Monday, April 27, 2009
If I could do whatever I wanted....
.... this is what I would be doing for a living. There is fascinating new work in cracking the Indus valley language code. Scientists and linguists have been poking at this elephant like the proverbial blind men for almost a century now. With the exponential increase in computing power, we may soon be able to bludgeon this problem into submission. We could solve once and for all the mystery of the origins of the Indus valley civilization and prove or disprove the various theories such as aryan migration. We may soon see the Harappan equivalent of the Rosetta Stone. I just hope that popular culture in India comes up with something better than 'Hosetta Stone'. I am quite sick and tired of the Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood sequence.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Torture and a haircut
The other day, I was getting my hair cut by a particularly garrulous girl. I told her that I was just back from vacationing in India, she proceeded to ask me why women 'over there' wear 'those black things all over them'.. I explained to her that a majority of women in India dont wear purdah, and she was probably talking of the middle east.. To which she asked me where exactly India was..'isn't it next to Eye-raq or some such'. So from a selfish point of view, this is what most scares me about this whole torture episode.... I will explain shortly. First things first.
I am not able to let go of these recent disclosures on torture by the CIA without any comment. The images and the descriptions are too gruesome to even contemplate. While I wish all terrorists their comeuppance in jahannum, or naraka or wherever their misdeeds take them, I do believe that as a nation bound by the rule of law, the government should not be acquiescing in such brazen violation of its own constitution. I will certainly forgive the decisions taken by the US govt. in the first few months after the 9/11 attacks, when the whole country was in panic and another attack of much bigger proportions was widely expected. But the recently released memos indicate that the institutionalization of these procedures contined and even flourished many many years after that event, even after the procedures became public and provided recruits to AlQaeda. And for those who say that 'those m..f..ers deserved it', I would humbly point out that the notion of torture without trial presupposes guilt. If you made an error, you cannot go back and 'untorture' a person, just like you cannot 'unkill' him or her after a death sentence has been carried out.
Furthermore, I shudder when I think about my experience in the first paragraph in this context. The average American, sad to say, is still very ignorant about geopolitics, and certainly cannot distinguish between the significant difference between being Irani or Indian or Indonesian... I wonder what would happen if I am stopped in some airport by mistake and events take a wrong turn, based on some random American officer's judgement. Remember, there was no recourse to the law or the justice system for any of these people. I do not expect such shocking things to happen within the borders of the US, but I cannot be sure anymore.
Having said all this, let me also reiterate in the same breadth that very few nations of the world have the moral authority to lecture the United States on this issue. It is a fundamental and admirable trait in American system that, despite all its shortcomings, it has repeatedly displayed the capacity to self-correct. I maybe accused of naivete, but I sincerely believe that if John McCain had become president, he would have authorized a similar trajectory of disclosure, though perhaps much later in his presidency. As a veteran and a former PoW, he has a unique perspective and has always said that he does not condone torture.
It is a all too easy for other coutnries in the so-called western world to lecture the United States, but none of them have to deal with the size, scope and complexity of the threats facing the US. Those countries will get a right to voice their opinion right after they contribute substantially more soldiers to the Afghan effort... And with regard to the rest of the world, such as China, Russia or any of the Islamic coutnries, a not-so-gentle reminder about ' glass houses' is in order. The same goes for my own country, India, home of the 'encounter' and the 'extra-judicial treatment'.
Finally, this issue has somehow become a partisan debate in the American political scene, much like the Iraq war has been. We have to remember that members of Congress (atleast members of the Intelligence and other relevant committees) were aware of these practices, and chose to ignore, or even support them. While the previous administration and their justice department deserves most of the blame, a portion of it also goes to both the Republican and Democratic leaders in Congress. If we are going to look in the rearview mirror, let us atleast use an unblemished one. My vote ( I don't have one in this country by the way), is to let the truth come out by itelf in bits and pieces over a long period of time. Every such reminder of these past events will be like another drop of Chinese water torture for the collective conscience of the nation, and a reminder to never do it again.
I am not able to let go of these recent disclosures on torture by the CIA without any comment. The images and the descriptions are too gruesome to even contemplate. While I wish all terrorists their comeuppance in jahannum, or naraka or wherever their misdeeds take them, I do believe that as a nation bound by the rule of law, the government should not be acquiescing in such brazen violation of its own constitution. I will certainly forgive the decisions taken by the US govt. in the first few months after the 9/11 attacks, when the whole country was in panic and another attack of much bigger proportions was widely expected. But the recently released memos indicate that the institutionalization of these procedures contined and even flourished many many years after that event, even after the procedures became public and provided recruits to AlQaeda. And for those who say that 'those m..f..ers deserved it', I would humbly point out that the notion of torture without trial presupposes guilt. If you made an error, you cannot go back and 'untorture' a person, just like you cannot 'unkill' him or her after a death sentence has been carried out.
Furthermore, I shudder when I think about my experience in the first paragraph in this context. The average American, sad to say, is still very ignorant about geopolitics, and certainly cannot distinguish between the significant difference between being Irani or Indian or Indonesian... I wonder what would happen if I am stopped in some airport by mistake and events take a wrong turn, based on some random American officer's judgement. Remember, there was no recourse to the law or the justice system for any of these people. I do not expect such shocking things to happen within the borders of the US, but I cannot be sure anymore.
Having said all this, let me also reiterate in the same breadth that very few nations of the world have the moral authority to lecture the United States on this issue. It is a fundamental and admirable trait in American system that, despite all its shortcomings, it has repeatedly displayed the capacity to self-correct. I maybe accused of naivete, but I sincerely believe that if John McCain had become president, he would have authorized a similar trajectory of disclosure, though perhaps much later in his presidency. As a veteran and a former PoW, he has a unique perspective and has always said that he does not condone torture.
It is a all too easy for other coutnries in the so-called western world to lecture the United States, but none of them have to deal with the size, scope and complexity of the threats facing the US. Those countries will get a right to voice their opinion right after they contribute substantially more soldiers to the Afghan effort... And with regard to the rest of the world, such as China, Russia or any of the Islamic coutnries, a not-so-gentle reminder about ' glass houses' is in order. The same goes for my own country, India, home of the 'encounter' and the 'extra-judicial treatment'.
Finally, this issue has somehow become a partisan debate in the American political scene, much like the Iraq war has been. We have to remember that members of Congress (atleast members of the Intelligence and other relevant committees) were aware of these practices, and chose to ignore, or even support them. While the previous administration and their justice department deserves most of the blame, a portion of it also goes to both the Republican and Democratic leaders in Congress. If we are going to look in the rearview mirror, let us atleast use an unblemished one. My vote ( I don't have one in this country by the way), is to let the truth come out by itelf in bits and pieces over a long period of time. Every such reminder of these past events will be like another drop of Chinese water torture for the collective conscience of the nation, and a reminder to never do it again.
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