Is It A War On Islam?

Here`s John LeCarre: Famous MI-spy and great novelist. One of my favourites. An Insider!

Check out complete talk at www.sundayherald.com/30700


One of Britain`s leading writers sparked controversy last week when he accused President Bush of being driven to war by the thirst for oil and power. Here, for the first time, is John le Carré`s full and specially updated essay



AMERICA has entered one of its periods of historical madness, but this is the worst I can remember: worse than McCarthyism, worse than the Bay of Pigs and in the long term potentially more disastrous than the Vietnam war.

The reaction to 9/11 is beyond anything Osama could have hoped for in his nastiest dreams. As in McCarthy times, the domestic rights and freedoms that have made America the envy of the world are being systematically eroded.

The hounding of non-national US residents continues apace. `Non-permanent` males of North Korean and Middle Eastern descent are disappearing into secret imprisonment on secret charges on the secret word of judges. US-resident Palestinians who were formerly ruled stateless, and therefore not deportable, are being handed over to Israel for `resettlement` in Gaza and the West Bank, places where they may never have set foot before.

Are we playing the same game here in Britain? I expect so. Another 30 years and we`ll be allowed to know.

The combination of compliant US media and vested corporate interests is once more ensuring that a debate that should be ringing out in every town square is confined to the loftier columns of the East Coast press: see page A27 if you can find and understand it.

No American administration has ever held its cards so close to its chest. If the intelligence services know nothing, that will be the best-kept secret of all. Remember that these are the same organisations who brought us the biggest failure in intelligence history: 9/11.

The imminent war was planned years before Osama bin Laden struck, but it was Osama who made it possible. Without Osama, the Bush junta would still be trying to explain such tricky matters as how it came to be elected in the first place; Enron; its shameless favouring of the already-too-rich; its reckless disregard for the world`s poor, the ecology and a raft of unilaterally abrogated international treaties. They might also have to be telling us why they support Israel in its continuing disregard for UN resolutions.

But Osama conveniently swept all that under the carpet. Eighty-eight per cent of Americans want the war, we are told. The US defence budget has been raised by another $60 billion to around $360 billion. A splendid new generation of US nuclear weapons is in the pipeline, tailored to respond equally to nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in the hands of `rogue states`. So we can all breathe easy.

And America is not only deciding unilaterally who may or may not possess these weapons. It also reserves to itself the unilateral right to deploy its own nuclear weapons without compunction whenever and wherever it considers its interests, friends and allies threatened. Precisely who these friends and allies are going to be over the next years will, as ever in politics, be a bit of a conundrum. You make nice friends and allies, so you arm them to the teeth. Then one day they`re not your friends and allies any more, so you nuke them.

It is worth remembering here for just how many long hours, and how deeply, the US cabinet weighed the option of nuking Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11. Happily for all of us, but for the Afghans in particular whose complicity in 9/11 was much less than Pakistan`s, they decided to make do with 25,000 ton `conventional` daisy-cutters, which by all accounts deliver as much clout as a small nuke anyway. But next time it`ll be for real.


Quite what war 88% of Americans think they are supporting is a lot less clear. A war for how long, please? At what cost in American lives? At what cost to the American taxpayer`s pocket? At what cost -- because most of those 88% are thoroughly decent and humane people -- in Iraqi lives? It is probably by now a state secret, but Desert Storm cost Iraq at least twice as many lives as America lost in the entire Vietnam war.

How Bush and his junta succeeded in deflecting America`s anger from Osama bin Laden to Saddam Hussein is one of the great public relations conjuring tricks of history. But they swung it. A recent opinion poll tells us that one in two Americans now believes Saddam was responsible for the attack on the World Trade Centre.

But the American public is not merely being misled. It is being threatened, bullied, browbeaten and kept in a permanent state of ignorance and fear, with a consequent dependence upon its leadership. The carefully orchestrated neurosis should, with any luck, carry Bush and his fellow conspirators nicely into the next election.

Those who are not with Mr Bush are against him. Worse -- see his speech of January 3 -- they are with the enemy. Which is odd, because I`m dead against Bush, but I would love to see Saddam`s downfall -- just not on Bush`s terms and not by his methods. And not under the banner of such outrageous hypocrisy.

Old-style American colonialism is about to spread its iron wings over all of us. More Quiet Americans are slipping into unsuspecting townships than at the height of the Cold War.

The religious cant that will send American troops into battle is perhaps the most sickening aspect of this surreal war-to-be. Bush has an arm-lock on God.

And God has very particular political opinions.

God appointed America to save the world in any way that suits America.

God appointed Israel to be the nexus of America`s Middle Eastern policy, and anyone who wants to mess with that idea is: a) anti-Semitic, b) anti-American, c) with the enemy, and d) a terrorist.

God also has pretty scary connections. In America, where all men are equal in His sight, if not in one another`s, the Bush family numbers one President, one ex-President, one ex-head of the CIA, the governor of Florida and the ex-governor of Texas. Bush Senior has some good wars to his credit, and a well-earned reputation for visiting America`s wrath on disobedient client states. One little war he hand-launched was against his own former CIA pal, Manuel Noriega of Panama, who served him well in the Cold War but got too big for his boots when it was over. Power doesn`t come much more naked than that, and Americans know it.

Care for a few pointers?

George W Bush. 1978-84: senior executive, Arbusto Energy/Bush Exploration, an oil company. 1986-1990: senior executive of the Harken oil company.

Dick Cheney. 1995-2000: chief executive of the Halliburton oil company.

Condoleezza Rice. 1991-2000: senior executive with the Chevron oil company, which named an oil tanker after her.

And so on.

But none of these trifling associations affects the integrity of God`s work. We`re talking honest values here. And we know where your children go to school.


In 1993, while ex-President George Bush was paying a social visit to the ever-democratic Kingdom of Kuwait to receive their thanks for liberating them, somebody tried to kill him. The CIA believes that `somebody` was Saddam Hussein. Hence Bush Junior`s cry: `That man tried to kill my Daddy.` But it`s still not personal, this war. It`s still necessary. It`s still God`s work. It`s still about bringing freedom and democracy to the poor, oppressed Iraqi people.

To be an acceptable member of the Bush team it seems you must also believe in Absolute Good and Absolute Evil, and Bush, with a lot of help from his friends, family and God, is there to tell us which is which. I think I may be Evil for writing this, but I`ll have to check.

What Bush won`t tell us is the truth about why we`re going to war. What is at stake is not an Axis of Evil -- but oil, money and people`s lives. Saddam`s misfortune is to sit on the second biggest oilfield in the world. Iran`s, next door, is to possess the world`s largest repositories of natural gas. Bush wants both, and who helps him get them will receive a piece of the cake. And who doesn`t, won`t.

If Saddam didn`t have the oil, he could torture and murder his citizens to his heart`s content. Other leaders do it every day -- think Saudi Arabia, think Pakistan, think Turkey, think Syria, think Egypt -- but these are our friends and allies.

In reality, I suspect, Baghdad represents no clear and present danger to its neighbours, and none to America or Britain. Saddam`s weapons of mass destruction, if he`s still got them, will be peanuts by comparison with the stuff Israel or America could hurl at him at five minutes` notice. What is at stake is not an imminent military or terrorist threat, but the economic imperative of American growth.

What is at stake is not -- as presently offered -- a handful of empty rocket-heads, but America`s need to demonstrate its over-arching military power to all of us -- to Europe and Russia and China, and poor mad little North Korea, as well as the Middle East; to show who rules America at home, and who is to be ruled by America abroad.

The most charitable interpretation of Tony Blair`s part in all this is that he believed that, by riding the tiger, he could steer it. He can`t. Instead, he gave it a phoney legitimacy, and a smooth voice. Now I fear, the same tiger has him penned into a corner, and he can`t get out. Ironically, George W himself may be feeling a little bit the same way.

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I think anti-war people are wetting their pants for all the wrong reasons. there isn`t going to be a war . However, Us is using it as a front to station its military throughout Muslim world. In other words the military occupation of Muslim lands, including Paksitan is complete. In about couple of months Iraq will be declared in ``compliance`` and war will be averted declaring US as the savior of humanity since it didn`t kill anybody. The staus quo will persist with the only change that there will be about 250K US army stationed at all strategic locations to control the natural resources and governments of the Muslim world. The menace is bgger than war.

#82 by nazarhayatkhan :
``History shows us that all great powers began to decay when they became unjust and unreasonable. ``

Can you expand on that with some examples?

urstruly sahib:

i respectfully beg to disagree. i think war is going ahead because someone has to pay for the cost of stationing those troops. also money will be made from infrastructure reconstruction after the war. fat contracts will be routed to gop backers as a reward for the hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign contributions.

#87 Minhaj

``History shows us that all great powers began to decay when they became unjust and unreasonable. ``

The Ottomans, The Mughals, The Mongols, The Soviets,

O what a fascinating account!
WORTH READING, REPEATING, and BROADCASTING.


In Brazil Muslims are doing even better. There are ONE MILLION recent converts to Islam in Brazil and 30,000 in Argentina. And no, the money is not coming from Osama bin Laden. It is coming from a sufi (mystical) sect whose leader is a Scotsman, a man who doesn`t like democracy and global capitalism, but also doesn`t like terrorism.

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Aptos Times. Thursday, August 15, 2002
A Strange Religious Two-Step: Mayans Convert to Islam by Laina Farhat-Holzman Aptos Times, August 17, 2002

Of late, a favorite theme for papers at our annual International Society for the Comparative Study of Civilization (ISCSC.net) has been the relationship between civilization and religion. We are looking at 5,000 years of human history, and many of us are surprised that what looked like a dead issue only 30 years ago has suddenly climbed out of the grave and is marching out into the street. Religion is alive and kicking, and is sometimes walking backwards.

Even stranger, however, is a phenomenon taking place in Spain. With the rise of literacy and the economic success of modern Spain, Spaniards have begun to look at their history without the censorship of the Catholic Church. In 1492, Columbus was in his armada of ships setting out for Asia (he thought), and other ships loaded with Spanish Jews and Spanish Muslims were setting out for exile to North Africa and the Turkish Ottoman Empire. Their most holy Majesties, Isabella and Ferdinand, had decreed that by sundown, there would be no more Jews or Muslims in that Christian land. Those Jews and Muslims who couldn`t bring themselves to leave their beloved Spain swallowed hard and were converted; the rest left.

In Spain today, quite a few Catholic Spaniards have delved into their family histories and are reconverting to Judaism and Islam. I have also heard that some people who live in New Mexico (of Spanish ancestry) have discovered their Jewish roots and are coming out after 400 years of fear.

This is something new in history. Up to now, when people are converted to a new religion, they stay converted. It is also a given that most of us are the religion that we profess because somewhere back in history a prince was converted and his people were expected to convert with him. Religious choice was only the option of certain princes. Even in Old Testament Judaism, when Moses adopted what has since become Judaism, his people had no choice. Dissenters were slaughtered.

The same is true for the Christian conversion of Pagans; the chiefs and nobility accepted the new faith and their people were part of the package. Islam, too, operated the same way. The Prophet Mohammad fought for ten years to bring the entire Arabian peninsula, including his reluctant home town of Mecca, into the fold. Dissenters were killed. When Islam spread out across the world, particularly in such places as Central Asia, it was the princes who made the decision and the people had no choice but to follow.

Now we are living in an era of designer religions. People are choosing their faiths and their sects. The latest are the desperately poor Mayans who live in southernmost Mexico, Chiapas State. We first heard of them a few years ago when there was a rebellion against the Mexican government that had previously ignored or oppressed them. I have since been fascinated to note that these Mayans are tossing out Catholicism, a religion forced on them by their Spanish conquerors in 1600. Protestant evangelicals have made great inroads in this community, and now Islam is entering the arena. Financing is coming from abroad to support both the Protestant and the Muslim missionary efforts, and they are having success--the Muslims more so.

The poor Mayans, once the cultural wonder of the ancient Mexican world, have lost everything--their religion, their culture, and their economy. They are poor, neglected, and downtrodden--and they refuse to take it any more.

Much fuss has been made about the Catholic forced conversions of the Mayans, but in all truth, there have been times in native Mexican history, even before that, when the gods failed to perform and the people dumped them. The great ghost-city of Teotijuacan is providing archeologists with a picture of a city of one million that went through a very long drought, where young adults were dying in droves from hunger, disease, and warfare, and where the statues of the gods were finally hacked into pieces by the enraged population. I am sure that the Spanish conquest looked to most native Mexicans like the failure of their gods. Time for a new religion had come.

Well, it is happening again. Since the early 1970s, population explosion has increased the stress on the land and the misery of the people in Chiapas. After the assault of missionaries beginning with Dominican monks 500 years ago, there has been a succession of Presbyterians, Pentecostals, evangelical preachers, left-wing Roman Catholic priests (Liberation Theology) and Mormons. Now there are Muslim missionaries from Spain, gaining converts from among the thousands of evangelical Christians who were converted 45 years ago. There has been such competition among the rival sects that people convert and reconvert, looking for the best deal. Now Islam is coming in with a message and with money.

In Brazil Muslims are doing even better. There are one million recent converts to Islam in Brazil and 300,000 in Argentina. And no, the money is not coming from Osama bin Laden. It is coming from a sufi (mystical) sect whose leader is a Scotsman, a man who doesn`t like democracy and global capitalism, but also doesn`t like terrorism. Stay tuned as this weird story unfolds. ------ 878 words

Dr. Laina Farhat-Holzman is a historian, writer, and lecturer. Her newest book, God`s Law or Man`s Law, will be available in September. You may contact her at Lfarhat102@aol.com or www.globalthink.net.

nazarhayatkhan I am uncomfortable whith that . Persians, Greeks, Arabs, Mughals were all great in the sense that they gave an established order and millions flourished under them. But can we say that they rose up because of Justice? Surely creating an empire involves killing looting and other unjust things. Or like you said that they decayed due to a lack of Justice.

What does Justice mean to you? Are you refering to general things like good mailing system, fine roads, and opportunity. Or do you idealisticaly believe in some great moral character that a nation tends to lose over time, and therefore falls from grace??

From today`s HBL by Rasheeda Bhagat . . . http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/stories/2003012200060800.htm

Are Musharraf`s fears for real?
Rasheeda Bhagat



We like to think — or rather we comfort ourselves with the thought — that the West, especially the United States, is caught in a frenzy of Muslim-bashing. We try not to realise that our own condition, a mixture of ineptitude and backwardness, is an invitation to bashing. We are not the victims of a cosmic conspiracy. We are responsible for our backwardness ourselves.

SO WROTE the Pakistani columnist Ayaz Amir in his weekly column in the Pakistani daily Dawn dated January 17, a full 48 hours before the Pakistan President, Gen Pervez Musharraf, made the rather startling — for his countrymen, that is — — statement that after the US had done with Iraq and its President Saddam Hussein, there was ``impending danger`` of Pakistan being the next target of the ``Western forces.``

Addressing a distinguished group of Pakistani businessmen and industrialists in Lahore on Sunday, he painted the doomsday scenario that when this happened ``we`ll have to work on our own to stave off the danger. Nobody will come to our rescue, not even the Islamic world.``

Once again, Gen Musharraf used the occasion to urge Pakistanis to strive to make their nation a ``modern country, not with a confrontationist approach but with a liberal mind.``

We Indians can accuse the Pakistan President of being an India-baiter and carrying on, like other Pakistani leaders before him, the song and dance about the ``freedom struggle in Kashmir.`` But at least he is not cut in the fundamentalist Islamic mode and, in this aspect, is very different from the last general who ruled Pakistan — Zia-ul-Haq.

Zia had some of the most obscure and orthodox ideas and, as far as the gender scene in Pakistan is concerned, took the country backward several decades by bringing in the Hudood Ordinance, with its absurdities such as one man`s testimony in a court of law being equal to two women`s in certain disputes.

But, today, Gen Musharraf, who made it to the covers of almost all the top magazines of the western world, including Time and Newsweek, more than once, has himself to blame for the despondence evident in his Lahore speech.

Any visitor to Pakistan knows only too well the derision with which the average, educated and discerning Pakistani looks at his/her country`s relationship with the US. It is with the utmost contempt that they talk about successive Pakistan governments, either civilian or military, having sold the country to the Americans.

In most interviews, when questions are asked about the future direction of the country and its economy, people will say, and most of the time not even off-the-record, that this would depend on ``what the Americans want us to do.``

Hence, after 9/11, when Gen Musharraf thought he was scoring a brownie point by offering the Americans unstinted support in their fight against the Al Qaeda and the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, there was outrage in Pakistan. That is why he had to go before the people and try to convince them on PTV, through a well-written speech, on how he had taken this decision in Pakistan`s self-interest.

More important, he told the nation that, had he not done this, the Indians were waiting to offer their territory to the US. If that happened, they could bid goodbye to their dream of helping the ``freedom struggle`` in Kashmir, was the not-so-understated burden of his song.

Surely, it must have been a heady feeling for the general to find, a few months after September 11, and during the thick of the strikes on Afghanistan, magazines like Time and Newsweek describing his job as ``the most difficult in the world``.

In trying to prove what a brave soul he was, the correspondents had interviewed his childhood buddies, his military comrades and others who were prepared to say a few kind words about the general`s extraordinary courage. Surely, such people would not be difficult to find when the subject in question is the president of their country!

Anyway, it`s been quite a downhill journey for President Musharraf since those heady days. The US President, Mr George W. Bush`s task in Afghanistan is long over. The Taliban has been replaced and Hameed Karzai anointed the new chief and left to struggle with a host of warlords.

Mr Bush has moved on to the next target on his list in his self-proclaimed and rather pompously titled ``war against terrorism``. When he has no time for Mr Karzai, he has even less, or none at all, for Gen Musharraf, who is at present reduced to the status of an American ally only on paper. In fact, he and his nation have become more than a bit of an irritant for the Americans.

First, Gen Musharraf could not even prevent the electoral triumph of the anti-American Islamic coalition of political parties. They were somehow denied the throne in Islamabad — with help from the US, of course — but they continue to rule in the provincial areas of the north-west. It is no great secret that the Taliban and Al Qaeda militants are holed up in this region of Pakistan. So we had the skirmish between the Pakistan and US governments last fortnight over the Americans` right to enter Pakistani soil in ``hot pursuit`` of these militants.

It is evident that Gen Musharraf`s cosying up to the US post-9/11 has helped neither himself nor his country. But that hardly gives us, the neighbour most troubled by Pakistan in terms of frequent attacks from jehadis of various hues, cause for rejoicing. True, the Pakistan President has cut a sorry figure before his own people, especially the Islamic hardliners. But that is not going to help us.

Gen Musharraf`s latest admission that his country could be next on the US` hit list after Iraq will only give more power to the fundamentalist forces in Pakistan which, in turn, will only increase our headache over the continuing terrorism in Kashmir.

Dawn`s Ayaz Amir sees the fundamentalists notching up more support in Pakistan when, comparing the progress of Israel as a modern nation to the rest of the Islamic world, he says: ``We like to say that we have been bad Muslims and have not kept faith with the true tenets of Islam. So towards a self-defined purity of Islam many of us have tried to return in the conviction that this journey back in time holds the key to all our problems. This journey into the past took no cruder form than the emergence of the Taliban. It has taken no cruder form than the ideas firing the zeal of Osama bin Laden and his followers.

``The West feels threatened by Al Qaeda terrorism. But perhaps we may consider that bin Ladenism is a greater threat to the world of Islam than it is to the West. For the West it is but a physical threat in the form of terrorism. For the world of Islam it is a threat more grave and sinister for it to be trapped in bin Ladenism, to travel back in time to the dark ages of Muslim obscurantism. It means to be stuck in the mire which has held the Islamic world back.``

So much for Pakistan`s woes. Clearly, its President`s dream of being ``a valued ally in the fight against terrorism`` has gone sour. Instead of trying to score brownie points over India by snuggling up to Mr Bush, had Gen Musharraf bothered to sincerely respond to India`s gesture in inviting him to Agra, and prior to that had he not sabotaged the Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee`s bus journey to Lahore through the Kargil intrusions, his position today would not have been as pitiable. Right now, the tough-talking general has fallen between two stools.

True, any desire to make genuine peace with India too would have created problems from the fundamentalist lobby at home. But a hand of friendship towards India would have prevented the massive build-up of troops on the border and all the rhetoric of a nuclear war.

Anyway, there is no immediate danger of the general and his government changing policy towards India, and this is evident from the latest bout of harassment to which the Indian Charge d`Affaires, Mr Sudhir Vyas, has been subjected in Islamabad in the last couple of days. This led an exasperated Prime Minister to say, ``What does Islamabad want?``

It is doubtful that the Pakistani establishment itself knows the answer. With the passage of time, as Pakistan`s miseries increase, as they are bound to, with parts of the country having become a safe haven for the Al Qaeda, surely the Kashmir ``freedom struggle`` will become an irrelevant cause for them. Anyway, how long can you flog a dying horse?

Meanwhile, Gen Musharraf`s observations on Pakistan being the next target of the ``western forces``, have an echo in what his former boss and chief of the Pakistani army, Gen Aslam Beg, has to say about the US leadership in his latest communication to ``Friends``, a think-tank he has set up.

He has been quoted by the Washgton Times, in an article, where portraying Mr Bush as a latter-day ``Goebbels`` for reducing Afghanistan to a ``wasteland``, Gen Beg says, ``Protecting their own civilization, by hurling bombs and missiles on other nations — labelled the axis-of-evil, or rogue, states — is based on conceit and delusions of grandeur.``

Meanwhile Mr George T. Abed, IMF Director for Middle East, North Africa and Pakistan, has said in Islamabad that an attack on Iraq by the US-led forces would have a negative economic impact on Pakistan and the region, including further increase in oil prices.

``I must say that the outcome of war will have serious consequences.`` Calling upon the government to reduce fiscal deficit, he said that apart from increasing oil prices it would hamper FDI into Pakistan and discourage tourists from visiting the country.

Illegal Pakistanis in perspective

http://www.dawn.com/2003/01/22/letted.htm#1

I failed to understand why there is this uproar from the media and politicians in Pakistan about the checking of documents of Pakistanis illegally staying in the US. Every country has the right to safeguard its territory and population from suspected elements. Thus, we are not justified both legally and morally in forcing the US to pay heed to our desires/ demands simply because Pakistan is a front-line state in the America-led war on terror.

The question is, why are we criticizing the US government for taking on illegal Pakistani immigrants while we have not objected to the recent deportation of hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis by the Gulf countries?

The Indian government is also considering deporting about 12,000 Pakistanis illegally staying in the country. East Asian and South East Asian countries, too, have deported our nationals in thousands. I fear that if this process continues, Pakistani professionals may face similar treatment.

The fact is that the world is now afraid of us. In the 60s and 70s, Pakistan gave its best economists, professors, engineers and scientists to the US. Generally, Pakistanis were respected by Americans then. But in the 80s, we started exporting Ramzis, Kansis, Abu Zubaydas and Abu Hamzas.

Now whom should we blame for this change of heart? Our past policies, which were ostensibly discarded after the 9/11 incidents, caused an irreparable loss to Pakistani expatriates.

Besides, investigations by American intelligence agencies have disclosed that some of those involved in the 9/11 attacks were somehow connected in their training and travelling in Afghanistan via Pakistan, and entered the US in the garb of students. Small wonder that Americans do not trust us any more.

Their intelligence personnel, after interrogating Al Qaeda members, have reached the conclusion that there is a presence of almost two to three scores of sleepers (terrorists presently under hibernation), who may operate in the future.

Today, we are being overwhelmed by the tribal and mediaeval philosophy preached by those who are not aware of the real world. They brainwash millions and millions of uneducated lot and create a siege mentality amongst them.

Our independent writers know where the country is heading to, but either they are confused or are not willing to risk their lives to write on such issues boldly. The bottom line is: unless we put our own house in order, we will be doomed.

KUNWAR KHALID YUNUS

Karachi

In response to # 94 Veeresh`s article in response to an article, I have to say the following:

1. He should recall that after 9/11 the joint front of 29 parties supporting Talibans was not able to gather more than 20,000 protestors at the peak of emotionalism and only 4,000 protestors turned up towards the latter part. The front was in such a weak state subsequently that the Government was arresting its leaders at will and putting them behind bars for indulging in violence, vandalism and inciting the feelings of people through emotional speeches. The small number of protestors were also aided by Western media unintentionally. CNN and BBC continuously reported curtailed protests using close-ranged videoizing, which is a camera trick to project small crowds as massive ones. However, this fuel on the fire attempt was thwarted by Pakistanis too.


2. He should also recall the recent protest rallies by the MMA. Khaleej Time’s issue of 9th January (3rd column and 3rd paragraph from top) reports, “Nationwide rallies against US policies on Friday were sparsely attended by Pakistani standards; just 400 gathered in the capital, while 3,000 took to streets in Peshawar”. He has to understand that after Friday prayers protests are easiest to hold and give wrong information as to the size of the same. I would say that much more massive anti-American protests have been held in Europe and in other countries than in Pakistan.

3. He should understand that long before him, many a journalists like Robert Kaplan and Jessica Stern had forecasted that NWFP would go anti-military and anti-Pakistani and will destabilize Pakistan due to its conservative nature and support of Talibans. However, the province did not become unstable under the most trying circumstances of American assault of Talibans in 2001-02.

4. I would also like to know if at all Pakistan becomes unstable at the hands of fundamentalists, how would it help India? Without any state authority to control them, the ‘Fundamentalists” would have a free hand into entering India and to destabilize it. Veeresh should learn from Israeli method of crushing the extremists and the cycle of violence that it is leading to.

5. That America keeps Pakistan in its folds on WOT is in the mutual favor of both. Americans need moderate and democratic Islamic countries like Pakistan to be role models for other Muslim countries. Hence, Mr. Haas’ advice to Indians to start the process of dialogue with Pakistan without any pre-conditions. This is an advice that India would be better off heeding to in order to be part of the civilized societies.

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I would consider the Illegal Indians, Pakistanis, and all thirdwolders at par with the ``Poineers`` of America a hundred years and earlier. :)

Ref ahmadzai #96

[Americans need moderate and democratic Islamic countries like Pakistan to be role models for other Muslim countries. Hence, Mr. Haas’ advice to Indians to start the process of dialogue with Pakistan without any pre-conditions. This is an advice that India would be better off heeding to in order to be part of the civilized societies.]

Civilized countries do not declare they were ready to nuke their neighbors. Civilized countries do not cry, ``Restrain me before I use my nukes.`` Civilized countries do not poke their noses in other people`s affairs as in Chechnya, Bosnia or Kosovo. Or, Kashmir.

Anytime any Indian thinks he needs to heed the advice of a Pakistani on talks with Pakistan, he needs to lie down until the thought goes away. Persistent symptoms need medical intervention.

Ref Donkey Express #98

[THEN WHY INDIA IS IN LINE FOR REGISTRATION AFTER PAKISTAN IN APRIL _MAY S SOON AS AFTER THE PRESENT BATCH??????

To lick the Americas feet they can justify breathing carbon dioxide instead of oxygen EVEN by some twisted imagination.....after all who checks these theories or LIES as i like to think of them so i dont even have to check them & mostly i am right !]

Are we to understand that you are selling your Studebaker and moving to the Belly of the Beast (India) or do you plan to continue licking the Americas feet they can justify breathing carbon dioxide instead of oxygen EVEN by some twisted imagination?

Such a complete Namak Haram I haven`t seen in my life.

If you have so much contempt for the US (and India), what prevents you from moving to al-Arabia as-Saudia?