Bouquet & brickbats

Politicians came in for a fair bit of stick.

When my editors asked me to write a review for the year, I was a bit hesitant. To explain my hesitation, we may have to take a bit of a step back. Back in the beginning of this year, when I was first asked to write a column, it was a large step for me. While nobody can accuse me of not having an opinion on absolutely anything and everything irrespective of the amount of knowledge which I may have on it or not, usually my opinions would be inflicted on my long suffering wife or my uncomprehending son and recently to my newborn daughter who seems to fall asleep when I am discoursing on weighty matters relating to non-proliferation or terrorism.

To actually write a regular column on international relations, terrorism, military science, history and such like, while very intellectually appealing, called for abilities which I frankly doubted that I had. So to expect a review was pushing it but still here goes.

Still, after lots of encouragement from my friends and family and threats of grievous bodily harm from my editor (just kidding, my editors are very supportive and understanding), I embarked on this journey of writing columns and what a journey this has been! The friends from all over the world have been very helpful in suggesting topics, the readers for giving me bouquets and brickbats, the diverse topics, the discipline to sit down every week and work on punching out a reasonably cohesive and coherent argument.

In particular, the Professors mailing list members have been very helpful in kicking my head in when I go off my rails, helping in research, bouncing ideas off each other and providing an excellent sounding board. The name of this column was their idea as well, to stand for trying to understand current topics, go deeper than what a news story will cover, see both sides of the story, and finally, try to avoid sounding pompous by advising people to take what I say with a grain of salt. I tell you, the number of times I have heard my readers advising that a grain is not sufficient but to get couple of tons to swallow this.

As I look back at the forty odd columns that I have written in this space, some broad themes seem to jump out. India and Pakistan are a popular theme as is the Middle East. The Iraq War was a god sent, as far as getting topics to write about are concerned. Nothing like a war to get the figurative writing juices flowing. We talked about whether people see the Coalition intervention as invasion or liberation and as far as I can see, the jury is still out whether people are seeing the coalition forces as invaders or liberators. There is a small minority who is totally against them and is carrying out violence against them, but then, look on the bright side, the level of crime in current day Baghdad is lower than New York.