Why Are Sweden And Finland Likely To Apply For Full NATO Membership

 The fog of war and the plumes of acrid smoke when you are close enough, has some heading for the exits. It gives you wings. It is the panic of hope.  But how will it be safer outside when the missiles are striking? Is outside really outside when those borders are still exactly where they were? Is the fear that Russia could invade (again), before the all-for-one-and-one-for-all NATO cover comes about?

Alexandre Dumas, the amazing 19^th century Black Frenchman wrote The Three Musketeers, which was actually about four, after you count the essential D’Artagnan. The story was a thrill a minute saga about loyalty and brotherhood, rather than politics or humiliating Cardinal Richelieu’s private militia. 

It does not have a lot in common with the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), a prosaic and blunt military hardware-cum-boots-on-the-ground style insurance policy, originally to take on the Soviet Communists behind the Iron Curtain. But, this hoary insurance policy, will it pay out when the claim is presented in the ongoing 21^st century, with 32 countries on the bus?

Every day that NATO grows bigger, with more dependants than actors, this becomes the $64 billion dollar question. Incidentally, $63 billion is what America has spent or committed to the Ukraine war, in under three months, even as institutional bankers warn of a hard American recession to come. Is NATO as panacea even as formidable as it is made out to be?

Is the much-touted Article 5 of the NATO founding treaty, which enshrines the principle of collective defence, really effective in practice. NATO has attacked countries such as Kosovo and Libya unilaterally. After 9/11 it was more or less a US operation against Afghanistan, with only token participation of a few NATO allies. Most NATO allies, as President Donald Trump complained, didn’t pay their bills or pull their weight. Has Ukraine changed all this? For how long?

 For Ukraine, America’s Raytheon Missile Systems is struggling to resurrect the Soviet era Stinger missile, a shoulder-held man-portable air defense system (MANPADS), still very useful today for taking out Russian tanks and helicopters. But the 1980s parts are out-of-production today. The Stingers, and Javelin anti tank weapon, in service since 1996, need constant upgrading.  And the manufacturers, probably interested in selling far more expensive weapons systems, are scrambling to meet demand.

Then, there are the several kinds of attack drones from various NATO countries. Tanks, armoured cars, bombs, helicopters, fighter planes, much of the expensive stuff that ruled yesteryear wars, are still great for bombing, strafing and taking over non-nuclear countries in Africa, Arabia or Asia. Otherwise, they seem to be obsolete. 

It’s the age of missiles of many kinds, sometimes fired far away from the target, others out of a backpack; some a bit bigger, handy soldier-carried loitering drones, anti-tank weapons, and the like.

The implication is small powers can make them quickly and at no great cost. Quad bikes with shoot ‘em up gadgetry atop are doing better in all terrain situations.

As for nuclear weapons, it is a zero-sum game. Even tactical nukes cannot be used. Besides, Russia, mostly unloved in Europe now, is still the opposite number in a new Cold War, and the world’s second deadliest nuclear power.

 So why are Sweden and Finland likely to apply for full NATO membership circa 2022? Sweden has been a member of the EU since 1995, is already a NATO partner country, and is, of course, in the UN. Finland has been in the Organisation For Economic Cooperation (OECD) since 1969, and joined the NATO Partnership for Peace in 1994, the EU in 1995, the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council in 1997, the Eurozone in 1999, and likewise is a member of the UN. Both are already entwined with NATO and the EU in protection treaties. The neutrality that they profess is therefore partial.  This is really a last step in a growing embrace.

Besides, their recent experiences with the Soviet Union during WWII, being brutally conquered and dominated thereafter, have caused Sweden to maintain a good level of arms manufacturing and an impressive Navy in the Baltic Sea. Finland has not relented on developing crack troops for 30 years, to take on Russia should the day ever come back again.

The moot point is that a rampant Russia scares them, and revives old genetic memories as well as relatively new ones. Besides public opinion polls in both countries now want them to join NATO with around 50%  to 70% saying so, up from around 25%.

It was Tsar Peter the Great, after his period of tutelage incognito in Europe, who returned to a feudal Russia, modernised his armed forces, his own attitudes, and indeed his court practices to an extent.

Then, he promptly attacked Sweden, a shock in early 1700, and conquered Finland, then the Eastern part of Sweden. Tsar Peter’s troops and Cossacks kept rampaging through the Swedish countryside till the peace treaty of Nystad in 1721, made Finland, Estonia and Latvia, all part of the Russian Empire. It also ended Sweden’s great power status.

During WWII however, Sweden ostensibly neutral, first leaned to facilitate the actions of the Germans, and later did the same for the Allies. In Ukraine, both countries have already sent in armaments and humanitarian aid.

This outing of Tsar Peter also gave landlocked Russia a relatively warm water port on the Baltic Sea, and the chance to build a Baltic fleet. Tsar Peter built a new capital at St. Petersburg, on the site of the old Swedish town of Nyen, later Leningrad, then Stalingrad, and now once again, St Petersburg.

Turkey, a NATO member sitting opposite Russia on the Black Sea, has already raised objections based on long standing Swedish and Finnish support to Kurdish rebels in Syria. As many as 33 extradition requests to release the Kurdish rebels to Ankara have been denied over a decade.

To admit Sweden and Finland, the existing NATO members must agree unanimously. Western media is talking of American pressure, even sanctions, to force an economically savaged Turkey, with 70% inflation, to fall in line. NATO itself expects to smooth things over with Ankara so that they don’t stand in the way.

 It is hoping for a fast tracking that could see both countries as NATO members within this year.

With all the cracks and strains in the NATO alliance that have surfaced, just in the last three months, the chances of its long term cohesion are in doubt.

Likewise the EU, propped up by the economies of Germany and France, neither very happy with the America forced sanctions on Russia.

Switzerland, normally very discreet, has suggested America get out of Europe forthwith.

There are food shortages – wheat, bread, cooking oil, inflation, spiking fuel and gas prices. Slovakia won’t share its food. Hungary wont sanction Russia. Germany can’t do without Russian piped gas. Serbia staunchly backs Russia even though it has applied for EU membership.

In fact, Russia has gained handsomely over the last three months from its oil and gas exports to Europe. Its insistence on being paid in Roubles pegged to the price of Gold, after being excluded from the SWIFT mechanism has worked. This has lifted the value of the Rouble to unprecedented levels even as the US dollar and the Euro are tanking.

American gas prices have risen as it tankers in the LPG to Europe, and this has  begun to starve American industry. 

Turkey is fighting the Kurds in Syria. The Russians are fighting in Syria too, along with Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah in support of the durable President Assad and his regime.

In support of the rebel groups are the Israelis, the Americans, the Germans, the British, the French, the Dutch, Qatar, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and sundry others. The Kurdish and ISIS seem to be fighting their own war within a war. All participants and logistical supporters are jostling together in a very complicated militia ridden war without end. It has already been over a decade.

Could the war in Ukraine, very young yet, become as much of a convolution as Syria, if not as prolonged? It also has multiple proxies in the theatre, ‘contractors’, mercenary groups, a wide variety of heavy and light armaments, some of them being tested for the first time in a real war.

Russia has stuck to its own weaponry so far, but in terms of fighting men it too has its favourite imports from Syria, in addition to the fierce Chechen. Apparently, Turkey, getting high marks for the performance of its Bayraktar TB2 drones, does as well.

But Russia, vast as it is, will have to consolidate its relations with Central Asia, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia-Pacific, India, China.

There have been 16 new NATO members since the fall of the Berlin Wall. This addition will make it a massive 32. Many had to adapt from former Soviet ways to suit the NATO alliance. Sweden and Finland have been semi-NATO members for some time now, sitting in on NATO meetings, military exercising with it, going on peace-keeping missions. 

What will happen next is dependent on the military equipment and infrastructure placed in Finland, Sweden, in the Baltic Sea and the Arctic. Russia will have to respond with counter-measures.

(1539 words)

May 17^th, 2022

For; Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Singapore Is Not Happy With India At Red China’s Behest

Why did Singapore ban the Kashmir Files to the gleeful delight of a senior member of our own Indian National Congress Party? That the Congress point of view increasingly concurs with that of China and Pakistan and Islamic radicals is an important, if worrisome part of the public discourse.

Ostensibly, Singapore banned it because the film seemed to portray Kashmiri Muslims in a ‘one-sided’ bad light. It had also banned, years ago, ‘The Last Temptation of Christ,’ presumably because it portrayed the ancient Romans in a bad light.

Singapore said, under its film classification guidelines, ‘any material that is denigrating to racial or religious communities in Singapore’ will be refused classification.

While Buddhism accounts for 31.1% of the population of Singapore, added to by Taoism and other Chinese religions at 8.8%, Islam is represented by 15.6% and Hinduism by a mere 5%. Even the Catholics count for more at 7%. But the religions practiced by the majority ethnic Chinese account for 40%.

Singapore has a nice deep-water port from which it has gained its significance. It is the maritime capital of the world, as of 2015, with the second busiest port in terms of tonnage handled. It is also the world’s busiest transshipment port, handling amongst other things, 50% of the world’s annual supply of crude oil. It used to be the world’s No.1 port in terms of tonnage handled, till, you guessed it, Shanghai overtook it in 2005.

Singapore is located at the extreme tip of the Malay Peninsula. The colonial British, who arrived as early as 1819, established a Crown Colony in 1867. In 1963 Singapore became part of independent Malaysia, but was expelled by the former for its fractiousness, and became independent in 1965.

The British had used Singapore for an entrepot trade, and brought in a large number of ethnic Chinese, who are also represented in lesser number in Malaysia. Ethnic Chinese form the bulk of the population of Singapore to this day. Some ethnic Indians, largely from South India, mostly descendants of the erstwhile rubber plantation indented labourers, also found their own way in from Malaysia.

Still, the Chinese part of the population, some 75.9% of the total, accounts for over  4.5 million of about 6 million. It is the Chinese that dominate business and politics. Ethnic Malays account for 15% of the rest, and ethnic Indians for 7.5%. The rest have Eurasian blood, alongside a significant expatriate European, American and Indian presence.

All this in the thumb-nail sized city state of just 700 sq.km, with a population density of nearly 8,500 people per square kilometre.  

The Singapore authorities told Channel News Asia about the Kashmir Files, ‘The film will be refused classification for its provocative and one-sided portrayal of Muslims and the depictions of Hindus being persecuted in the on-going conflict in Kashmir’.

Not a word about the factual portrayal of Kashmiri Pandit genocide, ethnic cleansing, and forcible expulsion by Kashmir Valley Sunnis, 30 years ago, which is the actual subject of the film. That, and the complicit role played by the Valley politicians, in cahoots with the Congress Party and its government at the Centre.

No, the Singapore authorities emphasise the ‘on-going conflict’, and the ‘provocative and one-sided portrayal’.  

They added ‘These representations have the potential to cause enmity between different communities, and disrupt social cohesion and religious harmony in our multiracial and multi-religious society’. Pretty unctuous, but also angry with India. But why?

As movie review it wouldn’t pass muster, given that the film, directed by Vivek Agnihotri, has been received rapturously in multiple multiracial and multi-religious countries around the world. UAE banned it briefly before lifting it. New Zealand gave it a more restricted classification, from R 16 to R 18.

So, is this hostile over reaction, or just the political stance of a Singapore allying itself to the Chinese and Pakistani position?

Red China of course, has its reasons and vested interests. With increased business interaction with tiny Singapore as sanctions are imposed on it, Singapore is more than a little beholden.

China has illegally built a road through Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (PoK) as part of the embattled China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), linking Xinkiang in China to Gwadar Port in Balochistan. It is very concerned at the rapid and positive changes being wrought by India in its Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory (J&K), with an increasing possibility that India could make a move, military, political, and diplomatic, to reclaim its territory in PoK, as well as Gilgit Baltistan before long.

Singapore is simply playing along. But there is also a recent history that is not just club loyalty.

 The first salvo fired by none other than the Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsein Loong, was after India banned a Chinese app rolled over via Singapore- Sea Ltd.’s Free Fire’ gaming app. This caused it $ 16 billion in losses in a day. Earlier India had already banned as many as 54 Chinese Apps with major losses accruing to it, because of continued Chinese bellicosity along the Line of Actual Control (LaC).

In this instance, Sea Ltd. stock, listed in New York, fell 18% overnight. The shareholders of Sea Ltd. which still have other wares operating in India besides the Sea Fire App, such as its e-commerce arm Shopee, are overwhelmingly Red Chinese via TenCent. Shopee, while not yet banned, has seen a decline in interest.

Soon after this, Prime Minister Lee Hsein Loong criticised the ‘decline of Nehru’s India’ in a marked attack against the Modi government. He said, nearly 50% of the members of the Indian parliament today are facing criminal charges including rape and murder, in a gratuitous set of remarks on India’s internal affairs. They were made at the Singapore parliament in mid-February 2022 and promptly objected to by India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

Singapore has business to protect with Red China. It has made its choice despite its Indian ethnic minority and other presence.

The hypocrisy with regard to the Kashmir Files film is glaring because it is just the latest veiled attack on India. This is a consequence of the company Singapore now keeps. But with a population of a mere 6 million it is unlikely to make a dent in the film’s box office.

Meanwhile, film maker Vivek Agnihotri called the wordy Congressman who was clapping at the ban a  ‘fopdoodle’, meaning stupid, and a ‘gnashnab’, meaning a habitual complainer. Good dictionary mining that.

Agnihotri also called the Singapore censor one of the most ‘regressive in the world’, and listed 48 films banned by Singapore that did well around the world.

 

(1,098 words)

May 11^th, 2022

For :Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

The Indian Diaspora Is A Diplomatic Force Multiplier

Before Narendra Modi became prime minister in May 2014, the ruling Congress, at the head of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), painted him out to be a communal demagogue with blood on his hands. 

It urged the United States and most of the Western embassies along the Shanti Path in New Delhi to not even speak to the man, let alone invite him to their countries, or grant him a visitor’s visa.

They were fairly convinced that Modi, sneeringly called a ‘chai-wala’ by a senior Congress leader, could never become prime minister.

They did not reckon with the discipline of the RSS karyakarta Modi was for many a obscure year before being sent into electoral politics and governance. The Congress also ignored Modi’s elected popularity as a three-term Chief Minister of Gujarat. 

Nevertheless, Narendra Modi, who Sonia Gandhi called ‘Maut ka Saudagar’ was for a time something of a persona non grata, and was actually not granted a US visitor visa.

However, when he won at the head of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), the first thumping majority in thirty years, President Barack Obama immediately despatched the US Ambassador in India from New Delhi to Ahmedabad with an invitation to come to America on a state visit at the earliest.

Narendra Modi has an easy familiarity with other heads of state and government. He carries himself with dignity, and gets along famously with most, replete with his propensity to hug them. His early friend ‘Barack’ for example, soon after becoming prime minister, was hugged. And they poured tea for each other.

Much water has flowed down the Ganga since.

Modi has demonstrated how to fill vast Stadiums abroad with his erstwhile countrymen and women. Fill them with ticket-buying, cheering, patriotic, ethnic Indians.  This is a feat on this scale not matched by other politicians or heads of government in the 21^st century.

The shift in the diaspora’s attitude towards India and Narendra Modi was engineered at the ministerial level by the former Foreign Minister the late Sushma Swaraj, responding with succour and action to tweets of any Indian in trouble abroad, however humble he may be.

And at the top, Modi’s unprecedented mobilisation of the diaspora juggernaut for long taken for granted by earlier Indian prime ministers. Occasionally, if an ethnic Indian was awarded the Nobel Prize or a literary prize, there was a brief flurry of excitement. The government however saw Indians abroad, the useful NRI as well as the Indians who were now foreign citizens and PIOs, as a source of massive inward remittances, the largest in the world. But they were not acknowledged or thanked as people by the head of government.

Modi was the first to see the diaspora as allies, benefactors, and unofficial ambassadors. And if some were Muslim, all the better. Fact is, there is no place on earth where you can’t find an ethnic Indian.

Indian diplomacy developed two new dimensions under him that not only improved the image and prestige of every ethnic Indian on the planet, but changed international diplomacy itself. The Indian prime minister stretched it beyond what was earlier thought possible or proper.

Even the Chinese, numerous and influential as they are, could never match it in terms of amiability, though their money diplomacy has captured much of the Western media, the UN, and a number of other institutions and officials.

The ‘Swaraj spirit’ has seen Indians and other stranded nationalities of civilians, nurses, students, hostages, being rescued from battle zones and disaster areas by Indian civilian and military aircraft, mostly free of charge, sometimes after organising facilitation and assistance from rival groups and third countries.

This shift in response policy towards Indian citizens abroad has been carried forward not only by her successor, current EAM S. Jaishankar, but by Prime Minister Modi himself, in a major departure from the practices of the past.

Earlier, Indian lives were thought perhaps to be cheap and dispensable, unless those who needed assistance were important, connected, and from the upper echelons of society. This despite India’s long standing socialist pretensions.

As for mobilising the Indian diaspora as a diplomatic force-multiplier, a demonstrator of the usefulness of Indians living in any country, their contribution, their law-abiding nature, their intelligence and culture, Narendra Modi put his personal stamp on it.

 The implementation began as soon as he became prime minister and immaculate it was too. Modi did his part. He brought gifts, often craft and textile items, books, projections of our history and culture, figurines, from different parts of India, for his counterparts. He started speaking almost exclusively in Hindi instead of his more laboured English. He always dressed in Indian style clothes. He showed off gorgeous shawls. He projected both the old and the new, yoga and pharmaceuticals,  aatmanirbhar manufacturing, digital India, our growth rate, climate awareness, our responsible ‘rules based’ attitude .

In turn, the diaspora, both in an organised and spontaneous manner, lauded, feted and lionised Modi as the prime minister amongst prime ministers, and India as a unique nation on the move, with a huge domestic market and appetite for all kinds of goods and services from around the world.

The popularity of this prime minister was there for all to see, and put paid to Opposition, hostile leftist media and enemy country attempts to besmirch his image and that of India. 

India is now seen to have arrived. The diaspora amplifies Modi’s own message. India is well worth associating with says Modi. Come invest in India. See how useful and worthwhile the Indians are in your own country, but remember they come from India, the land of opportunity. You don’t want to miss the bus. No other Indian prime minister had the bottle and the charisma to even attempt such a combination before.

Of course, the excellent organisers from the diaspora wherever Modi has been over the last eight years as prime minister deserve solid credit. They also lobby their governments and put forward Indian concerns. Some have electoral power and cannot be ignored.

There has never been a damp squib in terms of a response during scores of  Modi visits, some to countries where no Indian prime minister has been, others visited after decades, covering more countries, cities, places, than any of his predecessors.

It is a truism that the Indian diaspora tends to be dramatically patriotic, romanticising the connection out of nostalgia. Still, there is no gainsaying that Prime Minister Modi evokes the love and adulation of the ethnic Indian population abroad to an unprecedented degree.

India’s standing in the global community has grown substantially, new alliances have been forged. At home, infrastructure modernisation, welfare initiatives for the poor, growth initiatives for business, industry, investment are all seen as very creditable. The handling of the Covid pandemic in a country of 1.4 billion people has been extremely good and the production of vaccines, their disbursement and immunisation of millions, exports to other countries, sometimes free-of-charge, quickly, is much admired. India is being called the pharmacy to the world. In defence matters, the Modi administration standing up to and containing Chinese aggression on our borders is noted by the whole world.

The Madison Square Garden event in New York by himself a few years ago, the 50,000 capacity crowd at the ‘Howdy Modi’ event at the NRG Houston Stadium in Houston, Texas, with President Trump, deserve solid credit. Of course, when  Donald Trump came to India, Modi treated him to a crowd of over 100,000 at a massive brand new stadium in Ahmedabad. Trump had never seen so many people at a political rally before.

But it is Prime Minister Modi himself who has woven in the globally accessible televised interactions with the Indian diaspora, sometimes with just one or two people, with children, from all parts of India originally, and not just his native Gujarat. This is the leitmotif of every visit abroad in between the bilateral meetings, the multilateral summits, and the statecraft.

These are Indians who are now citizens of their new countries, some with a few thousand Indian origin people, others with significantly higher populations, educated, managerial, professional, entrepreneurial, from various disciplines. T

They seem to be everywhere, from the time the prime minister lands at each new destination, children with songs, flowers, classical Indian dancers in their gorgeous Banarasi sarees, Dhols, kettle drums, shehnais, lately both Bhagwa and Indian flags. Priests who apply tilaks.

On the street, outside his hotel, inside auditoria, in large open-air venues, stadiums. Their message, enthusiastic as it is, is not lost on the host countries and their leaders either.

Wembley Stadium in London holds 60,000 people. A galaxy of Soccer or Rock/Pop Stars are generally necessary to fill it. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, held its attention in 2015, at the ‘Namaste Wembley’ event, the crowd whistling, clapping, cheering, Modi, Modi, Modi, through his long speech. They came to it as to a celebration, with Modi themed scarves, hats, plastic masks, taking selfies, family portraits.

His counterpart, then British Prime Minister David Cameron, wondered aloud if he could have attracted such a crowd by himself.

In small countries such as Denmark, a crowd of 1,000 Indians in an auditorium saw the Danish prime minister in attendance, glad to be associated with India, its charismatic prime minister, in company with the Danish Indians.

 (1,553 words)

May 7^th, 2022

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

 Narendra Modi Visits An Emerging 21^st Century Concert of Europe

The 19^th century version of the Concert of Europe existed intermittently between 1815 up to the beginning of WWI in 2014, lasting for an entire century. Its purpose was to ensure stability by general consensus, maintain the European balance of power, its political boundaries, and spheres of influence.

The first phase of the Concert, up to 1848, was sometimes referred to as the Age of Metternich, the conservative Austrian Chancellor with great influence over the relatively newly formed German Confederation.

Notably, and in the present context, Tsar Alexander 1^st of Russia was very much part of the Concert. It was a kind of EU of its times, given to breakdowns and resurrections, till it gave up the ghost with the challenges posed by the Great War.

Curiously today, almost eight decades after WWII which the Soviet Union helped to win, and thirty years after the end of the Warsaw Pact, Russia was not invited to join NATO. It was not seen as part of Europe even as many of the former Soviet satellites, Slavic states like Russia, have been lapped up.

Instead, as Pope Francis made bold to say to an Italian publication recently, ‘NATO’s barking at Russia’s door might have resulted in Vladimir Putin launching a military offensive in Ukraine’.

While the situation in Ukraine, was very much part of the discussions in every capital visited by the Indian prime minister, India’s position is one of neutrality between the warring sides, with calls for an end to hostilities and a return to negotiations and dialogue.

India is seen as a friend of both sides, and indeed an important global presence now, part of QUAD, and an invitee to the G-7. This even as it has existential problems with China, arraigned for thousands of kilometres along the Line of Actual Control (LaC), on what was not so long ago, an independent Tibet.

Despite this, are India and China slowly but surely pulling away at the balance of power from Europe and America?

Could China and India possibly unite someday, if a union amongst unequals can work? Can Russia maintain its independence in its alliance with China on the strength of its military prowess alone?

Between India and China, is it the story of the hare and the tortoise? China with its attempts to encircle and intimidate India, finally falling short because of financial inability, and client states that have gone bankrupt. India making its gradual but sure-footed progress towards a kind of invincibility against Chinese designs, as well as other big power menaces?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first three-day visit abroad in 2022 began with him touching down in Berlin to meet with the new Chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz, from the centre-left Social Democratic Party, at the head of a coalition with the environmentalist Green Party and the neo-liberal Free Democrats.

It is perhaps no surprise that the one solid announcement from the German leg of the tour was about a Euro 10 billion German fund to be disbursed by 2030 to support green projects in India.

It has long been a plank of the latter-day economies like India and China that the responsibility for global warming falls unequally upon the West. This is because it is largely due to reckless exploitation of natural resources and the environment during their earlier Industrial Revolution. Therefore, there is a demand from the new economies that it should be financially supported in making expensive changes to a more green format. India showed its willingness to make deep cuts in its carbon footprint at the last Paris based Climate Talks. China was less forthcoming.

The German announcement was possibly in this context, and set the theme for  Prime Minister Modi’s visit next to Denmark where he was very warmly received, and where he also attended the Nordic Conference with Denmark, Sweden, Iceland, Finland and Norway.

Green technologies, techniques, and experience from Denmark and the countries of the Nordic Conference were high on the agenda for discussions and early initiatives in areas such as reforestation and environmental restoration. Other areas that featured were renewables, waste water management, digitisation and innovations. In the latter, India, despite its 1.4 billion population has made impressive gains.  Still there is a lot to learn from the neat and orderly Scandinavians and Nordics, not least in value-added and processed food technology, which strangely has not found a mention.

India’s spectacular tackling of the Covid Pandemic, its production and administration of tens of millions of doses of Indian vaccines, came up for admiring comments. India is increasingly seen as the pharmacy to the world, not least of all due to its affordable vaccine exports on an emergency basis to many countries.

In Germany, seven more MOUs were signed, some with an eye to greater trade between the two countries, easier exchange of personnel, solar power and hydrogen power initiatives, greater trade, in the context of seeking diversification of supply channels away from too much dependence on China. India, on its part, invited investment from Germany in its bid to further its Aatmanirbhar aspirations.

 Prime Minister Modi was accompanied on this trip by the External Affairs Minister and the National Security Adviser amongst others in his high-powered delegation.

Germany, that Prime Minister Modi visited first, and France, the last stop on his tour, are the mainstays of the European Union, and its biggest economies.  The visit bracketed the solvent, even rich, and important Nordic and Scandanavian countries in between, not all of them members of the EU, or, as yet, NATO. The Indian diaspora in each country accorded the prime minister a most effusive welcome, sometimes complete with Hindu motifs.

What is perhaps most significant about this trip is the growing importance accorded to India in world affairs, and a growing desire for many countries in Europe going through hard economic times, to engage with it.

The immediate causatives are both the pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine which has inflated costs, occasioned shortages of all kinds including food, fuel and other goods. These challenges have come on top of slowed economies, high defence costs suddenly thrust on them by the situation in Ukraine, and potential increases in tensions with China, now allied with Russia.

China may not be doing anything to annoy the Europeans or Americans at present, unless one counts its solid purchases of Russian oil and gas and the support it is providing to Russia’s financial systems. But the future, given the  European dependencies, is not certain.

The Ukraine conflict has also revived the spectre of a second Cold War, this time involving a pugnacious Russia versus all the Western European states. A Cold War with no end unless the EU and NATO rolls back from its Eastern expansionism. But that will open up a new can of worms from the countries divested of the NATO umbrella. 

The Ukraine conflict has distracted both the Europeans and the Americans from the challenges posed by China in the Asia-Pacific region, opening up new strategic possibilities for the strengthening Russo-Chinese Axis. Orders of howitzers from Taiwan has seen America push back the delivery timelines by three years!

The clumsy and hurried sanctions applied on Russia may have resulted in a closer embrace between the Bear and the Dragon even as they have failed to constrain Russia from prosecuting its military offensive in Ukraine. The world order, including its reliance on the US dollar and the Euro as principal reserve currencies is changing. The return to a possible Gold Standard is a real possibility, at least in Russia.

Germany however is willing to cut fuel imports from Russia even at considerable expense to itself as announced during Modi’s visit. Is this wise or the fog of war? Still, it may not be any of India’s business.

Most glaringly, the failure of America and NATO to bring the Russian invasion of Ukraine to a close, despite pouring in millions of dollars worth of armaments, mercenary fighters, and NATO trainers, will have a major long term impact.

There are divisions and cracks emerging in the Western alliance. Hungary is not on board. Neither is Serbia. Belarus is firmly in the Russian camp. Poland is eyeing the territory it lost to Ukraine after WWII. Moldova, not yet part of NATO, is on the Russian radar. Other Russian supporters include Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Cuba, most of Africa and the Middle East.  Already Ukraine is cut off from the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea, making it very difficult for its oil and other imports.

Prime Minister Modi’s last stop in Paris was to congratulate Emmanuel Macron on his consecutive second term victory as President, and to reaffirm ties with the only country in Europe cooperating militarily with India.

France has also supported India, over its going nuclear, over Kashmir, to be made a permanent member of the UNSC, in the collaboration on Safran fighter jet engines, in jointly building the Scorpene class diesel-electric submarines, in supplying the Rafale fighter jets, missile suites. 

We have Russia in our armaments radar at some 45% today, down from 80%, but France is picking up quite a bit of the difference, alongside America, Israel, South Korea. We surely look forward to more military collaboration with France.

The Concert of Europe in the 19^th century tried to preserve the world of monarchs against a rising tide of republicanism. It went under several times only to surface and try again. But in those days, the rest of the world, Asia, Africa, the Middle East were just so many colonial resources.

Today, while the Europeans and Americans fight with Russia, it is countries like China and India that will inherit the earth. More so, because their economies are under immense pressure owing to the old-world politics they still pursue. Even the survival of EU and NATO is not certain in the medium term.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has held and continues to hold his ground against Western pressure in this knowledge. And the West, coming in a stream to India, one after the other, partly to trade, occasionally to threaten or hold out a carrot, have realised the need to shift gears to achieve a fairer, more equitable basis, for its dealings with India.

(1,702 words)

May 4^th, 2022

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

The Third Coming Of Prashant Kishor

Is the long innings of a decade as Consultant to various political parties, except for part of Prashant Kishor’s time in Bihar, about to come to an end?

There is a growing view that Kishor is good when the going is good for his client, and not so much when the road is rocky and uphill. At the same time, his ability to sharpen political messages, coin appropriate slogans, and analyse data is much admired. The presumption that he knows better than seasoned politicians who have put in the time and hard work to reach their positions however, always works against him. This, despite his always working with the supreme leader and his or her immediate power structure. This infighting is also what brings him down, time and again.

Kishor did advise Capt. Amarinder Singh’s Punjab government in 2016-2017, and the central leadership in 2021. Amarinder Singh won handsomely. The effort did not go so well with the Gandhi family and the coterie around them in 2021. Kishor was ejected. Probably just as well for him, because it was early enough. In 2022, all five state assembly elections were lost, with a zero performance or very poor showing for Congress.

Likely at their wits’ end, the Gandhi family is willing, via interim president Sonia Gandhi, once again, to countenance Prashant Kishor and his ideas. However, Sonia Gandhi is 75 and in poor health. She would not want to take on further terms at the helm of the Party, given a choice in the matter.

For Kishor, wearying of selling his wares as a travelling salesman going all over the country for every election, is it now thought better to settle down? Prashant Kishor, reinvented as a Congress panjandrum, with specific responsibilities and performance expectations.

After all, Kishor and his organisation are aware of the benefits and pitfalls of being an outside force with unstitched, undefined powers.  Irrespective of Kishor and his I-Pac’s performance, or indeed electoral results obtained, the role seems to end on the very day the votes are counted. And they begin to sour, via criticism from party leaders, well before that.

The one exception in his career was with Nitish Kumar and his successful Mahagathbandan in Bihar, but that stint as Vice President in the JDU ended abruptly in 2022.   Reason: party leaders who criticised Kishor. And this despite Bihar being his native state.

They say the best political minds in the country come from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. But nowadays, we can see Gujarat is nothing to sniff at as well.

 So can Kishor, as, say, a Congress General Secretary, with the stamp and wax seal of the Gandhi family backing him, be better positioned to weave together an Opposition alliance for the general elections of 2024?

All the political pundits agree that an Opposition construct without the Congress will not be sufficient, as the arithmetic, and the authenticity will not suffice.  Kishor does speak of the unique political space the Congress Party occupies, despite its poor showing of late. Is he right, or was that in a very different Idea of India that no longer exists, even as many disrupted and ousted by the changes, find it difficult to accept.

And yet, the biggest impediment to Congress involvement in an Opposition alliance has been, thus far, Rahul Gandhi, a fourth generation scion of the family that gave us three prime ministers. He wants to lead it, and inevitably be the prime ministerial candidate.  The trouble is, he is widely perceived  as not being up to the task.

Can Prashant Kishor somehow retain Rahul Gandhi at the head of the Opposition alliance, and, for that matter, his own head in the Party, and yet not project him as the prime ministerial candidate?  What can the Gandhi family countenance, even as it stubbornly clings to power in the near destroyed Party.  Critics like the G-21 within the Party have not made a dent.

Will Rahul Gandhi himself agree to such a fate? It is suggested that Rahul Gandhi does not want Prashant Kishor at all, and the coterie around him had him thrown out in 2021.  However, in recent days, it is Sonia Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi that wants to give it another go, even as Rahul Gandhi has gone abroad on yet another of his mysterious and private foreign visits.

Besides, can Kishor get other constituents, some of whom aspire to the pole position themselves, to agree to this?  Perhaps his main focus will be on how to get the Congress wins in 2024 up to a respectable total in three digits. He may prefer to keep things vague on an alliance till after the elections. If Congress has more than 100 seats, it will automatically be a strong contender for the leadership.

Can there be someone else from the Congress in an echo of the Manmohan Singh-Sonia Gandhi dyarchy that might be acceptable as the prime ministerial candidate? In those days, the Congress had a lion’s share of the seats in parliament, in the UPA tally. Can those sort of numbers be replicated in 2024? Given the sorry state of its election machinery at present it will be difficult. Besides we haven’t once mentioned the formidable RSS/BJP electoral machine and funding.

As a precursor, there are a number of assembly elections late this year and in 2023. Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh in 2022, in which both AAP and Congress will contest, and then Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh in 2023.

Can Congress, with Kishor on board, do well enough to actually bag one or more of the states currently with the BJP? It seems unlikely, but even a better showing could help Kishor’s credibility.

If Rajasthan or Chhattisgarh, or both, are lost however, Kishor’s days in Congress may be numbered. Unfortunately, in or out of the Party, once an election strategist, always thought of as one.

Unless compensation comes, say, via Karnataka, a money-generating state, one in which Congress has solid minority backing. It is badly needed, given its empty coffers.

Gujarat has been with BJP for over 20 years, but who can pry it loose? If there are any opposition seats won, again by wooing the minorities, tribals, and perhaps the Patidars, they are likely to be won by the AAP.

Depending on how these assembly elections go for Congress, perceptions could change for the better or worse in the opposition ranks. Will any attempt to put in place a remote control in the hands of the Gandhi family end up breaking rather than making for opposition unity?

The buzz is in terms of organising one-on-one contests between the BJP and Congress in as many seats as possible. This presupposes other parties will stay away to prevent cutting into each other’s votes. I can’t see a resurgent and ambitious AAP agreeing to this in view of a near headless-toothless Congress. 

Mamata Banerjee of TMC has long advocated that the opposition should let its strongest constituents contest on their own turf without cutting into their votes. So TMC in West Bengal. DMK in Tamil Nadu, and so on.  But Congress has no pucca turf it can call its own anymore. It gets a tally based on a few seats from everywhere, and the one or two states it still might retain going forward.

Banerjee also seemed to suggest that the political party that garners the most number of Lok Sabha seats should be allowed to lay claim to the prime minister’s slot, in the event of a BJP defeat. However, this was after her thumping win in West Bengal against the BJP, and before pulling a set of blanks in Tripura and Goa. Her one-time acolyte, Arvind Kejriwal of the AAP, has similar ideas, particularly after winning Punjab convincingly.

In all this, Prashant Kishor’s usefulness lies in the fact that he has worked with many of the dramatis personae. He can therefore keep tweaking and nuancing the pulls and pressures in the lead up to the elections. He can jet around like Kissinger carrying missives and suggestions between the chief ministers.

However, his disadvantage will be the perception that now he comes as a Congressman, no longer as a detached consultant.

 (1,367 words)

April 21^st 2022

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

Cow Belt Dreams And Elsewhere Screams

P.C. Sorkar, a famous Magician from the 1930s till the beginning of the seventies, in the days of magic shows and circuses, had a highlight in his act.

He kept conjuring what he called ‘The Water of India’. It was a nice unifying sort of gesture, because the water was indubitably sourced in India when he performed his Indrajal magic show in-country.

And the water was probably not the same when he took his magic show to Europe, Japan, and other parts. In those instances, Sorkar probably expected the audience to accept that it was the Water of India, not because he had brought it from home, but because it emanated from his hands.

The BJP is essentially a ‘Hindi belt’ phenomenon, though it has won two terms at the Centre and has spread its wings to the North East plus a solitary outpost in the South, in the form of Karnataka. It could be well on its way to All-India domination as well, if it resists some of its sillier impulses.

It was fathered by an eminent Bengali, Syama Prasad Mookerjee, in its Jan Sangh avatar. Mookerjee, a beacon of the Hindu Mahasabha prior to founding the Jan Sangh, is credited with saving West Bengal from the clutches of the Partition, and protesting the separate status of J&K. Mookerjee, briefly a member of Nehru’s union of ministers, is also credited with giving the Jan Sangh, which became the BJP, its strong Hindu nationalist posture.

This too has given rise to the Hindi-belt BJP’s fetish for vegetarianism. As if  being Hindu is equal to being vegetarian as well as revering the cow. It was however far from any Bengali mind like Mookerjee’s.

Before Air India was sold to the Tatas, it served vegetarian food only, in its latter days as a government owned entity with the Modi administration at the Centre. That this stance has no takers in BJP ruled Goa, all the eight states of the BJP ruled or allied North East, let alone in various Opposition ruled states, has seen this effort come a cropper.

The language however remains the hankering of the so-called ‘Cow Belt’. It wants to exalt the status of Hindi over other languages obtaining in the sub-continent, and demote English at the same time. This has never sat well with other regions, and probably never will.

Both Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has proclaimed an ever-lengthening motto in his ‘Sabka’ slogan; and loyal lieutenant Home Minister Amit Shah, should desist from stirring this particular Hornet’s nest. 

English, the non-frictional via media means of communication for all parts of the Union of India, as spoken and written here, is distinct from its usage elsewhere. The English of the colonial masters, the United Kingdom is different. As is the one used in America, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, and many other countries formerly colonised by the British.

Indian English has not only contributed many words to the English dictionary, but has developed a rich and varied literature of its own. Characterising Indian English as something other than native, is both narrow-minded and inaccurate.  English has much greater depth and range than the Hindi used in government communication or on the street. Which is, of course, a far cry from Sanskritised Shudh Hindi, the province of an erudite few.

Besides, English usage makes Indians comprehensible in large parts of the globe, and gives Indians, many with an excellent command of the language, an edge in IT, Engineering, the service industry, and many other disciplines.

 Narendra Modi and Amit Shah are both proud Gujaratis themselves.  However it didn’t keep Shah from essaying a confusing exhortation on the usage of Hindi in Sarkari communication recently.

This follows on from a milder attempt made by Shah in 2019, at Hindi Diwas celebrations, when he said, ‘If there is any language that can tie the whole country in one thread, it is the most spoken language of Hindi’.

That the Gangetic plains are the most highly populated part of India, is the pedestrian reason why so many people actually speak Hindi. But this is conveniently ignored, in this so- called quest for imposed unity. Amit Shah is the Chairman of the Official Languages Committee, but should  perhaps resist his innate biases.

Shah said Prime Minister Modi wants more usage of Hindi as opposed to English as the ‘Official Language’.  There is no attempt to work through the logic of this move that has angered many people unnecessarily.

At the 37^th meeting of the parliamentary Official Language Committee, Shah asserted Hindi was the official ‘Language of India’, implying Indian English, as spoken and written here, was somehow alien.  By way of justification, he said 70% of the Union Cabinet’s agenda was prepared in Hindi. He didn’t say that most of the Cabinet may not be very good at English, but the thought is  nevertheless implied.

Amit Shah said Hindi should be accepted as an alternative to English, as opposed to other local languages. This two-tier system with more Hindi instead of English usage, and other languages pushed down the ladder, is only comfortable for Hindi speakers.

To others, it is an aggravating insult. But this did not seem to stop Shah’s initiative. He said the North Eastern states, now under the BJP fold, had agreed to make the study of Hindi compulsory till Class 10. Many tribal texts in the region are being rewritten in the Devanagari script.

Hindi, is, as it stands, just one of 22 official languages. And most of the states in the Union of India have been organised along linguistic lines. To fly in the face of all this makes little sense. It is likely to promote regional chauvinism rather than unity.

The Opposition quickly labelled this latest attempt as one more effort of ‘Hindi Imperialism’, vowing it will be resisted by non-Hindi speaking states. As expected, West Bengal was quick off the mark with its sharp criticism. This was matched by outrage from most of the southern states, Maharashtra, Odisha and other non-Hindi speaking regions. Political parties other than the BJP were unanimous in their condemnation.

Hindi may be beloved in the top BJP leadership, but the universal Water of India it is not. It is more reminiscent of another of P.C. Sorkar’s famous magic tricks, called the ‘Floating Lady’. It was a routine featuring the illusion of ‘aerial suspension’. Ordinary fakirs from 19^th century India, and even the great Houdini, called it simply, the ‘ Indian Rope Trick’.

 

(1,082 words)

April 12^th, 2022

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

Freebie Mates With Collapsible Gates

We have two countries on our doorstep, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, with collapsed economies. So collapsed, that re-flotation is a herculean task.  So far out of control are they, that their survival as political entities may be in jeopardy. 

If these countries were commercial entities, they would be Chapter 11 bankrupts, with caretaker managements to realise what value could be salvaged from the wreckage.

Senior bureaucrats have come calling on Prime Minister Narendra Modi to warn of a fate like Sri Lanka, or Greece, if not for the whole country, certainly for certain states bent on distributing freebies they cannot afford.

States, profligate with promises of free this and that, in order to win elections. This is something of a winning formula for the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), if not also for quite a few other state satraps and their parties. Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West Bengal were also mentioned. 

Right now, it is the AAP that is in focus, even as they are off to try the same voodoo in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh for their forthcoming elections.  The formula is freebies for the masses, with a heavy slug of minority appeasement politics where the latter are present in number.

Both Punjab and Delhi, now with AAP, are in dreadful financial condition. One, Delhi, has been driven to the point of destitution by two consecutive terms of AAP politics. Very few promises have been kept on the development side, as in buses, new schools, colleges, hospitals, roads. Yes, subsidies on electricity and water have been given to the poor, and correspondingly loaded on to the rest of the bills.

The other, already run aground by Congress and Akali Dal administrations before the AAP win, has no money to afford Arvind Kejriwal’s extravagant promises. It has massive debt that cannot even be serviced from state revenues.

The bureaucrats are rightly worried. Bhagwant Mann has already come calling on Prime Minister Modi to ask for Rs. 50,000 crores as a first tranche of a special Rs. 100,000 crore package for the border state of Punjab. The threat, if any, implied, and wreathed in yellow turban clad smiles. The other states mentioned, also come, shawls and bouquets at the ready, for begging trips to see the prime minister. Most end in anger and frustration once back home when they don’t succeed.

This point of break down caused by devil-may-care spending, had also come to India, the whole country, in 1991, via Rajiv Gandhi’s excesses on the back of an unreformed low growth economy. It was thought to be the fag-end of Nehruvian Socialism.

But no, it saw a revival for another decade, with the surprise win for Congress in 2004, after the failure of BJP’s ‘India Shining’ campaign and election.

Under Congress party President Sonia Gandhi, (and remote-controlled  Prime Minister Manmohan Singh), plus her extra constitutional Leftist National Advisory Council (NAC), welfare expenditure went through the roof. 

There was MNREGA, set up for the election of 2014. But, good as it was, it didn’t do the trick. It should have, as per the formula, but there were Hindu nationalist forces at work.

 What happens when there is an imbalance? Between 2004 and 2014 we didn’t develop any infrastructure to speak of. The armed forces got no aircraft, ships, or tanks. Exports languished. Imports burgeoned. Industry lacked investment and ‘animal spirits’. Commission agents, speculators, and real-estate prospered.

Pakistan could do no wrong. The terrorism in Kashmir and all over the country went unchecked. China just helped itself to Indian territory with not even a murmuring from us. We could not afford to get annoyed.

 This longish interlude, marked by huge corruption, was preceded by six years of the Vajpayee administration that saw India boldly go nuclear-weaponised, and establish the Golden quadrilateral of excellent highways.

But, all in all, after over 30 years since 1991, we can clearly say that, in our case, the bankruptcy turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

When it happened in 1991, we had just a week’s worth of foreign exchange reserves, and were about to default on our international debt payments. We had to first of all fly out some 40 tonnes of our gold reserves to Switzerland. This held the wolf away from the door, while the World Bank (WB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), worked out a rescue package attached to a long prescription of economic reforms.  It was a prescription that was non-negotiable, if India wanted to see a second tranche of funds.

Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao, who took over after Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination, was probably our most learned prime minister to date. He seized upon the dictation from the WB and IMF to pry this country loose from the death embrace of socialism that had brought India to this pass.

The same malaise of reckless spending, a good deal of it on armaments in this case, brought down India’s all-weather friend, the mighty USSR. That too in the self-same 1991.

The friendship endures with the rump, which is Putin’s Russia.  President Vladimir Putin, an erstwhile KGB man of Soviet vintage, still thinks the economic mismanagement that dissolved the Warsaw Pact, broke the Berlin Wall, and dissolved the USSR, is plain unforgivable.

He has worked on reviving some of his nation’s former glory, via several annexations and alliances with countries in the neighbourhood like Belarus, Hungary and Serbia. The ongoing special military action in Ukraine, is also part of it.

In India, it is the liberalisation and economic reforms of 1991 that has sown the seeds of a prosperity that was never imagined by socialist India.

It is true that with 1.4 billion people headed towards 1.7 billion by 2050, despite a slowing birth rate, that every one of our citizens, via the inexorable logic of per capita income, will not be well off. This, even when our dollar economy more than trebles to $ 10 trillion plus.

But yes, this country will have the third largest economy in the world, perhaps as early as 2030.This is predicated however on a judicious mix of welfarism, and growth in the GDP, by all other means. Welfarism is unavoidable with at least 400 million poor people, with over 100 million below the poverty line. But we cannot be cavalier about it.

We cannot summon our finance minister, as Sonia Gandhi summoned Chidambaram and order him to write off Rs. 60,000 crores in farmer loans, off budget, only to have another Rs. 50,000 balloon up in just one year. That sort of monkey business didn’t work for Idi Amin’s Uganda, and it certainly won’t work for us.

We cannot really afford to have backed down on farm reforms that would have put money, perhaps even doubled and trebled the income of the small farmer, because of pressure from rich farmers in Mercedes Benz SUVs. But we have. And there’s the danger. The wolf is never that far from the door.

The suicides of poor farmers go on unabated. The rich farmers and commission agents pretend to have won the day for them, when everyone knows it was nothing of the sort.

Socialism of the irresponsible kind that wants to give tax payer money away to the poor, particularly in our perpetually overspending and indebted states, is touted as equity and justice politics. Politics of the people. A people, largely illiterate and poor, not familiar with the laws of economics, but armed with the universal franchising vote. A freebie is well understood. How the government pays for it is the government’s business after all.

And yet, in such a system, where the poor are handed sops, the productive forces, the rich, inevitably get richer. They may be a very small part of the overall population, but it is they that grow the economy.

To make it count and not let all the riches fritter away in non-productive expenditure, there have to be laws against making free with tax payer money you don’t have. And the politics that blackmails the Centre for unrealisable promises. It may be a good way to arouse the rabble. But this is abetment to anarchy, a lack of integrity, and not democracy.

Prudence and good economic management insists that AAP style conjuring of  pie-in-the-sky bonanzas must be outlawed and nixed. Unfortunately, the temptation to use ‘jumlas’ is something the BJP is also no stranger to. Jumlas are not designed to deliver. Is that the answer? Otherwise, who will bell the cat?

(1,411 words)

April 4^th, 2022

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee