Cartoon of the day: Afghanistan, again

But, wait, from the Chinese press, of all places?  Hmmm... let us see this cartoonist draw something critiquing an important geopolitical agenda of the Chinese government!

Am reminded of an old Cold War-era joke.
A Moscow resident, Vlad, is on a peace-exchange trip to the US, and his American host, Jim, takes him to the White House.
While standing outside the gates, the American says he will demonstrate the beauty of America's freedom.  Jim then yells "the American president is a moron who needs to be thrown in jail."  The visiting Soviet, Vlad, is impressed.
A year later, this same American is visiting the USSR, and Vlad is his host who takes him to the Kremlin.  Vlad swears that he too has the kind of freedom of expression that Jim has in the US, which Jim finds it hard to believe and asks Vlad to prove it.
So, Vlad takes out his megaphone right there at the Kremlin and yells:
"the American president is a moron who needs to be thrown in jail."

The other 9/11s

In talking about the latest wave of globalization, Thomas Friedman has often remarked that 9/11 was an important date, and this was before the events of 2001.
It was on September 11, 1989 that Hungary opened its border to the free world, and created a channel that eventually brought down the USSR itself.
And then, in even more coincidence, on November 9th, written as 9/11 in most of the rest of the world, the Berlin Wall fell.

This opinion piece in the LA Times tells the story, and it is worth reading in full:

[In Hungary] a new generation of reform-minded communists had taken charge. Almost overnight, they wrote a U.S.-style constitution and began speaking openly of a free press, free markets and free elections. Emboldened, a small group of local Sopron activists decided to celebrate the new spirit. Their modest aim: put up some tents, hire a brass band and let the beer and good vibes flow. One of the organizers came up with an especially inspired idea -- to briefly open a gate through the barbed-wire frontier to Austria, allowing people to casually stroll back and forth across the border for the first time in four decades. They called it the Pan-European Picnic.

Because anything involving the border was a matter of extreme sensitivity, their request for a permit came to the attention of Hungary's young prime minister, Miklos Nemeth, the man behind so many of the Gorbachev-like changes taking place. Immediately, a light bulb went off in his head.

Every summer, tourists from East Germany descended on Hungary, where "goulash economics," mixing Marxist industrial planning with a measure of free enterprise, provided things unavailable elsewhere in the grit-gray Soviet sphere: nice restaurants, ample food, good wine. But this year would be different. This year, Nemeth decided to use Hungary's visitors as pawns in a great geopolitical chess game.

Since 1988, Hungarian citizens had been allowed to travel relatively freely. But East Germans were still not allowed by their government to cross into Western Europe. Although they could vacation in Hungary, there was a mutual treaty in force obliging the Hungarians to ensure that East Germans did not escape to the West.

Earlier in 1989, before the seasonal onslaught of East German tourists, Nemeth had very publicly ordered the electricity in the barbed-wire border with the West turned off. Border guards began ceremoniously cutting down large swathes of the barrier -- filmed by Western TV crews summoned for the occasion. Nemeth intended this as a clear message to Hungary's East German guests. Look folks, he declared in effect, a hole in the Iron Curtain. There's nothing to prevent you from "escaping" through it to freedom.

Nemeth hoped to unleash a flood. He believed that a mass escape of East Germans from Hungary would pose an existential threat to the regime of Erich Honecker, the dictatorial boss of the German Democratic Republic. He also believed that if Honecker fell, it would bring down the Berlin Wall -- and with it the entire communist bloc. Amid the chaos, he could realize his true goal. Hungary too would gain its freedom.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Iran, the 1953 CIA plot, Obama, and the Cairo speech

I have no idea how President Obama's speech in Cairo will play out in the next few days and months. I am tired of the pundits on TV and in the blogs commenting as if they can see the future. Hogwash! I say this because I distinctly recall how Western pundits predicted the collapse of India after Indira Gandhi was assassinated. It did not happen. Later when the Tamil Tigers assassinated Rajiv Gandhi, Western pundits predicted chaos in India. Didn't happen. In this case, it is not as if the entire Muslim population is one country--yes, there is a concept of "umma". But, hello, ethnic, tribal, nationalistic sentiments mean that what is good for Indonesia might not be good for Iran.

Speaking of Iran, the Iranian media seem to be taking particular interest in this one paragraph in the President's speech:

For many years, Iran has defined itself in part by its opposition to my country, and there is in fact a tumultuous history between us. In the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government. Since the Islamic Revolution, Iran has played a role in acts of hostage-taking and violence against U.S. troops and civilians. This history is well known. Rather than remain trapped in the past, I've made it clear to Iran's leaders and people that my country is prepared to move forward. The question now is not what Iran is against, but rather what future it wants to build.

The big headline at one Iranian site:

Barack admits US role in 1953 Iran coup

I suppose Mahmoud and Barack are chums now for the President to be referred to by his first name :-)
But, seriously, I wonder how this will play out when Ahmedinajad's political future is to be decided at the polls only a week from now. Could it be interpreted by voters as that the President is truly apologetic for some zany actions during the Cold War, and that only by throwing out Ahmedinajad can they begin to start working with the US? Or, could they think that this apology came about only because of a potential nuclear bomb and, therefore, to become a real player Iran needs that nuke after all? In which case they will swing in favor of Ahmedinajad?

Obama is shrewd, and he has lots of talented people helping him out. I am sure they thought through such scenarios as they parsed every sentence of his speech. I can't quite make up my mind on what the impact will be. But, here is the thing: it was also a special day in Iran--the 20th anniversary of Ayatollah Khomeini's death. And note what his successor, Ayatollah Khamenei said:

He said the US remained "deeply hated" in the region and "beautiful and sweet" words would not change that.
He told the huge crowd at the mausoleum of his predecessor, Ayatollah Khomenei, that action was needed not words.

That speech was a few hours before Obama's speech in Cairo.

Another aspect of the timing of the speech that worries me: why did they choose Thursday? Fridays are important prayer days for Muslims, and many imams routinely use their pulpit to talk about the political issues--particularly in the highly volatile Middle Eastern countries. At least the impression from the outside is that these imams are highly Islamist, and support militancy. Won't this Thursday speech then make it convenient for those imams to make a big deal out of small issues?

I suppose I am a very, very cautious optimist.

The Chinese are coming, The Chinese are coming

Unless you are totally into movies, it is most likely that you haven't heard of a movie called 'The Russians are coming, The Russians are coming'. It came at the heights (depths?) of the Cold War--in 1966. A great comedy, and a great picture at the same time--not merely a slapstick one.


According to this LA Times story, it is literal--the Chinese are coming. And apparently they are coming to buy homes, because prices have dropped so much. It is almost like somebody went to China and advertised a huge clearance sale in California and elsewhere :-)

An excerpt from the Times piece:

The Chinese do have a lot of cash to spend. The central government holds the biggest stockpile of foreign reserves in the world, nearly $2 trillion, most of it in dollars. And the Boston Consulting Group estimates that there were more than 391,000 millionaire households in mainland China last year, up from 310,000 reported the previous year.
....
[Home] prices in the U.S. have fallen more sharply than in China, and many Chinese consider the American market highly alluring as a place to invest and live because of the United States' developed economy.

The purchasing tours in the U.S. grew out of similar trips by well-heeled Chinese back home.

Investors from Wenzhou and other entrepreneurial hot spots were known for chartering buses to visit such cities as Shanghai to shop for apartments. Now some of them are signing up with outfits like Soufun.com, the real estate website that is sponsoring the home-buying trip next month from Beijing to California and Nevada."