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East or West – India is the Best Sunday, Aug 26 2007
buddhism and China and columbus and diamonds and europe and european and greek and gurudev and hitxp and India and indian and indiana and indies and silk and spices and vasco da gama 11:41 pm
World War III – Potential Flash Points Monday, Jul 23 2007
America and China and europe and gurudev and hitxp and India and iran and israel and japan and korea and nuclear and pakistan and russia and terrorism and usa and USSR and war and world war 10:10 pm
One of my favorite quotes about wars is
“A war does not decide who is right, it only decides who is left” 
No sane person wants to see another world war, but at the same time it is ludicrous to say that there won’t be any wars in the future, unless and until the whole world starts following Buddhism!
The Scenario
The news we see everyday, the news we read everyday, the news we hear everyday is filled with how one country is pitted against the other, how one group wants to finish the other, ethnic violence, religious violence, racism, ideological violence, political violence and what not…
And enter Al Qaeda and Pakistan’s home grown breed of terrorists, kahani mein twist, a twist in the story…. Now its not just the political leadership of countries that can start a war, even terrorist groups can initiate one! The threat is not about sophisticated nuclear arsenals and delivery systems of US or Russia, but its more about dirty nukes in the hands of terrorists!
US and allies have waged a war on terror, Pakistan’s Musharraff is playing the game of running with the hare and hunting with the hounds, China is uneasy over Taiwan, Israel is watching Iran, Russia is irritated over UK, AlQaeda wants to wipe out the civilized world..
What are the possible flashpoints to trigger a third world war? Well, I am not a pessimist, but the triggers do very much exist in the world today. So as a member of a responsible(?) species with a duty towards its own species and more towards the planet, we have to identify all these triggers and not just TRY to put them off, but have to LITERALLY PUT THEM OFF..
The List
So here is the list, in the reverse order from the lowest to the highest probability of occurrence..
5. Musharraff overthrown by fundamental elements in Pakistan, a preemptive strike on Pakistani military facilities by India, An entry by China to assist Pakistan, US enters to support India, North Korea enters to support China, Japan enters to support India…..
4. US missile defense installations in Czech and Poland cause Russia to deploy ICBM missiles in its European borders, a misunderstood testing by the US systems in Poland or Czech is all that it takes to trigger a global escalation..
3. Taiwan declares Independence, China forcefully tries to annexe Taiwan, US strikes China, Russia enters the war, Japan enters the war, North Korea, South Korea….
2. Realizing the fear of acquisition of a nuclear weapon by Iran, Israel strikes Iranian nuclear facilities, Iran retaliates and the US enters into the equation…
1. A dirty nuke exploded by a terrorist group in any of the major western cities! Say US, and US reacts, and reacts strongly, on the root, the root as usual leads to Pakistan, enter China, India forced into the war, and then Russia, parallel ignition by Iran on the Israel….
The Solution
First of all, for heavens sake all countries should get rid of all their nuclear weapons. If not humans, at least other species should be allowed to survive on this planet after a world war.. All nuclear weapons should be disposed immediately and the process should be started in the order mentioned – USA, Russia, France, China, UK, India, Pakistan, Israel..
This ensures that even if there is a war, innocent people wont die, at least not in the number of millions. Let the wars not target any civilian locations. Nuclear fuel is meant to generate electrical power inside the nuclear reactors and let us stick to that use…
Fundamentalism should be wiped out of this planet, rather than trying to wipe out the terrorists.. All young kids all over the planet should be given proper civilized education and should be protected from being brainwashed by the fundamentalists..
It is a known fact that USA used fundamentalist terrorist elements against USSR during the cold war.. Pakistan is using them against India… This should not be allowed to continue any more…
Any regime supporting terrorist or fundamentalist elements should be thrown out and democratic institutions should be installed all over the globe. Every country’s fate should be decided by its own people and not by dictatorial regimes..
Having said all this, does it sound practical enough? Will US and other countries give up their nuclear arsenal? Can we prevent terrorist organizations from misguiding and recruiting youth?
Hope is a very beautiful and promising word, isn’t it?
Let us hope that the hope for a better future ultimately prevails..
Let us hope that the future generations on this planet will refer to the above mentioned list of flash points as, possible world war or nuclear flash points that once existed in this world, like the way how we today refer to the Cuban missile crisis as a possible nuclear flash point that once existed during the days of the cold war…
Quotes about India Thursday, May 31 2007
ancient and british and buddhism and China and chinese and einstein and europe and gurudev and hitxp and India and mark twain and quotes 6:47 pm
“We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made.”- Albert Einstein
“India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend and the great grand mother of tradition.” – American Writer and Humorist Mark Twain
“If there is one place on the face of earth where all dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India.” – French scholar Romain Rolland
“India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her border.” – Hu Shih (Former Chinese ambassador to USA, referring to the entry of Buddhism into China. Buddhism was born in ancient India).
So far as I am able to judge, nothing has been left undone, either by man or nature, to make India the most extraordinary country that the sun visits on his rounds. Nothing seems to have been forgotten, nothing overlooked.”- Mark Twain
“In India I found a race of mortals living upon the Earth. but not adhering to it. Inhabiting cities, but not being fixed to them, possessing everything but possessed by nothing.”- Apollonius Tyanaeus, Greek Thinker and Traveller 1st Century AD
“Bear in mind that the commerce of India is the commerce of the world and … he who can exclusively command it is the dictator of Europe.”- Peter the Great of Russia
“Many of the advances in the sciences that we consider today to have been made in Europe were in fact made in India centuries ago.” – Grant Duff, British Historian
“India was the motherland of our race and Sanskrit the mother of Europe’s languages. India was the mother of our philosophy, of much of our mathematics, of the ideals embodied in Christianity… of self-government and democracy. In many ways, Mother India is the mother of us all” – Will Durant, American Historian
“If I am asked which nation had been advanced in the ancient world in respect of education and culture then I would say it was – India” – Max Muller, German Indologist
“In religion, India is the only millionaire …. The One land that all men desire to see and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for all the shows of all the rest of the globe combined” – Mark Twain
“Indian cities are prosperous and stretch far and wide. There are many guest houses for travellers. There are hospitals providing free medical service for the poor. The viharas and temples are majestic. People are free to choose their occupations. There are no restrictions on the movement of the people. Government officials and soldiers are paid their salaries regularly. People are not addicted to drinks. They shun violence. The administration provided by the Gupta rulers is fair and just” – Chinese traveller Fa-Hien during the reign of Chandragupta II
“Indians have in general superior endowments in reading, writing and arithmetic than the common people of any nation in Europe.” – Warren Hastings
“It is very important to note that some 2,500 years ago at the least Pythagoras went from Samos to the Ganges to learn geometry…But he would certainly not have undertaken such a strange journey had the reputation of the Brahmins’ science not been long established in Europe…” -Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire, French Philosopher/Writer
