Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Forget global warming, worry about the MAGNETOSPHERE

Forget global warming, worry about the MAGNETOSPHERE: Earth's magnetic field is collapsing and it could affect the climate and wipe out power grids

Earth's magnetic field has weakened by 15 per cent over the last 200 years
Could be a sign that the planet's north and south poles are about to flip
If this happens, solar winds could punch holes into the Earth's ozone layer

This could damage power grids, affect weather and increase cancer rates
Evidence of flip happening in the past has been uncovered in pottery
As the magnetic shield weakens, the spectacle of an aurora would be visible every night all over the Earth

Deep within the Earth, a fierce molten core is generating a magnetic field capable of defending our planet against devastating solar winds.

The protective field extends thousands of miles into space and its magnetism affects everything from global communication to animal migration and weather patterns.

But this magnetic field, so important to life on Earth, has weakened by 15 per cent over the last 200 years. And this, scientists claim, could be a sign that the Earth’s poles are about to flip.

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The Earth's protective field extends thousands of miles into space and its magnetism affects everything from global communication to animal migration and weather patterns

Experts believe we're currently overdue a flip, but they're unsure when this could occur.

If a switch happens, we would be exposed to solar winds capable of punching holes into the ozone layer.

The impact could be devastating for mankind, knocking out power grids, radically changing Earth’s climate and driving up rates of cancer.

‘This is serious business’, Richard Holme, Professor of Earth, Ocean and Ecological Sciences at Liverpool University told MailOnline. ‘Imagine for a moment your electrical power supply was knocked out for a few months – very little works without electricity these days.’

The Earth's climate would change drastically. In fact, a recent Danish study believes global warming is directly related to the magnetic field rather than CO2 emissions.

The study claimed that the planet is experiencing a natural period of low cloud cover due to fewer cosmic rays entering the atmosphere.

The Earth's magnetic field explained

Radiation at ground level would also increase, with some estimates suggesting overall exposure to cosmic radiation would double causing more deaths from cancer.

Researchers predict that in the event of a flip, every year a hundred thousand people would die from the increased levels of space radiation.

'Radiation could be 3-5 times greater than that from the man-made ozone holes. Furthermore, the ozone holes would be larger and longer-lived,' said Dr Colin Forsyth from the Mullard Space Science Laboratory at UCL.

The magnetosphere is a large area around the Earth produced by the planet's magnetic field. It presence means that charged particles of the solar wind are unable to cross the magnetic field lines and are deflected around the Earth

The magnetosphere is a large area around the Earth produced by the planet’s magnetic field. It presence means that charged particles of the solar wind are unable to cross the magnetic field lines and are deflected around the Earth.

Space agencies are now taking the threat seriously. In November, three spacecraft were launched as part of the SWARM mission to uncover how the Earth’s magnetic field is changing.

The mission plans to provide better maps of our planet's magnetic field and help scientists understand the impact of space weather on satellite communication and GPS.

‘Whilst we have a basic understanding of the interior of the Earth, there is much we still don’t know,’ said Dr Forsyth.

‘We do not fully understand how the Earth’s magnetic field is generated, why it is variable and the timescales of these variations.’

The mission will provide a current map of Earth’s magnetic field. But historic evidence of its decline has already been found in a surprising source – ancient pottery.

Scientists have discovered that ancient pots can act as a magnetic time capsule. This is because they contain an iron-based mineral called magnetite. When pots form, the magnetite minerals align with the Earth’s magnetic field, just like compass needles.

WHAT IS GEOMAGNETIC REVERSAL?

The Earth’s magnetic field is in a permanent state of change. Magnetic north drifts around and every few hundred thousand years the polarity flips so a compass would point south instead of north. The strength of the magnetic field also constantly changes and currently it is showing signs of significant weakening.

The Earth magnetic field is mainly generated in the very hot molten core of the planet. The magnetic field is basically a dipole (it has a North and a South Pole). Magnetic reversal or flip is the process by which the North Pole is transformed into the South and vice versa, typically following a considerable reduction in the strength of the magnetic field. However, weakening of the magnetic field does not always result in a reversal.

During a reversal, scientists expect to see more complicated field pattern at the Earth's surface, with perhaps more than one North and South Pole at any given time. The overall strength of the field, anywhere on the Earth, may be no more than a tenth of its strength now.

The Earth's magnetic field is generated in the very hot molten core of the planet. Scientists believe Mars used to have a magnetic field similar to that on Earth which protected its atmosphere

By examining pottery from prehistory to modern times, scientists have discovered just how dramatically the field has changed in the last few centuries.

They’ve found that Earth’s magnetic field is in a permanent state of flux. Magnetic north drifts and every few hundred thousand years the polarity flips so a compass would point south instead of north.

If the magnetic field continues to decline, over billions of years, Earth could end up like Mars - a once oceanic world that has become a dry, barren planet incapable of supporting life.

WHAT ARE THE DANGERS OF A MAGNETIC FLIP?

Life has existed on the Earth for billions of years, during which there have been many reversals.

There is no obvious correlation between animal extinctions and those reversals. Likewise, reversal patterns do not have any correlation with human development and evolution.

It appears that some animals, such as whales and some birds use Earth's magnetic field for migration and direction finding.

Since geomagnetic reversal takes a number of thousands of years, they could well adapt to the changing magnetic environment or develop different methods of navigation.

Radiation at ground level would increase, however, with some estimates suggesting that overall exposure to cosmic radiation would double causing more deaths from cancer. ‘But only slightly,’ said Professor Richard Holme.

‘And much less than lying on the beach in Florida for a day. So if it happened, the protection method would probably be to wear a big floppy hat.’

Electric grid collapse from severe solar storms is a major risk. As the magnetic field continues to weaken, scientists are highlighting the importance off-the grid energy systems using renewable energy sources to protect the Earth against a black out.

'The very highly charged particles can have a deleterious effect on the satellites and astronauts,' added Dr Mona Kessel, a Magnetosphere discipline scientist at Nasa.

In one area, there is evidence that a flip is already occurring. ‘The increasing strength of the South Atlantic anomaly, an area of weak field over Brazil, is already a problem,’ said Professor Richard Holme.

The Earth's climate could also change. A recent Danish study has found that the earth's weather has been significantly affected by the planet's magnetic field.

They claimed that fluctuations in the number of cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere directly alter the amount of cloud covering the planet.

Henrik Svensmark, a weather scientist at the Danish National Space Centre who led the team behind the research, believes that the planet is experiencing a natural period of low cloud cover due to fewer cosmic rays entering the atmosphere.

But scientists claim the rate of decline is too fast for the Earth’s core to simply burn out. Instead, the story told by ancient pottery suggests the Earth's poles could be about to undergo another flip.

According to the British Geological Survey, the Earth's magnetic field has on average four or five reversals in polarity every million years and we’re now overdue a similar event.

‘At the moment, we cannot accurately determine whether or not the Earth’s field is about to flip,’ said Dr Forsyth. ‘We have only been recording the Earth’s field for around 170 years; about 1-15 per cent of the time a flip is expected to take.’

If a flip occurs, it would cause the Earth’s magnetic shield to be weakened for thousands of years, opening up our defences and causing cosmic radiation to get through.

'We have a double layer defence shield,' said Jim Wild a space scientists at Lancaster University.

'Space is full of stuff that’s not great for biological tissue. If we didn’t have an atmosphere, that stuff would be hitting us. It’s the magnetic field protects atmosphere from the solar wind.'

Mapping the Earth's magnetic field

‘Some speculative studies have suggested that as the Earth’s magnetic field weakens we could see an increase in cloud coverage in the troposphere and an increase in the polar ozone holes,’ added Dr Forsyth.

‘This would be particularly evident in the northern hemisphere where up to 40 per cent of the ozone within the hole region could be lost, far greater than the current losses.’

In fact, in one area, there is evidence that a flip is already occurring. ‘The increasing strength of the South Atlantic anomaly, an area of weak field over Brazil, is already a problem,’ said Professor Holme.

Mapping the magnetic field: Why it matters

Not all of the effects of a weak magnetic field will be bad. The much sought-after spectacle of an aurora would be visible every night all over the Earth as solar winds hit the atmosphere

‘Satellites flying over have far more problems than in other locations. Astrophysical satellite are just switched off in this location, but from my perspective, this isn’t much good if you want to study the Brazilian rainforest.’

'The very highly charged particles can have a deleterious effect on the satellites and astronauts,' added Dr Mona Kessel, a Magnetosphere discipline scientist at Nasa.

Scientists however, are quick to point out that while a magnetic flip could cause problems for mankind, the event won’t be a catastrophic.

‘We’ve had many reversals in the past, and haven’t been able to show that they had anything to do with, for example, mass extinctions,’ said Professor Holme.

And not all of the effects will be bad. The much sought-after spectacle of an aurora would be visible every night all over the Earth as solar winds hit the atmosphere.

There remains, however, much work yet to be done in understanding the properties of the deep Earth.

The Earth’s core is a hostile world where the crushing forces and temperatures, similar to that of the surface of the sun, take our scientific understanding and abilities to the limit.

'This isn't some crazy theory that might happen,' said Professor Wild. 'There is evidence, but we still need to do more science to understand the impact...I'm confident we can come up with a solution.'

WHAT IS THE SWARM MISSION?

Swarm is a ESA satellite mission which was launched on 22nd November 2013.

The mission consists of three identical satellites which will precisely measure the strength and direction of Earth's magnetic field. The new data will be processed by British Geological Survey to produce an accurate map of this field.

In order to best measure the field, the satellites will orbit in a unique configuration. Two satellites will fly side-by-side at height of 450 km, while the third satellite will fly at an altitude of 530 km.

The lower two satellites will allow very fine measurements of the magnetic field generated by the rocks in the Earth's crust, which are difficult to detect otherwise. The upper satellite will give a simultaneous measurement at a different location.

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Millions of Poor Are Left Uncovered by U.S Health Law

Millions of Poor Are Left Uncovered by Health Law

James Patterson for The New York Times

Claretha Briscoe, left, of Hollandale, Miss., with family. She earns too much to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to get subsidies on the new health exchange.

By SABRINA TAVERNISE and ROBERT GEBELOFF

Because they live in states largely controlled by Republicans that have declined to participate in a vast expansion of Medicaid, the medical insurance program for the poor, they are among the eight million Americans who are impoverished, uninsured and ineligible for help. The federal government will pay for the expansion through 2016 and no less than 90 percent of costs in later years. A sweeping national effort to extend health coverage to millions of Americans will leave out two-thirds of the poor blacks and single mothers and more than half of the low-wage workers who do not have insurance, the very kinds of people that the program was intended to help, according to an analysis of census data by The New York Times.

Those excluded will be stranded without insurance, stuck between people with slightly higher incomes who will qualify for federal subsidies on the new health exchanges that went live this week, and those who are poor enough to qualify for Medicaid in its current form, which has income ceilings as low as $11 a day in some states.

People shopping for insurance on the health exchanges are already discovering this bitter twist.

“How can somebody in poverty not be eligible for subsidies?” an unemployed health care worker in Virginia asked through tears. The woman, who identified herself only as Robin L. because she does not want potential employers to know she is down on her luck, thought she had run into a computer problem when she went online Tuesday and learned she would not qualify.

At 55, she has high blood pressure, and she had been waiting for the law to take effect so she could get coverage. Before she lost her job and her house and had to move in with her brother in Virginia, she lived in Maryland, a state that is expanding Medicaid. “Would I go back there?” she asked. “It might involve me living in my car. I don’t know. I might consider it.”

The 26 states that have rejected the Medicaid expansion are home to about half of the country’s population, but about 68 percent of poor, uninsured blacks and single mothers. About 60 percent of the country’s uninsured working poor are in those states. Among those excluded are about 435,000 cashiers, 341,000 cooks and 253,000 nurses’ aides.

“The irony is that these states that are rejecting Medicaid expansion — many of them Southern — are the very places where the concentration of poverty and lack of health insurance are the most acute,” said Dr. H. Jack Geiger, a founder of the community health center model. “It is their populations that have the highest burden of illness and costs to the entire health care system.”

The disproportionate impact on poor blacks introduces the prickly issue of race into the already politically charged atmosphere around the health care law. Race was rarely, if ever, mentioned in the state-level debates about the Medicaid expansion. But the issue courses just below the surface, civil rights leaders say, pointing to the pattern of exclusion.

Every state in the Deep South, with the exception of Arkansas, has rejected the expansion. Opponents of the expansion say they are against it on exclusively economic grounds, and that the demographics of the South — with its large share of poor blacks — make it easy to say race is an issue when it is not.

In Mississippi, Republican leaders note that a large share of people in the state are on Medicaid already, and that, with an expansion, about a third of the state would have been insured through the program. Even supporters of the health law say that eventually covering 10 percent of that cost would have been onerous for a predominantly rural state with a modest tax base.

“Any additional cost in Medicaid is going to be too much,” said State Senator Chris McDaniel, a Republican, who opposes expansion.

The law was written to require all Americans to have health coverage. For lower and middle-income earners, there are subsidies on the new health exchanges to help them afford insurance. An expanded Medicaid program was intended to cover the poorest. In all, about 30 million uninsured Americans were to have become eligible for financial help.

But the Supreme Court’s ruling on the health care law last year, while upholding it, allowed states to choose whether to expand Medicaid. Those that opted not to leave about eight million uninsured people who live in poverty ($19,530 for a family of three) without any assistance at all.

Poor people excluded from the Medicaid expansion will not be subject to fines for lacking coverage. In all, about 14 million eligible Americans are uninsured and living in poverty, the Times analysis found.

The federal government provided the tally of how many states were not expanding Medicaid for the first time on Tuesday. It included states like New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Tennessee that might still decide to expand Medicaid before coverage takes effect in January. If those states go forward, the number would change, but the trends that emerged in the analysis would be similar.

Mississippi has the largest percentage of poor and uninsured people in the country — 13 percent. Willie Charles Carter, an unemployed 53-year-old whose most recent job was as a maintenance worker at a public school, has had problems with his leg since surgery last year.

His income is below Mississippi’s ceiling for Medicaid — which is about $3,000 a year — but he has no dependent children, so he does not qualify. And his income is too low to make him eligible for subsidies on the federal health exchange.

“You got to be almost dead before you can get Medicaid in Mississippi,” he said.

He does not know what he will do when the clinic where he goes for medical care, the Good Samaritan Health Center in Greenville, closes next month because of lack of funding.

“I’m scared all the time,” he said. “I just walk around here with faith in God to take care of me.”

The states that did not expand Medicaid have less generous safety nets: For adults with children, the median income limit for Medicaid is just under half of the federal poverty level — or about $5,600 a year for an individual — while in states that are expanding, it is above the poverty line, or about $12,200, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.There is little or no coverage of childless adults in the states not expanding, Kaiser said.

The New York Times analysis excluded immigrants in the country illegally and those foreign-born residents who would not be eligible for benefits under Medicaid expansion. It included people who are uninsured even though they qualify for Medicaid in its current form.

Blacks are disproportionately affected, largely because more of them are poor and living in Southern states. In all, 6 out of 10 blacks live in the states not expanding Medicaid. In Mississippi, 56 percent of all poor and uninsured adults are black, though they account for just 38 percent of the population.

Dr. Aaron Shirley, a physician who has worked for better health care for blacks in Mississippi, said that the history of segregation and violence against blacks still informs the way people see one another, particularly in the South, making some whites reluctant to support programs that they believe benefit blacks.

That is compounded by the country’s rapidly changing demographics, Dr. Geiger said, in which minorities will eventually become a majority, a pattern that has produced a profound cultural unease, particularly when it has collided with economic insecurity.

Dr. Shirley said: “If you look at the history of Mississippi, politicians have used race to oppose minimum wage, Head Start, all these social programs. It’s a tactic that appeals to people who would rather suffer themselves than see a black person benefit.”

Opponents of the expansion bristled at the suggestion that race had anything to do with their position. State Senator Giles Ward of Mississippi, a Republican, called the idea that race was a factor “preposterous,” and said that with the demographics of the South — large shares of poor people and, in particular, poor blacks — “you can argue pretty much any way you want.”

The decision not to expand Medicaid will also hit the working poor. Claretha Briscoe earns just under $11,000 a year making fried chicken and other fast food at a convenience store in Hollandale, Miss., too much to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to get subsidies on the new health exchange. She had a heart attack in 2002 that a local hospital treated as part of its charity care program.

“I skip months on my blood pressure pills,” said Ms. Briscoe, 48, who visited the Good Samaritan Health Center last week because she was having chest pains. “I buy them when I can afford them.”

About half of poor and uninsured Hispanics live in states that are expanding Medicaid. But Texas, which has a large Hispanic population, rejected the expansion. Gladys Arbila, a housekeeper in Houston who earns $17,000 a year and supports two children, is under the poverty line and therefore not eligible for new subsidies. But she makes too much to qualify for Medicaid under the state’s rules. She recently spent 36 hours waiting in the emergency room for a searing pain in her back.

“We came to this country, and we are legal and we work really hard,” said Ms. Arbila, 45, who immigrated to the United States 12 years ago, and whose son is a soldier in Afghanistan. “Why we don’t have the same opportunities as the others?”

Courtesy:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/03/health/millions-of-poor-are-left-uncovered-by-health-law.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Friday, January 31, 2014

Ariel Sharon: Peacemaker, hero... and butcher

He was respected in his eight years of near-death, with no sacrilegious cartoons to damage his reputation; and he will, be assured, receive the funeral of a hero and a peacemaker. Thus do we remake history

Any other Middle Eastern leader who survived eight years in a coma would have been the butt of every cartoonist in the world. Hafez el-Assad would have appeared in his death bed, ordering his son to commit massacres; Khomeini would have been pictured demanding more executions as his life was endlessly prolonged. But of Sharon – the butcher of Sabra and Shatila for almost every Palestinian – there has been an almost sacred silence.

Cursed in life as a killer by quite a few Israeli soldiers as well as by the Arab world – which has proved pretty efficient at slaughtering its own people these past few years – Sharon was respected in his eight years of near-death, no sacrilegious cartoons to damage his reputation; and he will, be assured, receive the funeral of a hero and a peacemaker.

Thus do we remake history. How speedily did toady journalists in Washington and New York patch up this brutal man's image. After sending his army's pet Lebanese militia into the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in 1982, where they massacred up to 1,700 Palestinians, Israel's own official enquiry announced that Sharon bore "personal" responsibility for the bloodbath.

He it was who had led Israel's catastrophic invasion of Lebanon three months earlier, lying to his own prime minister that his forces would advance only a few miles across the frontier, then laying siege to Beirut – at a cost of around 17,000 lives. But by slowly re-ascending Israel's dangerous political ladder, he emerged as prime minister, clearing Jewish settlements out of the Gaza Strip and thus, in the words of his own spokesman, putting any hope of a Palestinian state into "formaldehyde".

By the time of his political and mental death in 2006, Sharon – with the help of the 2001 crimes against humanity in the US and his successful but mendacious claim that Arafat backed bin Laden – had become, of all things, a peacemaker, while Arafat, who made more concessions to Israeli demands than any other Palestinian leader, was portrayed as a super-terrorist. The world forgot that Sharon had opposed the 1979 peace treaty with Egypt, voted against a withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 1985, opposed Israel's participation in the 1991 Madrid peace conference – and the Knesset plenum vote on the Oslo agreement in 1993, abstained on a vote for a peace with Jordan the next year and voted against the Hebron agreement in 1997. Sharon condemned the manner of Israel's 2000 retreat from Lebanon and by 2002 had built 34 new illegal Jewish colonies on Arab land.

Quite a peacemaker! When an Israeli pilot bombed an apartment block in Gaza, killing nine small children as well as his Hamas target, Sharon described the "operation" as "a great success", and the Americans were silent. For he bamboozled his Western allies into the insane notion that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was part of Bush's monstrous battle against "world terror", that Arafat was himself a bin Laden, and that the world's last colonial war was part of the cosmic clash of religious extremism.

The final, ghastly – in other circumstances, hilarious – political response to Sharon's behaviour was George W Bush's contention that Ariel Sharon was "a man of peace". When he became prime minister, media profiles noted not Sharon's cruelty but his "pragmatism", recalling, over and over, that he was known as "the bulldozer".

And, of course, real bulldozers will go on clearing Arab land for Jewish colonies for years after Sharon's death, thus ensuring there will never – ever – be a Palestinian state.

Courtesy:http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/ariel-sharon-peacemaker-hero-and-butcher-9053699.html

Dharavi keeps Tamil culture alive

Once again, Dharavi is the talk of Tamil Nadu. Thanks to Vijay’s new movie, Thalaivaa that is set in the Mumbai slum and whose protagonist is a character inspired by a late Tamil leader who lived there.

But did you know that Dharavi, a slice of Tamil Nadu in the heart of Mumbai, still keeps alive the Tamil culture, language and traditions? Makizhnan (29), who was born and brought up in Dharavi and is now settled in Chennai with his family, tells us how the bustling slum is a little Tamil Nadu though located in another state.

In fact, when Makizhnan came to Chennai two years ago, he was shocked at the way Tamil was spoken here. He feels that the language was spoken in a better form in Dharavi.“I can speak better Tamil than anyone across Tamil Nadu,” he proudly says.

Currently working in the production unit of a media firm, Makizhnan is also an accomplished Tamil writer and speaker. He has written articles about the lifestyle in Dharavi, apart from being an activist. He recounts how he, along with three other friends had succeeded in bringing 50,000 Tamilians across Maharashtra to form a human chain, as a protest against the genocide in Sri Lanka. “I studied in Kamaraj Memorial High School where I got to learn Tamil apart from Hindi, English and Marathi,” explains Makizhnan. When it comes to Tamil medium, there is only one school in Dharavi – Kamban high school, which has 40 students giving their public exam in tenth. However, according to him, it is not the schooling, but the books by Periyar and Ambedkar which nurtured in him the affinity towards Tamil literature.

The Tamil tradition, according to him, is kept alive by people who still have strong Tamil sentiments. “The streets are narrow, but we still manage to put kolam in the limited space during festivals,” he recalls. Not just the kolams, Makizhnan says that the “‘Tamizhan’ within them stays wherever they are” – the men wear lungis at home, and the women wear davani and jasmine flowers during occasions. Unlike the staple chapathis which Marathis have, the Tamils stick to their sambar, rasam, thayir, idli and idiappams, with beef during the weekends. Be it the Tirupathi laddoo, the Tirunelveli halwa or Kolli herbs, there will be a shop in Dharavi that sells it, he says.

“In fact idli-selling is a thriving business there,” says Makizhnan. Explaining the business prototype, he says, several families have women making around 200 idlis each, which the men sell in the city.

Talk about festivals, and Makizhnan has stories galore. “Last year, during Pongal, we organised 365 matkas,” he says, referring to the pots in which pongal is prepared. He and his group of friends, had invited Tamilians from across Dharavi to come and participate in the one-day celebration. What about Mattu pongal and Kanum pongal? “No, there is no madu in that part of the city to celebrate all that,” he snaps.

While pongal is the only Tamil festival which they celebrate, there are other North Indian festivals, to which often Tamil flavour will be infused through Karagatam, Oyilattam, and Koravan Korathi dance troups called from Tamil Nadu. This, he says, happens especially for the nine-day celebration of Ganesh Chathurthi. It’s that time of the year when the streets get noisy with the kutcheri groups singing top Tamil songs of the season, while they march the Ganesha idol, one that is made separately for the Tamil community there.

The same applies for the weddings, which happen in either of the Mariamman, Sudalai madan, Karupu Sami or Ganapathi temples there. “It happens in complete Tamil style with local nadaswaram groups playing a role in it,” he says.

“These festivals are not brought to limelight. No one shows how content we are. None shows our celebrations,” Makizhnan says, referring to the “grossly wrong picture” of Dharavi portrayed in Slumdog Millionnaire. He says that in spite of the slum being a perpetual shooting spot, till now, no one has contributed to its upliftment. “Probably, it’s because they want it to remain this way for further shooting,” he remarks in his sarcastic tone.

Akhtar’s war: Afghanistan

Up to the date of his tragic death on August 17, 1988 in the plane crash that also killed President Zia, few people apart from his family, knew General Akhtar Abdur Rehman. Certainly, within Pakistan, his name was unknown to the public. Even within the military few appreciated his enormous contributions to the Afghan jihad. This was partially due to the secret nature of his job as Director General of ISI from 1979-1987 and partially due to his deliberate avoidance of publicity. But as the dust of war settled down, he emerged as the only general in history to take on the Soviet military might since the end of World War II — and win.

There is hardly any book of international repute on Soviet-Afghan war that does not pay glowing tributes to General Akhtar and his ISI for their role in the jihad. Below are some of the excerpts from a book - ‘AFGHANISTAN - A Military History from Alexander The Great to The Fall of Taliban’ by Stephen Tanner. The author is a military historian and a freelance writer. His works include: From 1776 to the Evacuation of Saigon and Refuge from the Reich: American Airmen and Switzerland during WW II.

“General Akhtar Abdul Rehman Khan, head of Pakistan’s Intelligence Agency, Inter Services Intelligence (1S1), persuaded Zia that the Soviets could indeed be stalled in Afghanistan with all Pakistani assistance to the Mujahideen covertly funneled through ISI while the government officially denied participation. The Afghans would fight while Pakistan quietly stood behind them providing arms and expertise. It was considered important that the ‘Soviets were not goaded into a direct confrontation, meaning the water not get too hot.’ The other risk run by Zia was that Pakistan would have to effectively cede sovereignty of its Northwest Frontier Province to Mujahideen fighters and base camp. It was not then known that millions of refugee would follow.

Zia was disdained by the US, which had become aware of Pakistan’s secret nuclear programme, and the country itself was still wracked with poverty and politically unstable. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan thus presented a dual opportunity for Zia to become a hero simultaneously to Islam and the West, leading both jihad against infidels and the crusade against Communism.

Pakistan took a decisive stand against the Soviet invasion from the beginning. With a hostile India on one side, and a Soviet occupied Afghanistan on the other, Pakistan was in danger of isolation. In addition, after Afghanistan, Pakistan’s own barren Balochistan was the only remaining barrier between the Soviets and the Arabian Sea. If the Soviets met with feeble resistance in Afghanistan, it was thought that Pakistan might well be their next target.

Akhtar’s ISI, who had lobbied for the stingers, thought that fall of Zhawar tilted the balance. General Yousaf of ISI wrote, ‘that frightened everybody into forgetting the risk and giving us what we wanted.’ lSl, which trained the Mujahideen in their use, applied strict safeguards, refusing to re-supply fighters with the weapons unless they produced proof of firing, and only providing weapons to skilled, trustworthy commanders. As it turned out, some stingers did fall into the enemy hands. Spetsnaz commandos sprung ambush near Kandahar and captured three of the weapons. Another Mujahideen unit lost four firing tubes and sixteen missiles to Iran when they accidentally, it was presumed, wandered over the border.

The turning point of the war occurred on September 25, 1986, when a formation of eight Soviet Hind helicopter gunships flew into Jalalabad on a routine mission. On its approach to the landing zone the lead helicopter suddenly exploded in the sky. The following also burst into the flames. Rockets curved through the aircraft, barely missing while the pilots dropped their helicopters like stones, shaking them and causing injuries. On the way down, still another helicopter exploded, spreading debris across the landscape.

The stingers were a gigantic success that had a ripple effect on the war. In the following year, 270 Soviet aircraft were knocked out of the skies, the Mujahideen claiming 75 percent killing rate. (American estimated an actual 30 to 40 percent rate, which was still excellent). Soviet aircraft especially the fearsome Hind gunships were forced to back off en mass from their previous close-quarter tactics. Bombing became less accurate as jet aircraft stayed at high altitude. According to the post war Soviet General Staff study ‘Beginning in January 1987, the Soviet forces for all practical purposes, ceased offensive combat and fought only when attacked by the Mujahideen’.

In August 1988, President Zia, General Akhtar, who headed the 1S1 for most of the war US Ambassador and military attaché, and eight Pakistani generals, all died in a plane crash. In clear skies the aircraft was seen to dip precipitately, regain altitude for a few seconds and then nosedive into the ground. During the last moments the cockpit crew was silent on the radio, and analysts estimated that they had been gassed.

By 1989, the original architects of Pakistan’s covert war strategy, President Zia, and the ISI chief Akhtar had been assassinated. The writer who had been the head of the 1S1 branch that directed Mujahideen field operations, planned weapon supply and training had retired after being passed over for promotions.

Akhtar’s funeral was a fitting one for a soldier of his rank. The president of Pakistan, the chiefs of all three services, members of the Senate and National assembly, together with large detachments of soldiers, sailors and airmen, attended it. They, along with sorrowing representatives of his comrades-in-arms, the Mujahideen came to give their final salute to the Silent Soldier. Probably, it will be the Mujahideen who would remember General Akhtar with more admiration and affection than his own countrymen.

The writer is a Former Head of the Afghan Cell in 1S1and author of Silent Soldier & The Bear Trap

Courtesy: http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-13-24830-Akhtars-war-Afghanistan

Human Being

Wednesday, February 5, 2014