Is the presence of the United States in the Middle East justified?

An American drone struck North Waziristan located on the Pak-Afghan border at dawn break. Somewhere in the killing fields of the Levant, an Iraqi suicide bomber blew himself up, killing fourteen. And that too before breakfast. Is it a bloodbath today? No, just another Sunday morning.

That is exactly how things are at this moment. These occurrences have become so common that we regard such incidents with a very vocal expression that is a cacophonic medley of abhorrence, disdain and anger. But then let us examine such incidences a bit more closely. Let us ask ourselves a question that is long overdue. Where did it all begin?

Now the Middle East has always been a hotbed of political turbulence. Trying to oversimplify this enormous labyrinth of political ideologies would be tantamount to insulting the intelligence of countless men who have gone before me. Men, whose eminence, charisma and power I cannot even hope to match in this life or the next. All I can do is offer my humble, and very normative (due to the nature of this piece) opinion on this issue.

I see this conflict as a sea which is calm with the pallor of death. And along sails this huge oil tanker, causing ripples in the water. Because this is one word that it all comes down to -oil. The oil must come through, and lives must be traded for it. The only thing I blame Europe for as far as this aspect of the war is concerned is,let’s see, developing the internal combustion engine in the first place. 

Now, I do recognize that all the belligerents in the present war are to blame, and some of the powers opposed to the United States even more so. But as a liberal, I feel that the NATO, as a responsible power has a responsibility to quit acting with such petulant childish anger at every small occurrence in the world. The world has already seen the inefficacy of such devices as sanctions that NATO employs. We have seen how the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions plan against Israel, however uncalled for, backfired. No amount of sanctions could deter Russia from invading Ukraine or Crimea. On the other side of the fence, the American war efforts in Vietnam and Afghanistan proved to be debacles that that cannot be repaired ever even by a generous application of the political antihistamine that is apologetics.

It is time for NATO to come out of its false supremacist ideologue that the world is Eurocentric, and that it must be involved in every little incident that goes on round the globe. They have to come to terms with the fact that they cannot do much if North Korea or Iran develops nuclear weapons. Or the Taliban starts massacring innocents in Afghanistan. They must allow ‘nature’, for lack of a better word, to take its course and carry out timely purges against such elements in the form of civil war.

Events in the contemporary world have conclusively proved that any interference may tip the balance of a war in the short run. But if you stay involved in the long run, or 'camp', such wars end up to be much more disastrous than they would have otherwise been. I can give you detailed analyses of such wars, but as I mentioned, this piece is intended to be normative in nature, and more importantly, short.

The bottom line is that the NATO must now realize that every country must go through certain stages of political significance, before it blossoms into a peace-loving and responsible world power. Sometimes this is attained in a matter of years, while sometimes it takes decades, even centuries to come about. Interference if it is at all required, must, therefore be limited to a point till which it is conducive to the political maturing of the country AS WELL AS popular aspiration. It must evaluate the opportunity cost of military expenditure over economic growth at every stage of the war, and should care more about the popular aspirations of the countries they have a presence in.

Vibhor Kashmira
Y13 Undergraduate, The LNMIIT

Being Her

In most men, here I don’t quantify how big, but there lies a chauvinist, which dictates his conscience how he is better of the two genders. It’s not a general implication that I am placing most men in this category but just an instinct I am drawing attention to.

It’s a male dominated society whose perceptions and strength have forced a view of womanhood to be nothing, but a curse. So many years of evolution, so many years of independence but this country still possess an age old “suppress women” psyche. Here when she puts a question mark on her security, they put an exclamation mark or rather a full stop on her liberty. On her liberty to clothe herself, to move around, I am surprised they let her breathe without restriction.

It is the woman who gives birth. She is the one responsible for the continuation of the species. Without her, the newborn cannot hope to survive. How easily is this fact overlooked nowadays? What she is capable of feeling, both emotionally and physically, can’t be understood by men. She is made strong enough to endure the most painful task of giving birth.

But she is still quoted as the weaker of the two genders, why? Because she sheds tears? Or basically, because she is in a position to feel something so profound that Mr. I-Never-Cry can’t?

In India, the glorifying personification of womanhood, the Goddesses, are worshipped but the significance in existence of women, demeaned. Why the double standards? The partiality done between a baby in pink and the one in blue is known to us all. Determination of the gender of the foetus is a crime here while in western world it’s a ritual to know. Throughout history, women have fought for their rights in different societies of the world. But in India we are still fighting.

Since ages fairy tales have been passed down which portray beauty of womanhood. It has always been our culture, human culture, to respect women. It’s just been forgotten today, deliberately or inadvertently is not an issue, that it needs to be imbibed into everyone’s heart and soul is.

Mihika Naik
Y14 Undergraduate, The LNMIIT