www.dailytimes.com.pk Ishtiaq Ahmed It is quite possible that a nuclear war will break out in South Asia. If some people survive the massive devastation, perhaps then a lasting peace may emerge. Western Europe could extricate itself from the grip of pathological politics only after two world wars and the holocaust At dusk everyday the flag-lowering ceremony at the Wagah-Attari Border, situated between Lahore on the Pakistani side and Amritsar on the Indian side, is a perverse spectacle. The soldiers symbolically seal the border by ramming the iron-gates with a fierce bang. Such a gesture is undoubtedly meant to emphasise that an impassable barrier exists between the two countries and their peoples. There are always large crowds on both sides who watch this charade. They nervously clap and shout slogans and the more vulgar ones employ course Punjabi abuse and bodily gesticulations to manifestly loathe and denounce the other side. It is not uncommon to see foreigners present on both sides. A look of utter disbelief and wonderment can easily be discerned on their faces and some are visibly awe-stricken by the perversity and depravity of the scene. Perhaps similar public expressions of dislike and hatred can be witnessed at the border crossing between Israel and its Arab neighbours. It is doubtful if elsewhere such grotesque rituals are enacted on such a regular and steadfast basis. Before the partition of Punjab some people daily travelled by the early bus or train from either of these cities, did their job or business in the other, and returned. The distance between them is some 30 miles. Now for more than 55 years there has hardly been any contact between people of the two cities. It was not a problem for smugglers and terrorists to cross the border till recently. They could easily cross over to the other side, but now a barbed wire has been erected by India and such traffic has come down significantly. We need to ponder if such mutual repugnance and hostility is in the interest of these two neighbours. Both states have been raising their defence expenditures over time. Although China should worry the Indian defence planners more than Pakistan, most of India’s actual armed encounters and wars have taken place with the latter. Pakistan’s defence planning has always been based on the assumption that the main threat to its security comes from India. During 1948, India and Pakistan fought an undeclared small-scale war in Kashmir. The United Nations-based cease-fire came into operation in January 1949. A Line of Control (LoC) constitutes an unrecognised border between them. There is enough evidence to suggest that India did not give Pakistan its proper share of the common military assets inherited from the colonial state and generally adopted an unfriendly posture towards the latter, exacerbating its sense of weakness and vulnerability vis-à-vis the bigger and more powerful neighbour. Pakistan began already in 1948 to seek closer relations with the West, while India adopted a neutralist foreign policy posture. In the 1950s, India became an important player in the non-aligned movement while Pakistan sought membership in the western defence pacts of the Southeast Asian Treaty Organisation and Central Treaty Organisation. India cultivated closer ties with the Soviet Union in the 1960s; Pakistan reached an accommodation with the People’s Republic of China during the same period. In 1962, China inflicted a humiliating defeat on India in a border conflagration. India requested American military intervention, but was provided arms instead. Britain and France also rushed arms to India. The West in general increased its military and economic aid. During September 1965, India and Pakistan fought a major border war for 17 days over Kashmir. In December 1971 India and Pakistan fought their third war, when the Indian army intervened in behalf of the East Pakistani Bengalis fighting the Pakistani army. It resulted in a crushing military defeat for Pakistan and the loss of East Pakistan, which became the independent state of Bangladesh. In 1974 India exploded a nuclear device. In Pakistan Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto vowed that Pakistanis would acquire their own bomb even if it meant eating grass. During the 1980s and into the 1990s both states spent huge sums of money to brace their military capabilities. Both sides have provided military training and bases to secessionists on the other side. On May 11 and 13 1998 India detonated altogether five nuclear devices. Pakistan followed suit a few days later with its own series of six test explosions on 28 and 30 May. The most alarming aspect of this hostility is that large numbers of people on both sides were jubilant when their governments conducted the tests. Since then, the governments in the two countries have vastly expanded their expenditure on armaments, intensified cross-border terrorism, connived, some would say, patronised the ultra-nationalist extremists parties and movements in their own societies. In addition, they have fought a limited war at prohibitive heights in the Kargil region of Kashmir in May 1999, which many feared could end in a nuclear confrontation. After the terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament on December 13, 2001 both countries deployed hundreds of thousands of their soldiers along the international border and the LoC; only international mediation, and thanks mainly to the pressure from the USA and Britain, things did not get worse and thus no war broke out. How far the ruling elites and the hawks in the two establishments will pursue confrontational politics is difficult to say. The recent diplomatic row accompanied by expulsions is indicative of a continuing dangerous and hopeless situation. The leadership in both countries seems to believe that because both sides are armed with such weapons, no major war can take place between them. It has been noted that small-scale military showdowns along the Line of Control in Kashmir have increased, maybe as an alternative to major confrontation. It is quite possible that a nuclear war will break out in the region, perhaps accidentally. If some people survive the massive devastation it is likely to inflict, perhaps then an atmosphere conducive to building a lasting peace may finally emerge. Western Europe could extricate itself from the grip of pathological politics only after two world wars and the holocaust had demonstrated the utter futility of pursuing ethno-nationalism, colonialism and racism. Perhaps societies do not learn to forgo the path of war unless they are forced to pay a heavy price in blood for their lack of foresight. The only hope seems to be greater effort by Indian and Pakistani intellectuals to campaign and lobby for peace. The author is an associate professor of Political Science at Stockholm University. He is the author of two books

www.news8austin.com 2/15/2003 7:10 PM By: News 8 Austin Staff

The 14 Austin-Bergstrom International Airport employees that were arrested last month pled guilty to falsifying information on their job applications.

The workers were part of the 28 ABIA employees charged in a federal crackdown to tighten airport security.

None of the workers are terrorism suspects, but officials say they posed a security risk because their badges gave them access to restricted areas.

Of the 28 charged, 18 were arrested and 10 remain at large.

Four cases are awaiting adjudication.

All were living in the United States illegally. Officials say the 14 who pled guilty will be deported.

sf.indymedia.org by Kellia Ramares Saturday February 15, 2003 at 04:05 PM

tomorrow in SF: "You’ve got to tell them that their actions will have serious consequences, not in the afterlife, not in the next election, but soon. They know you are marching against the war. Don’t bother advertising that. Go with signs demanding impeachment."...

www.channelnewsasia.com First created : 16 February 2003 0815 hrs (SST) 0015 hrs (GMT) Last modified : 16 February 2003 0815 hrs (SST) 0015 hrs (GMT)

Authorities in Bahrain have broken up a terror ring of five people possibly linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

Those arrested are all Bahrainis; two of them were from the military.Advertisement They were allegedly planning terrorist attacks against US military interests in the Gulf state, which is the headquarters of the US Navy's Fifth Fleet.

"Security forces arrested a cell which was planning terrorist attacks after receiving information on their movement which targeted national interests in the kingdom and the lives of innocent nationals," said the official Bahrain News Agency (BNA), quoting a security official.

Officials say a significant cache of weapons and ammunition was seized during the arrests.

Authorities are trying to establish if the cell is linked to groups inside or outside Bahrain.

"Investigations have started with this terrorist group to find out if they belong to certain political organisations or if they were working alone," the security official said.

The arrests came amid heightened anti-American feeling in the Gulf ahead of a possible US-led attack on Iraq.

Security has been beefed up in Bahrain, where some 4,000 US troops are stationed aboard Fifth Fleet ships.

sf.indymedia.org by Kellia Ramares Saturday February 15, 2003 at 04:05 PM

tomorrow in SF: "You’ve got to tell them that their actions will have serious consequences, not in the afterlife, not in the next election, but soon. They know you are marching against the war. Don’t bother advertising that. Go with signs demanding impeachment."...

"Not in our Name" is Not Enough!

By Kellia Ramares (of KPFA news)

As you get ready for the latest round of marches and rallies, please consider the character of the people whose conduct you are protesting. These are ruthless usurpers, militaristic imperialists who have repeatedly shown that they don’t care what people think. Warmongers, fearmongers, and liars.

So Colin Powell gets caught citing a plagiarized report? Go to Orange alert (that buried the plagiarism story in a hurry) and start making New York and Washington D.C. look like armed camps. (Hey, where were all those armaments and planes on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001?)

Some countries in NATO and the U.N. Security Council not going along with the program? Come up with another "Osama bin Laden tape" and claim that it proves a "partnership" between bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, when the best it shows, even assuming it’s authentic, is that Osama is saying, "The enemy of my enemy is my friend…for now."

Are France and Germany not bowing to the browbeating of Secretary of War Donald Rumsfeld about them being "Old Europe" and France in particular being "a second-rate country?" Start saying there could be terrorist attacks as early as this week and people should by duct tape and plastic sheeting. (Duct and cover? or shall I say, "Duct tape, peanut butter and bottled water: The economic stimulus package for the rest of us).

And what if the informant whose story supposedly led to the Orange Alert couldn’t pass a lie detector test? Claim other sources. Gotta keep that Orange Alert! After all, it’s handy for judges to use to say, "Sorry, kiddies, it’s too dangerous to march by the U.N."

So please, don’t get the idea that any amount of yelling, "What do we want, Peace? When do we want it, NOW!" is going to matter to the Bush Cabal. No number of celebrities on the podium, and no number of singers, dancers, drummers and spoken word artists performing to show how diverse the movement is, is going to mean anything to these liars and warmongers. Certainly no amount of shouting, "Not in our name," is going to dissuade them from bombing Iraq. Go ahead, disclaim the war all you want. They don’t care. They’re not doing this for you. Sure, they’re using your tax dollars, they are using the bodies of you and your loved ones, but this war is not in your name really. This is their war, for their purposes. Your bodies and your money are just the tools. No one values the opinions of tools.

And please, politicians, (attn: Rep. Barbara Lee), no talk about voting them out in ’04 or taking back the Congress then. Have you ever really considered that there may not be an election in ’04? That a timely bioterror attack could make it too unsafe to hold an election?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not suggesting that you shouldn’t march. The more the better. But you’ve got to have a message that is going to mean something to warmongers. You’ve got to tell them that their actions will have serious consequences, not in the afterlife, not in the next election, but soon. They know you are marching against the war. Don’t bother advertising that. Go with signs demanding impeachment.

I completely endorse nonviolence. But it seems that somewhere along the line we forgot how to be militant while we are being nonviolent. My impression of the big January rally in San Francisco was that protesting is becoming another form of entertainment. As a friend of mine pointed out, "We march down empty streets [e.g. San Francisco’s Financial District on a weekend], into an empty plaza, where we talk to and sell food to each other."

Remember the fall of the Eastern bloc? Demonstrators didn’t fill the squares with signs full of cutesy slogans. They were there for one purpose, to get rid of their regimes. That was the unified message. Yes, regime change begins at home. How do we do that in this country? With impeachment. A threat to their careers might make the warmongers sit up and take notice.

Massive demands for impeachment would also send a message to the Congress that we expect them to have the backbone to do their constitutional duty and that we will support their efforts to do the correct thing. We need to convince Congress that it is politically necessary for them to impeach and political suicide for them not to.

Now what the warmongers will do in response to large demonstrations for impeachment, I can’t say. Given their ruthlessness, their answer to a massive impeachment drive may very well be another terrorist attack on our soil. Or it may be another unfortunate plane crash for an outspoken member of congress, which is why impeachment has to be initiated by a group of about 20 or 30 members, not one or two brave souls.

But certainly, namby-pamby calls for peace will be met with war. The best way to stop the war is to take the warmongers out of the positions from which they can start it. In our country, peaceful regime change between elections is accomplished by impeachment. Given how opposition from several countries has set their timetable waaaay back, an impeachment may be more than they can handle. It might help other nations that disagree with the warmongers' course of action the courage to stand up and be counted, which will give other members of Congress the courage to say, "Look, more and more of the international community is against this," and so forth.

Then after the marching, you can back up your calls for impeachment with other forms of political action: Write to the embassies of France, Germany, Belgium, Russia and China and express support for their efforts to achieve a peaceful solution to the crisis in Iraq. Boycott major corporations that have funded the Bush regime. Continue to demand a REAL investigation of the events of September 11, 2001. Have your city council pass a resolution calling for local police to not cooperate with the Feds in implementing the unconstitutional "Patriot Act." Lobby your Senators and Representatives not to pass the so-called Patriot II, that Ashcroft is planning, even if there is another terrorist attack.

And if there is another terrorist attack, anywhere in the world, tune out the corporate media, and start asking yourselves how the warmongers benefit from terror.

But put away the calls for peace and take to the streets demanding that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft and Powell be impeached. If we can’t stand up for our Constitution, we might as well sit back and watch the slaughter on television.