Hari Sud’s International View

 Killer and Surveillance Drones for India. India is once again behind in acquiring Predator/Attack drones. Pakistan has acquired the Turkish Bayarktar 2 UAVs. It’s 40 personnel have already been trained in Turkey in its operation and maintenance. Two years back Pakistanis had acquired Chinese Wing Loong drones (worthless copies of the Western hardware) hence they are ahead on this newest warfare technology. Bayarktar have been proven in Armenia-Azerbaijan and in the Syrian war. Initially, Ukraine used the Bayarktar but either the Russians managed to shoot all of these down or these were withdrawn in favor of free hardware from US/NATO. India woke up late to the new war technology. Indian Marshals and generals are trained in the conventional warfare technology of Tanks, fighter jets, artillery and frontal attacks. They woke up late to the low cost drone danger from high above. The Indian drone Rustom (under development for 10 years) was not very successful. As this remains a prototy...

  Three Warmongers of the World are Leading us into World War Three very peace-loving leaders are in fact warmongers. They lead the economically powerful nations (US and China) or technical proficient and resource rich nation of Russia with the power at their disposal enough to annihilate the other two and in the process get annihilated.  The world is on brink of a nuclear war today because US cannot give up its desire to dominate Europe and the rest of the world with its money power and influence. That is unacceptable to Russia and China. This has led to war in Europe with Russia and the United States pitted against each other. It has led to global instability with oil shortages, food shortages, economic chaos and inflation reaching a forty-year high. These economic problems will worsen as the war progresses. Not only in Europe, where the war clouds have gathered, China is doing its best to start a new war in the East with a threat to invade Taiwan. It will invite US re...

 What does economic and political instability leads to in Pakistan With economic and political stability at the bottom of the barrel and floods ravaging southern Pakistan, one can always begin to speculate on what will happen in Pakistan. It probably is getting ready for a the military take over once again. Currently, foreign policy is run by the army. Pretty soon the economy will be in the hands of the military too. All they need is an excuse or an instability that develops with the failure of the civil government or the outcome of the next election, and so on. All the foreign policy changes which came to light with Pakistani Army providing co-ordinates for Zawahiri killing, US right away approving $450 million F-16 upgrade to Old and out of date Pakistani airforce, US voting to allow $6 billion IMF loan, US Ambassador’s visit to occupied Kashmir, two US coast guard vessel visiting Pakistani ports after a lapse of 6 years, Pakistani Army Chief given red carpet welcome at Pentagon ...

 Europe in the Middle of Energy Muddle Did you say that Europe is in the middle of a Gas squeeze, then I agree?  About 24% of the Europe’s Energy requirement is met with Gas piped from Russia to Germany and other central distribution points. Another 34% of Europe’s energy requirement is met by oil, 13% by Nuclear and remaining 30% is met by Coal and renewable sources. Overall, around 58% of the EU's energy needs originate from outside sources. Of this, 24% of gas is made available by Russia in a good commercial arrangement. Over the last 15 to 20 years, gas has reached the EU on multiple pipelines. Prior to Ukraine war, it was a good buddy-buddy arrangement.  The US/NATO never factored Gas supply interruption when they escalated tension in Europe, by trying to Get Ukraine into NATO. The Russian invasion of Ukraine during the spring of this year worsened the situation. If the war was a quick job and the Ukraine was forced to cease & desist from Joining NATO, then today...

 India and the Western Media. The Western media are profoundly anti-Indian. First, we imagined that it is the work of local reporters posted in India; but now it is becoming clear that the media reporters write what they are told to write by higher ups e.g. the Chief Diplomatic Correspondent of opinion maker media outlets of The New York Times or the Washington Post etc. They in fact are in touch with their governments. The same is true of all the British media outlets like the BBC, the Economist, the Guardian etc. All these media outlets have local representatives who are tasked to concentrate more on the negative aspect of India’s rapid economic advancement and or all negative aspects of India’s diversity and ethnicity. It has gone on 75 years since the British were ejected and India became neutral in international affairs. At that time, India was economically weak and the West was making fun of India’s low rate of progress. A real effort to improve relations with the West was ma...

 Chinese Threat in Himalayas Chinese are no longer a threat except third rate Author like Pravin Sawhney overstate that threat. He is selling a book not security. The Chinese have actually mastered two things, —- stealth and propaganda. They occupied a few peaks in Ladakh stealthily in 2020 and attacked an unarmed Indian party in Galwan. That they attributed it as a victory. Victory or not, India reacted strongly and started to confront Chinese at the heights with a bigger military force. Unfortunately a few politicians and China friendly media agreed with them. Chinese later were totally surprised when India stealthily occupied Kailash Heights and put their garrison at Moldo within Indian gun range. They quickly negotiated withdrawal. Other withdrawals were long conversations at the Commander's meet. One thing was clear: they were negotiating, prestige and not withdrawal. Now they knew that the Indian Army has arrived in Ladakh in strength and there is no further headway.  Th...

 Why is U.S.-India relations down? This is not the first time that relations between the United States and India have experienced problems. It has happened three times before (1954, 1981 and 2001) and every time all the diplomatic and political relationships built is allowed to take a back seat in favor military expediency. This time it is the killing of an unimportant Al Qaida leader  Ayman al-Zawahiri. Pakistan had full knowledge of his whereabouts and would tell only if $6.5 billion IMF loan is approved and $450 million military upgrade package for old and outmoded F-16 built in 1984/85 is approved. The US has thrown ten years of diplomatic effort of India-US relations reset, under the bus.  This $450 million of military assistance approved in August 2022 will make Pakistan more warlike and they will find an excuse to start another war. US diplomats all through the period 1954 till 2022 were reassuring India of great mutually beneficial trade and economic relationship ...

  UK- India Relations UK and India relations have never been cordial, not in last 75 years, although commercial business continued. UK is an ex colonial power hence it still wants to maintain its pre-eminent position at the head of the table. This was alright with the Congress Party when for 60 years they were in power. Most of its high operatives were either British graduates or were somehow connected to the British interests, hence they were soft on them. The situation changed when BJP came to power. All those British influence in politics, diplomacy and military began to decline. Modi and his cohorts were not anti British and were not their supporters either. They wished Indian brand in everything, not British brand. They began the process of decolonization slowly first by removing British trained officials in every walk of life. Most of Modi’s inner circle boys have no connection to Britain. Then came the flight of financial fugitives to Britain. Even if the British courts said...

  Is China an Adversary or Enemy of the West? It is not highly unexpected that China continues to suckle the US’s breast to stay strong and healthy but confront it wherever it can. Take, for example, China's diplomatic and political support for Russia in the Ukrainian war. It has now gone from being quasi-neutral to supporting Russia. The other example is that China came close to unleashing a war of its own during the Nancy Pelosi visit to Taiwan. It withdrew from its actions only when the US prepared to face the semi-trained Chinese military and then the Chinese withdrew.  Would that make China an enemy...? No, not yet. China exports a trillion dollars to the U.S. and Europe. They cannot afford to jeopardize that. As a result, the Chinese are certainly not enemies, but certainly become an adversary.  As an adversary, they cleverly wink at Russia to continue the war, but also shake hands with the West and continue to do business. They have shifted the Taiwan issue to the ...

 India built battlefield Drones and UAVs for China border The Turkish UAV Bayraktar gave Azerbaijan the victory over Armenia. Later same was true in Syrian war. Now in the Ukraine war in the beginning, the Russian forces were held up or destroyed by the same Turkish drone. Honestly, like it or not, but tanks, fighters and the importance of artillery will be reduced with drones/UAV. Future battles will be fought with these and fully autonomous flying objects equipped with artificial intelligence, with the ground controller sitting hundreds of kilometers away and steering them.  Finally, when the push came to shove, then the rush began in India to incorporate drones. Indian built Tapas-1 drone was tested 15 years, but then put on the back burner in favor of imports. Now the Indian armed forces have a large number of UAVs mainly of Israeli-origin, for real-time reconnaissance and precision-targeting. The air force also has Israeli Harop "killer" or Kamikaze drones that act like ...

 Bayraktar type drone in India Can the Indian military bureaucracy reorient itself to direct the country’s money from fighter jets, aircraft carriers, tanks and armored vehicles to newest fighting technologies of UAVs and artificial intelligence drones etc.? Today, the battles in Ukraine are not so much with tanks and planes, but more with missiles, drones and drones. The goal is to catch the enemy by surprise from a UAV flying at low altitude, hardly detectable and with long endurance. It has changed the nature of the war.  In the Middle East and the Ukraine wars of the last three years, UAVs have played a role. Turkey's Bayraktar-TB2 construction played a vital role in Azerbaijan's victory over Armenia. In Ukraine, Bayraktar-TB2 sold by Turkey blasted the Russian tanks and armored columns advancing towards Kiev. It is still in use and at $5 million or less a piece it is expendable.  In performance, it is nowhere close to the American MQ-9, but you can buy ten of Bayrakt...

 The US will Continue War with Russia The Americans have nothing to lose... Nothing at all, even if the war in Ukraine lasts another 10 years. It is the Ukrainians who are dying, they will continue to suffer. If anybody else who would suffer, it will be European nations who are supporting the US. In fact, the U.S. is 5,000 miles away and has provided some military support, but not enough to make a difference in the war. A similar tepid support has come from the European nations. They are more vocal while controlling the airwaves & internet, but not enough military support to make a difference. Russia has already built a land bridge from Crimean to Russia and no power either US or European can take it away from them. As a matter of fact, Crimea had been a Russian territory for the last 300 years. Only about 90 years back for administrative reasons, it was transferred to Ukraine by Stalin. They have now taken it back. The US involvement is to inflict as much military and economic...

 Chinese Bullet Trains to nowhere Everybody has heard of Chinese default on their real estate loans of $2 trillion; but there is another story of similar magnitude which is under the covers. They borrowed heavily to finance their expensive High Speed Train (Bullet Train) building, but are unable to meet the interest payments on the monies borrowed, hence another big default is coming.  Wildly building to showcase their economic prowess, Chinese planners have failed to take into account realistic passenger-kilometer traffic revenue. It turned out to be far below their debt servicing cost. This debacle, including a few others*, has heavily piled up against their total national debt and its servicing costs. Such mindless investments are a major financial headache for China. It is only exports of consumer goods to the United States and Europe that guarantee that any money spent unnecessarily will be repaid, if ever. *Belt & Road Initiative is another example. Fifteen years bac...

 Drought the Political Earthquake in China, US and Europe China is in a grip of drought, even River Yangtze basis has dried up with no rainfall and only about 30% power generation is possible. The US who is so much proud of its Colorado River has dried up. It serves 40 million people and irrigates millions of acres of fruit and vegetable production. The famous Hoover Dam has only 30% water left and elsewhere dry and parched land is catching fire. The worst of all - Europe, where UK, Germany, France and other tiny countries are suffering the after effects of this year's drought. This is in addition to the NATO war in Ukraine and the possible interruption of Russia's gas supply. This will end the war very soon. It is all blamed on La Niña impact where sea temperature dips by a degree every three or four years and creates a geographic impact, the likes of which are visible in today’s drought. In previous hundred years or so, the La Niña used to impact mostly Indian Monsoons, but t...

  Chinese 2020/22 unfriendly Act in Ladakh - Part 1 Chinese numerical and infrastructure advantage has been neutralized at the LAC in Ladakh. In addition, their equipment is not robust enough to be reliable in cold air and rarefied heights of 14-20,000 feet. One great disadvantage Chinese suffers is that most of Tibet is a plateau of 4,000 feet and when soldiers come to reinforce from the plateau to the heights, it is a hell of a difficult job. In addition, the Chinese rotate troops between the Sinkiang region and Tibet, so all troops have to be acclimatized for heights first and then reinforce. Yes, the same disadvantage remains for the Indian troops also but because for the Indian reinforcements the mountain starts from Pathankote. The heights are gently scaled from 1,100 feet in Pathankote to 5,000 feet in Srinagar and pass through 14,000 feet Zozila Pass and to 8,500 feet Leh. Then they climb to 14,000 feet of mountains to confront the Chinese. The troops remain within the accl...

  Chinese Victory or Defeat at the LOC  The dye has been cast, there is no resolution of the border dispute at the LOC in Ladakh. The commanders met needlessly in an attempt to intimidate each other for the 16th time, but to no avail.  Just before the Commander’s met, Chinese staged a big exercise with long range artillery, attack helicopters and about 20,000 troops. This is the same type of exercise they staged in the spring 2020 when their forward troops kept moving forward and captured a few points past the LOC at the Galwan River valley, Pan-gong Lake Area, pasture grounds elsewhere.  Indian Army, although in strength in Ladakh was tricked into believing that it was a routine exercise. In fact Chinese had come to occupy land, not very useful land, but to deliver a message to India after they lost an argument for the Bhutan, India & China tri-junction two years back.  That is where India misread their intent. Soon there were face to face confrontation and...

  German Gas Supplies Germany should be mindful of mechanization from far off US which is running the Ukraine propaganda war and loosing it. The key criteria is that Germany and others in Europe are dependent on Russian oil and gas supplies. Nobody in US can make up that loss of supplies. Even the Arabs do not have arrangement large enough to make up the loss of gas if Russia shuts down. It is Biden war in Ukraine. Germany was cowed into it and so did others. It is Biden after loss of face in Afghanistan decided to reach the Russian border thru Ukraine’s plaines. It is mostly US war with Russia. Russians gave the warnings by shutting down the supplies under the pretext of pipeline maintenance. People in Germany threw up their hands in disgust for loosing supplies of gas for somebody who do not matter except US forced the issue on Europe. Now the Germans can relax. The flow in the pipeline has resumed. —————————- Chinese overbuilt in last 15 years Chinese overbuilt just to get a hea...

  Chinese invasion of Taiwan on hold Chinese in their enthusiasm to display power in the Pacific, had planned to cross the 80 miles of the China Sea and invade Taiwan this year. They had been building up power, right in the vicinity for about ten years. Several new islands had been built to serve as stationary aircraft carriers. In a dumbest demonstration of their missile power they staged a simulated attack on an American carrier with their DF-21missile to sink it. They also organized multi-sea landings exercise in the public view as a practice. Heavy missiles were prepared to attack Guam (the American base in the Pacific) to stop bombers and fighters from using it. In short, two-thirds of the Chinese power has been concentrated between north and south China Sea. On the other hand highly modernized Taiwan forces are ready to take on the attacking Chinese marines. American navy will be waiting to isolate the invading Chinese force by blocking their sea supply routes, just the wa...