What Constitutes Blasphemy?

re fairdinkum

``Let us not forget that US doesn`t have a better human rights record than rest of the world.``

I`ll let that pass. I think I distinctly remember all the Americans in the `60s and `70s and `80s trying to escape to the Soviet Union and Iraq and Pakistan for search of better human rights:):)

Pal, that aside, have a safe trip back and enjoy your visit. Tell my favorite city I miss her! God never created a more vibrant and vivacious city than the pearl by the Arabian Sea. Good luck and bon voyage my friend!

re bahmad

Bilal Sahib,

Your calm and cultured response always leaves me feeling inferior. It is hard to argue with that. I try to differentiate the guys who are fundamentally good from those who are fundamentally evil. Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi are in the latter category. For all the suffering of the people of Iraq, I wonder if somebody ever asked Saddam Hussein to sell his billion dollar palaces and feed his people? Or is it easier to just criticise Anglo-American policy?

Pardesi #732
Thanks.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/529367.asp

``...In 1986, Ehsan volunteered for service in Afghanistan. There he fought the Soviet invaders alongside the Islamic mujahedin-a cause encouraged and aided by the United States. Now, to Ehsan and his supporters, the struggle against Indian control of predominantly Muslim Kashmir is more of the same. ``What is the difference between the jihad in Afghanistan and the jihad in Kashmir?`` asks Hafiz Saeed, head of the Lashkar-i-Taiba, one of the largest groups fighting in Kashmir. ``That was for freedom, and this is for freedom.`` Ejaz Haidar, a Pakistani journalist who is no friend of the guerrillas, asks: ``If America can use jihadis for their own cold-war purposes in Afghanistan, then what`s wrong with an Islamic state using them for its own purposes in Kashmir?``... ``


My question to resp Mr Ejaz Haider `` If America could get Pakistanis to shoot themselves in the foot, whats wrong with Pakistanis deciding on their own to shoot themselves in their heads?``

And why would such specious simplistic illogic be acceptable to nonPakistanis, esp India?

Sadhana

sattar2 #706

You write ``In post #703 you stated that considering a hadith to be true if it is consistent with Quran, does not logically follow. I am not sure if I understand you correctly...``

To make this point clear, let me provide an example: A map that we believe to be true says that there is a city beyond the river bend. Only a person who does not believe that the map is true will then look around for other maps for help. A person would have to be somewhat confused as well as non-believing if he looks at these other maps when the authenticity of the other maps is certainly not confirmed as that of true map. Furthermore, only a person who is totally irrational will bother with these other maps when they also happen to be contradictory and sometimes even an affront to common decency. Or else these people are trying to over-ride the Quran for their personal reasons. I hope this makes my point clear.

Thanks and regards.

There are 4-5 articles on Pakistan, Jihad and the holy warriors in Newsweek (19th Feb.).

http://www.msnbc.com/news/529382.asp

Some excerpts:

“Bin Laden operates more like a venture capitalist than the head of a conquering army. Think of him as the chairman of Jihad Inc., together with its subsidiary, Jihad.com.”

“For many Islamic extremists, their main obstacle is the lone superpower: America the Evil Empire. “The Muslims have global thoughts just as much as Americans,” says Maj. Ehsan ul-Haq, an ex-officer of the Pakistani Army who trained with U.S. Green Berets, and who is now a commander in the Muslim jihad in Kashmir. “There’s the American New World Order, and this world order,” he says, putting his hand on the Qur’an. “The whole of the globe belongs to Allah, and the whole of [Allah’s] law has to be executed on the globe.”

“When a shahid dies, the body smells very sweet,” says Ehsan. “And insects don’t eat the body, as they normally do in death.” Attacking the position on the other side of the minefield, Ehsan’s men put the enemy to rout—aided, he claims, by angels in white gowns riding on horseback in the air. In both Afghanistan and Kashmir, he insists, “I have seen corpses where the heads were chopped off—not by man, but by angels.”

“The military has so far refused to crack down on such strident Islamist groups. One reason is that there are so many believers within its own ranks. The entire top leadership of Tanzeemul Ikhwan is drawn from retired senior Army officers, and hundreds of current officers and soldiers attend its ideological training sessions. “Pakistani Army soldiers have always been religious, but now growing numbers of officers have turned Islamist,” says Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul, former head of the Inter-Service Intelligence, the secretive military group that is Pakistan’s government within the government. Gul, now closely aligned with Islamist groups, advocates a “soft Islamic revolution.”

fairdinkum,

To do what the heart says and not necessarily what the mind says is the most courageous act. I have many times felt i should go back to my country. May be i will,someday.Meanwhile,my best wishes to you.

rsridhar

fairdinkum #728
All the best to you and keep in touch :)

Sadhana

I will be away from chowk for a month (at least)... flying back to Pak today... taking a year off from work... will reassess everything in my life, reflect on last 11 years in the land downunder and then make my next move... some say I am not going to last a year in Karachi.. well, i have taken up the challenge... lets see what happens... will keep you guys posted on my adventures in the land of the pure!

See ya!

Re: US & George W

Well, I see several hardcore US supporters here :)
It is not whether rest of the world including some European countries such as France are white lillies... of course they are not... but they don`t lecture the rest of the world on ``human rights`` or on ``morality`` as shamelessly as US does. the purpose of highlighting vietnam (mai li massacre etc.), bay of pigs (cuba), Japan (Hiroshima & Nagasaki), Afghanistan (drugs and arms business, osama bin laden, talibans, millions of drug addicts in pakistan, support for zia ul haq), Israel (total reversal of US human rights standards applied to rest of the world outside Israel) are only a few examples of US excesses/crimes against humanity.

Let us not forget that US doesn`t have a better human rights record than rest of the world. They only pretend that they do and that is what we are discussing here.

As for George W... Yale... and Harvard, anyone who has money and connections (and please don`t give me BS about ``it doesn`t happen in US``) can get into those institutions... its immaterial whether i or anyone else attended those Unviersities or not... I don`t think Alber Ian Stein attneded those Universities either... he may have taught at prestigious universities, but he didn`t get his education at Ivy league unis...not before he became famous anyway... Bottom line, George W is an idiot and nothing can change that...! our friend sigalph has made a cheap and quite ``Jahilana`` assertion in this regard...but i forgvie him (on this occasion)... he is only a young chap... :)

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/19/world/19PAKI.html
Pakistani Journalists May Face Death for Publishing Letter

By BARRY BEARAK

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Feb. 18 - That calamitous night, the editor left in charge of the newspaper`s letters page was a heroin addict, just a few days out of detox.

As he recalls it now, his prescribed sedatives were proving no match for his cravings. When a long letter to the editor arrived via e-mail, he barely read past the title, which seemed to him harmless enough: ``Why Muslims Hate Jews.``

Pakistan is a Muslim country. ``I thought if the letter was negative to anyone, it`d be negative to Jews,`` the editor, Munawwar Mohsin, said by way of alibi, looking thoroughly woebegone and sitting in Peshawar`s central jail. He had put the letter at the top of the section.

This careless editing may now prove his fatal undoing, for Mr. Mohsin and six of his colleagues at The Frontier Post have been charged under the nation`s blasphemy law, which can carry the death sentence. The wordy letter, published on Jan. 29, turned out to be a sacrilegious attack on the holy Prophet Muhammad. A furious mob was soon on its way to the newspaper`s offices, with outraged policemen not far behind.

The authorities immediately shut down the paper, whose nervous management then bought ad space in the pages of its rivals to make abject apology. The amends claimed that the English-language Frontier Post was itself the victim of some unspecified conspiracy. ``We appeal to the nation to stand by us in this hour of adversity and sympathize with us,`` the ad said.

But piety, and not pity, was the prevailing sentiment here in Peshawar, a city of one million people that sits to the east of the Khyber Pass near the border with Afghanistan. Leaders of fundamentalist political parties urged dramatic displays of dismay. On Jan. 30, as outnumbered policemen looked on, protesters torched the Frontier Post`s printing press, with piles of unsold newspapers serving as fodder for the fire.

At this juncture, the nation`s military ruler, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, made public his own consternation, though it did not include any condemnation of the mob. His disapproval focused on the abuse of ``press freedom`` that had allowed the blasphemous letter into print.

To many of his critics, his response seemed indicative of the general`s inability or unwillingness to take on the Islamic fundamentalists - and yet another portent of the nation`s drift toward religious intolerance.

Pakistan, with 150 million people, is a near-bankrupt country with a nuclear arsenal and explosive problems. In October 1999, the army seized power in a coup, and General Musharraf declared himself the steward of a modern and tolerant state. He promised social reforms, but whenever he has met opposition from the fundamentalists, he has backed down.

Indeed, in April the general tried to modify the blasphemy law, which, according to civil rights groups, is often used in personal vendettas and the persecution of minorities. The proposal was modest, urging more investigation before charges are filed; nonetheless, when fundamentalists objected, it was discarded.

By any standard, the letter in The Frontier Post of Jan. 29 was blasphemous. Mr. Mohsin, the heroin addict, finally got around to reading it in the morning. He was at home, he said. A colleague phoned to alert him about angry calls to the newspaper.

The frightened editor then allowed his eyes to roam beyond the opening lines. He was appalled. The writer, who used the single name BenDZac, portrayed Muhammad as a liar, a murderer, an anti-Semite, a ``nazi`` and a male chauvinist with a formidable libido.

Such heresy rarely sees the printed page in Pakistan. The style of The Frontier Post, like that of other newspapers, was never even to mention the Holy Prophet without parenthetically adding the reverent phrase ``peace be upon him.``

``As a Muslim, I could never think of abusing our Holy Prophet,`` said Mr. Mohsin, 40, a slightly built man who has bounced between newspaper jobs while also caroming in and out of occasional drug rehabilitation.

The jailers have shaved his head, as is routinely done to drug addicts, of which this country has an abundance. The United Nations estimates Pakistan`s heroin population at 1.5 million, perhaps the world`s largest.

``I was craving that night,`` Mr. Mohsin said, pleading for understanding. ``I`m only a human being. I make errors. And think of the conditions I was working under.`` The Frontier Post, once well-respected, already had fallen on hard times. Its owner, Rehmat Shah Afridi, is in prison on charges of drug trafficking. The staff had gone unpaid for two months.

Imtiaz Hussain, the paper`s chief reporter, said the number of workers in the newsroom had fallen to about 8 or 10 from 28. On Jan. 29, he had attended a news conference about the plight of Afghan refugees. He was unaware of the offensive letter. When he came to the office, he found the police in the entryway.

``I was asked, `What is your position here?` `` he recalled. ``I said, `chief reporter.` They said, `All right, you have to come with us.` ``

The police were unacquainted with newspaper operations, so they threw a big net to make sure none of the guilty got away. Arrested along with Mr. Hussain and Mr. Mohsin were The Frontier Post`s news editor, the man who operated the computer system, a 76-year-old feature writer and a guest who had picked an unfortunate time to visit.

``It is my bad luck that my designation contains the word editor,`` said Aftab Ahmad, the news editor. ``I told them a news editor deals with news, not letters. They did not understand anything. What is e-mail? What is the Internet? What is a server? What makes up a page? They were unfamiliar with any of these things.``

Some sorting out did get done, and the guest managed to be released. But the others were all charged under the blasphemy law, as were the newspaper`s managing editor and a teacher who writes an occasional editorial from the city of Lahore. Those final two suspects were not present when the arrests were made. They have since fled.

``I am a practicing Muslim,`` said Mr. Ahmad, 34, who was sitting beside Mr. Mohsin in jail. ``Nobody in their right mind would knowingly publish things so sacrilegious. In the first place, it is against our faith. In the second place, I have a family, two little daughters. Why would I intentionally ruin all our lives?``

Peshawar has a large press contingent, and those reporters seem to have convinced the authorities and many of the mullahs that not all of those arrested bear responsibility for the letter. The chief reporter, the feature writer and the computer operator have been freed on bail, though the charges against them stand as investigation continues.

``Yes, we have received the information that the letter was printed by mistake,`` said Dr. Murad Ali Shah, a spokesman for the Jamaat-i-Islami political party, which governs Peshawar. ``But some mistakes are deliberate. Yes, there was a drug addict overseeing the letters. But you must ask yourself: why was this particular man placed in charge on this particular night?``

He said he suspects a conspiracy by Americans, specifically American Jews. ``The Americans have done many such things, expressing themselves with such hatred,`` he said, adopting a popular line of reasoning. ``Most anything bad that happens, prices going up, whatever, this can usually be attributed to the I.M.F. and the World Bank, which are synonymous with the United States. And who controls the United States? The Jews do.``

In the Pakistani press, the unknown blasphemer BenDZac has usually been presumed to be ``a Jew.`` Indeed, in a spare exchange of e-mail messages with The Times, BenDZac strongly suggested he is Jewish and said he hoped his letter would prompt some Muslim soul- searching about their ``hate for Jews and Israel.`` He allowed that recent violence in Jerusalem may have somewhat overheated his sentiments and that perhaps ``I should have chosen my words more carefully.``

Mr. Mohsin would surely agree. He now believes cyberspace is a launching pad for anonymous hate-mongers. As a heroin addict, he was a slack defender, and he despises himself for it, he said sullenly.

And yet, as one of the jail house guards was about to pull him away, he added one more plea. Though he might appear depressed, he continued to have faith, he said softly. ``I believe in Allah,`` he said. ``He knows I did not do this thing intentionally. He will be a fair judge, and he is almighty.``

krashid:

RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTIONS WANTED FOR MR KRASHID

Dear krashid

aoa

I tried to answer ur questions but u did not want any answers. You fired one question after another.

Unfortunately I do not have the time or inclination to give any religious inst.

I am listing more than 20 questions which u asked.

Now does this list show ur interest in a dialogue or something else?

1.If Shariat and Islamic laws are final, why even collection of Zakaat is controversial among Muslims. Why there is Khums in Shias etc.

2. Instead of hiding behind Mowdudi and Khursheed Ahmed who were themselves hiding behind other people. Can you give answer to this question.

3. As far as Rijm is concerned what is the prescibed punishment for slave for adultery in Koran. If you can answer this million dollar question, I will say I accept your version.

- Bhai Adnan Albadr-ie or Al-Shams-iye Hain.

- Islam Ke Naam Pur Sharabion, Zaanion or Smugglaron Ke Saath Mil Kur Awaam Ke Qatle-Aam Ko Sawab-e- Dareen Hasil Karne Ka Zariya. or Raza-e-Ilahi Ka Husool Samajhte Hain.

- Karachi University Mein Khawateen Ko Shalwarein Utarwane Ki Dhamki Ka Sawab Hajj Se Ziada Samjhte Hain. Aur Qatiloon Ki Rahai Ke Liye Tehrik Chalane Ko Momin Ki Meraj. (Waisey Yehi Naam Un Ke Nazim-e-Aala Ka Bhi Hai).

- Sheikhul-islam Wale Doosre Log Hein.

Do you think it is name calling?

So let me put it in a milder way.

4. Why Jamat-e-Islami was a partner in genocide of Bengalis. Why did they support rapes, murders and torture of Bengali Muslims at the hands of rapist, smugglers etc. What has islam to do with it.

5- Why did Jamiat workers in Karachi Univerisity openly threatened women of opposition party to take their clothes of if they continue with their political activities.

6- Why did Jamat-e-Islami and Jamiat ran a movement to acquit Saif-ud-din the Nazim of Jamiat in Karachi of murder charges. Is it Islamic to acquit a person with murder charges through street demonstration. (And if you don`t know Saif-ud-din let me know).

So can you answer these questions.

Or does it still falls into name calling.

7. You said that Islamic Laws are final. But there is only difference in detail. On Khums I don`t see that. What difference in detial are you talking about. It is like saying Shia believe in God and we don`t believe but still there is difference in detail.

8. How do you explain ``Mut`aa``. Does it mean that prophet PBUH sometimes acted against the laws of Islam to appease people.

9.You know of prophet`s saying that that ``Don`t write his Hadith``. And that is why Hadith were written many decades after the death of Prophet PBUH. In view of this what punishment would you suggest for slave.

10. You know it is half of a free person and for free person it is clear. Were there any circumstances which led prophet PBUH to apply the law of Rijm.

11. The authentic version of last sermon of prophet PBUH only mentions that prophet PBUH is leaving behind Quran (and no mention of Hadith), Did you have time to read Hadiths yourself or you directly read Mowdudi. It will be a good exercise to read it yourself to come out of your thoughts.

12-I asked you why did you support genocide of Bengalis at the hands of Drunkards, rapists and smugglers in 1970.You did not give the answer 2- Your point is well taken, that men makes mistakes regarding terrorizing and threatening opposition party women. But why mistakes done by Jamati`s are Islamic and mistakes done by common man is Un-Islamic.

- Your point of justice system is also well taken. But why only Saif-ddin is to be acquitted because of this.

-You flunked one million dollar question.

-Now a two million dollar question for you.

13. You believe in Hadith. You also believe in Hadith narrated by Aisha RZAH.

14.Does it say anywhere in Quran or Hadith and its Islamic interpretation that evidence of two women is equal to one man except Hadrat Aisha RZAH.

15. Or you don`t believe in Hadith narrated by Aisha RZAH or you don`t believe it in the category of evidence.

-Thanks for quoting the verse. I am well aware of it.

-It is very clearcut. In business transactions.

16.What is the Islamic law of evidence.

17. For example why the evidence of two women is equal to one man not in business transactions but in all evidences. Can you quote an Ayah to that effect.

18. If you believe this Ayah to be related to business transaction only, that is what most so called liberals are saying.

19. Can you proclaim this statement of yours clearly and does it contradict with Hadith and Fiqh you believe in.

- The problem with you guys are that you think nobody has read Quran or Hadith. To assure you you might have wasted your energy by reading Mowdudi`s and Khursheed Ahmed`s book.

- Anyway you are saying that you accept Hadith by Ayesha RZAH because evidence of men and women are equal except in business transaction. Did I get your point

20. In your list of tyrant, you mentined Ayub Khan and Bhutto.

21. You clearly skipped Yahya Khan if you are covering the period from Ayub to Bhutto.

22. Does it mean that Jamat still believes Yahya Khan as Mard-e-Momin or that award given to him by Jamat-e-Islami is no longer valid.

-Bhai Apni Hi Bolte Rahe Go. Kabhi To Sawal Ka Jawab De Diya Karo.

-Aur Apne Islam Ki idhar Ziada Na Choro. Sub disco jamation ko acchi tarah jante hain.

-Tumhare Islam Ko to Binnori Town Mein Bhi Koi Nahin Poochta.

-Pehle Apnaa Islamic credential Le Kur Aao. Phir Baat Karo. Varna Ek Ram Doosra Rahim Kehta Hai. Kartoot Dono Ke Eik Hain.

-Does speaking in a derogatory tone makes you more Muslim or your point more valid.

-I asked you a simple question.

- Do you believe in Hadith of Aisha RZAH?

Then I asked you how you can accept an evidence of a woman without corroboration with another woman or man?

-You presented the Ayah regarding evidence is related to business transaction.

I ACCEPTED IT.(sic)

- Then I asked you. Does it contradict with the Fiqh you believe in.

- You are saying I am using circular logic.

- No my friend. See mirror. You are saying that law of evidence need to applied on every (fuc--) Muslim woman, but not on Aishah RZAH

In response to Fuzair (Reply # 721)
Dear Fuzair:

I want to draw your attention toward Sumanta Bose’s “The Challenge in Kashmir: Democracy, Self-Determination and a Just Peace (1997). This book is based on Bose’s Ph.D. dissertation at Columbia University.

Bose has made five main arguments:

First, that Kashmiri secessionism, which erupted into a violent insurgent movement in 1989, was prompted very largely by India`s denial of democracy to the people of Kashmir. He maintains that the secessionist urge ``can be explained ... by one factor alone: the Indian state`s consistent policy of denying democracy``.

Second, the repressive counterinsurgency practices of Indian security forces in Kashmir, including such things as routine cordon-and-search operations, arbitrary detention of thousands of youths, extended curfews in major towns and cities, looting, rape and torture, far from being aberrations ``are integral components, or at least inevitable extensions, of a systematic policy.``

Third, Pakistan`s intervention in Kashmir, ``dogmatically irredentist`` and ``virulently communal`` in content, has seriously alienated the Kashmiris, who are now unambiguously and unequivocally committed to independence from both India and Pakistan.

Fourth, the Kashmiri separatist movement, while obviously dependent on ``a deeply-felt collective Muslim identity,`` is essentially noncommunal in inspiration. Bose insists that it is not at all a product of an underlying Hindu-Muslim animosity.

Fifth, the solution to the Kashmir imbroglio has to be sought, at one level, in the renewal of Indian democracy and, at another level, in the ``skillful renegotiation and complex redefinition of the concept and practice of state-sovereignty in South Asia.” In practical terms, he endorses strengthened autonomy for Kashmir within the Indian Union.

Sincerely, Bilal Ahmad

P.S. Another recent source of information of Jammu and Kashmir is Victoria Schofield’s “Kashmir in Conflict” (2000).

In response to Fuzair (Reply # 721)
Dear Fuzair:

Your conclusion that I (in some way) was engaged in US-bashing is based upon an inadequate reading of what I had argued. You may need to see my Reply # 708 in response to Reply # 704. I was reacting to a point made concerning the US`s capacity to destroy places. Yes the US has a capacity to annihilated both land and people, but the actual use of such a force often comes with direct and/or indirect consequences/costs. In your reply, you have also hinted at this point.

Sincerely, Bilal Ahmad

Eklavya #719
Our neighbour`s involvement in the Northeast is another example.
http://www.rediff.com/news/2001/jan/22inter.htm

Re: Eklayva #719

I thought that virtually every unbiased observer (i.e., most non-Indians and non-Pakistanis) were of the opinion that the Kashmir insurgency was started in 1989 by the Kashmiris themselves and was then taken over by the Muslim extremist groups (including unemployed Afghan mujahideen and Kashmiris trained by them) and the Pakistanis. Indian brutality and sheer force of numbers had beaten the indigenous Kashmiri unsurgents but was/is not able to do the same to the new guerillas.

To use Prof. Bilal`s analogy, the Kashmiri people are the wheat that is being ground between the upper and lower millstones of the brutal Indian military occupation forces and the equally (if not more) brutal Pakistani-backed insurgents. The start of it was hardly Pakistan`s doing but the continuation of it certainly is. The Indians refuse to acknowledge that there is any indigenous Kashmiri element to the insurgency and the Pakistanis refuse to accept the fact that if it wasn`t for them, it would be long over by now. The dead don`t fight wars and, God knows, the Indian Army has killed enough Kashmiris. At the risk of further incurring Sigalph`s wrath, there are some, but not too many, similarities between E. Pakistan in 1971 and Kashmir now: in both cases the indigenous portion of the insurgency was crushed by extremely brutal government repression but the situation was not `resolved` since external forces kept it alive. This is the exact opposite of what happened to the Sikhs in the Punjab. Gen. Zia--contrary to Indian propaganda--did not support the Sikhs militarily but provided only moral support. Without a secure base and government assistance, the Sikh insurgency was quite brutally and quite easily crushed in a few years.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Re: Ahmadb #720

Yes, the Iraqi people are certainly suffering but this is because the US decided to not topple Saddam Hussein in 1991 as they were afraid of the power vacuum left behind and of Iran becoming more powerful in the region. It was a grave miscalculation and the Iraqi people are certainly paying the price for it (including the brutality with which the Shatt Arabs and Kurds were crushed). That having been said, one must also point out that if the Iraqi government cared one iota for its people, the UN`s oil-for-food program would have been used much more effectively by Hussein`s government to greatly alleviate its people`s suffering. The fact that it hasn`t done so is proof of the government`s willingness to use its people as pawns. You don`t see any of Hussein`s umpteen palaces being turned over for use as nursing homes, do you?

True humanitarianism would be for the US to remove sanctions against Iraq, let the Hussein regime declare its victory and save the Iraqi people from more suffering. While the US foreign policy is not `moral,`being motivated by US interests and domestic pressure groups, it still tries, every now and then, usually after trying everything to avoid it, to actually live up to its principles. This is more than can be said of virtually any other country in the world (bar the Scandinavians maybe but they have no national interest to defend). There is certainly a European intellectual hatred of the US, led by French poseurs, that reflexively condemns everything American but they have no legitimacy or moral authority since their arguments are very rarely based on morality but usually on hatred of capitalism/globablism.

Everyone always brings up Nagasaki/Hiroshima and Vietnam when raking the US over the coals. As far as bombing the Japanese goes, it was a legitimate use of weapons in war. No one in positons of power then realized exactly what kind of weapons these were and, in any case, the Japanese refused to surrender and Operation Olympic, the US invasion of Japan, would have resulted in over 100,000 US casualties in the first few days alone and who knows how many in the complete pacification of the Japanese homeland. The Japanese miliarists were still willing to fight on AFTER the two bombings but it was only then that they were over-ruled by the Emperor.

The US has done enough self-flagellation over Vietnam (in its own narcissistic fashion). Let me ask critics of the US this: have the French ever questioned themselves about the number of Algerians killed by them? Or the Vietnamese for that matter? Or the Viet Cong`s terror tactics used against government employees? The list is endless, so lets lay off the US-bashing unless we bash the critics for their mistakes as well.

Regards to all.

In response to sigalph235 (Reply # 713)
Dear Friend:

It seems that you maintain a clear distinction between good-guys and bad-guys. I personally don`t.

There is no doubt that humanity at-large suffers in various conflicts. And humanity includes the people of both Kuwait and Iraq and North Vietname and South Vietnam. The wars in both cases were not fought from the standpoint of humanity. The real culprits are not the people of this or that country -- the culprits are those who hold power and make its use in their own interest at the cost of others. Even if I assume that Saddam Hussain is as bad as he is painted, why should the people of Iraq pay the price and for such a long time. Is is not simply the victimization of the victims?

Do you really believe that the United Nations and the international law are apolitical and/or egalitarian institutions?

Sincerely, Bilal Ahmad

re: PM#: 716 and nacheketa #697

Someone should have the precise figures on the amount of money India pumped into Kashmir in the form of grants and other such develomental funds. What I do know is that the amount has been LARGE, amongst the highest per-capita in the nation.

So the trouble in Kashmir is not about the question of money.

Some people would say that the Kashmiri politicians ate up all the money. Poor people got little. But that is true of Bihar too. And, it is the true of the entire Pakistan. Almost every living prime minister of theirs has got a few dozen cases of corruption pending.

So it is not about corruption of politicians either.

May be the nub of the matter is that the Indian government gave no respect to Kashmiris. May be it is all about the fact that the Indian government arrested Sheikh Abdullah when he got too adventuresome. But what state has the Indian government ever respected? And, in Pakistan, what do you mean by respect, anyway? There, being arrested is part of an elected prime minister`s job-description. Respect Kya Hota hai?

The problems in Kashmir have NOTHING to do with any of these things. No amount of tinkering with them is going to change the situation one bit.

Kashmir`s misfortune have the same root as do the misfortunes of brave Afghani people, and as did (fortunately, Indian Sikhs proved too smart) those of Indian punjabis -- it has for its neighbor a fundamentally flawed state with a fundamentally flawed vision.

So long as that flawed vision is maintained, noting is going to change for anyone--Kashmiris, other Indians, and poor Pakistanis. It is just a price India has to pay for living where it does. You do not deal with a thief by welcoming him or handing over the keys of your house to him. You just minimize his ability to cause you harm. Not ideal, but that is the best anyone can hope for.