Crisis Simulation: India

A reminder to you all:

Position papers are due this Saturday, March 1. Thank goodness for leap years. You must turn it in by then to be considered for any type of award. I will grant extensions if you e-mail me by today (Thursday). You are completely welcome to e-mail them to me, seeing as this is a small committee and I can actually manage the paper costs. In fact, I implore you to e-mail them because I want to grade them sooner than later. If you snail mail it, it will take a few days to get to me, and there’s always the chance of papers getting lost in the shuffle.  So far, I have 4 papers (Minister of Commerce/Industry, Minister of Home Affairs, Director of Central Bureau of Intelligence, National Security Advisor).

My e-mail is bhuang419(at)berkeley.edu. I will respond pretty quickly so feel free to ask questions. Eric is also holding office hours tomorrow from 6:00-7:00 PM on the AIM screenname “bmuncrisisoh”, if you need some more help. Good luck!

The conference is a little more than 2 weeks away…I’m pretty excited for what will be an amazing weekend. I hope you are too.

First of all, I want to tell everyone who is reading this that you are doing a great job of making this blog popular and useful. Your comments have clearly demonstrated an interest in the committee and the topics pertinent to the issues. I’m glad that people are commenting and really digging into the issues that I present. This will only make our time in March more exciting and more productive. Believe me when I say this–the rest of the BMUN chairs are pretty jealous that this blog gets so many comments. Keep it up!

Also, I want to encourage delegates to e-mail me if they have any questions. A lot of you have already e-mailed me asking logistical questions and/or suggesting articles to post up on the blog. I know a lot of you are first-timers at crisis, so I really want you to ask questions so we can be best prepared to jump right in during the conference in March. That being said, I am almost always on gmail (unless I’m in class or out), so I usually respond very quickly. So don’t be afraid to e-mail me if you have questions, I know you do because the logistical parts of crisis are very new to the first-time delegate.

If you want to chat with our head chair, Eric Ching, he will be holding online office hours on AIM. Office hours are meant for you to get some one-on-one time with the chair and to get any questions you have answered quickly. He will be holding office hours on Tuesday and Thursday this week from 6 PM to 7 PM on the screenname “bmuncrisisoh”. Feel free to IM him during this time if you want to talk to him.

Finally, a few links for you with limited commentary, because this post is already too long for my tastes.

• Pakistan decided to block YouTube, saying that there was content that was offensive to Islam. While not completely relevant, it still raises a debate about whether a government has the right to do this. Also, consider the religious motivations behind this action. The religion issue might be something you have to deal with both internally and externally.
• Thanks to one of our delegates, National Security Advisor M K Naranyan for submitting this article. It’s an opinion article on the effect of what has been happening in Pakistan. A good read.
• Finally, another opinion article on what the recently negotiated Pakistani coalition might offer. This doesn’t relate to India directly, but it’s always good to think about what effects on India certain events might have. This is one of those events.

As usual, feel free to e-mail me at bhuang419(at)berkeley.edu.

We are less than a month away from the conference. Things are beginning to take shape, in both the real world and in our own crisis world. I hope you’ve been paying attention to the news in South Asia, as the election results are all over the place. Read about it here, here, and here.

To summarize briefly, the PPP (Pakistani People’s Party) “won” the elections by taking 87 of 272 parliamentary seats. For Musharraf, this hurts, and it looks like democracy might prevail in Pakistan. Be warned, however, that there are still strong forces in Pakistan, and the nation is nowhere close to stability.

Please comment below and discuss what you think about the results of these elections and the implications for India. Think, also, about things that might go wrong in terms of the relationship between Pakistan and India. After all, that is what Crisis about- worst case scenarios that we will be throwing at you.

We’ve had a lot of fun preparing for the conference as well. Now that the elections are over, we can brainstorm even further on how to challenge delegates in our committee. I want to remind you again that this is an advanced committee, and it does require a lot more than the typical MUN delegate. Critical thinking is an absolute must at this stage. Do not fret, however, as it will be a lot of fun.

Continue to e-mail me if you have any questions about the topic, or if you just want to chat (I’m down for that too). My e-mail is bhuang419(at)berkeley.edu.

More updates to come soon!

A more contemporary song for you: OK Go (one of my personal favorites). Now on to today’s news update.

If you are paying attention to the news, the big headline this week is the Pakistani Parliamentary elections. The elections were canceled the first time around because of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination. Elections are set for Monday, February 18th, 2008 (tomorrow). Here it goes again.

Much has been happening of late in Pakistan. A recent poll has shown Pervez Musharraf’s growing inpopularity. A suicide bomb went off at a meeting of the Pakistani People’s Party, killing 37. And there have been wide fears of vote rigging and more violence on election day. Need more? Find it here. Please read all of these articles, as they are *extremely* relevant.

Pakistan’s bid for democracy is on the line here, and this is sure to affect Indo-Pakistani relations. Keep an eye on the results tomorrow- there is wide fear of continued Musharraf rule and possible militant takeover. What’s at stake for Pakistan here? How will India respond? Is there still hope for Pakistan?
Continue posting your thoughts on this blog, as we approach conference timhe, this event will have huge ramifications on what we do then. As usual, feel free to e-mail me at bhuang419@berkeley.edu. Remember that papers are due in a little over two weeks. I’ve said this in a few e-mails to some delegates, but I will be accepting electronic copies of position papers. Any questions, you know where to find me.

Yes, this is an REM song. But the article that I found to share with you today is relevant. As you should know, India is multiethnic and multireligious. Hindu is a primary religion in the nation, but there are also a significant number of Christians and Muslims in the country as well. You can imagine that they might not get along together all the time. That’s pretty much all the background information you need. Please read the article and consider the questions below:

THE blackened shell of a burnt car lies in the yard of Radha Bai’s farm in this bucolic village of whitewashed houses and unhurried bullock carts in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh. On January 16th, as she prayed with a large group of Christians, a mob of Hindu extremists arrived. They chased worshippers away, set fire to a car and ten motorcycles and, says Mrs Bai, threatened to cut her “into pieces”.

The entire article can be found on Economist.com here.

• What do you make of the religious disconnect among Hindus, Christians, and Muslims?
• Taking into account your minister’s background, how might you respond to this wave of violence?
• Think about these issues and how they might affect the government’s proceedings.

As usual, please email me at bhuang419@berkeley.edu if you have any questions. I’ve gotten some e-mails from some of you in the past week– please keep it up! I’m sure you have questions, so please don’t hesitate to ask. You can even ask a question in the comments and I will be happy to respond.

Also, the conference is just over a month away, so keep researching!

A fellow delegate forwarded this speech to me, and I decided to post it. It is the keynote address at the Asian Security Conference, made by the Indian Defence Minister:

Asia in the 21st Century will be a very different place than what it was in the past. For over 200 years, external powers played a dominant role in shaping Asia’s political, social, economic and cultural arenas. This situation has been undergoing significant changes for quite some time now.

Read the rest of the speech here.

In the speech, Mr Antony talks about economic growth, terrorism, nuclear weapons, and climate change- all issues that concern all of Asia, not just India. While this speech provides some information on India’s foreign policy, it is also essential to observe the rhetoric of foreign policy. If you examine the speech closely, very few concrete things were said. He basically glossed over many issues and did not really offer a true solution to the problems. He was simply posing them as questions. Think about this rhetoric when you come to committee in March. When you talk to Pakistan, China, and the world, what sort of presentation do you want to offer? How might some of this rhetoric be a benefit to you?

It’s important to keep note of this speech as a good example of how to deal with speaking on behalf of your country to the rest of the world. The way that India is represented through this person is significant to whoever is watching. Some of you may have to go through this during the conference, as press releases might not always be the best solution when a speech or public announcement is.

A very serious but somewhat amusing article (at least for me) for you to read. Take a look and think about it. It’s not completely relevant to our committee, but I still thought it was interesting. I’ll have more articles later in the day that actually deal directly with India.

WHEN two undersea cables were damaged, apparently by ships’ anchors, five miles north of Alexandria on January 30th, it seemed like a reminder of the fragility of the internet. The cables—one owned by FLAG Telecom, a subsidiary of India’s Reliance Group, the other (SEA-ME-WE 4) by a consortium of 16 telecoms firms—carry almost 90% of the data traffic that goes through the Suez canal. When the connections failed, they took with them almost all internet links between Europe and the Gulf and South Asia.

Read the entire story here

I’ve been talking about India’s economy for quite awhile. Now I want to shift focus to the political/strategic end of things. After all, as a cabinet, you will be making political decisions based on many different types of crises/events. This article, hopefully, will get your mind jogging about other things you might need to think about as the conference approaches. I want you to keep in mind that a lot of things that we find in the news are the basis for what we present to you during the actual conference. While I can’t post every article that is related to India on this blog, I do post the ones that might be significant or are adequate examples of what we want you to focus on. Keep in mind, though, that we do a lot of planning and rest assured that we will throw some curveballs at you. That’s what we expect from our delegates in an advanced committee.

Also, February 1st has come and gone, and that means position papers should have been postmarked on this date. I neglected to say on this blog that February 1st is the deadline for eligibility for research awards. The actual deadline for papers is March 1, which is less than a month away. If you didn’t get your paper in by February 1st, you need not worry, since you will still be eligible for a committee award if you submit it before March 1. However, if you do not submit your paper by then, you will not be eligible for a committee award. E-mail me if you have any questions or requests for extensions.

Please keep on reading this blog! While you may have finished your position papers and you think that you don’t need to do anything for the next month, you must still be updated on the news. We continue to monitor events in South Asia through February, and I’d hate to see someone be left out of the loop because he/she decided to stop doing research.
Without any further ado, the article, and some questions:

A FULL-PAGE advertisement ran in many English-language newspapers in India on January 15th for the “Harbingers of Peace and Stability”—the country’s 1.1m soldiers. The occasion, Army Day, is an annual celebration of the world’s second-biggest regular force. Yet the army now has a particular need of publicity: in a country of over 1 billion people, it needs more officers. Harbingers of the right stuff are proving hard to find.

• How do you get more people to join the army? Do you think that raising the salary will really have an impact?
• Think about the implications. Without adequate, trained officers, how do you expect to defend the country from possible attack?
• How do you go about balancing India’s booming technology industry with its need for military support?
• Why the army and not the navy or air force?

Find the article here

As usual, comment comment comment. And e-mail me if you have any questions at: bhuang419(at)berkeley.edu