pioneer: amb. parthasarathy on iran's help for india

oct 6th

while amb. bhadrakumar pointed out an occasion on which iran helped india over kashmir, here amb. parthasarathy points out several other occasions on which it did not.

and that's perfectly acceptable. iran is not india's slave, after all. iran should do what is in its national interest. india should do what is in its national interest. where the interests coincide they should collaborate. otherwise they should oppose each other.

this is something india's second-rate journalists and ideologues do not understand. just because you accept, broadly, one position -- let's say, communism -- nowhere is it written that you have to accept it hook, line and sinker, 150%. you are allowed to pick and choose that which makes sense to you.

i wrote many years ago on rediff, in 'towards a neo-liberal manifesto', about this particular issue. although i am broadly and solidly right-wing, there are occasions on which i find leftists have a point, and i am happy to accept this. for instance, i have quoted noam chomsky approvingly because in that instance he was, in my opinion, correct. i have been yelled at by some idiots for daring to appropriate what chomsky said (on other occasions i have been yelled at by other idiots for daring to quote pink floyd. go figure!)

it is not true that right-wingers are always correct. in particular, american right-wingers have some very serious problems based on their complete religious idiocy. but if there are areas where allying with them helps india's national interest, i'd recommend doing so.

this is true of others too. for instance, i think there may be some value in being chummy with that new castro-clone, chavez of venezuela (he has a lot of oil and gas). so i'd say where it suits india's national interests, india should be chummy with him too.

the days of NAM are over, when india used to be a water-carrier and patsy (i said pansy before, a slip of the finger, i meant patsy) for NAM banana republics. some of india's dinosaurs do not realize this, but india is now a Major Power: the kind that NAM people want to non-align with :-) instead of there being the us and the soviet union as two poles, there are now three: the us, china and india. so NAM will have no learn to non-align with china and india as well, and indian dinosaurs will have to learn to non-align with NAM types. quite a painful change, but necessary.

so neither iran, nor the us, or anybody else, is india's permanent friend. they are all temporary allies in the pursuit of india's permanent interests.

those who don't understand this should read kautilya's arthasastra, a particularly well-articulated text. in my opinion, superior to the much-ballyhooed sun tzu and von clausewitz.

parthasarathy's article: http://www.dailypioneer.com/indexn12.asp?main_variable=EDITS&file_name=edit3%2Etxt&counter_img=3