Gunners Shot

Lt. Gen. PR Shankar(R) & Maj. CN Anand (R)   New Delhi   12 May 2019 website of original article  @ sniwire.com Most of us tend to believe that Pakistan will fail as a state due to its poor economy, terrorism or over-militarism. The talk in strategic chat rooms or cocktail circuits is all about that. Hold on. Look at the water availability graph of Pakistan above. In the 1990s, Pakistan became a water-stressed nation. Around 2005, it entered the water-scarcity zone. After 2025, it is going to dip below the absolute water scarcity line. When Pakistan goes beyond the absolute water scarcity zone, it will also have entered the perpetual failure zone. The situation is scary due to multiple factors. The economy is hemorrhaging and the nation needs an IMF bailout. Well known. The bailout has no water element in it. Not so well known. Pakistan’s military spending is rising continually. In 2018, it spent 4 per cent of its GDP on its bloated military. Every penny sp...

May 10, 2019 ;  website of original article @ bharatshakti.in Print Email Editor’s Pick Pakistan seems to be riding a downward spiral. Or, perhaps it’s already in a state of free fall. However, even with Khan now firmly in saddle for a reasonable period of time, no policy decisions seem to have been taken to turnaround the economy. The story remains the same day-after-day: get other countries and international institutions to bail it out with loans that it can never repay. The author paints a broad canvas of the situation in Pakistan with bits and pieces covering a large enough mosaic to undertake some well-defined prognosis. ………………………………………………………………………………………………….. When did the last kingdom or people flourish in the Indus Valley after the Dravidian civilization? Reflect. The Indus Valley, historically war-torn, crisscrossed by turbulent hordes, tribes, kingdoms and empires, is cursed. Pakistan has inherited the ‘The Indus Curse’. It will remain our neighbour in i...

The second BRI Forum was recently held at Beijing (25-27 Apr 2019). In the first Forum, grandiose plans were announced and BRI took off like a tornado and suffered hiccups. Countries became wary of Chinese debt trap diplomacy and started reviewing their commitments with China. In the second forum, a chastened China had to reassure the participants that BRI would be more transparent and corruption free. However, it was still all about how to further Chinese economic and geopolitical dominance.   India very rightly refused to participate in it since CPEC, the flagship of BRI, does not take into concern our sovereignty issues and is inimical to India’s interests. The Chinese reaction to our non-participation was multi-faceted. In public it stated that it understood our compulsions at non participation and that instead there will be a one on one meet as a follow up on Wuhan. It sounded conciliatory. In the same breath it also stated publicly that CPEC did not violate Indian...

Let us get turn away for a moment from the heat and dust of Indian electoral politics and talk again of ASAT, which creates a different kind of dust -  Star Dust.  More lethal than imagination.   This article may kindly be read with my earlier articles at links indicated below for a better understanding   https://palepurshankar.blogspot.com/2019/04/a-quick-supplement-for-understanding html ://palepurshankar.blogspot.com/2019/04/a-simplistic-understanding-of-low-earth.html Long back I had a course-mate to whom I was explaining basic trigonometry and that Sin X/X as X tends to 0 is 1. He asked me a question for which I had no answer. In Sin X/X , whether X is 0 or not please explain to me how can it be 1 if X is cancelled out in the top and bottom. Only Sin will be left!  This article is precisely for such scientific geniuses.    The recent ASAT test has evoked various reactions from various quarters. NASA was sanctimoni...

                                       The politicization of the last bastion of India is well and truly underway. The beeline of Armed Forces officers in joining a political party is just the latest milestone in this journey. More will follow. That will be to the detriment of national security, in the short run. Very definitely. In the long run. It is debatable since the nation is into uncharted oceans. At the outset I must state, that this is an apolitical analysis of a symptom for which I do not have answers. There is a view that unless Service Officers join the political platform, there will be no redressal of the imbalances our Services and nation face. That is agreed to. However, for that to happen, induction of retired service personnel into politics must be across the political spectrum and not confined to one party alone. If it is only one party which is attracti...

Lt Gen. PR Shankar (retd)   New Delhi   23 April 2019 original article in sniwire.com The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), dubbed the “Project of the Century”, evokes sharp reactions, divided opinions and polarised views. The divide is clear—for or against. The views expressed here are those I consider best in India’s national interests. The second Belt and Road Forum is to be held in Beijing from 25-27 April 2019, with 37 heads of state expected to attend. During the first forum held in May 2017, the Chinese sun was fully shining. Two years down the line the Belt is a bit loose and the road is bumpy. The BRI infrastructure development and construction projects—railways, highways, ports, energy projects and industrial estate development which started off in a frenzy are facing headwinds. Irrespective of whether the slowdown is lull before the storm or not, it will affect all of us. It will need constant watch and analysis. The project covers 70-odd countries spanni...

Today my day was made. After three weeks I got a response on my blog ( https://palepurshankar.blogspot.com/2019/03/a-rebuttal-to-spice-miss-theories-at.html ) on my views which I had expressed wherein I had proved beyond doubt that A.     The Australian expert was flawed and probably biased. B.     There was no way the Spice bombs would have missed at Balakot. The response I got was as under:- Apr 20, 6.49 to 6.54am Certain nay Sayers have this to say There is a simple error in calculation, btw. He states that if the approach angle was 60% and the miss was 33 meters, the missiles would have missed by a mere 17 meters, not over a hundred. But he doesn't see that the structure is on a hillside and calculates for flat ground! Would you like to rebut Nay Sayers further state  There is a basic error made by expert in the field. Here's the diagram he offers to 'prove' that the miss could not have been 100 meters. Notice he ...