Sushila Sawant Mendes
The wars will end and the leaders will shake hands and that old woman will remain waiting for her martyred son and that girl will wait for her beloved husband and the children will wait for their heroic father, I do not know who sold the homeland but I know who paid the price,” are the words of Mahmoud Darwish, a Palestinian poet, author and a creative writer beyond political boundaries. I received this quote from a friend on a group after the announcement of the ceasefire on May 10, an indicator that people’s minds were thinking and analyzing the aftermath of a war.
Ceasefire is always the result of a diplomatic effort worked out behind the scenes. But to expect Donald Trump to honour the nicety of these diplomatic efforts is just too much! When a war ends or a ceasefire is announced, at any point of time, even from a position of strength it is always a welcome move. It has brought the rainbow at the end of the savagery by the terrorists. The Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri, with thirty five years of experience was however subjected to online trolling by the hatemongers who wanted the war. The National Commission for Women strongly condemned the “reprehensible” online abuse of his family especially his daughter! The Border area Indians were facing the fire and the hinterland jingoists charged by mass media and the TV debates want new geographical boundaries without any understanding of the cost and loss of human life involved. Azeem Banatwalla, the comedian Youtuber, said, “that we send these directly to the LoC and that some people need less TRP and more TheRaPy”.
‘War and Peace’ is the name of Leo Tolstoy’s magnum opus set in 1805, though much of this story begins with the French Revolution of 1789, it focuses on Napoleon Bonaparte's conquest of Europe, causing fear in Russia, as it then centers around the French invasion of Russia in 1812.The famous line from this novel is, “The strongest of all warriors are these two — Time and Patience. If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war.”
As a tourist in Kashmir some years back, I have seen the goodness and the poverty of the Kashmiri people from close quarters. The waiters who served us food in the hotel that we stayed were students who supplemented the family income and they would ask us if there were any job opportunities in Goa. When the brutal attack on Pahalgam took place on April 22, the first reaction was of sadness at the senseless killing of 26 innocent lives but it was also sadness writ large on every wage earning Kashmiri, that the tourist season which had just began, would be badly affected. This is how war and uncertainty result in children going to sleep with hungry bellies. The Misery of Civil War is a 1680 tragedy drama by the English writer John Crowne which exemplifies this kind of a situation.
Baisaran Valley in Pahalgam, was strategically selected by the terrorists as this place referred to as mini Switzerland, is accessible only by foot or horseback. Many tourists who are afraid of heights or sitting on ponies or horses do not even venture on this journey. I recall the coaxing required to be done by at least one member in each family, including mine, to motivate the less adventurous to venture this journey. The path uphill is very mucky and steep and immediate help would be very difficult, thus giving sufficient time for the armed terrorists to escape. This green plateau is beautiful almost the same as the green valleys and slopes that one can see in Switzerland but pleasantly cool, not like the snow capped plateau of Jungfraujoc, advertised as the ‘top of Europe’. Gulmarg on the other hand has chilly snow slopes most of the times.
After the attack, Nasir Khuehami of the Jammu and Kashmir Students Association told CNN that, “Kashmiris have always faced violence and we know what it is like to loose a father or son, we empathise with these families”. Pakistan’s Army Chief Air Marshall, had made speeches just before the attack he had spoken of the two-nation theory first and referred to Kashmir as the “jugular vein” of Pakistan which worsened relations with India. Unfortunately there was an out lash of a strong anti-Muslim sentiments.
Kashmiri students studying in India were senselessly attacked. We need to make a difference between Pakistani and Indian Muslims and not merge the lines between the two and the terrorist.
The world has seen so many wars, like the Crimean War, the two World Wars and the ongoing Ukraine-Russian conflict. In a war, nobody wins, as there are losses on both sides in terms of human and animal life caught in the cross fire and also large scale destruction which takes years to rebuild. Women and children are the first victims of any armed conflict. The war between Palestine militant outfit Hamas and Israeli forces, has claimed thousands of lives so far – many caught in the crossfire. Thousands of Palestinian children have been killed and this war has given birth to thousands of orphans and widows. Gaza City is today traumatized with the land attacks by Israeli airstrikes. In fact, the first signs of normalcy in the recent India-Pakistan ceasefire was that the children have started going back to schools.
Former Army Chief General M M Naravane, while addressing a function in Pune on May 10, cautioned that war should never be celebrated or entered into lightly, “War is not a romantic Bollywood movie. It is a very serious and expensive last resort”. He said that diplomacy should always come first. When war breaks out, there is death and destruction. Children loose parents. Families carry emotional trauma for generations. People subjected to combat wake even 20 years later, bathed in sweat needing psychiatric care. He also warned of war’s long term human and economic toll.
Gen Naravane gave the example of the Kargil conflict’s cost of Rs 1,500 crores, including Rs 800 crores incurred by the IAF alone. Rebuilding bunkers and border infrastructure added hundreds of crores more.
I am reminded of the words of the Red Indian Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce tribe when he surrendered in Montana on October 5, 1877 to the US Army General Nelson A, Miles “I am tired of fighting. Our chiefs are killed… It is cold, and we have no blankets; the little children are freezing to death. No one knows where they are - I want to have time to look for my children and see how many of them I can find. Maybe I shall find them among the dead. Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever.”
Be it armed conflicts waged in African countries or the recent wars fought in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Ukraine, and Kashmir, these have brought unimaginable suffering and trauma to the inhabitants of these lands. War has brought poverty to its victims. It kills people and destroys business, trade, economy, property, hampers diplomacy and ushers in political instability. The bar is now raised to the use of nuclear weapons. The Orange Gas Effect in Vietnam and the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki led to deformed births in four generations thereafter. We need to learn from the lessons of history and not repeat its mistakes.
(Dr. Sushila Sawant Mendes is a Professor and Author of History and an
Indepenent
Researcher.)