Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.
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Notes -
There was an anti-immigration protest in Dublin today, with the turnout in the thousands. There was also a counter-protest attended by the Revolutionary Communists of Ireland (lol) and the People Before Profit political party (whose seats in the Dáil fell from 5 to 3 in the last election) - Palestine flags, pride flags and keffiyehs as far as the eye can see. I had heard that this was going to be a big one, possibly as big as the one in November 2023 which led to rioting, looting and public transport set alight. The police were out in the streets in force and a police helicopter was circling overhead. My girlfriend, herself a recent immigrant, felt a little nervous about going outside.
In the end, nothing came of it - so far as I'm aware, not even minor street scuffles. Is it weird that I feel a little bit disappointed?
I saw this on X and was surprised (or perhaps not so surprised) at the lack of coverage in International Media. The police kept the groups from clashing, so maybe that had something to do with it.
Mainstream media estimates are around 5000 for the protest and 1000-2000 for the counter-protest.
That estimate sounds about right from where I was standing.
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Pakistan-Indian strife
There was a terror attack in Indian Kashmir, likely stemming from Pakistani intelligence (they all come from Pakistani intelligence in that part of the world).
Both sides have also been cancelling visas and expelling diplomats willy-nilly:
Goes to show that you can just do things as a state, you can expel whole peoples if you want. On the other hand, India doesn't have the state apparatus needed to actually get rid of them AFAIK. America as a whole has the power but not the will, India has the will but not the power.
https://x.com/Osint613/status/1915364624335098031
https://x.com/Osint613/status/1915521996353360267
In spite of all this, I'm betting on 'nothingburger'. There have been bigger terror attacks in the past, there have been countless skirmishes in Kashmir, jets have been shot down... India doesn't really have the means to stop the water flowing down to Pakistan (imagine being a worker on such a damming project in Kashmir of all places, you'd need to sleep with both eyes open).
Also, the Indian military isn't that strong. They're stronger than Pakistan but not that much stronger, they lost the last aerial skirmish. What were they doing still flying the Mig-21 in 2019, let alone in combat? It was obsolete 40 years ago! Pakistan has similarly ancient equipment in places but also a decent amount of modern Chinese gear. There may be a certain level of national wealth/ambition that paradoxically diminishes combat power. Pakistan is humble enough not to try and develop everything themselves, so they get local-built Chinese jets, US jets... India has great power pretensions and so embarks on expensive domestic military R&D projects while also buying a smorgasbord of foreign equipment as the domestic projects underperform or are delayed due to resource limitations. You need those capabilities to be a great power but it's not cheap!
Few corrections, observations and 'smells' that imply this time it may be different.
1. It's overt - The attack was claimed by the Resistance Front (Lashkar-e-Taiba LeT). Pakistan operates many terrorist cells in the Kashmir area with different levels of overt and covert involvement. LeT is about as overt as Pakistani intelligence involvement gets. Why be so obvious ? It's so overt that Pakistan's defense minister almost let the mask slip off.(ignore the twitter handle, video is real)
2. It's timely - Last week, the new Pakistani General Munir (defacto leader) gave a fiery speech highlighting Pakistan's militant islam identity, Kashmir and Hindu-Muslim strife. It was big new in India even before the attack. Makes it look like Pakistan really want war.
3. It's cruel - The pointed slaughter of Hindus has everyone pissed. I mean, really ? How comically evil can you be ? Almost as if Pakistan is provoking war.
No. Which brings me to #4 and #5
4. It's extreme - The last time as many civilians died to Pakistani terror attack was during 26/11/2008. (India's 9/11). The only reason India did not go to war back then was because Congress's pro-muslim stance makes it impossible for them to sell aggressive rhetoric towards Pakistanis.
5. It's the right people - Unlike the congress, a war with Pakistan comes with better optics for Modi. Both Modi and Munir are seen as hardline strongmen, more conservative than their predecessors during 26/11.
6. It's the right signals - The military build up is higher than usual. America has taken a suspiciously weak stance in condemning Pakistan & Modi has said surprisingly little (when it is saber rattling, nations take strong stances. When it is real, they hedge). In such situations, Modi jumps on it and makes strong statements. This time is eerie silence. Like the calm before a storm. In time of silence, the words that get spoken are more important. Modi made a speech in English. The speech was for the world, not Indians. His phrasing was ominous. I expect there to be cross border action at the very least.
7. It's the right incentives - India is internally stable, while Pakistan is in crisis. Pakistan uses war to stabilize their nation. India avoids war because it risks destabilization in Kashmir. This time around, local Kashmiris have been silent. India feels confident that a hot border won't hurt its stability.
All in all. While this may still be a nothing burger. There are indications that this time may be different.
What I expect will happen:
In wars, nations have desired outcomes. India and Pakistan do not want land on either side of the border. Primarily, Pakistan wants to destabilize Indian-Kashmir and India wants to stabilize it. Likewise, India wants to destabilize Pakistani-Kashmir.
Short term - Full scale war is unlikely to impossible. Air strikes are near guaranteed. Given the non-commital language adopted by Modi, I expect an un-easy calm and sudden retaliation. Pakistan is reeling from internal strife. Modi has time. If Modi is feeling it, he can try to secure new vantage points near the line of control, but that seems unlikely.
Long term - Hindus will continue to be aggressively resettled back into the valley. Security levels will stay high. Ie. Freedoms of non-BJP operatives will stay limited in Kashmir. Infrastructure development will similarly continue. Kashmir's stability after the attack will come as a huge relief to Modi. It lends credence to the idea that Pakistan has ran out of traditional avenues (saber rattling, funding local opposition and activism for Kashmir's independence) for retaliation. The abeyance of water-rights agreements with Pakistan would allow for resumption of various half-built dams.
What the hell? His argument is 'we're only a state sponsor of terrorism because the West trained us to be'?
Well, I guess the pressure's off Hegseth with Defense Ministers like this bumbling around.
Even in their own fantasy, they cast themselves not as the hero, not even as the villain, but as the disloyal servant of the villain.
I've had a few moments where I thought I was watching fake videos or Indian propaganda. Then looked into it and turned out the Terrorists/Pakistanis are really that comically evil.
No wonder The Boys fell off after season 2. Can't compete with reality.
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Airstrikes and more skirmishing on the border that doesn't end in a major war isn't particularly significant as an outcome. Even the Kargil War was a nothingburger, there were no major consequences besides India-Pakistan relations remaining very bad.
ISI is sure to direct great effort into blowing up any dams that threaten Pakistani water, that's actually in their core national interest. If the Indus starts to be choked off, then that would be a major event but it seems unlikely.
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Shutting off the river is a very big deal if it stays that way. They didn’t even do that during the 2019 war IIRC.
The rivers are already shut off for all intents and purposes. Pushing it further can set scary precedents in the sub-continent.
India could go upstream and cut off rivers at the source, but Pakistan's best friend (China) controls even more important rivers upstream. If China did a tit-for-tat than India would lose a lot more than they'd gain.
It's the main reason I consider Indian inaction to the Chinese annexation of Tibet to be the worst strategic misstep of a newly independent India. And for those who say 'India did not have the resources', Tibet is a defenders dream. All supply lines are cutoff for half the year. You can't lay siege, you can't set up shop, you can't invade. Well, I have enough reasons to dislike Nehru already. But here's one more.
Ofc Patel was on the right side of history. Everything I read about him makes him seem like a 'Lee Kwan Yew' style pragmatic statesman that India needed. But ofc, Nehru chose naive optimism as he always did. Oh, how I wish the man had just gone to Cambridge and been a brown Francis Fukuyama instead.
Why is China Pakistan's best friend? They oppress their own Muslims quite brutally, and generally have zero tolerance to any ideology that can compete with the Party. Do they just think they own Pakistan as a counterweight to India and a stepping stone to dominating Asia, and Pakistan is happy to be owned?
China is fine with nation-wise oppression of minorities. They have no issues with oppression of Muslims in China, Hindus in Pakistan or the Chinese in Malaysia.
Second, the Muslim identity is primarily an Arab identity. East-Asian and great-lake-African muslims are oppressed all the time, and global Islam does not care. (note: North African islam is not the same as Subsaharan islam). These are the Muslims that matter to other muslims.
Yes. It's less friends, and more that Pakistan is a client state of China. Pakistan is Turtle to China's Vince.
No, but what option do they (Pakistani Army) have ? IMF isn't giving new loans anymore. Even the Saudis stopped giving freebees. Big daddy China is all that's left. Anything to be in opposition to India.
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His stupidity fucked the nation up in ways that most will not be able to comprehend. I dislike Hindutva for being the Indian equivalent of the republican party, with their centrist Ideas, yet I can never defend someone as asinine as Nehru.
Jinnah was a much more opportunistic and capable leader than Nehru by all accounts. A book my grandad adores and I recommend heavily is Freedom at Midnight, which includes a quote from Jinnah where he says that Nehru is fit to be a professor of English but not the head of a nation. Jinnah was a "muslim" who shaved daily, ate pork, was fond of liquor and married a Parsi half his age, yet he had a sense for his people. His family converted to Islam due to Hindu purity spiralling, but that is a story for another day. Nehru, otoh had issues visiting temples as the Prime Minister.
His insistance on being cordial with china, straight up retarded beliefs on the issues of borders and armed forces fractured the himalyan front for India, which is beyond recovery now. Similarly, we lost the Indo-China war because in many ways, he always feared military coups. The soldiers had few resources for the cold. Patel was a much more competent man compatred to Nehru, or saner at least despite having fairy milquetoast views. Nehru was a socialist like Gandhi, and the two surviving post-1930s leaders damaged the subcontinent badly.
For context for people who are not from India, Nehru was the son of a super elite Kashmiri Pandit father, and he let his own Motherland get savaged for ideals that I would find hard to steelman. He was right about Phule and Ambedkar, but beyond that, anytime I hear him being discussed, I always shake my head. I learn something new that makes me dislike him even more. Until this thread I did not put together the Tibet connection but holy shit. This guy's family is still representing anti Upper Caste leftism in India.
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https://catholicvote.org/record-number-cardinal-electors-logistical-challenge-conclave/
With a conclave coming up(I plan to do weekly updates in the transnational thursdays until it starts), time to cover the first SNAFU- there are more cardinals participating than the number of rooms to house them. See, cardinals are housed in the Domus Sanctae Marthae(you might also see it referred to as the Casa Santa Marta, the Italian name, or more rarely as the St Martha house). There are 129 rooms and 134 or 135 cardinals participating, maybe 136 if the rumors are true about Becciu. But pope Francis had resided in the Casa Santa Marta rather than the apostolic palace, and that space- at least his personal chambers, but possibly more than that- will be sealed off, unavailable to the cardinals.
Likely this will be resolved by having some cardinals either share rooms or sleep in the cells built into St. Peter's basilica for the purpose when the cap on cardinal elector numbers was lower. Cardinals get assigned rooms by lottery, so there's no way to use this for political advantage, but it will make the previous administration look bad.
https://catholicvote.org/college-of-cardinals-holds-third-general-congregation/
The college of cardinals has completed its third(of nine) convocations before the start of a conclave. This is an unusually rapid timetable and the dean of the college of cardinals, Cardinal Re, has been criticized for this by Cardinal Zen, who is influential but not voting. This likely points to starting the conclave at the earliest possible date(May 6 unless all 135 electors arrive earlier- which is highly unlikely).
https://www.pillarcatholic.com/p/the-cardinals-becciu-test
Disgraced cardinal Becciu is now insisting that he will participate in the conclave, despite having resigned his voting rights in 2020 due to criminality. It is unclear what the cardinals will do about it- his cartoonish corruption was a scandal for Pope Francis in his pontificate, so it's not like he's popular, but who's going to actually deal with him is unclear.
This prompts an interesting question for me -- who's actually in charge? If some sort of major crisis happens, or some terrorist incident happens that disrupts the conclave, or something especially dire, who coordinates the response? Who is empowered to make sure things run properly?
There are a number of candidates. Cardinal Re, cardinal Parolin, and cardinal Farrel are likely to be making the major decisions which can’t be put off.
Which one actually does something about the Catholic version of blagojevich is probably more a matter of personalities than constitutions.
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