It's the terrorism, stupid; not India: US message to Pak

Courtesy : Times of India

The United States will institute benchmarks that Pakistan will have to meet, including scaling down its confrontational posture against India, if Islamabad is to earn the massive foreign aid Washington and its partners are lining up, Secretary of State

Hillary Clinton indicated on Thursday. ( Watch )

The benchmarks will include moving troops from its border with India to its insurgency stricken areas to fight its homegrown terrorism problem, Clinton suggested, following up on the broad US prescription and advice to Pakistan that its grave domestic situation, and not India

, constituted the biggest danger to its existence.

Clinton provided the assurances about benchmarks at the urging of some lawmakers, but said she would prefer they remain an executive decision rather than legislative so that the administration would not be paralyzed. Some of the benchmarks would be classified, but the administration would share them with Congress

.

"You know, on a simple measure, is the Pakistani military still amassing hundreds of thousands of troops on the Indian border, or have they begun to move those toward these insurgent areas?" Clinton explained at a Congressional hearing, citing the example of one such benchmark. "What kind of kinetic action are they taking? How much? Is there increasing up-tempo or not? Is it sporadic, so they start in and then they move back?"

"I agree with you completely that we need the internal benchmarks," she told an anxious lawmaker, adding the approach would be across the government. "The intelligence community will have certain measurements; the Defense Department will; we (the State Department) will look as well."

The Pakistani government — and some of its supporters like Senator John Kerry — has opposed legislative benchmarks, especially those which condition US aid to Pakistan ending its sponsorship of terrorism against India, saying they are humiliating. But lawmakers on the House side are against giving Pakistan a free ride given what they say is its history of double-dealing.

"I've been around this place 40 years. My experience with Pakistan during all that time is that it has always been Pakistan, which means it's a country of dealmakers, but they don't keep the deals," said Congressman David Obey. "I have absolutely no confidence in the ability of the existing Pakistani government to do one blessed thing."

Other members also complained about Pakistan's double-dealing – paying lip service to fighting terrorism while cutting deals with extremists. "How do we succeed in Pakistan if the Pakistanis themselves are either unwilling or incapable of making the tough choices and taking the tough action needed to confront the insurgency?" asked one Congressman.

Following up on President Obama's

assurance that there will be no blank checks for Pakistan, Secretary Clinton also re-iterated what has become a virtual mantra in Washington in recent weeks: Repeated advice to Pakistan that it is not India, but Islamabad's own home-grown terrorism that posed an existential threat to it.

In an indication that US aid to Pakistan will be contingent on its India policy, even if it is not incorporated into legislation, Clinton said US officials have been "spending countless hours in really painful, specific conversations," to convince Pakistan of the changed situation. Pakistan was slow to understand this, she suggested.

"Changing paradigms and mindsets is not easy," Clinton told anxious lawmakers, adding, "I want to underscore the feeling we get, which is that if you have been locked in a mortal contest with someone you think is your principal — in fact, only — real enemy, and all of a sudden circumstances change, it just takes some time."

Similar policy prescriptions and sentiments (It's not India, it's home-grown extremists) were expressed at a Harvard lecture earlier this week by General David Petraeus, chief of the US Central Command with oversight of Pakistan and the middle-east, indicating that US interlocutors are all reading from the same page.

"The existential threat" facing Pakistan "is internal extremists and not India," Petraeus said in the speech at the Kennedy School of Government, adding such an idea was "intellectually dislocating" for the institutions of Pakistan fostered on decades of projecting confrontation against India.

Over at the White House, spokesman Robert Gibbs said the Pakistan crisis was taking a lot of President Obama's time. Defense Secretary Robert Gates too chipped in, asking Islamabad to recognize the danger and take action.

On her part, Clinton told lawmakers there is a growing understanding of the changed circumstances within the Pakistani leadership.

"Now, there are no promises. They have to do it (act against extremists)," she warned.

Every 1 says time to change;yes it is time to change ourselves

The Ex-President of India DR. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam's Speech in Hyderabad .

Why is the media here so negative?
Why are we in India so embarrassed to recognize our own strengths, our
achievements? We are such a great nation. We have so many amazing
success stories but we refuse to acknowledge them. Why?
We are the first in milk production.
We are number one in Remote sensing satellites...
We are the second largest producer of wheat.
We are the second largest producer of rice.
Look at Dr. Sudarshan, he has transferred the tribal village into a
self-sustaining, self-driving unit. There are millions of such
achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad news and
failures and disasters.
I was in Tel Aviv once and I was reading the Israeli newspaper. It was
the day after a lot of attacks and bombardments and deaths had taken
place. The Hamas had struck. But the front page of the newspaper had
the picture of a Jewish gentleman who in five years had transformed
his desert into an orchid and a granary. It was this inspiring picture
that everyone woke up to. The gory details of killings, bombardments,
deaths, were inside in the newspaper, buried among other news.

In India we only read about death, sickness, terrorism, crime.. Why
are we so NEGATIVE? Another question: Why are we, as a nation so
obsessed with foreign things? We want foreign TVs, we want foreign
shirts. We want foreign technology.

Why this obsession with everything imported. Do we not realize that
self-respect comes with self-reliance? I was in Hyderabad giving this
lecture, when a 14 year old girl asked me for my autograph. I asked
her what her goal in life is. She replied: I want to live in a
developed India. For her, you and I will have to build this developed
India. You must proclaim. India is not an under-developed nation; it
is a highly developed nation.
Do you have 10 minutes? Allow me to come back with a vengeance.

Got 10 minutes for your country? If yes, then read; otherwise, choice is yours.
YOU say that our government is inefficient.
YOU say that our laws are too old.
YOU say that the municipality does not pick up the garbage.
YOU say that the phones don't work, the railways are a joke. The
airline is the worst in the world, mails never reach their
destination.
YOU say that our country has been fed to the dogs and is the absolute pits.

YOU say, say and say. What do YOU do about it?

Take a person on his way to Singapore. Give him a name - 'YOURS'. Give
him a face - 'YOURS'. YOU walk out of the airport and you are at your
International best. In Singapore you don't throw cigarette butts on
the roads or eat in the stores. YOU are as proud of their Underground
links as they are. You pay $5 (approx. Rs. 60) to drive through
Orchard Road (equivalent of Mahim Causeway or Pedder Road) between 5
PM and 8 PM. YOU come back to the parking lot to punch your parking
ticket if you have over stayed in a restaurant or a shopping mall
irrespective of your status identity. In Singapore you don't say
anything, DO YOU? YOU wouldn't dare to eat in public during Ramadan,
in Dubai . YOU would not dare to go out without your head covered in
Jeddah.
YOU would not dare to buy an employee of the telephone exchange in
London at 10 pounds (Rs.650) a month to, 'see to it that my STD and
ISD calls are billed to someone else. 'YOU would not dare to speed
beyond 55 mph (88 km/h) in Washington and then tell the traffic cop,
'Jaanta hai main kaun hoon (Do you know who I am?). I am so and so's
son. Take your two bucks and get lost.' YOU wouldn't chuck an empty
coconut shell anywhere other than the garbage pail on the beaches in
Australia and New Zealand.
Why don't YOU spit Paan on the streets of Tokyo? Why don't YOU use
examination jockeys or buy fake certificates in Boston??? We are still
talking of the same YOU. YOU who can respect and conform to a foreign
system in other countries but cannot in your own. You who will throw
papers and cigarettes on the road the moment you touch Indian ground.
If you can be an involved and appreciative citizen in an alien
country, why cannot you be the same here in India?

Once in an interview, the famous Ex-municipal commissioner of Bombay,
Mr. Tinaikar, had a point to make. 'Rich people's dogs are walked on
the streets to leave their affluent droppings all over the place,' he
said. 'And then the same people turn around to criticize and blame the
authorities for inefficiency and dirty pavements. What do they expect
the officers to do? Go down with a broom every time their dog feels
the pressure in his bowels?
In America every dog owner has to clean up after his pet has done the
job. Same in Japan.
Will the Indian citizen do that here?' He's right. We go to the polls
to choose a government and after that forfeit all responsibility.
We sit back wanting to be pampered and expect the government to do
everything for us whilst our contribution is totally negative. We
expect the government to clean up but we are not going to stop
chucking garbage all over the place nor are we going to stop to pick a
up a stray piece of paper and throw it in the bin. We expect the
railways to provide clean bathrooms but we are not going to learn the
proper use of bathrooms.
We want Indian Airlines and Air India to provide the best of food and
toiletries but we are not going to stop pilfering at the least
opportunity.
This applies even to the staff that is known not to pass on the service
to the public.

When it comes to burning social issues like those related to women,
dowry, girl child! and others, we make loud drawing room protestations
and continue to do the reverse at home. Our excuse? 'It's the whole
system which has to change, how will it matter if I alone forego my
sons' rights to a dowry.' So who's going to change the system?
What does a system consist of? Very conveniently for us it consists of
our neighbors, other households, other cities, other communities and
the government. But definitely not me and YOU. When it comes to us
actually making a positive contribution to the system we lock
ourselves along with our families into a safe cocoon and look into the
distance at countries far away and wait for a Mr. Clean to come along &
work miracles for us with a majestic sweep of his hand or we leave the
country and run away.
Like lazy cowards hounded by our fears we run to America to bask in
their glory and praise their system. When New York becomes insecure we
run to England. When England experiences unemployment, we take the
next flight out to the Gulf. When the Gulf is war struck, we demand to
be rescued and brought home by the Indian government. Everybody is out
to abuse and rape the country. Nobody thinks of feeding the system.
Our conscience is mortgaged to money.

Dear Indians, The article is highly thought inductive, calls for a
great deal of introspection and pricks one's conscience too.. I am
echoing J. F. Kennedy's words to his fellow Americans to relate to
Indians...

'ASK WHAT WE CAN DO FOR INDIA AND DO WHAT HAS TO BE DONE TO MAKE INDIA
WHAT AMERICA AND OTHER WESTERN COUNTRIES ARE TODAY'

Let's do what India needs from us.Let's change ourselves to change india