N-word, hard truth, soft power

Victimhood is often seductive and we have cultivated it into some kind of a chronic disease across generations. There are, however, many problems with this proposition

- SHEKHAR GUPTA

No, it isn't the N-word for nuclear weapons. National Interest shies from such simplicity or predictability and searches for complexity. That's why our N-word this week is "narrative," an expression so clichéd that I have banned it in successive newsrooms, unless, of course, narrative is what we are talking about.

The murmurs started immediately after the Pahalgam outrage. Why is the world not upbraiding Pakistan? That complaint became a clamor with Operation Sindoor. Why is nobody saying "well done"? The Western media were the usual suspects. Why aren't they acknowledging our armed forces' successes? How dare they equivocate or suggest we've suffered attrition?

Then, Donald Trump joined in the melee and the clamor became a convulsion. Inevitable conclusion: Nobody is with us. India must fight for its cause alone? Victimhood is compellingly seductive and we have cultivated it into a chronic disease across generations. There are, however, factual problems with this.

First, we've never been alone, except in 1965. In 1971, the Soviets were our treaty-bound allies. During Kargil, Operation Parakram, and 26/11 almost all of the rest of the world leaned towards us. Even the Chinese were nuanced.

After Pokhran-II in 1998, the Americans took no time lifting the sanctions, accepting India as a strategically important friendly, nuclear-armed power, and have never said anything adverse over Kashmir again. In 2000, on his brief airport stopover in Pakistan on his way home from India, Bill Clinton spoke on camera and, wagging his finger, told the Pakistanis that lines on the map of the region could no longer be drawn in blood. Pakistan lost its American anchor, and became a Chinese protectorate.