Army Vs AntiNationals

It is one thing to constantly gripe about the GOI, our systems or even PM Narendra Modi. Those remain within the realms of our internal squabbles and politics. To me, anti-nationals are those who strengthen the hands of our enemies. Enemies that have sworn to destroy India. You could call them “Misologists”. They have a predominant hatred for reason, logic and knowledge. So much that these anti-nationals would even go to the extent of distrusting a public statement by our Army DGMO over the surgical strikes at terror-camps across the LOC on September 29.

Conspiracy theories have been around us for ages. For decades many Americans have claimed the moon-landing in 1969 was a hoax. That the whole moon-landing thing was faked and choreographed in New Mexico just to show US was ahead of USSR in its space programme. There are many in the US that claimed 9/11 was orchestrated by their own govt to benefit the military-business-oil complex. There are also theories and documents claimed that Franklin Roosevelt knew about the Pearl Harbour attack but allowed it to happen so that US could join the war.

In India we have many conspiracy theories about the death of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and Lal Bahadur Shastri. Belief in these theories depend a lot on how much damage it can politically cause. In the case of 9/11, many in Al Qaeda and in Pakistan claimed the conspiracy theories as evidence that the US bombed itself. Not very differently, there were those in India who were tweeting about the “timing” of the Uri attacks claiming it was timed just before the UNGA. Conveniently, Pak too picked up on these theories to claim the Uri attack was orchestrated by GOI. Post the surgical strikes, the usual suspects and Paki stooges in India were quiet for a while. But they couldn’t hold on too long to rake up bogus issues for their darling sponsors. Here’s among the worst of the lot:

And promptly the Paki Tribune carries Kejriwal’s soundbite to further their claim of “Zero loss” like one of our politicians did over the 2G scam. AK is famous for indirectly defending Paki terrorists, be it the Batla guys or Kashmiri terrorists or the current LOC issues. He claims Pak is indulging in propaganda so govt should clarify. Since when is Paki propaganda new to us? And who are those fuelling Paki propaganda through their utterances in India? We have known them long enough. And in the current case, AK found a great opportunity to cover up AAPs rapes, molestations, scams and corruption by throwing a spanner in the integrity and record of our Army. Gaurav Sawant points out who are the junket-loving foreign journalists sponsored by Pak to carry out fake stories:

The Indian Army is not a “terrorist army” that operates like the Pak army. Our army would not carry out acts that it won’t own up. Immediately after the strikes our DGMO Lt. Gen. Ranbir Singh called up his Paki counterpart to inform him of what action was taken. Pak too claimed it had lost soldiers:

The Pakis closed airspace at multiple locations fearing the surgical strike. They were quite aware of the possibility but not the surprise surgical attack. To echo AK were none other than Congis and media stooges. Here’s one who thinks GOI should share evidence with these ranters as if they have some divine entitlement to it.

Yes, according to Shekhar Gupta, the GOI should share evidence with the same people who bat for Pak and separatists and ensure more info is leaked to Pakis. The anti-nationals in India pose as big a danger to our security and army as do the Paki terrorists. Even Nawaz Sharif threatened action against India after the strikes. He called an emergency Cabinet-meet and also an emergency parliament session to deal with the situation. The message has been clearly sent to Pak that Indian army and GOI will no more tolerate terrorism and it needs to send the same message to the anti-nationals. Much to the chagrin of these army-haters, an Indian Express article carried more info on the strikes based on eye-witnesses across LOC:

The IE article by Praveen Swami (a normally cynical person when it comes to our army and PM Modi) writes about multiple terror-camps destroyed by our army. The article also grandly claims IE also had “classified documents” to support the content. I am sure this is a bogus claim and I doubt Swami or IE have any classified documents with them. The article is based on eye-witness accounts across the LOC. Politically, the Congress, AAP and other similar elements were baying against ModiSarkar for action against Pak. But now that some action has been taken they are disturbed to find it is true and for the first time the Central govt has acted firmly. So what do the Congis do? They put out a grand claim that they too carried out surgical strikes. Somewhat laughable! Is this some kind of political competition?

And what kind of surgical strikes did the Congis carry out where they claim to have lost more Indian soldiers than Pak soldiers? This is absurd to say the least. Former DGMO Vinod Bhatia was quick to reject the Congi claims. He even stated there were no strikes at all. That is more plausible. Remember, it was Rahul Gandhi who grandly said his party “supported the BJP during Kargil”. As if the Congress was doing a big favour to a political party rather than standing with the country and our army. Other than these political and activists there are duffers in Bollywood who claim movies make people-to-people contact and improve relations. Enough of this sick nonsense! It improves nothing except fatten their wallets a bit more. That we have such pathetic people in this country should be a warning on how many battles the GOI and patriots have to fight. Take a look at this guy:

Indians will suffer? For not watching some stupid movie? I would rather the movie bombed and went into a severe loss for such stupid utterances by Bollywood creeps. And the guy writing that article is none other than a film distributor. So no matter what, he gives two hoots about dead soldiers or our army but issues stupid warnings about some dumb movie. While these anti-nationals are the ones that Pak relies on heavily to propagate their nonsense there is definitely something that our army too needs to learn. They issue statements to avoid posting sensitive information on SM but who is it they take along to sensitive territories with Jawans issuing statements when they shouldn’t be even talking to someone who has no interest other than presenting the Pak POV and has a dubious record of hailing terrorists like Burhan Wani:

Well, now if the terrorists didn’t get the idea yet then they can get it from Barkha’s tweet about using the Chenab river to carry out some terror attacks. Time and again Army allows Barkha to hobnob with the Jawans or even senior officers from our Armed forces escort her here and there at military programmes. This is a serious danger and journalists should stop being allowed anywhere near army or conflict zones. The GOI needs to be slammed for such acts of indiscretion and not for demands of evidence of Army strikes across LOC. The Indian Army is one of the finest in the world with great traditions and history. Any sane and reasonable Indian would put his or her faith in what the senior officials of the Army put out as public statements over conflicts and surgical strikes. Cartoonists say it well when they show who stands on whose side when it comes to Pakistan:

A lot more can be said about the anti-nationals who bat for Pakistan. What comforts me, is that our army is winning and that is all. The surgical strike in September cannot and should not be called “revenge”. It is not. It should be described as merely a small “retribution” for years of terrorism by Pak and should the need arise more strikes to follow till Pakistan comes to senses as also their stooges in India. 

Shekhar Gupta Lays An Egg

General Douglas MacArthur was easily one of the most powerful army generals there ever was. He was the youngest Chief of Staff of the US Army. He was the one that oversaw the surrender of Japan in 1945 as WWII ended. For many years he was effectively the ruler of Japan. He was Field Marshall of the Philippine army as also the Supreme Commander of the Southwest Pacific area. In 1951, in a continuing confrontation with his boss, President Harry Truman, he was fired. Gen. MacArthur remains a celebrated hero in the US. Parks and monuments are named after him. Stories about him are told in classrooms. Songs have been written and sung about him. Films have been made about him.

Gen. MacArthur left the army in honour. But if you go by the imagination of the likes of Shekhar Gupta the general would have conducted strange manoeuvres to battle the President instead of leaving and almost staged a coup. Maybe he would have even declared himself permanent emperor of Japan and Philippines This is what journalism has fallen to at the Indian Express. Turning incidents of ‘un-notified’ troop movement into fear-mongering and misleading the nation to believe there was grave danger of a coup. We will come to all of that in a bit.

Before you proceed maybe you would like to look up a bit of history. Here are some posts on this site about Gupta’s passionate skulduggery for the Congress party. ‘Shekhar Gupta's Summer Freeze’, ‘Shekhar Gupta - Doctoring & Nursing The Congress’ and ‘Saving Shekhar’s Indian Express’. Nobody can recall how a newspaper that was famous for its bold anti-establishment stance and standing up for freedom of the press has come to be a doormat for a political party. In the recent past Gupta and his pitiful rag, including writers like Tavleen Singh, have done hit jobs on anyone that has had a confrontation with the Congress-UPA govt. This includes Anna Hazare and Team Anna, particularly Kiran Bedi, Baba Ramdev and now comes the turn of the Army chief Gen.VK Singh.

So today, April 4, the Indian Express splashes a front page story with screaming headlines: “The January night Raisina Hill was spooked: Two key Army units moved towards Delhi without notifying Govt.” This is about the night of January 16 when the Army chief and the govt. were in a confrontation over the General’s age issue. On January 16 the army chief had filed a petition in the Supreme Court in the issue of his date of birth. Strange co-incidence at best you might say. What’s the story? Intel agencies reported an unexpected, un-notified movement by key military units, from infantry units based in Hisar (Haryana) in the direction of Delhi, about 150 km away. Following this, there was a flurry of activities in the defence department with even a Defence Secretary being recalled from a foreign tour. That the troops were stopped outside Delhi. To add to the drama, as IE states: “..The situation changed rapidly, though. Reports came in of yet another military movement “towards” Delhi. This unit was identified as a large element of the airborne 50 Para Brigade based at Agra”. The govt. didn’t know and according to the IE report army spokesperson had clarified that these were routine exercises.

But the mischief is not in the event or the incident of January 16 itself. The mischief is in the headline of IE, especially when read in the background of recent bad-blood between the Army and the Defence Ministry and the govt. It clearly led all other news outlets and the general public to believe that there was a possible ‘coup’ attempt that night. Clever! And throughout the day news channels have been busy discussing if it was indeed a coup attempt and what could have been the possible outcomes of such troop movements. Somewhere in his dark, dusty office at the IE building in Delhi Shekhar Gupta and his co-writers of the article, Ritu Sarin and Pranab Samanta must have had a good laugh over having fooled everybody, including their competitors. And if all that wasn’t enough you will have Sagarika Ghose, India’s best Defence expert, debating if reporting on ‘sensitive’ matters relating to the Army is  ‘anti-national’ on her show FTN on CNN-IBN. Bravo!

So what exactly was the motive for Shekhar Gupta’s mischief? Let’s read the opening lines of his article: “This is a story you would tell with extreme care and caution. But it so starkly characterises the current state of top-level politico-military relations that it is a folly to keep it under wraps, as the entire establishment has tried to do for a full 11 weeks now”. So you read that and tighten your belts to read the biggest scandal or potential threat. But the article hits the peak in the first few lines and then its downhill all the way. For all the experts who speculated on a possible coup the IE cleverly doesn’t even mention the word even once. That is great trickery at its best because it leaves so much to your imagination. At a press conference reporters even asked A.K. Antony if there were threats of a coup and he dismissed the IE report as ‘baseless’. The PM dismissed the IE report as ‘alarmist’ and TimesNow had to call in expert Mahroof Raza to explain the coup possibilities. In his usual candid assessment Raza dismissed the possibilities as ‘nonsense’ without actually saying so. Another past senior army officer called the report “planted by anti-national elements”. I would tend to agree with him. So essentially the IE article was sensationalism at best and utter nonsense at worse. Other than the spooky headline there is actually nothing in the article that is worth being alarmed.

Given that the Army chief has had confrontations with the defence ministry, there is a stinging letter by him to the PM which was leaked (and exposed by DNA), and this has resulted in the govt cutting a sorry figure in the continuing episodes, something had to be done. That seems to be the motive behind the sensational headline by Shekhar Gupta which makes it sound as if the Army had nearly run over an elected govt in India. Secondly, the article also clandestinely casts a shadow over Gen. VK Singh and makes it sound like he may have gone to the extent of over-throwing the govt on account of his fight with the govt. Of course, it doesn’t say all this in so many words but let’s you draw that conclusion. So like with Team Anna and Kiran Bedi and others Shekhar Gupta attempted another hit job on the Army and the Army Chief. Unfortunately, his attempt can be best described as a ‘failed coup’.

Despite his confrontations with President Truman, Gen.MacArthur was and remains forever a very popular General. The govt. probably realised that there is little they could do with Gen. VK Singh considering the immense popularity he has acquired as he took on corruption and the corrupt in the Army. Had they so desired they could have removed Gen. Singh but not tried to dent his reputation and popularity. Instead, there has been a lot of mud-slinging against Gen. Singh from the govt. and particularly the ‘anti-national’ media. Shekhar Gupta’s ‘failed coup’ is another attempt at that and nothing more. That the entire story could be a 'plant' is further reasoned by this article in the the SundayGuardian: "Senior minister Sutradhar of coup report?"

Once upon a time the IE was the second most read newspaper in Bombay and in many other cities. It has sunk without a trace in many cities and survival against competition can only be with putting out lousy stories with screaming headlines. By evening today, Shekhar Gupta is the laughing stock of the nation. He will really have to start worrying how he spooked himself and IE. He managed to lay an egg alright. LOL! He made only one mistake – He should have called Arindam to count it before it hatched. As it stands, this has to be the worst report of the year gone terribly wrong so far.