The war in Afghanistan is getting uglier by the day and NATO casualities are mounting. The US forces are finding the job of fighting in Afghanistan so difficult that the policy makers in US are slowly becoming aware of ther folly of supporting the mujahudeen against the Soviets. The insurgency is becoming more sophisticated and the Taliban are learning the lessons from Iraq very well. If domestic support for the war evaporates upon mounting casualities then US and NATO troops will withdraw. In ...
I am extremely familiar with the work of Professor Henry Lois Gates jr and have the greatest regard for his scholarship and academic attainments. Having said that, I must however say, that he comes off very poorly in the incident that is causing such an uproar all over the world. Professor Gates was known to President Obama right from his Harvard days and so he can be forgiven for "wading in" where mightier hearts fear to tread. Dr Henry Lous Gates front door was stuck and he tried to ente...
The news that broke this was scocking as it was unbelievable: Michael Jackson was dead. Jackson had a very troubled life, but his incredible talent cannot be denied. He pushed himself hard and rewrote the grammar of pop culture almost single handed. His music with its signature jerky movements of the hips and torso became widely imitated all over the world. It will be no exageration to say that Michael Jackson was the most widely recognised cultural icon from the USA and he had a world wid...
If Iraq was George W. Bush's war, the Afghanistan war is surely Barack Hussein Obama's. Richard Holbroke is a well regarded diplomat, but he seems to have run out of ideas and in the process Obama and Holbroke have got the region enbroiled in a major war and the world does not seem to notice. Using Diego Garcia as a base from where war materiel is being ferried to Kandhahar in chartered Russian planes, the US war effort in Afghanistan stands poised for, yes, the infamous word once again, surg...
I like animal stories: I count Animal Farm and Wind in the Willows as my favorite books read. I do not find the time to read novels and the only ones I get to read are the ones everyone's talking about like Dan Drown's Angels and Demons.I found a book the other day which was utterly enjoyable, a debut novel by Sam Savage. Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife is the story of a rat with a highly evolved intelligence and sense of being. Writeen from the perspective of a rat, ...
The venue was carefully chosen and the words well crafted as well as only Barack Hussein Obama can. The US President's speech at the University of Cario will go down in history as the speech that marked the end of an era of hostility in the Middle East and is as important for peace in the region as the Fullton speech of Sir Winston Churchill was in staring the Cold War. If peace could be achieved by making pretty speeches there would be no need for statecraft and dipplomacy. Afterall Thucydides...
The death of Vellupillai Prabhakaran in the jungles of Northern Sri Lanka, apparently in combat, has raised a number of questuions that beg to be answered. The Sri Lankan Army under the leadership of General Fonsekha launched a highly successful military camapign against the LTTE forcing it to retreat to the narrow coastal strip of Karayammullaikkaval, a mangrover swamp. The LTTE took with them nearly 250,000 civillians to act as human shield; they counted on the...
The military victory announced by the President of Sri Lanka over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam marks the end of 25 years of one of the most brutal and ruthless insurgent movements of the 20th century. Unfortunately many of the western powers such as UK, the EU, even USA before 9/11 identified the LTTE as a genuine liberation movement and extended both political and diplomatic support. The large Tamil diaspora spread out all over the world, in its shortsighted pursuit of identity p...
Exactly 10 years after the horrific massacre at Columbine High in Colorado, the country must question itself over the unristricted access to guns and firearms of various kind. It is no use saying that the citizens have a constitutional right to bear arms, as the Bill of Rights lays down thwe condition in a "national militia". Therefore the founding fathers of the US Constitution did not envisage a situation in which a gun culture would emerge and flourish in the USA. Since that incident there h...
The recent speech by the President of the USA, Barack Obama, at George Town University has rightly been billed as a "major speech". Without the economy in this state of utter chaos it is quite conceivable that Obama would not have made iot ti the White House and he has the mandate to take stringent steps to kick start the economy. He has stresswed that the regulatory framework had not quite done its job and hence the very institutions that shouls have prevented the sub-prime crisis started beha...
As I had warned often in the past, the Bush Administration pursued a self-defeating policy in Pakistan when it forced General Parvez Musharaf to yield to the so-called forces of democracy headed by Benazir Bhutto. Her tragic death opened the door for her husband the notorious 10% man to become President of Pakistan. This man neither has the education not the stature to head a country in crisis, and the first thing he did was to appont a non-entity Mr Ghilani as PM overlooking the claims of Mr ...
Many of JoeUser regulars would know that I have a serious eue condition. A tear in the retina along with a related problem. Tomorrow I enter the hospital for the surgery and will be off line till I recover. I have been postponing the surgery for mothe past year for one on the other reason and I have now reached a situation that brooks no further delay. I will start blogging probably after a month. Thanks .
Like the rest of the world, I too sat up late watching a moment when History is made right before our eyes: The installation of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the USA. The crowds that swept into Washington DC to watch the first African-American take the "sacred oath" as Obama put it, was unprecedented. The music that was strummed up for the occasion was a blend of blues, country, jazz and rock: a mixture that will appeal to all ages. First of all, Obama slipped in taking the oath. H...
In today's world there is little sympathy for political struggles whose primary weapon is unmitigated and wanton attacks on civillians. In fact Islamic terrorism has undermined the sympathy many once had for the Palestenians and their dispalcement from Arab lands and even here one may probably make out a strong case that the Arab governments were as guilty as any other power. The breakdown of the cease fire was heralded by the rocket attacks from Gaza on Israeli civiliian targets. The HAM...
9/11 changed US perception of the world forever. Nolonger does the US see the world in terms of our "freedom fighters" versus their "terrorists". During the days of Ronald Reagan, the contras were viewed as terrorists by the rest of the world but the US saw them as freedom fighters. During the same period the US along with its western allies aided and encouragred by the Arab world set training camps all over Pakistan and the tribal areas abutting Afghanistan to train Islamic terrorists who were ...