The two countries that regularly score well over others in terms of positive attitude towards Uncle Sam are Israel and India. Yet the popular American attitude towards Israel and India has been of very contrasting nature indeed. To the average American the land of Israel represents the holy land of milk and honey and the people of Israel represents as “God’s chosen people”. A majority of Americans continue to believe that the second return of Jesus will take place and Israel is the necessary catalyst to it. No American politician can afford to anger the very powerful groups promoting Israeli positions in America and America must risk her own reputation, moral and enmity of the rest of the World in order to shield Israel from the retributions of the rest of the World.
Now let us contrast the attitude of Uncle Sam towards Israel and to that of India. Indian corporations are regularly accused of violating US visa procedures though there may be some justifications to it, Indians are seen as “job-thieves” in the eyes of the average American, Indian leaders and policy makers are regularly slapped with paternalistic advises on how to run affairs in India by American policy makers whereas those very same American policy makers must listen to everything that rulers from Israel offers to them in terms of edicts and dictates.
The question remains what exactly the Israelis do right and what exactly the Indian communities are not doing right. Having a look at the number of political thinkers from Jewish background in the US and comparing them to the number of political and strategic thinkers from Indian background in the US will be enough. The main issue is that thinkers from Jewish background regularly think and present their agendas to the American scene. They can do the same since they have an agenda, a plan, a worldview as well as the conviction to convince others about the righteousness of their cause. And they are regularly able to convince others about the righteousness of their causes thanks to their successes in American context. The American neo-conservative thinkers are a prominent example of the same. Mostly from Jewish backgrounds these people did the ideological groundwork for much of the foreign policy objectives of the Bush administration including the now infamous war in Iraq.
It is true that the Indian communities also have achieved a high level of material success in America but these successes have stayed mostly within the realm of material and business fields. There have been very few Indian Americans who are willing to come out with a unique worldview as well as a plan of action that will set the agenda America in terms of American foreign policy or wider social policies. Fareed Zakaria may be an exception in this regard but exception only proves the normal. Also compared to prominent Jewish thinkers like Norman Podhoretz, Henry Kissinger, Richard Pearl, and Daniel Pipes and so on the contribution to the course of thinking behind US policy making, the Indian American contributions come up way short.
In the end, the major difference between the Jewish communities in America (and elsewhere) and their Indian counterparts ultimately is that the Jewish communities are not happy with only material success but they have got their own unique agenda as well as a vision and they have turned out to be the ones who have made their vision largely America’s vision, too. The Indian communities at this point of history seem to be too much bothered about their personal material pursuits and are unwilling or unable to present a clear-cut vision and Worldview in America. The Jewish communities think and make America think on their terms whereas Indian communities simply care about their material pursuits.
As a consequence, many prominent Americans campaign for the release of someone like Jonathan Pollard who is serving Jail terms for stealing America’s secrets and selling them to Israel whereas there are very few influential voices present in the United States who can cry out in favor of the Indian companies whenever they are accused of either “job-stealing” or immigration procedural violations.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
When the philosopher meets the software engineer
I know my readers will be jumping out of their PC-s or laptops or thinking about switching over to any other links in their blackberries after they read the title of this article. What in the World, they will think, this guy is talking about? Philosophy has got something in common with Software Engineering after all? Is not Philosophy a boring, dull, time-killing thing for ripe, old men with big, white beards? And is not software engineering a thing for cool dude, millennial-s? But there is something that binds philosophy with software engineering. Well to describe it in one single word is “reductionism.”
Let me explain the term a bit more. When we want to do a task, from the simplest of the tasks which includes doing shopping in our neighborhood grocery stores or even say eating our lunches with our hands or to the most extreme like sending a man to the moon, we tend to break our whole big job part into small tasks i.e. we reduce our overall objective into small goals which we can do with ease and after we are able to perform all those small goals we can say that the whole task is done. That is in essence the core concept of “reductionism”. This particular method follows one of the earliest truths of problem solving: it is always easy to solve a complex problem by breaking it into separate parts and then solving those parts individually.
The “reductionism” is considered one of the oldest and most common methods through which mankind has started to solve its various problems from finding out how the world works out to running and managing a project successfully. When Philosophers try to find out the answer of a particular question or the scientists try to explain a thing what they tend to do is to divide it in smallest possible parts, then explain away the smallest part and afterwards try to explain similar parts in the same way, and then combine all the parts together to come out with the overall theory. Say for example if I say that all human beings die after 60. Now to explain let me say John died at 65, Ramesh died at 61, Rahim died at 75, Ariel died at 71 and Novjyot died at 77. Now all my sample persons die after they have been alive for a minimum of 60 years on the earth. So based upon all of my samples, I can conclude my earlier claim that all human beings die after 60.
Even in our software projects, we tend to follow the same way. In any of our project strategies and project plans, we tend to divide the whole project execution into four basic parts:
1. What are we going to do (objective of the project)
2. How we are going to do it (approach for the project)
3. When are we going to do it (estimations and timelines for the project)
4. Who amongst us are going to do what (team role definitions and team structures)
Once we are through achieving all these parts then the overall project goes smooth and focused and if even one of the parts is not properly addressed then the whole project can go for toss.
Reductionism is not only in the realm of the philosophers and scientists but it is widely used in political and strategic fields also. One of the major strategies of the Roman Empire used to be “divide et impera”(divide and rule) i.e. divide your enemies into separate camps thereby weakening them and then they are easily conquerable. This strategy says that if you have an enemy to conquer and the enemy is most difficult to conquer then first try to create confusion and division within the enemy camp and then once you are successful in dividing the enemy camp then you can easily conquer them.
Even in literature and popular fictions we can see many examples of the same techniques of reductionism. Do you remember that Eeshop’s fable from your childhood whereby a dying farmer asked his sons to first break some sticks one by one and then asking them to break those sticks after putting them together? That story meant that reductionism inside families and society can ruin the whole thing.
So as we can see now more and more how common we cool, hip, software engineers are in our approach to finding solutions to our problems to the philosopher with a bored face and bearded chicks as well as a politician with sharp brains and crooked hearts. So reductionism i.e. solving problems by breaking it into parts is the way through which we cool , hip software engineers are attached with the bearded , boorish philosophers.
Let me explain the term a bit more. When we want to do a task, from the simplest of the tasks which includes doing shopping in our neighborhood grocery stores or even say eating our lunches with our hands or to the most extreme like sending a man to the moon, we tend to break our whole big job part into small tasks i.e. we reduce our overall objective into small goals which we can do with ease and after we are able to perform all those small goals we can say that the whole task is done. That is in essence the core concept of “reductionism”. This particular method follows one of the earliest truths of problem solving: it is always easy to solve a complex problem by breaking it into separate parts and then solving those parts individually.
The “reductionism” is considered one of the oldest and most common methods through which mankind has started to solve its various problems from finding out how the world works out to running and managing a project successfully. When Philosophers try to find out the answer of a particular question or the scientists try to explain a thing what they tend to do is to divide it in smallest possible parts, then explain away the smallest part and afterwards try to explain similar parts in the same way, and then combine all the parts together to come out with the overall theory. Say for example if I say that all human beings die after 60. Now to explain let me say John died at 65, Ramesh died at 61, Rahim died at 75, Ariel died at 71 and Novjyot died at 77. Now all my sample persons die after they have been alive for a minimum of 60 years on the earth. So based upon all of my samples, I can conclude my earlier claim that all human beings die after 60.
Even in our software projects, we tend to follow the same way. In any of our project strategies and project plans, we tend to divide the whole project execution into four basic parts:
1. What are we going to do (objective of the project)
2. How we are going to do it (approach for the project)
3. When are we going to do it (estimations and timelines for the project)
4. Who amongst us are going to do what (team role definitions and team structures)
Once we are through achieving all these parts then the overall project goes smooth and focused and if even one of the parts is not properly addressed then the whole project can go for toss.
Reductionism is not only in the realm of the philosophers and scientists but it is widely used in political and strategic fields also. One of the major strategies of the Roman Empire used to be “divide et impera”(divide and rule) i.e. divide your enemies into separate camps thereby weakening them and then they are easily conquerable. This strategy says that if you have an enemy to conquer and the enemy is most difficult to conquer then first try to create confusion and division within the enemy camp and then once you are successful in dividing the enemy camp then you can easily conquer them.
Even in literature and popular fictions we can see many examples of the same techniques of reductionism. Do you remember that Eeshop’s fable from your childhood whereby a dying farmer asked his sons to first break some sticks one by one and then asking them to break those sticks after putting them together? That story meant that reductionism inside families and society can ruin the whole thing.
So as we can see now more and more how common we cool, hip, software engineers are in our approach to finding solutions to our problems to the philosopher with a bored face and bearded chicks as well as a politician with sharp brains and crooked hearts. So reductionism i.e. solving problems by breaking it into parts is the way through which we cool , hip software engineers are attached with the bearded , boorish philosophers.
If they had senses , their hearts would also have melted away
“If they had senses , their hearts would also have melt away”
The membership count of the World of dreamers i.e. innovative and out-of-box thinking entreprenurs just got reduced by one count on Wednesday , October 5 , 2011 when Steve Jobbs , the founder of Apple computers i.e. one of the most famous brands ever known in terms of compuer technology.
The life story of this dreamer cum the no-nonsense editor is as dramatic as a beautiful bollywood storyline except that this one had a real tragic end without the familiar Indian-middle-class-family-women-crying happy-ending. The story begins when a certain Abdulfattah Jandali , a native of Syria , decided to travel to the United States to chase his dream of life i.e. do higher studies. There he somehow happened to cross the path of a certain Joanne Schieble , a German-American girl , and as they say in Bollywood , “when something is about to happen , the whole of the Universe just conspires to get it done” , the two fall in love and as it used to happen so often in that beautiful part of the World (and also happens so often now days) , the Syrian gentleman leaves the seed of his love in the womb of his beloved.
Now as so many times happen that the father of the girl did not agree in marriage , how could he accept a Syrian Muslim speaking a foreign tongue marrying his beautiful daughter. So the couple had a choice to make , either abort the baby or put him into an orphanage. After a long deliberation , they decided to take the second option.
A couple called Paul and Clara Jobbs , later adopted the child and Christened him as Steve Jobbs and the rest is history. The biological parents of Steve Jobbs married sometime later and they had a girl thistime within their wedlock , she is Mona Simpson , a famous novelist in her own rights. Steve Jobbs later went to build the relationship with her sister and mom but he never ever talked with her dad.
His dad was by this time ,a manager in a Casino in the United States and according to his own statement , he would have gone to grave but not take the initiative to make the first phone call to his son lest he thinks that his dad is coming to his once dejected son for his fame and fortune. In his own words , “"This might sound strange, though, but I am not prepared, even if either of us was on our deathbed, to pick up the phone to call him. Steve will have to do that as the Syrian pride in me does not want him ever to think I am after his fortune. I am not. I have my own money. What I don't have is my son ... and that saddens me."”
But Abdulfattah Jandali showed his love for his son in a different way , when the news got to him that Steve is fatally ill from cnacer , Jandali mailed him , his own complete medical history , hoping against hope that some miracle may happen.
But since this is not a bollywood story but a real world thing , the happy ending does not happen and as you know when Steve Jobbs took his last breath on this last Wednesday , his dad Abdulfattah Jandali was still waiting to hear from his son for the first time in his life.
That is why just after the world media broke the news about Steve Jobbs’s death , the youth in Syria have begun calling their apple made ipads and iphones as “isad”-s. Undoubtedly , had those devices had their own senses their hearts would also have melt away.
The membership count of the World of dreamers i.e. innovative and out-of-box thinking entreprenurs just got reduced by one count on Wednesday , October 5 , 2011 when Steve Jobbs , the founder of Apple computers i.e. one of the most famous brands ever known in terms of compuer technology.
The life story of this dreamer cum the no-nonsense editor is as dramatic as a beautiful bollywood storyline except that this one had a real tragic end without the familiar Indian-middle-class-family-women-crying happy-ending. The story begins when a certain Abdulfattah Jandali , a native of Syria , decided to travel to the United States to chase his dream of life i.e. do higher studies. There he somehow happened to cross the path of a certain Joanne Schieble , a German-American girl , and as they say in Bollywood , “when something is about to happen , the whole of the Universe just conspires to get it done” , the two fall in love and as it used to happen so often in that beautiful part of the World (and also happens so often now days) , the Syrian gentleman leaves the seed of his love in the womb of his beloved.
Now as so many times happen that the father of the girl did not agree in marriage , how could he accept a Syrian Muslim speaking a foreign tongue marrying his beautiful daughter. So the couple had a choice to make , either abort the baby or put him into an orphanage. After a long deliberation , they decided to take the second option.
A couple called Paul and Clara Jobbs , later adopted the child and Christened him as Steve Jobbs and the rest is history. The biological parents of Steve Jobbs married sometime later and they had a girl thistime within their wedlock , she is Mona Simpson , a famous novelist in her own rights. Steve Jobbs later went to build the relationship with her sister and mom but he never ever talked with her dad.
His dad was by this time ,a manager in a Casino in the United States and according to his own statement , he would have gone to grave but not take the initiative to make the first phone call to his son lest he thinks that his dad is coming to his once dejected son for his fame and fortune. In his own words , “"This might sound strange, though, but I am not prepared, even if either of us was on our deathbed, to pick up the phone to call him. Steve will have to do that as the Syrian pride in me does not want him ever to think I am after his fortune. I am not. I have my own money. What I don't have is my son ... and that saddens me."”
But Abdulfattah Jandali showed his love for his son in a different way , when the news got to him that Steve is fatally ill from cnacer , Jandali mailed him , his own complete medical history , hoping against hope that some miracle may happen.
But since this is not a bollywood story but a real world thing , the happy ending does not happen and as you know when Steve Jobbs took his last breath on this last Wednesday , his dad Abdulfattah Jandali was still waiting to hear from his son for the first time in his life.
That is why just after the world media broke the news about Steve Jobbs’s death , the youth in Syria have begun calling their apple made ipads and iphones as “isad”-s. Undoubtedly , had those devices had their own senses their hearts would also have melt away.
Assasination of Al-Awlaki-Winning the battle on the ground and losing the war of ideas
Last week the American people saw over their television the announcement of the assassination of one of their own by their popularly elected government. There was some jubilation in the traditional conservative circles in terms of like “Thank God, another one of them bites the dust” and some condemnation from the libertarian circles of the Obama administration for assassinating an American citizen without a proper trial.
For most Americans struggling with worries about from where the next meal is going to come ; the death of Anwar-Al Awlaki may be an event without any immediate consequence and in a far away land. But yet this particular event raises a fundamental set of questions which may yet turn out to be decisive in their significances over the long term.
First of all, groups like Al-Qaeda and people like Al-Qaeda do motivate and encourage their existing followers and potential recruits by posing fundamental questions with respect to ideology. The point that they want to make is that the United States is not unlike any hegemonic power and when push comes to shove she could be willing to transgress those very same rules that she preaches to the whole World. When President Obama signs the order to execute one of his own citizens without any course of law, he unwittingly follows in the footsteps of Gaddafi, Bashar Al-Asad, Mubarak, the likes of whom he has opposed because of their treatment of dissidents in their own country, thereby hollowing his own criticisms of those very same regimes. Next time when he decides to lecture the like of Bashar Al-Asad or the Bahraini monarch about the killing of innocent protesters they may throw the Al-Awlaki example back to him.
Secondly, to a West Asian audience in the revolutionary mood and looking for models and ideals to guide, this particular assassination just reduces the appeal of the American model one more notch. After all if the sole superpower which claims to be exceptional in nature and which preaches to the whole world about “rule of law”; goes down to the very level of those authoritarians whom the West Asian revolutionaries have been trying their best to throw to the dustbin of history then surely, then surely the revolutionary movements in the West Asia fighting for dignity and freedom in their own countries may decide to look elsewhere for guidance other than the American model which because of this assassination may not look like so exceptional at all from the regimes they have fighting against. The Turkish model or some other model may be something that they may find more attractive or suitable to work with.
Thirdly, and probably most importantly, this particular assassination shows the desperation of America. People like Al-Awlaki or Osama Bin Laden for that matter, throw ideological questions to the American superpower regarding the contradictions of American policies and practices. When America decides to suspend the rule of law and go down to the very same level of these terrorists whom she is in war with, she just not only fails to meet the ideological challenges head on, but she unknowingly makes those ideological counter-claims from the likes of Al-Awlaki of America being “arrogant” and “unprincipled” seemingly truthful. Already people may be concerned with questions like “would Obama have taken this decision had the terrorist been not an American with a West Asian background?” This is something American policymakers need to consider with much more careful deliberation and consideration. Otherwise they may win this battle on the ground of assassinating people like Al-Awlaki but they may lose the battle of ideas in the long run.
For most Americans struggling with worries about from where the next meal is going to come ; the death of Anwar-Al Awlaki may be an event without any immediate consequence and in a far away land. But yet this particular event raises a fundamental set of questions which may yet turn out to be decisive in their significances over the long term.
First of all, groups like Al-Qaeda and people like Al-Qaeda do motivate and encourage their existing followers and potential recruits by posing fundamental questions with respect to ideology. The point that they want to make is that the United States is not unlike any hegemonic power and when push comes to shove she could be willing to transgress those very same rules that she preaches to the whole World. When President Obama signs the order to execute one of his own citizens without any course of law, he unwittingly follows in the footsteps of Gaddafi, Bashar Al-Asad, Mubarak, the likes of whom he has opposed because of their treatment of dissidents in their own country, thereby hollowing his own criticisms of those very same regimes. Next time when he decides to lecture the like of Bashar Al-Asad or the Bahraini monarch about the killing of innocent protesters they may throw the Al-Awlaki example back to him.
Secondly, to a West Asian audience in the revolutionary mood and looking for models and ideals to guide, this particular assassination just reduces the appeal of the American model one more notch. After all if the sole superpower which claims to be exceptional in nature and which preaches to the whole world about “rule of law”; goes down to the very level of those authoritarians whom the West Asian revolutionaries have been trying their best to throw to the dustbin of history then surely, then surely the revolutionary movements in the West Asia fighting for dignity and freedom in their own countries may decide to look elsewhere for guidance other than the American model which because of this assassination may not look like so exceptional at all from the regimes they have fighting against. The Turkish model or some other model may be something that they may find more attractive or suitable to work with.
Thirdly, and probably most importantly, this particular assassination shows the desperation of America. People like Al-Awlaki or Osama Bin Laden for that matter, throw ideological questions to the American superpower regarding the contradictions of American policies and practices. When America decides to suspend the rule of law and go down to the very same level of these terrorists whom she is in war with, she just not only fails to meet the ideological challenges head on, but she unknowingly makes those ideological counter-claims from the likes of Al-Awlaki of America being “arrogant” and “unprincipled” seemingly truthful. Already people may be concerned with questions like “would Obama have taken this decision had the terrorist been not an American with a West Asian background?” This is something American policymakers need to consider with much more careful deliberation and consideration. Otherwise they may win this battle on the ground of assassinating people like Al-Awlaki but they may lose the battle of ideas in the long run.
The history repeats itself and How (Published in the Hindu as on 23-rd October,2011)
Published in the Hindu as on 23-rd October,2011
as on http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/open-page/article2562907.ece
History has a fascinating way of playing with the human actors in ways that the same actors are unable to comprehend. Human beings play their roles in the great stage of history without knowing that their actions in the present can draw parallels to the long-forgotten actors who have left the same great stage many years sometimes many centuries back. The story of the former Libyan leader Gaddafi also in many ways seem to draw a parallel with a long-forgotten character from the region of North Africa; i.e. the King of the ancient Numidia in what is called modern day Algeria; Jugurtha.
Jugurtha who was the nephew of King Micipsa , the king of Numidians , a powerful ally of the Roman power in North Africa during the late Roman republican period. Jugurtha came to power by removing an existing monarchy, i.e. that of his uncle’s sons or his cousin brothers. Gaddafi came to power after leading a coup to replace King Idris , the British-supported king who was the head of the monarchy that ruled Libya since the end of the Second World War.
Both Jugurtha and Gaddafi started their carriers as military leaders; i.e. Jugurtha started his carrier as a trusted lieutenant of the famous Roman general Sipio Africanus in his African campaigns and of course Gaddafi was a military officer i.e. colonel when he led the palace coup that ended the rule of King Idris.
Another interesting commonality between Jugurtha and Gaddafi is how both used their wealth to manipulate their Western counterparts. Both sensed that money is something that can easily role heads and trump other loyalties in the Western and particularly Romano-Italian political circles. Now days we hear many interesting tales of friendship between the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Barlusconi and Gaddafi which includes among other things lucrative deals for Libyan oil by Italian companies. Jugurtha also found out how often Roman statesmen fail to their desires and ambitions when offered with a sufficient amount of fortunee. He famously described Rome as "urbem venalem et mature perituram, si emptorem invenerit" ("a city for sale and doomed to quick destruction, if it should find a buyer,") Indeed he is said to have purchased the friendship of many Roman generals and senators who came to end his regime with the allure of money.
Both the men had also shown the audacity to take on the superpower of the day. In case of Jugurtha it was the provocation of killing the Roman Italians while attacking the city where his brother was hiding that earned him the enmity of the Roman power and in the case of Gaddafi it was his supporting of groups like the Irish Republican Army and the Palestinian Liberation Organization that earned him the anger of the modern superpower i.e. United States.
The method taken by the superpower of the day to dispose the challenges of Jugurtha then and Gaddafi now has also parallels in between them. In case of Jugurtha , the famous Roman general Sulla who was given the task of removing the threat of Jugurtha once and for all , decided to form alliance with some of the neighbors of Jugurtha whereas in case of Gaddafi it was some of his own countrymen (called as “rebels” by the mainstream International media) who were co-opted by the current superpower and their Western allies for bringing an end to the reign of the man whom the West has called “the mad dog of the Middle East” for a long time.
The end of Gaddafi is much less humilitaing than Jugurtha. Jugurtha was taken to Rome as a prisoner in chains and was paraded before the crowds before being thrown into the dungeon of Rome to rot. When Gaddafi received the last bullet in Sirte , he was actually spared the abomination of being taken to the Hague in chains and rot in his cell towards an uneventful death.
The post-Jugurtha scene is also quite interesting. The ambitious general Sulla who brought an end to the reign of Jugurtha that was troublesome to the eyes of the Roman power decided to fight his boss Marius who was given the main command of removing Jugurtha. Sulla ended Jugurtha;s reign thereby ending an embarrassment for the Roman ruling elite but it was his boss Marius who got all the credits. Sulla was aghast at this with his own boss and this was the beginning of a rivalry between these two men which would ultimately strike a blow at the very core of the Roman republic. Some years later when the time came for the Roman senate awarding the supreme military command to an worthy man; the candidates were only two i.e. Sulla and Marius, the senate first chose Sulla but when Sulla had left with his legions to fight in the East the same body decided to award the overall military command to Marius thanks to the latter’s intrigues with the senate. This led Sulla to turn his legions back on Rome and thus was the beginning of the first Roman civil war and a chain of events which would later go on to end the Roman republic and would lead to the beginning of the Roman empire. Sulla’s example would later lead to names like Pompeii, Ceasre and Augustus declaring themselves as the sole centre of power in Rome.
Until now the stories of Jugurtha and Gaddafi have many things in parallel but whether the aftermath of the two stories will also have some sort of commonality or not it will be really interesting to observe. After all as I mentioned in the beginning, History has a wonderful way of making itself repeat in many ways that we can not comprehend. Let us think about this scenario. A look at the current situation of the American republic leads us to draw a straight line between the last days of the Roman Republic and the current situation in the modern American republic. In the situation of Rome during its last days, the existing institutions of power like Senate were beginning to get irrelevant since instead of exercising their independent authority they tended to follow whatever the richest and most powerful of the elites had to say. The election of Marius over Sulla’s prior election for the same post is a case in point. This particular irrelevance of the institutions of Rome would later go on to encourage ambitious and powerful men to first challenge these institutions and then make them subservient to their wishes. This would go on to the end of the Roman republic and the beginning of the dominance of a single leader in Rome i.e. the Emperor.
The current situation in the USA also has quite a few similarities with the late Roman republic. Since 9/11, the legislative institutions in the USA; the Senate and the Congress have largely transferred a lot of emergency powers at the hands of the executive i.e. the presidency. These emergency powers allow the current American president to order the assassination of American citizens on far away lands without a legal trial (as we have seen it in the case of President Obama ordering the assassination of US citizen Anwar Al-Awlaki in Yemen for allegedly being a terrorist) as well as keeping the stringent laws of surveillance into place. The current political situation also tells us that the two main political parties in the USA instead of following any independent positions of their own follow the guidelines as given by their powerful lobbies who help these American politicians to get elected in the first place with the contribution of their monetary as well as other support (as observed in the bipartisan support the Israeli leaders enjoy in Washington.) The overall political scene gives a picture of gradual decline and irrelevancy of the American legislative institutions. They do not seem to comprehend the economic or political problems faced by their nation and thereby unwilling to contribute to the solution for these problems. Now imagine what will happen if an American general in an emergency situation like a foreign war or a terrorist attack on American soil decides to declare these legislative organizations as worthless and declares himself the supreme ruler aka Sulla.
Does it seem too far fetched? But did I not tell you my readers that History tends to play the fascinating game that very few of us can comprehend.
as on http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/open-page/article2562907.ece
History has a fascinating way of playing with the human actors in ways that the same actors are unable to comprehend. Human beings play their roles in the great stage of history without knowing that their actions in the present can draw parallels to the long-forgotten actors who have left the same great stage many years sometimes many centuries back. The story of the former Libyan leader Gaddafi also in many ways seem to draw a parallel with a long-forgotten character from the region of North Africa; i.e. the King of the ancient Numidia in what is called modern day Algeria; Jugurtha.
Jugurtha who was the nephew of King Micipsa , the king of Numidians , a powerful ally of the Roman power in North Africa during the late Roman republican period. Jugurtha came to power by removing an existing monarchy, i.e. that of his uncle’s sons or his cousin brothers. Gaddafi came to power after leading a coup to replace King Idris , the British-supported king who was the head of the monarchy that ruled Libya since the end of the Second World War.
Both Jugurtha and Gaddafi started their carriers as military leaders; i.e. Jugurtha started his carrier as a trusted lieutenant of the famous Roman general Sipio Africanus in his African campaigns and of course Gaddafi was a military officer i.e. colonel when he led the palace coup that ended the rule of King Idris.
Another interesting commonality between Jugurtha and Gaddafi is how both used their wealth to manipulate their Western counterparts. Both sensed that money is something that can easily role heads and trump other loyalties in the Western and particularly Romano-Italian political circles. Now days we hear many interesting tales of friendship between the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Barlusconi and Gaddafi which includes among other things lucrative deals for Libyan oil by Italian companies. Jugurtha also found out how often Roman statesmen fail to their desires and ambitions when offered with a sufficient amount of fortunee. He famously described Rome as "urbem venalem et mature perituram, si emptorem invenerit" ("a city for sale and doomed to quick destruction, if it should find a buyer,") Indeed he is said to have purchased the friendship of many Roman generals and senators who came to end his regime with the allure of money.
Both the men had also shown the audacity to take on the superpower of the day. In case of Jugurtha it was the provocation of killing the Roman Italians while attacking the city where his brother was hiding that earned him the enmity of the Roman power and in the case of Gaddafi it was his supporting of groups like the Irish Republican Army and the Palestinian Liberation Organization that earned him the anger of the modern superpower i.e. United States.
The method taken by the superpower of the day to dispose the challenges of Jugurtha then and Gaddafi now has also parallels in between them. In case of Jugurtha , the famous Roman general Sulla who was given the task of removing the threat of Jugurtha once and for all , decided to form alliance with some of the neighbors of Jugurtha whereas in case of Gaddafi it was some of his own countrymen (called as “rebels” by the mainstream International media) who were co-opted by the current superpower and their Western allies for bringing an end to the reign of the man whom the West has called “the mad dog of the Middle East” for a long time.
The end of Gaddafi is much less humilitaing than Jugurtha. Jugurtha was taken to Rome as a prisoner in chains and was paraded before the crowds before being thrown into the dungeon of Rome to rot. When Gaddafi received the last bullet in Sirte , he was actually spared the abomination of being taken to the Hague in chains and rot in his cell towards an uneventful death.
The post-Jugurtha scene is also quite interesting. The ambitious general Sulla who brought an end to the reign of Jugurtha that was troublesome to the eyes of the Roman power decided to fight his boss Marius who was given the main command of removing Jugurtha. Sulla ended Jugurtha;s reign thereby ending an embarrassment for the Roman ruling elite but it was his boss Marius who got all the credits. Sulla was aghast at this with his own boss and this was the beginning of a rivalry between these two men which would ultimately strike a blow at the very core of the Roman republic. Some years later when the time came for the Roman senate awarding the supreme military command to an worthy man; the candidates were only two i.e. Sulla and Marius, the senate first chose Sulla but when Sulla had left with his legions to fight in the East the same body decided to award the overall military command to Marius thanks to the latter’s intrigues with the senate. This led Sulla to turn his legions back on Rome and thus was the beginning of the first Roman civil war and a chain of events which would later go on to end the Roman republic and would lead to the beginning of the Roman empire. Sulla’s example would later lead to names like Pompeii, Ceasre and Augustus declaring themselves as the sole centre of power in Rome.
Until now the stories of Jugurtha and Gaddafi have many things in parallel but whether the aftermath of the two stories will also have some sort of commonality or not it will be really interesting to observe. After all as I mentioned in the beginning, History has a wonderful way of making itself repeat in many ways that we can not comprehend. Let us think about this scenario. A look at the current situation of the American republic leads us to draw a straight line between the last days of the Roman Republic and the current situation in the modern American republic. In the situation of Rome during its last days, the existing institutions of power like Senate were beginning to get irrelevant since instead of exercising their independent authority they tended to follow whatever the richest and most powerful of the elites had to say. The election of Marius over Sulla’s prior election for the same post is a case in point. This particular irrelevance of the institutions of Rome would later go on to encourage ambitious and powerful men to first challenge these institutions and then make them subservient to their wishes. This would go on to the end of the Roman republic and the beginning of the dominance of a single leader in Rome i.e. the Emperor.
The current situation in the USA also has quite a few similarities with the late Roman republic. Since 9/11, the legislative institutions in the USA; the Senate and the Congress have largely transferred a lot of emergency powers at the hands of the executive i.e. the presidency. These emergency powers allow the current American president to order the assassination of American citizens on far away lands without a legal trial (as we have seen it in the case of President Obama ordering the assassination of US citizen Anwar Al-Awlaki in Yemen for allegedly being a terrorist) as well as keeping the stringent laws of surveillance into place. The current political situation also tells us that the two main political parties in the USA instead of following any independent positions of their own follow the guidelines as given by their powerful lobbies who help these American politicians to get elected in the first place with the contribution of their monetary as well as other support (as observed in the bipartisan support the Israeli leaders enjoy in Washington.) The overall political scene gives a picture of gradual decline and irrelevancy of the American legislative institutions. They do not seem to comprehend the economic or political problems faced by their nation and thereby unwilling to contribute to the solution for these problems. Now imagine what will happen if an American general in an emergency situation like a foreign war or a terrorist attack on American soil decides to declare these legislative organizations as worthless and declares himself the supreme ruler aka Sulla.
Does it seem too far fetched? But did I not tell you my readers that History tends to play the fascinating game that very few of us can comprehend.
The monster of hatred has strucked and it will strike again
Watching the horrors at the Oslo on the last Friday two factors can be analyzed about as behind this carnage. The first is the sinister role played by the propagandist websites and their influence over the minds over some of the young men in the Western countries. Ever since 9/11, there has been a steady rise in the hate-propagating websites in the West and the United States in particular. Websites such as JIhadwatch by Robert Spencer or Atlas Shrugs by Pamela Geller or even individual blogs like the one by Fjordman or “The gates of Viena” have been fairly popular and influential in promoting views of intolerance and bigotry among sections of Western youth. The main themes of these publications are that the West is involved in an existential struggle with Islam and the Muslim communities living in Europe are at worst fifth columnists in the Islam-West struggle and at best unwilling to assimilate into the norms of their host cultures. Another familiar pattern in these publications is in their belief that the “liberal left” which in many cases transpires to be the established elites in many of these Western societies are involved in a conspiracy with the Muslims to convert their societies into “Eurabias”. Indeed the self-admitted perpetrator of the carnage Anders Behring Breivik widely cited JIhadWatch founder Robert Spencer’s ideas in his manifesto “2083 – A European Declaration of Independence” as his inspiration. Now one of the main reasons that these publications have been able to win so many converts among the Western youth is because of the Internet. In the pre-Internet age, it would have been very difficult for these hate-propagating websites to get their ideas published by any descent publication let alone winning converts across the Atlantic in faraway Norway. Indeed this is one of the unfortunate aspects of the Internet that it allows people with irrational and biased ideas to bring those in the mainstream for affecting impressionable minds.
Talking about impressionable minds, it was in interesting to note that the self-admitted perpetrator decided to target the youth of his country’s ruling establishment. This brings us to the second main factor behind the carnage which is alienation between the ruling establishments in many of the Western countries like Norway and some sections of their youth population.
Talking about impressionable minds, it was in interesting to note that the self-admitted perpetrator decided to target the youth of his country’s ruling establishment. This brings us to the second main factor behind the carnage which is alienation between the ruling establishments in many of the Western countries like Norway and some sections of their youth population.
The rejection
The impact of small, obscure events in History sometimes leave a lot of impact with them that very few among us can either understand at the time or long afterwards. Sometimes even very small and seemingly without any particular significance can have big impacts upon the turn of events in history.
Sometimes even a very small and trivial thing like say a failed meeting can affect the history in a big way.
The scene is in the small desert town of Yaathrib in Arabia around 640 AD. There is a meeting going on in one of the small houses in the town. A middle-aged Arab was meeting with some of the residents of the town.
The man’s voice was measured and confident. He never spoke a word in hurry but always spoke softly and with a tone that others found soft but convinced about his views. His eyes radiated with energy and a sense of calmness that some people in the area thought reflected the way Prophets would look. He never hurried in his tone or in his gesture while presenting his viewpoint but always found enough time to organize his words in way that others did not need to think to understand his viewpoint. In short he was a man whom everybody in the town looked for guidance when in trouble and he knew how to shoulder that responsibility.
Talking with the man was a group of bearded men who looked confused and sometimes bitterly disappointed. Some of them hushed among themselves “oh by the name of Abraham, how can a man from the tribe of Ishmael talk about the same way the prophets did“. Some of the eyes of the men rolled around in disbelief “how could this man speak truth the same way our holy books say the Prophets spoke truth in their times”.
The man in question looked on at his bearded counterparts and he continued to assert his case. He was introducing himself as the last messenger of God and was constantly asking the rest of the men in room to accept him as such. But most importantly his voice was sure and confident when he talked about his grand plan. He wanted to create a unified community of those who worship the God of Abraham in the city and then propagate the same idea all over the World. He wanted the rest of the men in the room to accept his plan and help him implementing it. His eyes were beaming with great expectations and hope as he spoke.
The other men in the room started to look increasingly concerned. Some of them started to open their holy books and scurry through chapters, it seemed that they were not happy with what they themselves were thinking and just needed the holy book to support their contention.
The man increasingly understood the combative nature of the debate. His eyes which were shining brightly with hope of a genius who has just performed his masterpiece, now suddenly began to become sober with sudden realization that his ideas might not have appealed to his audience the way he would have believed in the beginning. Suddenly one of the bearded men looked at the man and said with a voice which seemed to have been coming from a long way away, “By the name of the God of Abraham, we know you are the prophet, by the God of Abraham, we also know we are not going to acknowledge your prophet hood because if we accept today that prophet hood can be bestowed upon a man from the children of Ishmael , then we will lose the status of being the only chosen people of the God of Abraham”. The man after hearing all these words, looked at those who had rejected him, his demeanor did not change, the colors and lines in his face did not darken and the glow that was radiating from his face continued to shine as he spoke with the same confident and unrushed voice which this time had also added a touch of sobriety to itself. The man said “I know I have been bestowed Prophet Hood by the God of Abraham, it is now my duty to spread his message throughout the World, even if you reject me today.”
“I know I am the last of the messengers that the God of Abraham has sent to the World. The angels of the very same God have told me so. And they also told me that you will never accept the truth. But irrespective of what you people say, I will continue to spread the message that has been bestowed upon me by the God of Abraham till eternity and no one can stop me from doing that.” He left the room as he finished his words.
So this was the story of the most significant rejection of History. This was the story that could probably have changed the World had the turn of events have resulted in an acceptance and not rejection. But ultimately it was the rejection and prejudice that won the day. The consequences that started from that rejection is there for all of us to see even after all these centuries have passed since that rejection took place.
Sometimes even a very small and trivial thing like say a failed meeting can affect the history in a big way.
The scene is in the small desert town of Yaathrib in Arabia around 640 AD. There is a meeting going on in one of the small houses in the town. A middle-aged Arab was meeting with some of the residents of the town.
The man’s voice was measured and confident. He never spoke a word in hurry but always spoke softly and with a tone that others found soft but convinced about his views. His eyes radiated with energy and a sense of calmness that some people in the area thought reflected the way Prophets would look. He never hurried in his tone or in his gesture while presenting his viewpoint but always found enough time to organize his words in way that others did not need to think to understand his viewpoint. In short he was a man whom everybody in the town looked for guidance when in trouble and he knew how to shoulder that responsibility.
Talking with the man was a group of bearded men who looked confused and sometimes bitterly disappointed. Some of them hushed among themselves “oh by the name of Abraham, how can a man from the tribe of Ishmael talk about the same way the prophets did“. Some of the eyes of the men rolled around in disbelief “how could this man speak truth the same way our holy books say the Prophets spoke truth in their times”.
The man in question looked on at his bearded counterparts and he continued to assert his case. He was introducing himself as the last messenger of God and was constantly asking the rest of the men in room to accept him as such. But most importantly his voice was sure and confident when he talked about his grand plan. He wanted to create a unified community of those who worship the God of Abraham in the city and then propagate the same idea all over the World. He wanted the rest of the men in the room to accept his plan and help him implementing it. His eyes were beaming with great expectations and hope as he spoke.
The other men in the room started to look increasingly concerned. Some of them started to open their holy books and scurry through chapters, it seemed that they were not happy with what they themselves were thinking and just needed the holy book to support their contention.
The man increasingly understood the combative nature of the debate. His eyes which were shining brightly with hope of a genius who has just performed his masterpiece, now suddenly began to become sober with sudden realization that his ideas might not have appealed to his audience the way he would have believed in the beginning. Suddenly one of the bearded men looked at the man and said with a voice which seemed to have been coming from a long way away, “By the name of the God of Abraham, we know you are the prophet, by the God of Abraham, we also know we are not going to acknowledge your prophet hood because if we accept today that prophet hood can be bestowed upon a man from the children of Ishmael , then we will lose the status of being the only chosen people of the God of Abraham”. The man after hearing all these words, looked at those who had rejected him, his demeanor did not change, the colors and lines in his face did not darken and the glow that was radiating from his face continued to shine as he spoke with the same confident and unrushed voice which this time had also added a touch of sobriety to itself. The man said “I know I have been bestowed Prophet Hood by the God of Abraham, it is now my duty to spread his message throughout the World, even if you reject me today.”
“I know I am the last of the messengers that the God of Abraham has sent to the World. The angels of the very same God have told me so. And they also told me that you will never accept the truth. But irrespective of what you people say, I will continue to spread the message that has been bestowed upon me by the God of Abraham till eternity and no one can stop me from doing that.” He left the room as he finished his words.
So this was the story of the most significant rejection of History. This was the story that could probably have changed the World had the turn of events have resulted in an acceptance and not rejection. But ultimately it was the rejection and prejudice that won the day. The consequences that started from that rejection is there for all of us to see even after all these centuries have passed since that rejection took place.
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