Gulf factor key to PM’s Iran vote decision (India says US has said we will invade Iran)

Calcutta Telegraph ^ | today | K.P. NAYAR

[Rodney King]

FYI. Given that the muslims hate India as well, and India is actually in the region, it would be nice if we could get India into a war with the muslims.

[voletti]

India's home to some 140 mill mussies. A war with mussies will mean an eventual civil war within india that'll make the partition look like a walk in the park.

As an Indophile, I dont want that.

[steel_resolve]

I read on FR earlier that Muslims hate Hindus even more than Christians or Jews. BTW, that post made me laugh. That would be pretty kool if they started a war with the muslim slime. A billion Indians versus a couple hundred million muslims? No contest...

[muawiyah]

Less than a billion Hindus versus more than a billion Moslems ~ keep the numbers straight here!

[RightWhale]

the US has plans to invade Iran before Bush’s term ends

Here ya go, Hillary, you did want to be President, didn't you?

[steel_resolve]

Are you sure that there are a billion mualims? I never heard their number that high

[Eric in the Ozarks]

There's at least that many working at the airport in Minneapolis.

[muawiyah]

Yup ~ more than a billion Moslems. Remember, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Bengla Desh, etc. ~ lots and lots of people there.

India is short a billion Hindus because they have, as another poster already noted, 140,000,000 Moslems themselves!

[Billthedrill]

Maybe in the world, but of India's population (1.08 billion) about 80% are Hindu - 800,000,000 - and about 12% are Moslem - 120,000,000. The bulk of the Moslem population went to Pakistan upon partition.

[Billthedrill]

Ah, ya beat me to it...

[muawiyah]

Hey, I'll give you an addition to Hinduism ~ Bali, and anywhere in the Caribbean that has Santeria.

Although Santeria is for long been considered a continuation of West African shamanism, a good look at it's "gods" and "spirits" reveals mysterious equivalences to popular Hindu cults.

Best explanation for this was the arrival of Hindus in the Americas in the 1700s. As we all recall from our World History course in 8th grade, the Brits conquered India in the early 1700s and immediately began transporting cheap Indian labor worldwide to all of the new British colonies. They brought their religion with them. In several countries in the Americas descendants of Indian immigrants dominate culture and government!

[fallujah-nuker]

"FYI. Given that the muslims hate India as well, and India is actually in the region, it would be nice if we could get India into a war with the muslims."

The British Empire became powerful by controlling India, unable to hold India she lacked the resources to maintain the rest of the empire. The US did not appreciate the British Empire until it was gone and the British pulled out from "east of Suez" in 1971.

The British were replaced with the "twin pillars" of Saudi Arabia and Iran, the latter pillar undermined by Jimmy Carter a scant eight years later. The Iran-Iraq War balanced the two main regional threats against each other but Saddam got greedy in 1990 and invaded Kuwait. After the Gulf War our strategy was "dual containment" of both Iraq and Iran. Now our strategy is to transform Iraq into a democracy.

Each new decade seems to bring a new Mideast strategy, and each new strategy seems to require more American resources to implement.

I reason that if the British were able control the region using India, should not India be able to do so on its own? India would be able to finance this using the wealth of the region, something we fail to do. I think our failure in this regard comes down to lack of will, the same lack of will epitomized by our definition of the enemy as terror, rather than radical Islam.

Sun Tzu wrote "Hence a wise general makes a point of foraging on the enemy. One cartload of the enemy's provisions is equivalent to twenty of one's own, and likewise a single picul of his provender is equivalent to twenty from one's own store."

I do not think India would be reticent about taking advantage of the oil wealth of the Persian Gulf to finance her campaign to control all between Suez and Sumatra. This would relieve us of a burden, and would also make her more of a match for China which would also serve our interests.

[neutronsgalore]

"I do not think India would be reticent about taking advantage of the oil wealth of the Persian Gulf to finance her campaign to control all between Suez and Sumatra. This would relieve us of a burden, and would also make her more of a match for China which would also serve our interests."

As well as giving India some blackmail capability over China since they get oil from Iran which would fall under Indian control.

That in turn could spark a full-scale war between the two countries, with the positive benefit of seeing all of the mercantilist free trader investments go up in flames.

[fallujah-nuker]

And they would all head to Uncle Sam for a bailout!

[neutronsgalore]

"And they would all head to Uncle Sam for a bailout!"

They would try, but with the resulting severe economic damage that the US would suffer due to it's stupidly excessive dependence upon both nations there wouldn't be enough money for it.

[fallujah-nuker]

I'm sure they'd be willing to loan us the money to bail themselves out, as long as we paid interest on the money.

[Mount Athos]

It is really sick to say it would be "nice" to start a war, maybe think about what you are saying please

[PokeyJoe]

You're right. It would be nice to win a war.

[humint]

"it would be nice if we could get India into a war with the muslims."

Rodney... where you been? Who are the Kashmir militants? Anyway... It's a GOOD POST! I particularly like this part: The EU-3 also assured India that IAEA director-general Mohamed El Baradei would continue to have the whiphand on the issue.

[MunnaP]

What exactly does 'India getting into war with Muslims' mean...???

India cannot and would not butcher her own 140 million muslims citizens...So what exactly would they do to get into a war with the Muslims... As it stands some 4 million Indian citizens are employed in the Gulf region and India make a lot of money from that region...What would India want to change that?

Even the Kashmir issue is highly localized...mostly limited to the Kashmir valley.....