What Do We Do Now

I am Angry, I am upset, I am hoping mad, I want to tear up the bloody system and replace it with something youthful, something which has the guts to say to the world that we are not what the world take us for.

We are not fucking gutless. We should not be this incompetent.

But alas emotional reactions are not of any value when we are dealing with a bunch of brain fucked terrorists. We need to see things in their proper light, we need to hold on to sanity and make decisions based on our reason.

Blood of innocents has been shed in this land and lives have been taken. The people are suffering ; the country has been dealt a wicked blow by misguided and fanatical minions of terrorism. It is all over the media and does not require any further elucidation.

Their inventiveness is growing by the year. Now what are we going to do about it? We are supposed to be the greatest fucking democracy around. We should be proud of it. But we are not are we?

We don't even hold any real liking for our land. If we did we would have been more vigilant.

For there has to be a minimum allegiance to your people and its institutions in times of distress and calamity. You spring from them, you have shared their resources.

What can you give back to your people? When terror strikes everything is put in jeopardy. People no more believe in themselves, they are frightened, they don’t know where to turn and what to do.

But something must be done. Other than voicing platitudes what can we do about the menace that has best our society?

Unfortunately none seems to have an answer to this problem. In a vast and populous country like ours, the means and capability for dealing with growing terror is limited. It is no use blaming the system alone for all that is happening in our midst. Our attitude is to be blamed for the fiasco, it is our apathy and disinterestedness that is ruining us.

There are situations where a “Lets wait and see” attitude might be of use. But this not one such. There have been hundreds of deaths already. The whole country is being targeted by the terrorists.

What we do we do now?

Removing incompetent people from positions of power alone is not going to help. The current need is for a comprehensive strategy on dealing with terrorism which is not limited to paper.

People strong enough to handle situations like this have to be put in harness and they have to be given freedom to act. There can be no politicization on this front. They have to be given the power and equipment to deal with the attacks and curb it brutally if it occurs.

Deng Zhao Ping the former Chinese supremo told the world that if he had to kill a million men to save a billion people he would do it at the time of Tienanmen Square incident. I am not defending his moral stance on the issue. But the strength and political will power he and the Chinese displayed at that time is remarkable.

These are not the times for the week willed and the vacillating specimens of humanity. The leaders have to be strong and tough minded. Decisions have to be taken in split seconds and implemented. In the terrorist scenario this could only be done by people who have prior knowledge and experience in such situations. We do not lack them here in India. These have to be put in positions to deal with them and their decisions supported even if they turn out bad in some cases.

Billions of bucks are ear marked every year for the defense of our country. Defending our rights to live without fear is important too. Don’t spare expenses to modernize the anti terrorist machinery in the land.

The National Security Guards are the last option. We should not let the situation get to that. This can all be done at the government level.

All external and internal intelligence agencies have to be linked to each other and asked to grant strict priority to anti terrorist operations. All entry points to the land monitored strictly with every available equipment. If needed ban tourism for a period till we have put an effective monitoring apparatus in place.

The government and its agencies alone can not do everything in this fight.

This is where people’s participation becomes important. We have seen what happens when our government machinery can’t do anything to save us from the threat in the last few years. This has to act as a catalyst in organizing people into vigilante groups to support government in its efforts to combat terrorism.

Our country is vast and its population is too bulky to be handled singly by the agencies that we have in the land. So it is up to us to save our asses. Only we can monitor our neighborhood efficiently to isolate foreign elements in our midst.

The terrorists would only strike at populous places to inflict more damage. Cities like Mumbai can only be effectively monitored by the people living there.

Make people carry ID’s at all times. Make them responsible for what they do with their time. Grant the vigilante groups semi legal powers to inspect any one’s ID if they think fit.

I know that the terrorists would come prepared to deal with all this. They would have picture perfect accounts of every segment of their time in a day with records to prove it. But they will have to be very careful with it then onwards.

No organization would be able to bring in thousands of men into the land to carry out an operation like that in Mumbai. Strict monitoring by the people and the law would make their life difficult and make them either alter their plans or commit blunders. No amount of brain washing would be able to overcome physical barriers once they are newly put in place. Whether they are robots or not they are human too. They can also fail.

The problem with the modern version of terrorism is that they have no demands at all. Their only objective is to attract attention of the media by acts of mass murder and demolitions. We can’t negotiate with them, we can only eliminate them. For this we need the same physical, mental capabilities that they have. The NSG and such forces should be provided with all safety equipments and technological support that they require. It is not great having causalities among them.

We can’t allow a few senseless fanatics to do anything they please in India. That would be tantamount to denying the people the liberty and freedom that they otherwise have.

These are the preliminary thoughts which came to my mind as I was watching the recent story evolving on the TV. We lost a few honest souls in the fray. Our officers got gunned down. It was a fiasco. The only consolation is that the death toll could be limited to some extend. But that doesn’t mean that it was a victory for us. We were morally, politically and physically defeated in the incident. We had to surrender to the terror merchants for a period of over 50 hours. This is unacceptable.

I think what I have said above reflects the thought of every person in the land. We are angry, agitated and troubled. We do not want this to go on. We feel that our government has failed us and has been incompetent in dealing with the situation, we feel that they have betrayed out trust in them. None could intrude into a country (Even a country like ours) without help from people in power. This has to stop.

This has to stop forever.