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Opinion
USA or Russia: Strategic partner in civilization
By Dr Kunal Ghosh
Contrary to popular belief America is a deeply divided society on the basis of religiosity. The coastal cities of both the east and the west are centres of non-religious liberalism and are home to the major universities of world fame.
The American constitution enshrines religious freedom explicitly and unambiguously, it is well known. What is not well known is that America has many anti-cult laws on her statutes. A cult is defined as a cohesive social group devoted to beliefs or practices that the surrounding culture considers outside the mainstream.
?Western Christianity? is central to America?s civilisational identity. By Western Christianity he means Protestantism and Catholicism. He is hypocritically silent on Judaism, whereas in fact, Judaism is integral to American civilisation.
India is in the process of reaching an agreement with the USA on civil cooperation in nuclear power. The Left parties are opposing it on the ground that it makes India a global strategic partner of America and that has some long term ramifications. They say, ?The nuclear cooperation deal is an integral part of the July 2005 Joint Statement, which has political, economic and strategic aspects. It is also closely linked to the June 2005 Military Framework Agreement signed with the United States?. They look at the deal from their traditional anti-imperialist point of view and they make no secret that they consider the USA to be the number one neo-imperialist hegemon that has put on the garb of neo-liberalism. There is some element of truth in their assessment but I consider it incomplete. There is a cultural-civilizational-religious-racial dimension to America?s geo-politics which impinges both directly and indirectly on India?s national interests, and it is this aspect that all political parties, including the Congress, Left and the BJP, have ignored so far. I shall call it the religio-ethnic dimension in brief. It has something to do with the national identity of America and its core allies.
National Identity and Secularism (or SECTARIANISM) of America
Contrary to popular belief America is a deeply divided society on the basis of religiosity. The coastal cities of both the east and the west are centers of non-religious liberalism and are home to the major universities of world fame. We often tend to judge the USA by the social mores of these high profile cities. The majority of people lives in Middle America and is deeply religious and harbour narrow sectarian outlook. They tend to have large families and their population is increasing faster. They are increasingly dominant in national affairs. They are primarily Protestant and secondarily Catholic. The presence of the third important Christian denomination, Orthodoxy, is negligibly small. Among the Protestants the Episcopalians and the Baptists are dominant. Both sprang from the Anglican Church in different times in history. Traditionally the Baptists have been more intolerant and devout, some say, fanatical. In contrast, the Episcopalians have been more tolerant toward other denominations and religions and have a more liberal-secular outlook, in the mould of the Church of England. But all that seems to have been changing for last one generation with the rise of the mid-20th century Evangelism. A very famous Baptist preacher, Rev. Billy Graham took center stage during the 1960s. He supported the American aggression in Vietnam to the hilt and to the last, even when it appeared that American withdrawal was inevitable. He was a family friend of most of the Presidents, such as, Johnson, Nixon etc of that era. He was tremendously popular among the blacks and was a friend of Martin Luther King Junior, the legendary black leader of the civil rights movement, till they fell out later over the Vietnam war. What is most important is that he had also a tremendous following among the Episcopalians. Wikipedia, the web encyclopedia, says, ?Billy Graham, is a career evangelist and was active as an ordained minister with that denomination for many years, but holds to a charismatic theology not traditionally common among Southern Baptists (Wikipedia 2007). The Middle America has a long tradition of donating enormously and regularly to church funds, and with the rise of Evangelism this trend has strengthened. The Evangelical movement has tremendous money power, which can be easily judged by looking at the number of their web sites, TV channels, publications and world wide network. The declared aim of the Evangelical movement is converting the whole world to their version of Christianity. Their enormous man and money power is active in North East India, Africa, Eastern Europe and Latin America. They have tasted much success in targeting Catholics in Brazilian slums, and that has become a bone of contention with the Catholic Pope. To summarize, [1] the American Episcopalians and Baptists have come closer. They seem to be in the process of a de facto merger. [2] Both have moved away from their traditional world view and found a new cause in Evangelism. President George Bush, Jr., born in an Episcopalian family, is a declared ?Born Again? Christian and a supporter of Evangelism. In his book, A Charge To Keep, he says he was inspired by the Baptist preacher Rev. Billy Graham, who was a family friend, during one of his visits to Bush family home at Maine and ?this contributed to my decision to commit my heart to Jesus Christ?.
The American constitution enshrines religious freedom explicitly and unambiguously, it is well known. What is not well known is that America has many anti-cult laws on her statutes. A cult is defined as a cohesive social group devoted to beliefs or practices that the surrounding culture considers outside the mainstream. Under the cult laws any religious organization, outside the pale of traditional Christian denominations, can be sued for millions of dollars if even one disgruntled or disappointed former disciple can be found who states that he/she has been taken advantage of. Many Hindu-Buddhist organizations and secular Yoga exercise groups have been sued under cult laws. Often an evangelical Christian enters a so-called cult in the disguise of a disciple only to come out later lifting an accusatory finger. Organized Christian cult-busting legal groups with dozens of lawyers and million dollar budgets go around systematically encouraging suits against Hindu and Buddhist groups. Such groups as the Hare Krishnas (ISKCON), Transcendental Meditation, the Sikhs under Yogi Bhajan, to name a few, have faced such suits and sometimes adverse settlements in the millions. To summarize, [1] what the Constitution gives with the right hand it takes away with the left, and [2] Evangelist influence is increasing as America moves more and more toward persecution of beliefs alien to mainstream Christian denominations.
I have written quite a few articles in the pages of Mainstream on the Baptist connection of separatism in North East India (Ghosh 1999, 2002; Ghosh & Kumar 2004, 2005a, 2005b). The British during the Raj consciously used religion as an instrument of politics and facilitated access to north east India for American Baptist missionaries and had drafted a plan (the Coupland plan) for creating a Crown Colony comprising parts of India and Burma. After independence American missionary funding continued for Christianization and secession. American government tacitly encouraged it for punishing a non-aligned India, which had refused to join their camp. Now a day the funding continues with renewed vigour from an America that is in the grip of combined Episcopalian-Baptist Evangelism (see Note 1 for American connection). Many of the separatist organisations of north east India are motivated by political tenets of Christianity and employ terror tactics such as bombing of civilians and trains, forced conversion of people in remote hamlets etc. I am tempted to coin a term, namely Christianism, after the well known term Islamism. The latter means, according to Huband (1999), ?the ideological belief in the requirement to enact the political tenets of Islam as the basis of political life?. In the Indian North-East there are groups which believe in creating a Christian theocratic state as the basis of political life. A few excerpts from the political manifesto of National Socialist Council of Nagaland are sufficient to substantiate this point:
?To us the sovereign existence of our country, the salvation of our people in socialism with their spiritual salvation in Christ are eternal and unquestionable.?
??import of things repugnant to the taste of a Christian people would be prohibited.?
?We stand for faith in God and salvation of mankind in Jesus, the Christ, alone, that is, ?NAGALAND FOR CHRIST?. ?I call such people Christianist and their ideology Christianism. America is the main support base for Christianist separatists of North-East India. Returning to the proposed 123-nuclear agreement, it is apparent that America expects its Indian ally to refrain from anything that is not in America?s strategic interest, and it restricts India?s hands in any natural-gas-deal with Iran. The least the Government of India could have done was to include a clause for closing funding channels from America to Christianist terrorists in north-east India, as a quid pro quo. There is no evidence that India has even mooted the topic.
Religio-Ethnic Core of America
Huntington (1996) in his book, Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order, says that ?Western Christianity? is central to America?s civilizational identity. By Western Christianity he means Protestantism and Catholicism. He is hypocritically silent on Judaism, whereas in fact, Judaism is integral to American civilization. The Jews are a minority in America but they are the most significant minority, distinguished for their control of banking and finance, and contribution to music, film industry and all forms of intellectual activities from research in science and technology to economics, social sciences and liberal arts. Also they are singularly active and powerful in American politics. They occupy significant posts in both the mainstream parties, in strength which is out of proportion to their number. From the inception of Israel in 1948 the American Jewry has been allowed to hold dual citizenship of Israel and USA, a privilege not given to any other group or country. The West European Protestant and Catholic countries, Canada, Australia and Israel form the block of kin-civilization countries allied with the United States. After the disintegration of Yugoslavia and Soviet Union, a few countries of Central Europe, such as, Slovenia, Croatia, Poland etc have joined this kin-civilization group. But there is an inner core inside this group. This core consists of the English-speaking white nations and Israel. The security and welfare of the core is paramount and takes precedence even over the economic interests of America. This fact our Leftist politicians should do well to pay attention to. The next most important thing to America is, of course, her global economic interest, which include relationship with the oil exporting countries, most of whom happen to be Islamic. Most of these countries are in a dilemma over Israel?s brutal treatment of Muslim Palestinians and this dilemma is the greatest influence on American foreign policy and global politics, more than her neo-imperialist considerations. The central issue to this dilemma and American response needs a name and I shall call it America Israel Kinship factor, in short, AIK factor. World-wide growing anti-Americanism among the Muslims is the direct product of the AIK factor.
(To be continued)
(The author is a Professor & Head, Aerospace Engineering Department, I.I.T. Kanpur.)
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