Where have the Doves gone?

Where have the Doves gone?
Originally uploaded by sharad_2007

A New Kind of Enemy Needs a New Response.

Hawks are hovering over my country!

My country has been slighted.

A slight it could have done little to protect itself from. For ten years, no country in the world has escaped the ignominy of seeing its hapless citizens being mowed down.

A slight it finds itself at a loss on how to deal with. No country in the world has found an appropriate response to such a slight in the last ten years.
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A mood of anger and retribution!
The people are seething with anger! Just about coming to terms with India's new power in the world order built on the two decades of economic growth and half a century of Democracy, they are demanding India flex that power.

We have seen the US in hot pursuit.

Peace has not returned to the world but its soldiers are dying in an almost Vietnam kind of situation.

Its president had to admit his unpreparedness to tackle the enemy of this scale and this invisibility.

And of course he has the distinction of being the most ridiculed Presidents of the USA ever.

In the meanwhile this hot pursuit has pushed some more gullible young men with dreams of martyrdom against the big bad enemy of their religion, into the waiting clutches of the Generals of this hidden enemy.

But the people demand a hot pursuit nevertheless. Even if we know that that only helps swell the ranks of the enemy!

To fight the Satan, we do his bidding!
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The Enemy Beckons us to Strike at him and Increase his Numbers!
The world today is like a rat infested home. A housewife knows that you do not get rid of the rats by spraying bullets. Rats will just wait in their lairs and then strike when the lights are off and everyone is asleep. In the meanwhile they would be swelling their ranks by procreating.

This rat like enemy today is using these strikes to evoke a righteous and forceful reaction from us.

This reaction alienates its kind from the world and swells its armies, but it does not kill him!
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The Enemy is Taking from us Our Morale!
The fact that we are now worried that he can strike anywhere. In trains. In temples. In office buildings. In nightclubs. In parliaments. In markets. In five star hotels. Seems like it is by design. A sample of all kinds of locations that cover all strata of the society.
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The Enemy Makes us Headless and Directionless!
Till yesterday, the guerilla aimed at decapacitating its massively larger enemy by assassinating its leaders.

Ask Indian Peace Keeping Force that operated against the LTTE in Sri Lanka. The LTTE snipers would take out the leader of our troops and then run down the confused troops. This kept happenig till our troops learnt to protect their leaders by making them wear uniforms similar to theirs and by keeping them in the midst of the formation rather than at the head of it.

Today's enemy is far savvier! He kills our leadership not our leaders.

Can you see the pattern?

The democratically elected President of the most powerful nation in the world, today looking like a shadow of his former self. A country that elected him less than four years ago, laughing and jeering at him.

Aren't our leaders facing the same fate today?

This enemy's snipers are not its riflemen but its propagandists!

I wonder how many derogatory SMSs, blogs and emails floating around today, seen as public sentiment by our television, are generated by the propaganda modules of the enemy!

The pattern is clear. The motive is very clear. We know who gains when leaders get eliminated. Do we still doubt who the culprit is?
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May be the enemy won't succeed. May be we can get better leaders?
Most dangerously, SMS, blogs and emails are now asking for the Army to move in and take over the country. Such fine soldiers, who have this image of impeccable honesty, should be able to protect our country and govern it better.

The messages are not only inviting or wishing for military rule but also provoking the men in uniform.

Look, how the politicians insult the soldiers! Look they can't even treat the mothers, a powerful word in India, of the slain soldiers properly! The TV channels then promptly get mothers of martyrs on television and speak against the politician.

The news channels show with glee the shameful incident of the father of a slain army officer throwing out the chief minister of his state from his house. The chief minister had come to offer condolences. One can pardon the act of the aggrieved father, but one can not extol this as a virtue of behavior. His son was a role model, not this act of the father.

Our TV channels go on regardless. They represent people's mood. People want change? Or do they? Or does someone else stoke the flames and guides the fire in a direction of their choice? Are the TV channels unwittingly playing in the hands of the enemy's information machine?
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The Enemy Brings us Down from the High Ground!
Physical higher ground in conventional warfare gives disproportionate advantage to its occupant. We have had that moral higher ground due to our resilient democracy and human rights.

How much would be enough for some power-hungry or emotional (or both) General to roll his tanks and take over the country?

Our neighbors envy our democracy. They lose faith of their biggest ally, the US, because we have it, they don't.

There is a concept of force-equaliser in warfare. Do their propaganda modules aim for that? Would any enemy not?

Citizens of my country; media of my country; leaders of my country; security forces of my country - beware of this new enemy. Beware of his new warfare. A warfare with same objecives - kill leaders, bring down morale, equalise numbers, equalise ground - the weapons are different - the way of 'Kautilya' - disinformation.

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So what do we do now?
First of all what we do not do.

Let us not counter this warfare with missiles and tanks.

Let us not fall for the timer bombs of disinformation, aimed at 'assassinating' our leaders.

Let us not divide ourselves. Politicians versus citizens. Army vs police. Agencies blaming each other for lapses. Communities of people suspecting each other. The enemy has struck all of us - but in a way that divides us.

Let us not do what the enemy wants us to do!

Let us not let the hawks take over our skies!
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(Watch out for "What we Should Do Other than Pray")