The Real Hero.

How do you define greatness of a person? Who do we think is worth enough to be called a Hero? Is it that he – as a leader - survived toughest time of the history ? If that’s the case, what is the definition of ‘toughest time’? Is it that he lead the nation to the dizzying height of the success? Then, in that case, what is the definition of the ‘success’?. Or is it that he – as a leader - astutely lead an already established empire and succeeded in maintaining the hegemony? Of course, the definition tough times or success will vary drastically according to the time and situation. More ever, the society that person belongs to also play important role in shaping the nature of greatness of a person. Apart from being brave, intelligent and inspiring, that person not only needs to be on the winning side in order for the world to understand his greatness, but also the nation that he commanded and voiced needs to understand the consequence of his deeds for it be immortalized. There are number of examples where the extremely gifted people failed to grab the attention and ended up surrendering meekly to the unresponsive, pathetic and regressive society.

Thus it is quite hard to pinpoint exact reason behind greatness of a particular personality as time, situation and society plays great role in shaping a personality. Having said that, there are some common traits in great people – whether he is a political leaders, military general, ideologues or philosopher - who change the course of the history and future of the lackadaisical society drastically. That person is a rebel at the core because the ability to question the contemporary practices is a necessary first step towards revolutionizing the society. But Revolution doesn’t mean complete destruction of reigning social structure and forceful imposition of ‘new’ ideas because such a charade always fails. The genius of a great person becomes evident at the way he seamlessly institutionalizes his revolutionary ideas with contemporary social structure. The process of social change is usually very slow. And a leader understands this shortcoming of the society and yet manages to inject the vigor and confidence in the society. It is not that he is undefeated in all the contests. But he understands the nature of the defeat better than other looser. He learns from his mistakes and make sure that he doesn’t repeat the same mistake. At the end of the day – by hook or crook - he emerges victorious because of tremendous confidence and unflinching conviction in the cause.

To certain extent, heroes of the one society can be villains for the other. But then there are some deeds that transcendence the political and cultural boundaries. Such examples are quite rare. These people make cause more important than their persona. The rallying cry is the necessity to take action rather than personal whim. The result is counted on the basis of its effect on the cause rather than personal success. And, that’s precisely make them stand out among the other leading minds of the history. These great people attain higher degree of success even after their death. Because during their life time they rear such high quality of talent and imbibe the next generation with quintessential philosophy, that the next generation not only further the cause but take the success to the next level. Their legacy continue to live for hundreds of years and when ever society finds itself confused and under siege, these great people act like a bacon of hope the lost generations.

Such heroes are quite rare. And, in the last thousand years of Indian history, only Shivaji fits all the criteria described above.

Iraq : Now What?

The recent reports about U.S. pulling out the troops from the Iraq all together or at least, not increasing the troop level is depressing as well as sickening. The common arguments in pulling out troops goes like this - One, US has no business of being in the Iraq at first place and we need to pull out of Iraq as soon as possible. Second, US is the rallying point for the Jihadist in the middle-east and if US disappears from the scene then the budding jihadist movement will fizzle out. And, third one - the most inane one amongst the others - is that Iraq war is hurting US economy and war expenditure is burdening the US budget.

So, let's deal with each of these three points one by one.

I partially agree with the first point. US should have never invaded Iraq. They should have attacked Iran or Pakistan (or better Saudi Arabia). Iran is soon going to emerge as te spokesperson for all the terrorist attack around the world, whether the jihadist like it or not. And Iran with its huge oil reservior is going to hold world economy at the ransom. If they get the nuclear weapons then the scenario is going to be worst than expected. So, it would have been prudent to root out the evil in its childhood. Of course, Iran would have provided the stiff resistance but defeating them would have been worth every penny spent and every life lost. About Pakistan - to say anything against this cancerous country would be an understatement.

Second, US was a rallying point for the Jihadist for long time. Way before the Iraq war. Remember the September 11 attack ? It happened before Iraq war ! In any case it makes sense to engage enemy in their own backyard. And, even if US did leave Iraq, the Jihadist movement will gain strength because they will project US exit as their victory. Also, the current violence in Iraq is the result of infighting between Shia’s and Sunnis rather between US army and Muslims. It may sound preposterous but US seems to more like a bystander in the gory play between Iraqi Shia’s and Sunnis.

Third, Is Iraq war really hurting the economy? I mean China and India are on the roll here And, all the economic indicators in the domestic US economy are positive with corporate profit are over the roof. (and so are the corporate pay checks ! ) And, If unemployment and poverty level is increasing in US in last few years then it has more to do with Bush governments domestic policies than foreign policies.

But the concerns that are raised against the war stems from the fact that most of their American citizens refuse to believe that their country is indeed a superpower. They have to understand that they are the sole superpower in the world and with characteristic traits like - tremendous military expenditure, insatiable consumer appetite for everything and insurmountable habit of the political class to meddle into the internal matters of other countries – they (America) for all practical purposes are an empire.

And, to maintain an empire i.e. to maintain the higher level of living standard and continuous growth, they have to invade – physically or financially - other countries in order to grab and secure the valuable and limited natural resources. I mean, that’s what empires do.

The Bush government media relations are quite pathetic. Bush is an extremely dumb person to begin with but more ever, they advertised, marketed and executed this war quite shabbily. If US government balking under the pressure from the opposition party, decides to bolt from the Iraq, not only Muslim terrorist wreck havoc across the globe but US will cease to be an empire.

In any case, given a choice between US and Saudi fuckers or knuckle head like Ahmadinejad, dominating the Oil resources, I will always choose the US.