Shock

It still hasnt sunk in.

A bunch of psychotic killers can just waltz into our country armed with enough sophisticated weaponary to wage a small war, can shoot inconsiderately and manage to reach the commercial capital within the commercial capital of the country and hole up with hostages while the entire security machinary has no alternative but to sit back and say oops.

Enough has been, and is being said about the attacks so I shall not write too much here. Just a few points that have come to my mind.

1. In todays editorial in Times of India Jug Suraiyya wrote something which is invaluable in my opninion. Lets get our nomenclature right. These people are not Jihaadis or Fidayeen or any such originally respect inducing names for fighters for a cause. These are just psychotic brainwashed murderers and criminals. Giving them any other name is aggrandizing their inhuman acts. They should be treated the way criminals should be.

2. My heart goes out to our ill equipped police force. When I see young men of my age walking towards life threatening situations with only a basic gun and a prayer to protect them, and then I see the huge entourages including hordes of commandos, ambulances and generally a large number of cars that trail on most minor to national level politicians, I seriously think that the priorities are all mixed up. But Ive given up hope. When we can have an attack on the seat of power, the parliament, and even then not have any reforms for the security forces, you can well imagine the sweeping reforms that will be instituted after the hue and cry of this terror strike subsides.
Young men would still be going in grave situations with not even basic protection. I know life is deemed very cheap in our country but is its cost really valued at even less than a basic bullet proof jacket and a proper helmet? How long till even the most patriotic security personnel starts getting second thoughts about his chosen profession?

3. To see officers go into the attack leading the charge and taking risks with their lives makes your heart swell with pride. They are the true martyrs who had the option of sitting at the back and planning and sending willing jawans into the battle, but with the act of donning the mantle themselves and leading the charge they have made their name indelible in the list of true patriots.

4. What is the upshot of this event going to be? Its shameful but I think that absolutely nothing is going to happen. Again I go back to the parliament attack. If a country can take a daring attack on their very heart and then slip into the lethargy of meandering words at obscure international forms then what can be expected as an off shoot of this attack. We are a soft target.

China did their Olympics in the face of huge expectations of some sort of terror strike. But not even a whimper was heard. A strong state backing up a strong security and intelligence service with strong intent in mind can prevent disaster. A nations resources, if concentrated on the job at hand, will always be superior to a rag tag group of psychos who are surreptiously supported by another nation. China did it, and it stands to reason that we should be able to do it too. As the real threat has changed from a full on invasion to such terror attacks the role of the security forces and the resources they get has to be realigned to beat this kind of danger.

5. I again wonder about the mentality of these suicide mission people. Life is the biggest gifts one can get. To snuff out lives of innocent people, not to mention your own life, without even a proper reason just doesn;t make any sense. Seriously, what has this attack achieved for the cause they propound? Nothing. More hatred. More suspiciousness. All it did is that probably a khakhi uniformed colonel or general would be congratulating a rag tag bearded man living in a terror training camp near the border and giving him more weapons and money.
What were these men thinking? Apparently they had a return path all planned out. Who are you kidding guys? Whoever gave you this plan had no intention of ever seeing you alive. They fed you a lie and are probably sipping champagne somewhere while you are hunted and shot.

6. I dont want to give condolences to the affected families on this blog. Thats something very very personal and a casual blog is not the place to show respect and grief, even if it is heartfelt.