Where’s the war?

IT is a truth generally acknowledged that there is nothing quite like a visceral, eye-stabbing, gut-wrenching, heart-pounding, ear-splitting, head-swirling war to keep us from worrying endlessly over rising prices, the coming recession and all the other inanities that drive us to boredom. Consequently, there is a distinct disappointment in Middle India over the fact that the promised Third World War hasn’t begun and the Americans appear to be taking an unconscionably long time to fly their B-52s in Afghan skies.

All the amateur generals and pop strategists (and we have some 900 million of them) whose artillery of analysis has got a little rusty since the Kargil encounters ended, are getting extremely edgy in fact. They’ve studied the Afghan terrain, made a quick calculation about collateral damage, have come to their conclusions on how the US should approach The Enemy, and are now waiting for an opportune moment to release their ammunition — but that moment, alas, continues to elude them.

I realised how dangerous this state of uncertainty is for the national psyche when I took a little stroll the other day. The first person I encountered was Mrs Mehta, who lives down the road.
‘‘Arrey, tell me, why haven’t they started?’’

‘‘Who?’’ I asked, wondering whether she was referring to the neighbourhood plan about starting a general cleaning drive.
‘‘The US soldiers, of course. Their battleships must have left their Diego Garcia base by now and must be anchored some 200 km from Mumbai. From there they will probably use their F-16s to penetrate Afghan airspace.’’

I managed a feeble nod and attempted to move on but Mrs Mehta held me with her glittering eye, ‘‘Perhaps they’ll do it tonight. But I hope it’s not before Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi. I want to know if that wicked Payal will be exposed and tonight’s episode should reveal that. After that I’ll be free to switch to CNN for live coverage of the war. I believe they did a marvellous job during Operation Desert Storm....Arrey, look who is here, it’s Rajinder!’’

Before I could make good my escape, Major (retd) Rajinder Tomar was upon us. ‘‘Good evening, ji, wonder if they’ll strike tonight,’’ was his opening salvo.‘‘It’s not a full moon night and the weather is perfect for a Stealth operation.’’

This got Mrs Mehta very excited. ‘‘Will they come in from the Arabian Sea side or from Kyrgystan, d’you think?’’ she demanded to know.
That was just the strategic opening Major Tomar was waiting for and he struck with awesome firepower, ‘‘Well, ji, if I were Colin Powell I would advice the Pentagon to launch a series of what I term as wave manoeuvres. I would fly in from Tajikistan using Pakistan airspace and drop my ground troops in the foothills...’’

With great stealth I tiptoed out of this war council — Mrs Mehta and Major Tomar didn’t even notice my exit because they were within striking distance of Osama bin Laden himself. But the moment I walked into Jaichand Das Grocery Store I knew I had made a mistake. ‘‘Didi, mark my words, I know the Afghans. They will fight to the last man. This is going to be a long war, didi, and the price of dried fruits will rise. That is why, I am telling, Amrikans must use big bombs and finish quickly,’’ he began, as he instructed his teenaged assistant to get 3 kilos of sugar and 2 kilos of basmati rice.

I hurriedly picked up my shopping and made a hasty exist but not before I stumbled on 14-year-old Ashish, who had come to buy a packet of chewing gum. He evidently had a school project on Afghanistan and wanted help from me — the neighbourhood journalist — on how many soldiers, tanks and missiles the Taliban had. ‘‘Aunty, I just read that USA’s F-16 has testfired a modified AGM Maverick missile. Cool, isn’t it?’’ he said.

I extracted myself in as aunty-like a manner as I could muster and walked a few furlongs more to the local multiplex to pick up some tickets for the evening show. Sure enough, I had barely entered the premises when I came across a maniac sporting a completely shaved head and a t-shirt that read: ‘The US Marines’ across the chest.
He seemed to be directing operations somewhere above Kandahar over his cellphone.‘‘Yeah, and then they could mobilise their F/A 18 Hornets from the USS Theodore Roosevelt but before that they would need real time intelligence, or else they could get swarmed...Yeah, yeah. Germ warfare? Nah. Not now I’d say. Yeah, yeah. Sure, sure, you need to smoke him out but you could do that by supplying Stingers to the Northern Alliance...’’

By now it was as if the entire US airforce was circling above my head. The guy who said jaw-jaw is better than war-war had better come over to my neighbourhood. Here, in this land of Gandhi, jaw-jaw is war-war and we certainly are ready for action in Afghanistan. Before winter please.

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