Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams, Chapter 589
Palash Biswas
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The US-led coalition forces today intensified air and sea strikes on Libyan defence targets flattening a command centre of Muammar Gaddafi close to his private residence in Tripoli, as the Arab League voiced concerns over the bombardment taking a toll on civilians.One of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's sons has died in a hospital in Tripoli, opposition websites and Arab media reported Monday.In india, UPA, NDA and LEFT Combined Brahaminical Zionist Hegemony has NO OPTION but to Lick Uncle SAM`s dirty Bums as WIKILEAKS EXPOSED BJP to move privilege motion against PM in Lok Sabha tomorrow.After a wide-ranging movement, the BSE Sensex ended in losses for the third straight session today, down nearly 40 points, as rising crude oil prices after US-led strikes on Libya raised inflationary concerns.
Meanwhile,Endemic corruption in India has grown in scale and represents billions of dollars, with the potential to discourage investors and derail growth prospects, consultancy firm KMPG said in a survey published on Monday. On the other hand,Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) has sought a relief from Employees' Provident Fund Organization (EPFO) for loss-making companies that run their own PF trusts.
Cracks in Libya strike group - India hardens stand as Aafrica seeks to halt raids | ||||||
| K.P. NAYAR | ||||||
New York, March 20: India hardened its opposition to the Anglo-French military action against Libya with US support and said tonight that it "regrets the air strikes that are taking place". In a statement, the external affairs ministry said: "The measures adopted should mitigate and not exacerbate an already difficult situation for the people of Libya." The statement underlined the urgency that South Block was giving to the unfolding conflict because it was unusually issued on a Sunday night, that too while the national capital was in the midst of celebrating Holi. Tonight's statement calibrates India's abstention on Thursday on a UN Security Council resolution which, among other things, called for a no-fly zone over Libya. Five countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China (Bric) and Germany — did not vote for Thursday's war resolution, which was passed anyway because its main sponsors, Britain and France, managed to get 10 votes in the Security Council in their support. Nine votes were required under UN rules for its passage. The hardening of New Delhi's position appeared to be the result of a major setback for the Anglo-French-led military enterprise with the African Union demanding an "immediate stop" to all attacks on Libya. The African Union's panel on Libya announced late night on Saturday that it would follow up on its opposition to the air strikes by calling a meeting in Addis Ababa on Friday. While debating the resolution on Thursday, Manjeev Singh Puri, India's deputy permanent representative to the UN, had sensibly advised Security Council members who wanted immediate military action against Muammar Gaddafi to be patient and cautious. "The African Union is... sending a high-level panel to Libya to make serious efforts for a peaceful end to the crisis there. We must stress the importance of political efforts, including those of the secretary-general's special envoy, to address the situation," Puri had said. The reluctance of the western powers to heed Puri's advice has now turned out to be a slap in the face for Britain, France and the US, the latter a reluctant supporter of the Anglo-French initiative because of President Barack Obama's reservations about pushing his country into a third war against a Muslim nation in a decade. Representatives from the Arab League, the Organisation of Islamic Conference, the European Union and the UN would be invited to the Addis Ababa meeting to "put in place a mechanism for consultation and concerted action" to peacefully end the Libyan crisis. Theoretically, if the African Union directs its members not to allow western aircraft to overfly their territories on military missions, that could complicate the enforcement of a no-fly zone. Western aircraft could still mount flights over Libya for bombing or other actions from the sea into Benghazi and eastern territories, but it would hamper their missions. Attacks on Gaddafi's forces would then have to be carried out primarily with cruise missiles launched from naval ships. Simultaneously tonight, the Arab League effectively backtracked on its support for Thursday's Security Council resolution, insisting that the ongoing military operations went way beyond what the Arab League had originally supported. Amr Moussa, head of the Arab League, said the organisation had only supported the enforcement of a no-fly zone and not full-scale bombing in Libya. "What we want is civilians' protection not shelling more civilians," Moussa, a former Egyptian ambassador to India, said in Cairo. "What happened differs from the no-fly zone objectives." With the African Union opposing military attacks and the Arab League backtracking, the pro-war group in the Security Council that wants regime change in Libya has effectively lost the UN mandate for the bombing missions. South Africa and Lebanon voted on Thursday for the Council's resolution, but they would not have done so if the African Union and the Arab League had taken today's position at that time. That position has effectively reduced the strength of the pro-war group of countries to eight, which is not adequate to have passed the resolution last week. The latest Indian statement "called upon all parties to abjure (the) use of, or the threat of use of, force and to resolve their differences through peaceful means and dialogue in which the UN and regional organisations should play their roles". http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110321/jsp/frontpage/story_13742853.jsp
The use of "all parties" in the advice makes it clear that New Delhi is following an even-handed approach and wants to leave the door open for advancing its interests in Libya in the event of a regime change in Tripoli and a victory for the rebels fighting Gaddafi. |
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"We have received a representation from CII, and also from several companies. They have argued that though they are making losses for three years, the workers' monies are safe. However, we have made it clear to all the companies and also to CII that such a request is not in the interest of the workers," said an official.
As many as 2,775 companies — called exempted establishments in PF parlance — enjoy a special status under which the money from their employees' provident fund is not given to EPFO, instead invested through trusts formed by the companies. The exemption, however, can be withdrawn if a company makes losses for three years.
EPFO suspects that the loss-making firms may dip into employees' dues because of financial constraints.
The survey of 100 leading domestic and foreign businesses was published as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government struggles to defend itself against graft cases ranging from a $39 billion telecoms scandal to houses for war widows diverted to bureaucrats.
The scams, exposed in recent months, point to a pervasive culture of corruption in Singh's administration, prompting a man once seen as India's most honest politician to defend his leadership and scramble to keep the ruling coalition intact.
And the graft riddling Asia's third-largest economy was no longer confined to bribing government officials for passports or telephone connections from the state provider, the report said.
"Today India is faced with a different kind of challenge," the report said. "It is not about petty bribes ('bakshish') any more, but scams to the tune of thousands of crores (billions of rupees) that highlight a political/industry nexus which, if not checked, could have a far reaching impact."
Most businesses surveyed said they were committed to their positions in one of the world's fastest growing economies with a rapidly growing, and wealthier, middle class, the survey showed.
More than two-thirds of those surveyed said corruption prevented India from moving beyond the 9 per cent growth expected in the next fiscal year starting April 1. Just over half said graft would make the country less attractive to foreign investors.
"Corruption poses a risk to India's projected 9 per cent GDP growth and may result in a volatile political and economic environment," the report said.
The murkiest sectors were real estate and construction - a focus for India as it plans to spend $1.5 trillion over a decade to overhaul creaky infrastructure - followed by telecommunications where the state was still heavily involved and the stakes high.
The scandals have created a sense of regulatory uncertainty, especially in the telecoms sector, which has come under heavy scrutiny after faulty allocation processes were said to have cost the government up to $39 billion in lost revenue.
Several big businessmen, including billionaire Anil Ambani, were questioned by federal police, and even Singh had to defend his conduct to the Supreme Court, unprecedented events in a country where the business and political elite were sometimes seen as above the law.
"India has at last realised that one of the major reasons for most of the large scale corruption incidents has been due to the empowered discretion that the government has had," Surjit Bhalla, the head of Oxus Investments, wrote in the preface to the report.
BUSINESS CLIMATE
British Prime Minister David Cameron wrote to Singh in February warning that India's unpredictable and non-transparent business climate could derail bilateral trade ties.
Ratan Tata, one of India's most prominent industrialists, in November recounted a conversation with a fellow businessman in which the latter detailed the hefty bribes the government demanded from players in the airlines business.
The Hindustan Times said in a report on Monday that envoys from eight countries, including Britain, wrote to Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to complain about unpaid bills of more than $74 million owed to firms from their nations from contracts relating to the Commonwealth Games.
The sporting extravaganza last October, which cost up to $6 billion, was also dogged by several cases of alleged corruption, including the purchase of equipment and issuing contracts.
Regulatory delays over London-listed Cairn Energy's $9.6 billion asset sale to India's Vedanta Resources, and legal wrangling over India's $2.6 billion Vodafone tax demand were raised by Cameron to Singh.
Trade Minister Stephen Green told Reuters in New Delhi that Britain wanted more predictability and transparency in India's business climate and would raise concerns from British firms during a visit this week.
Asked whether he would raise the Cairn-Vedanta deal and Vodafone tax issue, Green said he would discuss "specific business situations which are under examination.
"I think we'll see a significant increase in investment in both directions. In order to facilitate that ... we need to have predictability, transparency on both sides," he said.
But despite the murky regulatory environment, business remained engaged in India, with more than half of those surveyed by KPMG saying they were unaffected by corruption.
More than 80 per cent of respondents disagreed that corruption had reduced their ability to access domestic or foreign funds, while 55 per cent disagreed that corruption had impacted their business.
That would appear to chime with remarks on Monday by General Electric Co Chief Executive Jeff Immelt who, on a visit to New Delhi, brushed off concerns over the investment climate.
"We're long-term players in India," Immelt said.
Muammar Gaddafi's air defenses have been 'severely disabled' by a barrage of U.S.-led missile strikes launched on Saturday, a U.S. national security official said.
"Qaddafi's air defense systems have been severely disabled. It's too soon to predict what he and his ground forces may do in response to today's strikes," the source said on condition of anonymity.
Khamis Gaddafi was reportedly injured Saturday when a Libyan Air Force pilot purposefully crashed his jet into the Bab al-Aziziya compound in Tripoli where Gaddafi and some of his relatives are staying.
Khamis died of burn wounds sustained during the attack, the Arabian Business News website reported.
Airstrikes on several Libyan cities killed 48 people and wounded 150 in "civilian areas," a statement read out on Libyan state television said on Sunday.
Reacting strongly to the attacks, Libyan leader Gaddafi said the Mediterranean has been turned into a "real battlefield" after Western air strikes on Saturday.
The Libyan leader announced that he has opened arms depots for his people to defend the country.
Gaddafi, in a brief audio message broadcast on state television, condemned the allied Western attacks on Libya as "barbaric, unjustified Crusaders' aggression."
He vowed to retaliate with military and civilian targets in the Mediterranean, warning that the interests of Mediterranean and North African countries were now "in danger."
"The Mediterranean region has become a real battlefield," he said. "Arms depots have been opened and all the Libyan people are being armed" to defend the country against Western forces.
British, French and US forces earlier on Saturday launched strikes from the air and sea against Gaddafi's forces under a UN Security Council resolution to impose a ceasefire in a month-long showdown between loyalists and rebels.
US and British forces fired a barrage of at least 110 Tomahawk cruise missiles into Libya against Gaddafi's air defences, the US military said.
Global stock markets, however, remained firm. The Bombay Stock Exchange 30-share barometer opened higher and improved further to cross the 18K-mark, touching 18,007.73 on strong Asian cues in afternoon deals.
Stabilising of the Fukushima atomic power plant in northeastern Japan, hit recently by earthquake and tsunami, aided the rebound in world stocks.
However, air-strikes by Western forces on Libya as well as unrest in other neighbouring countries pushed up global crude oil prices, which weighed on market sentiment and the Sensex closed at 17,839.05,down 39.76 points or 0.22 per cent.
In last two sessions, it had tumbled by nearly 480 points or 2.61 per cent.
The NSE 50-issue Nifty index also softened by 8.95 points or 0.17 per cent to end at 5,364.75.
Selling in index-based counters like Infosys, Hindalco, TCS, L&T, Wipro, Hero Honda and Maruti Suzuki weighed down the market. However, buying in HDFC, Jindal Steel, M&M and Tata Steel cushioned the Sensex fall.
Rising global crude oil prices to nearly USD 103 a barrel in New York worried the market participants, expecting another round of hike in key interest rates to contain high inflation.
"After two straight sessions of selling, the Indian markets ended on (nearly) a flat note, amid choppy trades. FII selling in the past couple of sessions, plus the threat of inflation and hardening of interest rates could be among the pressure points that are keeping investors in India on tenterhooks," said IIFL Head of Research (India Private Clients) Amar Ambani.
BJP on Monday said it would move a privilege motion against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in Lok Sabha on Monday for "misleading" the house by claiming MPs were not bribed during the July 2008 trust vote even though the parliamentary probe committee said that money was paid.
"BJP will move a privilege motion against the Prime Minister tomorrow in the Lok Sabha for misleading the house on the July 2008 trust vote. He (PM) said in the house last week that no bribe was paid while the Kishore Chandra Deo committee has clearly stated that bribe was paid," party spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain said.
Leader of the opposition in Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj is likely to move the privilege motion.
Incidentally, as a counter to this, the ruling Congress has declared it will move a privilege motion against Swaraj for allegedly defying Speaker Meira Kumar last week by trying to seek clarifications from the Prime Minister after his statement on the revelations made by WikiLeaks on the cash-for-vote scam.
As per Parliament rules, clarifications cannot be sought from a minister or the Prime Minister in the Lok Sabha after he/she makes a statement on the demand of the opposition. This provision is there only in the Rajya Sabha.
BJP-led NDA will also demand a discussion in the Lok Sabha under Rule 193 (which does not entail voting).
"Sushma Swaraj and Yashwant Sinha from the BJP and Sharad Yadav from JD(U) will demand discussion under Rule 193. If the government wants Lok Sabha to run, it would agree as soon as the house meets for the day," Hussain said.
Since the Question Hour has been suspended for the remaining period of the ongoing budget session, NDA wants the discussion to start at 11am.
"The leaders of opposition in both the houses were not allowed to speak after the Prime Minister made his statement. Hence we are making the demand for a debate," Hussain said.
After Congress, BJP hit by WikiLeaks disclosure
PTI | Mar 19, 2011, 02.57pm IST
New Delhi: BJP was on Saturday hit by the Wikileaks expose with US diplomatic cables stating that the party leadership had told them that its criticism of the US in public was to score "easy political points" against UPA and when in power, it would not harm the Indo-US nuclear deal.
The expose, published by 'The Hindu', drew immediate strong reaction from ruling Congress which asked BJP to apply to itself the same standards it adopted for the government when it was needlessly disrupting Parliament for the last few days.
The BJP, however, denied there was any doublespeak and maintained that because of its strong position, the government had to come with 16 amendments to the Civil Nuclear Liability Bill.
Seshadri Chari, BJP National Executive member and RSS pointsman in the party, figured in the diplomatic cables as having told an US embassy official in Delhi in December 2005 "not to read too much into the foreign policy resolution especially the parts relating to the US", which had attacked the UPA's "subservience" to Washington.
"Chari dismissed the statement (resolution) as standard practice aimed at scoring easy political points against the UPA. BJP spokesman Prakash Javadekar echoed these statements, saying that the BJP was not really upset about the US-India relationship, but merely wanted the Government of India and US government to be more forthcoming about any deal on nuclear policy," the cable said.
In another cable, the embassy's then Charge d'affaires Peter Burleigh wrote after a meeting with L K Advani in May 2009, just before the Lok Sabha poll results were out, the BJP veteran "downplayed" any move by his party to reopen the nuclear deal noting that BJP "does not take international agreements lightly".
Advani acknowledged that the BJP's public position in July 2008 was that the deal constrained the country's strategic autonomy and that the party would reexamine if it returned to power but connected that stance to "domestic political developments" then at play in India.
The BJP leader, the diplomat wrote, was clear that there would be "no imminent BJP move to reopen the (nuclear) deal. In his view, the government is a continuity, particularly in matters of foreign policy and international agreements cannot be taken lightly."
Asked about the diplomatic cables quoting him, Chari declined to comment saying he has not seen the report. He said he did not remember if he had talked to Deputy Chief of Mission Robert Blake in December 2005.
"I don't remember the name. I don't remember the names. I don't remember whom I met in 2005," Chari said, adding the party will officially comment if required.
Javadekar said there are "no contradictions" in their stand. "We have made our position clear both in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha and through are press statements that we value strategic relations with the US and that all sources of energy should be tapped," he said.
But, he said, when the government brought the Nuclear Liability Bill, the party raised certain objections and the government had to make 16 amendments to the Bill at its insistence. "We keep national interest foremost...there is no double speak," Javadekar said.
But Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari would not buy the BJP's defence. He said, "For the BJP, chickens have come home to roost and they have come rather soon."
He said BJP had made Wikileaks "the Holy Grail of their political philosophy" even when Congress had warned them not to give credence to hearsay.
"Now the shoe is on the other foot. It is for the BJP to explain to the nation whether they will apply same standards to themselves as they attempted to apply to the government by needlessly disrupting Parliament for the last few days," Tewari said.
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Coalition Fires More Missiles at Libyan Targets
Photo: REUTERS
A supporter of Libya's leader Moammar Gadhafi shows shrapnel from what the government said was a western missile attack on a building inside Bab Al-Aziziyah, Gadhafi's heavily fortified Tripoli compound Mar 21, 2011
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The U.S. military says a multinational coalition enforcing a no-fly zone over Libya has fired at least 10 more cruise missiles at Libyan military targets.
U.S. military officials said Monday the missile strikes were carried out Sunday night into Monday. A U.S. official also says a British air strike on the Tripoli compound of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi late Sunday targeted his "military command ability."
The strike heavily damaged a building inside the compound. There was no word on casualties.
U.S. officials say the military action is aimed at protecting civilians from attacks by Mr. Gadhafi's forces, not at targeting the Libyan leader. Aircraft from several coalition nations patrolled Libyan skies Monday, but there were no reports of new airstrikes.
British Prime Minister David Cameron told the nation's parliament Monday that the coalition has "neutralized" Libyan air defenses and made "good progress" in achieving its goals of protecting civilians.
Libyan rebels trying to end Mr. Gadhafi's 42-year rule were taking advantage of the coalition assault by pushing to reclaim territory lost to the government during the past 10 days.
After regrouping Monday, the rebels moved on the eastern town of Ajdabiya, attacking the positions of Gadhafi loyalists. Western media reports say the rebels later pulled back.
But, opposition sources in the western city of Misrata said government troops surrounding the rebel enclave continue to harass it, allegedly using civilians as a shield against any attacks by foreign forces.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Washington expects to turn control of the mission in Libya over to a coalition - probably headed by the French and British or NATO - within days.
U.S. President Barack Obama will take questions from reporters Monday for the first time since the allied assault began, during a joint news conference in Chile.
Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.
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Followers form human shield at Gaddafi's home
Even as the allied intervention began, a group of foreign journalists were bused on a rare visit inside Col Muammar Gaddafi's compound—a labyrinth of concrete barracks, fortified walls and barbed wire designed to deter potential military coups.
There, hundreds of supporters offered themselves up as human shields, cheering to newly minted dance songs about their adoration for their leader. "House by house, alley by alley," the catchiest song went, quoting a Gaddafi speech. "Disinfect the germs from each house and each room."
The crowd included many women and children, and some said they had family in Colonel Gaddafi's forces. They said they had come to protect Colonel Gaddafi's compound from bombing by volunteering to be shields.
"If they want to hit Muammar Gaddafi, they must hit us because we are all Muammar Gaddafi," said Ghazad Muftah , a 52-year-old widow of a soldier from the Warfalla tribe, who said she was there with her six grown children. At least one person attending the rally spoke out against Colonel Gaddafi in a recent interview — a double-agent phenomenon that appears common among Libyan demonstrators for and against the government.
In Tajoura—a neighbourhood near the capital that has been a hotbed of anti-Qaddafi unrest—one resident had complained earlier in the day that despite the announced no-fly zone, Libyan Air Force jets could be heard taking off from the nearby bases, presumably headed toward the eastern front with the rebels.
"Our suffering is greater than anyone can imagine," he said. "Anyone who dares go outside is either arrested or shot dead.
"Food is decreasing, there is no tap water, and electricity comes and goes," he added. "The hospitals cannot really offer much treatment anymore because there are no medicines. There is no milk for the children."
It was unclear Saturday night whether the missile strikes had hit the air base, but in the city of Misurata—the last major rebel holdout in the west—one person said residents were cheering the sound of airstrikes. The Gaddafi forces had continued their siege Saturday, including the cutoff of water and electricity, he said, and Gaddafi gunmen continued to fire into the city. Speaking on the condition of anonymity to protect his family, he said: "The airstrikes sound good to the Libyan people."
But analysts have questioned what Western powers will do if the Libyan leader digs in, especially since they do not believe they would be satisfied with a de facto partition which left rebels in the east and Gadhafi running a rump state in the west.
"It's going to be far less straightforward if Gaddafi starts to move troops into the cities, which is what he has been trying to do for the past 24 hours," said Marko Papic at the STRATFOR global intelligence group.
The western powers denied that civilians had been killed in their operations which got underway after the UN Security Council (UNSC) gave its nod for imposing a 'no fly' zone over Libya. coalition official said Gaddafi's "command and control capability" inside the Libyan leader's compound at Bab el-Aziziya in south of capital Tripoli had been demolished.It was unclear where Gaddafi(68) was at the time of the strike on his air defences as part of a renewed allied assault on Libya involving British submarines and RAF Tornado jets.
US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said the US expects to turn control of the Libya military mission over to a coalition probably headed either by the French and British or by NATO "in a matter of days".
The Arab League, which supported the UNSC move for the 'no fly' zone, criticised the heavy bombardments by the western forces, saying several civilians had been killed or wounded.
"What has happened in Libya differs from the goal of imposing a no-fly zone," the Arab League's Secretary General Amr Mussa said.
"What we want is the protection of civilians and not bombing other civilians," Mussa said.
The three-storey administrative building which was flattened is about 50 metres from Gaddafi's iconic tent where the Libyan strongman generally meets guests in Tripoli. It was hit by a missile, Libyan government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim told reporters who were taken to the site by bus.
"This was a barbaric bombing which could have hit hundreds of civilians gathered at the residence of Muammar Gaddafi about 400 metres away from the building which was hit," Ibrahim said.
Smoke was seen rising from within the heavily fortified compound which houses Gaddafi's private quarters as well as military barracks and other installations. A Libyan official displayed to reporters a piece of shrapnel, apparently from the missile, at the ruined building.
BBC reported that anti-aircraft fire and several explosions were heard overnight in Tripoli.
"I can confirm that British armed forces have participated in another coordinated strike against Libyan air defence systems," senior Defence official Maj Gen John Lorimer said in London.
Pentagon spokesman Vice-Admiral William Gortney at a news briefing in Washington said, "We are not going after Gaddafi. At this particular point I can guarantee he is not on the target list."
Gortney also said it had no evidence of civilian casualties in air strikes by coalition forces over Libya.
"There is no indication of any civilian casualties," he insisted in comments that came after Tripoli's official media said the air strikes were targeting civilian objectives and that that there were "civilians casualties as a result of this aggression."
The proxy battle in Bahrain
Michael Slackman, NYT :
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has demonstrated one lesson learned from the course of pro-democracy uprisings across West Asia: The world may cheer when autocrats resign, but it picks carefully which autocrats to punish for opening fire on their citizens.
That cynical bit of realpolitik seems to have led the king to send troops last week over the causeway from Saudi Arabia to Bahrain, where they backed up a violent crackdown on unarmed protesters by Bahrain's own security forces.
The move had immediate consequences for West Asian politics, and for American policy: It transformed Bahrain into the latest proxy battle between Iran and Saudi Arabia for regional dominance. And it called into question which model of stability and governance will prevail in West Asia, and which Washington will help build: one based on consensus and hopes for democracy, or continued reliance on strongmen who intimidate opponents, sow fear and co-opt reformist forces while protecting American interests like ensuring access to oil and opposing Iran.
For Saudi Arabia, the issue in Bahrain is less whether Bahrain will attain popular rule than whether Iranian and Shiite influence will grow.
Struggle for supremacy
Iran and Saudi Arabia have sparred on many fronts since the Iranian Revolution of 1979 in a struggle for supremacy in the world's most oil-rich region. The animosity was evident in Saudi Arabia's support for Iraq during its war with Iran, and it still shows in Iran's backing for Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Now, after a decade that seemed to tilt the regional balance toward Iran, Saudi Arabia decided that Bahrain was the place to put its thumb more heavily on the scale. It sent troops under the auspices of the Gulf Cooperation Council to help crush pro-democracy demonstrations because most of the protesters were Shiites challenging a Sunni king.
The problem for the US, however, is that Bahrain, at Saudi urging, chose to resolve its fears with force, rather than by addressing the protesters' demands for democratic reform, as American officials had publicly encouraged.
And for that reason, the military deployment may now have a profound impact on the US and its primary strategic interest in Bahrain, the navy base it maintains there.
Because Washington did not ultimately support the protesters' demands many protesters believe that the Saudi troops were sent in with American complicity, or at least with an expectation of American acquiescence. So, among the protesters, who turned out by the tens of thousands, the crackdown may well yield animosity toward America and its navy when events finally settle down.
One American expert in the Persian Gulf who advises policymakers in Washington said the Saudi king's action was taken without regard for what might happen if it fails.
Saudi Arabia's supporters acknowledge that this confrontation can escalate, but they tend to place the responsibility on Iran. There has been no evidence that Iran played a part in Bahrain's uprising, which was led by young Bahrainis from the Shiite majority. Still, many protesters have said, it is reasonable to expect Shiites to be more receptive to Iran if they do gain power. There is little doubt, they also say, that a Shiite-led government would be less receptive to the Saudis.
Advantage Iran
Even some of the Iranian regime's harshest critics are saying the Saudi military venture in Bahrain will change the narrative of the region in Iran's favour. Abbas Milani, an Iranian who went into exile after the 1979 revolution and is now director of Iranian studies at Stanford University, put it this way: "Iran, as the most brutal authoritarian regime in the region, will now have the chance to seem to stand with the democratic aspirations of the people, and against authoritarians clinging to power."
The Saudi king's decision to back King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa's crackdown in Bahrain also underscored the challenge the US often faces with its closest allies in West Asia, where some interests align and others do not, like financing global terrorism. Saudi Arabia has moved aggressively to cut off radical Islamic terrorism within its own borders, but it has addressed the global phenomenon with far less conviction, many American experts have said.
One effect of the crackdown was to underscore President Obama's failure to close the gap in expectations between his talk of democracy during his historic speech in Cairo in 2009 and his actions on the ground. The contortions needed to preserve the old model of stability while supporting aspirations for democracy were strikingly evident.
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/147358/proxy-battle-bahrain.html
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