President Donald Trump joined Israel in yet another war of choice in the Middle East last week. Polls conducted in the United States immediately after the start of the Iran war show that the majority of Americans do not support it. A YouGov snap poll fielded Saturday — the day of the strikes — found 34% of Americans approve of the U.S. attacks on Iran, with 44% disapproving and 22% unsure. A CNN poll done soon after found that 59% of Americans disapprove of the war.
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| 59% of Americans Disapprove of the Iran War. Source: CNN |
It appears that President Trump has caved in to pressure from the Israelis to go to war against Iran, a fact confirmed by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. In answer to a question, Rubio essentially admitted that Israel forced the US into war with Iran. 'There absolutely was an imminent threat,' Rubio said. 'And the imminent threat was that we knew that if Iran was attacked (by Israel), and we believed they would be attacked, that they would immediately come after us, and we were not going to sit there and absorb a blow before we responded.'
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| Majority of Americans Disapprove of Iran War. Source: YouGov |
Support for prior US wars in the Middle East such as the Iraq war started in the low-mid 70% range in the beginning. Trump is starting at half of that in his attack on Iran — lower than where the average American was in 2013. It's clear that Americans' support for wars in the Middle East has rapidly declined.
President Trump's MAGA base is particularly incensed by what they see as abandonment of the "America First" promise he made during his presidential campaign in 2024. Many of them now accuse him of pursuing "Israel First" policies at the expense of ordinary Americans.
"Absolutely disgusting and evil," Tucker Carlson said about the joint US-Israel attack in an interview with ABC News. "This is going to shuffle the deck in a profound way."
"The Trump admin actually asked in a poll how many casualties voters were willing to accept in a war with Iran??? How about ZERO you bunch of sick (expletive) liars. We voted for America First and ZERO wars," said former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, as she blasted the administration on US social media company X.
"We said ‘No More Foreign Wars, No More Regime Change!’ … Trump, (Vice President JD) Vance, basically the entire admin campaigned on it and promised to put America FIRST and Make America Great Again (MAGA)," she added.
Other MAGA figures joined the criticism, with podcaster Tim Pool and influencers Keith and Kevin Hodge writing, "President Trump has completely LIED to his voters, backstabbed our country and has disgraced his legacy beyond repair," reported TRT World.
One of the most effects of this war will most likely be on energy prices which have begun to spike already. Energy prices affect all other prices, fueling broader inflation. Rising prices will hurt the entire economy but their negative impact will particularly be felt by middle class households.
The average price for a gallon of regular gas is just shy of $3 right now, according to AAA, as reported by Marketplace. Tom Kloza, chief analyst at Gulf Oil, told Marketplace that “we’re gonna go in relatively short order to about $3.10 to $3.25,” he said. But if the conflict with Iran continues deeper into March and April, Kloza said prices might peak as high as $3.50 a gallon.
AIPAC, the powerful Israel lobby, is starting to lose its political power and influence in the United States. Several Congressional Democrats have recently refused campaign contributions from AIPAC, the powerful Israel lobby, according to media reports. “Democrats who once counted AIPAC among their top donors have in recent weeks refused to take the group’s donations”, says a New York Times story titled "Democrats Pull Away From AIPAC, Reflecting a Broader Shift". “AIPAC is becoming an increasingly toxic brand for some Democrats on Capitol Hill," it says. It cites the example of Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., the minority leader, who has long been endorsed by the hardline AIPAC, has now chosen to accept the support of J Street, the competing Israel lobby that advocates a two-state solution.
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| Results of Recent Poll of American Jews. Source: Washington Post |
A recent poll conducted by the Washington Post has found that "most (American) Jews (61%) say Israel is committing war crimes — and 39% say genocide — while often distinguishing between the country and its leadership". American Jews are particularly unhappy with the current right-wing government of Israel. 68% give negative marks to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s leadership of Israel, with 48% it “poor” — a 20-percentage-point jump from a Pew Research Center poll five years ago.
Mamdani's resounding win in New York City, a city that has the world's second largest Jewish population after Tel Aviv, is particularly significant. It sends a clear message to American politicians, particularly Democrats, that they don't have to bow to hardline AIPAC to win elections.
Although the rebellion against AIPAC is mainly among Democrats, there's also growing anger among Trump's "America First" base who see the Trump Administration's policies as "Israel First". Prominent among Republican critics of Trump's pro-Israel policies are Republican Representatives Thomas Massie and Marjorie Taylor Greene, talk show host Tucker Carlsen and former Trump advisor Steve Bannon.
Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of Anti-Defamation League, has blamed the shift in the US public opinion against Israel on popular social app TikTok. “We really have a TikTok problem, a Gen Z problem,” he said in a leaked audio recording. “The same brains that gave us Taglit, the same brains that gave us all of these amazing other innovations, need to put our energy towards this, like fast.”
TikTok is particularly popular among young people. It has carried viral short videos of the Gaza Genocide over the last two years. The pressure from the Israel lobby forced the sale of Chinese-owned TikTok to an American Zionist group led by Oracle's billionaire founder Larry Ellison. Ellison has given tens of millions of dollars to pro-Israel groups. He is reported to be among the six American Zionist billionaires supporting Israel's wartime economy.
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
South Asia Investor Review
Modi and Netanyahu: Two Sides of the Same Coin
Israel's Gaza Attack is Criminal, Not Defensive
Congressman Massie Exposes Israel Lobby's Bullying Tactics
American College Campuses Rise Up Against Israel's Genocidal War on Gaza
Israeli Settler Colonialism
Islamophobia Driving US Policy in the Middle East and South Asia?
Israeli Scholars Offer Insights into Zionist Psyche
Total, Extended Lockdown in Indian Occupied Kashmir
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PakAlumni: Pakistani Alumni Social Network
57 comments:
I believe Nethanyahu convinced Trump that elimination of the Ayatollah and other heads would cause a quick iranian surrender and Trump would have his quick in out war. Trump team lacked intelligence to understand what would be the result of killing an Ayatollah.
Netanyahu takes a gamble on American support for Israel with the war against Iran
https://www.wric.com/news/u-s-world/ap-netanyahu-takes-a-gamble-on-american-support-for-israel-with-the-war-against-iran/
“A large part of the American public will view it as the Israeli tail wagging the American dog and that it is dragging the United States to a war in the Middle East that isn’t theirs,” said Ofer Shelah, a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based think tank. The drop in public support that might unleash “will be very harmful for Israel in the medium and long term,” he said.
But, he added, in a nod to the Israeli leader’s political ambitions: “Netanyahu is not interested in the medium and long term.”
Vali Nasr
@vali_nasr
I told
@StevenErlanger
@nytimes
that Iran’s strategy is to expand the War, increase the cost, and outlast Trump. The war has become a test of wills and stamina. Iran is facing qualitatively superior militaries, so the strategy is to test their will by expanding the battlefield, complicating the war and increasing the danger to the world economy.
https://x.com/vali_nasr/status/2028877310632300592?s=20
----------------
Iran’s Strategy: Expand the War, Increase the Cost, Outlast Trump
The Islamic Republic is aiming to draw out the conflict and broaden the fighting. That would force President Trump to risk more casualties and more political capital.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/03/world/europe/iran-war-strategy-trump-israel.html?smid=tw-share
The Islamic Republic of Iran’s first priority is to survive. To do that, its leaders will want to drive up the cost of the war for President Trump — in terms of American casualties, energy costs and inflation — to try to persuade him to declare victory and go home.
Faced with the overwhelming firepower of the United States and Israel, diplomats and analysts say, Iran is working to enlarge the battlefield from its own territory to the broader region. The goals are to damage oil and gas infrastructure in neighboring countries, shut the Strait of Hormuz to shipping and curtail air traffic — all to disrupt the economies of the Persian Gulf and drive up global energy prices and inflation. Iran will also be trying to exhaust the number of expensive missile interceptors held by its enemies.
“The war has become a test of wills and stamina,” said Vali Nasr of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington. “Iran is facing qualitatively superior militaries, so the strategy is to test their will by expanding the battlefield, complicating the war and increasing the danger to the world economy.”
The strategy is not complicated.
Ali Vaez, the Iran director of the Brussels-based think tank International Crisis Group, said, “The Iranians want to spread the pain as much as they can, regardless of the cost to themselves and burned relations with their neighbors, hoping to create enough opposition to the war to compel President Trump to back off.”
Regardless of whether Trump blinks first and the Iranian regime survives this war, it would still be a great victory from Israel's perspective. Iran and its "axis of resistance" will be severely weakened to a point that they wouldn't be able to challenge Israel's hegemony in the region and its expansionist plans in West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon for a long time.
yeah, there will be hard power. But soft power for Israel is virtually non existing in most of western countries, except among whites above 50 years old. India is not reading the geopolitical wind changes quite well, or Modi is disillusioned by thinking that his RSS thinking will be helpful for international influence.
The economic costs of a prolonged war in the ME for Pakistan and India in terms of remittances, oil and gas supplies as well as debt rollovers (for Pakistan).
https://www.dawn.com/news/1978517/the-burdens-of-war
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn71j8mlkk8o
US has reportedly issued a 30-day sanction waiver for Indian refiners to import Russian oil as the supplies through Strait of Hormuz looks uncertain. However, as the BBC article says above, the problem for India isn't oil (which it has reserves and has the option of supplies from Russia) but LPG and LNG.
https://www.thehindu.com/business/Economy/us-issues-30-day-waiver-to-allow-india-to-purchase-russian-oil-amid-west-asian-supply-woes/article70709950.ece
Iran War Kicks India When It’s Already Down - Barron's
https://www.barrons.com/articles/iran-war-india-trump-us-economy-2c2c257a
No bombs or missiles are falling on India as war rages to its west in the Persian Gulf. But the world’s population giant is experiencing collateral damage anyway, at an already challenging time.
Indian oil and gas imports account for some 5% of gross domestic product. Energy-starved Japan pays 3% of GDP, by comparison. Remittances from the nine million Indians working in now-threatened Gulf Arab states represent about 2% of GDP.
These stresses come with Indian stocks already missing out on a global emerging markets rally and the rupee making record lows on an almost daily basis. The iShares MSCI India
INDA
+0.20%
exchange-traded fund sank another 4% in three trading sessions following the U.S. and Israel’s Feb. 28 attack on Iran. The currency slid 1% against the dollar.
“Rising oil prices due to the Middle East conflict pose serious macro risks to India’s crude import-dependent economy,” says Shumita Deveshwar, chief India economist at TS Lombard.
Narendra Modi’s Delhi government can cushion the economy, which lately passed Japan to become the world’s fourth largest. State companies control the distribution of diesel, the dominant motor fuel, managing soft price controls. The central bank has more than $700 billion in reserves to defend the rupee.
There’s still no such thing as a free barrel of oil, argues Arthur Budaghyan, chief emerging markets strategist at BCA Research.
The Reserve Bank of India has been spending about $10 billion a month to buy rupees and prop up the currency. That means less rupee liquidity for India’s banks, which will have to curtail lending and slow the economy in response.
“Reducing banking system reserves is kind of a stealth tightening,” Budaghyan says. “A recent pickup in credit growth is completely unsustainable.”
The rupee keeps falling anyway because no one wants to invest in India. Foreign portfolio investors withdrew some $20 billion from Indian assets over the past year, lured by rallies in other emerging markets. India’s own companies have invested $30 billion abroad, leading to the country’s first capital account deficit in decades, BCA research finds.
A prolonged Middle Eastern conflict could present Modi with a political conundrum, too. India cut its imports of Russian oil by almost half, or 800,000 barrels a day, in the second half of last year under U.S. pressure, according to industry analyst Kpler. Most of the replacement volumes have come from Persian Gulf crude that is now impeded by the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
Delhi’s longer-term incentive is to stay on U.S. President Donald Trump’s good side, Budaghyan says. The U.S. is India’s top market for goods exports, not to mention the generator of well over $100 billion annually in services sales by the IT powerhouses of Bengaluru.
Still, Modi may have to turn back to Moscow eventually. “It’s too early to call Putin, but they still have his number on speed-dial,” says Ellen Wald, president of energy market watcher Transversal Consulting.
It’s way too early to fret about the end of India’s broader resurgence, with economic growth for the fiscal year that ends this month clocking in around 7.5%.
But the Iran War could make an ongoing asset price correction more painful. Indian stocks, still at higher multiples than emerging market peers, need to fall by 20% to tempt global investors back, Budaghyan estimates. Oil has to come from somewhere.
“Geopolitical uncertainty will now be the biggest overhang,” TS Lombard’s Deveshwar says.
Vineeth, for once I agree with you, we'll partly.
Weather the Arab regimes change after this war needs to be seen. The problem is that most of these rulers are more interested in saving their rule rather than making the country strong.
That is one mistake Pakistan didn't make. Our rulers made sure that the country is militarily strong. It is because of a strong Pakistan, and to some extend China's presence,that India's expansionist and imperialistic policies gave been kept in check.
G. Ali
Riaz Sb,
I find it really amusing sir, that even as I posted a comment about how the ongoing war could impact BOTH Pakistan and India, you evidently seem far more interested in how it might impact the latter alone.
Even as India hiked the prices of LPG by 7% today, Pakistan seems to have hiked their petrol and diesel prices by an even more substantial 17%. To be sure, both Pakistan and India are in for a rough ride if this conflict drags on, and the country with the weaker economic fundamentals could end up being impacted more.
In India,
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.moneycontrol.com/news/india/domestic-lpg-cylinder-price-hiked-by-rs-60-commercial-up-by-rs-115-amid-iran-war-13853501.html/amp
A 14.2 kg domestic gas cylinder will now cost Rs 60 more across the nation. Similarly, the price of a 19 kg commercial gas cylinder will be up by Rs 115.
According to the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) website, non-subsidised LPG will now be priced Rs 913 per 14.2 kg cylinder in Delhi as against Rs 853 previously. This is the second increase in prices in less than a year. In Mumbai, the new rate of a domestic LPG cylinder now stands at Rs 912.50, up from Rs 852.50 earlier. In Kolkata, the price has risen from Rs 879 to Rs 930, while in Chennai it has increased from Rs 868.50 to Rs 928.50.
Meanwhile in Pakistan,
https://www.dawn.com/news/1979182/govt-hikes-petrol-high-speed-diesel-prices-by-rs55-per-litre
The government announced a Rs55 per litre hike in the price of petrol and high-speed diesel each on Friday.
Consequently, the ex-depot high-speed diesel rate has been fixed at Rs335.86 per litre for next week while the ex-depot petrol price has been revised to Rs321.17 per litre from Rs266.17 per litre, with an increase of 17pc.
India’s economy is not as big as economists thought
https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2026/03/05/indias-economy-is-not-as-big-as-economists-thought
Indian officials have been in a boastful mood lately. A government report in December argued that judging by real-time economic indicators, India had overtaken Japan as the world’s fourth-biggest economy. This was to become economic fact once the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation updated how it calculates gdp. So in one sense, the new numbers released on February 27th are a disappointment: gdp was 3.3% smaller than previously thought. In other ways, though, they are a cause for celebration.
The methodological update, the first since 2015, reset the “base year”—which sets the weights for different parts of the economy—to 2022. It also added new data sources that capture a clearer picture of the Indian economy. The country looks more rural than before. Agriculture, responsible for 18% of gdp, appears bigger, largely thanks to more detail on fisheries and dairy. Finance and business services also produced a bit more output, while commerce, hotels and transport generated 26% less. The net effect is a service sector that looks 8% smaller than it did using the previous methodology, and makes up 41% of the economy. Manufacturing, which accounts for 15%, has also shrunk slightly.
On the bright side, India is growing even faster than previously believed. gdp expanded by 7.1% in the fiscal year 2024-25, up from an earlier figure of 6.5%. Other numbers show it has grown quickly since, despite facing high duties on exports to America from August until last month, when the Supreme Court curtailed Donald Trump’s willy-nilly tariffing. Although manufacturing’s share failed to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s goal of a quarter of gdp by 2025, high-tech production and electronics assembly are fuelling growth. Business-friendly reforms to taxes and regulations are starting to pay off, too.
A qualified win for India, then—and also a victory for Indian statistics. Economists have raised doubts over the gdp figures released shortly after Mr Modi came into power 12 years ago, and which revised down growth under the previous administration. The shelving of a survey in 2019 that showed a drop in rural consumption hinted that the government might suppress inconvenient facts. That the new figures show a less rosy picture of Mr Modi’s record should reassure observers that the government will not hide unflattering data. And the figures should reassure Mr Modi that India’s title as the world’s fastest-growing big economy remains secure, even if it is not quite as big as he hoped. ■
https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/explained-economics/gdp-india-revision-size-gdp-per-capita-10567789/lite/
"According to the old estimates, India’s GDP in 2025-26 had crossed the $4 trillion mark. But thanks to the new estimates pegged GDP at a lower level, as well as the fall in rupee’s exchange rate against the US dollar, India’s GDP is now at around $3.9 trillion, assuming an average exchange rate of Rs 88 to a dollar in the current financial year."
With these new numbers and assuming the official size of $400 billion for Pakistan's economy, the new figure of $3.9 trillion would make the Indian economy around 9.5 times larger than Pakistan's. China's economy which is estimated at $21 trillion would be 5.3 times larger than India's. So, we can approximate the relative GDP sizes of Pakistan, India and China as somewhere between 1:9:55 or 1:10:60.
G Ali,
- "It is because of a strong Pakistan, and to some extend China's presence,that India's expansionist and imperialistic policies gave been kept in check."
Larger countries tend to treat their smaller neighbours as their "backyard". That's a common complaint we hear against US, Russia and China from their smaller neighbours as well, and India would not likely be an exception.
But I'm curious to hear what exactly are India's "expansionist" and "imperialistic" policies that you refer to? Not the "Akhand Bharat" nonsense I hope, because the only people in India who would see benefit in reversing partition and the assimilation of an additional 450 million Muslims to the Indian population would be the liberals and the secular-minded. And being the resident of a state with 55% Hindu, 25% Muslim and 20% Christian population, I'm all for "Akhand Bharat". But if you ask the right-wing "Akhand Bharat" fanboys what they would do with the three times larger Muslim population that comes with it they are quite clueless. :)
Vineeth: “With these new numbers and assuming the official size of $400 billion for Pakistan's economy, the new figure of $3.9 trillion would make the Indian economy around 9.5 times larger than Pakistan's”
Pakistan’s gross domestic product (GDP ) reached $411 billion in June, 2025, according to Economic Survey of Pakistan 2024-25. Now let’s wait and see where it stands in June 2026.
The real issue here is the boastful and repeated false claims of the Modi government about surpassing Japan which are still being repeated by Hindutva gang.
The other important takeaway from these revisions is that the agriculture contribution to Indian GDP rose to 18% while the manufacturing contribution shrank, as did the service sector contribution.
Riaz Sb,
- "The real issue here is the boastful and repeated false claims of the Modi government about surpassing Japan which are still being repeated by Hindutva gang."
I fail to see what is the "issue" there. They made the claim based on the previous methodology of calculating GDP size. Developed economies like Japan ($4.4 tr) and Germany ($5.3 tr) have become highly saturated in terms of growth and its only a matter of time before India would surpass them and become the third largest even with a modest growth rate. Nothing to boast of, but nothing to be contested either.
- "The other important takeaway from these revisions is that the agriculture contribution to Indian GDP rose to 18% while the manufacturing contribution shrank, as did the service sector contribution.".
Those are in comparison to the inaccurate numbers from the previous base year and methodology, isn't it? It doesn't imply India's manufacturing and service sectors are actually shrinking.
"Agriculture, responsible for 18% of gdp, appears bigger, largely thanks to more detail on fisheries and dairy. Finance and business services also produced a bit more output, while commerce, hotels and transport generated 26% less. The net effect is a service sector that looks 8% smaller than it did using the previous methodology, and makes up 41% of the economy. Manufacturing, which accounts for 15%, has also shrunk slightly."
India’s share of employment in agriculture has also been growing in recent years, particularly since the Covid pandemic in 2022.
Instead of moving from farm to factory, the Indian labor force is moving in the opposite direction.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/271320/distribution-of-the-workforce-across-economic-sectors-in-india/
Employment woes deepen as workers move back to farm jobs
With manufacturing and industry failing to generate sufficient jobs, urban joblessness is rising
https://www.forbesindia.com/article/news/employment-woes-deepen-as-workers-move-back-to-farm-jobs/2988619/1
The Indian labour market was characterised by two key shifts in the second quarter of FY26: Rising youth joblessness in urban areas and a flight of labour back to the farm sector at the expense of manufacturing jobs.
According to government data for the July-September 2025 quarter, while the overall unemployment rate marginally declined from 5.4 percent in the April-June quarter to 5.2 percent in the latest quarter, youth unemployment (for those aged 15-29 years) increased from 14.6 percent to 14.8 percent in the same period.
Vineeth,
"But I'm curious to hear what exactly are India's "expansionist" and "imperialistic" policies that you refer to..."
Hyderabad, Sikkim, Goa to name a few. Not to mention the constant threat colonize Azad Kashmir.
G. Ali
G Ali,
- "Hyderabad, Sikkim, Goa to name a few. Not to mention the constant threat colonize Azad Kashmir."
What about Hyderabad, Sikkim and Goa? Do you have any reasons to believe that their inhabitants did not want to join India or that they resent being part of India now? Hyderabad state was entirely surrounded by India on all its sides. Goa was a Portuguese Indian colony that they refused to relinquish unlike the French and the British. (Portugal was ruled by a military dictatorship at the time.) As for Sikkim, it was an Indian protectorate with only internal autonomy prior to its annexation.
And as for "Azad Kashmir", its part of the disputed territory of erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir kingdom, isn't it? India considers AJK and GB as part of its territory based on the legal justification that the king signed an instrument of accession to India. Pakistan may have reasons to dispute that claim, but the bottomline is that India's claim on AJK and GB is no more "expansionist" or "imperialist" than Pakistan's claims on J&K and Ladakh. The whole area is a disputed territory as per international law. And unlike Pakistan which sent military units across the LoC and attempted capture lands under Indian control during the 1965 and 1999 Kargil wars, India has made no attempts to capture or "colonize" AJK or GB militarily since the conclusion of the 1948 Kashmir war.
"As for Sikkim, it was an Indian protectorate with only internal autonomy prior to its annexation."
Sikkim was never an Indian protectorate. Sikkim was an independent kingdom and a neighbor of China for over three hundred years before there was even such a thing as India. Here is a map of Sikkim created by Chinese cartographers.
https://gis.rchss.sinica.edu.tw/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/mapclub_20251216_001-1-scaled.jpg
This map was created in 1915 and is a replica of the original map drawn in the thirteenth year of Emperor Guangxu (1887). In the map, Sikkim was referred to by its old name, Dremojong. This map is collected by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of China (ROC), and is currently consigned to the National Palace Museum in Taipei.
In the 18th century, Sikkim was overrun by the Nepalese Gurkhas, and the Qing emperor Qianlong dispatched two expeditions to expel the Gurkhas and restore Sikkim's sovereignty and independence. Sikkim became a tributary state of China after that. In the 19th century, the British Empire in the subcontinent brought Sikkim under its influence and signed a treaty with China in 1890. Sikkim became a British protectorate.
https://treaties.fcdo.gov.uk/data/Library2/pdf/1894-TS0011.pdf
The British have never incorporated Sikkim into the British Raj. Sikkim enjoyed greater independence from the British Raj than Burma, which at one time was a British Raj province. Beginning in the 20th century, the British began returning sovereignty to Sikkim, and the Chogyal (king) of Sikkim spent more time there rather than in Tibet.
Of the four Himalayan kingdoms (Ladakh, Nepal, Bhutan, and Sikkim) that border China, Sikkim has the closest relation with China. Here is a picture of the Sikkim royal family.
https://thumb.vancdn.com/van/info/2024/12/0_202412121906021UdH0_w750_3cee.jpg
The middle is the eleventh king of Sikkim; the right is the twelfth king of Sikkim; the left is Queen Hope Cooke, the wife of the twelfth king. The Sikkimese traced their ancestry to the Tibetan Kham region of China. But since the Sikkim royal families historically have a close relationship with China, you can see their royal attire in Chinese-style silk robes. Queen Hope Cooke is currently living in New York.
India's annexation of Sikkim is certainly unfortunate because it happened at a time when China was weak and was unable to help Sikkim as it had before. Nowadays, India's target is Bhutan, a country very similar to Sikkim in every way but a little bigger. Despite India having a stranglehold on Bhutan, I don't think India's ambition will be realized because China is certainly not going to let its neighbor get gobbled up again.
Vineeth,
"Do you have any reasons to believe that their inhabitants did not want to join India".
Do you have any that they did want to join India? Specifically, Sikkim and Goa, if India had support in those it wouldn't have held that sham referendum in Sikkim and would have held some type of referendum in Goa.
Do you know that Portuguese were having internal discussion about holding a referendum in Goa, when Nehru found out he said he will not accept the results if they held the referendum and the results came out against India (expansionist policy).
Goa was a Portuguese colony, so was Macau, just check how both India and China dealt with them and then tell me who has expansionist policy.
Hyderabad, so it was Ok to take an internationally recognized country, a member of UN just because they were surrounded by India. Lesotho, Vatican and San Marino comes to mind, none of their neighbor's want to take them over, (expansionist policy).
Your country constantly shows Azad Kashmir as it's part, has anyone asked them if they want to be colonized again by you?
Btw, check the meaning of "expansionist policy" you have yourself provided the proof that India has an expansionist policy.
G. Ali
Mantou, interesting read.
Today the term "Sikkimization" is used by every smaller country in South Asia, meaning they can be next Sikkim. The only country that does not use this term is Pakistan. One can easily guess why.
Also, I am not sure if Bhutan is India's next target or Nepal. Had China not taken over Tibet, India would have definitely gobbled them over by now.
G. Ali
G Ali,
- "if India had support in those it wouldn't have held that sham referendum in Sikkim and would have held some type of referendum in Goa."
So, India holding a "sham referendum" (in your words) in Sikkim and not holding one such in Goa is the issue that you have with both? Let me emphasize this again. Goa was a "Portuguese colony" on "Indian soil" and its people were ethnic Indians. The occupying power there was Portugal. There was no need for any "sham referendums" (except for the one it held to decide if Goa wanted to be a separate state or merged with Maharashtra). Unlike the case of Kashmir valley where I'm aware the majority prefer independence to Indian rule, the people of Goa have no problems with remaining as a state of India and there hasn't been any popular movements for independence either. The same goes for Sikkim. Sikkim was not an independent country, but a protectorate with internal autonomy (excluding defense and foreign affairs) under the British and the later government of independent India. It still retains much of that autonomy as a state in India with its own elected government. No problems there as well.
How China treated Hong Kong and Macau was its own business. They didn't extend the same courtesy to Tibet which it took by force, you know.
- "Hyderabad, so it was Ok to take an internationally recognized country.."
Hyderabad was no more an "internationally recognized country" than Mysore, Travancore (where I live), J&K, Baroda and the many other princely states under the British Raj. The vast majority of Hyderabad State's population (except perhaps the Muslim-majority in the Old city) had no issues about a union with India. There has been no subsequent independence movements there as well.
- "Your country constantly shows Azad Kashmir as it's part, has anyone asked them if they want to be colonized again by you?"
I have answered this already. India considers AJK, GB and Aksai Chin as part of its territory based on the territorial claims of the erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir kingdom and the king's signing of the instrument of accession to India. Its a legal standpoint, not "expansionist". Unlike Pakistan which made attempts capture territories across LoC by force in 1965 and 1999, India has not made any attempts to take AJK and GB since the conclusion of 1948 Kashmir war. Since any such attempts would risk mutually destructive war, I'm quite sure even Modi govt would be prepared for a compromise by turning LoC into the de-facto border and be done with it.
- "you have yourself provided the proof that India has an expansionist policy."
Please elaborate, because I fail to see any "expansionist policy" in whatever I said.
- "Also, I am not sure if Bhutan is India's next target or Nepal. Had China not taken over Tibet, India would have definitely gobbled them over by now."
So, China taking Tibet by force without holding a referendum there isn't in your opinion "expansionist policy"? If India wanted to take over Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka or Maldives, don't you think it would have already done so? Remember, unlike Pakistan these countries do not have nukes, missiles or a large military force that can withstand an Indian assault, and India practically surrounds Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh on their three sides as well. It would be a piece of cake for India to militarily occupy these countries should it wish so, but it clearly has no desire for that.
Mantou,
I'm aware China has its own maps with territorial claims that is at odds with what its neighbours and the rest of the world considers legal or legitimate (South China Sea being a good example), but let me assure you that Sikkim was a protectorate under the British since 1890 and under independent India after 1947. India handled Sikkim's defense, foreign affairs and communications even before it was added as a state in 1975.
"Had China not taken over Tibet, India would have definitely gobbled them over by now."
Absolutely. In fact, this is the reason that eventually led to the 1962 war between the two countries. India has been lying to its people and to the world that China attacked India unprovoked in 1962, when in fact it was India that was agitating for land that China finally responded to in 1962. But firstly, Tibet has been part of China longer than the United States has been a country. China's sending its army into Tibet in 1951 was to reassert its sovereignty after a lapse of control due to the chaos happening in China in the last century (Western colonial powers were carving up China, World War II, Japanese invasion, civil war, etc.). It was not an invasion, as like to be characterized by the Indians and Western countries.
China has been bending backward to accommodate India's expansionism, but India interpreted China's gesture as submission, resulting in India being even more belligerent.
https://ppr06262023.substack.com/p/renewed-tension-india-china-border
https://gregoryclark.net/others/remembering-a-war-the-1962-india-china-conflict/
Yeah right. The one that engages in this kind of deceptive behavior is India. India is known for publishing dubious maps. This map was published by India in 1954, which shows not only that Sikkim was part of India, but also that Bhutan was part of India.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:1954_Political_Map_of_India_by_Survey_of_India.jpg
Sikkim was never a protectorate of India. By the beginning of the last century, the British were returning sovereignty to Sikkim. The Sikkim Chogyal even ended its self-imposed exile in China's Tibet and returned to Sikkim.
India handled Sikkim's defense, my ass. The one that was threatening Sikkim is India.
"Goa was a "Portuguese colony" on "Indian soil" and its people were ethnic Indians. "
When Goa became a Portuguese colony, there was no such thing as India or the concept of Indian, which is a very recent concept.
"How China treated Hong Kong and Macau was its own business. They didn't extend the same courtesy to Tibet which it took by force, you know."
Usual bunch of nonsense. The one that is occupying Tibetan territories is India. In February 1951, India invaded and annexed Tawang, South Tibet. Tawang is the birthplace of the Sixth Dalai Lama and home to a four-hundred-year-old Tibetan monastery. India has no business in South Tibet in particular or in the northeast in general. The region has no connection whatsoever to the subcontinent. India also has no business in Ladakh.
"If India wanted to take over Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka or Maldives, don't you think it would have already done so?"
India certainly has designs on these countries, going by the way India behaves with regard to this country. But India's pathetic power projection is only able to intimidate Bhutan. India has been meddling in Nepal's internal affairs for decades, but Nepal is too large and too complicated for India to digest. As to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, or the Maldives, India simply does not have the military capabilities to do so.
"So, China taking Tibet by force without holding a referendum there isn't in your opinion "expansionist policy"?"
Tibet has been part of China longer than the United States has been a country. Here is the map of China by the Republic of China (usually known as Taiwan nowadays) and it clearly shows that Tibet is part of its territory.
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/db1bp3/a_detailed_map_of_the_republic_of_china_including/
"It would be a piece of cake for India to militarily occupy these countries should it wish so, but it clearly has no desire for that."
India's military is pathetic; this is the reason India didn't militarily occupy Nepal or Bangladesh because it didn't have the ability to do so. But India certainly militarily occupied Bhutan.
The Iran War Could Be Catastrophic for the US-Israel Alliance. Good. | The Nation
https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-israel-protest/
As Israel’s role in pushing the war with Iran comes into ever sharper focus, it’s up to us to turn outrage into change.
JACK MIRKINSON
It’s never a good idea to expect Donald Trump to stick to one argument. The president is a congenital liar who loses a little more brain functionwith each passing day. Inventing new rationales for terrible decisions is kind of his whole thing.
But even by that degraded standard, Trump’s ever-shifting justifications for his war on Iran are breathtaking. Every few hours seems to bring a new explanation for why the United States and Israel decided that it was a good time to launch an illegal, unprovoked, open-ended assault on another country. The two countries struck because of some undefined imminent threat! No, wait, it’s because the nuclear program Trump definitely “obliterated” last year was perhaps un-obliterated and needed to be re-obliterated! Sorry, what he really meant was that the Iranians took Americans hostage… in 1979, and it’s time someone did something about it! Hmm, scratch that—it’s to do regime change! Actually, hold that thought…
This nonsense makes Trump look like what he is: a reckless imperialist engaging in an already spiraling war of choice. It also helps create what he may feel is an encouraging level of confusion about what exactly he wants out of this catastrophe.
There’s just one problem: Other people are also talking about why we’re suddenly at war. And a lot of them are giving the same reason: because Israel wanted it. That has the potential to erode both the US-Israeli relationship and Israel’s already shaky standing with the American people. For anyone who wants to see the US-Israel alliance, with all of its inherent cruelty and oppression, consigned to the dustbin of history, this can only be a good thing.
Before we get to why that is, though, it’s important to understand how this story has unfolded over the past couple of days.
The first thing that really raised eyebrows was Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s explanation of why a war with Iran was happening “now,” that “the President made the very wise decision—we knew that there was going to be an Israeli action, we knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties…”
Mantou,
That map clearly shades Sikkim and Bhutan in a different colour showing their status as Indian protectorates. India has never claimed Bhutan as part of India, and it did not claim Sikkim until it was added as a state in 1975. I can understand your disappointment that China wasn't able to annexe Sikkim and Bhutan as part of Tibet (or atleast pull them into Chinese orbit), but that's how it is. :)
And yes, Sikkim was a British protectorate until 1947 and later an Indian protectorate until 1975. Perhaps that isn't mentioned clearly in Chinese textbooks.
Mantou,
- "India's military is pathetic; this is the reason India didn't militarily occupy Nepal or Bangladesh because it didn't have the ability to do so."
So I guess the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 was all the work of Mukti Bahini. Please tell that to G Ali and your other Pakistani friends who keep complaining that India did it.
- "But India certainly militarily occupied Bhutan."
No, it did not. Stationing Indian troops as per mutual agreement with Bhutanese government isn't "military occupation". They are there to stop China from gobbling up Bhutan like it did with Tibet.
Mantou,
- "When Goa became a Portuguese colony, there was no such thing as India or the concept of Indian, which is a very recent concept."
India always existed as a distinct cultural realm ruled by different empires and kingdoms at different points of time. That's why you find references to "India" right from the time of ancient Greek and Roman sources. "China" too was nothing but a territory ruled by different dynasties and kingdoms and the extent of territorial control of these dynasties varied over the centuries. India and China as nation-states is a 20th century thing.
- "Usual bunch of nonsense. The one that is occupying Tibetan territories is India. In February 1951, India invaded and annexed Tawang, South Tibet."
India did not "invade" or "annexe" the so-called South Tibet. MacMahon Line was agreed as the boundary between British India and Tibet in 1914. Independent India inherited the boundary just like how independent Pakistan inherited the Durand Line boundary with Afghanistan (which the latter does not recognize as well).
So, blame the British if you will.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMahon_Line
- "India also has no business in Ladakh."
I have read that Chinese rulers believed China as the center of the world and considered everyone else as tributaries. But the world doesn't revolve around China or its peculiar worldview, you know.
- "Nepal is too large and too complicated for India to digest."
I did not know that a country that is half the size and one-eighth the population of the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh state was too large and complicated for India to manage. :)
- "As to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, or the Maldives, India simply does not have the military capabilities to do so."
Oh, India already invaded Bangladesh once back in 1971 when it was East Pakistan. India also "invaded" Maldives in 1988 to thwart an attempted coup against its government. So the capabilities are clearly there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988_Maldives_coup_attempt
@ Vinneeth,
"That map clearly shades Sikkim and Bhutan in a different colour showing their status as Indian protectorates. India has never claimed Bhutan as part of India, and it did not claim Sikkim until it was added as a state in 1975."
According to the map legend, the thick purple line denotes the international boundary, and both Sikkim and Bhutan are within the thick purple line. This means India is showing that Sikkim and Bhutan are part of India in 1954. The fact that it shows them in different shades of color only indicates that India considers Sikkim and Bhutan to have a different status than other Indian states. India claimed both Sikkim and Bhutan as part of India in 1954, according to the map.
"I can understand your disappointment that China wasn't able to annexe Sikkim and Bhutan as part of Tibet (or atleast pull them into Chinese orbit), but that's how it is. :)"
Sikkim was a neighbor of China for over three hundred years before there was even such a thing as India. And China helped Sikkim once by defeating the invading Nepalese Gurkhas in the 18th century. China could have annexed Sikkim if it wished, but China never did. It is India, an artificial country that historically doesn't exist that annex Sikkim.
"And yes, Sikkim was a British protectorate until 1947 and later an Indian protectorate until 1975. Perhaps that isn't mentioned clearly in Chinese textbooks."
Sikkim was never an Indian protectorate because by 1947, the British had already returned sovereignty to Sikkim. Keep deluding yourself.
"So I guess the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 was all the work of Mukti Bahini. Please tell that to G Ali and your other Pakistani friends who keep complaining that India did it.
Bangladesh is physically detached from Pakistan. Bangladesh's split from Pakistan is more the result of geography than Indian military prowess. The Indian military is pathetic. Please tell me what happened to the Rafales, Su30 and Mig29 in Operation Sindoor last year.
"No, it did not. Stationing Indian troops as per mutual agreement with the Bhutanese government isn't "military occupation". They are there to stop China from gobbling up Bhutan like it did with Tibet."
This is just the usual Indian sophistry, using China as the bogeyman for its designs on Bhutan. You think Bhutanese are dumb? Bhutanese are well aware of Indian design in their country, and they certainly don't want to be the next Sikkim. Here is a Bhutanese offering her opinion of what she thinks of India, a bully.
https://www.reddit.com/r/india/comments/6q4rou/india_bullying_bhutan/?utm_source=embedv2&utm_medium=post_embed&utm_content=post_body&embed_host_url=https://www.unz.com/jnino/the-forgotten-plot-how-india-and-israel-nearly-destroyed-pakistans-nuclear-program/
"India always existed as a distinct cultural realm ruled by different empires and kingdoms at different points of time. That's why you find references to "India" right from the time of ancient Greek and Roman sources. "China" too was nothing but a territory ruled by different dynasties and kingdoms and the extent of territorial control of these dynasties varied over the centuries. India and China as nation-states is a 20th century thing."
What would have happened if the British had never colonized the subcontinent? The subcontinent today will comprise at least five hundred, if not thousands, of fiefdoms fighting each other. It certainly has a distinct civilization, but there is no central government to speak of. The dominant language will be Urdu because that is the court language of the Mughal, and the written Hindi language would not have existed because the British used the Tibetan alphabet to create the Hindi written language and gifted it to the Hindus. Without the British, you would still be using Urdu today. Even the concept of Indian is created by the British. All nation-states are a 20th-century thing. Without the British, China would still be China.
"India did not "invade" or "annexe" the so-called South Tibet. MacMahon Line was agreed as the boundary between British India and Tibet in 1914. Independent India inherited the boundary just like how independent Pakistan inherited the Durand Line boundary with Afghanistan (which the latter does not recognize as well)."
The Simla Convention was a tripartite conference between Britain, China, and Tibet. China never signed the treaty, meaning there is no result obtained from the convention. Even the Tibetan Lhasa government immediately repudiated the treaty once the delegates went back to Lhasa. Later on, a certain British officer by the name of Olaf Caroe did a diplomatic forgery to alter the Aitchison Treaties to make the line look legitimate.
https://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article2582.html
- "India also has no business in Ladakh.
I have read that Chinese rulers believed China as the center of the world and considered everyone else as tributaries. But the world doesn't revolve around China or its peculiar worldview, you know."
Same old nonsense. What business does India have in Ladakh?
- "Nepal is too large and too complicated for India to digest."
"I did not know that a country that is half the size and one-eighth the population of the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh state was too large and complicated for India to manage. :)"
Looks like you are proud of India's management. Let's see, right in the Indian capital, there is a garbage dump the size of a mountain giving out toxic fumes day and night. The area is filthy beyond description. There is chaos everywhere. A sizable percentage of its people practice open defecation. The society is dysfunctional, and there is a general lawlessness. People live worse than animals. India can't even manage its own capital, let alone Uttar Pradesh.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zs0ZElApDg
India is the butt of jokes for anyone who has been there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BMu6Vv8Cvw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Trga0KMcn4
"Oh, India already invaded Bangladesh once back in 1971 when it was East Pakistan. India also "invaded" Maldives in 1988 to thwart an attempted coup against its government. So the capabilities are clearly there."
The Maldives kicked out the Indian military two years ago. India tried to bully the Maldives and backfired.
Vineeth,
"So I guess the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 was all the work of Mukti Bahini."
There is an interview of FM Manekshaw avaliable on YouTube where said that Pakistan army had no chance, they were 1000 miles away from home and were outnumbered 15:1.
G. Ali
Mantou,
- "What would have happened if the British had never colonized the subcontinent?"
Who can predict "what ifs"? What if Nazi Germany defeated Soviet Union in WW II? What if World War II in Asia had come to an end with an armstice between US and Japan, and Japan decided to conquer the rest of China? What if Koumintang defeated the Communists? History is full of such "what ifs" that no one can predict with any certainty.
"The subcontinent today will comprise at least five hundred, if not thousands, of fiefdoms fighting each other. It certainly has a distinct civilization, but there is no central government to speak of."
That's just your assumption. Like I said above, we cannot predict "what ifs" of history. Europeans were a distinct civilization too and yet they were politically divided by languages and have fought one another for most of its history. And yet they have recognized their common "European" identity and shared cultural heritage and have come together to create a common market, a common currency, a free travel zone, a common Parliament, and they coordinate their foreign and defense policies as well. In effect, they are well on the way to becoming a "nation of nations" that India already is. That's how I see it. Tibetans, Uighurs, Manchus and other ethnic groups aren't Han Chinese and yet you would consider them Chinese? Why?
- "The dominant language will be Urdu because that is the court language of the Mughal, and the written Hindi language would not have existed because the British used the Tibetan alphabet to create the Hindi written language and gifted it to the Hindus."
Where do you learn such laughable absurdities, sir? For one, you are clearly confusing language and script here. Script and language aren't the same. Any language can be written in any script as long as it has the letters to represent the sounds. Turkish, Malaya/Indonesian and Vietnamese use Latin-derived scripts these days and the Turkic languages of Central Asia use Cyrillic script, and yet none of these are European languages and have used other scripts in the past. Anyone listening to "Hindi" and "Urdu" will recognize that they are essentially the same language even if they are written in different scripts.
Secondly, Tibetan script is derived from the Gupta script which itself traces its origin back to ancient Brahmi, and the Devanagari script used for writing "Hindi" also trace its origin to the Gupta script via Nagari. And not just Devanagari, but also Gujarati, Punjabi, Bengali and Odiya scripts which are all distinct from one another are derived from Gupta.
And speaking of Brahmi itself, most South Asian and South East Asian scripts (like Burmese, Thai, Cambodian, Lao, Javanese, Balinese etc) are derived from one or the other historical Brahmic scripts and therefore have a similar structure.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devanagari
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gupta_script
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahmi_script
But I guess you cannot read any of these scripts, so they all look the same to your eyes and you perhaps assume they must all be the same.
- "Without the British, you would still be using Urdu today."
Clearly you are clueless about the linguistic diversity of India. Only half of India even understands "Hindi" and those who speak that as their first language is even less.
- "Without the British, China would still be China."
Before "Republic of China" was proclaimed as a nation-state in 1912, "China" was the Qing empire.
"The Simla Convention was a tripartite conference between Britain, China, and Tibet."
Exactly what I said. Britain and Tibet signed it. And India inherited those borders at the time of independence. Like I said, go ahead and blame the British. By the way, may I ask why was Tibet even represented as a separate party in the treaty if it was part of China? :)
Mantou,
- "Same old nonsense. What business does India have in Ladakh?"
Who's to decide if India has any business in Ladakh? China? China had no presence in Ladakh. It was captured from the Tibetans by the Kashmir kingdom. And when ruler of Kashmir signed the instrument of accession to India in 1948 it became Indian territory.
- "Looks like you are proud of India's management.."
After confusing script and language, now you are confusing political control of a territory with urban waste management. :)
- "The Maldives kicked out the Indian military two years ago. India tried to bully the Maldives and backfired."
India stationed a small force in Maldives as part of an agreement with the previous Maldivian government. When the new Maldivian government terminated the agreement and asked for their withdrawal, India pulled them back and replaced them with Indian technical personnel to maintain the Indian air assets stationed there. Clearly, India had no intention to occupy Maldives.
- "Bangladesh is physically detached from Pakistan. Bangladesh's split from Pakistan is more the result of geography than Indian military prowess."
So? My point was that India is clearly capable of invading and occupying Bangladesh as it had already done so in the past.
- "You think Bhutanese are dumb? Bhutanese are well aware of Indian design in their country, and they certainly don't want to be the next Sikkim."
And? What are they doing about it? Have they asked Indian troops to leave? Have they asked China's assistance for it?
- "Here is a Bhutanese offering her opinion of what she thinks of India, a bully."
For one Bhutanese who think India is a bully, you can find even more Vietnamese, Filipinos, Koreans and Japanese who call China their local bully too. So what's your point?
- "Sikkim was never an Indian protectorate because by 1947, the British had already returned sovereignty to Sikkim. Keep deluding yourself."
It is you who is deluding yourself here. British did not grant any sovereignty to Sikkim when they left. They left all such matters about protectorates and princely states to the governments of independent India and Pakistan to decide. Sikkim continued to be an Indian protectorate after 1947. India continued to manage Sikkim's defense, foreign affairs and communications.
- "India claimed both Sikkim and Bhutan as part of India in 1954, according to the map."
India never made any claims then or now that Bhutan is a part of India. Until 1949, Bhutan was an Indian protectorate like Sikkim and afterwards India recognized its status as a sovereign nation, but "guided" or "advised" by India in its defense and external relations. The 2007 Indo-Bhutan Friendship Treaty revised this as a cooperation between the two sovereign nations. The 1954 map you have linked here likely shows the pre-1949 status of Bhutan and wasn't updated.
Sikkim on the other hand continued to be an Indian protectorate until 1975. But India did not claim it as Indian territory until it was added as a state.
Mantou,
Further on that question of "what if" British hadn't colonized India, here's one possibility.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maratha_Empire
By the middle of the 18th century with the Mughal Empire in decline and British expanding its foothold in Mughal Bengal in the east, Marathas were busy conquering Mughal possessions elsewhere. Their ambitions were clearly a pan-Indian empire or confederacy of Maratha-ruled dominions, until it was thwarted by defeats at the hands of Afghans (Third battle of Panipat) and later the British (Anglo-Maratha wars).
Also, I came across this BBC article today about China's new law to promote "ethnic unity" by assimilation of its ethnic minorities to the dominant Han culture and the Mandarin language. All I would say is that India's idea about accomodating its various ethnicities and their languages under a unified national identity is a bit different.
"Why is China set to approve a new law promoting 'ethnic unity'?"
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c6271gxpdkzo
I'm sure there is a Chinese official narrative for all this that you would swear and abide by, but I would rather trust what is written in that article.
""The Simla Convention was a tripartite conference between Britain, China, and Tibet."
Exactly what I said. Britain and Tibet signed it. And India inherited those borders at the time of independence. Like I said, go ahead and blame the British. "
Are you telling me that a three-party document in which only two parties signed the document is considered legitimate?
"By the way, may I ask why Tibet was even represented as a separate party in the treaty if it was part of China? :)"
Why is China even in the treaty if Tibet is an independent country?
"Have they asked Indian troops to leave? Have they asked China's assistance for it?"
This is why India is a failed state; part of the reason is its shamelessness. Indian complains all the time about British subjugation, yet feel shameless when talking about Indian troops in Bhutan.
China has no troops in Vietnam, the Philippines, or Korea and Japan. And when did Korea or Japan ever say China is their local bully? Where did you get this? Korea and Japan have been neighbors of China for thousands of years. How many times have Korea and Japan been invaded by China all these years? Zero.
"India continued to manage Sikkim's defense, foreign affairs and communications."
Yeah right. India manages Sikkim's defense is like the wolf guarding the hen house.
"India never made any claims then or now that Bhutan is a part of India. "
Showing Bhutan is part of India in a map published by the government of India does not mean India claims Bhutan is part of India? Really?
"For one, you are clearly confusing language and script here. Script and language aren't the same. "
No I did not. I used the phrase written language to mean script. I can rephrase what I said if you like:
The dominant language will be Urdu because that is the court language of the Mughal, and the Hindi script would not have existed because the British used the Tibetan alphabet to create the Hindi script and gifted it to the Hindus."
"Secondly, Tibetan script is derived from the Gupta script which itself traces its origin back to ancient Brahmi, and the Devanagari script used for writing "Hindi" also trace its origin to the Gupta script via Nagari. And not just Devanagari, but also Gujarati, Punjabi, Bengali and Odiya scripts which are all distinct from one another are derived from Gupta."
Here we go again. Bunch of nonsense. I have heard that some Indians claim Sanskrit is the mother of all languages. Yeah right.
The article is classic BBC nonsense.
Here are just two examples of how the article is misleading:
"In the months leading up to the 2008 Olympic Games, Tibetan monks led an uprising in Lhasa against Beijing's rule. Like previous uprisings, this too was crushed - Beijing says 22 people died, but Tibetan groups in exile estimate it was around 200."
What the article doesn't say is all the 22 people died were Han Chinese.
"The next year, in the far west of the country, deadly clashes between Uyghurs and Han Chinese in Xinjiang's regional capital Urumqi led to nearly 200 deaths."
Same thing. The 200 deaths are all Han Chinese killed by the Uyghur rioters.
"My point was that India is clearly capable of invading and occupying Bangladesh as it had already done so in the past."
You are delusional. What is the lesson Operation Sindoor teaches India? Bangladesh is getting the JF17 from Pakistan. I am sure Pakistan and Bangladesh would love to give India a beating once Pakistan gets the J35.
Pakistan Sends Navy Escort for Its Ships in the Middle East - The New York Times
Pakistan, Iran’s neighbor, has been striving to remain neutral in the conflict. But its government and military have been forced to act to protect its economy.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/10/world/middleeast/pakistan-gulf-conflict-oil-economy.html
Schools closed until the end of March. A four-day workweek for the next two months. Warships escorting commercial vessels.
Pakistan, a South Asian nation of 250 million people and Iran’s neighbor, has been striving to remain neutral in the Middle East conflict. But with its economy, heavily reliant on oil imports, under threat from the choking of tanker traffic in the Persian Gulf, Pakistan’s government and military have been forced to act.
The Pakistani Navy said Monday that its warships would escort the country’s commercial vessels in the Middle East “to ensure the uninterrupted flow of national energy supplies.” It said two vessels from Pakistan’s national shipping company were already under navy escort, posting images on social media of a warship sailing next to a crude oil tanker.
The navy did not say which route the tankers were sailing, and did not say which countries posed the “multidimensional threats” to shipping.
Pakistan imports most of its natural gas from Qatar and crude oil from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. All of this is brought over sea, but shipping companies have stopped energy transports from those countries because of security risks, especially along the narrow Strait of Hormuz, through which around a fifth of the world’s oil transits.
President Trump and President Emmanuel Macron of France have both floated the possibility of naval escorts for commercial vessels, as the conflict roils global energy markets and threatens economies around the world. Mr. Trump on Monday threatened even more intense strikes if Iran disrupted the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz.
India was also considering sending its warships in response to requests from Indian shipowners for naval escorts, according to Capt. P.C. Meena, a senior official at India’s main maritime authority.
It was unclear if the deployment of Pakistani warships would be enough to prevent an oil supply crunch. Pakistan has less than two weeks left of crude oil reserves, and enough liquefied natural gas to last until the end of the month, according to the oil ministry.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan said Monday that he had to make “difficult decisions” to protect the economy as he announced sweeping fuel-saving measures, including trimming the workweek to four days for the next two months and a two-week school break.
Half the staff in both the public and private sectors, except for essential services, would work from home to save fuel, Mr. Sharif said.
Pakistan has been trying to carefully balance its relationships in the Middle East during the conflict. The billions of dollars Pakistani workers remit every year from Arab countries in the Gulf region are crucial for Pakistan’s economy. Pakistani officials have also indicated that they want to avoid a confrontation with Iran.
Mantou,
- "The article is classic BBC nonsense."
Just what I expected you to say. Like I said, I would rather trust BBC on this than Chinese propaganda. And of course, we know really well that Chinese government would never publicly acknowledge it killed ethnic minorities.
- "You are delusional. What is the lesson Operation Sindoor teaches India?"
Operation Sindoor was a limited aerial skirmish for a few days with no ground operations. If there were to be a hypothetical war between India and Bangladesh, India would be able to invade Bangladesh from three sides as it did in 1971. Bangladesh's Air Force is too small in comparison to India's and it has neither nukes or ballistic missiles. But India has no interest in occupying Bangladesh. It didn't do that in 1971 either after Pakistan's defeat.
- "Indian complains all the time about British subjugation, yet feel shameless when talking about Indian troops in Bhutan."
Like I said, India stations troops in Bhutan as per mutual agreement between Indian and Bhutanese governments. If Bhutanese government indeed wants Indian troops to leave, let them say so publicly.
- "China has no troops in Vietnam, the Philippines, or Korea and Japan."
India has no troops in Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka or Maldives either. It stations troops only in Bhutan and that too based on an agreement with its government. That means India isn't bullying them, isn't it?
- "Yeah right. India manages Sikkim's defense is like the wolf guarding the hen house."
Whatever. Sikkim was an Indian protectorate and India had been managing Sikkim's defense, foreign affairs and communications prior to 1975. And that was my point.
- "Showing Bhutan is part of India in a map published by the government of India does not mean India claims Bhutan is part of India? Really?"
Not really. As I said, the map only shows the status of Sikkim and Bhutan (prior to 1949) as Indian protectorates. The 1954 map probably wasn't updated to reflect the new status of Bhutan. Can you point out any Indian govt statements that claim Bhutan as Indian territory?
- "Here we go again. Bunch of nonsense. I have heard that some Indians claim Sanskrit is the mother of all languages. Yeah right."
I am not talking here about any claims made about Sanskrit by someone. Tibetan script is an Indic/Brahmic script derived from the Gupta script which was in use in India at the time of the Gupta empire. Devanagari script used to write "Hindi" is derived from the same Gupta script via Nagari (not Tibetan).
You can read more about this "nonsense" here:
Tibetan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_script
Nagari: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C4%81gar%C4%AB_script
Devanagari: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devanagari
Secondly, as I said "Hindi" and "Urdu" are essentially the same language irrespective of script. Turkish and Vietnamese languages did not change when they switched their writing systems to Latin-based scripts. Change in scripts don't change a language.
- "Are you telling me that a three-party document in which only two parties signed the document is considered legitimate?"
Its legitimate enough for India as India inherited the British-era agreements. The border was agreed between Tibet and British in 1914. If China or Tibet had a problem with it they had 30 years to raise it with the British government until India became independent.
- "Why is China even in the treaty if Tibet is an independent country?"
Why is Tibet there as a separate party if it was part of China? And why did Tibet sign the agreement while RoC did not? :)
Just what I expected you to say. Like I said, I would rather trust BBC on this than Chinese propaganda. And of course, we know really well that Chinese government would never publicly acknowledge it killed ethnic minorities.
How about this article by an Australian who acknowledges that the 200 victim are all Han Chinese and the killers are all Uighurs?
https://gregoryclark.net/pearlsandirritations/another-unprofessional-performance-by-four-corners-this-time-on-xinjiang/
But believe whatever you want. Indians are delusional. Indians believe their shithole country is a superpower and VishwaGuru. What can I say?
Operation Sindoor was a limited aerial skirmish for a few days with no ground operations. If there were to be a hypothetical war between India and Bangladesh, India would be able to invade Bangladesh from three sides as it did in 1971. Bangladesh's Air Force is too small in comparison to India's and it has neither nukes or ballistic missiles. But India has no interest in occupying Bangladesh. It didn't do that in 1971 either after Pakistan's defeat.
Why did you skip the part where three Rafales, an SU30, and a MIG29 were downed by the Pakistani air force in Operation Sindoor? Too embarrassing to bring it up?
Like I said, India stations troops in Bhutan as per mutual agreement between Indian and Bhutanese governments. If Bhutanese government indeed wants Indian troops to leave, let them say so publicly.
India has no troops in Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka or Maldives either. It stations troops only in Bhutan and that too based on an agreement with its government. That means India isn't bullying them, isn't it?
If India has the ability, it would certainly station troops in these countries. India stationed troops in Bhutan because it has territorial design on Bhutan, just like Sikkim.
Whatever. Sikkim was an Indian protectorate and India had been managing Sikkim's defense, foreign affairs and communications prior to 1975. And that was my point.
If India's real intention is really for Sikkim's defense, it can certainly do so without gobbling it up. Use China as an example, Sikkim was overrun by the Nepalese Gurkha in the 18th century, and China expelled the Gurkha and restored Sikkim's sovereignty and independence. China could have gobbled up Sikkim, but didn't. Protecting a country by gobbling it up is the height of hypocrisy.
Not really. As I said, the map only shows the status of Sikkim and Bhutan (prior to 1949) as Indian protectorates. The 1954 map probably wasn't updated to reflect the new status of Bhutan. Can you point out any Indian govt statements that claim Bhutan as Indian territory?
The map shows Sikkim and Bhutan are within the thick purple line, which according to the map legend, the thick purple line denotes international boundary. It cannot be clearer on that. The map is the government statement because it is an official map published by the government of India. This is not some stupid Akhand Bharat map created by some retarded in India.
You can read more about this "nonsense" here:
Tibetan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_script
Nagari: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C4%81gar%C4%AB_script
Devanagari: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devanagari
Wikipedia is hardly an authoritative source. It can be edited by anybody.
Secondly, as I said "Hindi" and "Urdu" are essentially the same language irrespective of script. Turkish and Vietnamese languages did not change when they switched their writing systems to Latin-based scripts. Change in scripts don't change a language.
When did I say they are different languages? I used the term "written language" to differentiate from vernacular. I could have used the term script instead of "written language". My point is that the Hindi script was created by the British using the Tibetan alphabet.
Its legitimate enough for India as India inherited the British-era agreements. The border was agreed between Tibet and British in 1914. If China or Tibet had a problem with it they had 30 years to raise it with the British government until India became independent.
Do you really believe in what you just said? Even your former master, the British, considered the agreement void, and this is the reason in the British government official records, the Aitchisons Treaties, it specifically stated that the Simla Conference was a failure.
Read this article:
https://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article2582.html
Here is the relevant passage:
"The failure, indeed fiasco, of the Simla Conference must have left the forward school frustrated, perhaps abashed, certainly leaderless. The Outer Line continued to form Indias north-eastern border with Tibet/China, and the collapse of the new-born Republic of China into war-lordism and civil war meant that the sense of potential threat to India from that quarter faded away. There was no McMahon Line except as a marking in red ink on map sheets filed away in the Potala in Lhasa and the Foreign Departments archives in Delhi. After a few years it was forgotten, indeed the very idea lapsed from the institutional memory of the Indian Government. Its only trace was a curt entry in the 1929 issue of the governments official record, Aitchisons Treaties, listing the failure at Simla with the sentence: The Chinese Government refused to permit their plenipotentiary to proceed to full signature [of a tripartite agreement]"
Why is Tibet there as a separate party if it was part of China? And why did Tibet sign the agreement while RoC did not? :)
In case you don't know, the British was an expansionist and tried to grab land from the Tibetans and pressured the Tibetans into conceding land to the British Raj. China refused to allow the British to unilaterally enter into any agreement with Tibet because it considers Tibet part of China. The British relented, and hence a Tripartite conference was held. The British used duplicities to induce a Tibetan delegate to sign the agreement. China held its ground and refused to sign the agreement. The British acknowledged China's refusal, and hence in the British official record, the Aitchisons Treaties, it was noted that the Simla conference was a failure.
Let me repeat, the British regard the Simla conference as a failure because, in the British own words, "The Chinese Government refused to permit their plenipotentiary to proceed to full signature."
"And of course, we know really well that Chinese government would never publicly acknowledge it killed ethnic minorities."
If only Indians extend the same kind of empathy to their fellow countrymen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrsSm2_BWpI
https://markmanson.net/a-dust-over-india
India is really a cancerous tumor among the communities of nations because of its primitive culture.
"If China or Tibet had a problem with it they had 30 years to raise it with the British government until India became independent."
The Republic of China (ROC) did, it repeatedly protested to the British Raj of its incursion. In 1944, when the British invaded Dirang Dzong, both the ROC and the Lhasa government protested to the British. In fact, the ROC has sent diplomatic representations to the British at least four times. When India was created in 1947, the Tibetan Lhasa Government dispatched a formal request to New Delhi, asking the newly independent Indian Government to withdraw all its predecessors' intrusions into the territory between the McMahon Line and the traditional border beneath the foothills and return a wide swath of territory from Ladakh to Assam, including Sikkim and the Darjeeling district.
Chris Murphy 🟧
@ChrisMurphyCT
I was in a 2 hour briefing today on the Iran War. All the briefings are closed, because Trump can't defend this war in public.
I obviously can't disclose classified info, but you deserve to know how incoherent and incomplete these war plans are.
1/ Here's what I can share:
https://x.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/2031531835453309125?s=20
--------
2/ Maybe the lead is that the war goals DO NOT involve destroying Iran's nuclear weapons program. This is, uh...surprising...since Trump says over and over this is a key goal.
But then of course we already know air strikes can't wipe out their nuclear material.
https://x.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/2031531836816359851?s=20
-----------
Chris Murphy 🟧
@ChrisMurphyCT
3/ Second, they confirmed "regime change" is also NOT on the list. So, they are going to spend hundreds of billions of your taxpayer dollars, get a whole bunch of Americans killed, and a hardline regime - probably a MORE anti-American hardline regime - will still be in charge.
https://x.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/2031531838234128525?s=20
-----------
Chris Murphy 🟧
@ChrisMurphyCT
4/ Ok, so what ARE the goals? It seems, primarily, destroying lots of missiles and boats and drone factories.
But the question that stumped them: what happens when you stop bombing and they restart production?
They hinted at more bombing. Which is, of course, endless war.
https://x.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/2031531839685267787?s=20
----------------
Chris Murphy 🟧
@ChrisMurphyCT
5/ And on the Strait of Hormuz, they had NO PLAN. I can't go into more detail about how Iran gums up the Strait, but suffice it say, right now, they don't know how to get it safely back open.
Which is unforgiveable, because this part of the disaster was 100% foreseeable.
https://x.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/2031531841048432911?s=20
Vineeth,
"So, India holding a "sham referendum" (in your words)....
Have you ever read a book on Sikkim's merger or even an article, or even talked to a person from Sikkim about it. The whole saga is quite well documented. "Smash and Grab" is a great book to start with. The results of were 97.5% in favor of India, these are the results that Saddam Hussains and Husni Bubaraks of the world get. Even Morarji Desai called annexation an immoral and unjust act.
https://countercurrents.org/2025/05/annexation-of-sikkim-remembered-50-years-later/
Former Indian intelligence officer RK Yadav’s book “Mission R&AW” published in 2014, in which Yadav has revealed inside information about the workings of the Indian intelligence agency.
On page 263 of the book, Yadav writes: “[Rameshwar Nath] Kao [founding chief of RAW] told me that after the merger of Sikkim, he had a plan to disintegrate the Tarai area of Nepal because of the increasing presence of China there much to the discomfiture of the Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. He foresaw the Maoist menace to India in 1973 which is now posing a serious security threat to India. However, the merger of Tarai of Nepal was deferred in view of political turmoil in India when Indira Gandhi declared an emergency in India in 1975 just after the merger of Sikkim with the Indian Union….Unfortunately, when elections were held in 1977, Indira Gandhi was defeated and her party did not come to power and Kao’s operation of merging Tarai and other assignments did not materialise.”
Here is the definition of expansionist policy:"An expansionist policy involves a nation or entity aggressively increasing its territorial, economic, or geopolitical influence through mechanisms like colonization, military conquest, or economic stimulation. It is used in foreign policy to acquire resources and land,..."
"India always existed as a distinct cultural realm ruled by different empires and kingdoms at different points of time."
Do you mind telling us enthnically, linguistically, culturally and religiously what is common between you and a Punjabi Sardar?
G. Ali
Mantou,
- "How about this article by an Australian who acknowledges that the 200 victim are all Han Chinese and the killers are all Uighurs?"
May I ask what business China has Xinjiang and Tibet since neither Uighurs nor Tibetans are "Chinese"?
Also from the same article:
"And Chinese authorities sometimes are not gentle in their crackdowns, even with their own citizens, as we saw in recent Covid lockdowns. If they could imprison their own citizens for months on end to exterminate the Covid danger, is it too surprising if they set out harshly to suppress all and any suspected hints of Uyghur separatism in the wake the 2019 killings? Nor should it be surprising that if they are going to lock up suspected separatists for extended periods then they will also use the chance to teach them Chinese."
Indian govt doesn't have a policy of forcing "Hindi" down the throat of India's ethnic and linguistic groups, which is perhaps why China has one official language for over 1 billion people while India has 22.
Also, can you tell me what really happened in Tiananmen square in 1989 during "June Fourth incident"?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre
- "Why did you skip the part where three Rafales, an SU30, and a MIG29 were downed by the Pakistani air force in Operation Sindoor? Too embarrassing to bring it up?"
Nothing about embarassment. Its irrelevant to the topic. "Operation Sindoor" wasn't a war or invasion. The May 7 operation was a limited strike by Indian jets on terror infrastructure belonging to LeT and JeM on Pakistani soil in retaliation to the massacre of tourists by terrorists in Kashmir. It wasn't intended as a strike on Pakistani military and India did not target Pakistani military installations or its air defense systems in that initial strike. It was only after Pakistan shot down Indian jets that conflict expanded in scope with both sides striking each other's military installations. But even then there was never a ground war and there was never any attempt by India to invade or occupy Pakistani territory.
Therefore "Operation Sindoor" has no relevance on the original question of whether India can occupy Bangladesh, Bhutan or Nepal. Unlike Pakistan, all three of these countries are surrounded by India on their three sides and none of them have a large military capable of withstanding an Indian ground invasion. But with the exception of Kashmir dispute with Pakistan India has no claims on territories under the control of its neighbours and has no reason to invade them.
- "If India has the ability, it would certainly station troops in these countries. India stationed troops in Bhutan because it has territorial design on Bhutan, just like Sikkim."
If India had territorial designs on Bhutan, it would already be an Indian state. It has long stationed troops on Bhutanese soil, remember? :)
Also, India has stationed troops for a period in northern Sri Lanka as IPKF. But as in the case of Bhutan that was again as per an agreement with the Sri Lankan government to monitor a ceasefire and disarm the Tamil rebels. India withdrew the troops when SL government asked for it. No territorial designs there was well. Indian troops had invaded and occupied East Bengal together with Mukti Bahini rebels during 1971 war. After the surrender of Pakistani troops and the proclamation of Bangladesh as a new country, India withdrew its troops from Bangladesh's territory.
- "If India's real intention is really for Sikkim's defense, it can certainly do so without gobbling it up."
Do you have any reason to believe that Sikkimese resent being part of India or that they are pining for independence? Sikkim continues to have its own government to manage its internal affairs as before and there is no separatist movement to speak of.
Mantou,
- "The Republic of China (ROC) did, it repeatedly protested to the British Raj of its incursion."
Then ROC or Tibet should have settled the issue with the British government. No point in blaming independent India for inheriting the borders and treaties that British authorities left behind.
"..and return a wide swath of territory from Ladakh to Assam, including Sikkim and the Darjeeling district."
Oh! So it isn't just Ladakh, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh, they need Assam and Darjeeling too! :) I can understand China's frustration at not being able to control the "five fingers of Tibet", but that's how it is.
- "Wikipedia is hardly an authoritative source. It can be edited by anybody."
Then go ahead and read any trusted academic source on languages and scripts and read for yourself where the Tibetan and Devanagari scripts came from.
- "My point is that the Hindi script was created by the British using the Tibetan alphabet."
Absurd, laughable and ludicrous are the terms that come to my mind when I read this. Tibetan script is Indic/Brahmic and is based on the Gupta script from India. Devanagari script used to write Hindi, Nepali and several other north Indian languages derive from the same Gupta script via the Nagari script. Nothing to do with Tibetan which is a different derivative of Gupta.
Perhaps you need to ask yourself why Tibetans have long been using an Indic script rather than Chinese script to write their language.
- "The map is the government statement because it is an official map published by the government of India.".
I repeat. That map was published in 1954 and shows Bhutan as an Indian protectorate like Sikkim. Until 1949 Bhutan was an Indian protectorate. Take any modern official Indian maps published after that period and tell me if it shows Bhutan as Indian territory or Indian govt sources makes any claim of Bhutan as Indian territory.
- "Do you really believe in what you just said? Even your former master, the British, considered the agreement void.."
As I said repeatedly, India inherited the borders as defined by the British government at the time of independence. Neither Tibet nor Chinese government had any territorial control south of MacMahon Line or in Ladakh at the time of Indian independence.
- "India is really a cancerous tumor among the communities of nations because of its primitive culture."
You first acknowledged India as a distinct "civilization" and now you say this. I would never make such racist, vitriolic, xenophobic or hate-filled comment against any country or its culture, however backward, poor or under-developed it may be. And I greatly respect Chinese "civilization" for its rich cultural heritage, and the economic progress modern China it has made in the last few decades (even if I am not a fan of its political system). However, the above statement you have made is nothing but a reflection of your own mindset and your comments doesn't deserve any further reply from me. From my end, I consider this discussion closed.
Vineeth,
"So, India holding a "sham referendum" (in your words)....
Have you ever read a book on Sikkim's merger or even an article, or even talked to a person from Sikkim about it. The whole saga is quite well documented. "Smash and Grab" is a great book to start with. The results of were 97.5% in favor of India, these are the results that Saddam Hussains and Husni Mubaraks of the world get. Even Morarji Desai called annexation an immoral and unjust act.
https://countercurrents.org/2025/05/annexation-of-sikkim-remembered-50-years-later/
Former Indian intelligence officer RK Yadav’s book “Mission R&AW” published in 2014, in which Yadav has revealed inside information about the workings of the Indian intelligence agency.
On page 263 of the book, Yadav writes: “[Rameshwar Nath] Kao [founding chief of RAW] told me that after the merger of Sikkim, he had a plan to disintegrate the Tarai area of Nepal because of the increasing presence of China there much to the discomfiture of the Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. He foresaw the Maoist menace to India in 1973 which is now posing a serious security threat to India. However, the merger of Tarai of Nepal was deferred in view of political turmoil in India when Indira Gandhi declared an emergency in India in 1975 just after the merger of Sikkim with the Indian Union….Unfortunately, when elections were held in 1977, Indira Gandhi was defeated and her party did not come to power and Kao’s operation of merging Tarai and other assignments did not materialise.”
Here is the definition of expansionist policy: "An expansionist policy involves a nation or entity aggressively increasing its territorial, economic, or geopolitical influence through mechanisms like colonization, military conquest, or economic stimulation. It is used in foreign policy to acquire resources and land,..."
"India always existed as a distinct cultural realm ruled by different empires and kingdoms at different points of time."
Do you mind telling us enthnically, linguistically, culturally or religiously what is common between you and a Punjabi Sardar?
G. Ali
"May I ask what business China has Xinjiang and Tibet since neither Uighurs nor Tibetans are "Chinese"?"
Who told you they are not Chinese? They certainly considered themselves Chinese. They are just not Han Chinese? Have you ever asked a Uyghur or a Tibetan in China if they don't consider themselves Chinese? They are actually more nationalistic than their Han Chinese counterpart. Listen to this podcast:
https://ppr06262023.substack.com/p/china-and-its-ethnic-policies
"Do you have any reason to believe that Sikkimese resent being part of India or that they are pining for independence? Sikkim continues to have its own government to manage its internal affairs as before, and there is no separatist movement to speak of."
Isn't this obvious? Who would want to be part of the filthiest country in the world? The problem with Indians like you is the lack of self-awareness. I can tell you that eventually Sikkim will be like the other Seven Sisters States with many separatist movements operating in its soil.
"If India had territorial designs on Bhutan, it would already be an Indian state. It has long stationed troops on Bhutanese soil, remember? :)"
India is biding its time. India's design on Bhutan cannot be more obvious because it puts Bhutan within India on its 1954 map. If India has no designs on Bhutan, it would have pulled back its troops already and also allowed Bhutan to establish diplomatic relations with China. I am sure you will say India station troops there to protect against China. Yeah right.
"Then ROC or Tibet should have settled the issue with the British government. No point in blaming independent India for inheriting the borders and treaties that British authorities left behind."
We are talking about the certified bully, the British Raj, trying to grab land from China. The British were grabbing Chinese land from the east and from the west. This is why the British grabbed Hong Kong in the east and part of South Tibet in the west. If anybody knows about British land grabbing and bullying, it should be the Indians. But Indians hate colonialism only if it is on the receiving end. If Indians can do colonialism themselves, they are all for it. This is why India is insisting that it should keep South Tibet. This is the height of hypocrisy.
"..and return a wide swath of territory from Ladakh to Assam, including Sikkim and the Darjeeling district."
Oh! So it isn't just Ladakh, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh, they need Assam and Darjeeling too! :)"
This is the request made by the Tibetan Lhasa government. I thought the Indians were on the side of the Tibetans. Why don't the Indians listen to the Tibetan Lhasa government?
" I can understand China's frustration at not being able to control the "five fingers of Tibet", but that's how it is."
Your choice of the word "control" says a lot about Indian's mentality. You will never get it. This is why India is a failed state. I can tell you that South Tibet will eventually return to China. Ladakh, Sikkim, and the rest of the northeast will gain independence because people there never want to be part of the filthiest country in the world. The northeasterners considered the desis primitive and ugly, yes, these are their words. The Dalai Lama has openly said Indians people are lazy, who knows what he said behind closed doors?
"I repeat. That map was published in 1954 and shows Bhutan as an Indian protectorate like Sikkim. Until 1949 Bhutan was an Indian protectorate. Take any modern official Indian maps published after that period and tell me if it shows Bhutan as Indian territory or Indian govt sources makes any claim of Bhutan as Indian territory."
The 1954 map shows Bhutan as part of India. This blatantly shows India has designs on Bhutan. Just because today the Indian map doesn't show that Bhutan is part of India doesn't mean India does not have designs on Bhutan anymore. India's behavior of stationing troops in Bhutan to exert a diplomatic stranglehold on Bhutan shows that India's design on Bhutan has not ceased.
"India is really a cancerous tumor among the communities of nations because of its primitive culture."
You first acknowledged India as a distinct "civilization" and now you say this. "
I said India has a distinct civilization. I never said India has an illustrious civilization. Indian civilization is distinct specifically because, unlike other civilizations, it is particularly backward and primitive. Examples like the Caste culture, Sati, bride burning, and the " might is right" mentality, to name a few. The British have tried to civilize the desi people, only to some extent. With the departure of the British for almost eight years, India has degenerated back to its pre-British condition.
Addressed Conference at top think tank, Institute of Regional Studies: ‘Akhand Bharat (Greater India) & Eretz Israel (Greater Israel) are two sides of same coin representing bigoted ideology of Hindutva & Zionism, seeking expansionism with racist & fascist mindset’!
The Petrodollar Loop Supporting the Treasury Market Is Broken - Bloomberg
By Aaron Brown
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2026-04-06/the-petrodollar-loop-supporting-the-treasury-market-is-broken
Takeaways by Bloomberg AI
The virtuous loop that has seen America underwrite stability in the Middle East in exchange for Gulf states recycling their dollar revenues into US Treasuries has been broken.
Foreign central banks have been net sellers of Treasuries for consecutive weeks, with holdings at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York dropping by roughly $82 billion to $2.7 trillion.
The US-Israeli war with Iran has fractured the petrodollar loop at both ends, with oil-importing nations selling Treasuries to limit depreciation and Gulf producers unable to export oil due to the Strait of Hormuz closure.
——————
This time, Gulf producers can’t get their oil out. The Strait of Hormuz closure has stranded their barrels along with everyone else’s.
Gulf states including Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the UAE collectively cut production by at least 10 million barrels per day in March. Saudi Arabia and the UAE can export reduced volumes through alternative pipelines. But those routes handle only about a quarter of normal Strait throughput at full capacity, and they are under active Iranian drone and missile threat. Qatar declared force majeure on exports of liquified natural gas after strikes on its Ras Laffan facility. The Gulf Cooperation Council’s economic model — export hydrocarbons, recycle into global assets — has effectively seized up.
The petrodollar loop requires two moving parts: dollars earned and dollars invested. Both have stopped.
—————
There is a longer structural story that the war is accelerating rather than creating. The share of Treasuries held by foreign investors had already fallen to around 32%, down from half in the early 2010s. Central banks became net sellers in early 2025. For the first time since 1996, global central banks now hold more gold in aggregatethan US government bonds. These were slow-moving trends, easy to dismiss as noise. The Iran war is making them look like signal.
The standard reassurance is that there is no alternative to Treasuries — no other market offers the depth, liquidity and legal infrastructure that central banks require. This remains true. Foreign central banks will not abandon Treasuries wholesale. But “no realistic alternative” and “unquestioned safe haven” are not the same thing, and the Iran war is clarifying the difference.
The flight-to-quality trade has always rested on a political premise: That in a global crisis, the United States is a stabilizer or bystander, not a combatant. But the calculus changes when the US itself is the belligerent; when the conflict is partly America’s war, driving the oil shock, straining Gulf relationships, and generating the fiscal pressure that has bond investors worried about US budget deficits. Not completely. Not permanently. But enough.
Kissinger’s 1974 deal held through the Cold War, the Gulf Wars, the financial crisis and a pandemic. It has not survived this. The petrodollar loop was always a political arrangement dressed in financial clothing. Now that the politics have changed, the finance is following.
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