|
Books > Social sciences > Warfare & defence > Military life & institutions
The issue of nationalism and anti-nationalism has always been the
subject of intense debate. To deride their own country and culture
has become the hallmark of India's intelligentsia. Why does India
breed so many traitors? Is treachery a part of our DNA? An attempt
has also been made to analyse reasons for our disunity,
caste-ridden elections and degradation of the national
institutions. Pakistan was born on anti-India plank and shedding of
anti-India posture would amount to questioning the very logic of
its creation. After tracing its saga of treachery, the book
recommends that balkanization is the only cure for cancer-afflicted
Pakistan. Advocates of cultural and cricketing ties with Pakistan
are belittling the sacrifices of those battling militancy. It
asserts that the demilitarisation of Siachen is a seditious
proposition. The book exposes the true agenda of unscrupulous
pseudo-intelligentsia that resorts to highly slanderous campaigns
to spawn dissensions and tarnish the image of the country. Finally,
the book exposes the Non-Functional Upgradation to be a
bureaucratic scam of gargantuan proportions.
When the first American servicemen arrived in England in March
1942, the indigenous population greeted their presence with mixed
feelings. A certain level of resentment of these newcomers was
harboured by the English and expressed by many in the in the
well-worn phase of the time 'over-paid, over-sexed and over here'.
But without the presence of American servicemen in Britain and its
huge military and industrial muscle, the war with Germany would
probably have been lost. Using a combination of contemporary
eyewitness and documentary sources plus latter-day interviews,
linked together by engaging narrative, Helen Milligate takes a look
at the background to 'the friendly invasion' - where they all came
from, who they were, where they were stationed and what they did.
She examines how the 'Yanks' got on with the locals, how they
fitted in (or didn't), their impact on the social structure of
England in the 1940s, the problems they brought with them and their
impressions of England. She concludes with the journey home once
the war in Europe had ended, describing what the Yanks left behind
them and the wives and sweethearts they took 'stateside'.
|
|