Peaceful Sneaking, Part 2

Do we look like we can pronounce "Gilgit-Baltistan?"

B. Raman is having fun with this.

6. Under the heading “China Withdraws Reference to Gilgit-Baltistan as “northern Pakistan”, the correspondent of “The Hindu” of Chennai in Bejing reported as follows on September 5:

“A day after India voiced concerns to China over its reference to the disputed Gilgit-Baltistan region as a 'northern part of Pakistan', the Chinese Government withdrew its statement from its official Xinhua agency as well as from the Foreign Ministry’s web site ..."

On Saturday (September 4) the statement appeared to have been removed from the Xinhua’s web site. The link to the statement, headlined “China refutes reports of sending troops to Pakistan”, did not open. The Chinese Foreign Ministry, which in a regular briefing on Thursday (September 2) had repeated the reference to Gilgit-Baltistan as “ a northern part of Pakistan” in response to a question on the presence of Chinese troops, deleted records of both the question and its response from its official transcript, which was posted on its website on Friday (September 3)“

If the issue about semantics confuses you: Gilgit-Baltistan is in Indian territory, but Pakistan occupies it. So India doesn't like to hear China referring to the territory as "northern Pakistan."

This situation is a big mess, which can be blamed in great measure on Selig Harrison. Bad Selig! Bad for embarrassing China, Pakistan, United States, and NATO -- and India -- by blowing the whistle on Chinese troop activity in GB! These are not 7- to 11,000 Chinese soldiers in GB, Pakistan explained. These are Chinese humanitarian aid and construction workers.

At least on the surface, part of the mess is New Delhi's doing because they didn't respond when GB begged them for help during the recent flooding, which hit GB hard.

The Chinese did race in with some aid and to rebuild washed out roads and bridges -- work that's still ongoing. They did not help out of the goodness of their hearts but to protect work they were doing on large construction projects in GB.

The questions are why New Delhi sat on their hands instead of providing aid and why they had to pretend they were learning from Selig's report that thousands of PLA troops were in GB. The U.S. Department of State and the NATO command in Afghanistan might have the answers but if so I doubt they'll share them with the public.

Sorry to break this news to New Delhi but if they think Americans have turned over a new leaf since the end of the Cold War -- did they get that idea from our actions, or from hearing State jabber at them for hours on end?

Americans can't turn over a new leaf. That's because one side of the U.S. flag is stamped "Property of Saudi Arabia" and the other side is stamped "Property of China." And the fine print on the flag reads, "United States of NATO."

Haven't PM Singh and his government seen what the U.S. did to the Afghans? Stabbed those people in the back so many times they look like pin cushions. We'll do the same to the Indians if the Saudis or Chinese snap their fingers. For that matter, look at what we've done to our own troops. Yesterday, in the process of skewering Paul Krugman's economic advice, Rajeev Srinivasan observed:

[T]he US war in Afghanistan is the most Kafkaesque war I have ever seen. They pay the Pakistanis to kill Americans, in effect. Following up on Yossarian in Catch-22 I ask: "Why have the intermediary?" Why not just have the Americans shoot their own soldiers?

And this is the government India wants to take defense guidance from? Do they really think the weapons and nuke technology they buy from Americans are worth it?

Peaceful Sneaking, Part 1