Marxists in India go against the Stream of History
And they swim along with George Bush, Manmohan Singh, Adwani and Mamta Bannerjee!
And they swim along with George Bush, Manmohan Singh, Adwani and Mamta Bannerjee!
Palash Biswas
Contact: Palash C Biswas, C/O Mrs Arati Roy, Gosto Kanan, Sodepur, Kolkata- 700110, India. Phone: 91-033-25659551
Email: palashbiswaskl@gmail.com
IAEA talks on nuke deal to continue: Pranab
Business Standard, India - 27 minutes ago
External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee today made it clear that IAEA negotiations for implementing Indo-US nuclear deal will go on. ...
Govt has put nuke deal on hold: Left NDTV.com
Government rejects demand for Parliamentary Committee to review ... DailyIndia.com
Nuke deal on hold, committee to go into Left concerns Hindu
Former Indian armed forces officers to lobby for Indo-US nuke deal
DailyIndia.com, FL - 4 hours ago
The luncheon and conference, is also slated as a 68th year reunion of Indo-US armed services, according to the IASLC invitation. An IASCL official said the ...
Singh Says US Nuclear Accord Is Vital for India (Update3)
Bloomberg - 43 minutes ago
By Kartik Goyal and Archana Chaudhary Aug. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said India needs to seek international backing for its nuclear agreement with the US to acquire atomic reactors and material required to sustain record economic ...
PM sees nuclear energy for economic growth Commodity Online
Indian Prime Minister Pushes Nuclear Energy Voice of America
Cabinet approves Aam Aadmi Bima Yojna
Cabinet approves launching of Aam Aadmi Bima Yojna for rural landless households and six percent hike in DA for central government employees and pensioners.
Marxist in India go against the Stream of History and they swim along with George Bush, Manmohan Singh, Adwani and Mamta Bannerjee! Friends, it is time to read history of colonisation as India is colonised once again and there is a total absence of the forces joing the national struggle for Freedom, Sovereignity, human Rights and Peace!
India can`t afford to miss nuke bus, PM Dr Manmohan Singh asserts despite putting the Indo US Nuke Deal operationalisation on hold for time being. However, thanks God, the Leftists could not do anything to restrict US military presence with strategic regrouping of Asian Nato including Japan as well as Israel either in the sub contient or in the Indian Ocean region! It is lest interested as it witnesses how under the umbrella of AFPSA, in entire North East and kashmir Indian military option to deal tghe nationality problems is adpoted with active US and Israel Security Cooperation. Not only the US War ships and fighter bombers arrive and depart with other allies, joint exercises continue, but GOI looks on US strike power to hold the escalation of Maoist movemet countrywide.Amid continuing tension over the Indo-US nuclear deal, Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh on Friday once again sought to drive home the point that without nuclear power, India would find it tough to meet its rising energy demand.Well it is well known thatIndo US Defence cooperation has many dimensions today including the sale, purchase and joint development of military equipment, transfer of technology, intelligence sharing and coordination for counter-terrorism and counter-proliferation, cooperation in jointly providing relief and succour after natural calamities, coordination in transnational anti-drug trafficking activities and the joint patrolling of sea lanes of communication against piracy and terrorism. India shares good defence relations with several friendly countries. Indo-US defence cooperation has also gained prominence in recent years due to the shared interests that emerged after the end of the Cold War.
Even as the differences between the UPA and the Left over the Indo-US nuclear deal continued to simmer, the government informed Parliament that the joint naval exercise by India, Japan, Australia, Singapore and the US, in the Bay of Bengal from September 4-9 "is in consonance with India’s foreign policy".
The CPM polit bureau had described the move as being "harmful to India’s strategic interests" and the Left has announced two ‘jathas’ (processions) against the naval war games from September 4-8, coinciding with the exercise.
It could do nothing more than that. nimitz visit proved it!The Indian government’s main argument for signing the 123 Agreement for nuclear cooperation is that it will help India meet its energy needs. Critics of the Agreement state that this point of view of the government ignores the very limited contribution that nuclear power makes to our overall energy generation which is just 3% and which cannot exceed 7% even if the ambitious plans for expansion are implemented in the next 25 years! They further contend that to make India’s foreign policy and strategic autonomy subservient to the potential of nuclear energy does not make sense. It simply pushes India to be subservient to the US in furtherance of their strategic plans for Asia.
The CPM polit bureau had described the move as being "harmful to India’s strategic interests" and the Left has announced two ‘jathas’ (processions) against the naval war games from September 4-8, coinciding with the exercise.
It could do nothing more than that. nimitz visit proved it!The Indian government’s main argument for signing the 123 Agreement for nuclear cooperation is that it will help India meet its energy needs. Critics of the Agreement state that this point of view of the government ignores the very limited contribution that nuclear power makes to our overall energy generation which is just 3% and which cannot exceed 7% even if the ambitious plans for expansion are implemented in the next 25 years! They further contend that to make India’s foreign policy and strategic autonomy subservient to the potential of nuclear energy does not make sense. It simply pushes India to be subservient to the US in furtherance of their strategic plans for Asia.
Not a victory or defeat for any side, Karat explains in New delhi and later in kolkata. He has to convince or subvert the West Bengal CPIM unit which is the most staunch supporter of Neoliberalism, Capitalist development and GOI led by Dr Manmohan Singh. It is not only electionphobia or votebank equation which worry the comrades as the so called toilet mainstream media focuses on. If only Vote bank equation was considered, entire Left should rally behind CPIM General Secretary as he has launched the most vocal fight against US War against terrorism and Islamophobia!Since the Muslim Votebank is behind the thirtyyears historical run of power in WB and Muslims vote enblock in favour of the Left, Karat`s role must be plauded. But the CPIM is keen to convince him for a retreat and eventually despite politburuea and central committe parleys , despite the majority in the Parliament is against the deal and the strategic regrouping , CPIM could neither pull the anti national MNC goverment down nor it could lead the nation in its anti Imperialist resistance! If it is the case of Nandigram , Singur, SEZ and PCPIR, it was the golden opportunity to expose MS Mamta Bannerjee, Congress and TMC.
The problem is that the communists in India has lost the Vision and have become completely devoid of commitment. No more they believe in Social change as the expected change has to annihilate the Brahminical Hegemony first for which they stand united with Congress as well as the Nazi Sangh Parivar since the debut of Communist Movement in India. No more the marxist study circle refers to Communist Menifesto or Das capital! They creates nonsense of materialist interpretation of History.
Indian History witnessed all along the Time that the indigenous people consistin mostly the tribal, dalit and muslim peasntry resisted Imperilism everytime, everywhere! The Indian Marxists now belong to shining Sensex India and the global upper caste upper class and may not afford to support any Peasant Insurrection. Thus, what may come, the regimented Gestapo has to kill the uprising resulting Marichjhanpi to Nandigram massacres!
The CPI(M) today said the truce between the Left parties and the Congress on the nuclear issue is not not a victory or defeat for any side. It also said the Left parties behaved responsibly during the crisis and that it did not not precipitate it.
"This is not a victory or defeat of any side," said CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat when asked by reporters whether the Centre had got a reprieve following the truce with the Left parties. He said a committee has been formed to go into the concners raised by the Left parties and and "let it do its work. Then we will see." The party would closely study the functioning of the Commitee, he added. His party leaders in Parliament said in Delhi that the Left has behaved responsibly during the crisisi.
"The Left parties have behaved very responsibly. There was a crisis facing the nation and the Left did not not precipitate it. We never said 'stop this or scrap that'. We only said ally our apprehensions," party leader Mohd Salim told reporters.
The other issue, which has put up the tail of the Communist group, is that the bilateral Agreement is going to be governed on the US side by what is called the Hyde Act. The Hyde Act is a new law passed in USA and adopted in December 2006. Under the Hyde Act, India will be expected to follow a foreign policy matching that of the US, and the US President is required to report to the US Congress, every year, on how India is complying with the provisions set out in the same Act. Even though the Hyde Act or its provisions are not binding on India, but the mere fact that the US President will be under pressure to report progress/compliance will require a great deal of subservience on India’s part, which is, of course, unacceptable to any Indian.
The other issue, which has put up the tail of the Communist group, is that the bilateral Agreement is going to be governed on the US side by what is called the Hyde Act. The Hyde Act is a new law passed in USA and adopted in December 2006. Under the Hyde Act, India will be expected to follow a foreign policy matching that of the US, and the US President is required to report to the US Congress, every year, on how India is complying with the provisions set out in the same Act. Even though the Hyde Act or its provisions are not binding on India, but the mere fact that the US President will be under pressure to report progress/compliance will require a great deal of subservience on India’s part, which is, of course, unacceptable to any Indian.
When the UPA government took office in 2004, a Common Minimum Programme (CMP) was drafted amongst its constituents. When the Left was consulted on the draft of the CMP, they had insisted on the deletion of a reference to "strategic relations with the United States". Soon thereafter, the UPA government proceeded with forging wider strategic alliances with the US. Till the signing of the 123 Agreement, these moves were virtually ignored by the Left parties supporting the government or the NDA in opposition.
The nuclear cooperation deal is only one part of these wide-ranging alliances that the UPA government has forged with the US. The Indian Prime Minister and the US President, in the Joint Statement of July 2005 in Washington, spelled this out. This Joint Statement covered political, economic, military and nuclear cooperation. This Joint Statement entails not just nuclear cooperation but talks of the two countries promoting global democracy, revamping the Indian economy to facilitate large-scale investment by the US and strategic military collaboration.
Prior to the Joint Statement of July 2005, the UPA government had also signed a ten-year Defence Framework Agreement with the US. It is obvious that without this Defence Agreement, the US would not have agreed to ratify any nuclear cooperation agreement. It is also well noted that even before the nuclear cooperation agreement was finalised, the government had began to realign its foreign policy in accordance with the strategic alliance with the US.
The present disagreement within the UPA allies is not their first major difference. The first serious conflict arose when the UPA government did a volte-face on the Iran nuclear issue. The government voted along with the US and the Western countries in September 2005 and was not even prepared to go along with the position adopted by Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) countries. It is clear that the Leftists were waiting for the opportune moment to strike and have done so with vengeance.
Sikhs want a nuclear Free South Asia
Wednesday 29th of August 2007
Dr. Amarjit Singh, Khalistan Affairs Center
Sikhs want a nuclear Free South Asia
Wednesday 29th of August 2007
Dr. Amarjit Singh, Khalistan Affairs Center
Washington DC - The crescendo of the orchestrated ‘Nura Kushti’ (phony shadow boxing) between the Communist party (& fellow travelers) and the Manmohan Singh-led ruling Congress party, about the US–India Nukes-for-Mangoes deal which has dominated the headlines of the Indian media for the past few weeks, maybe about to end in a whimper as L. K. Advani of the right wing Neo-Nazi BJP opposition has thrown a life line to the shaky Manmohan Singh-led government.
As we have mentioned many times in this column, when discussing the US-India ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal that the eyes of every Indian jingoist, and peace-loving Punjabi too, (worried about his survival under an Indian or Pakistani radioactive nuclear cloud) are on any discussions on this deal any where. We have also mentioned that Section 123 of the US Atomic Energy Act must conform in letter and spirit with the provisions of the Henry J. Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act 2006 which was signed into law, by President Bush, in December 2006. What the jingoistic Indian rulers do not want to understood is that, any modification of the requirements under the Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act 2006 cannot be brought about through merely word-engineering a cleverly drafted agreement to be settled between the two executive branches of government. As long as the Hyde Act remains what it is today, no Section 123 of the US Atomic Energy Act can be used to override its legal provisions. In case of an override, this new understanding will have to be presented to both Houses of U.S. Congress and approved by each before it becomes part of the overall US-India ‘Nukes for Mangoes’ deal. The US negotiators think that they have convinced the Indian side to agree to positions in conformity with the Act’s current provisions, rather than take the legal route of getting the Act amended (in the two chambers on the Hill) to accommodate the chameleonic Indian negotiators. The recent discussions in Washington DC, between the two governments, Delhi claims have helped to clarify the Indian ambitions to the right to Nuclear tests. Washington did not take very long to clear this misunderstanding promptly and has made it very clear that in case nuclear test the deals ends.
http://www.panthic.org/news/129/ARTICLE/3511/2007-08-29.html
Subir Roy: Living with the left enemy
VALUE FOR MONEY
Subir Roy / New Delhi August 31, 2007
The threat to the UPA government posed by the left over the Indo-US nuclear deal seems to have passed for just now. But there is every reason to believe that the government will remain in a perpetual state of uncertainty, with periodic crises, until elections are held again, whenever that might be. This political uncertainty comes at a particularly inopportune moment as the global markets keep getting rocked, shaking the Indian markets with them, over the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the US. The resultant stemming of liquidity flows is likely to affect both stock market sentiment in the short run, as it is already doing, and corporate India’s expansion plans in the longer term. All this poses a clear threat to the near 9 per cent growth prospects that were being confidently foreseen till barely two months ago.
This scenario dictates a clear agenda for the Congress: understand what the left is up to, use that understanding to predict what is likely to happen, visualise the shape of the alliance that it is likely to lead into the next elections and start writing the manifesto for them. To understand the left mindset it is necessary to focus on the CPI(M) and its general secretary, Prakash Karat. The country’s leading left party remains about the only unreformed and unrepentant Stalinist party in the world. Its mindset, as that of its leader, remains frozen in history, its tactic dictated by past habit and taken out of the dusty pages of history.
http://www.business-standard.com/economy/storypage.php?leftnm=3&subLeft=3&chklogin=N&autono=296371&tab=r
Battle of wits
Los Angeles Times
Eight years after seizing power in a military coup, the 64-year-old president faces declining public support and has been negotiating a power-sharing deal with former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
http://www.panthic.org/news/129/ARTICLE/3511/2007-08-29.html
Subir Roy: Living with the left enemy
VALUE FOR MONEY
Subir Roy / New Delhi August 31, 2007
The threat to the UPA government posed by the left over the Indo-US nuclear deal seems to have passed for just now. But there is every reason to believe that the government will remain in a perpetual state of uncertainty, with periodic crises, until elections are held again, whenever that might be. This political uncertainty comes at a particularly inopportune moment as the global markets keep getting rocked, shaking the Indian markets with them, over the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the US. The resultant stemming of liquidity flows is likely to affect both stock market sentiment in the short run, as it is already doing, and corporate India’s expansion plans in the longer term. All this poses a clear threat to the near 9 per cent growth prospects that were being confidently foreseen till barely two months ago.
This scenario dictates a clear agenda for the Congress: understand what the left is up to, use that understanding to predict what is likely to happen, visualise the shape of the alliance that it is likely to lead into the next elections and start writing the manifesto for them. To understand the left mindset it is necessary to focus on the CPI(M) and its general secretary, Prakash Karat. The country’s leading left party remains about the only unreformed and unrepentant Stalinist party in the world. Its mindset, as that of its leader, remains frozen in history, its tactic dictated by past habit and taken out of the dusty pages of history.
http://www.business-standard.com/economy/storypage.php?leftnm=3&subLeft=3&chklogin=N&autono=296371&tab=r
Battle of wits
Los Angeles Times
Eight years after seizing power in a military coup, the 64-year-old president faces declining public support and has been negotiating a power-sharing deal with former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
Historical materialism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Historical materialism is the methodological approach to the study of society, economics, and history which was first articulated by Karl Marx (1818-1883). Although Marx himself never used the term (he referred it as "materialist conception of history", or "philosophical materialism" - a term he used to distinguish it from what he called "popular materialism"). Historical materialism as an explanatory system has been expanded and refined by thousands of academic studies since Marx’s death.The fundamental proposition of historical materialism can be summed up in a sentence: "it is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but, on the contrary, their social existence that determines their consciousness." (Marx, in the Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy.)
Historical materialism looks for the causes of developments and changes in human societies in the way in which humans collectively make the means to live, thus giving an emphasis, through economic analysis, to everything that co-exists with the economic base of society (e.g. social classes, political structures, ideologies).
Although Marx said he was only proposing a guideline to historical research, by the twentieth century the concept of historical materialism became a keystone of modern communist doctrine
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_materialism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_materialism
Robert Clive, 1st Baron Clive
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Major-General Robert Clive, 1st Baron Clive of Plassey, KB (29 September 1725–22 November 1774), also known as Clive of India, established the military and political supremacy of the East India Company in Southern India and Bengal. Together with Warren Hastings he was one of the key figures in the creation of British India
Return to England
Memorial, King Charles St near St James's ParkIn 1760, the 35-year-old Clive returned to England with a fortune of at least £300,000 and the quit-rent of £27,000 a year. He financially supported his parents and sisters, while also providing Major Lawrence, the commanding officer who had early encouraged his military genius, with a stipend of £500 a year. In the five years of his conquests and administration in Bengal, the young man had crowded together a succession of exploits which led Lord Macaulay, in what that historian termed his "flashy" essay on the subject, to compare him to Napoleon Bonaparte, declaring that "[Clive] gave peace, security, prosperity and such liberty as the case allowed of to millions of Indians, who had for centuries been the prey of oppression, while Napoleon's career of conquest was inspired only by personal ambition, and the absolutism he established vanished with his fall.", a passage repeated in the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. Macaulay's ringing endorsement of Clive seems more controversial today, as some would argue that his own ambition and desire for personal gain set the tone for the administration of Bengal until the Permanent Settlement 30 years later. The immediate consequence of Clive's victory at Plassey was an increase in the revenue demand on Bengal by at least 20%, much of which was appropriated by Zamindars and corrupt Company Officials, which led to considerable hardship for the rural population, particularly during the famine of 1770.[8]
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Major-General Robert Clive, 1st Baron Clive of Plassey, KB (29 September 1725–22 November 1774), also known as Clive of India, established the military and political supremacy of the East India Company in Southern India and Bengal. Together with Warren Hastings he was one of the key figures in the creation of British India
Return to England
Memorial, King Charles St near St James's ParkIn 1760, the 35-year-old Clive returned to England with a fortune of at least £300,000 and the quit-rent of £27,000 a year. He financially supported his parents and sisters, while also providing Major Lawrence, the commanding officer who had early encouraged his military genius, with a stipend of £500 a year. In the five years of his conquests and administration in Bengal, the young man had crowded together a succession of exploits which led Lord Macaulay, in what that historian termed his "flashy" essay on the subject, to compare him to Napoleon Bonaparte, declaring that "[Clive] gave peace, security, prosperity and such liberty as the case allowed of to millions of Indians, who had for centuries been the prey of oppression, while Napoleon's career of conquest was inspired only by personal ambition, and the absolutism he established vanished with his fall.", a passage repeated in the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. Macaulay's ringing endorsement of Clive seems more controversial today, as some would argue that his own ambition and desire for personal gain set the tone for the administration of Bengal until the Permanent Settlement 30 years later. The immediate consequence of Clive's victory at Plassey was an increase in the revenue demand on Bengal by at least 20%, much of which was appropriated by Zamindars and corrupt Company Officials, which led to considerable hardship for the rural population, particularly during the famine of 1770.[8]
During the three years that Clive remained in England, he sought a political position, chiefly that he might influence the course of events in India, which he had left full of promise. He had been well received at court, had been made Baron Clive of Plassey, if in the peerage of Ireland, had bought estates, and had got not only himself, but his friends returned to the House of Commons, after the fashion of the time.
Then it was that Clive set himself to reform the home system of the East India Company, and began a bitter warfare with Mr Sullivan, chairman of the Court of Directors, whom in the end, he defeated. In this he was aided by the news of reverses in Bengal. Mir Jafar had finally rebelled over certain payments to English officials, and in consequence Vansittart, Clive's successor, had put Kasim Ali Khan, the Mir Jafar's son-in-law upon the musnud (throne). After a brief tenure, Kasim Ali had fled, ordering Walter Reinhardt (known to the Muslims as Sumru), a Swiss mercenary of his, to butcher the garrison of 150 English at Patna, and had disappeared under the protection of his brother, the Viceroy of Oudh. The whole Company's service, Civil and Military, had become mired in corruption, demoralized by gifts and by the monopoly of the inland as well as export trade, to such an extent that the natives were pauperised, and the Company was plundered of the revenues which Clive had acquired for them. For this Clive himself must bear much responsibility, as he had set a very poor example during his tenure as Governor. Nevertheless, the Court of proprietors, (who elected the Directors), forced them, in spite of Sullivan, to hurry out Lord Clive to Bengal with the double powers of Governor and Commander-in-Chief.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Clive,_1st_Baron_Clive
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Clive,_1st_Baron_Clive
Vasco da Gama
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dom Vasco da Gama, 1st Count of Vidigueira (IPA: ['va?ku d? 'g?m?]) (Sines or Vidigueira, Alentejo, Portugal, ca. either 1460 or 1469 – December 24, 1524 in Kochi, India) was a Portuguese explorer, one of the most successful in the European Age of Discovery and the commander of the first ships to sail directly from Europe to India.
Second voyage
On 12 February 1502, Gama sailed with a fleet of twenty warships, with the object of enforcing Portuguese interests in the east. This was subsequent to the voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral, who had been sent to India two years earlier. (Swinging far to the west across the Atlantic in order to make use of the pattern of favourable winds, Cabral became the official European discoverer of Brazil. The find may have been an accident). When he finally reached India, Cabral learned that the Portuguese citizens who had been left by Gama at the trading post had been murdered. After encountering further resistance from the locals, he bombarded Calicut and then sailed south of Calicut to reach Cochin, a small kingdom where he was given a warm welcome. He returned to Europe with silk and gold.
Second voyage
On 12 February 1502, Gama sailed with a fleet of twenty warships, with the object of enforcing Portuguese interests in the east. This was subsequent to the voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral, who had been sent to India two years earlier. (Swinging far to the west across the Atlantic in order to make use of the pattern of favourable winds, Cabral became the official European discoverer of Brazil. The find may have been an accident). When he finally reached India, Cabral learned that the Portuguese citizens who had been left by Gama at the trading post had been murdered. After encountering further resistance from the locals, he bombarded Calicut and then sailed south of Calicut to reach Cochin, a small kingdom where he was given a warm welcome. He returned to Europe with silk and gold.
Once he had reached the northern parts of the Indian Ocean, Gama waited for a ship to return from Mecca and seized all the merchandise on it. He then ordered that the 380 passengers be locked in the hold and the ship set on fire. It took four days for the ship to sink and everyone on board died. [citation needed] When Gama arrived at Calicut on October 30, 1502 the Zamorin was willing to sign a treaty.[5]
Gama assaulted and exacted tribute from the Arab-controlled port of Kilwa in East Africa, one of those ports involved in frustrating the Portuguese; he played privateer amongst Arab merchant ships, then finally smashed a Calicut fleet of twenty-nine ships. Following that battle he extracted favorable trading concessions from the Zamorin.
On his return to Portugal, in September 1503, he was made Count of Vidigueira, with his seat in land sold to him by the Duke of Bragança (the future royal family of Bragança). He was also awarded feudal rights and jurisdiction over Vidigueira and Vila dos Frades.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasco_da_Gama
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasco_da_Gama
Modern History Sourcebook:
Vasco da Gama: Round Africa to India, 1497-1498 CE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Vasco da Gama was born about 1460 at Sines, Portugal. Both Prince John and Prince Manuel continued the efforts of Prince Henry to find a sea route to India, and in 1497 Manuel placed Vasco da Gama, who already had some reputation as a warrior and navigator, in charge of four vessels built especially for the expedition. They set sail July 8, 1497, rounded the Cape of Good Hope four months later, and reached Calicut May 20, 1498. The Moors in Calicut instigated the Zamorin of Calicut against him, and he was compelled to return with the bare discovery and the few spices he had bought there at inflated prices [but still he made a 3000% profit!]. A force left by a second expedition under Cabral (who discovered Brazil by sailing too far west), left behind some men in a "factory" or trading station, but these were killed by the Moors in revenge for Cabral's attacks on Arab shipping in the Indian Ocean. Vasco da Gama was sent on a mission of vengeance in 1502, he bombarded Calicut (virtually destroying the port), and returned with great spoil. His expedition turned the commerce of Europe from the Mediterranean cities to the Atlantic Coast, and opened up the east to European enterprise.
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1497degama.html
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1497degama.html
Christopher Columbus (Genoa, Italy 1451 – May 20, 1506, Valladolid, Spain) was a navigator and colonialist who is one of several historical figures credited as the first European to discover the Americas. Though not the first to reach the Americas from Europe, it was Columbus' voyages that led to general European awareness of the hemisphere and the successful establishment of European cultures in the New World. It is generally believed that he was born in Genoa, although other theories and possibilities exist. The name Christopher Columbus is the Anglicization of the Latin Christophorus Columbus. Also well known are his name's rendering in modern Italian as Cristoforo Colombo and in Spanish as Cristóbal Colón.
Columbus' voyages across the Atlantic Ocean began a European effort at exploration and colonization of the Western Hemisphere. While history places great significance on his first voyage of 1492, he did not actually reach the mainland until his third voyage in 1498. Likewise, he was not the earliest European explorer to reach the Americas, as there are accounts of European transatlantic contact prior to 1492. Nevertheless, Columbus's voyage came at a critical time of growing national imperialism and economic competition between developing nation states seeking wealth from the establishment of trade routes and colonies. Therefore, the period before 1492 is known as Pre-Columbian.
The anniversary of the 1492 voyage (vd. Columbus Day) is observed throughout the Americas and in Spain. Columbus had noted that the Indian people were friendly. Controversy came later, since first person accounts depict the genocide of the indigenous people by the Spanish conquistadors.
......
The Spanish colonization of the Americas, and the subsequent effects on the native peoples, were dramatized in the 1992 feature film 1492: Conquest of Paradise to commemorate the 500th anniversary of his landing in the Americas. In 2003, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez urged Native American Latin Americans to not celebrate the Columbus Day holiday. Chavez blamed Columbus for leading the way in the mass genocide of the Native Americans by the Spanish.[23]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus
......
The Spanish colonization of the Americas, and the subsequent effects on the native peoples, were dramatized in the 1992 feature film 1492: Conquest of Paradise to commemorate the 500th anniversary of his landing in the Americas. In 2003, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez urged Native American Latin Americans to not celebrate the Columbus Day holiday. Chavez blamed Columbus for leading the way in the mass genocide of the Native Americans by the Spanish.[23]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus
Columbus and Genocide
The discoverer of the New World was responsible for the annihilation of the peaceful Arawak Indians
By EDWARD T. STONE
On April 17, 1492, Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic monarchs of Castile, signed the Capitulations of Santa Fe, the agreement by which Christopher Columbus, one-time wool-weaving apprentice in Savona, Italy, undertook a voyage of discovery to the western Atlantic.
Columbus was in his forty-first year. After forsaking his father’s loom in Savona he had spent some nine years in obscurity in Portugal, where his only known occupations were those of petty trader in sugar for an Italian commercial firm and maker and purveyor of maps and marine charts in collaboration with his younger brother Bartolomé. During this period he married a poor but aristocratic young Portuguese woman who bore him a son; he also supposedly made one or more sea voyages in an unidentified capacity.
Some time in those years he had conceived his enterprise of discovery. Finding no acceptance of it in Portugal, he had come to Castile in the early months of 1485 after his wife’s death. There he had eked out a precarious living as an itinerant peddler of books and maps, existing partly on charitable handouts from noble patrons whom he had managed to interest in his enterprise.
Now the fruition of his dream was at hand. The Capitulations provided that:
Columbus was to be admiral of "all those islands and mainland in the Ocean Sea which by his hand and industry he would discover and acquire," the title to be hereditary and the office to be equal in pre-eminences and prerogatives to that of the High Admiral of Castile.
He would be "viceroy and governor general of all the said islands and mainland." In a subsequent royal provision signed a few days later, Columbus was specifically granted the power, as admiral, viceroy, and governor, to "hear and dispatch all civil and criminal proceedings pertaining to the said offices of the admiralty, viceroyalty and governorship" and to "punish and castigate the delinquents."
For his personal enrichment he was to have 10 per cent of all the removable assets of the newly discovered lands, including gold, silver, pearls, and precious stones, and the trade therein was to be a crown monopoly under his control. He was to receive an additional 12½ per cent in return for his pledge to contribute an eighth part of the cost of the expedition.
How a ragged and indigent foreigner whose only known experience at sea had been as a travelling commercial agent and earlier as a common seaman and who had not set foot on a ship in the seven years he had been in Spain could thus acquire by the stroke of a pen a station equal to that of the highest-ranking officer of the Castilian navy—indeed, how he could have wrung from these two powerful and able sovereigns such extraordinary concessions—is a fascinating story in itself, but it need not detain us here. [See "Christopher Columbus, Mariner," AMERICAN HERITAGE, December, 1955.] Of far more significance in their tragic portent were the provisions of the agreement that gave to the former weaver’s apprentice the absolute power of life and death over tens of thousands of innocent human beings. His incapacity to discharge that responsibility justly and humanely would be distressingly demonstrated in the years that were to follow.
He would be "viceroy and governor general of all the said islands and mainland." In a subsequent royal provision signed a few days later, Columbus was specifically granted the power, as admiral, viceroy, and governor, to "hear and dispatch all civil and criminal proceedings pertaining to the said offices of the admiralty, viceroyalty and governorship" and to "punish and castigate the delinquents."
For his personal enrichment he was to have 10 per cent of all the removable assets of the newly discovered lands, including gold, silver, pearls, and precious stones, and the trade therein was to be a crown monopoly under his control. He was to receive an additional 12½ per cent in return for his pledge to contribute an eighth part of the cost of the expedition.
How a ragged and indigent foreigner whose only known experience at sea had been as a travelling commercial agent and earlier as a common seaman and who had not set foot on a ship in the seven years he had been in Spain could thus acquire by the stroke of a pen a station equal to that of the highest-ranking officer of the Castilian navy—indeed, how he could have wrung from these two powerful and able sovereigns such extraordinary concessions—is a fascinating story in itself, but it need not detain us here. [See "Christopher Columbus, Mariner," AMERICAN HERITAGE, December, 1955.] Of far more significance in their tragic portent were the provisions of the agreement that gave to the former weaver’s apprentice the absolute power of life and death over tens of thousands of innocent human beings. His incapacity to discharge that responsibility justly and humanely would be distressingly demonstrated in the years that were to follow.
The somber chronicle of the events that ended in the genocide of the peaceful Arawaks of the Caribbean islands is amply documented in Columbus’ own letters and journals and in the pages of his most ardent admirer, Father Bartolomé de Las Casas, the great contemporary historian of the West Indies who believed Columbus had been divinely inspired to make the Discovery. But Las Casas was a thoroughly honest writer, and he did not hesitate to pass harsh judgment on his hero for initiating and carrying on the wholesale enslavement for profit of the gentle natives who had affectionately welcomed Columbus and his fellow argonauts to the New World. Throughout his long life Las Casas was an impassioned crusader for the rights and survival of the hapless Indians—his "poor innocents," as he called them—whose cruel oppression by the Spanish invaders he laid square at Columbus’ door.
http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1975/6/1975_6_4.shtml
http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1975/6/1975_6_4.shtml
What is Historical Materialism?
Historical Materialism is the application of Marxist science to historical development. The fundamental proposition of historical materialism can be summed up in a sentence: ""it is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but, on the contrary, their social existence that determines their consciousness." (Marx, in the Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy.)
What does this mean?
Readers of the Daily Mirror (a British daily paper Editor) will be familiar with the "Perishers" cartoon strip. In one incident the old dog, Wellington wanders down to a pool full of crabs. The crabs speculate about the mysterious divinity, the "eyeballs in the sky," which appears to them.
The point is, that is actually how you would look at things if your universe were a pond. Your consciousness is determined by your being. Thought is limited by the range of experience of the species.
We know very little about how primitive people thought, but we know what they couldn't have been thinking about. They wouldn't have wandered about wondering what the football results were, for instance. League football presupposes big towns able to get crowds large enough to pay professional footballers and the rest of the club staff. Industrial towns in their turn can only emerge when the productivity of labour has developed to the point where a part of society can be fed by the rest, and devote themselves to producing other requirements than food.
In other words, an extensive division of labour must exist. The other side of this is that people must be accustomed to working for money and buying the things they want from others-including tickets to the football-which of course was not the case in primitive society.
So this simple example shows how even things like professional football are dependent on the way society makes its daily bread, on people's "social existence".
No comments:
Post a Comment