The Conspiracy Theory

C'mon Pavo, don't hold a grudge against Iqbal for accepting the knighthood. But he was also badmouthing the 'Farang' all the time. Wasn't he?

Lapak kar jhapatna, jhapat kar palatna
Lahu garm rakhney ka hai ik bahana

Isn't that what the tribals do?

Afghaniyon ki ghairat-e-deen ka hai ik ilaaj
Mullah ko inn key koh-o-daman sey nikaal dau

So Sir?

#93 Posted by pavocavalry on December 9, 2007 12:15:33 pm


In surprise attack time and space matters.


Not when you have stealth bombers based in the US that can fly bombing missions to any part of the world.


With these bases flying time to various future targets has been substantially reduced.


What future targets?


This is a matter of precision target attacks and gunnery.


Gunnery?

#112 Posted by pavocavalry,

Thanks but you signed your post as a lowly major from St Mary's. SIR, you don't have to sign it like that for ME.

BTW mine was the St. Mary's in Lahore next to the mini market, Gulberg ... you know .. the doongi ground walla (wink)!

Re: # 114:-- Sir , with all due respect , Stealth is no substitute for other attack aircrafts.I suggest that you discuss this with an airforce officer.

wih respect

Lowly Major

Re: # 115:-- OK sir ! I will not use the title " LOWLY MAJOR" bestowed upon me by His Great Highness High Ranking Most Esteemed HP.

kind regards

Agha

Re: # 113:-- This was idealism from safety of Lahore.But 100 marks to Iqbal.My knowledge of poetry is limited sir.

kind regards

Agha

Re: # 114:-- 90 % of US attacks on Waziristan were launched by air assets other than Stealth.

with respect

Agha

#119 Posted by pavocavalry,

But was there anything other than joystick controlled predators?

pavocavalry:

IMHO, the Congress was and is elitist, except for an interim period when it was hit by an exogenous shock called M.K.Gandhi. He (knowingly or unknowingly) did the following:
1. Politicized a sizeable proportion of the masses. It included rural masses too, and here I disagree with HP and Jang. This was to a large extent due to his initial Champaran emphasis.
2. He brought an amount of "pride" back. It was all right to be "unwashed", and being a "brown sahib" was not necessary.
3. Due to 1 and 2, he had to bring in indegenous "chauvanists", "casteists" and "fundamentalists" into the political process, for these were the "institutions" which influenced us then and do so even now.
4. A "good" effect of this was that, at least in India, they could not be ignored. They have to be, and perhaps to an extent are, dealt with politically. So after a long period of "pseudo goody-goody" we had the "Hindu fundamentalists" come to power. "Dalit fundamentalism" and "Muslim fundamentalism" are flexing their political power in a reasonable democratic framework. "Chauvanists" came to power in Maharashtra, Punjab, Assam, Mizoram etc. All had to compromise and are still at it. Hopefully the process continues.

I hope the same happens in Pakistan. But the army - "brown sahib" nexus has to be TOTALLY destroyed. You need a paan chewing/spitting ugly guy as your next foreign minister who can negotiate with their Indian counterparts like Laloo and Mayawati.

Regards and have enjoyed reading your write-ups. Will do so more carefully when I have time.

Pavo by the way means a turkey in Spanish ;-)

#118 Posted by pavocavalry

This was idealism from safety of Lahore.

Again true. But Marx never fought alongside Che or Mao or Ho Chi Minh as well.

Zee:

"But Marx never fought ....". Depends on what you mean by "fight" .... he was much more of a fighter than Iqbal :-)
Cheers! How have you been?

#124 Posted by GT,

Oh I've been fine. And you?

Well, Pavo is a soldier, so he wants Iqbal to have fought with guns instead of accepting the knighthood. But he also says in his article on Waziristan that the tribals know how to use extortion with the occupiers pretending to be collaborators while at the same time sniping at them.

Perhaps Iqbal was doing just that.

GT, good points, but just to think in a contrarian manner, I have always wondered if basic differences between the leaders and the led tend to be sometimes overstated. For instance, it is hard to imagine a Gandhi becoming so powerful among the Muslims (so frontier gandhi met his just ends), or a Jinnah among the Hindus (although many hope one arises soon and gains similar levels of power).

As an unrelated random statement, elitism may be as much a property and a characteristic of entire groups as of some members of groups....That is, groups may exist that actually celebrate elitism for its own sake (brahminism could be one one such philosophy and its believers one such group. Iqbal's idea that people should be weighed not counted too comes to mind.).

zee, iqbal seems to be the ultimate fighter. I mean, the man openly called for fighting the infidels with their own tools and weapons, virtually destroying them in their own homes!! - a call that did not go unheeded.

#125 Posted by zeemax:

Been a bit busy of late, but fine. Yes, perhaps Iqbal was doing just that ... who knows?
Pavocavalry's main point seems to be that you cannot defeat the Pathans militarily. But the bigger issue is that why should there be a "need" to defeat. We, India and Pakistan, need to go a long way before understanding this. But, by then, who knows what will survive?
Regards.

#126 Posted by Eklavya

Kaal, long time no see. I believe that "good" leaders have to (not always) work inspite of there being "basic Differences" if any. That is just my POV and I know that there are a lot of counterexamples, at least in India.

"..elitism may be as much a property and a characteristic of entire groups as of some members of groups..." I have always been fascinated by this hypothesis. In a trivial sense, it can explain mundane matters like fashion cycles etc. Try reading a guy called Veblen if you care. Please do not ask me to explain or write an abstract :-)