Narratives on How the Real World Works : By Sulochana Ramiah Mohan
A career Indian intelligence officer for 31 years, Vikram Sood, who retired in March 2003 after heading the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) of India, pens his latest book The Ultimate Goal with descriptions on the big game of the nations as a means to assert and maintain superiority over the other. The book talks about complexity of building and sustaining narratives as the underpowered too can strive to create a narrative. Besides that, he projects that narratives do not have to be based on the truth but on perceptions created.
The Ultimate Goal assures that the book is a factual account, and is not a critique of global systems and narratives. The author says it’s an explanation of the storylines that are created by States to rule or dominate others and exercise control. Narratives evolve over time; they cannot be made available at the flick of a button. Narratives have to be nurtured over years, sustained and fed all the time from multiple sources and agencies. Narratives are about the superiority of one’s own country, civilization, culture and, in every possible aspect, by implication, innuendo or, if required, quite brazenly, about the inferiority of the other.
In the past, in the days of empires, conquest or victory in war automatically bestowed superiority to the victor and, as a corollary, inferiority on the conquered. In the present age, superiority is sustained and exhibited through other means. Narratives are also constructed to justify a course of action, to give it a rationale – be it a threat to peace, violation of treaties or humanitarian considerations. The real reasons could easily lie elsewhere.
The book invariably notes the unsolved assassination of John F Kennedy(JFK), the story of Donald Trump and the Russian leadership that was not concerned about individuals, but about defeating the U.S. at large. He also speaks in length on the capture of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan and who should take credit for it. Another impressive story about James Chao, who became an all-American philanthropist, is also documented. A lot more on the rise of China has been penned too.
The author convinces that Colonies had no voice during the age of imperialism and no abilities either as independent nations.
The book hints that the references to India are from sources within the nation, because that is where the genuine Indian narrative lies; especially the young, who constitute the majority and to whom the future belongs. The author says he relied extensively on Western sources, as global narratives in the past 150 years have emerged mostly from there. The Russians and the Chinese have not been able to spread their stories, hampered as they are by their systems of governance and their languages.
He goes on to say that it is important to understand them and project their points of view if India is to build its own narrative. It is to them that this book attempts to explain how the real world works, without being judgmental.
The book ’Ultimate Goal’ has 12 chapters and an acknowledgment. The first chapter is about Getting the Story Right and followed by: God’s Own Country; The Hollywood Narrative Factory; Intelligence, Media and the Narrative; Profits of War in the Name of Peace; Reluctant Imperialist or Empire by Design; Empires, Immigration, Nationalism and Islam ; The Perils of Political Correctness; The Russian Way ; Through China’s Looking Glass; Corporate Dream and lastly The India Story.
The introduction of the book notes that the facts are not always what they appear to be but are often what they are perceived to be. Thus, the truth is not supreme in affairs of State, and is often hidden within a bundle of lies, half-truths and innuendo. Instead, perceptions built on narratives become the accepted truth.
The first chapter is about defining narratives in the geopolitical context and the next chapter, ‘God’s Own Country’, is about the powerful institutes of influence in the U.S. where the rich and powerful from both sides of the Atlantic mostly congregate to decide the future of the world. The Christian church also has a role to play in this and he says none of the narratives – of conveying impressions and influencing the common citizen – can work without the help of the celluloid world, along with the intelligence community which is featured in the following chapter. Tinsel town and its many arms, in the media, internet and television, is where many of the dreams are imagined for those who can be influenced. The role of the media with quiet assistance from intelligence agencies, where the two anticipate, create or prevent influences and biases, is detailed in Chapter Four ‘Intelligence, Media and the Narrative’.
The fifth chapter ‘Profits of War in the Name of Peace’ deals with the narrative of the hugely powerful and profitable military–industry complex and its increasingly widening ambit. The sixth chapter: ‘Reluctant Imperialist or Empire by Design’ is about America’s role as the reluctant imperialist, while the next one is about imperialism, nationalism and Islam. Chapter Eight, ‘The Perils of Political Correctness’ is about storylines built around political correctness and their perils, followed by chapters on how the Russians and then the Chinese have tried to create their narratives, mostly with the help of their powerful intelligence agencies. The corporate world has its dreams to manufacture and sell, and this is detailed in the next chapter and the last chapter is about India – about how the narrative of the country was created by the West, from the time it ruled the world. It also deals with how India now tries to answer the question: who are we, and what is an India for all, without favours? The last chapter describes how the British Raj divided Hindus and Muslims and ruled. He points the Brits had in fact, favoured the Muslims.
He talks about the colonial powers that lost their colonies in the twentieth century, they felt the need to reassert themselves – in some cases, by reverting to their old practices of pulling down recalcitrant local rulers by conspiring against them and threatening them, or occasionally nursing them back to health. Since this could not be done by a State Army, they turned to mercenaries to preserve the interests of colonial powers, like the British, with plausible deniability of any Government intervention. The mercenary was the corporate executive with a gun. The monopoly of States on violence was given up in favour of outsourcing it, as it was a subtler and more effective channel for the pursuit of foreign policy without upsetting existing arrangements.
The book then slates how the British came to Sri Lanka in the 1980s as mercenaries from a British company, Keenie Meenie Services, made up of former SAS (Special Air Services regiment) and SIS (Secret Intelligence Service) personnel. They were allowed by the British Government to train and equip the Sri Lankan Armed Forces for operations against Tamil insurgents. The author says these mercenaries were brought in so as not to upset India, where Britain had substantial commercial and defence sales interests that far outweighed anything Sri Lanka could offer. As the war raged on, the company began to play a much more active role in it, and in the training of Sri Lankan Security Forces in jungle warfare, based on their experience in the SAS.
Keenie Meenie got its name from the Swahili term for ‘the movement of a snake in the grass’. The company had earlier been involved in Oman, Nicaragua, in the well-known Iran-Contra scandal, as well as in Afghanistan. There were other similar private companies in Britain like Control Risks, which specialised in protecting VIPs from kidnappers. After an initial burst of creative destruction in Sri Lanka, it seems Keenie Meenie scaled down its methods of operation and left this role to companies like Sandline International and Executive Outcomes in the 1990s, to be replaced by Blackwater and G4S in the 2000s, and the Spear Operations Group that has also been operating in Yemen.
To explain how narratives do not have to be based on the truth but on perceptions created, the author narrates many of the true stories that had been the talk of the town for decades. The story of Rudolf Ivanovich Abel whose real name Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher, is one such.
He was a Soviet intelligence officer and on a spying mission had adopted codenames such as Andrew Yurgesovich Kayotis and Emil Robert Goldfus. He was arrested on charges of conspiracy by the FBI in 1957. Fisher was trained as a spy for entry into the United States.
In the epilogue to this story, Goldfus was betrayed by his deputy and arrested in New York in 1957. The American Press went ballistic when Goldfus declared that his name was Col. Rudolf Ivanovich Abel. In reality, there was no Colonel Abel; it was a name the Soviets had given him as a cover. Goldfus used it to convey to his masters that it was really him that the Americans had arrested and that he had not revealed his actual identity. Fisher was the son of Russian émigré parents, and was born in England in 1903.
China and Media narratives
The book also talks about the battle of narratives has never been so grim as it is today like the war between China, the U.S. and India because real power comes not from the barrel of a gun but from those who control the narrative. The author points out the case of China and that the coronavirus that is widely believed and accepted to have originated in China and that has its own narrative. On the other hand well publicised military exhibition of China preparedness and intentions across its borders aiming mainly India comes at a time when the U.S. is in domestic strife and these acts also reveal the true nature of a rising power that is irresponsible, egregious and a bully.
Vikram argues that when national interest is camouflaged as principles, which are then transformed into narratives, it is a matter of time before the two come into conflict. He goes on to say that China is not a mysterious power; it is dictatorial in the extreme. It is avaricious, ambitious and ruthless, ruled by megalomaniacs and it is the West and the rest of the world that has glamourized a dictatorship and created a new ecosystem around it to fill its coffers and obtain benefits of various kinds, he underlines.
The author further reveals that the unravelling China’s mysteries became an intellectual challenge at universities and think tanks, even as activists flagged human rights violations in the country. Eventually, it was a big game destined to go awry, as we can see today when previously held narratives have become skewed.
Narrative of racial superiority
The author brings out a truth that was accepted as a norm based on the racial narrative at that time. The five million Indian soldiers from the colonies of the British and French empires fought for the Allies in the Second World War where Indian troops were shoulder to shoulder with the British forces at Dunkirk, but when the time came to participate in victory parades, not a single black or brown trooper was represented, nor did the 2017 film Dunkirk show a single Indian face.
U.S. President Kennedy was assassinated in 22 November 1963 and Lee Harvey Oswald was identified as the sole person responsible for the murder but the case was not closed. There were many narratives on his assassination dismissing that Oswald was not the one who killed him. Later, a filmmaker who came with a movie line on JFK was accused of every possible misdemeanour and of having war neurosis in the movie; the New York Times devoted twenty-seven columns to criticising the film. There were many conspiracy theories about plots to assassinate the President and other theories to contradict this that have still not gone away. The lone gunman theory was suspect and the bullet that killed the President probably came from the front. This was the evidence recorded on the camera of a bystander, Abraham Zapruder.
White supremacy and the Rockefeller phenomenon
This chapter tells how a superpower also shapes the narratives with immense interests around the world. Its forces spread all over the globe like its investments, resources and markets, and assured routes for accessibility– has great need for narratives that are global, positive and permanent. Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union (now Russia) use their intelligence agencies to help build such narratives, or change others’ narratives. It is a gigantic, collective effort with corporates and the Government acting in concert. This was a common practice during colonialism and the days of Empire; the Chinese have been the latest to adopt these practices.
Another narrative in the book is about white male supremacy at its best. The writer gives a great description of good-looking, clean cowboy who kept away the wild and unruly Native Americans from their ancestral lands and The Ultimate Goal also projects the British Empire was served by Viscount Greystoke, a.k.a. Tarzan, who swung from tree to tree in ‘dark’ Africa, emancipating and protecting the locals and saving his king’s realm from cousin Kaiser Wilhelm.
Interestingly, the books brings about the wealth and might of the Rockefeller Phenomenon and the ‘Rockefeller family bank’ and U.S.–China relations during this period and the American power structure that created its own narratives that had a global reach.
There are 6,000 individuals in the U.S. who are members of the superclass and who can influence the lives of millions of people globally. This super 6,000 includes Heads of State, CEOs of the largest companies, Media bosses, billionaires who are actually involved in their investments, technology giants, oil potentates, hedge fund managers, private equity managers, top military commanders, and even renowned authors, scientists, religious leaders and artists. Many of these 6,000 are also in the Council of Foreign Relations (CFR), Trilateral Commission, the Davos Group, the Bilderbergers and the Bohemian Grove, with some names common to all four or five.
Also, the book reveals the Hollywood narrative spreading the good word about the American values of freedom. The film Zero Dark Thirty-the Hunt for Osama bin Laden In 2012, the CIA got a major propaganda boost with the release of the film but in 2015 by the well-known American investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh claimed that the hunt for Osama bin Laden as an all-American affair was false, and senior generals of the Pakistan army and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) were involved.
Telling India’s story
But the last chapter, ‘The India Story’, touches the brief history of the Chinese Admiral Zheng who sailed out from Nanjing for Sri Lanka in 1405 CE, he led a fleet of 300 vessels, which included tankers carrying drinking water, vessels with advanced rudders, watertight compartments – presumably to carry back treasures – and elaborate signalling devices. The Chinese emperors, however, were not too impressed by such seafaring adventures, unlike their European counterparts. They banned oceanic voyages in the 1430s and this ended China’s age of exploration. In contrast, about sixty years later, in 1492, Christopher Columbus, the Italian explorer, set sail from Cádiz in Spain to “discover” India, with just ninety men aboard three ships. He changed the course of history when he landed in the Americas instead.
The book goes on to describe India and how the rulers saw India with different perceptions. It describes the shortcomings and the wars that were fought within the Indian sphere and the areas of negligence even today in rectifying them.
In telling his own story, the author nails that in India, the game of creating new narratives that are significantly different from what was handed down in the past, and counter narratives that consider what is needed at home and abroad, has only just begun. “We need to take a second look at our recent history too, to fill in the omissions and correct perspectives,” notes Vikram.
The Ultimate Goal: pages 349; Copyright: HarperCollins; India First published in hardback in India in 2020; P-ISBN: 978-93-5357-844-2 E-ISBN; Published by Penguin Random House India Pvt. Ltd
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Thanks: Reproduced from Ceylon Today