WHILE YOU WERE LOOKING THE OTHER WAY...

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/01/12/while-you-were-looking-the-other-way/

• Politics is a dirty game

…Suddenly, all news about Donald Trump’s impeachment is almost gone, even though this impeachment, a charge of misconduct against the President of the United States is only the third such charge in American history, and it occurred less than a month ago. The reason is the sudden, unexpected attack upon Irani Maj Gen Qassim Soleimani by the USA, which led to Soleimani’s death. The attack, if you notice, comes hard on the heels of impeachment and just before the President faces a trial in the Senate that will decide whether or not he remains in office.

This is called a diversionary tactic.

Elizabeth Warren, the Democratic Senator and Presidential hopeful, was interviewed by the CNN recently where she questioned the timing of the attack, and its validity. She said that the current Administration was all over the place with its responses regarding a reason for the attack, some saying it was to prevent an imminent attack, others saying no, no, it was to prevent some future attack, and Vice President Mike Pence chiming in by saying that Soleimani “assisted in the clandestine travel to Afghanistan of 10 of the 12 terrorists who carried out the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States.”

The New York Times refuted Pence’s statement, saying that there was no proof that Soleimani had any contact with any of the terrorists. The 9/11 Commission even states that it found no evidence that Iran or Hezbollah was aware of the planning that led to the 9/11 attacks. Soleimani’s name in fact appears nowhere in the report.

Diversionary tactics are popular in politics. The reason is that most people fail to question what they hear. And when they hear something, the information stays with them as valid, never mind that later on the information is proven wrong. That is what the President and those on his team are counting upon.

…Kashmir is a source of diversionary politics for both Pakistan and India. It comes in useful to either side when one commits yet another transgression upon that hapless state, because the other can then cry foul and make a lot of noise while pushing through questionable measures under cover of the noise

The French Revolutionary Wars were said to have been started by the newly formed National Assembly which replaced King Louis XVI, because the National Assembly wished to bring the country together under the new political system and new flag. For this France declared war on Austria in 1792.

Years later, in 1870, Napoleon III was told by his advisors that one way of bolstering his waning popularity amongst the people would be for him to declare war on Prussia, which they said they could win. France, accordingly, declared war on Prussia. It turned out to be a war that France lost.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, the USA brought in its troops, in ‘Operation Desert Storm.’ In what was most important for the then President George HW Bush, his ratings went up, although (luckily) he was not re-elected as a result. That luck for the rest of the world did not hold out as far as his son was concerned. Following the 9/11 attacks, the morale of the US public was down and with it the economy went down as well. George W Bush was responsible for wrongfully accusing Iraq of possessing ‘weapons of mass destruction’ and for subsequently invading that country, something like Henry VIII killing someone for marrying more than once. George W Bush’s move was initially popular with the public and he was re-elected. But when the war dragged on and the US economy lost out, the President’s approval ratings went down as well.

In an example closer to home, Kashmir is a source of diversionary politics for both Pakistan and India. It comes in useful to either side when one commits yet another transgression upon that hapless state, because the other can then cry foul and make a lot of noise while pushing through questionable measures under cover of the noise.

And in Saudi Arabia Jamal Khashoggi– a most visible critic of the Saudi government and in particular of its then crown prince– was brutally murdered by Saudi government agents at the Saudi Consulate in Turkey. Shortly afterwards Saudi women were given the freedom to travel without the permission of their guardian and to drive, too much international rah-rah. That helped drown the storm of condemnation against the topmost persons who were said to be involved.

Politics is a dirty game.