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Friday, March 29, 2024

Facing Star-Dot-Star Colonialism

(This article is the final part of a 4-part series. Read Part 1Part 2 and Part 3)

Part 4: Facing Star-Dot-Star Colonialism:

In earlier parts of this series, we saw that Colonialism has adopted many forms, morphed itself under various disguises and has been gnawing away at the vitals of the Civilization and Knowledge Systems of Bharat. The colonial past has somehow managed to influence and even dictate our present. Bharat, a sovereign country, does not enjoy that sense of real freedom in society, economic development or education or even the arts.

Star-dot-Star Colonialism, a game of asymmetry, is unsustainable and needs periodic cycles of mass looting right under the nose of the public at large along with the support of helpful legislation – the instruments that give legal sanction to effect this loot. Star-dot-Star Colonialism constantly needs new players to be fielded as losers in the win-lose game and keeps introducing new variations to the heads-I-win-tails-you-lose theme through acts of engineered deception. Some acts of deception are getting more desperate: an example is the occupation of Iraq by playing the game of ‘Weapons of Mass Deception’. In the 2008 financial meltdown, caused due to widespread reckless and highly speculative gambles by some of the largest Financial Institutions, the losses were bailed out by tax payer money in a ‘Free Market’ US and Europe. This was followed by a record payout of bonuses by Wall Street – a cycle that in effect transferred hard earned wealth of tax payers into first shoring up culprits and then giving them great rewards for their culpability. Star-dot-Star Colonialism subverts justice too.

The bad news is that it will take a long while and a big global struggle for the world and Bharat to de-colonize itself. Consortiums of stakeholders, including the Sepoys recruited by Global Star-Dot-Star Colonialism Inc., are powerful and influential. They control vast resources, run a plethora of institutionalized mechanisms, manage currency & commodity markets, public opinion, produce education systems that create more colonized minds and more.

Star-Dot-Star Colonialism in all forms is parasitic in nature. Just like all parasites, Colonialism will wither under one of two situations – either after killing its hosts followed by a cannibalistic orgy of self-destruction or it will wither away if the hosts become less intimidated, more informed and better armed. This will help escalate the cost of and reduce the benefits of colonizing intended targets. At the same time, better and deeper policy analysis will help intended Targets of colonizers being forewarned of potential pitfalls.

The Star-dot-Star colonizers, under times of survival stress, have nothing to lose and gain time by inhibiting, intimidating  or even harming their target hosts for they are like terminal stage addicts willing to take desperate measures. The arm twisting and blackmailing tactics used in WTO negotiations is one such instance where predatory tactics, inducements, divide & rule, and even deception are used to create parasitic hooks while appearing to be working for the public good.

The asymmetry in WTO is a double whammy for less developed countries. While the developed countries have industrialized themselves (thanks to a long cycle of colonial looting lasting several centuries – discussed in earlier parts of this article), the less developed countries, being generally in tropical areas with much bio-diversity, have a natural competitive advantage in agriculture. However, enormous and opaque subsidies make agriculture produce from developed countries cheaper than formerly colonized countries. This prevents capital formation as well as appropriate modernization for agricultural communities in formerly colonized countries globally. Developing countries have a large majority but are kept divided skilfully. Farm subsidies are kept outside of the scope of most multi-lateral discussions even as the WTO hammers out policies for the expansion of manufactured products, technology and a narrow interpretation of Intellectual Property Rights. It wilfully ignores the engineered win-lose policies of subsidies in Agriculture that help perpetuate an unequal world.

It will be in Bharat’s interest to shake off colonial pressures by spreading awareness on a large number of such issues. Colonizers do not like the bright sunshine of awareness being cast on their acts – especially in the presence of their own constituencies. The emergence of a vibrant social media has exposed tightly controlled colonial facades and their credibility is being dented only a little bit now. To move forward, Bharat needs to urgently develop and co-opt a wide variety of intellectuals who understand the nature of Colonial mechanisms in various sectors and who can engage in the decolonization process not just in Bharat but also globally. Relying only upon a bureaucracy that has grown up with a colonial legacy and flavour to do this task alone is perhaps not an optimal solution. Neither will sections of a political class that is steeped with colonial feudalistic roots and ideologies help create policies to de-colonize Bharat.

It may sound out of place but a stark truth is that as Star-dot-Star Colonialism -a parasitic ecosystem – begins to get pinched, retaliatory acts will follow. They may even fight dirty proxy wars through recruited sepoys, mercenary fronts and even hit squads if ad-hominem attacks fail. This has been a recurring pattern in colonial history. Some instances of this – like interventions in Guatemala and Iran are mentioned in Part 2 or Iraq’s ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’ gambit mentioned earlier in the same part of the article series.

Even during times of peace, Colonizers extract powerful concessions that create the necessary conditions of asymmetry. Bharat has been a willing party to several such episodes during its history, being lulled into a false sense of security and trust. This is a deception used by Sinon in the Greek legends set around the Trojan War. The Greeks won against the Trojans not during a long ten year war but by lulling the latter into accepting a giant horse as a gift through deception. Adaptations of this deception are used to this day.[1]

Simultaneously, Bharat must shed the asymmetry model of Prithviraj Chauhan – wherein a victory over colonizers meant full pardon & free passage while a loss meant captivity, death and humiliating subjugation of an entire kingdom. In such a case, the cost of losing an attempt to colonize is insignificant compared to the benefits of realizing a victory and only serves to encourage wannabe colonizers. In more modern times, after the 1971 war, when Bharat liberated Bangladesh – the former East Pakistan from West Pakistan colonialism and genocide, Bharat did not have the will to bargain the release of over 90,000 Pakistani Army Prisoners of War captives for a settlement of Kashmir. In effect, this too was an act similar to Prithviraj Chauhan’s asymmetry which caused self-inflicted harm on Bharat. Bharat incurred enormous costs to liberate an external population from oppression, it returned an entire army of soldiers and equipment to the oppressors and it extracted zero territory eg. PoK, illegally held by the oppressors.

Such acts are signals that encourage other would be colonizers. This weak and self-defeatist approach has to be eradicated from Bharat despite the howls that may emerge from privileged, elite but colonial mindsets. Bharat must develop the strength and clarity to see through acts of desperation and fend them off in diplomacy, negotiations, during war and during peace. Bharat needs to remember that the legitimate use of force is an integral part of Dharma.

It is worth quoting what Will Durant wrote when he ended the chapter “The Muslim Conquest of India” and the tragic destruction of much art, knowledge and culture of an ancient civilization:

“…The bitter lesson that may be drawn from this tragedy is that eternal vigilance is the price of civilization. A nation must love peace, but keep its powder dry.”[2]

Bharat’s past track record over the last millennium has been one that enabled it to get colonized, for it succumbs to a variety of win-lose games being played out even as it depleted itself perilously towards extinction on a variety of planes. In recent times, its refusal of a UNSC seat, its tame capitulation when China occupied Tibet and then the Aksai Chin area and its lack of resolve to handle illegal immigration from Bangladesh are some examples where it has shown a willingness to engage in win-lose scenarios. This willingness has been aided by a weakening moral fibre in many areas despite history bearing witness to outstanding figures who bucked this trend.

Failure to recognize this and the inherent asymmetry that the leadership of Bharat has taken at various times has to be scrutinized and analyzed as these decisions in many cases enable Star-dot-Star colonial systems. Some peculiar examples are worth recollecting here. During World War I, Bharat willingly gave to the British colonizers over a million soldiers to be a part of the Allied war efforts. A Mahatma Gandhi, the apostle of non-violence, who had issues with an independent Bharat keeping an army was strangely supportive about troop mobilization of young citizens of Bharat during both world wars. Our civilization that has encouraged human beings to even question the Gods and not consider it as an act of blasphemy must be vocal and vigilant against creeping Star-dot-Star Colonialism. They must not be used as tools and expendable ‘resources’ by Star-dot-Star colonial forces and their sepoys. A sovereign nation needs to first have citizens with a strong sense of self-sovereignty.  This in itself is not a trivial yagna. To be performed it calls for enormous tyaga and tapa. However, this is one of the key points that will stop the haemorrhaging drain of wealth from Bharat and help in the transformation of the region and the world.

The Star-dot-Star Colonial model and its sepoys serve the cause of a Contracting Universe of diminished wealth, opportunities and hope as they work to denigrate and then exterminate one of the last living civilizations on this planet. They see an opportunity to do so with a young population of Bharat which has been, by design, divorced from its legacy through interventions in education, economic policy making and aggressive social conversion into alien, artificial models that have been constantly collapsing while imposing high costs on humanity. In contrast, the Hindu Dharma premise based on the Brahman, which pervades and transcends the Universe, has an intrinsic property of being ever expansive and ever diversifying to create greater Consciousness, Wealth and the Well Being of all living creatures.

Bharat has to make a choice between aligning with the natural delight of an Expanding Universe or suffering a life-threatening suffocation of an ever diminishing Contracting Universe imposed on it by selfish, deception driven models of Star-Dot-Star Colonialism in this era.

END

Footnotes:

 [1] In the Greek Legend of the Trojan War, Sinon gained the trust of the Trojans by claiming to be an intended target of a Greek human sacrificial ritual. His deception paved the way for the Trojans to place the giant Greek horse inside their unconquered fort. For a view on this and other forms of deception one can read ‘The Education of a Speculator’ – Victor Niederhoffer, p230 (http://bit.ly/EdOfSpec-V-Niederhoffer)

[2] The Story of Civilization, Volume I, Chapter XVI, The Muslim Conquest of India, p. 463, Author: Will Durant.

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Prashant Singh
Prashant Singh
Prashant Singh is a private citizen and an independent observer of current business, social and global developments. Twitter ID: ps_009

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