If a war breaks out...

Swami Gulagulaananda preached:

"The danger of HIV is not the virus itself, but the fact that it nullifies our defense to face newer ones"

The recent terror strike in Mumbai has taken the lives of hundreds of innocent people. And
the blame game has already started, with the intelligence agencies saying that they had
warned about these attacks long back and no action or preparation came from the Mumbai
police and government to prevent this from happening. And the people at the other end of
the fingers pointed claim that no specific information was given - strikes could be
anywhere, anytime. Information too general... Well, whichever is true, the damage has
already been done. Now for the correctional measures - which several people have demanded
for, and new Home Minister, Chidambaram has made several promises which if truly
implemented will be really effective.

However, this is within the country. A lot of people have strongly felt that we should go
on a full nuke strike on Pakistan - finish that country once and for all, they won't be a
migraine anymore. Other people, including US President elect, Barack Obama feel that
striking the terror camps on Pakistan is a better solution. It will be like helping
Pakistan get rid of terrorists. Just perform rapid air strikes on Pakistan, and before you
know it, it will be cleared of its nuisance (and ours)

But it is not as easy as it sounds, for surely, Pakistan will retaliate. And they will
start mobilising their troops from the Western border to the eastern, towards India.
Several people feel that this is exactly the idea of the Taliban, because fewer soldiers on
the west means that they can fight better. Some people feel that this is the idea of ISI so
that increased troops near India, means increased infiltration.

Now suppose a war does break out between India and Pakistan, India will surely win, no
doubt about it, just like it has happened several times before. However, there will major
disadvantages because of this war. One, several lives will be lost. Two, the economy will
fall back, and we will be a little behind than what we are now... This means that we will
be much behind China, which as of now is a silent spectator. China's economy will continue
to grow, while we are a going behind due to the war. And in the future, we will be up
against a far stronger enemy, and we will be weaker than what we should be to fight them.

Another aspect is - India will not suffer a major setback if the USA and the UK assist
India in this. But this is doubtful as USA needs Pakistan's help to curb issues in
Afghanistan, and also needs its troops there. So, their help might be minimal.

The only probable way that everything will go fine - with USA and UK assisting India
without us suffering a major setback would be if Taliban takes over Pakistan which they
have threatened to do. If that happens, then that country will truly become a rogue nation,
and the western powers will have no choice for the sake of their own safety, as for India,
whoever is ruling Pakistan, military or democracy, elements from that country have been a
perinneal threat.

Our objective would have to be to get rid of these rogue elements only - Pakistan, as a
country I doubt would be involved in this. This would be the work of ISI and terrorists. We
should therefore strike at these terror camps, therefore not affecting Pakistan, not
inviting a war and therefore rendering us stronger to stand up against China. New
technology that is being developed should be inducted as soon as possible - Like anti
missile weapons etc. to prevent pre-emptive strikes, nuclear or otherwise. We need to
develop far more aggressively, and should suppress our urge to fight on communal lines, for
now, we need to stay united as a nation.

Also, we should learn to be more security conscious, our police needs to be upgraded in
terms of training and weapons, our reconnaissance improved... India has the best cameras on
satellites in the world. Still we are not using it to guard our borders effectively. We can
see upto a metre very clearly Anything suspicious could be quickly captured. Also, with
advancements in Digital Image Processing, human intervention can be removed, and the
computer itself should be capable of reporting suspicious behaviour, like unknown boats,
ships arriving. If we have the will to do it, we can do anything, not a big deal. We have
the best brains in the world. Another approach I feel would be to have communities like the
open source, where people volunteer and provide small bits of help, which when put together
will form a large powerful system. Where they can help, and how? Well, this is left for you
to ponder about... But the borrom line is - we need to brace against probable future
threats or attacks from China which is a bigger danger than Pakistan which can be defeated
relatively easily. For China has more people, better technology, larger land and greater
clout and will.