[HN Gopher] YouTube disrupted in Pakistan as former PM Khan stre... ___________________________________________________________________ YouTube disrupted in Pakistan as former PM Khan streams speech Author : xbmcuser Score : 162 points Date : 2022-08-22 18:41 UTC (4 hours ago) (HTM) web link (netblocks.org) (TXT) w3m dump (netblocks.org) | user3939382 wrote: | The story I heard on this is that the US "asked" Khan to play | ball on Ukraine/anti-Russia and he basically said no, came out | with a statement like "Are we your slaves?" | https://www.ibtimes.com/are-we-your-slaves-pakistans-khan-sl... | and about 2 weeks later he was removed from office. There's no | concrete evidence the US was connected to regime change here but | it sure looks that way and it wouldn't be the first time. | abdullahkhalids wrote: | We will never know the truth. But it has to be said that the | opposition parties that brought about the vote of no-confidence | had tried to muster the strength to do so a year prior and | failed. They had restarted to talk about a No-confidence vote | months before the Ukraine/Russia war and had started to slowly | form the alliance to do so [1]. | | [1] Jan 13 https://www.dawn.com/news/1669107 The vote happened | early April | paxys wrote: | Third world countries blame "US/CIA interference" for their | domestic problems so often I wish we were really that competent | in projecting power across the world. | | Do people really think western powers care that much about | Imran Khan's opinion on Russia-Ukraine to pull off a regime | change in one of the largest and most unstable countries (that | too with nuclear weapons) in the world? It's a tactic for such | politicians and countries to make themselves feel more | important on the global stage, nothing more. | | Pakistan has always been run by its military. Politicians who | get out of line quickly get deposed/exiled/assassinated. There | is nothing new or surprising with the latest development. | serial_dev wrote: | It's because US interference is actually pretty common. | | Here is Wikipedia on this topic, which is actually one of the | more "US intelligence friendly" sources out there: https://en | .m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in... This | list is endless and shocking. | | Pakistan is a big and important country, so their position is | actually important. Furthermore, for any empire, it's vital | that it gets other smaller countries in line, even if the | small country's position would be irrelevant. | | The way I see it is that most countries' leaders will always | be both popular and unpopular in a significant portion of the | country so it is always possible to frame a | revolution/coup/insurgence as either a great thing or a bad | thing. | | I don't know what happened in this case, and in complicated | scenarios like these, there are always many factors and | forces at play, but it's certainly not unreasonable to think | that foreign powers gave a little push in order to see the | outcome they wanted in the region. | asdajksah2123 wrote: | That's the propaganda Khan, who was extremely unpopular with | both the army and the public, was pushing. | | The real reason his PM career was untenable was because (a) he | pissed off the Pakistani military by threatening to | unilaterally replace the military leader, whose support was the | only reason he became PM in the first place, and (b) his party | appointed some virtual unknown and definite incompetent (who | was a friend of his wife's) as the leader of the Punjab | province which has over 50% of the population of Pakistan. | | His latter action also angered members of his own party and | members of his alliance that saw their own political careers | threatened because he took such politically poor actions with | half the country's population. | | Finally, what would have been astonishing is if Imran Khan (or | anyone for that matter), would have completed his term. He | would have been the first PM to do so in Pakistan's history. | | It really doesn't require a conspiracy theory centered around | America to explain something that is the norm in Pakistan. | waqasx wrote: | That is completely untrue. His party has won all elections by | landslide since he was removed in this regime change. | [https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/22/asia/pakistan-imran-khan- | anti...] | abdullahkhalids wrote: | The elections you refer to had PTI winning 46% of the vote, | while PMLN won 39% of the vote. This is far too small a | difference to be characterized as a landslide, even if this | difference resulted in a 15-5 seat split, given that the | winning party has less than 50% of the votes. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Punjab_provincial_by- | elec... | kache_ wrote: | This information is true | renewiltord wrote: | This is at least partly true. Pakistan is mostly ruled by the | military so keeping them happy is important. That's the | actual power centre there. | | Prime Ministers of Pakistan don't usually manage to serve out | their term https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prime_minist | ers_of_Pak... | isr wrote: | I know this kind of reply may trigger a harsh response from | HN mods, but this really needs to be said. | | You are lying through your teeth. | | The plain facts, in no particular order: | | 1. Imran Khan's party had much larger support in 2013 | elections, and that support was suppressed via election | rigging. Its impossible to really say wether he would won an | outright majority then (probably not), but who knows | | 2. In 2018, there was massive rigging to ensure that Imran | Khan would NOT win an outright parliamentary majority. This | was admitted to, PLAIN AS DAY, by one of the crooks who is | currently "defence minister" (what a joke). He openly and | plainly admitted that he was losing during the count in his | constiuency, he picked up the phone and complained to the | army chief, and lo and behold - the remaining count | miracoulusly went in his favour. | | Multiple other examples like this. THE ONLY REASON that the | previous opposition were complaining about rigging is | because, FOR THE FIRST TIME IN HISTORY, they were handicapped | in rigging in their own favour,in their own localities. | | 3. Imran Khan was extremely unpopular with the public? | | Complete hogwash. BEFORE HE EVEN MENTIONED THE US | INVOLVEMENT, he held a number of political rallies, in the | last week of his premiership. One such rally resulted in A | MILLION PEOPLE coming to Islamabad. | | A MILLION NEW CELL PHONE NUMBERS were registered in the | Islamabad area by telco's during that weekend | | So there goes your entire narrative that you were trying to | falsely push. | MichaelCollins wrote: | > _Khan, who was extremely unpopular with both the army and | the public,_ | | If everybody hates him, then censoring him is pointless. I | don't know anything about any of these people or parties but | what you're saying doesn't pass my sniff test. | waqasx wrote: | he is massively popular, which is the reason the govt isnt | going towards elections. This WSJ articles sums it up | pretty well: https://www.wsj.com/articles/ousted-pakistan- | prime-minister-... | asdajksah2123 wrote: | Censoring him was dumb (this isn't the first time the | succeeding govt censored him). They've really made a hash | of it and allowed him to become a martyr. | | He was unpopular. Here's a poll from when the no-confidence | vote passed (Bloomberg referencing Gallup Pakistan | polling). | | https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-13/majority | -... | | That being said, the only thing that matters isn't just | overall support. The groups supporting also matter. And | even though Khan had minority support, he has support among | the extreme religious right of Pakistan, who are organized | enough to shut down the country and motivated enough that | they would do that even if it costs damage and lives. | BeetleB wrote: | The poll you cite doesn't support your earlier claim that | he was "extremely unpopular". He may not have had over | 50% of the public's support, but his support was near | that level. By your own reference, 43% were upset at his | removal. | _em_ wrote: | >>> who was extremely unpopular with both the army and the | public | | Bro, if you want to lie, at least lie at something which | can't be countered by other sources. | | Among all the leaders atm, khan is the most popular one. Ever | since he was ousted, he has been calling rallies and people | are coming out for him. He has pulled biggest crowd in | pakistan history. All can be seen on YouTube. | | I can't even read rest of your comment given that I already | know that either you are very disconnected from reality or | you have some other motive to discredit khan. | tibbydudeza wrote: | Much like in Egypt (bye bye to the Muslim Brotherhood aligned | democratically elected PM) the army in Pakistan get a lot of US | $$$ "assistance". | monetus wrote: | Didn't morsi try to dissolve the judiciary? | croes wrote: | And now it's better in Egypt? | daemoens wrote: | Of course it isn't but dissolving the judiciary still | wouldn't have been a good thing. | int_19h wrote: | It's not an uncommon thing for a justifiable uprising to | end up in a place worse than before. It doesn't | necessarily mean that it was instigated from the outside | for that or some other purpose. | guelo wrote: | Not liking the results of democracy is not a justifiable | uprising. | int_19h wrote: | It is when said democracy cracks down on human rights. | guelo wrote: | Not true but the judiciary did dissolve the democratically | elected parliament. Who was more legitimate? Answer: the | parliament | alpha_squared wrote: | Egyptian here, hello. | | Some pretty big quotes should surround "democratically". | Also, the Muslim Brotherhood attempted to enact | constitutional Sharia Law, something unfavorable even amongst | the Muslim-majority populace. If we're going to cherry-pick | Egypt as an example here, would be nice to provide the whole | picture of what went down (which this comment certainly | isn't). | guelo wrote: | It is not true that Morsi's government tried to enact | Sharia law. Egyptian liberal's overblown fear of Islam | resulted in something far worse, a military dictatorship | for another 30 years. | tibbydudeza wrote: | He was elected by mostly the poor and lower class - his | agenda and political leanings was well known - the middle | class and elites did not shed a tear when the army stepped | in again. | tenpies wrote: | Khan is definitely not an American puppet, but I don't think | the Biden administration has any grip on Pakistan at this time | compared to before. In that region, Biden surrendered | Afghanistan to the Taliban, but they also effectively | surrendered Pakistan to China some time ago. Pakistan is much | more aligned with the BRICS, although they will gladly | entertain the US for funding/weapons without delivering | anything. | | That said, if one is suspicious of American technology being | weaponized for foreign policy, then Poland will be the place to | watch next year. The Biden administration has every clearly | told Poland they want a regime change. The EU is also on board. | fatherzine wrote: | US has plenty of power to enact regime change, ie destabilize | entire countries and/or regions. What the US manifestly lacks | is power to bring up a decent replacement regime to provide | order around a set of resonant moral values. And so chaos | slowly engulfs the world as the sun sets over the American | Empire. Chaos age, until the next Empire. | gautamdivgi wrote: | How much sway does the US have in Pakistan today? They are | aligned economically and militarily with China. It's an honest | question. I know US bashing is popular but didn't Pakistan | align with China to move out of the US sphere of influence? | [deleted] | [deleted] | guelo wrote: | At some point Pakistanis are going to have to open their eyes | to how their politicians use the US as a convenient excuse to | blame for all their problems. | lifeplusplus wrote: | not an excuse if it's probably true.. same thing happened | when Iraq was invaded, Bush famously said you are either with | us or against us | ethbr0 wrote: | Granted, at that point it was an open secret that the ISI | had spent decades recruiting and funding armed and violent | Islamic groups. | | The enemy of India is my friend, etc. | lsllc wrote: | Heh, "play ball" -- I see what you did there: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imran_Khan#Cricket_career | [deleted] | CommanderData wrote: | It stinks of interference and that's a pretty big statement to | make. No surprises if he's pissed off a few. | ShivShankaran wrote: | It was absolutely this. US funds the pakistan army and a high | level meeting happened where they threatened to pull out funds | if they didnt dispose off Khan. | | We have a saying that most countries have an army but in | Pakistan the army has a country. | | Gaddafi was killed and his sons were murdered in front of him | because he threatened petro dollar. before that he was given | red carpet in france and even camped in sarcozy lawn. | | now Russia and China threaten the petro dollar and I am worried | what the US is going to do. | selimthegrim wrote: | Sitting in India (presumably) what evidence have you got for | this? | mercy_dude wrote: | What does the commented being in India have to do with what | he said? It is absolutely true Khan didn't want to cancel | the Russia trip when it happened the day of the strike. | DiggyJohnson wrote: | Direct funding of Pakistani military forces in recent years | is indeed unsubstantiated, but occurred as recently as | 2018. | | We still provide some significant funding to Pakistan for | humanitarian and development (i.e. civilian) efforts. This | information is widely available online. | | So GP is wrong to be so confident and absolute about their | claim that we still fund the Pakistani army, but we do | indeed give money to their government, and the Pakistani | government is not independent of its army. It's a messy | situation. | | Just trying to provide a bit of a more nuanced view before | this heavy-handed comment you're replying to is dismissed | outright. | throw_m239339 wrote: | > Gaddafi was killed and his sons were murdered in front of | him because he threatened petro dollar. before that he was | given red carpet in france and even camped in sarcozy lawn. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alleged_Libyan_financing_in_th. | .. | | Sarkozy got rid of an inconvenient witness... (the former | french president has been indicted for a series of financial | crimes related to Libya since). | selimthegrim wrote: | Ukraine was actually pro-Pakistan on the Kashmir issue and sold | them battle tanks. He needs to fire whoever in the Foreign | Office advised him to do this. | ShivShankaran wrote: | is this true? I would like to read more about it. | selimthegrim wrote: | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan-Ukraine_relations | | https://mobile.twitter.com/kanchangupta/status/149707149882 | 5... | ShivShankaran wrote: | thank you. Good to learn about something I never knew. | Probably one of the reason why Indian-related subreddit | were agaisnt ukraine but the reddit admins came down and | deleted all subreddits that were critical of war, even | the massively popular ones | prvit wrote: | > deleted all subreddits that were critical of war | | hmmmmm | | Or wait, are you confusing subreddits with threads and | admins with subreddit mods? That's the only way your | comment doesn't read as downright insane. | ShivShankaran wrote: | no, they outright deleted subreddits. Some of these | subreddits were long criticized for having genocide | material but reddit refused to remove them for "freedom | of speech". When they put up a banner criticizing the | war, reddit admins removed the subreddit outright. | | here is the time article about it | https://time.com/6160519/reddit-international-hate- | speech-ba... | | They refused to ban either subreddit for 2 years but a | week after they criticized the war, they were both | deleted. | prvit wrote: | And which war were these subreddits critical of? | binnerhn01 wrote: | mercy_dude wrote: | Pakistan is a classic case of what moral bankruptcy looks like | when you harbour terror just so you can hurt your neighbours. For | decades, they allowed terror camps and bases because it would | hurt India and in the process military was under supreme control | of the state. All along, US supported them because a) they were | always suspicious of India being a Russian ally and b) they | somehow thought by some crazy logic that Pakistan is going to be | their ally in war on terror. | | But then the snake they were growing in the backyard with the | hope of hurting their neighbours started biting them. First the | collapse in Afghanistan and then decade long war on terror | followed by economic stagnation coupled with corruption at the | military led the mass to basically become completely robbed. | | This is the populous that somehow thought India is their arch | enemy and their leaders are all on their side because the state | religion Islam was used as a tool. Ya I don't have much sympathy | for them. | throwawaylinux wrote: | > military was under supreme control of the state | | Many would argue the military should be under supreme control | of the state. Do you mean the state was under supreme control | of the military (i.e., when Pakistan was under military rule)? | helixfelix wrote: | Lets not pretend that there is only a single guilty party here. | No doubt pakistan tried to control mujahideen to fight their | proxy wars. Just like Indian intelligence has funded the | Balochistan insurgency inside Pakistan. This of course all | started with US asking Pakistan to setup these mujahideen to | counter Russia in 1980. | mercy_dude wrote: | This is a false equivalency. The extent to which Pakistan | used its military apparatus to train militias and other | terrorist organizations is unparalleled. There is a reason | Osama Bin Laden found a safe heaven. | | This is the what aboutism that most politicians toy with when | they want to fool the public. But like I said this is a | populous that are truly detached and delusional. They brought | it on themselves. | getcrunk wrote: | Really its unparalleled? Even by america. | [deleted] | dirtybird04 wrote: | You're not wrong about things as they stand. | | However, you do conveniently leave out that it was the US | toppling the Shah of Iran that resulted in a religious wave | taking over the whole region. And it was the US, again, that | armed and trained everyone in Afghanistan to the teeth to help | them fight the commies. And it was the US, yet once again, that | just bailed as soon as USSR collapsed, leaving a massive power | vacuum in the Afghanistan, which led to the Taliban takeover. | | Pakistani army merely tried to use that power vacuum to their | advantage. And it failed miserably, might I add. The army has | gotten used to the boatload of USDs for being an war ally, but | all the US hatred now is creating fractions within it. | | My point is, every country plays this game, and they all play | it dirty. Why assign moral bankruptcy to a minor player while | completely overlooking the major player that's stirring all the | global shitstorms? | JumpCrisscross wrote: | > _the US toppling the Shah of Iran that resulted in a | religious wave taking over the whole region_ | | If we're looking for a founding mistake, it's probably the | British (and French) betraying the Hashemite king [1][2][3], | thereby permitting Wahhabism to take hold. That and the | absence of a Marshall Plan for the post-WWII de-colonised | world. | | > _every country plays this game, and they all play it dirty_ | | The Mujahideen plotted attacks on Soviet military targets in | Afghanistan. They're analogous to the Taliban post invasion. | To my knowledge, the U.S. wasn't knowingly supporting | terrorism in _e.g._ Moscow the way the ISI has supported | militants striking Bombay. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hashemites#World_War_I_and_ | the... | | [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Revolt | | [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMahon- | Hussein_Correspondence | mercy_dude wrote: | I don't think you understand geopolitics in that part of the | world. Shia dominated Iran has very little influence on Sunni | Pakistan. As far as I can recall, Pakistan always had their | entire existence centred around anti-India perspective, the | war they fought with India over Kashmir in 65 and then over | Bangladesh in 71 predates the shah movement. Soms of their | most fanatic military leaders were actually before the 71 | war. | | Every country plays games but not in a self destructive | manner. If Pakistani leadership had any sense and if their | people were not always fooled by thinking that their leaders | are leading a jihad and protecting Islam, they would have | realized focusing your entire foreign and economic policy | based on the geopolitical rivalry over a piece of land that | has less than 1% of total GDP is not a good cause. | | Just wait till they have a balance of payment problem. Their | reserves are drying up too all because of these stupid | economic policies. Instead of doing trade deals with your | closest neighbour and one of the largest economic powers, | they actively sabotage any economic influence. These people | are really stupid. | skinnymuch wrote: | This commentary is pretending the US had any legit reasons for | supporting the corruption and evilness beyond America's own | immediate power hungry thinking. | awaisraad wrote: | awaisraad wrote: | curious_cat_163 wrote: | This is not the first time that the powers that be in Pakistan | are trying to pull this gimmick. The last time they tried (and | failed) resulted in a massive BGP blackhole: | | https://www.wired.com/2008/02/pakistans-accid/ | | (edited) | efitz wrote: | I think the thing that makes me most sad about the internet is | how susceptible it is to control and censorship. | | Back in the early 90s we were all about PGP and anonymous | remailers and we've let the forces of government and big business | slowly nullify every mitigation we've tried. | | As technologists we haven't used our positions on technical | standards boards, etc., to force protocols that would preserve | freedom by not providing the capabilities needed for control. | | So now I guess we're just supplicants on the internet we created. | hackernewds wrote: | If anything due to monopolies like YouTube, it's EASIER to | restrict access. we have to begin decentralizing compute power | neilv wrote: | Even in the early '90s, there was already suspicion of | remailers. (Not only among cypherpunks-types; for example, I | vaguely recall some relatively mainstream outlet, maybe Michael | O'Brien in SunExpert magazine, saying to be skeptical of new | anon services.) | spacemark wrote: | I think you overestimate how much control we technologists | actually have. Takes far more than a few seats on some | standards boards. | ajsnigrutin wrote: | In the 90s, you had a few people on the internet, who knew all | that stuff, but because the internet was "hard", they (we?) | represented the majority of internet users. | | Now, they/we are all still here, knowing all the ways of | private communications, protocols, etc. + all the new, better | ways to communicate privately and securely. | | The only difference now is, that a few billions of "normal | people" joined us online, and they don't know and don't care | about all that, so the propaganda just moved from TV to | facebook and youtube. | ComplexSystems wrote: | "...we've let the forces of government and big business slowly | nullify every mitigation we've tried" | | Who is "we?" The Pakistani government is unilaterally doing | this. Surely you don't mean the Pakistani people? | malshe wrote: | This WSJ article (no paywall) explains the current developments | there. I had no idea things are so bad. The inflation is at 42%! | https://www.wsj.com/articles/ousted-pakistan-prime-minister-... | throwaways85989 wrote: | They are also out of foreign currency like Sri Lanka. Which | accelerates chinas problems, as pakistan is one of its debtors | and will likely default on those credits. | jessaustin wrote: | mynameisvlad wrote: | frank_nitti wrote: | What do you mean? That seems to be quite literally what is | happening? | | > Metrics corroborate reports of a disruption to YouTube in | Pakistan on multiple internet providers; the incident comes | as former PM Imran Khan live streams on the platform despite | a ban by media regulator PEMRA | | > ... Access was restored after the speech concluded. | | PEMRA is the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority | | You may disagree with the notion of a "deep state" but how | can you say that censorship of a populist is "not even | remotely what happened" ? | mynameisvlad wrote: | Corporate media are not the ones that are doing the | censoring. It was at the direction of the government. | | jessaustin is trying to allude to it being the same thing | that is happening to Trump. The circumstances are not | remotely the same and it's disingenuous to do so. | A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: | I have no proof to back it up, but most politically | sensitive subjects are likely monitored by various | interested parties ( in old country, it is a job to troll | internet forums[1] to sway public opinion one way or the | other. Needless to say, even on HN I started to view some | comments on political news as tainted. It is unfortunate. | | And HN is in a good position to being able to spot most | attempts to derail threads and so on. | | [1]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/01/undercover | -rep... | pessimizer wrote: | And the dismissal in this case is purely content free, | it's just a random insult, and then a successful | flagkill. Oh... and snarky twitter tone. | | > in old country, it is a job to troll internet forums[1] | to sway public opinion one way or the other. | | It's a job everywhere. Right now someone being paid to | troll internet forums and comment sections to disrupt | conversations about the food coloring used in Skittles. | jessaustin wrote: | _...successful flagkill..._ | | Friendly reminder: users with enough internet points can | attempt to rescue inappropriately killed comments by | clicking on "vouch". I do it quite a bit, and at least 5% | of the time I am rewarded by immediately seeing the | [flagged] tag disappear! | pessimizer wrote: | I read the entire, extremely short article, and you must be | talking about a different article. This one says that Imran | Khan's speech was banned, many Pakistani ISPs blocked Youtube | while he was giving it, and access was restored after the | speech was over. | | So what did the article you're talking about say? | mynameisvlad wrote: | I mean, if you don't see the heavy implications that | jessaustin is trying to make between what happened here and | what is happening with Trump, then you may want to get your | eyes checked. | | It's not what was said, it's what was heavily implied and | alluded to. Or, you know, I'm just part of the "deep state" | and trying to "disrupt conversations" that have nothing to | do with the article. | pessimizer wrote: | Maybe comment on things people said, rather than putting | words in their mouths. | | edit: and if jessaustin was trying to inject US party | politics into Pakistan, you certainly jumped in right | after them, literally denying the reality of what | happened in Pakistan in order to defend something that | you insist is not a good comparison. Who do you think | you're convincing? You make it impossible to be on your | side when you're so loose with the truth. | mynameisvlad wrote: | jessaustin wrote: | The difference is that YT tried to carry Khan and were | censored for it, rather than directly censoring Khan | themselves. Also, NetBlocks don't really care about the | political angle, which is fine for them. That is a fairly | small difference. | selimthegrim wrote: | Khan wasn't president and never had a TV show. | [deleted] | jessaustin wrote: | International cricket matches are typically televised in | Pakistan. b^) | selimthegrim wrote: | This isn't 1992. | renewiltord wrote: | Militarizing this country and supporting it as much as the US did | definitely already paid negative returns. The geopoliticists in | Washington are not particularly competent. It certainly looks | like their actions in this region are net negative. | | If they were a company, it would have folded from bad decision | making. | [deleted] | cato_the_elder wrote: | > This class of disruption can be worked around using VPN | services, which are able to circumvent government internet | censorship measures. | | Well, here's something for people who insist all VPN services are | a "scam". VPNs play an important role by circumventing censorship | in countries with more network level internet censorship. | skinnymuch wrote: | Are you in tech? People have specific reasons for VPN issues. | What you're referring to is not something people have an issue | with. | yieldcrv wrote: | That's.... not what people criticizing VPNs are referring to. | | VPN's privacy claims are a scam. Reselling their own internet | connection works, but advertising it that way doesn't. | | The customer has no way of having any assurance of a privacy | claim, and even past assurances can change at any time, and | even if active monitoring or surveillance wasn't being done by | the VPN provider, their data center, a third party along the | way or the government, the VPN provider would still respond to | a court order from the government undermining your privacy. | Thats the part people call a scam. | | Changing your reported location has nothing to do with that. | [deleted] | jbirer wrote: | The damage control by the Pakistani army is pretty crazy right | now. Pakistan is on the verge of devolving into mass riots as | Imran Khan has a massive fanbase. | walrus01 wrote: | For those people who haven't studied Pakistan extensively, the | army has _always_ run things, the politicians are just the thin | veneer of pretense at democracy as a public face. | | The Army and the military forces in general are the people who | really control the country. | | Pakistan makes a public show of having a parliamentary | democracy with elected MPs and such but it's all a farce. | | Doesn't particularly matter whether Bhutto, Zardari, Nawaz | Sharif, Imran Khan or anyone else. | namaria wrote: | American programs of "war on drugs" and "war on terror" has | done a great job of making sure most of their client states | are run by beefed up security forces behind a thin veneer of | democracy. | walrus01 wrote: | The US's involvement in Pakistan is much older and | historical than the war on drugs/terror. They were flying | U2s out of Peshawar in the 1960s. For a while, Chuck Yeager | (yes, that Chuck Yeager) was the US military representative | directly to the Pakistani military. | johnyzee wrote: | To be fair, they do have "a parliamentary democracy with | elected MPs". It's just that those elected MPs have some | fairly strict limits on what they are allowed to govern | (anything that does not involve the military, which in | Pakistan is not a lot). | | Of course it doesn't help that the elected MPs have almost | exclusively belonged to the same class of robber barons, | Imran Khan being one notable exception. | | Pakistan actually has a pretty vibrant and critical media, in | contrast to (other) military dictatorships. They have a lot | of great political satire (that, again, stops short of | criticizing the military). | skinnymuch wrote: | So it stops short of criticizing the actual power? That | does seem like it can be better than other countries, but | it can only be so much if the actual power is u touchable. | m00dy wrote: | "the army has always run things" | | sounds like Turkia but like 40 years ago | travisgriggs wrote: | And Egypt. And a bunch of countries in Asia. | 0xbadcafebee wrote: | When you have more guns than money, you get military | dictatorship. When you have more money than guns, you get | oligarchy. | labster wrote: | Sure, but if you have more holy books than guns or money, | you get a theocracy. | ShivShankaran wrote: | >the army has always run things, the politicians are just the | thin veneer of pretense at democracy as a public face. | | So a lot like the US with the Arms industry running | everything. Even mass murder of children and kindergarten | children doesnt change the arms industry. | | But look at the level of propaganda on reddit with it's | director of content from NATO, cheering for russian/ukranian | conflict. | | EU is going to feel the pain of having it's tongue up the US. | quadrifoliate wrote: | Well from time to time they make it pretty explicit too - | like under Ayub Khan, Zia-ul-Haq, or Musharraf. About 30-odd | of Pakistan's 75 years as an independent country have been | _explicitly_ under military dictatorships. | spaceman_2020 wrote: | None of their civilian governments have lasted an entire | term. | | Pretty damning. | chamanbuga wrote: | It certainly looks like this from the outside. The | establishment has always kept control over Pakistan even when | such social change was in the air. I expect the same to happen. | Also I'm expecting IK to start dialling it back given the | recent riots. | edgyquant wrote: | My hunch is that the real geopolitical upheaval of the next | 50-100 years will be post-decolonization. A number of these | nations were thrown together by a completely foreign power not | just with an interest in splitting countries up or grouping | them together but doing so in a way that prevents them becoming | a peer level opponent. | robocat wrote: | > splitting countries up or grouping them together [] in a | way that prevents them becoming a peer level opponent. | | Any links to research that shows (a) this was the intent, and | (b) shows that it works? | | Aren't there plenty of counterexamples to that thesis (null | hypothesis), of more homogeneous nations or island nations | where countries haven't become "first world". Even the USA is | rooted in non-homogeneous immigration. | throw_m239339 wrote: | > Even the USA is rooted in non-homogeneous immigration. | | USA used to be mostly Northern European and christian | (protestant), black slaves who were moved there by force or | pre European colonization inhabitants were never considered | part of the foundations of US. US foundations were anything | but non-homogeneous. | | Now after WWII, US attempted to replace the racial and | religious identity at the heart of "americanship" with some | idealistic identity based on american exceptionalism, the | american dream and the cult of the american imagery (flag, | eagle, colors...). No need to point out that this re- | invention of "americanship" is slowly crumbling as we | speak. Who knows what will remain of that cohesion in the | next 50 years. | Calavar wrote: | You're applying a 21st century post-globalization lens to | a 18th century world. Sure, today a German is welcome in | France or the UK and seen as more or less equal. In the | 1700s, there wasn't even a concept of equality for | subcultures within a single country, let alone different | cultures in different countries. See Scottish/English | relations or Parisian/Occitan relations or Flemish/Dutch | relations. | | The fact that people of Anglo-Saxon descent and people of | Scots-Irish descent had an equal hand in the early US | government was remarkable in and of itself, let alone the | fact that the Catholic population in Maryland had equal | rights under the law from day one. | throw_m239339 wrote: | > You're applying a 21st century post-globalization lens | to a 18th century world. | | because we're discussing 20th/21st century geopolitics at | first place? Of course I am. Pakistan or India didn't | exist in the 18th century, in fact these are British | constructs. | | > The fact that people of Anglo-Saxon descent and people | of Scots-Irish descent had an equal hand in the early US | government was remarkable in and of itself, let alone the | fact that the Catholic population in Maryland had equal | rights under the law from day one. | | Yes, fighting against the British empire certainly was an | efficient motivator. But still black people and | indigenous populations were still left out of what you | consider a feat. | JumpCrisscross wrote: | > _still black people and indigenous populations were | still left out of what you consider a feat_ | | If we concede no feats have been achieved in human | history for not being unblemishingly perfect, sure. Fine. | We'll leave the term with religion (and madness). | Whatever the next rung of achievement is, the highest one | in realm of the possible, America's founding matches it. | rayiner wrote: | Remarkably ignorant post. Like saying that everyone in | India/Pakistan/Bangladesh is homogenous because they're | all subcontinental "brown" people. The conflict between | whites on one hand and Asians/Latinos in modern America | pales in comparison to the conflict that existed between | different groups of northern european Christians at the | time of the founding. | edgyquant wrote: | Not really a hypothesis that the British lumped unrelated | and rival ethnicities in Africa together for a magnitude of | reasons. Most of these were geopolitical to the interests | of the metropole and almost none of these border decisions | were (initially at least) designed to accurately represent | cultural and ethnic identities the way America was | colonized for example or the way Europe was shaped by | feudalism and war. | | That's the "they weren't being actively malicious end" with | the nation this thread is discussing having been the go to | example of this being done. Pakistan only exists to be a | thorn in Indias side | spaceman_2020 wrote: | You're 100% right. | | Democracies are going to collapse in a lot of places because | the people in these places never really wanted democracy or | even cared much for it. They were just handed it down because | the people the colonizers left in charge were born and bred | within the colonizer's own political systems. | rayiner wrote: | Good example: https://unherd.com/2021/04/the-culture-wars- | of-post-colonial... | | Although I think it's not quite about "democracy." Many | people don't want liberal democracy. They might be fine | with non-liberal democracy: https://slate.com/news-and- | politics/2016/08/shadi-hamid-on-i... | [deleted] | pphysch wrote: | 50-100 years is quite a long time; it's already happening at | an accelerating rate. Washington is rapidly losing its | foothold in Latin America and SEA, France is losing West | Africa. The West is in an unprecedented crisis right now and | will be unable to compete with the next gen foreign policies | coming out of China, Russia, and the many other "enemy | states". | ta8645 wrote: | China is in the midst of a demographic collapse, and will | be struggling with internal issues for decades, they're not | going to be a threat. Russia is isolated and may lose most | of their energy export revenues. They're not going to be a | threat to anyone but their immediate neighbours. | | But globalization, that has been enabled by the American | military, may be coming to an end. The US armed forces are | retooling in a way less geared to policing global merchant | shipping. This signals a likely return to more local trade, | controlled by regional powers. | | We have been lucky to live in the richest, most prosperous | era of human history. But the party seems to be winding | down, and most of us and our heirs, will be living more | modest lives, with reduced travel, diversity of goods, | diet, and wealth. | pphysch wrote: | Yeah, that is Zeihan's narrative, very sparsely backed by | holistic analysis. | HappySweeney wrote: | Could you elaborate on "next gen foreign policies"? | jessaustin wrote: | Not OP, but I would offer " _not_ sanctioning /embargoing | a third of the world"... | pphysch wrote: | BRI, BRICS+, SCO, EAEU/"petroruble". | | the post-Washington Consensus | daemoens wrote: | The "post-Washingtion consensus" is too fragmented to | have any real coordinated actions. BRICS is not some | united force willing to work together. BRICS was meant | for economies of similar scale to work together. China is | already more than three times the size of the other 4 | combined.The only thing that aligns all 5 now is | generally anti-americanism which isn't much of a unifying | force. China and India continue to worsen ties and Russia | has become a bit of a pariah. Brazil and South Africa are | too far apart from the rest for any meaningful | cooperation. | daemoens wrote: | What petroruble? Barely any countries are paying for gas | in rubles, and the rest of the world certainly isn't. | binnerhn01 wrote: | selimthegrim wrote: | Maybe he's been listening to Zaid Hamid too much. | [deleted] | spaceman_2020 wrote: | Are you in Pakistan? What are things on the ground like? | | Arresting IK right now would be national harakiri. Surely | they're not going to do that? ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-08-22 23:00 UTC)