Raghu Raman

Freedom is never really free

India needs to reconsider the meaning of democracy due to the rising intensity of violence

In 1982, social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling postulated the Broken Window theory popularized by Malcom Gladwell in his 2000 best-seller The Tipping Point. This theory was used by the New York City Transit Police to clean up the hell hole that the city’s subway had become in the 1980s. Vagrants and muggers ruled the underground after dark. Drunks and drifters wallowed there and used platforms as urinals. The trains were dirty, damaged, littered and splattered with graffiti.

William Bratton, former chief of the New York City Transit Police described Kelling as his mentor while administering his “zero tolerance” programme, which virtually eradicated crime in the subway. Bratton went on to become the New York City Police Department commissioner under Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and his methods were credited for the decreasing crime rates for the next 10 years in the whole of New York City.

The Broken Window theory went something like this: If there was an abandoned house in a street, which had some broken windows, vandals would come along and break some more. If the broken windows stayed unrepaired, it would embolden delinquents to break open the doors and become squatters. Before long, the place would turn into a den for petty crime and criminals and soon that entire street would turn into a “criminal” zone with drugs, illicit liquor, trafficking and other serious crimes.
According to Kelling, this all began with the first broken window. Allowing them to remain broken sent out the message that no one was in charge and that started the criminalization process. And this is exactly what Bratton addressed in his campaign to clean up the New York subway system.
Bratton began by literally cleaning the trains. The New York subway had many more pressing problems than dirty trains. They were losing money, trains were never on time and the whole experience of travelling on the subway was a nightmare. Yet, Bratton focused on cleaning the trains, at times waging a raging battle with the graffiti “brigade”. He then extended the zero tolerance approach to ticketless travellers, arresting and trying them in mobile courts. At times, his cops would arrest so many delinquents that they would be daisy chained in handcuffs and led out in large groups. Every arrested person would also be searched and checked for criminal records. This forced criminals to avoid carrying illegal arms and ironically to start buying tickets!
Bratton also started the strategy of a diverse police force, representative of the community being policed, being tough on gangs and encouraging a strict policy against any form of anti-social behaviour. Before long, Bratton’s methods started showing success and were emulated by other police forces as well.
We encounter the Broken Window virtually every day. Only it is called the “red light jumper”. Picture a herd of vehicles champing at the bit, on a red light. A lone motorcyclist revs up and jumps the red light and that is the trigger for scores of hitherto law abiding citizens to break the law. All it takes for the whole crossing to stay disciplined or turn into a morass—is fixing that first red light jumper.
This article is not about traffic violations, though. It is about the increasing intensity of violence descending on our society day by day. Babies, women and grandmothers are brutally raped—often by the very people who are supposed to be protecting them. People are killed over a few rupees or minor affronts. Ten-year-old child workers are beaten to death in squalid sweatshops run in the national capital. Scores of deaths in separatist violence, hundreds in agitations and thousands because of starvation don’t even register in mindshare anymore. And employees of companies, which are taught as case studies in management schools are burnt alive, while the community and the larger fraternity stand by watching and—continue to stand by watching.
Bratton did not seek to appoint committees to discern the “root cause” of the state of New York City. He did not resort to apportioning the blame on other stakeholders. He also did not try to boil the ocean by addressing all the mores of a crime-laden city. Instead, he chose one broken window, made that a non-negotiable and pursued it relentlessly.
Given our geometric and skewed growth, India is going to face numerous shortages, ranging from jobs, food, living space, water and virtually every other resource. It would be naïve for us to believe that we will not have our share of disagreements and conflicts. But we must choose our broken windows carefully and make them non-negotiable. So, while we can be argumentative, we should not tolerate violent articulations of those arguments.
Our society needs to introspect some basic definitions. If we believe that we are democratic and free people who want to live without fear or terror—then we must remember that terror is not always from across the border and freedom is never really free. It must be paid for by fighting terror and intimidation in all its forms—not by looking the other way and hoping that it will not happen to us or those dear to us.

Strategic security by design

Enhancement of the national security posture makes focus on improving economic security a prerequisite.

Nations have the choice to respond to threats with a short-term tactical or a long-term strategic perspective. Of course, these aren’t mutually exclusive and a sound approach lies in an optimal mix. However, developing countries such as ours need resources far more in areas of energy, food and water security and despite best intentions, conventional external and internal security often take a back seat. While tactically we can and must implement specific security projects, our strategic thinking cannot be limited to holding two ministries accountable for India’s external and internal security.

A nation’s need for security is not just confined to its territorial sovereignty. Matter of fact, most flashpoints of conflicts such as the blockade of the Suez Canal or overproduction of oil by Kuwait had nothing to do with territorial conflicts. The US retains its world dominance more by holding sway over the trade routes on the high seas, than it does by stationing troops overseas. Economic sovereignty is as important to national security as territorial sovereignty.

By the same analogy, enhancement of the national security posture pre-requisites a focus on improving economic security. Developing nations, therefore, must use building blocks of economic security in a manner that also improves national security, reducing the need to embark on separate standalone, resource-consuming initiatives. Here are some examples of such opportunities.

Since its announcement in 2006, the unified goods and services tax (GST) has missed two deadlines due to reasons beyond the scope of this discussion. In short, GST envisages doing away with multiple levels of taxation to leverage efficiencies in logistics and investments in warehousing and allied infrastructure. The introduction of GST has such powerful potential that it can add a percentage point to India’s gross domestic product!

However, apart from its obvious financial benefits, GST will bring a single unified national goods tracking system, giving visibility of consignments, allowing security officials to better discern outlier behaviour such as movement of narcotics, contraband, human trafficking and a wide array of illegal activities that is possible today—because of the fragmented nature of logistics in India. GST will reduce waiting time for trucks at state border checkposts, thus diminishing opportunities for pilferage, sabotage, adulteration and corruption. Security agencies will have the ability to speedily track down the origin and routing of equipment such as mobile phones, computers or explosives used in illegal activities by querying GST. Trucks can be “sealed” at the point of origin with no need to open and examine the contents (from a tax perspective) at each transit point. All of this will also free up vast infrastructure that is currently necessary to monitor piecemeal taxation—and focus it on security.

GST will also aid during natural disasters and crises by allowing the free and unrestricted movement of essential equipment, food and transportation to locations in dire straits. In the past, trucks have waited for hours at checkposts while people were in desperate need of food, water and medical supplies just a few kilometres away.

Another example is India’s pressing requirement of maritime security. The 26/11 Mumbai attacks highlighted the need to secure and monitor the coast, but massive resources are required to guard the 7,000km-long zone. However, there is a way to hitch a ride on the back of the reforms in maritime policies. Coastal security will improve dramatically because of the sheer increase in maritime traffic along the coast if the reforms are implemented. Paradoxically, despite a multitude of advantages, maritime transportation has remained a neglected area in India. Only 7% of cargo in India is carried on marine routes compared with 16% in the US and 46% in the European Union. Despite the fact that maritime transportation is six times cheaper, has a far smaller carbon footprint and the ancillary benefits of reducing congestion, pollution and road fatalities, investments in coastal shipping infrastructure is less than a fraction of the spending on roads, rail and airports.

Like GST, development of maritime corridors will have several collateral benefits for coastal security. For one, escalation in traffic along the coast will defray the cost of patrolling and monitoring the zone. With an increased number of vessels plying along the coast, surveillance, early warning and quick response to emergencies will be much easier as commercial ships are equipped with state-of-the-art radar and communications equipment that security forces will be able to piggyback on, to transmit and receive alerts and advisories. The maritime corridors will also result in the proliferation of ports, jetties and other infrastructure along the coast, creating a lattice of ancillary vessels, establishing a stronger coastal defence system. As coastal economies improve, there will be better communications along the shoreline, which will make it easier to detect and track hostile vessels and reduce the chances of infiltration and smuggling.

In a complex world, security threats themselves are often manifestations of deep festering and interconnected issues. While security forces can be tasked to confront the manifestations and establish an environment of immediate control— strategic thinking lies in leveraging all nation-building projects to create an interlace of security grids that work in symbiotic conjunction. But to do that, we must look beyond parochial interests and heed the words of Benjamin Franklin—that we must indeed all hang together or assuredly we shall all hang separately.

The age of mind wars

Nations must stop fighting today’s battles with yesterday’s tools

In warfare, commanders are trained to capture their theatre’s “ground of tactical importance”, or GTI. The textbook definition of GTI is that piece of land, the loss of which renders the defender incapable of fighting the battle. In conventional warfare, GTI is usually a dominating height such as Tiger Hill in Kargil or beachheads in Normandy. Failure to control this “centre of gravity” is a deal-breaker, resulting in certain defeat for the side which loses it.

However, in asymmetric warfare, the centre of gravity shifts from physical “ground” to abstract perceptions. Nations realized this shift when insurgents struck using guerilla-style operations, inflicted damage and disappeared into the hinterland, avoiding head-on battles with security forces. The objective here was not to capture any ground. Instead, it was to show the local populace that they were more powerful than the government. In this context, the centre of gravity became the support of local villagers wooed both by insurgents and security forces—the former portraying themselves as “freedom fighters” and the latter representing the law.

Though it took some time for conventional forces to recognize this changing paradigm, the doctrine of “winning hearts and mind” evolved as a necessary weapon to counter insurgency. The change was not easy as most senior commanders were from the old school whose focus was on use of force, intelligence and tools of law enforcement. Leveraging non-kinetic operations such as information warfare or projection of soft power was scoffed upon as “unsoldier-like”.
However, this aspect exacerbated in the context of terrorism because here the centre of gravity is perception of key public audiences who are not limited to any geographical location. The metric that has most meaning for terrorists is not the number of people killed or the value of property destroyed. Instead, it is the amount of attention they draw to their attack—and consequently to their identity and ideology. Or in other words, the effectiveness with which terrorists communicate their ideology and strategy to capture public perception, which in the media age means rapid information dissemination.
Until recently, governments could afford to ignore this because they controlled the media which was surrogate of influencing, if not outright controlling, perception. But three tools of the digital revolution changed that dramatically. These were the digital camera, easy-to-use editing software and the new tools of Internet. Unsurprisingly, terrorists groups were quick to recognize the potential of this novel instrument of war. As counterinsurgency expert Thomas Hammes points out—insurgent strategy shifted from military campaigns supported by information operations—to strategic communication campaigns supported by terrorist operations. There are several reasons why communication campaigns have become the centre of gravity with terrorist acts supporting them, rather than the other way round.
The first is fundamental to all conflicts—propagation of an alternative ideology. An ideology does not have to be based on truth to be believed. It just has to be communicated effectively and persuasively in a favourable cultural, socio-economic and political environment. Persecution of minorities, ethnic cleansing, communal and religious conflicts, etc., all leverage this essential principle. The tools of Web 2.0 such as social networking platforms, YouTube and blogs allow powerful and unfettered advocacy of ideology. As early as 2005, key Al Qaeda leaders instructed their cohorts to capture the hearts and minds of the masses and commended the “mujahideen of the information front line” recognizing that their efforts—sound, video and text—were more lethal than rockets and missiles. In July 2007, The Economist noted that the handheld video camera had become as important a tool for insurgency as the AK-47. The terrorist communication process has now evolved to a point where they control the entire production and distribution and can target multiple audiences with precise messaging in multiple languages.
The second reason is that terrorists can use the Web 2.0 with complete impunity and safety. In September 2004, a terrorist group in Iraq beheaded three Western hostages and posted the video on websites and blogs. In a chilling sequel in January 2007, a similar plot to kidnap and behead a hostage live on a webcast was disrupted in the UK. As Aidan Winn of Kings College points out, the nature of this plot was very different from previous attacks causing mass casualties. It is believed that as improved security measures and better intelligence thwart large-scale attacks, terrorists will resort to macabre acts such as beheadings and leverage their publicity as the new weapon of terror.
Terrorist organizations have elevated their communication strategy beyond one-way information. In 2008 Ayman al-Zawahiri responded to several hundred questions posted by the public in a video. The Web allowed a terrorist leader on the run—to interact with millions of his target audience.
Marshall McLuhan’s famous aphorism “the medium is the message” is reinforced in the current scenario where the centre of gravity is rapidly shifting from physical space into the minds of stakeholders. The response of nation states trying to ban dissemination of such content is ineffectual and counterproductive. Democracies have particular challenges in developing counterterrorist strategies without seeming draconian themselves. However, as James Forest, former faculty at the US Military Academy advocates, an approach could be to develop strategies that highlight the inherent contradictions, hypocrisies and internal divisions of terrorist groups and help terrorists defeat themselves rather than trying to defeat them. But to do that, we must stop trying to solve today’s problems with yesterday’s tools.

The strategic threats within

05th March 2012

A fundamental challenge that nations, especially developing ones like ours, constantly face is resource allocation between defence and development. Regardless of the quagmire that our defence modernization process is—it is irrefutable that we expend a large part of our gross domestic product towards defence. Having said that, it is also important to appreciate the strategic shift of threats over the last two decades lest we miss the woods for the trees.
The Indian Armed Forces have historically been organized to defend against external aggression from land and to a lesser extent from coastlines. The bulk of our troop deployment is facing Pakistan, China, Bangladesh and Myanmar. The former two are obviously considered higher risk for historical reasons. While our conventional forces provide a strong deterrence from inimical neighbours, after 1971, the threat spectrum has shifted from conventional all-out war, to irregular but economically draining battles. Even Kargil, which had overtones of a regular military operation, was a limited “incursion” rather than an all-out effort to seize any meaningful chunk of territory. “Set piece” conventional war involves capture or destruction of strategic towns with the aim of forcing the enemy to the negotiating table or degrading them economically.
However, the development of the new instrument of warfare—terrorism, has demoted conventional threats for which our defence forces had been traditionally organized and continue to be funded. The benefit of this instrument is that, while it can be state sponsored and controlled, it has the advantage of deniability and precise deployment. Consider the following scenarios.
Sixty per cent of our country’s container cargo is handled by just one port location—the Mumbai/Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT). Despite having 7,500km of coastline, our economic jugular continues to be held in this port which can be struck and put out of action for days if not weeks by a team no larger than those who assaulted Mumbai in 2008. The resulting potential of damage doesn’t have to be war-gamed hypothetically. We have empirical evidence from the collision of two ships in August 2010 when the port had to be closed during which over $4 billion worth of cargo was affected. And that was just accident without the accompanying fear psychosis of a terrorist strike.
India has the world’s largest oil refinery in Jamnagar. In an eventuality of its take down, India could grind to a halt in a matter of days. While the facility is spread over several hundred acres and well protected, its close proximity to Pakistan and location on the coastline continue to make it a vulnerable point.
Forty-five per cent of India’s air cargo is handled at Mumbai airport which is hemmed inside just 720 acres (compared with 5,000 acres of Delhi.) The airport is surrounded by regular and irregular residential areas over which there can be little control especially in this day and age when shoulder-fired missiles or high explosives are easily available from underground arms markets. Regular thefts from cargo hold areas clearly prove that hostile elements can gain access to them. The entire airport, including the criss-crossing runway, is in easy line of sight of even a rudimentary shoulder fired missile.
Similarly, Bhiwandi, 60km from Mumbai, is the world’s second biggest road transport hub and the largest storage location of all hazardous chemicals in India. By the virtue of this, it also has the highest transient population anywhere in India.
The 26/11 attacks on Mumbai were a paradigm shift in the way terror strikes are maturing. While there have been far more devastating and terrorizing strikes, such as the Beslan School attack in Chechnya or the 9/11 in New York, Mumbai attacks showed the extent of economic damage that 10 men with assault rifles and grenades could achieve. The “bang for buck” both from an investment and deniability perspective will not be lost on potential terrorists who will focus such attacks on the Achilles heel of the Indian economy—which are its logistics nodes.
The tactical way of addressing these risks would be to strengthen security of such nodal areas, but that has a diminishing point of return or as in the case of JNPT or the Mumbai airport is simply implausible beyond an extent. But if India were to consider addressing such risks strategically, we would soon realize that placing all eggs in one basket is not just suicidal from a security point of view, but is also a suboptimal way of organizing our resources. With the fourth largest coastline in the world, increased investment in port management all along the country is not just good economic sense; it is also solid security strategy. Similarly, relocating cargo terminals away from the proximity of major cities reduces fuel consumption, road congestion and overall storage costs drastically. Such strategic redesigns would pay for themselves in simply the resultant efficiencies.
It is an old adage that generals continue to fight the previous wars. Our previous wars were highlighted by their focus on territorial gains rather than economic damage. However, if we were to consider the eventual objective of war—it has always been degradation of the adversary’s economic prowess. To that extent, while we need to address the modernization of our forces, it is also time we started considering the identification and arraignment of our strategic assets.

Terror against women

21st March 2012

The solution lies in providing a strong support structure to victims and high deterrence to potential perpetrators

This month, another victim of “terrorism” succumbed to her injuries, which included broken arms, smashed head and human bite marks. And she was all of two years old. During the same time, two women were abducted in broad daylight, gang-raped and thrown away, one of them just a schoolgirl. Even if the National Crime Records Bureau figures were to be taken as comprehensive, which, given the low rates of reporting they certainly aren’t, a woman is raped in India every 24 minutes and this crime is rising faster than murder, robbery and kidnapping. Ironically, the supposedly safer urban areas lead in rape cases and the national capital holds the ignominious distinction of accounting for nearly half of all rape cases in urban India. Our country that touts youth as its economic powerhouse also holds the world record for child abuse and trafficking. And just to complete the gory story, nearly 40% of married women suffer some form of physical or sexual abuse at the hands of their husbands and in-laws. Undoubtedly, the above figures are nowhere near the real numbers given the social stigma and the high degree of apathy victims encounter. Also, the depiction in percentages veils the fact that we are talking about millions of victims here.

Sometimes it makes me wonder if we have got our understanding of “terror” all mixed up. The underlying essence of “terror” is the ability of a small group of individuals to exert compellence on a much larger majority, forcing the latter to alter its behaviour. To that extent, rising crime against women and children is probably the most heinous kind of “terror” that India suffers for three reasons. First, it is perpetrated by fellow citizens and not some sinister external force. As a matter of fact, in the majority of rape and sexual abuse cases, the victim knows and at times is related to the perpetrators. Second, the trauma of the victims continues far beyond the incident itself as they are scarred for life—physically, psychologically and socially. But what probably puts this crime in the worst category is the fact that most instances are suppressed, allowing the perpetrators the impunity to strike again and again.

Like all crimes, our society pays a price for this at several levels. Studies show that survivors of such traumatic events continue to be dysfunctional and often become pathological committers themselves. Abused children have much higher proclivity towards violence and crime and most rape victims are suboptimal for the rest of their lives.

Without absolving law-enforcement authorities, or condoning their insensitivity at times, society at large is equally responsible for rape, sexual abuse and domestic violence. The latter atrocity clearly shows that the answer does not lie in just better policing or deploying more uniforms around the city. Instead, society, its exemplars and every individual are in some sense accountable for the deterioration.

While rape, sexual abuse and domestic violence are clearly three different crimes, their common thread is low rates of reporting. Estimates suggest that over 75% of rape cases are never reported. Reporting of sexual abuse and domestic violence is even lower. This clearly indicates that the “pareto” of addressing these crimes lies in creating an environment that fosters disclosure rather than suppression, which only emboldens the perpetrator. And again, while measures such as sensitizing law-enforcement authorities, assigning women police officers or protecting the identity of the victim are important, they still address the smaller percentage of cases where the victims and their families muster enough courage to approach the police. That is because society still treats rape and abuse as “personal” crimes where the victim has a Hobson’s choice of seeking recourse to the law and being subjected to the trauma of a largely apathetic society or just accepting the situation and moving on.

If such crimes have to be addressed forcefully, the answer lies in implementing steps that provide a strong support structure to victims and high deterrence to potential perpetrators. The rape of a woman who works in a mall is an attack on every working woman. Every woman who needs to be out of her house is now forced to be restrained. The abduction and rape of a schoolgirl is an attack on every child that forces each parent to be cautious and constrain their child’s childhood. And while being cautious is common sense, it is definitely not the long-term answer.

Social institutions have a responsibility to create an environment where it is the perpetrators who are afraid and not the other way round. Schools and parents must teach children self-defence. Workplaces, corporates, NGOs and families must “own” the responsibility of providing financial, moral and legal support to victims on a continuing basis. Bystanders must realize that the girl they witness being abducted could have been one of their own and, therefore, must get involved. And society must demand pursuance of such cases with the same fervour as it does for outrages such as terror attacks. For, it is farcical to demand zero tolerance for terrorism in a society which is tolerant of such crimes.

India's quest for the top gun
23rd Feb 2012


With announcement of Rafale as the Indian Air Force's (IAF) next generation fighter, the “dogfight“ among six of the world's leading aircraft seems to have ended. However, those unfamiliar with weaponization strategies might wonder how countries decide upon any weapon system. Is it simply a matter of the best? If so, what is best?
The answer isn't straightforward.
The choice of a weapon system has less to do with specifics of its technical capabilities and more with imperatives of strategic doctrine. To understand this better, let's start the journey from a lowly assault rifle rather than a sophisticated aerial platform such as a fighter jet.
An assault rifle is the mainstay of infantry, i.e. bulk of the fighting force of any country, and has over 10 design parameters which are of- ten contradictory. For instance, a rifle should be accurate, have long range, be easy to maintain, sturdy enough to survive the rigors of battlefield, have a rapid rate of fire, and easy to handle with one hand for urban combat. In addition, the weapon must be light, have com- pact ammunition of the same caliber as other weapons so that supply chain logistics are manageable. It must have the capability to be used in different versions, for instance, paratroopers need shorter rifles and infantry support groups need longer ranges. Each of these requirements contradicts many others.
For example, accuracy over long ranges means the barrel will have to be long and the rate of fire cannot be high. This in turn makes the rifle unwieldy and suboptimal in a fierce firefight. If the rifle has to be sturdy with heavy munitions then it can't be light and soldiers will tire before they enter battle.
Such complications exacerbate as weapon platforms get more complex. For instance, let's consider the battle tank. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato designers were compelled to build heavier tanks because their theatres are limited in space and their tanks had to be heavily armored to hold ground without ceding position. A lesson reinforced by the German blitzkrieg when France was overrun in a matter of days. Also, NATO countries have comparatively low manpower though they are better skilled and educated. Hence, tanks such as the British Chieftain and French Leclerc were designed up- ward of 55 tonnes, have high crew comfort and the crew is “dual traded“, i.e. each member of the crew is expected to know more than just his own job, necessitating higher investments in training and retention.
The Soviets, however, relied on a much lighter and cheaper tank of the T54/55 series, because they could trade “time for space“. The Soviet strategy was to let invaders enter deep into the Russian hinter- land--a situation they could afford, primarily because of their strategic depth--and then hit the supply chains through encirclement and, of course, the assistance of “General“ Winter. The “Warsaw“ doctrine, therefore, catered to Russia's strengths which are plentiful supply of conscripted manpower, maneuvering space and the severe weather where sophisticated equipment had more chances of failure. These strategies are consistent with their assault rifles as well. While the West has relied on relatively sophisticated weapons such as the American M16, British FAL and the French Famas, the Soviets developed the cheap but reliable AK47 series.
The key to understanding these strategies is to appreciate that in combat, a weapon is never pitted against another weapon in purely technical terms. It is, instead, a combination of the technical prowess, soldier's capabilities, terrain and the national doctrine which decides the optimum arraignment of weapon platforms. So, while a sophisticated Heckler and Koch rifle could be an ideal weapon for highly trained special forces, a much cheaper and rugged AK47 is better suited for mass infantry attacks, though on a purely technical comparison, the Heckler would outgun the AK.
Fighter aircraft are sophisticated weapon platforms and, hence, their inter-linkage is far more complicated. Modern fighters are expected to perform “omniroles“. They have to be highly maneuverable for “air-to- air“ dogfights, possess heavy lift capability for tactical and strategic bombing, have long radius of action, be capable of operations from land and sea, etc. Their supply chain is even more complicated, especially for India, which has a wide and diverse area of geographical interest. Fighters need air refueling, naval carriers, multi-weapon capability, an intricate web of radars, airborne warning and control system, sophisticated maintenance, re- pair and overhaul facilities and indigenous manufacturing to minimize external dependence.
They also need synchronization with other arms such as the army and navy. For, while IAF may pummel the enemy and establish air superiority, it is of little use unless armored formations can rapidly exploit this hole and pour into enemy territory. And the latter's ability to do that is contingent on their own modernization programme which depends on the country's threat perceptions and mitigation strategy over the coming decades.
Viewed from this perspective, it is rarely the technical superiority of any single weapon system that matters. Instead, it is the complex “organization for battle“ derived from strategic doctrine which serves as credible deterrence. And deterrence is what it must be--because as any soldier will affirm, war is an ironic game. The only winning move- is not to play.

15 Dec 2011

Demons and angels


Humans can inflict terrible cruelty or be incredibly
selfless—society needs to choose the right role model


In 1961, Yale University psychologist
Stanley Milgram sought to
answer a question that had
perturbed the civilized world for
decades. He wanted to know how
thousands of soldiers and civilians in
Nazi Germany could participate in
the extermination of millions of Jews
and other “undesirable” people. How
was it possible that perfectly normal
people would commit acts that go
against the moral conscience and
values of human civilization? Could a
holocaust happen again in any country
or environment—or were Hitler
and Nazi atrocities an aberration of
normal human behaviour?
The Milgram experiment cast
subjects into the role of “tutors”
who were supposed to teach their
“students” a list of words and were
directed to punish them for wrong
answers. The punishment was in the
form of increasing voltage of electricity
administered to the student at the
press of a button by the “tutor”. The
range increased from a mild 15 volts
shock incrementally to a dangerous
300 volts to a fatal 450 volts.
Unknown to the subject, an actor
played the part of the “student”, and
was located in another room, but
within earshot so that the “tutor”
could hear simulated screams of the
student. Before the experiment,
Milgram polled several psychologists
to get their sense of how many
“tutors” would administer painful
shocks and the answers were
consistent with normal belief that
only a small minority—fewer than
1%—would have sadistic tendencies.
However, when the experiment got
under way (and Milgram did 16
separate studies), the startling results
were that more than two-thirds of
the thousand subjects he tested administered
the fatal level of 450 volts.
Many subjects were traumatized
during the experiment, but once reassured
that they were not personally
responsible for damage caused to the
“student” and the experiment was
being done for a “larger” purpose,
over 60% of the subjects went on to
perform what was clearly an atrocity
on another human who had done
them no harm. Variants of Milgram’s
experiment have been performed in
several countries—more famous
among them being the Stanford Prison
experiment conducted at that university—
all of which reiterate that
humans are capable of incredible
levels of evil if certain conditions are
met. The belief that only a small percentage
of us are capable of sadistic
behaviour is factually incorrect.
Psychologists attribute this deviation
from one’s personal code of conscience
to “deindividuation” or transfer
of personal responsibility onto the
group. Philip Zimbardo, the conductor
of the Stanford experiment, identified
specific social processes that
lead down the slippery slope of moral
decay, which begins with taking the
first step of administering 15 volts
rationalized by “it is so mild that the
student can hardly feel it”!
This is precipitated by the dehumanizing
of others, abdication of
personal responsibilities, uncritical
conformance to the group and
passive tolerance by inaction or
indifference.
The implication of such behaviour
is chilling. Our children and future
generations are exposed to far higher
degrees of violence in games, TV,
movies and world events, inuring
them to the first step of using
violence as an acceptable way of
quashing dissent. Critical views are
marginalized and societies are
exhibiting indifference and inaction
as responses to social issues. This is a
bigger challenge for India because of
its diversity and expanse where major
problems seem distant and unconnected.
The behaviour of lynch mobs
and violent instances of road rage or
hate crimes expose the deterioration
of our much-lauded tolerance. Every
generation sets the benchmark of
behaviour for the next and if current
trends are anything to go by—we are
setting a dangerous role model.
But the good news is that the behaviour
of societies can also be influenced
positively by selfless exemplars
who put the well-being of others
ahead of their own. In July 2007, a
young student, Cameron Hollopeter,
fell in front of an incoming train at a
subway station in Manhattan. With
the speeding train literally metres
away, death seemed certain, but for
the actions of a 50-year-old black
American, Wesley Autrey. He jumped
onto the track and, realizing that he
would not be able pull Hollopeter out
of harm’s way, performed an act of
selfless bravery for a complete
stranger, while his own two small
daughters stood watching. Autrey
pushed the student down flat in
between the tracks and lay on top
of him, allowing the train to pass
over both of them with an inch of
clearance. When asked later, Autrey
said that he did what anyone could
do—and everyone ought to do.
Closer home, we have several instances
of brave hearts who decided
not to be bystanders, though they
could have and remained alive.
Employees of the Taj who went back
into the hotel during the terror attack
to assist guests, or the nurses who
died saving patients in the hospital
blaze in Kolkata, bear testimony to
the inherent heroism and nobility in
all of us.
Philip Zimbardo chronicled the
Stanford experiment in his book The
Lucifer Effect and, ominously enough,
the behaviour exhibited by his students
was replicated three decades
later in the prisons of Abu Ghraib by
the US army—though the latter chose
to explain it away as deviant conduct
by a few individuals. It is, therefore,
important to recognize that our behaviour
is shaped by social forces
that can bring out the demons or angels
existing within each of us. And it
is the collective responsibility of
society as to which of these two
avatars becomes the archetype for
future generations.



http://epaper.livemint.com/Default.aspx?selpg=3763&selDt=12/15/2011&BMode=100#

01 Dec 2011

The Resource Wars of the Future.

War originated as a coordinated form of theft about 10,000 years ago. From the time early man began farming and hunting
tribes that could not grow food or had surplus to barter began raiding other communities that produced food. This was more difficult than hunting animals as their adversaries were equally intelligent and learnt to defend themselves.
The raiding tribe's strategy depended on attacking defenceless or, at least weaker, tribes at specific times of the year. At the same time, defending tribes began organizing themselves to repel raiders with better emplacements, obstacles and deception. Eventually some tribes focused on farming and others on raiding. While the former created and developed ecosystems for better agricultural yields, storage methods and bartering, the latter developed efficiency in war, communication and fast transportation.
Wars are initiated for many reasons. It may be to consolidate federated tribes as Genghis Khan did or due to ideological divides such as in the US Civil War or for “living space“ as in the case of Nazi Germany's concept of Lebensraum.
War can also break out because of underlying geopolitical schisms as in many African or East European countries. Another possible reason can be ethnic divides such as in the case of Rwanda or the oppression of minorities in Sri Lanka.
Whatever may be the claimed reason, the real and base purpose for all war is the desire to control re- sources in situations when there are more claimants than the avail- able resource.
This brings us to a worrying conundrum. Mankind has been proliferating with scant regard to the planet's capacity to sustain the consumerist lifestyle that we take for granted. More perturbing, how- ever, are the patterns of consumption. The United Nations Development Programme's 2011 Human Development Report reads like a prologue to apocalypse. Human consumption--which has a direct bearing on the planet's capability to sustain and replenish itself is at an all-time high and shows no signs of abating. Our requirements of energy, water, food and living space are fast outpacing the planet's capability to provide them.
Nearly 1.3 billion people are directly affected by agricultural depletion, forestry, fishing, hunting and foraging. Millions more will be affected because of rising water levels caused by global warming.
Contamination of water has dis- placed more humans than all wars put together and new incurable strains of diseases are incubating in a hot and crowded world. A few hundred years ago, when space or resources became a constraint, tribes just moved to new locations.
But now, the earth is full. There simply aren't enough resources for all, especially as a small percent- age of our species is consuming more than 80% of the world's re- sources, creating an existential threat for others.
This essentially boils down to a simple formula. As resources dwindle and demands increase, conflicts will exacerbate. We will see more wars, violence and devastation in the coming decades. Wars for basic supplies such as water and food are already on in some regions of the world. And several other ideological or political conflicts are simply resource wars masquerading under different euphemisms.
The situation is especially worrying for India. As a nation, we are surrounded by failing states and hostile countries. We need to maintain the second largest army in the world and face the largest one as our foe. We have fought major wars across three fronts and have been facing a proxy war for two decades. We spend nearly 2% of our national output on defence while struggling to provide for education and health care. In addition to external threats, we are in the epicentre of global terror and have several internal security issues --the biggest being ultra-Left violence that according to some re- ports also has elements of a re- source war.
Nation-building activities directly and indirectly affect millions of people. Health care, education, infrastructure, employment, energy distribution, agriculture and other sectors have economic implications, especially when there are several stakeholders, all of whom can't benefit equitably. Even if care were taken to be fair to all, several would have to undergo a forced change in their way of living, which is always a cause for dissent.
Unfortunately, in these times when the world is embroiled in multiple crises, the only way to draw attention to the issue of dissent is violence. This is especially true for the weaker and minority groups for whom asymmetric war is increasingly becoming the favoured option.
Our next generation of business, political and bureaucratic leaders and managers will be confronted with security related situations more frequently. But our education, awareness and planning systems do not factor their security implication. This deficiency constantly forces us to expend far more resources in trying to con- front and contain the dissent rather than preventing it in the first place. In some situations, the latter option is simply not possible be- cause of severe depletion of re- sources.
Careful husbanding of our resources is essential to balance development and security. Ignorance of this symbiotic relationship is probably the biggest security risk that our nation faces.



18 Nov 2011

The primitive origins of war

Despite all the achievements of mankind, as a species we present a paradox to future generations. One could question why humans unarguably the “smartest“ animal to inhabit the planet would devote so many resources to destroying their own kind. Man is the only animal to have changed the environment to his needs, rather than just adapting to the constraints imposed by it. It is also the only animal to grasp the concept of delayed gratification: the concept of sacrificing now for greater benefit in the future. Then why do we consistently destroy our own environment, pollute the air we breathe or the water we drink?

Why does the brain, which can envision projects yielding results after decades, commit actions that lead to disasters in a matter of months? Why is man the only animal that commits atrocities such as genocide on others of its own species or ecocide on his own environment?

The easy answer of course would be self-centred emotions such as greed, selfishness, etc., but these are behaviours at an individual level. And while individual or occasional acts of self-destruction can be put down to personality or circumstances, a series of such acts by an entire species suggest a hardwiring of destructive behaviour that can push us over the abyss, unless we understand and correct it.

Conflict is as old as our species itself. Mankind, as we know it, evolved physiologically about four million years ago. However, our species' cultural evolution happened less than 200,000 years ago. During this comparatively short period, man learnt his most important survival skill--the ability to work in groups. Ironically, anthropologists suggest the development of this core skill that differentiates mankind--our ability to plan and communicate--stemmed from “war“.

Early man foraged for food be- fore evolving into farming and hunting. While farming was fraught with uncertainties such as weather, water supply and the delays between sowing and harvesting, hunting was immediate, and man was able to supplement his food with instant protein in the form of meat. But hunting posed its own challenges. Man quickly learnt that it was better to hunt groups of large animals so that more meat could be obtained from each hunt. Also large animals like the mammoth meant more fat, fur and bones. The first two were essential to survive the cold and the bones helped make tools.

But this action of a communal hunt gave mankind more than just food or clothing. When prehistoric men banded together to track, stalk and bring down a large animal, they needed to accomplish the sophisticated task of planning and organizing a hunt, which is warfare in primitive form. They needed to communicate a complex set of instructions with precision (later to be known as military precision) to individuals who may not even be a part of their band.

These individuals would have to work in smaller sub-units under junior leaders. Elements of an organization, leadership under stress, terse unambiguous orders and situational shift in headship were all born out of the need to fight together to take on a larger “enemy“. Hunting became the seed for many powerful frameworks that distinguish our species--such as collaborative strategies, social structures, situational leadership, and communication.

As man evolved, the basic unit of a “family“ enlarged to kinsmen, then clans, tribes and eventually nations. It was a matter of survival that the clans and tribes were “right-sized“. They had to be large enough to provide enough manpower for the communities' needs and yet not have too many mouths to feed. So when the size of the tribe grew beyond what the lay of the land could sustain, clans would move or hive off on adaptation paths of their own.

Mankind's secret to survival and becoming the most proliferate species on earth was not being the fittest. As anthropologist Jacob Bronwski points out, environment exacts a price from the fittest. It imprisons them within the confines of that environment. For mankind to proliferate, it had to adapt to the freezing cold of the Arctic and to the searing heat of the deserts. Also being an animal that had no integral weapons (such as claws and teeth to hunt) or bodily defence mechanisms (such as fur or armour), humans had to adapt and create survival strategies--the first of which was the act of war.

We often confuse fighting or conflict with war. Fighting is a much baser instinct hardwired in our primordial brain. A dangerous situation produces the same physiological reaction in us today as it did millions of years ago in our ancestors.

So whether faced with a tiger or a mugger--the adrenalin rush, suspension of digestive activities, twitching of muscles, nervous palpitation, etc., are all responses of the body getting ready to fight or flee. Conflict is a mental and physical state where two different instincts are chosen depending on the situation. These are instincts that drive a predator to hunt its quarry or help female mammals protect their young. War, on the other hand, is a planned and coordinated form of theft that originated about 10,000 years ago.


02 Nov 2011


Pirates of the Gulf of Aden
An explosive mix of ecological destruction and plunder has led to piracy in Somalia. It will be hard to end it.

Over the last decade, Somalia has become synonymous with piracy. Several countries, including India, have been affected directly or indirectly because of this menace. Despite patrolling and intervention by security forces of many countries, Somali pirates have exacted several hundred million dollars in ransom, held over a thousand people as hostages and disrupted trade worth $12 billion annually. The cost of keeping naval channels safe, security on ships, delays in sailing time and increased insurance premiums all add up to a sum that has to be borne by consumers. Security measures, however, address only one issue—and perhaps at the wrong end of the stick. To appreciate why the combined might of several countries fails to check this threat, it is important to understand the root of the problem rather than its manifestation.

Somalia like several other African countries has been ravaged by war, famine and acute deprivation for decades. When United Nations (UN) forces withdrew from Somalia, the country turned into a “failed” state virtually overnight. With the collapse of any credible government, the Somali navy ceased to be an effective force and the country’s territorial waters became happy hunting ground for industrial fishing vessels from all over the world.

Unscrupulous and indiscriminate fishing—which included devastating methods such as deep-sea dredging—destroyed all marine life decimating the oceanic ecosystem. Somali fishermen, who had for centuries practised eco-friendly and traditional fishing methods, were no match for the powerful fishing mafias.

When word about this unprotected haven got around, Somali waters were further ravaged by dumping of radioactive and toxic material all along its coastline, damaging marine life. As if this weren’t enough, the 2004 tsunami washed up contaminated waste right to Somali shores, sounding the death knell for millions of Somalis who depended on the sea for subsistence.

The first instance of “piracy” began when the deprived Somali fishermen started confronting the industrial fishing ships and were obviously beaten back. However, this led to the fishermen teaming up with battle-hardened gunmen who were in plentiful supply, thanks to the decades of civil war. A lethal combine was formed between fishermen who knew the waters like the back of their hand and fighters for whom the ubiquitous AK-47 was an extension of their body.

Warlords, especially in southern Somalia, seized this income opportunity and turned piracy into military campaigns. The raiding parties now had automatic weapons, rocket launchers, high-powered outboard motors and state-of-the-art navigation and communication devices. Pay-offs of up to $5 million have been obtained for the release of individual ships, and delivery of ransom has included sophisticated methods such as airdropping of cash over high seas.

For the starved Somalian economy, the pickings were simply too rich to resist. The Gulf of Aden is the jugular for most shipping in the southern hemisphere and is especially vital for India. What started out as an outraged protest has turned into a billion dollar industry with low investment.

In 2008, the world started getting its act together, with the UN empowering naval interceptors to enter Somali waters in hot pursuit. Large flotillas are now escorted by destroyers, but there are simply too many ships and not enough sheriffs to ride shotgun.

In response, the pirates leverage time-tested tools of guerilla warfare. Agility is laced with ruthlessness to send a message that it is cheaper to settle the ransom than to involve authorities. A typical raid begins by identifying and stalking a potential vessel from a safe distance using radars. At an opportune time, usually during the night, fast attack craft approach the vessel from multiple directions and overpower the defenceless crew, sometimes killing and maiming them. Next, the vessel is rigged with explosives to prevent storming by security forces. This is a strong deterrence because it uses the crew as human shields and also threatens an environmental disaster.

This deadlock has the same elements as many security issues facing the world. An impoverished community is pushed over the edge by the rapacious greed of a few. Fragile environments and meagre livelihoods are destroyed with disregard to people who rightfully own and depend on them. When those communities rise in retaliation, the world is outraged and brings its heavy-handed (and horribly expensive) might to tackle the surface problem, while continuing to ignore its root cause. This same script is played out time and again, be it forced relocation of coastal fishermen in Sri Lanka after the tsunami, purportedly for their safety—where five-star hotels were built—denying them access to the sea, or spraying of chemicals in Afghanistan to destroy the poppy crop without providing an alternative source of income.

Even as you read this, pirates are holding nine vessels with more than 240 hostages. Their beat has increased way beyond the Somali waterline into the high seas, often as far as the Kenyan coast. Piracy continues to exacerbate, costing the world billions of dollars. And yet it all started when poor fishermen were denied their livelihood. It is time for us to realize that the world is one village and no matter how distant the problem seems to be when it begins—unless addressed immediately with foresight—it lands at our doorstep quickly.