Opinion Directionless India
It is just as well that the latest crisis on the Line of Control left the triumvirate that heads the Indian government speechless
It is just as well that the latest crisis on the Line of Control left the triumvirate that heads the Indian government speechless as usual. If they had spoken,they may have made the Defence Minister seem like a statesman instead of the clown he has proved he is. Every time one or other of the triumvirate has spoken on a matter of grave national importance they have ended up proving that India is today frighteningly leaderless. Had Sonia Gandhi spoken to reporters she may have been asked questions about the wider implications of the recent attack in view of the impending changes in Afghanistan. She would not have had an answer. Had the Prime Minister spoken to the nation who knows what he might have said? Memories of Sharm el-Sheikh return. And,if the young prince had spoken he may have described Pakistan or even the LoC as a state of mind.
By comparison,the Defence Ministers shilly-shallying between behaving like Pakistans Defence Minister and then almost declaring war on Pakistan seems almost forgivable. He is not entirely to blame since surely he would have checked with senior officials like the National Security Advisor before making that first statement absolving the Pakistani army. Our problem is that it is beginning to seem more and more as if there is nobody at Indias helm in a complex and scary time. Al-Qaeda has resurfaced everywhere. The American drawdown from Afghanistan draws close and respect for jihadis in Pakistan has reached such levels that Hafiz Saeed led Eid prayers last week at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore.
In case you have forgotten,this is the man we believe was the master planner of the 26/11 attack on Mumbai. This is the man who spends most of every interview he gives spewing venom against India and vowing to destroy the very idea of it. In case you have forgotten,it is now an established fact that not only was the Lashkar-e-Toiba responsible for the worst act of terrorism on Indian soil but it was ably assisted by the ISI. If only our Defence Minister had remembered this he would have hesitated to absolve the Pakistani army from involvement in the LoC attack.
Speaking of the 26/11 attack,may I remind you that despite all those promises of dealing resolutely with jihadi terrorism,nothing has actually happened except a lot of talk. So if the ISI thinks that it is a good time to organise another massacre in an Indian city,they would find it as easy to organise it as they did in 2008. The Indian government has taken none of the steps that the Americans took in their homeland after 9/11. Except for some token patrolling in Mumbai,nothing has really changed.
Nothing will change until the Indian government accepts at the highest levels of national security that we need to treat jihadi terrorism as war. If we had a real defence minister,instead of a man who got his job due to his loyalty to the Gandhi family,he would by now have put in place systems whereby the Army and civilian authorities could work together to fight this war. We would by now have had intelligence systems that really worked and police stations manned by policemen trained in counter-terrorism. As we approach the fifth anniversary of 26/11 it would be fair to say that not only have none of these things happened but senior members of the Congress party have made statements denying that Pakistan was behind the attack.
So when Shri A K Antony said that the LoC attack was by a group of 20 men who were accompanied by some people in Pakistani army uniform,he was really only continuing to sing the same tune. He may have taken his cue from that other Sonia loyalist in charge of national security,our Home Minister,who famously said when Chinese soldiers crossed into Ladakh that it was not serious. He made it sound as if it were no more than a game that both sides played just for fun.
The truth is that there is nothing funny about the games that the Chinese are playing in South Asia. They appear to be working in accordance with a definite strategy to weaken India,and who better to help them do this than their old and reliable ally on the other side of the LoC? And,what is Indias strategy to counter theirs? Nobody knows. Every time there is a serious problem of national security,our senior ministers behave as ineffectually as amateur fighters in a boxing ring. Their antics always make India seem like an insignificant,pathetic little country instead of an aspiring regional power. What else can one say other than that the Government of India is no longer just an embarrassment to itself,it is an embarrassment to India.
Follow Tavleen Singh on Twitter @ tavleen_singh
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