Write to us at letters@atimes.com

Please provide your name or a pen name, and your country of residence. Lengthy letters run the risk of being cut.

(Or join the The Edge, the lightly moderated discussion board for our global community.)

Please note: This Letters page is intended primarily for readers to comment on ATol articles or related issues. It should not be used as a forum for readers to debate with each other. The Edge is the place for that. The editors do not mind publishing one or two responses to a reader's letter, but will, at their discretion, direct debaters away from the Letters page.

It was very interesting to read F William Engdahl's article China lays down gauntlet in energy war [Dec 21], especially the mention of the possible shipments of Iranian oil north across Central Asia to China. One of the few oversights of the article, however, is that it sort of dismisses the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) as a serious alternative route to all other projects with a reference that "following years of pressure, most members of the CPC group decided to not pursue future expansions of the CPC line". Yet the pipeline's expansion is planned and its program has been approved this year. It sees expansion from its current maximum capacity of [560,000]-640,000 barrels a day of Kazakh oil to 1 million bpd whereas the BTC is unlikely to see similar commitments of Kazakh oil in the short to medium term; full CPC expansion is [envisaged] at 67 million tons a year/1.34 million bpd. Finally, it would have been interesting to include the key role of Turkey, especially since an agreement has been reached between Turkish and Italian companies to build a 1 million bpd pipeline from Samsun on the Black Sea coast to Ceyhan on the Mediterranean, allowing CPC to raise throughput across Russia and the Black Sea, as is also the benefit of the Bulgarian-Greek (Burgas-Alexandropolus) pipeline from the Black Sea to the Aegean with a capacity from 450,000-750,000 bpd. Another claim, that "China will for the first time have secured a source of imported energy not vulnerable to US aircraft-carrier battle groups", ignores the current Russian oil deliveries of [150,000]-170,000 bpd to China via rail in the Far East.
Leon Rozmarin
Hopedale, Massachusetts (Dec 21, '05)


Re Iran wins big in Iraq's elections [Dec 20]: The formation of political parties in Iraq strictly along communal lines does not bode well for the future of that country. Political parties that represent religious or ethnic groups are recipes for the failure of the nation-state they are supposed to form and for its ultimate dissolution. The Muslim League of India was a political party that wanted to form the government of India but ended up breaking up the country in order to carve out a homeland for the Muslims to be called Pakistan. In turn, the country called Bangladesh was carved out of Pakistan as a homeland for the Bengalis, who were represented by a political party called the Awami League. I would like to propose that the overarching charter of a democracy include mechanisms to ensure that political parties remain purely political.
Cha-am Jamal
Thailand (Dec 21, '05)


I read with interest the article Iran wins big in Iraq's elections [Dec 20] by M K Bhadrakumar. I disagree with the writer's analysis. The real winners in this election are the Iraqi people. They have gone to the polls in very large numbers to vote for whom they wish, not whom the state demands that they vote for. It is not for any country to tell another whom to vote for, but to support the people in their right to vote without interference. No matter how one feels about the US and what it has done in Iraq, at least it enabled and supported the Iraqi people in being able to choose those [whom] they wish to lead them. I think that is the real victory, and that it is terrific.
Richard Winters (Dec 21, '05)


I wish to comment on When self-immolation is a rational choice [Dec 20] by Spengler. The Middle East is at present suffering from the same kind of [problem that] Europe did in the mid-20th century: ethnic conflict and diversity, a volatile and erratic economic situation, struggle for survival among the European imperial powers and their sad decline. It was above all the erratic performances of European economies between the 1920s and 1930s that drove millions in Europe to embrace extreme ideologies as communism, Nazism and fascism, which led the imperial powers to battle it out for the riches of the colonized world and eventually World War II. It was the imperial weakness of the British caused by its overstretching greed for power and wealth that saw its rapid decline and with it emergence of historical political conflicts that still haunt our world today. The French and the British divided and dissected between them colonies as conveniently as a Christmas cake, and after digesting it left behind the litter of the dependencies of Iraq, Jordan and Palestine and the creation of the illegal State of Israel and its illegitimate existence in the Middle East. The majority of problems in the Middle East and Asia are the direct consequence of ugly maneuvering by British imperialism, and later on in 1950s dominance of the United States in the Middle East taking sides with the Saudi royal family and kingdom. Strangely and cunningly the Americans built a special relationship with Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia to fight the Soviet Union and at the same time even stronger ties with Zionism in Israel that helped Israel to conquer Arab lands. It is the United States [that] since the collapse of European imperialism has become a new imperial power with overambitious imperialistic ambitions and has played such an ambiguous and duplicitous game in the Middle East. Iraq fits into the equation easily, and it is a widely held view that the Iraqis have never developed a sense of nationhood, and [this is] supported by an argument that the Iraqi army did not fight the invading Americans and it melted away in Sunnism, Shi'ism and provincialism, which [is more or less] what we have been seeing since the invasion and occupation. The Shi'as are hoping to get elected and suppress the Sunnis and divide the south under sectarian rule and dominance; the Kurds are hoping that when the democracy fails, which it is bound to [do] eventually, they will get their independent Kurdistan, and finally, the Americans are hoping that this mess lasts until they have dried every liter of oil from the Iraqi wells. Whatever the result of these elections, one thing is clear: the new Iraqi government under American tutelage is a recipe for disaster and stagnation. There is another interesting twist to the story and that is that the majority of Sunni Arab states would not like a Shi'ite Iraq supported by Iran in their midst. Sunnis and Shi'as have never lived in peace and harmony ... The "democratic peace" theory that two democracies are always a better option than two dictatorships is unworkable in the Middle East because as long as the West holds the whip, the region will remain a hotbed for intrigues [and] conspiracies, and that means nothing but trouble for ever.
Saqib Khan
London, England (Dec 21, '05)


ATol has one of the liveliest and most informative [letters] forums, one that I read religiously every day. But what is this hang-up with paragraphs? There is no good reason for ATol's editors to cram everything into one big block of text. It's very hard on people with vision disabilities. Surely publishing the readers' letters with full paragraphing will make their comments much clearer and easier to read and also easier for one to extract certain sections to quote from.
K L Mok
Edmonton, Alberta (Dec 21, '05)

Our single-block style does get unwieldy at times, but this would be mitigated if contributors kept their letters short, as we frequently request. - ATol

In his article When self-immolation is a rational choice [Dec 20], Spengler speaks with authority about democracies and their proclivity for war. Indeed, the USA is a case in point. Yet in my judgment, the US is not a democracy; rather it was created as a constitutional republic. Not the people but the constitution rules. Political rhetoric about democracy overshadows this fundamental historical point. Now, with unflagging emotion surrounding talk of the "American people", we [the US] are admittedly a Fabian democracy. The polls, initiatives and referenda, inter alia, so in vogue today, all point up the democratic fervor that abounds in the US. Spengler notes that "for a democracy to produce good results, first one must have a good people". One must then conclude that democracy will not prevail in the long run, since no peoples are "good". Additionally, recent trends in the world at large point up the dilemma we in the US face: all our rhetoric about being a "beacon of freedom" et al are coming home to roost, as we confront the nasty truth that many people elsewhere do not choose to adopt our expansive form of government. Believing we are mankind's salvation, it is not easy for "Americans" to accept such a rejection. The US is indeed in decline. Whether or not our demise will be precipitous is a matter of conjecture. But, paralleling Spengler, the US is lashing out militarily, seeking to prevent the unavoidable: the demise of our way of life. Because of our arrogance and pride, we believe we can avoid the fate of those who went before. Iraq is only the most excruciating example of this haughtiness. To cite an old saw, give the people the keys to the treasury and the game is over.
Stuart L Perkins, Colonel (retired)
USA (Dec 20, '05)


Spengler's description (in When self-immolation is a rational choice [Dec 20]) of Iran's nutcase president [Mahmud] Ahmadinejad as "the Islamic world's pre-eminent democrat" is insane. First, hundreds of reform-minded candidates for president of Iran were disqualified by unelected mullahs from running in last June's election. Second, Iran's true democrats boycotted the election. Ahmadinejad was guaranteed that "landslide victory". And third, the real ruler of Iran is not the "elected" president. It's the Supreme Leader, the appointed-for-life ayatollah, who can overrule anything the president or parliament does. If Iran had a real democracy, clowns like Ahmadinejad would have almost no chance of winning election. Public debate usually (but admittedly not always) weeds out the lunatics. Right now, Ahmadinejad speaks for a dictatorship [that], in the face of growing demands for political freedoms, is appealing to irrational bigotries to stir up support. Don't blame this on democracy. Blame it on a dictatorial theocracy, desperate to survive. Note, too, that one free election does not make a democracy. The institutions of democracy cannot take root without at least two or three transfers of power (from one party to another) in the executive and legislative branches of government. Spengler stretches far too far when he tries to label the American Confederacy and Iran's theocracy as democracies. Stick to modern history and to modern realities. In the entire 20th century, no two established democracies went to war with each other. And in the same 100 years, dictators killed more of their own people than all the world's wars combined. That's a good case to free the world fast. Democracy should not worry you.
Frank Warner (Dec 20, '05)


I would like to commend M K Bhadrakumar [Iran wins big in Iraq's elections, Dec 20] for his insightful reporting regarding recent political developments in the Middle East, particularly Iran. His long diplomatic career, and the cultural links between his native India and the Middle East, are tremendous qualifications. In the Western press, writing on Iran and the Middle East is dominated by American authors to whom the Middle East is utterly alien in every way. People like Thomas Friedman and Spengler can relate to the Middle East only through the prism of American and European history. They refuse to widen their horizons to see the vast history and culture of the world beyond the West, and are thus at best clawing in the dark at the elephant, to borrow [Maulana Jelaluddin] Rumi's metaphor. I have the greatest respect for the many Indian writers at Asia Times Online, The Hindu and other publications who have offered fresh and thoughtful analyses from their own perspectives. It was Jawaharlal Nehru, the distinguished Indian prime minister, who wrote in his Discovery of India, "Few people have been more closely related in origin and throughout history than the people of India and the people of Iran." The work of writers like M K Bhadrakumar and Siddharth Varadarajan (who wrote extensively on the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] controversy with Iran) is indispensable to a deeper understanding of today's Iran and the Middle East as a whole.
G Travan
California, USA (Dec 20, '05)


[Jephraim P] Gundzik, what planet are you residing on [India takes a left, Dec 20]? India has been pursuing a left-of-center political policy for over 50 years. It is not an outcome of high levels of poverty as you cite, but rather the high levels of poverty are still there because of it. Economists can argue all day long what the levels of poverty are. However, I will cite you a single example why the "left" is out of touch with reality and will keep India from attaining its true levels of achievement. Take the case of the Food Corp of India. It overpays for substandard wheat and rice because of political pressure and then "stores" these food stocks in some medieval warehouses where the bulk of these grains rot. Not to mention most of these grains are collected from farmers who have been subsidized heavily in terms of fuel, water and fertilizers. How does this "left-oriented" policy improve the food intake of millions of Indians below the poverty level?
Rocky (Dec 20, '05)


Jephraim Gundzik [India takes a left, Dec 20] states the obvious: there is a tilt to the left in Latin America. Yet a shift [into] left gear does not make for a radical reorganization of society. Look at Lula da Silva's Brazil, which is now racked with financial scandals. Evo Morales' triumph at the ballot box in Bolivia may be encouraging, but although he is unashamedly progressive, geography will cool his ardor for rapid reform. Bolivia is wealthy in minerals and oil and gas, but it is landlocked. So Mr Morales will have to be flexible and nuanced in the way he negotiates with oil-and-gas and mineral companies, and his neighbors, especially Chile, which in war had Bolivia's port on the Pacific as booty. Even today the irredentist flame burns in the hearts of Bolivians. Chile will soon have a socialist as president but years of stern Milton Friedman economics have tempered and tamed the socialist will to rapid reform. Now, if we consider Gundzik's treatment of India, it is a far stretch to say India will lean to the left. Kerala has had communists in government but that has not changed much traditional India, nor for that matter have Naxalites in Kolkata, piecemeal reforms not withstanding. India today is straining for a rank as an economic superpower. It will follow a capitalist road as it loosens willy-nilly a dirigiste economy. No matter how rapid [its] economic growth, India wears the millstone of poverty and overpopulation and a decaying traditional [agricultural] and artisan culture. It is weary of radical reform, and for that matter looks with a cold eye on the Maoist rebels in Nepal, which it regards as its turf. Let's not forget that social democrats have held political power for decades in Scandinavia, and yet even they worked the economy for the benefit of the private sector while they taxed for the social security of its citizens across all classes.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 20, '05)


Cha-am Jamal's letter [Dec 19] in response to Software and boiled beans (Dec 16) assumes that there is but one definition of a nation. Sure, the imagined community is needed to form a nation in the Westphalian sense, and India was not a nation in those terms until the British Raj was firmly entrenched. However, India has always been much more than a nation - it is a civilization. Ancient scriptures refer to people from as far as Jambudweep (Indonesia) as their own kin. Sprawling empires had brought a sense of unity since the days of Ashoka. Switching to a traditional name for a city is, therefore, not a mistake. However, the priority should be repairing the pothole-laden roads in Bangalore. In his [Dec 19] rant, Frank correctly "accuses" me of justifying the caste system on its ancient roots - that of division of labor. I would have no qualms being compared to a toilet cleaner who would be from a different caste, because different does not entail inferior. It merely teaches us that each of us [has] a different duty in society. Were I to take her job, I would have different duties to what I have now. By the way, how does Frank explain the Confucian social hierarchy? Or does he consider that redundant vis-a-vis the "genuinely Chinese" Marxism? As far as outsourcing being equivalent to "master-servant", I am not sure if he himself knows what he is saying. If producing bespoke software and managing business processes for clients is "enslavement", then exporting cheap toys and clothes for Tesco and Wal-Mart cannot be any different. He should realize that this is a world of interdependence, where economies are trading with each other for mutual gains. Nothing less, nothing more.
Aruni Mukherjee (Dec 20, '05)


John J Barnhardt III [letter, Dec 15] is correct that the US Civil War was costly and destructive. The Civil War was not listed in my article [Superpower vulnerability, Dec 14] because the context of my analysis was focused on the exemption of destruction on the US homeland by all foreign wars waged by the US, except the War of 1812. A civil war is not a foreign war by definition. The US experience in the Civil War is not material to my argument. The US did apparently learn a lesson from the Civil War as no other civil war has been waged for more than a century since, a fact that reinforces my argument. The point of the article is that had the US experienced destruction from foreign wars on its homeland the way many other countries did, it might have had a less foreign-war-prone policy. Nations that can engage in foreign wars with immunity on their homeland are likely to be cavalier about engaging in foreign wars. Such a proposition is hardly a "deficient analysis", and the exclusion of the Civil War does not make my statement quoted by Mr Barnhardt "seriously wrong".
Henry C K Liu (Dec 20, '05)


Miguel A Guanipa [letter, Dec 19], accusing US House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of "doublespeak" because she defends Democratic diversity of views over Republican groupthink, asserts: "The main difference between [the Democratic] position and that of the Republican Party ... is that when the Democrats go to war their primary concern is to ... have an exit strategy. When the Republicans go to war, theirs is more of a victory strategy." Being politically correct as substitute for being factually correct, Mr Guanipa, is only worsened when you rely on the revisionism of Fox's fake news. Here are the words of Republicans when [Bill] Clinton was president: "Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the president to explain to us what the exit strategy is" (George W Bush, April 9, 1999). "I think it's also important for the president to lay out a timetable as to how long they will be involved and when they will be withdrawn" (George W Bush, June 5, 1999). "If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy" (Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of presidential candidate George W Bush). "Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years" (Joe Scarborough, Florida Republican). "You can support the troops but not the president" (Representative Tom DeLay, Texas Republican). "My job as majority leader is be supportive of our troops, try to have input as decisions are made and to look at those decisions after they're made ... not to march in lock step with everything the president decides to do" (Senator Trent Lott, Mississippi Republican) ...
Joseph J Nagarya
Boston, Massachusetts (Dec 20, '05)

Gareth Porter [US embraces Iraqi insurgents, Dec 17] is an expert on the Middle East, but he may have just missed two important reasons as to why the US Army has to stay for a little longer. First: Not all the Sunnis in Iraq are insurgents. Even though the heavier fighting seemed to have taken place in Sunni-controlled area, no one has come up with a certified conclusion that the majority of Sunnis do not want democracy or oppose US intervention. Under Saddam [Hussein], Sunnis, especially those in the Ba'ath Party, might not have suffered as badly as the Shi'ites or the Kurds, but suffer they did. Second: Even if the Sunnis now want to join the fight to get rid of the terrorists in Iraq, not many of them are trained to do so effectively. It is one thing to want to fight. Doing so effectively is another matter altogether. This may be the reason US troops are training what will become the nucleus of a new Iraqi army. Those [who] were in Saddam's army were never motivated or trained enough to fight well. Perhaps the new army made up of Sunnis, Shi'ites and Kurds under the command of a professional leadership will do a good job in neutralizing the terrorists.
J Chua
Montville, New Jersey (Dec 19, '05)


Andrei Lankov [China raises its stake in North Korea, Dec 17] looks at China's growing economic investment in North Korea with a fair eye. And if as he says learning Chinese is almost as popular as learning English, it is a barometer of the flow of foreign investment from Beijing. China shares a common goal with South Korea: the economic viability of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Collapse of the Kim dynasty is something China does not want on its borders, for the chaos and unrest would surely spill over to its heavily Korean minority province on the other side of the Yalu; nor does Seoul look forward to a forced, lock-stepped reunification on the German model, which as we know would sap a vibrant South Korean economy and create harsh social tensions. Although Pyongyang would gladly welcome a less aggressive American diplomacy and solve outstanding issues from the war in Korean War, it finds in China a traditional protector, and one that has a large hand in offering most welcome economic assistance in kind, in loans, and in investments. (Here it should be pointed out that Chinese bankers strategically placed in Europe "front" for Western investors who prefer not to ruffle Washington's feathers.) Dr Lankov's article, it seems to me, discounts the visceral desire among Koreans, North or South, for unification, or at least for more open contacts and exchanges. Proof of this is readily seen in Seoul's aid in kind, investment, and tourism and family exchanges. Mention must be made of the expressed desire of North and South Koreas to compete in the Asian Games as a unified team. Pyongyang knows its neighbor China very well. Conversely, Beijing knows North Korea. Professor Lankov is spot-on in saying that China is publicly taking a low-keyed stance. Negotiations are held behind closed doors. Solidarity among brotherly communist parties are observed. Although Lankov does not suggest it, it is nonetheless worth repeating that China's influence in Korea is centuries old, and that relationship has weathered well dynastic changes, war, revolution, and varying stages of detente.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 19, '05)


I was enjoying Pepe Escobar's lighthearted prose in But it's so cold in Alaska [Dec 16] until he eerily concluded said article with sentiments seemingly resembling (if not tacitly concurring with) those of "Bibi" Netanyahu and the hardcore Israeli right regarding an attack on Iran by Israel next March. Something needs to be made emphatically clear to Pepe, Spengler, Straussians, the Likud, those who fail to learn from the weak links of empires past, and the world at large: any attack on Iran by Israel would result not only in an immediate and devastating response, but also a potentially widening conflict merging heaven and earth, and abject disaster for global energy as well as fiat-currency-based economic and environmental security. Subsequently, then, such an attack would hardly result in the Osirak-like outcome that the aforementioned MIT-educated neo-con Sith Lord keeps glibly and dubiously promising in Tel Aviv. Among the routinely and widely ruminated potential fallouts from such a tragically misconceived (despite the plethora of war games conducted) attack on Iran: mayhem in the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz; a subsequent energy-price spike surpassing US$100 per barrel, with gold in turn surpassing $800 per troy ounce and a (re)confiscation (a la [US president Franklin Roosevelt] circa 1933) order for gold being issued by the US Federal Reserve; interest rates spiking the ceilings in most central banks; the opening of Pandora's Box just west, and southwest, of the Iranian border; potentially rising instabilities (if not outright client-state cave-ins) in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Libya, Afghanistan and Iraq; Beijing viewing, and possibly acting upon, an alleyway opportunity for "annexing" Taiwan; et cetera. Despite the appointed [Mahmud] Ahmadinejad's recently and understandably distressing remarks issued domestically and abroad, it's best to keep the genie in the bottle, regardless of the amount of supposedly reassuring "intel" that either Tel Aviv or Washington claim they have on Iran. There is only so much that the smaller, darker kid in the playground can take from the fat kid before ditching all timidity and decorum and aiming his swung trainers directly for the groin.
R Davoodi
Tehran, Iran (Dec 19, '05)


[Re Software and boiled beans, Dec 16] Entire generations of Indians have grown up with the words Bombay, Madras, Calcutta and Bangalore. What purpose does it serve to cling to ancient history? There was no India then, anyway. India itself is a British invention. So is cricket. Does India really want to completely de-Britainize itself? The obsession with historical names seems a tad childish.
Cha-am Jamal
Thailand (Dec 19, '05)


Chrysantha Wijeyasingha writes [letter, Dec 15] re A dust storm over the Holocaust [Dec 13]: "My family are Catholics who chose to immigrate to the US for two reasons. First, it was a Christian nation." As a longtime student of the US constitution and its origins, I am beyond fed up with the lie that the US is "a Christian nation". The US is a secular nation, with a constitution which itself stipulates that it is the "supreme law of the Land" - above which there is no other - and expressly establishes separation of church and state. And [he] writes: "The racial divide that separates this so-called Christian nation gives ... no logical reason to criticize India's caste system. When we first arrived we noticed that in every school, church, even business, race played a key role in US society and still does." One cannot have it both ways: there is every reason to criticize racism, if one would see it end, regardless where it exists, including that of one's country of origin. It is worth noting that some immigrants to the US see others' racism but never their own. At odds with Mr Wijeyasingha's defense of India's racism is his assertion that he is a Christian, and that racism in the US "goes contrary to the teachings of Jesus Christ". The reason it is not resolved is that some racists constantly point their fingers away from themselves: "Frank should focus on his own culture [China? or US?] before criticizing other nations." It's inconsistent that Mr Wijeyasingha would cite Jesus Christ as proper exemplar, and criticize the mote in others' eyes, and actively defend the log in his own, and in that of his country of origin.
Joseph J Nagarya
Boston, Massachusetts (Dec 19, '05)


I am not planning to debate on Letters section. This letter is the last one. Chrysantha Wijeyasingha [letter, Dec 15] was wrong. The caste system is not a problem. It can be banned. What I have been criticizing is the English-speaking Indians' caste mentality. The mentality to classify a person based on job, wealth, country of origin, skin color etc is what makes some people disgusting. You cannot ban such mentality. For example, [letter writer] Aruni Mukherjee was trying to categorize persons based on their job codes. Lou Ya (Pallavi Aiyar, In the men's room, China leaves India standing, Dec 6) makes an honest living by taking on a dirty job. She is proud of herself. She should be. Aruni Mukherjee should be flattered if he could be compared with such a great woman whom we can respect.
Frank of Seattle
Washington, USA (Dec 19, '05)


The litany of scathing criticisms on the ATol readers' page promoted me to read Pallavi Aiyar's article (In the men's room, China leaves India standing Dec 6), and in her defense, it is irrational of the readers to accuse her of overlooking China's other social and worker problems when her main focus is on the issue of the caste system in India and its lack thereof in China. Consider the reverse: if a Chinese journalist were to write glowingly of India's sophisticated and highly successful technical university system, which produces an abundance of creative, independent-minded Indian scientists, while blaming the Confucian system in China for the significant, comparative lag, is it fair then to criticize said journalist for lacking objectivity in not mentioning India's less laudable caste system and its stigma? Aren't they both different issues and aspects of society not to be lumped together and compared? Is it not possible for an Indian or Chinese to write positively about an aspect of the other's culture or political system without seeming to insult the superiority or nationalistic instincts of their own? Come on, both India and China have their respective successes and failures. To be progressive, one needs to be able to cast an objective eye towards one's culture, to identify its problems and to learn from the success of others. A nationalist only sees and extols the virtues of one's "unblemished" and "superior" culture.
L Kirchhoff (Dec 19, '05)


Regarding Juchechosunmanse's rather sarcastic [letter, Dec 15], one only has to look at China's human-rights record on a microeconomic level: basically the constant (almost every week) reports of how Chinese miners are killed in "accidental" explosions within the mining industry. India, along with many other mineral-rich nations, hardly ever has an article on mass deaths of miners. Hasn't China got the same kind of technology to prevent such catastrophes from happening to its miners, or does Beijing really care as these reports continue to mount? If the miners of China are treated in such a manner, one could easily deduct that human rights and the safety of workers is really not the high priority of Beijing.
Chrysantha Wijeyasingha
New Orleans, Louisiana (Dec 19, '05)


One wonders if [US] House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi had a minor Freudian slip recently when she stated that "there is no one Democratic voice ... and there is no one Democratic position" on the Iraq war, and defending this lack of direction as a sign of strength because they can boast of a party where different views are represented. I am afraid that type of doublespeak will not be able to obfuscate the reality that the Democratic Party does indeed have one clear position on the war, which is reflected in what has thus far been correctly perceived as the main difference between their position and that of the Republican Party. This is that when the Democrats go to war their primary concern is to make sure they have an exit strategy. When Republicans go to war, theirs is more of a victory strategy.
Miguel A Guanipa
Whitinsville, Massachusetts (Dec 19, '05)

Indian politicians in their infinite wisdom can resort to any number of gimmicks. I loathe their chauvinistic shenanigans. But after seeing some disproportionately vicious criticisms from articles like [Software and boiled beans, Dec 16], distorting the facts, I cannot feel but certain empathy towards the politicians. First comes the ridiculing of the original name "Bengaluru" by [translating] it as "city of boiled beans". Bengaluru does not mean that. It is already a corrupted form of the original name (Benda Kalooru) and original meaning (boiled beans). The British only anglicized from Bengaluru to "Bangalore". At least by the 9th century, "Bengalooru" [was] in vogue. Not only does the article need to get some facts right, [it needs] some perspective too. Bengaluru is neither a tongue-twister nor obtuse for a non-Kannadiga. There is hardly a consonant change between Bengaluru and "Bangalore" (unlike Kolkata or Mumbai or Chennai). Even the vowel sounds in "Bengaluru" hardly stray from the sound of "Bangalore" vowels. The last "u" is a typical south Indian way of softening Indian proper names (Raj becomes Raju, Ram becomes Ramu). Losing that last "u" while speaking Hindi or English is quite common. Most of us non-Kannadiga south Indians do call it Bengaluru in our (non-Kannada) languages and have been perfectly comfortable with it, and even in English we might say "Bengalur". Most Westerners would probably find it easy too, if it not for journalists like these overemphasizing tiniest of tiny differences. Instead of giving genuine perspective to the rest of the world, Indians are the first off the block to exaggerate, distort and ridicule the name. [Whatever] the motives of politicians [may be], the motives of these journalists aren't exactly objective either.
Sriman Kanuri (Dec 16, '05)


Regarding India changing the names of its cities [Software and boiled beans, Dec 16], one outstanding issue might as well be addressed. The mountain region being called the "Hindu Kush" ("slaughter of the Hindus") by the medieval Muslim invaders is a singular humiliation to a major faith, especially considering that no other major or even minor faith has a geographical area named after such a horrible deed. Since the medieval Muslims ultimately failed in their mission to wipe out Hinduism and in the 21st century Hinduism has truly become a global religion, the name of that mountain range should be changed to "Hindu Jayanti" or "Victory of the Hindus".
Chrysantha Wijeyasingha
New Orleans, Louisiana (Dec 16, '05)


Indrajit Basu missed a major point in the article Outsourcing: India's golden egg starts to crack [Dec 16]. India's IT [information technology] industry is nothing but a servant feeding on [its] master's leftovers. Masters will never allow servants to make more profit then them ... Building 12 more townships is not going to solve India's problem ... Building more public toilets to clean up the existing cities seems more reasonable.
Frank of Seattle
Washington, USA (Dec 16, '05)


[Paul] Bigioni [The real threat of fascism, Dec 15] could have added Japan to the list of the countries which in the 1920s and '30s paved the way for fascist militarism by, in the words of [Karl] Marx and [Friedrich] Engels, making the state executive a "committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie". And he is entirely right in that during the last 30 years, the same process has proceeded apace in the United States, and in the last 15, in Europe as well. Readers of Asia Times [Online] are probably not unaware of how far the processes of cartelization and corporatization have gone on their own continent. The future does not look bright.
Henri Day
Stockholm, Sweden (Dec 16, '05)


Jakob Cambria writes [letter, Dec 14]: "India welcomes hard currency and the infusion of millions of US dollars, pound sterling, and euros. It has a source of cheap, well-educated labor willing and able to work. This army of the employable ... take Western names and speech lessons to sound more American in most cases." You have a typical arrogant Western attitude, telling other nations: Do as I say but not as I do, all with the false authority of the IMF [International Monetary Fund], WTO [World Trade Organization] and World Bank. What makes you think a nation of 1 billion people cannot have its own hard currency that rivals the dollar, cannot use her talents in service of her own people, cannot invest in herself, cannot take pride in her own names? Anyway, thanks for the orders and instructions, yes sir, master boss.
Roy
USA (Dec 16, '05)

The use of "fascism", to me, sounds shopworn and overused - perhaps not to the degree it readily fell from the lips of anti-Vietnam protesters and armchair philosophers and neo-Marxists. It has come back in usage today as a reaction to galloping globalization, the resurgence of mergers and acquisitions worldwide since [September 11, 2001]. Paul Bigioni appeals to history in his The real threat of fascism [Dec 15]. History, it has to be pointed out, is a fickle taskmistress, for comparisons are relative and differences extreme. Fascism was coined by [Benito] Mussolini's regime. Its nature was an object of great, heated debate among the communists during the two world wars, and mostly misapplied, it should be pointed out. Today if [one needs to] call on history, one has to go back to the years before the Great War or World War I. One has to consult the Austro-Marxist Rudolf Hilferding's seminal work, Das Finanzkapital. Hilferding studied concentration in industry in an age of great trusts which in the United States corresponds to the age of [Andrew] Carnegie, [Andrew] Mellon and [John D] Rockefeller. [That] age of muckrakers and the Roosevelt and Taft administrations is a more likely parallel to our times than labeling it fascistic, which is much bandied much about ... Looking at the buyouts by private investment banking houses has the odor of the triumph and ubiquity of Hilferding's oeuvre than stale air of German industrials who wholeheartedly propped up [Adolf] Hitler.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 15, '05)


Henry C K Liu's article Superpower vulnerability [Dec 14] makes some interesting points, especially as to the Crusades, but one statement stands out as seriously wrong. Because the statement is quite material to his analysis, I quote it: "The US had been exempt from the destructiveness of war on its homeland until the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, with the exception of the War of 1812." Wrong. The most costly war in American history was fought between 1861 and 1865, on the American homeland. In the north, it was referred to as the Civil War, in the south as the "War Between the States". Either way, it destroyed the American south and nearly the American nation in fighting as horrid, given the tools of war then extant, as any in history. Fortunately or unfortunately, we have not been spared the horrors of war on our homeland except for relatively minor engagements in the War of 1812. In fact, Union and Confederate losses in proportion to their respective populations in the 1860s were remarkable. Mr Liu's analysis is deficient in stating or implying otherwise.
John J Barnhardt III (Dec 15, '05)


Thank you for bringing my story to light. Please offer my sincere appreciation for a very well-written article (Racial slurs that hurt India [Dec 14]) to Siddharth Srivastava.
Neelima (Dec 15, '05)


[Commenting] on A dust storm over the Holocaust [Dec 13], Saqib Khan [letter, Dec 14] supports the expressions of the president of Iran by [saying the] US, the UK and Australia should follow [the logic of some Israelis' "birthright" claim to Palestine] and return [their] lands to their original inhabitants. He cunningly avoids mentioning all the lands that the Muslims have taken over from previous civilizations, such as Turkey from the Christian Byzantines and Kashmir, Pakistan and Bangladesh [from] the Hindus. After all, the renaming of the mountain range to "Hindu Kush" or "the slaughter of the Hindus" by the medieval Muslims should give India sufficient reason to reclaim any property that is now under Muslim hands. And how about Tibet? Shouldn't his argument also apply to China? I would like to respond to Frank's assessment of India's "non-functional" democracy [letter, Dec 14]. He bases it on the caste system. My family are Catholics who chose to immigrate to the US for two reasons. First, it was a Christian nation; second, it was an English-speaking nation. But the racial divide that separates this so-called Christian nation gives Frank no logical reason to criticize India's caste system. When we first arrived we noticed that in every school, church, even business, race played a key role in US society and still does. This goes contrary to the teachings of Jesus Christ (who if alive now would be disgusted at how his teachings have been twisted in US culture), and yet the oldest democratic nation of modern times hasn't been able to solve this problem. Frank should focus on his own culture before criticizing other nations.
Chrysantha Wijeyasingha
New Orleans, Louisiana (Dec 15, '05)


So, my letter has finally been misread (again!) - this time by the irrepressible Frank [letter, Dec 14]. He fails to see the crystal-clear argument: dignity of labor per se cannot - and should not - be judged by comparing the lives of a single category of manual laborers. If we were to look at how "urban, upper-class" (adapting Frank's quote) Chinese look down upon migrant workers and farmers, then their plight would be comparable to what toilet cleaners face in India. It is a fundamental error made by one of Asia Times [Online's] journalists [Pallavi Aiyar, In the men's room, China leaves India standing, Dec 6] by launching into such big generalizations. As I mentioned, she should [have] restricted herself to toilet cleaners, and not gone on to take this as a minuscule version of the bigger picture. What caste and English proficiency [have] to do with this topic, perhaps even Frank doesn't know.
Aruni Mukherjee
University of Warwick, England (Dec 15, '05)


Pallavi Aiyar's article In the men's room, China leaves India standing [Dec 6] would be more objective if she observed the work of Sulabh Shauchalay in promoting healthy sanitation. I recently had the opportunity to use [its] facilities in the vicinity of no less a monument than the Taj Mahal in India. I was not only impressed by the "cleanliness", but was even more impressed by [its] promotion of "waterless" urinals. If the author was a bit observant, she might have noticed that in spite of charging high "fees" to visit the Taj from "foreign" visitors, the government agency in charge fails to provide even basic facilities such as toilets. Second, the work of the government is done by organizations like Sulabh, which incidentally are promoted by a so-called high-caste Brahmin. The obvious failure here lies not with the caste Hindus, but the so-called secular government that "promotes" the Nehruvian idea of equality. It is fair to compare India's progress with China's; it would, however, be more useful if the pseudo-liberal Indian writers were better informed.
Rocky (Dec 15, '05)


Jayanti Patel writes [letter, Dec 14], "It is a fact that a foreigner will see only what the government of China wants to him to see." Hmmm. If he is right, those foreign journalists and correspondents who have been writing extensively about China's problems such as corruption, human-rights abuses, religious persecution and social unrest etc must have either got their information from official Chinese sources or they made everything up, since they are not able to see anything the Chinese government doesn't want them to see. Wow. What this means could be very profound. It either means China has a free press today which allows all those stories and reports about China's dark side to turn up freely (so that foreign reporters can "report" them from China, using materials from the Chinese press), or it means the problems and issues those foreign journalists reported were totally fabricated. The incident near Dongzhou, Guangdong province, where up to 20 villagers were allegedly killed by the police? Of course it was made up, right? Kind of repetitive, but you know what I mean.
Juchechosunmanse
Beijing, China (Dec 15, '05)


I completely agree with L Kirchhoff [letter, Dec 14]. Pointing fingers, constantly bickering and engaging in unabashed nasty bouts of verbal jousts against each other are surely disgusting human behaviors. It is more beneficial for India and China to leave each other alone.
Frank of Seattle
Washington, USA (Dec 15, '05)


Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad is the Howard Cosell of the Middle East. He is just a plain-spoken, up-front kind of guy. The difference between Ahmadinejad and most other Muslim leaders is not in the substance of their real beliefs but only in the degree of deference to political correctness. The only Muslim leader [who] actually holds a radically different view is Pakistani President [General Pervez] Musharraf, whose desire to rebuild the historical ties between the Muslims and the Jews appears to be genuine.
Cha-am Jamal
Thailand (Dec 15, '05)

Re Food for thought for Thai hawkers [Dec 14]: Bangkok need only look south to Singapore for a solution to its street-hawker problem. In nearly every residential neighborhood and shopping mall here there are "hawker centers" serving up the full spectrum of the city-state's street cuisine. Hawker centers are generally clean, convenient, cheap and, more important, off the street. Hawker centers deliver the same benefits as street hawkers in other Asian cities. The difference is that in Singapore, clustering them together into manageable centers eases both car and pedestrian traffic on major streets and helps contain and reduce litter. Overheads such as cleaners and utility costs are shared among the occupants. Hawker centers have the added benefit of bringing their vendors into the formal economy through licensing. It's hardly rocket science. But it does require planning and good government to make it work. Having lived in other Asian cities where hawkers crowd the sidewalks, create traffic jams and spread rubbish, I'll take the hawker-center model any day.
Tony B Graham
Singapore (Dec 14, '05)


It is ingenuous of Siddharth Srivastava [Racial slurs that hurt India, Dec 14] to say that India urged countries outsourcing there to ban through legislation "call centers and software". India welcomes hard currency and the infusion of millions of US dollars, pound sterling, and euros. It has a source of cheap, well-educated labor willing and able to work. This army of the employable, as Srivastava notes, take Western names and speech lessons to sound more American in most cases. But the accent is never right, and the cultural divide too rigid for the flexibility and informality Americans expect. Thus, a reason for frustration and anger. On the other hand the Western customer is unaware that the call centers are run by a third party; some are Indian, others are creations of Americans. The work discipline is very strict, and dismissal happens often, as does turnover. Nonetheless, going offshore makes dollars and sense for companies looking to keep coupon clippers happy, a rosy bottom line, and very fat bonuses for senior management. Outsourcing has gone up a notch. JPMorgan has announced hiring 4,500 analysts and bankers, which tolls the bell for the higher, white-collar workers with advanced degrees. In other words, the support-staff hires will diminish in importance as the more value-added work goes offshore. Thomas Friedman posits a flattening world as globalization expands in all directions of the compass, but it has a destabilizing effect and one that ultimately will shake the pillars of 21st-century capitalism. A word about Neelima [Tirumalasetti]. She has recourse in the law for discrimination at the work place. However, workers losing jobs afar have little or none since the business of government is to feed the capitalist furnace with its own citizens by outsourcing low-, medium-, and eventually high-end jobs.
Jakob Cambria (Dec 14, '05)


Having nothing to do with Asia, Spengler's [Dec 13] piece [The gay, the bad and the Israeli] confirms my view that any piece he writes will be published prominently by Asia Times [Online]. I honestly can't say what is more absurd, Spengler's tortuous rant on gays, [Steven] Spielberg and Islamic terrorism, or his insane geopolitical revelation that "the Arab world despises Marxists, homosexuals and Hollywood directors". I have not heard of a single attack against a gay communist filmmaker by Islamic terrorists. Tony Kushner, despite earning the title of "world's worst playwright" from one of the world's worst columnists, is not losing any sleep to fears of Islamist assassination squads, despite being a gay, Marxist screenwriter. The presumably straight, avowedly capitalist commander-in-chief of the US, however, travels with an army of guards. Perhaps Spengler knows something about G W Bush and the neo-cons' personal lives that the rest of us don't.
Gunther Travan
California (not Hollywood), USA (Dec 14, '05)


I refer to the article A dust storm over the Holocaust [Dec 13]. More than 25 years after the ayatollahs first seized power in Tehran, the Islamic Republic of Iran headed by a new invigorating and hothead president is taking on the cause of Palestinians and reaffirming his government's position on the illegality of Israel's existence and its illegitimacy on Arab soil. Once again, he has provoked anger and resentment when he denied that the Holocaust took place and called [for the] "tumor" of Israel to be moved to Europe. The truth cannot be denied: the principle on which Israel was created, as an extension of colonialism ruled in proxy by the colonial powers, was illegal and illegitimate. Jews' claim that Palestine belongs to them as a birthright because their ancestors lived there 2,000 years ago, as reminded by a spokesman of Ariel Sharon recently, should be taken seriously by the [natives] of America [and] ancient inhabitants of Australia and New Zealand, and on that premise, the Europeans [should be] asked to leave the lands belonging to [Europe's] original peoples. President [Mahmud] Ahmadinejad's militant and bellicose posture has put him on a collision course with President [George W] Bush and with some of the Western governments, but I should imagine it is a sort of diversion from Iran's real intent to go nuclear. I believe that Mr Ahmadinejad is quite right when he says that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is worse than anything Europe experienced under Nazi Germany ... The American and [other] Western governments must change their partial attitude towards Israel and must realize the fact that it has become a liability and scourge for the rest of the world and is responsible for many economic and political ills that confront the world today. Peace must prevail in the Middle East and the Jews must try living in peace with [their] neighbors. That is the only way forward and best for Israel's survival. They will not for long be able to bomb their way into everything which is to their advantage. Arabs and Jews are extremely intelligent people and if the Jews decide to live in peace and harmony with [their] Arab neighbors and not as an extension of American colonial ambition and the imperialistic intentions of Emperor G W Bush, the potential for the whole of the Middle East to develop is colossal.
Saqib Khan
London, England (Dec 14, '05)


Re Why Southeast Asia is turning from US to China [Dec 10] by Tim Shorrock and Why the East Asian Summit matters [Dec 13] by Barry Desker: The USA pretends it is not containing China and China pretends it is not trying to break the containment. The above statement encapsulates the true nature of the Sino-American relationship to date. The operative word is "pretend". Both the above articles give the impression that the Americans are letting the Chinese having a "free run" in Southeast Asia, and it is a false one. The following two new developments will be enough to repudiate the claims of the authors of the above-mentioned two articles. We all know that for years the Americans have failed to get the members of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) to upgrade their organization from a loose association of geographical neighbors to a much more structured and proactive one where members would work for a common stand on political, economic and military issues. The Americans have always wanted ASEAN to join its allies in East Asia to provide a counterweight to the rising Asian giant, China. ASEAN had consistently rejected such a role for itself and [its] leaders remained adamant against allowing the [members] of ASEAN to affect their independent national policies, be it foreign relations or domestic politics. It seems things are finally moving in the American direction with the just-concluded 11th ASEAN meeting in Kuala Lumpur. The ASEAN nations have just agreed to a charter to consolidate ASEAN to play a bigger role, and we can foresee a tougher stand on Myanmar, and a prominent place will be given to "American touted" values like human rights in domestic politics. Will ASEAN thus immunize itself against "Asian values" and the Chinese influence? China had been working for the last couple of decades to form some kind of EU-style multilateral economic arrangement for East Asia but was consistently frustrated by the Americans and [their] allies. The Americans had successfully shoved a talking shop, APEC [Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation], in its place. Further attempts by the Chinese [after the] 1997 financial crisis did not get them any nearer their goal. This time the Americans with their allies and their "closet allies" within ASEAN have managed another "coup" against China. This American brainchild, this so-called East Asian Summit, a misnomer by the way, will be just another expanded APEC with the inclusion of Australia, New Zealand and India. China's hope of a Far East common market is quickly dissipating into thin air.
Chan Ah Tee
Malaysia (Dec 14, '05)


I am shocked and disappointed with the immature response from ATol to my letter [Dec 12] ... First of all I am a guy. Second, I am not Frank. Please do not lump me with him. This is in no way defending his views, but can a person living in China extol the virtues of democracy and vice versa? Or is that not allowed? The comment about where I live stumped me totally. Is this some kind of new goofy rule? From now on one is allowed to comment only on events within one's country? If that is the rule, I have to say that I am not the only one who should plead guilty. A quick check of the letters reveals [Chrysantha] Wijeyasingha commenting on Iran (he lives in the US! How dare he?), Jakob Cambria commenting on Japan; unfortunately he lives in the US. Tarun and Aruni [Mukherjee] also have commented on the article while living in the US and England respectively. Tsk, tsk. If I did not include my place of residence, pray what would you have done? Pay attention to what I wrote? Most of my post was based on facts. It is a fact that a foreigner will see only what the government of China wants to him to see. The website I referred to will show you the same pictures whether you live in Mumbai or Helsinki. It is obvious to me that the article writer did not react positively to criticism and has chosen to respond in a childish manner.
Jayanti Patel (Dec 14, '05)

Pallavi Aiyar, author of In the men's room, India is left standing (Dec 6), has not responded to any of the comments about that article on this page. - ATol


Since my name was mentioned so many times, I should be allowed to say a few words. Aruni Mukherjee [letter, Dec 13] missed a major point of the article In the men's room, China leaves India standing (Dec 5). The key point of the article is that despite being a toilet cleaner, Lou Ya has dignity and pride. It has nothing to do with the political systems of both countries. I did not defend the joys of living under communism. ATol editor should stop lying. I just asked others to respect Chinese people's choice. Indians never had a choice. The English gave India a non-functional democracy, but left out the dignity and pride for its people. That is why those shameless self-praising wealthy upper-caste Indians care nothing about their brothers and sisters living in extreme poverty. To them, exhibiting obedience to their masters is far more important.
Frank of Seattle
Washington, USA (Dec 14, '05)


It amuses me to see how ethnic Chinese and Indians, regardless of their nationality, are completely defensive about China and India, especially on the ATol Letters page. What is incomprehensible is how both ethnic groups engage in unabashed nasty bouts of verbal jousts against each other, as if China and India, instead of having shared a much longer history of trade, cultural exchange and good relations, have always been bitter and irreconcilable rivals. Do you have to be against one to be pro the other? Don't both countries have their fair share of problems - from population explosion, poverty [and] corruption to human-rights abuses - as well as developmental achievements? Why must one be perpetually benchmarked against the other? Isn't it more mutually beneficial for both huge nations to engage, or even to leave each other alone, than to point the finger and constantly bicker? It comes across as immature and petty, and plays into the hands of any opportunistic third power.
L Kirchhoff (Dec 14, '05)


[Re] Joseph Nagarya's letter [Dec 13]: Of course the Pew poll I mentioned said nothing to the effect that Indians approve of torture, whether of Indians or others. My speculation is that they, like me, see the US as a whole, not just its faults. Also, to pick on "The United States, unlike India, has a tradition, beginning before its founding", etc, just drive down to Salem, Massachusetts, to check this. The colonies had this quaint punishment called "figging and birching", you should look that up. My point is not that I'm blind to the faults of either the country of my birth or my present home, but I still see them as bright and shining exceptions to the chaos that prevails in many other less fortunate lands.
Jonnavithula ("Jon") Sreekanth
Acton, Massachusetts (Dec 14, '05)


I venture to guess Jakob Cambria [letter, Dec 12] is a historian as he shows such knowledge of historical facts. However, he should allow for the fact that the leaders of Southeast Asian nations are forward-looking and wise enough to look after the present and future interests of their countries without delving into "centuries-old memories about China". Likewise scratching up old wounds for India at the "defeat at the hands of Chinese troops in 1962" serves the same useless purpose as asking Japan not to cozy up to the US after the atomic bombs of yesteryear.
S P Li (Dec 14, '05)


To Jakob Cambria: I don't have a problem with you being an equal-opportunity basher. You bash the US, China, and [whomever] you see fit. But I do have a problem when there is no coherency in your analysis. Without coherency, you sound a bit schizophrenic. Is it this? Or is that? Ooh, I see, it must be this. Most geopoliticians agree that: (1) America wants to be the only superpower, and is enlisting Japan help for this purpose; (2) China must eventually democratize, thus becoming more attractive to Taiwan for reunification. Your responses to these will help me understand the intent of your letters. Or join us on the forum for more.
Roy
Proudly American and World Citizen (Dec 14, '05)


Nobody understands that globalization is a fake and phony concept ... In Europe farmers need institutional help because with the taxes they pay, they belong like every citizen to their own societies. Tell me one place, one nation, outside of Europe, where universities are free, where hospitals and medicine are free, where people with no employment get 50% of their last salary. When in China a farmer will earn US$1,000 monthly, then we can talk about globalization, not before. Right now is only a big speculation with low salaries, no education, and no social rights.
Umberto Postal
Italy (Dec 14, '05)

[Re A dust storm over the Holocaust, Dec 13] To understand Iran and Israel, it is useful to consider the disconnect between their concepts of themselves and their perception of their realities. A most reptilian instinct of human beings is a yearning to be part of something bigger. In a world dominated by giants like the US, Russia, China etc, Israel and Iran both feel dwarfed by not one but many other countries. (The same instinct led to the formation of the EU.) To make matters worse, their insecurities are multiplied manifold by the hostility of powerful neighboring states. All this grates against their ideas of who they are - heirs to ideas, traditions and cultures that, they believe, dominated the world at one time or another, in one form or another. To reconcile their ideas of self with reality, Israelis took to the idea of a "Judeo-Christian" civilization, while Iran went after the "ummah needs a leader for the caliphate" idea. Neither of them is deluded enough to risk war, but neither will back down from what they perceive to be a challenge to their concepts of self. The trouble is that both of them seek their identities in religion. And both these religions have books that stop them from making compromises. Before any compromise can have a chance, both countries will have to shift their sense of self, from religious to cultural or geographical identities. Iran must find Jewish citizens to argue Iran's case, and Israel must find Muslim citizens to defend it. That would require both states to separate religion from their politics. Doing so, however, will diminish their sense of self. It will be much tougher for Iran to do so, since it has invested so heavily in an Islamic identity. Above all, there has to be some other idea which will give people of the world a sense of belonging to something bigger than what they know, so that they can live among the giants without fear.
Brij (Dec 13, '05)


The article A dust storm over the Holocaust [Dec 13] suggests that Mahmud Ahmadinejad's statement should actually send shivers across the Middle East. Once Iran becomes a nuclear power in the region, Israel is not the only target of Tehran's foreign policy. Iraq, which fought an eight-year war with Iran, should take note. Even if Iran never uses the atom bomb but possesses it, Iran will have a leverage that the rest of the Muslim Arab Middle East will not have. Saudi Arabia, Iraq, or any other Middle Eastern nation that won't [agree with] Iranian policy may feel the sharp end of its dictates. This will leave the Middle East with only two choices. First is to desperately develop their own nuclear arsenal, which would be roundly denounced by the world at large. Second and more plausibly, they will have to ally with the very same "infidels" who do have nuclear arsenals to checkmate a theocratic nuclear Iran. That means aligning themselves with the "satanic" USA, or the "infidel" EU or Russia. Either way a nuclear-armed Iran will not be to the best interest of the entire Middle Eastern region, let alone Israel. Mr Ahmadinejad cleverly singled the Israeli state as the "enemy" but there is a crucial element that must be considered. Assuming the impossible, that Iran does launch a nuclear attack on Israel, there would be two important consequences from this action. First is the deadly reaction from Israel and second is the prevailing winds of the Middle East which flow west to east. A nuclear attack on Israel would result in the inevitable radiation fallout which would have a direct effect on [the Muslim nations to Israel's east], and Israel's nuclear counter-strike would have the same effect on Iran and its eastern neighbors, namely Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. A radiated Middle East, apart from the human toll, would be a global catastrophe - something [of which] the Middle East and the world at large should take note.
Chrysantha Wijeyasingha
New Orleans, Louisiana (Dec 13, '05)


I think it is morally reprehensible for a publication of your high standing to publish an inflammatory piece such as that written by Spengler, an otherwise fine writer, on December 13 [The gay, the bad and the Israeli].
John Scherb (Dec 13, '05)


[The US fast-food chain] Wendy's had a catchy commercial years ago. The punch line was "Where's the beef?" Well, according to Hisane Masaki [Japan adds beef to US ties, Dec 13], it is found in America's beef exports to Japan. Japan [at present] is the odd man out in Asia. So [to] outplay China's gambit in isolating Tokyo, Prime Minister [Junichiro] Koizumi has strengthened relations with Washington, commercially and militarily. Japan has joined the United States in guaranteeing Taiwan's sovereignty. It is edging closer to abrogating de jure the peace constitution by enlarging a standing army which today is called a defense force. China might fear existential encirclement but Japan deserves its rightful place in Asia. China's desire to browbeat Japan has given life to a geopolitical configuration which a half-century ago the world thought consigned to history's dustbin.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 13, '05)


Is ATol Editorial afflicted by Frank-itis, or is it that Frank became a "cult figure" (your own inane words at propping up the village idiot) because he reflected your personal, totally un-ATol-like bias in his nitpicking on India? Jayanti Patel [letter, Dec 12] made valid arguments in pooh-poohing the silliness in Pallavi Aiyar's In the men's room, India is left standing [Dec 6]. While there are reports of thousands of unreported [sic] strikes and revolutions in the Chinese countryside every year, Aiyar's "objective" reporting found the gem of class equality in the loo in China and bemoaned the lack of it in India. What elevated standards in journalism and what a high quality of editorial board that passed this brilliant, hard-hitting article for the great information it contained! I could see the objective, superior brains that passed this unsanitary article rising to the defense with a totally irrelevant comparison of Jayanti Patel's place of residence (Chicago) as having been sufficient proof to puncture her arguments. What does where she lives have to do with her valid observation that censored news from China does not reveal the true facts? At least pick on Jayanti's language, spelling, grammar, tense or presentation to belittle her instead of this fatuous statement "but you are in Chicago and 23.6% of people live in poverty in India's well-lit cities". Perhaps Frank is on board the editorial staff. Or is it the season to be stupid?
Sri
New York, USA (Dec 13, '05)

Letter writer Frank of Seattle is famous for (among other things) writing glowing defenses of the joys of living in communist, undemocratic China while he himself enjoys the comforts of the capitalist, democratic US northwest. Our comment under Jayanti Patel's letter was meant only to point out a similar apparent disconnect between the observer and the observed. - ATol


The article that Pallavi [Aiyar] wrote [In the men's room, India is left standing Dec 6] could not have been more honest and the plain, simple, stark-naked truth. Every now and then I get e-mails from co-Indian friends about the Indian economy and FDI [foreign direct investment] and how Indians are doing so well in the USA and blah blah and so on and so forth. Purchasing-power GDP [gross domestic product] growth and all those great, super numbers. One such letter floating around is [about] how many scientist/how many engineers/doctors/employees in Microsoft/Intel etc etc are of Indian origin in the US. And how proud they are suddenly being Indian. And I am honestly angry whenever such I see such self-praising hobla-hoo. I ask them what have they done to better the conditions of their fellow humans who still exist on less than a US$1 a day. Somehow I turn out to be a bad guy trying to act smart. Pallavi is right about how people in India treat fellow human beings. We have shamefully done nothing about the dignity of labor of those toilet cleaners or the extreme poor, and they are looked down upon.
Tarun
Dallas, Texas (Dec 13, '05)


At the risk of prolonging a discussion on the Letters page, I must dissociate myself with the dubious "seconding" of my December 6 letter by Jayanti Patel (Dec 12) in response to Pallavi Aiyar's December 6 article [In the men's room, India is left standing] By no stretch of imagination did my letter come close to comparing the polities of India and China. Although I do agree with the benefits of Indian democracy vis-a-vis the Chinese system, this is a point entirely irrelevant to the discussion. To reiterate, my point in the letter simply was that Aiyar's analysis was hampered by a much too narrow compartmentalization of societal evils, and no worthwhile evaluation can be made about such diverse societies such as India and China without taking into account more factors. So toilet cleaners are better off in China - but what about the plight of migrant workers? Her analysis robs us of the overarching picture.
Aruni Mukherjee
University of Warwick, England (Dec 13, '05)


Jonnavithula Sreekanth writes [letter, Dec 12]: "Pepe Escobar's article [Full power on the Arabian Sea, Dec 3] was a travelogue about India, during which he noted signs of the Portuguese inquisition. For him to have compared that to Abu Ghraib is obviously a political statement, because in the long recorded history of mankind, Abu Ghraib was not the high-water mark ... unless one is motivated by a reflexive anti-Americanism." My concern is not relative degrees of "victimhood" and how those are weighted by the scales of prejudice, but apologists for a heinous and depraved war crime -- torture - which is universally banned, with absolutely no exceptions to those bans. The United States, unlike India, has a tradition, beginning before its founding, and secured in its constitution, of both dissent and protection thereof. I do not put domestic political party, or the anti-Americanism which attacks and violates both constitution and exercise of the rights secured thereby, before the rule of law and my country's interests ... And: "Also ... the people that [Escobar] is writing about don't share this prejudice [against the war crime of torture]; a June 2005 Pew poll showed that 71% of Indians had a positive opinion about the US." I would be ashamed and embarrassed, Mr Sreekanth, to admit that my country of origin viewed objection to a human-rights violation - the universally banned war crime of torture - and the exercise by a citizen of a right and duty as merely "prejudice". From whence, Mr Sreekanth, do you get the bizarre notion that the legal requirement that the US obey its own constitution and laws, and the secured right and duty of its citizens to demand that it do so, is anti-American? And from whence India's view that torture is acceptable - so long as its victims are not Indians?
Joseph J Nagarya
Boston, Massachusetts (Dec 13, '05)


What's with the smear campaign against the US on your website? Isn't there anything else happening in Asia?
James C Knoop (Dec 13, '05)


There's a rogue elephant running amok in our village. It kind of draws attention to itself, doesn't it? - ATol

Re US turns the screws on deal with India [Dec 10]: I strongly believe that the India-US nuclear deal will pass through the [US] Congress. After the public announcement of the deal and India taking a virtual U-turn to support the US against Iran, it is difficult for the Americans to backtrack. If the American Congress fails to ratify the deal, it is not going bring status quo for India, but it will surely strain the relations between the countries and it may even push India toward an anti-US camp. The US lawmakers must understand that they have only two ways to go, and since both are dangerous they will have to choose the less dangerous. If the US, UK and France, which have no nuclear adversary at their border, have any justification to have nukes, then India has more rationale to have nukes. Bending rules for India will certainly set a dangerous precedent for others, but ignoring India is not the right answer. They must not view India's nuclear ambition at par with other courtiers. India is too big to let someone dictate to it or someone (like Japan) to protect it. Other aspiring countries must be told that they have no nuclear neighbors to justify their demand. Let us imagine the course that India will have to embark on if the US is not willing to help India in the nuclear field. First, India will have to depend on oil for its energy needs, and for that India will [strengthen] its ties with Iran. That means, after securing good business relations with three important countries (India, China and Russia), Iran will more vigorously pursue its nuclear ambition. Second, if India comes to believe that the US and the world will still continue the nuclear apartheid toward India, and India, in turn, decides to ignore the world and the NPT [Non-Proliferation Treaty] (though [that] is less likely), that will be more dangerous for the world. I must remind the American lawmakers that there is an American proverb, "A starving man will eat with a wolf." If energy-starved India decides to eat (join) with a wolf, that is the last thing any US president would want to see.
Shivanantham
Cuddalore, India (Dec 12, '05)


US turns the screws on deal with India [Dec 10] points to the reality that the US Congress, especially the Democratic Party, is hell-bent on squashing any deal the Bush administration makes. India though, in need of nuclear technology and fuel, must stand its ground now. The US is not dealing with a pre-socialist India anymore but an emerging power in its own right. India needs the nuclear arsenal now more than ever before and the shortsightedness of the US Congress should not impede India's quest to be a nuclear-weapons power in the region, especially considering the anti-India nuclear-power states that surround India. To compare India's impeccable nuclear record to that of Iran's emerging nuclear ambitions demonstrates that the US Congress still cannot grasp the difference between India's spotless safeguards and that of its neighbors and the need for India to develop a vital nuclear arsenal. Twenty-first-century India can now rightfully stand up to any criticisms from the US Congress and should do so. Otherwise the US Congress will continue its demands on India until India is left defenseless.
Chrysantha Wijeyasingha
New Orleans, Louisiana (Dec 12, '05)


Tim Shorrock [Why Southeast Asia is turning from US to China, Dec 10] is optimistically using "rapidly" in saying that Washington is losing influence in Southeast Asia. His assessment is a judgment call as he sees it. Despite [US President George W] Bush's war in Iraq and his eccentric list of priorities in foreign and commercial affairs, it is worthwhile recalling that these very nations which make up ASEAN [the Association of Southeast Asian Nations] have centuries-old memories about China, the long shadow it cast for centuries as a mighty imperial empire, and today it is regaining the reflexes of a large regional power with global pretension. After all, many of the countries in Southeast Asia were vassal states of [China], and have no wish to reprise this role in the 21st century. Therefore, Washington's willingness to engage Beijing with the obvious aim of integrating it into the global capitalist economy notwithstanding, the ASEAN countries do look to the United States as a foil to China's geographic pretensions. As for India, [though it is] a member of the atomic club, it is well to remember that [it has] not forgotten its redounding defeat at the hands of Chinese troops in 1962, something which New Delhi has to overcome yet. Besides, it is not a countervailing vector of force which the United States is when it comes to mating China's designs.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 12, '05)


David Isenberg's article The daunting logistics of withdrawal [Dec 9] seems to imply that equipment returning from the invasion and continuing occupation of Iraq needs only to be run through some type of giant car wash. Mr Isenberg, please refresh my poor understanding of nuclear contamination: The washing might remove alpha particles, but won't the heavier beta, gamma and neutron particles stay with the equipment? Considering the total amount of DU (depleted uranium) used in Iraq since 1991 must be in the thousands of tons, that seems to be quite a bit of hazardous material ... that not only continues to maim and kill Iraqis, but will be shipped back to the US without proper decontamination. But don't take my word for this. A recent online article in the San Francisco Bay View, "Radioactive tank No 9 comes limping home", not only verifies this abomination, it is also replete with pictures of improperly shielded radioactive tanks sitting on railroad spurs in and around Topeka, Kansas. Still in doubt? Below is a comment [included in the sfbayview.com article] from the Pentagon's former director of the US Army DU Project, Dr Doug Rokke: "When contacted on October 22, he [Rokke] viewed Chris Bayruh's photographs and made this statement about the radioactive tanks in Kansas: 'The radioactive damaged Abrams tanks that were left unsecured on a Kansas railroad track are a perfect example of exactly how not to ship damaged radioactive equipment and how not to protect our army's Abrams tanks from possible sabotage and compromise of classified battle systems.'" Seems like the Pentagon has invented a rapid way to transport back Iraqi invasion equipment: Just ship it back home without using proper decontamination protocols, then leave it stranded on the rails. By now, the Bush/Cheney cabal has told so many lies about the illegal invasion and their war on terror that only someone with half a brain would believe anything they say. Hmmm, maybe that person should run for president.
Greg Bacon
Ava, Missouri (Dec 12, '05)


I would like to second Aruni Mukherjee's letter [Dec 6] on Pallavi Aiyar's article [In the men's room, China leaves India standing, Dec 5]. First of all, all bets should be off in any comparison when one country restricts one's access to certain areas of the country. Heck, if I could restrict my visit to the better parts of Shanghai, sure I could write an article on how China is now a developed country. There is a website which shows satellite images of the world and recently I came across some images that showed the lighting in various parts of the world [see The world at night]. The more well-lighted areas of the world were obviously the developed [regions] like the US and Europe. Africa was mostly dark. The surprising image was India in comparison to China. India was well lighted for the most part but China was only well lighted in the coastal areas. Much of the country's interior is dark. That tells me that while China is spending money on futuristic cities that look good in Western and Ms Aiyar's eyes, while ignoring the poor in its interior. I will take our democracy over China's communism any day.
Jayanti Patel
Chicago, Illinois (Dec 12, '05)

But you live in Chicago, while according to the Asian Development Bank (pdf file), millions of people (23.6% of the urban population in 1999-2000) live in poverty in India's well-lit cities. - ATol


This is with reference to It's propaganda (shock, horror)! [Dec 3] by David Isenberg. It goes to the credit of world-class online papers like ATol that call a spade a spade. Eighty thousand readers per day are sick and tired of "plug and play" "news" in the American media. ATol provides a breath of fresh air. The planted propaganda and the Patriots Act would make [Joseph] Goebbels proud. This imperils our American democratic institutions, moving us towards the Orwellian Nineteen Eighty-Four, [Terry] Gilliam's Brazil and the incarceration and trial of Socrates for "refusing to acknowledge the gods recognized by the State and of introducing new and different gods" and "corrupting the youth" ... There is a war on for the soul of America. Its not about far away Iraq, it is about Socrates and his idealism. On the one hand is our [Americans'] glorious constitution, a conglomeration of Jewish-Christian and Muslim knowledge, and the vision of the founding fathers; on the other hand is a band of "Bolsheviks" who are corrupting the original message. The neo-cons seem to be taking the scripts right out of Nineteen Eighty-Four, to malign and destroy the original vision of the founding fathers of America. My land is being infested with the disease that is eating away at every fiber of our society. Will we allow the politicians in power to asphyxiate our freedoms and force the "Socrates" of our times to drink poison? ...
Moin Ansari (Dec 12, '05)


To Joseph Nagarya [letter, Dec 8]: Pepe Escobar's article [Full power on the Arabian Sea, Dec 3] was a travelogue about India, during which he noted signs of the Portuguese inquisition. For him to have compared that to Abu Ghraib is obviously a political statement, because in the long recorded history of mankind, Abu Ghraib was not the high-water mark for torture, or the example that comes most immediately to mind, unless one is motivated by a reflexive anti-Americanism. That same attitude motivates your obsession with the specific failings of [the US] without seeing them in the context of the general positive. Also, as a point of interest, the people that he is writing about don't share this prejudice; a June 2005 Pew poll showed that 71% of Indians had a positive opinion about the US.
Jonnavithula ("Jon") Sreekanth
Acton, Massachusetts (Dec 12, '05)


I just finished reading a most excellent article [Fallujah: Inside the Iraqi resistance Part 1: Losing it, Jul 15, '04], which I must assume is true, written by a man who seems to know what he is talking about. It would appear that [the US] State Department, Pentagon and possibly secretary of defense are out of their league in a comprehensive approach to the insurgency in Iraq.
D R McDaniel (Dec 12, '05)


Thank you for your coverage of the US and the current absurd policies of the Bush administration. It is time that the US population wakes up to the way the rest of the world sees our incompetent leader.
Gordon Schneemann (Dec 12, '05)


My personal view is that President [George W] Bush and Tony Blair knew all along that Saddam Hussein was not lying before the war when he insisted persistently that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction and if he did, Bush and Blair would never have dared invading Iraq for the fear of losing thousands of their soldiers. I have a very simple answer to solve this puzzle to find who lied and who did not is ask to President Bush and Tony Blair to take a lie-detector test and prove their innocence. I would further add that there should be an "ignoble prize" awarded every year to men of evil, warmongers [and] horrendous liars and would dare say that the first nomination should go to G W Bush and Tony Blair if found guilty on the lie-detecting machine.
Saqib Khan
London, England (Dec 12, '05)

Re Throwing resources at Pyongyang [Dec 9]: [Ruediger] Frank knows of what he is speaking. He is not only expert in his field, but speaks Korean fluently, and has studied and lived in Pyongyang. Wise would be Democratic People's Republic of Korea watchers who have read the good professor's articles. There they will find close attention to detail and reasonable suggestions of the change in the DPRK's economic winds. ATol has to be applauded for bringing Dr Frank's observations to its readership's attention.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 9, '05)


Re Thai government gets it inside out (Dec 8): There is no doubt that Thailand's Ministry of Culture has gone off the deep end. It is a bureaucracy that, in trying to find its purpose, found weirdness instead. For one thing, it is fixated on teenage sex. It employs a team of sex police with flashlights standing guard in front of sex motels. The rejection of a book on moral grounds by these clowns is not in itself an indictment. However, it has to be said that in their obsession with sex they do have something in common with the farangs [foreigners]. I am convinced that the farangs see Thailand mostly as just one big brothel. A brothel with restaurants, and temples, and the BTS [Bangkok Transit System Skytrain], and all kinds of other goodies, but mostly a brothel. When they write about Thailand, even when they mean well, their sex craze comes through.
Cha-am Jamal
Thailand (Dec 9, '05)


Re Media wars: Weapons of choice [Dec 7]: The Islamic world has not recovered from the kicking it got in the colonial and post-colonial periods, and has not evolved viable political systems. After they were decolonized, they were pulled into greater games in the Cold War and allowed to remain under dictatorships and corrupt monarchies and governments that the West could control [in its] greed to control the wealth of the conquered lands. The Muslim world has enormous oil wealth and resources but it is the West that controls it. The fact of the matter is that they [the West] use even the tragic event of [September 11, 2001] for economic strategy in order to re-colonize the oil resources of the Middle East and Central Asia as well as Afghanistan. President Bush is cornered from all sides. Even his own party is questioning his [leadership abilities]; his reputation is tattered since [the Hurricane] Katrina disaster and the recent political cock-ups; he was becoming more menacing and belligerent towards Iran for the sake of diversion but that trick even failed him. He is very worried about his increasingly sagging reputation ... and would do his utmost to save his decline in popularity but there is nothing new on the horizon to bail him out ... [Osama] bin Laden [must] be laughing with his success, as he could not have envisaged that so many new recruits would be joining al-Qaeda in hordes after the illegal occupation of Iraq, Americans' military malicious excesses and abuses of Muslim prisoners in Iraq and worldwide ... these are the most fertile grounds for the patriotic Iraqis to rise against an invading army and free their country from infidel occupying powers ...
Saqib Khan
London, England (Dec 9, '05)

Apropos of the disappeared of Latin America [Disappearing tricks, Dec 8]: a wave of left-leaning populist democracy has been sweeping through that continent over the last several years. I wonder if this phenomenon owes its existence to the fact that the American State Department and the CIA [Central Intelligence Agency] have been so excruciatingly overstretched in Iraq and elsewhere in the Muslim world that they cannot muster the necessary resources to continue practicing their usual chicanery south of the [US] border. There was a time, not very long ago, when a leader like Hugo Chavez would have been quickly toppled or assassinated as was Salvador Allende in Chile. I wonder if the Iraqis' misfortune might not turn out to be Latin America's window of opportunity - its chance to finally crawl out from under Washington's iron heel.
Jose R Pardinas, PhD
San Diego, California (Dec 8, '05)


Regarding Spengler's most recent rant (Iran's strength in weakness, Dec 6), this writer could not be any more paranoid, sadly delusional or presumably disingenuous. For him to make a comparison between modern Iran and Nazi Germany is not only factually wrong, but also catastrophically hypocritical, considering the various constituencies he supports (or claims to support) in the "Occident" and Tel Aviv. Hypocritical, too, because the core ideological idols that his beloved neo-conservatives genuflect in their thoughts and writings, sycophantically appealed to Weimar's then rising Uebermensch. No, the new Axis, far more dangerous than Hitler's, involves the currently reckless, expansionary, fiscally inflated and patently hubristic US and Israel ... With regard to Spengler's reaching qualification of [President Mahmud] Ahmadinejad vis-a-vis Iran's nuclear-power negotiations with the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency], I sense that Russia, China and other neighbors probably have more to do with the recent American overtures towards Iran. Typically, Spengler refuses to see Iran's interests as married to those of its regional powers ... No, the true fear of Iran does not involve its influence over its immediate neighbors, nor its supposed nuclear power capability (current or imminent). The real fear is that Iran's bet on an economic alternative to the IPE/NYMEX/City/Wall Street juggernaut ... could very well find traction globally, especially as US debts pile up and central banks seek diversification away from the (petro) dollar. In this way, still, only possibly, would modern Iran's ambitions compare with that of a 1930s Germany that sought to throw off Versailles's economic chains - namely, a direct challenge to the Anglo-American financial and energy hegemony that has much of the rest of the developing world over a barrel, so to speak. Yet Iran's is an economic vision that many other nations (in Asia, South America, Africa and, yes, Europe) share and anticipate as well. Spengler asserts that Iran's demographic, political and economic future "is hopeless". Tell that to the rest of Asia, which looks to Iran for resource partnerships, support and increasing general trade as the global production impetus shifts from West to East. "Impending demographic collapse"? Over 80% of Iran's population is under 35 years of age, and our elderly hardly face Spengler's fictitiously drawn fate ... At his most arrogant, Spengler brags about Israel's "thermonuclear weapons" capability, the attainment of which certainly did not receive the level of IAEA/UN [International Atomic Energy Agency/United Nations] scrutiny that other states have, and continue to, due to the most rudimentary developments in alternative energy development. Meaning what? That under an Israeli first attack on Iran and subsequent response, Moscow, Beijing and most likely others would just sit still while Tel Aviv attempted to obliterate Iran? Spengler's ilk is precisely Israel's and America's largest liability to the world at large. After articles like these, one wonders if posting this foaming-at-the-mouth pseudonymed columnist's rants is the best way for Asia Times Online to present all sides' views credibly.
R Davoodi
Tehran, Iran (Dec 8, '05)


Miguel A Guanipa writes [letter, Dec 7]: "You have to wonder why people like ... Democratic [Party] national chairman Howard Dean announced that the 'idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong'." Mr Guanipa neglects to mention that [US President George W Bush] himself said of his "war on terror" that "it can't be won". And Republican Senator Chuck Hagel has said the same thing as Dean. Mr Guanipa also neglects to mention Democratic Representative John Murtha, through whom the US military brass speaks, saying, "The war cannot be won militarily." The question I and many other opponents of [Bush's] illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq have of the heroic chickenhawks who urge the throwing of live troops after dead: When will you, Mr Guanipa, being more expert in military matters and war than those - such as [Senator John] Kerry, Hagel, and Murtha - who've actually experienced it, be enlisting so as to put your loud expertise and bravado in action, instead of leaving it to others to die for your illusions, and smearing those who actually served their country in uniform, and who actually know what they are talking about? Jonnavithula Sreekanth writes [Dec 7]: "Abu Ghraib is a disgrace, but not because it is any way, shape or form comparable to the Inquisition, but because we intend to hold ourselves to higher standards today." In fact, Abu Ghraib is many things, most centrally state terrorism and a war crime which violates both international law and US federal law. As for the assertion that "we intend" - when? - "to hold ourselves to higher standards today", that would be true if it were not false. At this very moment, the European Union, and human-rights organizations, are investigating the US's secret rendition process and prisons, in and through Europe and Eastern Europe, as the CIA [Central Intelligence Agency] hightails it ahead of the investigators to relocate their "higher standard" of torture to North Africa. Some are lost in dreamland; others are knowing liars; thus is malconstrued "free enterprise" as "necessary happy talk" in order to remain oblivious of and opposed to substantiated fact. Who is to be fooled, beyond the teller of it? With abundant good reason, the world outside the US doesn't believe a word that comes from the Bushit War Crimes Family and Liarium. [Bush] says the US "doesn't do torture" at the very same time that [Vice President Richard] Cheney lobbies Congress against it prohibiting the use of torture. If the US doesn't use torture, then it shouldn't mind it being prohibited yet again. Meanwhile, Condi Rice is being laughed at all over Europe as she talks out of both sides of her mouth about how the US doesn't use torture, even though it does. Mr Sreekanth: on what date, exactly, is it intended that the US will hold itself to a higher standard than that of using torture while lying that it doesn't?
Joseph J Nagarya
Boston, Massachusetts (Dec 8, '05)

Spengler responds to readers
G Travan (letter, Dec 6) claims that Iranian President Mahmud Ahmedinejad is losing power. He is two weeks out of date. Iran's strongman trumped his internal opposition. On November 30, the former supreme commander of the Revolutionary Guard, Mohsen Rezai, announced a shift in his loyalty to Ahmedinejad away from his former patron, the losing presidential candidate [Ali-Akbar Hashemi] Rafsanjani. On December 2, Iran Focus reported, "Several hundred officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), the military force that has served as the main pillar of support for Iran's clerical rulers, have been appointed to senior government positions by the hardline administration of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad ... President Ahmadinejad is spearheading an unprecedented purge of officials appointed by his two predecessors, Mohammad Khatami and Ali-Akbar Rafsanjani, and they are being replaced by Revolutionary Guards officers." The report added, "'He [Ahmadinejad] is virtually handing over the bureaucracy to Sepah (IRGC) and the consequences are going to be huge,' a former official with close ties to Hashemi Rafsanjani told Iran Focus. Speaking on the condition of anonymity, he said, 'Anyone seen as a protege of Hashemi [Rafsanjani] is being booted out without any hesitation.'" Rafsanjani has complained about this purge, but appears powerless to stop it. I have verified the accuracy of this and many similar reports with my own sources, and believe my characterization of Ahmedinejad's consolidation of power to be accurate. Vincent Maadi (letter, Dec 6) sees a Jewish conspiracy "goal of breaking up Iraq into three smaller states and to establish Greater Israel stretching from the Nile to the Euphrates". If that is so, why has the US not done so already? The neo-conservatives of Jewish origin to whom Maadi attributes this dastardly plot (Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Michael Ledeen) uniformly oppose partition and support a unified democratized Iraq - a goal I have denounced as delusional. I have said many harsh things about President George W Bush, but comparing him to Adolf Hitler is preposterous. Hitler did not invade countries to overthrow dictators, pour in foreign aid, and attempt to create constitutional democracy. Bush may be a modern Don Quixote, but to see him as an instrument of an Israeli plot to dominate Mesopotamia is a paranoid hallucination. I should add that my analysis of Iran's expansionism began with the superb reporting of Pepe Escobar (Iran takes over Pipelineistan, Sep 10), which I duly cited. No one, I trust, will accuse Mr Escobar of any sort of fondness for US foreign policy.
Spengler (Dec 7, '05)


Re Iran's strength in weakness [Dec 6] by Spengler: The fight of [President Mahmud] Ahmedinejad and Iran is all about who will provide the leadership for the Muslim world, the West and its stooges or the truly independent Muslims. Spengler's observation is right on the nose even though his extrapolation is different from mine. Mr Ahmedinejad is not about Iranian imperialism per se. What he wants is for Iran to provide the leadership for the Muslim world, and this is understood by many Muslims, especially those disillusioned and desperate peoples of the Middle East. He believes that Iran's influence can reach the entire West Asian region, including the former Soviet republics and the Western-dominated political entities. Like [Adolf] Hitler and others before him, he would capitalize on anything that would help to consolidate his power, including the religious elements. Judging by his speech and deeds, Mr Ahmedinejad obviously understands one of Mao [Zedong]'s exhortations, "Despise [the enemy] strategically, but respect him tactically." He knows Iran has a good chance to fill the political and spiritual vacuum left by the collapse of the old Islamic empire and the degeneration of the Islamic civilization. For example, in wealth Iran is no match for the combined riches of those countries ruled by the pro-West regimes. In terms of demographic strength and the strength of ethnic identification too Iran is at a disadvantage, but politically and spiritually Iran is increasingly making gains at the expense of its adversaries. Mr Ahmedinejad is helped in this by America's war on terror, targeting the extremists and their religious fanaticism. As long as Iran continues to exist as an independent country and the dominant faction of nationalists led by Ahmedinejad holds sway in Iran, Iran's influence can only grow with time. The nationalistic policies of Mr Ahmedinejad, while extending and reinforcing some of his predecessors', have worked to secure Iran's continued independence from the West and improving Iran's chance of playing a leadership role in the Muslim world. I trust that with this long-term ambition in mind Ahmedinejad will work to soften the intimidating public face of the religious fundamentalists and build up the broader appeal of Iran in the Muslim world. As a means to reinforce Iran's image of an uncompromising independence with a view to enhance its standing in the Islamic world, and to keep the Americans at bay, Iran must have its nuclear capability and the respect and intimidating effects it can bring.
Chan Ah Tee
Malaysia (Dec 7, '05)


Spengler's article Iran's strength in weakness [Dec 6] states that both the US and Israel have now accepted a nuclear Iran and that Iran does not pose a threat to either nation. Yet he omits [former Israeli prime minister Benjamin] Netanyahu's statement that a nuclear Iran is unacceptable to Israel and [it] may take a preemptive attack on Iran. Furthermore the US is definitely concerned about an emerging nuclear-armed Iran. The strategic support to India is a case in point. Both the US and India recognize that a nuclear-armed Iran is not in their best security interest. Now we have the US, Israel and India seriously concerned about this nuclear rise of Iran. Iran claims that the nuclear facilities it is creating are only for peaceful purposes but at the same time the Iranian leaders want to eliminate the existence of Israel. Such a formula goes contrary to Spengler's article that a nuclear-armed Iran is now accepted by Israel and the US, but he never mentions New Delhi's concerns of this situation. When Iran does decide to develop nuclear weapons, the US, Israel and India, not to mention the world at large, will find this intolerable.
Chrysantha Wijeyasingha
New Orleans, Louisiana (Dec 7, '05)


Dear Spengler: I am an admirer of your views, and faithfully read the forum for your posts. I am unable to participate because registration is closed to new members, so I am using this vehicle to ask you a question. I have noticed many similarities between my favorite philosopher, Miguel de Unamuno, and yours, [Franz] Rosenzweig, particularly in their earnest search for God, both learning Danish to understand their precursor, [Soren] Kierkegaard. Do you see other similarities?
Booklady (Dec 7, '05)

Thank you for writing and for your kind words. Truth told, it is coming up on 40 years since I last read Miguel de Unamuno. I was a great admirer of the Generation of '98 - not just Unamuno, but Jose Ortega y Gasset and Ramon del Valle-Inclan. But I would have to spend some time rereading to answer your question adequately. Spanish culture in general is underrated in Western Europe, and French culture is overrated - I have written on a couple of occasions about Fernando de Rojas, for example. I will try to find the time to have another look. - Spengler

New members are still welcome to The Edge forum, but the registration process is more detailed than previously as we continue our battle against spammers and other abusers of this resource. To register, follow these instructions and the webmaster will get you on to the forum. - ATol


[Syed Saleem Shahzad:] In your excellent article Media wars: Weapons of choice [Dec 7], you summarized the al-Qaeda mission as: "to shed its shadowy image and openly propagate the call for mass jihad against the US and any other foreign occupiers in the Middle East." On Meet the Press this past Sunday, [US] Senator John McCain told Americans a slightly different, but critically nuanced, story: "I would say that we would have to evaluate our strategy, but we also have to consider the consequences of failure. If we fail - don't take my word for it. Take [Abu Musab al-]Zarqawi's. Zarqawi's and [Osama] bin Laden's version in history is that we were driven out of Vietnam, we were driven out of Lebanon, we were driven out of Somalia, and they're going to go after us in the United States of America. Now, that's not my saying, that's not anybody else - that's what they're saying. This is why there's so much at stake here. This is why I made a controversial comment that this is more important than Vietnam was. The Vietnamese weren't going to come after us. These people are dedicated to our extinction." I believe Senator McCain is doing great injustice to Americans, as well as Muslims. Dedicated to our extinction? Is there any evidence of this in the latest material you were discussing? In my research, I believe I have found the al-Qaeda movement wants instead an end to occupation, which initially related to the Palestinian conflict and now Iraq, but also an end to Western support for dictators, monarchs and pro-Western "puppet" leaders.
Scott Goold (Dec 7, '05)

The real al-Qaeda mission is the end of occupation of Muslim territories. Revival of a caliphate was an idea added later on. - Syed Saleem Shahzad


Dear [Syed Saleem] Shahzad: Your columns in Asia Times [Online] are very insightful and well written, and they are a must read for me every week. I am a high-school English and journalism teacher and would very much like to show my students the bin Laden speeches with translation [Media wars: Weapons of choice, Dec 7]. Where can I buy or procure a copy? If you could help me obtain a copy, I would be very grateful.
John Voll
Manual Arts High School
Los Angeles, California (Dec 7, '05)

In this "war on terror", only one side is allowed to project itself. Osama bin Laden and his network can only sell or project things illegally. - Syed Saleem Shahzad


Reading Singapore: A tale of two cities [Dec 7] brings to mind Michael Young's The Rise of Meritocracy. A reading of Lee Kwan Yew's The Singapore Story provides a better understanding of the pillars upon which the foundling Malay state which became Singapore stands today. Mr Lee's People's Action Party (PAP) stole the thunder of the left by providing affordable housing and food at very affordable prices in a city-state whose only natural [resources are] the energy and ambition and intelligence of its citizenry. To stanch the corruption so endemic among newly emerging nations, the PAP consciously adopted a policy which pays the upper levels of the civil service and members of parliament handsomely. [This] accounts today for the [constant] ranking of Singapore among the top five nations with the best environment for foreign investment. Singapore rewards excellence, it goes without saying. It has streamlined its educational system to that end. It has adopted a neo-Confucian model of its own confection, which nurtures and harnesses the boundless competitiveness of its people. Thus this meritocracy rewards the talented and the chosen for advancement for a financially richer life; [as] for those who do not make the cut, as Fabio Scarpello pointedly remarks, they belong to another city, another life, and another caste.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 7, '05)


Your usually astute reporting has missed the fact that the Nepal conflict has been prolonged and supported by the US and British military aid to a dysfunctional monarchy and crooked army [Between illusion and reality in Nepal, Dec 7]. Were it not for this ill-conceived aid the Maoist would long ago have taken over this country rightfully. Talk of "terrorism" etc is false - the Western powers are the terrorists.
Carlos Ballantyne (Dec 7, '05)


Pepe Escobar's article [Full power on the Arabian Sea, Dec 3] made interesting reading, and it's great to hear about the new dynamism that he saw in India, but the article was spoiled by his gratuitous digs at [US President George W] Bush, America, religious beliefs, and free enterprise ... Abu Ghraib is a disgrace, but not because it is in any way, shape or form comparable to the Inquisition, but because we intend to hold ourselves to higher standards today. The recent testimony at Saddam Hussein's trial should remind us that real torture is alive and well. The reference to Christ with "eerie, prying eyes" is not likely to please Goan Christians, who still have old-fashioned religious beliefs, unlike some of their self-hating Western counterparts. The reference to the Tatas as "opium concessionaires" is meant to encourage the attitude that there are no heroes among entrepreneurs, only exploiters. Finally, the approving reference to how Kerala participated "with full force" in a recent strike: the progress and energy that Pepe notices in India today is exactly because of (finally!) rejecting attitudes like that.
Jonnavithula (Jon) Sreekanth
Acton, Massachusetts (Dec 7, '05)


I wish to comment on Jim Lobe's article Rallying cry from fading Bush [Dec 2]. In war there are usually only two strategies: victory or defeat. The latter is easier. President [George W] Bush has said again and again that he would not accept anything other than a victory in Iraq but runs scared at the American casualties, which is a toothless way to fight a war. He has no military experience of war but believes as long as he is the commander-in-chief in cowboy hat and shoes, his troops will come home victorious. His wisdom is in his knees and wisdom is as alien to him as slippers to a snake. It is about time that he comprehends the fact that more American soldiers are going to be killed in Iraq as he pursues his ignorant philosophy of life, "kill him before he even thinks of killing you", will result in Americans dying not only in the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan but also on their own soil, in foreign embassies, barracks, warships and in every city of the world as they did through the '90s. Two-thirds of Americans disapprove of the way he is conducting his flagship policy: the attempt to create a stable democracy in Iraq at the point of his gun, which is a sick joke of a very sick mind. Democracy cannot be imposed but is an evolutionary process, which takes decades to evolve and the system has million inherent imperfections. It suits the West and the non-Muslim countries because it allows promiscuity, lewdness and greed, which [are] rejected by a majority of the Muslims but accepted by [a] few boot-lickers of Western tendencies. President Bush said nothing new in his recent speech and audaciously refused to set a timetable for withdrawal. It would in such a volatile situation do nothing else but throw innocent Iraqis in the deep muddy waters and encourage al-Qaeda and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi with their ruthless struggle to get foreign troops out of Iraq. President Bush asks his audiences for patience in his pursuit for victory and making Iraqi democracy as if it is a Kentucky fried chicken cooked in his White House corridors that would make America safe and prevent terrorists making a base from which to attack America. We have heard this silly talk and lies before when they [alleged that] Saddam Hussein with his WMD [weapons of mass destruction] was a threat to Europe and the USA. President Bush has no strategy but to prolong American occupation until all Iraqi oil wells run dry and innocent Iraqis are killed in hordes.
Saqib Khan
London, England (Dec 7, '05)


Now that even some Arab leaders seem to be slowly coming forward and denouncing acts of terrorism in the name of Islam, you have to wonder why people like [US] Senator John Kerry would utter such irresponsible comments [as the] one in which he compared the brave US soldiers fighting in Iraq to terrorists, and Democratic national chairman Howard Dean announced that the "idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong". If al-Qaeda operatives are searching for resources from which to get some public relations talking points, they no longer need to look for extreme jihad's supporters to fit that bill. They will easily find the [US] Democratic Party to be a virtual fountainhead.
Miguel A Guanipa
Whitinsville, Massachusetts (Dec 7, '05)

Had Pallavi Aiyar stuck to comparisons between Indian and Chinese societies based on the status of toilet cleaners alone, there would be little dispute with her article (In the men’s room, China leaves India standing, Dec 5). However, she goes on to argue that “India is generations away [from] a general belief in the dignity of labor” vis-a-vis China. The fundamental problem with such a truncated argument is that it leads to a mud slinging competition whereby one could cite the status of Tibetans, Uighurs, migrant workers, farmers, etc in today’s China, and also the ways in which mainland Chinese are looked down upon by the citizens of Hong Kong, to portray a similar societal problem for China. On the other hand, the kisaan (farmer) is a figure much celebrated and idealized in Indian public life, especially by the politicians and Bollywood. Aiyar has two options. One, to restrict the contours of her article to toilet cleaners alone; and two, to acknowledge that in diverse societies such as those of India and China, there remain numerous problems of varying degree which both need to address.
Aruni Mukherjee
UK (Dec 6, '05)


[Re: Iran's strength in weakness, Dec 6:] Egads. Another in a series along the lines of "Elvis Lives". With one Hitler already, for all purposes condemned and awaiting sentence in an Iraqi court. According to the quasi-Hollywoood scenarist who also happens to be a regular writer for ATol there is another Hitler playing everyone for fools excepting Spengler and doing a Hitler and Goering gig in Tehran. In support of his fantasy Spengler freely quotes leading scenarists of the [in]famous neo-con cabal that made Operation Iraqi Freedom a crowning achievement for the Bush administration. Regardless of Spengler's [delitescence - ?] in quoting names along with emphatic statements as to what is real and what is hyperbole, the game as of 2006 will have one team comprised of the US, Britain, India and Japan duelling a team which definitely will include Iran and most probably several assorted other nations led by individuals who must either look like or emulate Hitler. The die [and reality, Spengler] was cast the moment the decision to shock and awe Iraq was made. Les jeux sont faits!!
Armand De Laurell (Dec 6, '05)


[Re: Iran's strength in weakness, Dec 6:] Perhaps Spengler was too busy researching 1930's German politics to bother himself with the current situation in Iran. The Iranian people and the international community have reached an unlikely consensus that Mahmud Ahmadinejad is a blundering, hostile ignoramus. There is even talk of impeachment by the conservatives in Iran's parliament, on the grounds of cronyism, incompetence and harming the national interest. The Supreme Leader, Khamenei, has empowered the loser of the 2005 presidential election, Rafsanjani, with veto power over all of Ahmadinejad's policies and decisions. Ahmadinejad has been uniquely forced to nominate a political enemy as oil minister, the most important post in the cabinet. Ahmadinejad is the weakest Iranian president since Bani Sadr, who was impeached in 1981. Spengler's total ignorance of Iran's history, politics and culture does not stop him from predicting Iran's economic and demographic situation for the next half century. This arrogance defies description. Far from hungering for revenge and conquest, the mass of the Iranian people today yearn for freedom and peace, unlike the saber-rattling Ahmadinejad, whose belligerence has cost him the support of all but the most die-hard loyalists. Why Asia Times Online continues to publish such ill-informed, dangerous rants alongside its other thoughtful articles is a mystery. Perhaps Spengler is a major shareholder who demands room to vent his wacky analyses.
G Travan
California, US (Dec 6, '05)


Re: Iran's strength in weakness [Dec 6]: Spengler once again shows his racism in comparing Iranians to Nazis. In actual fact it is the opposite. It is George Bush who should be compared to Hitler, for having invaded Iraq, just as Hitler invaded Poland. Unlike America, Iran has not ventured out of it’s territory to invade and occupy any country. Americans were manipulated into this war by Jewish neo-cons such as Michael Ledeen, Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, et al, to serve Israeli interests with the goal of breaking up Iraq into three smaller states and to establish Greater Israel stretching from the Nile to the Euphrates. Americans were made to believe that Arabs have no mental or military capability and will not fight back. It was this typical Zionist racism that blinded them to this losing situation which in fact spells the end of America’s unipolar power and with it Israel’s invincibility. Spengler never expected such a defeat of his side, so now he goes into name calling. Sour grapes! The much hoped for and deliberately instigated civil war between Shia and Sunni will never take place. On the contrary there will be an alliance of Shias, Sunnis and Kurds to fight the Americans and Israelis, to put an end once and for all to the threat of Zionist aggression in the Middle East ...
Vincent Maadi
South Africa (Dec 6, '05)


Ronan Thomas makes a mistake in his article Kazakhstan in black and white (Dec 6), when he assumes that last month's elections in Azerbaijan were presidential ("As in Azerbaijan, where incumbent President Ilham Aliyev was returned last month"). Instead, the elections were parliamentary. The presidential elections in Azerbaijan take place every 5 years and next ones are scheduled for 2008.
Adil Baguirov, PhD (Dec 6, '05)

Thanks. The article has been corrected. - ATol


I wish to comment on Full power on the Arabian Sea [Dec 3] by Pepe Escobar. The attitude of Hindu fundamentalist politicians like Bal Thackeray and the fundamentalists in saffron clothes is to relish any opportunity to start bashing and butchering Muslims in India as they did in Gujarat few years ago. The brutality that killed over 2,000 Muslims in Gujarat will always be a heinous blow to Indian’s glossy claim to be a democracy, a secular state and a tolerant society with an inherently abhorrent caste system that would shame any human being with little intelligence. Yet, these evil politicians of hate prosper in their murderous political intentions ... Bal Thackeray is one of those political thugs who believe that “if you are not a Hindu in India, you are not an Indian”. The Bharatiya Janata Party [BJP] which controlled Gujarat as well as the national government at the time, and other known sahibs of politics, were implicated in turning a blind eye to mass murder of innocent Muslim men, women and children. The police force under the BJP was heavily implicated in the violence, which to a large extent was pre-planned ... Everyone seems to be singing Bollywood songs these days but it is imperative to mention that Mumbai has become one of the biggest sin capitals of the world where the sun sets at midday and nights are for lewd debauchery and sex in every available corner.
Saqib Khan
London, UK (Dec 6, '05)


A good read ... Michael Rank's profile on Dr Johnny Hon [Psychiatrist with a head for business, Dec 3]. Gambling is a goldmine and Dr Hon has tapped into a mother lode in east Asia. The itch to get rich quick has resurfaced even in the austere regime of Kim Jong-il. It just goes to show that by following the money, Rank has uncovered not only strange bedfellows, but also the shadowy network of tax havens and offshore banking. And, for that ATol deserves two cheers!
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 5, '05)


Pepe Escobar pens what is an extremely interesting piece on his encounters in Mumbai and Kerala (Full Power on the Arabian Sea, Dec 3). The commotion he witnessed, the mind boggling different activities people seem to be undertaking at a given instance, and the often frustrating cul-de-sac that Indian urban life can seem to be are all intrinsic parts of India. Perhaps it is apt that Asia Times Online published a review of The Argumentative Indian by Amartya Sen [Indian culture, heterodoxy under scrutiny] on the same day as Escobar’s article. For both of them show that there is no singular representation of India. From the stifling crowd in the local trains of Mumbai to God’s own country in the backwaters of Kerala - all of this is equally India. Crucially, as Escobar recognises, there seems to be an invisible force that propels India - and binds it together. Scholars have struggled to define this force which is the soul of India throughout centuries, and it is this that holds out a beacon of freedom and democracy in a still-poor part of the world, something unparalleled anywhere else.
Aruni Mukherjee
Warwick, UK (Dec 5, '05)


I congratulate ATol on publishing Pepe Escobar's brilliant piece Full Power on the Arabian Sea (Dec 3). The vignettes of Shiv Sena's bigoted xenophobia in India show us how a bigoted minority can hold billions hostage; informed us how the forgotten Goan and Spanish Inquisitions against Muslims reverberated throughout South Asia and impacts the world even today; displayed the marvelous Hindu-Muslim symbiosis experienced at the Haji Ali mosque, the best of the subcontinent. The Indian population rejected the BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party] excesses and has returned India towards its secular roots. Muslims sailed with the Chinese Muslim, Admiral Zheng He, traveled with Columbus (the Panzone brothers) and sailed after Columbus (African Americans like Kunte Kunte). Of course the "Moor from Gujarat" piloted Vasco da Gama to "discover" India. Acknowledging our joint Muslim, Hindu, Christian and Jewish heritage, without demonizing an entire people will help India pull up the pullulating masses out of penury. A limited software "boom" affected a few million Indians, concentrated wealth in a few areas, and creates a stratified society not conducive to peace at the regional or global level. India needs to learn a lot of lessons from China; peace with all her neighbors, and an efficient manufacturing base.
Moin Ansari
US (Dec 5, '05)


I have noted Asia Times Online's November 16, 2005 article Delhi knocked out over China. Please allow me to place my views on the subject with a critical analysis. In the November 2005 summit at Dhaka, the South Asian leaders agreed to include Afghanistan as a new member and China and Japan as observer of SAARC [South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation]. However, this enlargement of SAARC has raised some questions ... Some quarters may like to think that the status of China and India may change significantly in the South Asian political landscape when China joins as an observer of SAARC. With Beijing in, India's regional image may suffer. But this is not true at all. The China-India relationship has shown marked improvement during recent years. They do not consider each other as threat, nor are they competing for any regional leadership like the former Soviet Union and US. The China-India free trade agreement is producing impressive outcome for both countries. When someone says that by agreeing to accept China as an observer of SAARC, Delhi is knocked out, it is not correct. Both China and India already have good relations with all the countries of South Asia and inclusion of China as SAARC observer was just a normal event. As an observer, China may enhance this good relationship further through SAARC. But that does not mean that Delhi is out and Beijing is in for the South Asian political landscape ...
P L Chowdhury (Dec 5, '05)

The writer certainly did not intend to imply that India's role in SAARC had been usurped by China's new observer status. However, the fact that India opposed observer status for China, but was outvoted on the issue by almost all the other SAARC members, was discomfiture indeed for India: "The writing was there for New Delhi to see: that the Indian sub-continent ... will no longer be its own backyard ..." - ATol


Jim Lobe's article (Rallying cry from fading Bush, Dec 2), needs further elaboration. Once again, President Bush demonstrates that his administration and its apologists are incapable of understanding or dealing with reality concerning Iraq. The reality is: that Iraq is, and will always remain, an Islamic nation. No amount of wishing, maneuvering or speech making will make it secular; that the majority in Iraq is Shia and they will govern and no amount of deal-making with minority factions will ever change that; that US presence is seen by 80% of the Iraqi people as an occupation and over half of the people support the insurgency against us; that the specter of civil war is a falsehood being perpetuated by those who want to see the occupation continue so that they can go on killing our brave service personnel. The Iraqi authorities know who the insurgents are and are capable of dealing with them once we get out of the way; that restoration of electricity, water, sewage and oil facilities - the measure of the misery index for the Iraqi people - has not even reached the levels of pre-invasion; that our presence has made Iraq a magnet for terrorists, whereas it was not, pre-invasion. Yet the Bush administration insists on repeating and following the same old discredited policies that do not work. Continued denial of reality, hubris, ignorance and incompetence will not create progress nor are they a strategy for victory in Iraq.
Fariborz S Fatemi
Former Professional Staff Member
House Foreign Affairs Committee
Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Virginia, USA (Dec 2, '05)


The fast economic boom in the Asian economies like China and India and the economic recovery of the Asian tigers, namely Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia and South Korea, with the already established Japan, puts Asia on the road to economic stability. However, these new prosperous nations in the region should go one step further by helping other poor nations in the region regardless of political ideology and religion, namely, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Philippines, Sri Lanka, and the new Central Asian nations rich in oil deposits. The development of these poorer nations mentioned will further increase not only economic stability but also peace in the region and will help defeat terrorism and should create a united effort to combat piracy in the Malacca Straits. The unification of the Koreas will also be more doable than pressuring North Korea to disarm its nuclear weapons. Eventually unification will be realized with patience and with the change of leadership when Kim Jong-il passes away. The problem with energy is not so bad with the trade relations and investments in the oil rich Central Nations like Azerbajian, Kazahkstan, and Khyrgystan, together with unified efforts among nations to do more research into and applications of renewable energies like solar, geothermal, and wind power. Russia too can be tapped for energy sources at lower cost, not being a member of OPEC. These emerging economies in the region should also develop their own independent foreign policy free from US intervention and compete globally with the European Union. Peace and economic cooperation in the region is a win-win situation, unlike confrontation and war between some rivals like North Korea, Japan and China. Only the US and European Union will benefit from such war, whereas with peace the whole continent of Asia will prosper and be the future global leader.
Tom Lasam (Dec 2, '05)


Re What 'staying the course' really means, Dec 1: It seems to me that the American troops are in Iraq to be a bug zapper that attracts and destroys the enemy in a confrontation that is well removed from home. The idea is to divert the enemy to a distant venue and prevent an attack on US soil. America wants to fight the war on terror somewhere else. So far, the bug-zapper strategy appears to be working. The convergence of anti-American yahoos in Iraq was not a surprise. It is the essential part of the strategy. The US troops are not there to win a war. They are there to be a juicy target. A troop pullout would undermine this mechanism.
Cha-am Jamal
Thailand (Dec 1, '05)


Kudos to Robert Dreyfuss for writing What 'staying the course' really means (Dec 1). He brilliantly points out the facts forgotten by the bigots with "selective amnesia" in order to hide their incompetence in international relations. According to Jewish legend, narrated by Yudl Rosenberg (1909), the Maharal of Prague, a 16th century rabbi, created a "golem" out of the clay of the Vltava River to defend the Prague ghetto from anti-Semitic attacks. However, the "golem" grew bigger, more violent and started killing the Jews. The lesson learned by Rabbi Loew has been lost to those who have trained thugs and killers to support thier own parochial interests in the Middle East and elsewhere. Dreyfuss correctly points out that the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Syria, and Hamas (created as a counterweight to the PLO) are Frankenstein's monsters, the West's "golem" of our times. The Taliban are also "golem" created by the West to thwart the [Russians in] Afghanistan. The Saudi state and its rulers are of course a "golem" created by Lawrence of Arabia and the British raj. As Dreyfuss points out, the powers that be continue to create "golems". Placing the Badr Brigade in charge of Iraq and Karzai in charge of the opium kingdom in Afghanistan is creating its own blowback. The Muslims today refuse to accept foster parentage of the foreign policy fiascos of the powers that be. Like Rabbi Loew, the powers that be have to destroy their own creations! Like the song says, "I told you so's" simply lie on the floor to be swept away!
Moin Ansari (Dec 1, '05)


Re Anger at US inaction on the yuan, Dec 1: China is a debtor nation to major world economies save that of the United States. Consequently, Beijing sees no urgency in floating the renminbi/yuan. Bluster notwithstanding, the Bushes, pere and fils, are rank sentimentalists when it comes to China, and the Chinese play on that mawkishness. George W Bush and his minions have gone to change China's economic policy, but they came back with nothing but empty words and hollow promises. Bush is a poor poker player; for when playing with his cards close to his chest, he shows his weak hand by allowing the World Bank to open liberally its purse and encourage the sapping of America's manufacturing base through outsourcing of jobs, and turning in some respects [America] into a purveyor of primary materials to China as though it were some banana republic. Bush has become that hapless and helpless giant that Richard Nixon formally protest against.
Jakob Cambria
USA (Dec 1, '05)

November Letters