs waiting to get dropped on somebody. Probability that Americans will out-and-out revolt against government will grow much higher if they instate a draft, but domestic consequenes may grow higher even if a low-level arial war takes place. Take an air-war as a guarantee. If trends continue today with Petreus and other Pentagon officials widely blaming Iran as essential to arming and training Al Sadr's Mahdi Army, I believe the interaction is far more complex than they give credit. Indeed some Iranian sympathizers, specifically the Basij, the fundamentalist suicide brigades from the Iran-Iraq war, are more than common thinkers, they do indeed wish to see Iraq become a "glorious nation."

These people however have -nothing- to do with the nuclear ambitions of the country aside from voicing empty support to Ahmadinijad's regime (whom they blame for being too -secular-, amongst all things). Surely these mentally traumatized Iranian men who long for a distant glorious past to become their bloody future have better things on their hands besides bullying other moderate Iranians from violating narrow-minded Koranic public aesthetics codes, for they are hungry to serve any worthwhile purpose in the Iranian state again. Perhaps cooler heads will prevail, and perhaps E.U. will demonstrate much more obstinate leadership against Bush/Cheney's push towards yet a -fourth- front on the war on Terror, but I'm not holding my breath. Iran is much more sensitive to Europe's tithings and censures than they do the U.S.. That being said, I saw it coming five years ago that by now we'd be in the middle of not just Afghanistan, but toppling half the regimes of the mid-east.

I didn't see the new war in Somalia coming, but that was a much more tangential conflict to Iraq. Still unnerving if Ethiopia managed to get it to work out they way they want it, but for the most part everywhere the U.S. touches now turns to ash and shite and I don't see East Africa improving out of this.

Solution will have to involve bilateralism, multilateralism, or unilateralism. The unilateral solution is simple: wave and smile as our troops leave. No money is further given for reconstruction, chaos ensues, which will likely take 4-6 years to solve. Price of oil will skyrocket as Saudi and Iran get involved. This solution is unwinnable, but probable.

Bilateralism: we maintian friendly troops in harm's way for the indefinite future as a wildcard. Leave at least 100k troops in stations around the country or nearby in Qattar and Diego Rivera AFB. With the threat of new bombs overhead, assured destruction may be necessary to bind the Sunni and Shiites with direct threat of force. This solution lacks credibility and material implementation will proceed to become more difficult as costs will overrun effectiveness. The Pentagon doesn't like this solution as they want to save face and end what they think they can end. This solution is more probable.

Finally, multilateralism. Convince Syria, Jordan, Iran and Turkey to get involved in opening up to the country once it's reconstructed. Later bring in UN and EU as impartial arbiters for renegotiation of territorial boundaries. Currently the largest reconstruction firm in Iraq is actually a Turkish rebuilding company who also staffs translators for coalition and U.S. diplomatic detatchments. So there's some financial taste to this one, but it's going to take tremendous changes in foreign policy, domestic policy, and internal Iraqi policy. It's more of an end-game scenario, than a serious answer to the current instability in the country. Of course it's totally inconcievable under the current administration, so look to 2009 as the first year this is even possible.

CHUCK (18 September 2007)

Implied in you question is the assumption that there is a quick or easy fix for the problems in Iraq. That being said, it is imperative that the U.S. stay the course. A failed state would be a signal to Islamic terrorists that the United States can be defeated militarily if they can out last our efforts. Insurgency as a tactic is the acceptance on the part of those employing it of military inferiority. Those groups targeting US efforts right now understand that they are not going to be able to kill enough Americans to physically force the American out of Iraq. They can however kill one or two Americans at a time, which will slowly demoralize the American public (especially depending on how the media portrays our relative success or failure).

The U.S. needs to continue the transfer of political control and security responsibility to Iraqis. There needs to be some efforts towards a regional solution to the problems in country. This means getting the Iranians and to a less degree the Syrians to stop logistical support to their preferred factions within the country. The US also needs to make it clear that troops will remain in Iraq as long as necessary to accomplish the mission. A “deadline” for withdrawal (also know as “Benchmarks” to the democrats) is surrender.

Remember it is easy to rule and control a multi ethnic state if tyranny and terror are your methods it is much harder to create a heterogeneous state in which the rights of minorities are respected and there is a constitutional stability. Right now everyone sees a failed state in Iraq. Although there are problems they will work out.

Being trained as a historian I see many parallels between Bush and his policy of democratization in the middle east and Harry Truman and his policy of Containment at the beginning of the Cold War. Truman was very underrated as a president during his term in office. His support of the Republic of Korea in resisting the a Communist take over was described as a unwinable quagmire which was killing you Americans (33,000) with no end in sight. The Korean war cost Truman the presidency in 1952. However historians in the last 20 years now see the Korean war as a turning point in the Cold War and a definite victory (even though most observers at the time couldn’t see it). I think the same thing will happen with the war in Iraq once time passes.

Hansenian Memories - MICHELLE HAMILTON (USA)

I feel I should start with somewhat of a disclaimer. At times I’m afraid my thoughts and feelings may seem over simplified, or in someway “basic” in nature, but in no way do I intend to devalue or under represent the issues I believe to be important in the world today. With that said, I will attempt to convey my beliefs, concerns, and experiences to the best of my ability.

Being born and raised in the United States seems to have provided me with a unique perspective of society, specifically religion. It seems that as Americans we have a very different view of the world in which we live, and we have a very different view of our place in it. I was raised with the belief that I could grow up to be whatever I wanted to be, that my destiny was to be determined by me and me only. I have come to realize that this is not the case around the world, and this idea challenged my way of thinking. After great thought and consideration, I am now able to appreciate the complex differences in what appear to be very basic ways of thinking.

My way of thinking is somewhat based on where I was raised. I was born in Western Kentucky and grew up across the Ohio River in Southern Indian. This area is located in what is referred to as the bible belt of America. Religion has a strong hold on the society there, and it reflects heavily in the people and their beliefs. I, too, have been affected by religion, despite not claiming any religious affiliation.

My dad comes from a strong Catholic family. He and his brothers and sisters all went to a Catholic High School, the same high school that my mamaw (paternal grandmother) worked at. To this day, many of them remain very active in the Catholic Church. Others are only active participants around the major holidays. I’m not sure in what denomination my mother was raised, but my mother’s family was certainly mainline Protestant. I was raised in the Methodist church, and often was taken to a nondenominational church. My maternal grandparents are, and always have been, very religious.

There was a time when I, too, was strongly involved in the church and youth group. But as time went by, I couldn’t help but to sense that these institutions alienated so many people. I couldn’t understand why an institution that was supposedly set up to preach the word of God, and to exemplify his teachings could pick and choose who was worthy of their preaching. Perhaps the final straw was when I learned of how religion played a major part in my mother and my father’s marriage; then again divorce would be more appropriate. Because my mother was not Catholic, my parents could not be married in a Catholic church. I do not believe my parents were too concerned with this, but my paternal grandfather was deeply bothered. He refused to attend the wedding and did not support their marriage. My father was asked never to return to the Catholic Church and for what? Because he found a partner that made him happy, with whom he wanted to spend the rest of his life with?

The tension that this caused was so detrimental that a few short years later my parents divorced. Granted, this was not the sole issue, but it caused a large enough crack in the foundation, that there marriage eventually gave way to all the pressures. On a daily basis I was similar examples of detrimental religious tensions. It seems that all to often, those who are very adamant in their religion tend to have the opinion that their religious views are correct, which makes all others wrong. This idea has always perturbed me. Who am I to say who is right and who is wrong? That my God is better than yours, ignoring any possibility that God and have more than one name, more than one identity? It is my opinion that it is this strictly constructed view within organized religion that causes conflict.

I have had the opportunity to take several classes on world religions and the sociology of religion. Through these studies it seems to me that the notion of “my God is better than yours” is prevalent in most religions. Some religions tend to be more tolerant than others in this aspect, but as soon as you get into the realm of a universal approach to religion, people start referring to it was philosophy, or a way of life, more than a practicing religion. Granted I see no downfall to this. I remember a comment that Mr. Kamisa made in class, that to be spiritual and to behave accordingly does not require you to be a part of an organized religion. I believe that if more people were open to this idea, there would be fewer tensions across the globe. How many times has blood been shed in the name of religion? How many lives were sacrificed because “my God is better than your God?” One is too many.

I will say that the principles on which America was built have afford us a great deal of latitude where the freedom of religion is concerned. For the most part, all religions are accepted. There are the various radical groups that are looked at as outcasts, but I think most Americans are able to discern their absurdity. There are countries in which this is not the case, countries where a state religion is imposed. I was relieved to see, however, that in many of the countries represented, a sense of religious tolerance exists. India, for example, seems to have a very diverse religious population despite the large Hindu influence. Our lovely Moroccan friends hosted some Christians on their holy day, and in turn went to a Christian ceremony on its holy day. There are many countries that seem to have populations made up of Islam, Christianity, and Hinduism. The fact that in the majority of these countries’ people of the different religions are able to co-exist is promising. Perhaps it is here we can learn from the others the art of tolerance and acceptance for all.

These skills are essential not only to religion, but in everyday life. It is difficult for me to put into words everything I have gained from this experience. I will start by saying I am still puzzled as to why I was picked. The other participants are such wonderful people, that I am honored to be in the same classroom with them. I hope I can take their humility home with me. Their zest for life and knowledge never ceased to amaze me. I truly respect their openness to learn and to share despite some vary real religious and cultural differences.

I especially loved the lectures. I did not know it was possible to learn so much in such a short period of time. I learned things about myself, about other people, about the world. It was great having the opportunity to hear professors like Jacobo, Spitzberg, and Maxwell (just to name a few). Despite living in San Diego for a little over five years, I have never really been the border. It was always something I heard talked about, something that was just down the street, but I had never seen it. When Professor Jacobo discussed it in class and then accompanied us to Border State Park, I learned so much about our own border and immigration issues, but I also learned about the same issues in other countries like Cypress and China.

Dr. Spitzberg’s lectures on communication were exceptional. I know I will be able to utilize that knowledge in my day-to-day life as well as my professional and educational lives. The same can be said about Lisa Maxwell’s lectures on negotiation. I think most will agree that communication is a very important part of life, and miscommunication is the root of many issues. The tools that both Dr. Spitzberg and Lisa provided us, if applied, will certainly aid us in communicating our issues to others and will greatly decrease any miscommunication that could have otherwise occurred.

The ropes course at Challenge-U was an amazing confidence booster, not only on a personal level, but on the group level as well. I still look back and giggle thinking about our team (go ‘A’ Team) and how we were able to work together to accomplish the given tasks having only known each other for a few days. It was that day I got to know one of my now closest friends, Ramona from Romania. I will always to indebt to this program for enrichment it has brought into my life.

I am constantly amazed at the entire program. One day I was sitting in the back of the classroom, and I took a second to look around and I was taken aback. Seeing the thirty other students sitting in class, the diversity that existed, gave me hope for our future. I have learned something from each and every one of these individuals. I can only hope I have affected them half as much as they have affected me. I have made life long friends with the other students, and as growing leaders I cannot wait to see what the future has in store.

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Hansenian Earth - Water Science Discovery

Radio Frequencies Help Burn Salt Water
By David Templeton, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Tue, 11 Sep 2007, 11:41AM

ERIE, Pa. - An Erie cancer researcher has found a way to burn salt water, a novel invention that is being touted by one chemist as the "most remarkable" water science discovery in a century.

John Kanzius happened upon the discovery accidentally when he tried to desalinate seawater with a radio-frequency generator he developed to treat cancer. He discovered that as long as the salt water was exposed to the radio frequencies, it would burn.

The discovery has scientists excited by the prospect of using salt water, the most abundant resource on earth, as a fuel.

Rustum Roy, a Penn State University chemist, has held demonstrations at his State College lab to confirm his own observations.

The radio frequencies act to weaken the bonds between the elements that make up salt water, releasing the hydrogen, Roy said. Once ignited, the hydrogen will burn as long as it is exposed to the frequencies, he said.

The discovery is "the most remarkable in water science in 100 years," Roy said.

"This is the most abundant element in the world. It is everywhere," Roy said. "Seeing it burn gives me the chills."

Roy will meet this week with officials from the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense to try to obtain research funding.

The scientists want to find out whether the energy output from the burning hydrogen — which reached a heat of more than 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit — would be enough to power a car or other heavy machinery.

"We will get our ideas together and check this out and see where it leads," Roy said. "The potential is huge."

http://green.yahoo.com/index.php?q=node/1570

Note: We thank Dave for forwarding this news link.

ADAM CASLER - COUNTER POINT

* One problem. What do you do with all the salt once it has been separated from the water? If one plans to use this technology on a commercial scale there will be massive stockpiles of salt that must be accounted for.

* The salt cannot be merely poured back into the ocean because this will increase the salinity of the water past its ecological capacity and will begin to kill fish and other ocean-life. You cannot merely bury such quantities of salt because it will turn the soil into a desert incapable of growing any plant-life and possibly seeping down into the groundwater and contaminating our drinking sources. Nor can you just leave the salt in massive piles above ground because the wind will carry it and blow it to either the ground or water. And its easy to see how quickly storing the salt in ware-houses would become a problem.

* While this discovery has the potential to be a nice supplement and replacement to the current methods of desalinization such as those used extensively in the Arab-gulf which currently require much more energy expended than received, it will not be a source that can possibly replace oil as the article seems to suggest until this issue of the salt is remedied.

Saturday, September 8, 2007

Hansenian Discussion - FUTURE OF PAKISTAN

Dear Friends..

It was a moment of joy for me when I saw Dave's mail in the inbox. More than anything I really appreciate his interest in discussing contemporary events. This inspired me to start another strand in the blog "Hansenian Discussion" which will accomodate all view points on a particular subject. To start with let me take it from what Dave has pointed out.


Dave: (8 September 2007)It's getting crazy in the world this summer! So what's your thoughts about Sharif and Bhutto coming back to Pakistan? Sharif gets the anger of the entire Arab world if he goes back, and Bhutto's probably just as corrupt. Gupta was pretty pessimistic when I talked to him the other day. He was telling me he was on National Public Radio that morning citing how Bhutto's husband had chopped down ancient statues from an archaeological site to decorate his pool. All the corruption and tribal warfare makes for yet another argument as a failure to create a national ideal. I dunno if you've read Benedict Anderson's "imagined communities" hypothesis, but I reckon it fits the expected outcome.

Ram: (8 September 2007)


I tend to see the Pakistan issue not from the nationalism point of view. This also stems from the fact that I am not well-versed in Anderson's thesis of 'imagined communities'. I would love to hear more from you and the connection in the Pakistan context.

My understanding says that a post-Musharraf government, led by Sharif, Bhutto or anyone else will run into trouble and that Pakistan is entering another era of uncertainty.

Musharraf had vowed to prevent both Bhutto and Sharif from entering Pakistan again, blaming them for corruption and economic problems that nearly bankrupted the country in the 1990s, when each had two turns as prime minister. But with his support eroding, Musharraf has edged toward an alliance with Bhutto and her moderate Pakistan People's Party so he can be re-elected as a strong civilian president backed by a friendly parliament.

Sharif is opposed to such alliance between Bhutto and Musharaff. Surprisingly, Sharif has pleased his followers by taking a non-compromising stand against General Musharraf and the military establishment. Also, we have to understand that Sharif supporters are mostly from the lower-middle and middle classes who possess immense political energy. They are socially conservative and much closer to religious ideology. Like Sharif himself, they are opposed to modernity and new trends in Pakistani society. Therefore, it is not a coincidence that Sharif has formed an alliance with religious parties and Imran Khan (Former Cricket Player) who, according to some observers, sounded more to the right of Qazi Hussain Ahmad of Jama'at-e Islami.

Enter Bhutto. She not only talks the American talk of "moderation versus extremism"; she heads the largest political party in Pakistan. That is the reason why the Americans are backing the Bhutto-Musharraf rapprochement. ( Sharif had poor relations with Washington when in office in the 1980s — he authorized Pakistan's first nuclear tests in 1998 — and is now aligned with Islamist parties who accuse Musharraf of betraying Pakistan's national interests for turning against the Taliban after the 9/11 attacks.) Also, Bhutto has truly represented the elitist approach by endlessly manoeuvring the situation to ascend to power through a deal.

If any democratic government, led by Sharif or someone else, tries to accommodate the jihadis or their agendas, the US and the West will impose an economic blockade on Pakistan. The World Bank, IMF and all other credit facilitating institutions like the Paris Club or Asian Development Bank will pull the plug on Pakistan. Consequently, the Pakistani economy, addicted to foreign aid and loans, will tumble and the serving government will become highly unpopular.

In any case Pakistan is entering another era of uncertainty. I wish I am wrong in my predictions.

Dave (9 September 2007)
Interesting on Pakistan, so my understanding is Sharif occupies the center-right and Bhutto the center-left. Centrist politics may be a thing to criticize then. What's to stop radicalization of either one of their ideologies given the contstraints in-country?

Whenever I'm analyzing a country, the first thing I ask myself is, "what's missing here?" In Pakistan's case, I'd say a simple answer would be "national unity." Anderson has a constructivist argument about state-formation - states are non-real entities, and modern states are based on nationalism channeled through the collective belief in the nation-state. The "nation" is a large-n group of believers in an "imagined community" which is not synonymous with "country," but there's significant overlap. We think of a nation as just the group of people who
live on a particular piece of territory, and are emotionally tied to the people who use it.

Post-18th century liberalism opened the intellectual space to allow a "nation-state" where these people now have a collective mythologizing of their shared identity. The country gets big enough to get organized.

Ron Suny from University of Chicago gives the example of his people, Armenia, who have thought of themselves as a nation for centuries, but weren't recognized as an independent state till the late industrial era. Their whole history is a history of suspicion of outsiders (mostly of Turks who kicked their asses in 1915), but also pride based on inclusion of multiple religions, particularly as the first early converts to Christianity. So to -be- Armenian means to -be- tied to that strip
of hills in the Sub-Caucausus region, but it also means to accept the language, customs, and history (even if it's not accurate) of those who call themselves Armenians. As time goes on, this constructive mythmaking becomes a force to demand state-hood, to acquire popular political power.

The effectiveness of building that imagined community determines how organized they can get, so if your people lack pride, empathy, or trust in fellow members, your community will be dogged by others and you'll never get it off the ground.

In (West) Pakistan's case, of course they were an invented country after the Brits left the subcontinent up to India in 1945. In this case even the name's made up - -P-unjab, N.W.F.P. (-A-fghania), -K-ashmir, -S-indh, and Baluchi-stan-. They didn't have a chance to create their imagined community based on any uniting identity other than Islam. That was the principle by which the territory was divided, and the foment of the collective mythologizing. Since that point, you're gonna have one leader after another who takes advantage of retelling the "who are we" story in order to direct the country in the direction they want it to go. Whether it's
Shaukat Aziz, G.I. Khan, Bhutto, Sharif, or whomever wants to get their hands on the national unconsciousness.

I'd even go to the extent that there's no -real- Pakistan to fight over, just the ideal of what Pakistan should look like. The hills and trees and rivers of the country aren't going anywhere, they're not really fighting over their existential character, Bhutto and Sharif are fighting Musharraff over principles of leadership and control. Is it going to be a strong Islamic republic with Sharia as it's basic law, is it going to be a moderate secular government with no Islamic law included at all, or something in between? We shall see.

As long as the different tribal groups are going to fight each other for control and domination,or give in to a single party apparatus to reflect and reorganize their preferences on the country, it's never gonna hold together. Going simply by socio-economic status is a bit irrelevant, this case doesn't present itself as a purely class-driven revolt, it's driven by unjust political control at the top. People -look- for injustice, and when they see it go on in the streets of Karachi, they get pissed. It's natural.

The one time where they're unified on something is when it threatens their collective status - their emotionally charged identity as part of the imagined community. This is something like how Israelis deny the existence of Palestine right to the Palestinians faces (and vice versa), there's nothing quicker to turn off a discussion and turn it violent than to deny the other man's very existence as a nationalized entity. Same thing is going on here, Bhutto and Sharif are simply
taking advantage of the disarray of the last few years' alliance with the hamfisted U.S. military messing up Afghanistan next door and creating a huge diaspora problem.

That's why I'm not very worried about economic sanctions, there's not a whole lot the global capitalists of the world need from Pakistan that they can't resource from elsewhere. Indeed, I would principally reject sanctions from the get-go. You recall from Professor Nesbitt's lecture on South Africa - without a just cause they don't work, they just pin the dictator in the corner like an angry dog, and he'll just go on fighting the outside and blaming the outside for all the problems in their country. Right now it would be unclear who we're punishing - the guy we sided
with, the guys with the beards who support him, or the guys who nominally support him but because they hate the bearded guys?

The U.S. and the West lack such credibility in Pakistan or the rest of the world that any attempt to "punish" the leadership for siding with the wrong guy (regardless of whether Bhutto or Sharif wind up being the golden boy/girl), is just arrogant, half-hearted, and stupid. Instead of punishing, the U.S. would have to look to reward good governance with new economic prospects, planning commissions for new power plants, infrastructure improvement, etc.. Course even this will probably wind up making just a few investors rich, and the rest of the country down and out,
but such is the world of today.

So then a big existential question to ask: what do the Pakistanis themselves want? Can they trust bilateral relations with the outside? They've gotten screwed working with other countries before, esp. in the U.S.'s "War on Terruh." Do they want their young workers to be the whipping boys of the Arab oil-sheikhs for the next 50 years? I reckon they'd rather be home doing something constructive. Do they want to be stuck with the system they've got with the crime, violence, and political corruption that's dogged them for years? One would guess that they'd prefer stability and swept streets if it meant giving up a bit of their own ideals about Shari'a law. What's gonna deliver them out of this, merely a good job, or a good sense of who they are as a group? Does Islam offer this, or are they going to have to transcend petty religious sentiments and find higher purposes yet?

Big questions, little time for Pakistan to answer the challenges.

Adam (1o September 2007)

So, the critical question becomes, why does Pakistan lack national unity and what can they do to obtain it? Nationalist sentiments breed a feeling of similarity amongst the populace. Although you can see what dangerous paths these sentiments can take you from Europe in the 1920-40's, it is a necessary bond when in moderation as it dissipates inward pressure. Essentially it is the cement of the building.

Contrary to Anderson's prototype of the Imagined community, A.D. Smith wrote of nations as eternal entities. He believed that men are divided into nations from early times by ethnicity. However this theory fails to account for two things. One, how are new nations created? The United States of America is a separate nation from England. Two, if nations are primordial, what accounts for the discrepancies in their cohesion? This is the question of particular importance in the case of Pakistan.

Benedict Anderson believed that the invention of the printing press was the primary catalyst in the creation of nationalist sentiments. A printed press allows for the easy transmission of thoughts as all those within this same "community" are reading from the same pool of thoughts and thus developing a shared sense of community, or nation. The problem with Pakistan is the largest linguistic group is Punjabi and is spoken by only 48% of the population, so which language are these shared transmission to be written in? Language is a natural barrier to a community as it distinguishes and thus divides. A common religion is not enough to develop nationalistic sentiments as one can see from studying the Arab revolt from the Ottoman Empire.

There is also the issue of immigrants and refugees. Pakistan holds a substantial proportion of persons living within its territories whose primary allegiance lies with another country, notably those who have fled from Afghanistan. Also there are many tribes which have yet to be brought into the political system. The N.W.F.P. is only under the de-jure rule of Pakistan, while de-facto it is in tribal autonomy and actually shares closer allegiances to Afghanistan.

The best way to search for the "missing piece" as Dave put it, is to compare it to the case of India, an obvious choice for its shared descent and multitude of languages. Perhaps Ram could elaborate on why India was successful in building its nationalistic sentiments and how it overcame the divisive nature of having 16 national languages and over 600 in total.

RAM: (17 September 2007)
The discussion on nationalism inspired me very much that I had actually evolved myself reading few important literatures. Two of the most influential recent works on nationalism, by Ernest Gellner and Benedict Anderson identify national consciousness conventionally as the co-extensiveness of politics and culture: an over-riding identification of the individual with a culture that is protected by the state. Both also provide a sociological account of how it was only in the modem era that such a type of consciousness-where people from diverse locales could "imagine" themselves as part of a single community-was made possible.

Gellner presents the following account of this discontinuity. Pre-industrial society is formed of segmentary communities, each isolated from the other, with an inaccessible high culture jealously guarded by a literate ruling elites. With the growth of industrialism, Society requires a skilled literate and mobile work force. The segmentary form of communities is no longer adequate to create a homogenously educated work force in which the individual members are interchangeable. The state comes to be in charge of the nation, and through control of education creates the requisite interchangeability of individuals, The primary identification with segmentary communities is thus transferred to the nation state as the producer of culture. Thus a new type of consciousness, born of an homogenous culture and tied to the state, emerges in a industrial society.

In Anderson's view, nationalist consciousness was made possible with the breakdown of three defining characteristics of pre-modern society: sacred scripts, divine kingship and the conflation of history with cosmology. Together these had made for an unself-conscious coherence in society which broke down with the spread of print media through the engine of the Capitalist market. Print capitalism permitted an unprecedented mode of apprehending time that was "empty" and "homogenous"- expressed in an ability to imagine the simultaneous existence of one's co-nationals. To be sure, many of the characteristics of nationalism evolve historically through a succession of modular types of nationalist movements - one of Anderson's most interesting concepts. But he believes, nonetheless, that nationalisms have a defining systemic unity embodied in the unique type of self-consciousness of the people imagining themselves as one.

Now the question arises as to how do historical groups try to transform a society with multiple representations of political community into a single social totality? This process involves the hardening of social and cultural boundaries around a particular configuration of self in relation to an “Other”. Sociologically, we may think of communities not as well-bounded entities but as possessing various different and mobile boundaries that demarcate different dimensions of life. These boundaries may be either soft or hard. One or more of the cultural practices of a group, such as rituals, language, dialect, music, kinship rules or culinary habits, may be considered soft boundaries if they identify a group but do not prevent the group from sharing and even adopting, self-consciously or not, the practices of another. Groups with soft boundaries between each other are sometimes so unselfconscious about their differences that they do not view mutual boundary breach as a threat and could eventually even amalgamate into one community. An incipient nationality is formed when the perception of the boundaries of community are transformed: when soft boundaries are transformed into hard ones. This happens when a group succeeds in imposing a historical narrative of descent and/or dissent upon both heterogeneous and related cultural practices.

We need to understand that what is novel about modern nationalism is not political self-consciousness, but the world system of nation-states. Over the last century, this system, which sanctions the nation-state as the only legitimate form of polity, has expanded to cover the globe. Externally, the nation-state claims sovereignty within distinct, but not undisputed, territorial boundaries. Internally, the state claims to represent the people of the nation and through this claim, has steadily expanded its role in society, often at the expense of local authority structures. It is important to grasp that the form of the nation-state is sanctioned by a battery of discourses generated from the system as a whole. We have seen how Social Darwinism joined race and History to the nation-state. Later, anti-imperialism and even socialism and Marxism would come to sanction the nation-state. At the same time, these nation-states also have to confront other alternative or historical representations from within the societies they govern.

In India, several models of political community furnished the framework within which the modern nation was contested. We can find these historical conceptions within the motley body of the Indian National Congress itself which emerged in the late 19th century as the representative of Indian nationalism. Thus for instance, the secularist model of Jawaharlal Nehru and Rabindranath Tagore drew upon the idealized conception of the sub-continental empire. Each of the empires in South Asia was built upon the symbols of the classical idea of a universal ruler: Akbar restoring the Hindu idea of a chakravartin in the Persian idea of shahanshah; the British using Mughal ceremonies and language to re-vitalize the imperial state. Thus colonisers and conquerors reinforced a process of political formation whereby communities and regional kingdoms were incorporated (and not subsumed or obliterated) into an ordered heterogeneity.

Nehru may have been the first to narratives a history of the sub-continental empire into what comes to be known as the secular History of India. In his view, what he considered India was the secular unity of different communities and religions, each of which had made distinctive historical contributions. The achievements of Hinduism, for him was merely one of the sources of India's greatness, together with those of Buddhism, the Turkic emperors, traditional science among other sources. For Nehru, the History of India was the most authentic testimony to the capacity of Indians to maintain a "unity among diversity". The high points of Indian history were the reigns of Asoka, the Guptas, Akbar and the great Moghuls all of whom attempted to develop a political framework to unite the cultural diversity of the sub-continent. While in contemporary India this idealized version is countered by a forceful process of state-building, nonetheless, the memory of ordered heterogeneity is perhaps visible in the notion of Indian secularism, which is not so much a strict separation of state and society, as it is the equal support of the state for all religions.

The memory of Brahmanic universalism as the foundation of the new political community, filtered through Orientalist discourses of the 19th century, was appropriated in its split form as universalism and its supplement of closure. Its universal form was articulated by Sri Aurobindo and others and influenced Mohandas Gandhi. Aurobindo emphasized Advaita Hinduism, a radically monistic faith which believes in the unity of all being and denies the reality of the many particular entities in the universe. In this highly abstract system, a communal framework was created to absorb or tolerate heteregenous elements domestically within an essentially Brahmanic universalism. Thinkers like Aurobindo and Gandhi had of course to develop strategies to square the circle: to contain their universalism within their terminal political community of the nation. One such strategy was to devise the Spiritual East/Material West duality whereby India remained the privileged locus as the origin and repository of true (Hindu?) Spirituality.

The supplement to Brahmanic universalism, which in recent times has threatened to overcome this universalism, is the historical memory of the nation-space as Aryavarta whose charter is traced to the medieval political readings of the Ramayana. Hindu nationalism has drawn much attention by its violent mobilization campaigns to recover the site of the alleged birthplace of Rama in Ayodhya from a Muslim shrine which existed there until Hindu nationalists destroyed it in December 1992. The Ayodhya destruction is only the most recent expression of a series of campaigns launched by Hindu nationalists since the end of the 19th century, such as the protection of the cow, the promotion of religious ceremonies to capture public spaces and the take over of other Muslim shrines. These nationalists, like the anti-Manchu revolutionaries in China, foreground atavistic revenge in their narrative of discent. Through this narrative of vengeance, they seek to re-invest local gods, local issues and local conflicts with national meaning. Hindu nationalism has no use for universalism and declares a homogenized Hinduness (Hindutva) to be the sole or privileged criterion for inclusion in the political community of the nation. They thus seek to transform the relative porous boundaries of local communities into an over-arching hard boundary between a national community and its Muslim Other. It is a project that recalls the radical “other”ing.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Hansenian Celebration: TEACHER'S DAY (in INDIA)

(Teacher's Day in India is a tribute to the hard work that is put by the teacher all year long to educate a child. In India, teacher day is celebrated on 5th of September. Indian Teachers Day is dedicated to Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, who was a staunch believer of education and was one of the greatest scholars and teachers of all times, apart from being the President of India. As a tribute to this great teacher, his birthday is observed as Teachers Day in India.)

Teachers mold the lives that they influence. Lessons learned from teachers remain with their students throughout life. Teachers that break down barriers and reach into the souls of the students that they are responsible for do not get the recognition or gratitude they have earned. Many teachers are exhausted from their workload and responsibilities. Teachers need encouragement and support from the community to feel that their devotion to students is appreciated.

If you ever have come across one teacher in all your student life, which has changed your life and your way of thinking for the better, you have been blessed. Thankfully I have had several such opportunities. Right from pre-primary school right up to the University, I have benefited from teachers who have gone beyond their call of duty, to mould me and my fellow students into better human beings, first and foremost, and then to instill in us a sense of purpose for life, that at a young age seems all too ambiguous.

These teachers went above the regular lectures, exams; viva’s and juries, and made me realize that education is something much more than what is contained in the printed text book.

I consider education to be one of the nobler professions, akin to medicine. Teachers, who spend their lives teaching kids, do more than just teach. They help mould the future of our communities, cities and countries.

I shall forever be thankful to all those wonderful teachers, who have enriched my life. To name a few would not be fair, because there are too many to name. And this is a day about all the teachers who have worked silently, under great stress and pressure to produce responsible and capable citizens of this world.