Hegemony or Survival

America's Quest for Global Dominance

Foreword
As part of my Advanced English course, I had to present a review on a book. I chose the best selling political work 'Hegemony or Survival' by the great American critic of the U S of A - the inimitable Noam Chomsky. Here's the 'hyphenated' text of my presentation to the class based on my comprehensive study of the book.

Caution: This text has Anti-American views!

Chomsky the man:
1928 - Prof of ling at MIT - Philad. - Jew - IWW - Libertarian socialist - Anarcho-syndicalism (Labour) - Bertrand Russel

Works:
Logical Struc of Ling Theory, On Lang, Syntactic Strucs, Failed States, Culture of Terrorism, Middle East, The Fateful Triangle, For Reasons of State

Iraq:
Terrorism? War on terror - Mideast and Lat. Am. - S. Africa - Mandela; Soviet - Afghan - Al Qaeda - Islamists - Support for Saddam, Marcos, Ceausescu, Suharto, Mobutu & Noriega; Human rights violtns; US support ends; Rumsfeld - "Saddam in pantheon of failed dictators"; Wolfowitz - praise for Marcos and Suharto; Now Uzbek Islam Karimov, Turkmen Niyazov, Algeria and Libya (Qaddafi).
Reagan-Bush - fear; economic policy; Grenada & Nicaragua drug war use to contain public; Operation Just Cause; Tax cut and military spending; Disregard of Geneva protocol; 'Double Veto'; WMD proliferation; Havana lessons; World criticism; Maintain 'credibility'; Oil and imperialism; Iraqis disregarded - humanitarian; Halliday and Sponeck; Sanctions - people vs Saddam; School bus analogy; Afghan suffering.
US wanted Iraqi junta; Indonesia & East Timor 1999; Old Europe (Rumsfeld) - accepted majority of public opinion - irrelevant; New Europe - 'Yes Sir'; Criticism of India - BJP; Aznar, Berlusconi, Blair; Turkey's defiance.
US dislike of true democracy esp. in Lat. America; Neo-liberal reforms; Puppet democracies - Iraq admn; Oil & 'Petridish' for new norms.

Dilemmas of Dominance:
East Europe - a Trojan horse; West Europe's welfare state - 'Successful defiance'; EU shouldn't be indep; Tripolarity; Post WWII economic imperialism; 'MNCs are the economic expression of political framework in postwar policy.

Mid-East:
'Stupendous source of strategic power'; Oil & energy; 'Veto' over Asia; Rise of NE Asia - China's rivalry; Axis of Evil vs Axis of Good; Prosperity returning to Asia.

Cauldron of Animosities:
Israel-Palestine; Nukes of Israel; Iraq war spillover; US-Turkey-Israel axis; Indian (BJP) relns withs US-Israel; British imperialism - farcical rule; 'Arab facade'; Military bases of US; Central Asia - 'Great Game'; Threat of 'radical nationalism' in 1958 - Indonesia (Sukarno), Egypt (Nasser) & Algerian indep war; 1967 - Israel's wars and atrocities; Iran's Shah; 1971- Sadat's peace plan; Yamit Jewish settlement; 1973 war - Camp David agrmt; Lebanon; PLO; US vetoes over Israel; 2002 - Saudi plan - recognition to Israel - blocked by US; Unviability of discont Palest. Gaza & West Bank; Camp David 2000 - Jewish settlements; Right to return, East Jerusalem, IDF excesses; 'Roadmap to Peace'; Sharon, EU efforts; US Double veto, Israel's violtn of Geneva; 2000 - Intifada, extremely violent conflict, comparison to Indo-China and British 1857, cycle of violence.

Terrorism & Justice:
Truisms - 1) Principle of Universality, 2) Actions wrt consequences.
Terrorism - 'Calculated use of violence/threat to attain polit/relgs/ideolgcl goals by intimidation/coercion/fear.
US counterinsurgency is terror - Weapon of powerful vs weak; UN 1987 - 'People forcibly deprived of right to self-determination, freedom & indep partclrly those under colonial/racist regimes/foreign occuptn vs terror; Eg. SA, Nicaragua, Cuba, Lebanon, Chechnya vs 9/11 - 'Soft targets'.
Israel, USA & Turkey - 'State Sponsors of Terrorism'; Eg. 2002 Palestinian crippled; 'Man of peace' & 'Man of vision'; US media role (filters) and 'disappearing' facts.
Way to reduce terror - stop participating in it! 'Just War' - humanitarian intervention in Afghan; Innocents killed, illegal, bad intentions, not last resort.
'Why shouldn't Haiti/Nicar. attack the US/UK?'
Oxford - 'Principle of Proportionality'; US role in Serbia/Srebrenica.

Causes of terror:
Economic stagnation & neo-liberal globalization, cultural isolation, Islamophobia and feeling of being victimized by the 'Crusader-Zionist' schemes, political instability & oil politics.

Aims of terror:
Drive away the infidels from Muslim lands & overthrow brutal/reprsv regimes.
US support to Saudi/ Egypt/ C. Asia/ Pakistan etc.
Moral hypocrisy & double standards; Thus Islamism grows; Moderates vs extremists.

Afterword:
He expresses concern over US-style imposed democracy ('Nominal sovereignty'), loss of economic sovereignty, destrcn of workers' rights & privatzn; Erosion of democratic culture & severe democ deficit in the US.

---Hegemony or Survival Ends---

Appreciations and Criticisms:

Over 500 references and notes given indicate the immense scholarship that has gone into this work. He make scientific and substantiated arguments like an advocate to his cause. Surprisingly though, the 'K' word is not there! Chomsky also uses sarcastic humor and moving examples to make his point.
But, many quotations and references are radically out-of-context! He doesn't hide his 'anti-semitic' feelings either in spite of being a Jew himself. Marked by unabated anti-Americanism, there is an over-emphasis on US bashing. The book is also intensely political and very slow-moving.
Nevertheless, the book on the whole is moving and stimulating indeed! No wonder then that the Venezuelan Hugo Chavez recommended it at the UN General Assembly! This book has significantly altered my outlook of the US, Israel-Palestine etc.

Recent Developments:

The rise of the Left in Latin America poses the latest 'threat' yet to Washington DC. Castro has been joined by Chavez, Morales (Bolivia), Ortega (Nicarag) and Correa (Ecuador) and a new alliance is shaping up - Bolivarian Alternative for Americas (ALBA).

I don't even have to mention what a disaster Iraq has become under the US occupation! Afghanistan is still very unstable ruled by a government whose writ doesn't extend much beyond Kabul.

Having burnt its fingers in Iraq, the US has now started to meddle rather indirectly in the affairs of the former Soviet states in C. Asia and E. Europe. It began with the 'Rose revolution' in Georgia (2003-4) which brought the pro-US/EU Sakaashvili to power. Then came the 'Orange revolution' in Ukraine (2004-5) which swept the pro-West-anti-Russia Yuschenko to power (It is another matter that the 'revolution' is now collapsing as the White House is probably not funding the regime!). Finally, Uncle Sam brought his 'Great Game' right to backyard of Russia and China - Central Asia with the Kyrgyz revolution in 2006. The failed uprising in Andijan in Uzbekistan has however taught a lesson to the US. It must be mentioned though that many of these former dictators were puppets in Moscow's hands, which is why Russia is increasingly wary of the West's involvement in C. Asia.
Then again, comes the US nuclear policy towards Iran vis-a-vis North Korea. Why should the West seek confrontation with the Islamic republic while it succumbed to the demands of the Communist dictatorship?
This brings us to the major strategic issue of the 21st century - the rise and rise of China! Washington and the West as a whole are increasingly worried about the PRC's economic, diplomatic and military might. Thus originated the policy of 'Encirclement'! Why else would US want closer and deeper military/strategic ties with India, China's arch-rival? India has been wise enough to avoid being clubbed with the US. It also seeks greater ties with Russia and China. It would indeed be interesting to see how power politics plays out with the rise of a penta-polar world order - the US, EU, Russia, China and India.

Ultimately, we have to reconcile to the fact that the US administration may well be the strongest force on Earth (At least for the near future) . But there is a force that is bigger - the American people, for it is they who decide which person gets the unenviable task of leading their great country.

Bike Blog

Back in August of 2006, my brother was getting his stuff ready to go to the US. He took away the laptop, the digicam and even the MP3 player. But one thing he couldn't take with him was his Pulsar! Hence I had no option but to sell my small moped and inherit this huge motorcycle. There was however a small problem with that, I didn't know to drive a geared bike! So he offered to teach me how to drive the bike. I was under the impression that it would be more or less as easy as driving a moped. But wrong I was! I would drive the bike inside the IIT campus but away from the eyes of security guards.
My bro sat at the rear seat and would instruct me on how to use the clutch, brake, accelerator and of course the shifting of the gears. I had never driven a geared vehicle before and was not used to this new system. Initially, it was indeed difficult to hold the clutch with the left hand and change the gears with the left foot simultaneously. As was the case with pressing the right-leg brake. But the most difficult of them all was the cliched 'Starting problem. Big problem!'
It took me nearly a week to just master the mechanism of putting the first gear and slowly releasing the clutch whilst accelerating slowly. The bike switched off many times due to sudden release of clutch and he used to lose patience often, yelling at me!
Ultimately, I did get a hold on the basics of it and started practicing in my neighborhood streets. I went about it systematically not least due to the influence of the single-cycle processor that I had to assemble in my computer lab! I was impressed with the systematic way of building the memory, the control, the register file and other parts to assemble into a processor. Inspired by that method, I practiced one aspect of biking every couple of days. One day it was about gear shifting. Another day, it was about clutch and braking. Then, I practiced turning and steering etc. Putting all things together, I used the wide bypass road at Velachery, albeit at night! Ultimately, within a few weeks I had learned to drive my pulsar very well indeed!

Of Memory and Mnemonics

Right from my early school days, I've used 'condensation' as an aid to mugging things up! It goes like this - I list down the points and form weird words using the first letters of each. Then comes the rote. Believe me, this is one of the most effective methods that I'd applied to do well is subjects like History, Civics and Biology!
Then I came across this term 'mnemonic'. It is an easy form of remembering an otherwise difficult thing. Everybody knows VIBGYOR - to remember the colors in the spectrum in proper order. But of course, a mnemonic needn't be an actual condensation as such. It can also be a statement or a song! Here's another famous one - 'My Very Educated Mother Just Showed Us Nine Planets', used in primary to help children remember the planets in order. As I went into higher standards, more high-funds mnemonics were employed apart from my usual condensation technique. Here are some of the more famous ones used in different subjects:

1. 'How I want a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics!' - The value of pi
2. 'In showing a painting to probably a critical or venomous lady, anger dominates. O take guard, or she raves and shouts!' - The value of e, where O stands for zero!
3. 'B B Roy of Great Britain has a Very Good Wife.' - Resistance color codes
4. 'All altruists gladly make gum in gallon tanks.' - Isomers of glucose
5. 'Scanti vikraman feconi cuzan' - A direct map of the first row transition metals!

Now these two are slightly more weird:

5. 'Mother saw father wearing the turban.' - To remember when 'Rahukalam' occurs on a day!
6. And finally my own silly line - 'Ah-am-en-aaya-ath-asya-ae' - This one helped me remember the grammar tables in Sanskrit!

What mnemonics did you use?

Writing about my writing

Though blogging has long been at the back of my mind, I'd always thought that it would be a serious waste of time, just like orkut! But now that I have started writing, I find that this hobby is very relaxing indeed. I type my thoughts not only to chill out but also to refurbish my English though I try in earnest not to be ostentatious or bombastic! Comedy apart, this new hobby also acts as a method to streamline my thinking and presentation. As my prof says, 'Writing is to thinking what alum is to murky water!'
Since I don't have the practice of writing diaries, I rely solely on my memory and my photos to recollect everything. Often this reflects on my writing and I tend to illustrate my lines with photos! Another major characteristic of my writings I think is my attention to unnecessary details. I do feel this might slightly overburden the reader but I can't help it, I love writing all of it! Keep reading folks and send in your criticisms and suggestions, compliments and comments!