War between India and Pakistan

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi hoped to come out of the election campaign as a strong man. He did not quite succeed. On February 26th 2019 Modi bombed a terrorist camp in Pakistan's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, directly adjacent to the Kashmir mountainous region. He said he responded to a terrorist attack in Kashmir. In the long history of skirmishes between the two countries holding a nuclear stockpile, it was the first time that India did this, thus starting the conflict to escalate.

The cold war between Indian and Pakistan got hotter

Pakistan was unwilling to follow New Delhi's contention that the bombing was an anti-terrorist operation and a non-military preemptive strike. The following day Pakistani military aircraft shot down an Indian fighter plane over Kashmir and took the pilot in captivity. Now the airspace over Pakistan is closed to civilian traffic, because the government expects attacks from India. Thousands of flights have to be diverted worldwide. If this escalates to a war between the two nuclear powers, would it not only have consequences for the South Asian region but the rest of the world.

Dangerous situation

The situation is extremely tense. For the first time in almost 50 years, the air forces of both countries are in direct confrontation. The last war between India and Pakistan took place in 1971 and ended with the defeat of Pakistan and the secession of the state of Bangladesh, formerly East Pakistan.

My opinion

If Narendra Modi wants to respond to a terrorist attack and bomb a camp he should had spoken to the Pakistani president before. Let the Pakistani handle it. Only if Pakistan declined Narendra Modi should tell the Pakistani India will take care of of the situation itself. But as history often shows failure to communicate often leads to disaster. I wonder if Narendra Modi hasn't the brains to not have seen this. Lets pray that if the wage nuclear war there are no strong winds that the fallout falls on their countries only. Both have quite a large landmass.

War with North Korea?

Like the Trump administration or not (I don't). But while the threat, that North Korea develops nuclear weapons was lingering since decades, just like it was with the Iran, nothing has been done. Both countries are in my opinion instable and should not have nukes. Like children you give matches, "Now go playing outside, have fun". One might be reminded on the development in the 1930s when Nazi Germany (illegally, according to treaties) built up and army and weaponry. The world condemned it, namely European countries, especially neighboring France, and the UK, but also the US. But nothing was done. Pretty much until the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939. Only then war was decleared upon Nazi Germany. But it was too late to quickly deal with the situation, because Nazi Germany had one of the largest armies by then. The result was much of Europe was overrun by the Nazis, and the allies (well UK, France, Poland, Canada, Australia and a few others, but not the US yet) suffered defeat everywhere, while the Reich was expanding. You might also see parallels to the Japanese Empire, also pretty much have been left alone for too long. It took the attack on Pearl Harbor, until the US woke up. Not after a year two or until the US joined the war the tide was turned, but killing and destruction still went on for years until 1945. Are we (mainly the US) doing the same mistake again? Seeing the problem but not tackling it already? Again waiting until it's too late, and when finally dealing with it - which of course means war, since diplomatic attempts failed since decades - and casualties on all sides will mount? Back to Mr. Trump - like him or not. In my opinion he is the only president within the last decades to have the balls to do something about it. And now. Although so far he only had a big mouth and nothing has happened I hope he is doing something about it soon. Which unfortunately will include war. I hoped though that China could be persuaded to deal with it instead. Is China more or less the only reason the US hasn't intervened already when Bush or Obama was president. [Update] The 2018 inter-Korean summit was a meeting between leaders of the two Koreas, Moon Jae-in, President of South Korea and Kim Jong-un, North Korea's leader. It leads to the Declaration of Panmunjeom, which affirms the common intention of "no longer wanting war on the peninsula", to put an end to hostilities and to sign a peace treaty by the end of 2018; the two states also undertake to denuclearize the peninsula, both on the South Korean side, which does not have the atomic weapon but is under an American nuclear umbrella, than North Korea I don't understand why Kim Jong-un was building a nuclear arsenal over decades, threatens the US with an attack, and now takes a 180 degree turn, wants denuclearization and peace. Is North Korea out of money? Or is this just a distraction to soften up the US and secretly continuing building up?