Time We Understood America's Game

Sections of our media and elite take Western reports/judgements at face value and are ready to condemn the targets without understanding the deeper power linkages behind such actions, asserts Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).

In the current atmosphere of political confrontation in the country one has witnessed the flaunting of Western countries/media/NGO reports on our democracy, institutions, businesses and society at large, by a compromised/comprador elite.

Large sections of the Indian elite have still not outgrown the mental habit of accepting everything Western as the gospel truth.

Nearly a hundred years ago (October 1931) philosopher K C Bhattacharya in his seminal essay Swaraj In Ideas had drawn attention to this malady, when he said, 'In the field of politics, for example, we are only today beginning to realize that we have for long wrongly counted on principles that have application only to countries that are already free and already established and have not had sufficient perception of the dark think they call 'power' which is more real than any logic or political scholarship.'

Sections of our media and elite take Western reports/judgements at face value and are ready to condemn the targets without understanding the deeper power linkages behind such actions.

It is intended to give some specific examples to show the hollowness of these perceptions. I would only quote specific instances and leave the value judgement to the reader.

Ever since the end of the Cold War in the 1990s, the Western bloc has been on a political engineering spree.

Regimes that were close to the former Soviet Union or were neutral were the chosen targets.

Various 'coloured' revolutions took place in these countries including the Arab Spring in the Middle East.

The typical modus operandi was to deny election outcomes, doubt the fairness of institutions and unleash mob violence in the streets to overthrow the government.

This method of 'regime change' was successfully implemented in Bangladesh recently. The results of these efforts have been mixed, but by and large, these efforts resulted in bringing to power governments pliant to Western and American geopolitical interests.

Alongside the attempt to de-legitimise the electoral process, the judicial and regulatory systems in the target country are also targeted.

The British claimed to have given the gift of rule of law to India. The British indeed were fair when a dispute involved Indians.

But if a crime involved a British citizen, there was no justice. Anant Kanhere of Nashik shot dead District Collector Jackson when Jackson set free a Britisher who had killed an innocent farmer.

Closer to our times, a woman scientist of Pakistani origin, Aafia Siddiqui, was captured in Pakistan and kept in a military prison in Kabul.

In February 2010, she was found guilty of snatching a carbine from a guard, firing on an American soldier and sentenced to 86 years in prison.

Aafia at that time was so frail that she was unable to stand and yet this 'story' was sold to American judges who bought it hook line and sinker and sealed her fate.

These two illustrations have been given to show that the judicial system of the West is extremely selective and unabashedly serves the 'national interest' of the country and NOT justice when it deals with foreign entities.

This is of particular relevance in the present as the American State machinery including its judiciary is currently targeting an Indian multinational company, the Adani group.

The group has been accused of 'planning' to bribe Indian officials to obtain contracts.

Readers may have forgotten how in 1993, Enron's then chief executive Rebecca Mark openly boasted that Enron had spent $20 million to 'educate' Indian officials about the Enron project.

Enron later went bankrupt, but as anyone ever heard of any grand jury investigation of Enron in this matter.

The Adani group came on the American radar due to its acquisition of the strategic port of Haifa in Israel.

Recently as the US successfully installed its favourite, Muhammad Yunus in Bangladesh, the Adani group, acting possibly in concert with the Government of India, turned the screws on Bangladesh by stopping the supply of electricity over pending dues.

Even more worrying from the American point of view is the news that the Adani Group and the Israel based Elbit Systems won a major contract to supply Hermes 900 UAS (Unarmed Aircraft System) to a European customer. These will be manufactured in Hyderabad by Adani Defence.

I am reminded of what Henry Kissinger said post the 1971 defeat of Pakistan and the creation of Bangladesh. More than anything else, Kissinger was worried that the 1971 War showcased the defeat of American weapons.

The Indian foray into a lucrative arms market sounds a warning bell for the Americans as their entire economic wellbeing is currently dependent on the arms industry.

Is it any wonder that the Adani group is in American crosshairs?

It is very difficult to understand the hullabaloo raised by some Indians over the prime minister promoting Indian businesses on his foreign trips.

One has to just open an old newspaper to read how the US or French president lobbied for Boeing or Airbus respectively on their visit to India.

What is kosher for the US or France but a sin or worse when the Indian PM does it. It is time Indians realised that India has now reached a stage of investing globally to bring jobs and profits to the mother country.

I cannot but help but take one parting shot at our Anglophile elite. A year ago when the Ram Mandir was inaugurated in Ayodhya, many felt 'secularism' was threatened.

On December 7, 2024, when a rebuilt Notre Dame cathedral was opened, the entire French establishment and world leaders from Christian countries including US President-elect Donald J Trump were in attendance.

Did France become less 'secular' because of this?

It is time we free ourselves from mental slavery and regain Swaraj.

Disclosure: I have no financial or other interest in any Adani company.

Colonel Anil A Athale (retd) is a military historian whose earlier columns can be read here.

Feature Presentation: Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com