book-reviews, books, international-affairs, politics

The Chequered Brilliance by Jairam Ramesh : Book Review

I READ Jairam Ramesh’s The Chequered Brilliance practically non-stop, despite its intimidating length, mainly because of its lucid style, impressive logic and sound chapterisation. As I finished reading, I was reminded of Thomas Carlyle’s (1795-1881) words: “No great man lives in vain. The history of the world is but the biography of great men.” Of course, this view of history is not cent per cent right. One is reminded of Pierre Goubert’s Louis XIV and 20 Million Frenchmen that gives a polar opposite point of view. Reflection will show that both Carlyle and Goubert are partly right.

One can say with confidence that anyone seeking to find out more than what is generally known about India’s march towards independence in 1947 and how India under Jawaharlal Nehru formulated and followed a foreign policy based on a good deal of out-of-the-box thinking should read this book.

The title of the book has been chosen carefully, foreshadowing the ups and downs in the life of an exceptionally gifted human being. When V.K. Krishna Menon started speaking for India on the world stage, the world listened, and therefore, the establishment in the West started a cottage industry of demonising him.

Some in India obediently joined in. Why did the United States want to demonise him? Because he was seen as “dangerously persuasive”. That is what the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) told MI5 of the United Kingdom. The MI5 even seriously considered assassinating Krishna Menon when he was High Commissioner in London and there were hints that he might be called back to New Delhi to join the Union Cabinet. MI5 feared that his entry into the Cabinet would carry enormous risk for the West. Fortunately, the agency reconsidered the matter. This is revealed in the book Defence of the Realm (2009) by Professor Christopher Andrew of Cambridge University.

Prof Andrew was commissioned to write the history of MI5 for its centennial in 2009. He was given complete access to its archives. India’s Intelligence Bureau (I.B.) was established in 1887. Did anyone think of publishing its history in 1987?

As a people, are Indians willing and able to look at their past with a degree of scientific objectivity without falling into the temptation of misusing the past by manufacturing fake history for settling scores in the petty political debates disfiguring the present? A sensitive reader of the book under review cannot but help raise such questions.

Jairam Ramesh has dedicated this book to his wife Jayashree who passed away before it was completed. The author narrates the life story of Krishna Menon with a command over some family issues, all the more remarkable, as we do not know whether the author who was eight years old in 1962 and 20 in 1974 when Krishna Menon died, had ever met him.

The two quotations used before the text opens are the most apposite. The first quote is that of Indira Gandhi: “A volcano has been extinguished.” The second is from K.P.S. Menon, the first Foreign Secretary of free India who had a less than cordial relationship with Krishna Menon: “But, the glow of the lava which poured out so copiously and brilliantly from it… would long remain in the memories of men and annals of history.” Is it not intriguing that Indira Gandhi and K.P.S. Menon, should have both thought of a volcano in their tribute?

Jairam Ramesh has divided the text into two sections, pre-1947 and post-1947, with seven parts, in all 21 chapters, and A Final Word. We start with A First Word, less than four pages, summarising the life and work of Krishna Menon. “He finds significant mention in histories of the negotiations over nuclear disarmament, the struggle against colonial rule in Africa, the emergence of Cyprus, the campaign against apartheid in South Africa and the crisis in Congo.” There is at least one notable omission in this list. Krishna Menon played a pivotal role in the ceasefire in the 1954 Korean War, the 1954 Geneva Conference on Indochina, and the 1956 Suez Crisis, to name a few. However, the omission is not significant as the author has meticulously covered all this in this well-researched book.

The first chapter is about the Vengali family. Krishna Menon was born on May 3, 1896, in Calicut (now Kozhikode), where Vasco da Gama set foot in May 1498, eventually leading to the capture of Goa by the Portuguese. In 1961, Krishna Menon played a crucial role in putting an end to the Portuguese rule in Goa.

Strangely enough, he was fixated on astrology and asked his sister, Janaki Amma, to send him a horoscope reading before he left London in 1952 on completion of his term as High Commissioner. The horoscope said that he would be “mentally agitated”, though there is no “danger of being unbalanced mentally”. For once, astrology was right.

Chapter 2 is titled “Annie Besant’s Protege (1918-1930)”. Krishna Menon got his Bachelor of Arts degree in economics, political science and history in 1918. He joined the Theosophical Society the same year. He taught at the National University in Madras, started by Annie Besant with Rabindranath Tagore as its first chancellor. In 1924, Annie Besant sent him to England where he joined the London School of Economics (LSE), remaining there for 10 years. Frida Laski, wife of Harold Laski, quipped that “Krishna was a chronic [perpetual student] at the LSE.” He got a BSc degree with first class honors in 1927 and later an MA in Industrial Psychology in 1931 from University College, London. He returned to LSE, registered for a PhD, which he did not complete. But in 1935, Krishna Menon got an MSc degree in economics for a thesis on English Political Thought in the 17th century.

Role in freedom struggle

One of the reasons, he did not complete his PhD is that from 1934 Krishna Menon was engrossed in political campaigning in the U.K. for India’s independence. Chapters 4 to 8, in all 258 pages, give us a detailed account of his contribution to India’s struggle for independence. Krishna Menon’s contribution is not all that well known, and the author has made a singular contribution to historiography.

Krishna Menon took over as India’s High Commissioner on August 15, 1947, and held that post until July 15, 1952. We get more than a glimpse of Sardar Patel’s dislike for Krishna Menon. Nehru appointed him as High Commissioner despite Patel’s misgivings. It is not clear why Patel did not like Krishna Menon. But it appears that Patel had, without evidence, concluded that he was close to communists, if not one of them. Patel had wrongly concluded that the U.K. and the U.S. were working at the United Nations against India on the Kashmir issue because they saw India as “too close” to Russia.

Krishna Menon lived an ascetic life even as High Commissioner. He did not draw a salary for more than six months. In April 1948, he wrote to Nehru saying that the annual salary for the High Commissioner was about £ 3,000, but he wanted to take only the living wage, say between £350 and £650. The bureaucracy wanted this matter to drag on and raised the absurd argument about a “constitutional difficulty” in having an unpaid High Commissioner. In December 1950, an exasperated Krishna Menon told Nehru that he would not draw any salary.

Jeep scandal

Everyone must have heard about the so-called “jeep scandal”. But how many of us know that Krishna Menon had not benefited financially from the deal? The transaction was made in 1951. Some persons holding high office, suffering from Krishna Menon phobia, manufactured a “scandal”. On August 24, 1954, R.P. Sarathy, Director of Audit, Defence Services, sent a “most secret” 18-page note to Nehru fully exonerating Krishna Menon. The same Sarathy had signed the 1951 audit report damning Krishna Menon. In any rational polity the matter should have ended. But Krishna Menon’s foes continued with their vicious campaign for years, assisted by a compliant media.

British intelligence, with its visceral hatred for and fear of communists, convinced Prime Minister Clement Attlee that the High Commission was a den of communists and that what the British government told Krishna Menon might reach the communists. Obviously, Attlee, who had known Krishna Menon for years, should have known better. But he swallowed the MI5 capsule hook, line and sinker. (Incidentally, we may recall that Attlee played a dirty role in the partition of India as narrated by Narendra Singh Narela in his book The Untold Story of India’s Partition.) Finally, the British High Commissioner in India conveyed to Nehru that sensitive matters would be conveyed only through him and Nehru accepted. Krishna Menon protested to Nehru and, as Jairam Ramesh says, he was in the right.

On May 14, 1952, Krishna Menon wrote to Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Janaki Amma and some others of his intention to leave this world. The originals of these letters are in the archives and one might assume that they were not dispatched. All this strengthens the view that Krishna Menon was more sinned against than sinning.

Korean War

Jairam Ramesh’s account of his resolution of the prisoners of war issue in the Korean War is a study in brevity and accuracy. At one stage, Dean Acheson of the U.S., accused Krishna Menon of siding with the communists and, four days later, the Soviet Foreign Minister, Andrey Vyshinsky, called Krishna Menon “a stalking horse” for the U.S. Years later, Acheson would write of the “Menon Cabal” that included Lester B. Pearson (Canada), Selwyn Lloyd and Anthony Eden (U.K.), and R.G. Casey (Australia), “making life difficult for him”. As the author points out, Krishna Menon had divided the West.

I have found out, to my distress, that more than one political science faculty member in India is innocent of India’s role in the ending of the Korean War.

Let us look at another of Krishna Menon’s diplomatic triumphs. On April 24, 1954, Nehru read out a statement on the situation in Indochina (Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos) in Parliament. Nehru rarely read out from a note. Since the matter was important, he read out the note containing a six-point formula that Krishna Menon had drafted.

On April 28, 1954, 19 states met in Geneva, to discuss Korea and later Indochina. India was not among the 19. Two days after the start of the Geneva Conference, Nehru and Krishna Menon went to Colombo to attend a “mini summit” of Asian powers with Burma (Myanmar), Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Indonesia and Pakistan. That summit endorsed Nehru’s six-point formula on Indochina.

The Geneva Conference on Indochina started on May 8 and for a while it was meandering. Krishna Menon reached Geneva on May 23, partly at the invitation of British Prime Minister Anthony Eden, of course with no mandate to take part in the formal sessions. He worked “behind the scenes”. Miraculously, on July 20, an agreement was announced in Geneva based on Nehru’s six-point formula.

Interviewed by the Press Trust of India in Geneva, Krishna Menon said, “I am an old fool. I am here only as a tourist; just a bystander. If people, ask to see me or come to see me, well that’s very nice.” What disarming humility from a man portrayed as arrogant, incorrigibly arrogant, by the media!

Incidentally, hardly any book on India’s foreign policy narrates in any detail this incredible diplomatic tour de force by Krishna Menon. These days, some commentators wistfully speak of India’s mediation between Saudi Arabia and Iran or between Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Is there an equivalent of Krishna Menon? He had a serious shortcoming as a diplomat: He had not mastered the art of invariably suffering fools gladly. After all, there is an abundant supply of them. But seldom was Krishna Menon surpassed in the art of squaring the circle.

In 1961, Krishna Menon took the lead in liberating Goa. In a riveting account, Jairam Ramesh demolishes the myth that Krishna Menon acted without Nehru’s orders and presented him with a fait accompli. However, as regards the timing, Krishna Menon wisely told Nehru only after the action had begun. The U.S. Ambassador, John Kenneth Galbraith, was working overtime to prevent the liberation and meeting Nehru too often.

The year 1962 was crucial. The chapter is correctly titled as “The Glory and the Fall (1962)”. The author gives an exceptionally absorbing account of Krishna Menon’s landslide victory over J.B. Kripalani, president of the Indian National Congress in 1947, in the North Bombay Lok Sabha constituency in March 1962. Krishna Menon called on Kripalani at his residence after the result was declared. The reader will wonder what has happened to good manners these days among politicians.

Fighter aircraft deal

Krishna Menon was the third Indian to appear on the cover of Time magazine after Mahatma Gandhi and Nehru. Despite strident opposition from President John F. Kennedy, who roped in British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, the Air Force and the Ministry of External Affairs, Krishna Menon pressed hard and signed the MiG deal with the Soviet Union, a landmark achievement as it provided for transfer of technology and manufacturing in India. There was a good deal of correspondence between Nehru and his Defence Minister. Once again, the reader will be tempted to think of the ease with which another Prime Minister decided on the purchase of Rafale aircraft from France without the knowledge of his Defence Minister.

The author deals insightfully with the 1962 Sino-Indian war. What is striking is that all those who made a cottage industry of hating Krishna Menon found a heaven-sent opportunity to foist upon him the entire responsibility for the humiliating military debacle. Krishna Menon did make mistakes. He had discounted the threat from China. If the Indian military was caught lacking in arms and equipment, the primary responsibility is that of Finance Minister Morarji Desai who put the Defence Ministry on a tight budget.

Mao Zedong decided to strike taking into account the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. The good work done by Krishna Menon in defence production had not yet borne fruit. He established the Defence Research and Development Organisation in 1958, overcoming opposition from service chiefs. As former President R. Venkatraman, who was Defence Minister from 1982 to 1984, put it, the good work done by Krishna Menon bore fruit in the 1965 and 1971 wars.

When Lal Bahadur Shastri succeeded Nehru as Prime Minister, he wanted to send Krishna Menon as High Commissioner to London. Shastri did not want him in the capital. President S. Radhakrishnan called in the British High Commissioner to find out whether the U.K. would accept him. Prime Minister Harold Wilson was far from willing. Incidentally, the author seems to have taken care not to point out the irregularity, to put it mildly, of a head of state seeking agreement for the appointment of his ambassador.

The last four chapters of the book are devoted to Krishna Menon’s life after resignation as Minister. He tried to get back to Parliament, but the Congress refused to nominate him. He won as an independent candidate with Left support from Midnapore (Bengal) in 1969 and from Thiruvananthapuram in 1971.

Krishna Menon started his legal practice and engaged himself with Bertrand Russell and the World Peace Council. One celebrated case was that of Kerala Chief Minister E.M.S. Namboodiripad who was convicted by the Kerala High Court for saying that “Marx and Engels considered the judiciary as instruments of oppression… and even today… judges are guided and dominated by the class hatred….” Krishna Menon defended the Chief Minister in the Supreme Court, but lost the case. The court held that nowhere had Marx and Engels specifically said that about the judiciary.

The author does not forget to give us a glimpse of the women Krishna Menon was romantically close to. He lists seven.

Krishna Menon, who had advocated nuclear disarmament with religious zeal, was ill and in hospital when Indira Gandhi carried out the the peaceful nuclear explosion on May 18, 1974. He summoned her to his hospital bed and voiced his disapproval of the PNE. He passed away on October 6, 1974.

Indira Gandhi, speaking in Parliament at a meeting in honour of Krishna Menon, went down memory lane. What she said about the boundary dispute with China is significant: Had the solution which he had proposed on behalf of India in the 1950s for the India-China situation been accepted, a great deal of hardship, waste and suffering would have been avoided.

The author elaborates that in the 1950s Krishna Menon advocated a negotiated settlement on the basis of India accepting China’s claim in the West and China accepting India’s claim in the east. Nehru was “broadly supportive” but could not carry some of his senior colleagues with him.

The Jana Sangh’s Motherland saw a Voltaire in Krishna Menon, “full of wit, often pungent… The best-read politician, and with all his faults, a clean man.”

In the last chapter titled “Life after Death (1974-)” we are told about what his contemporaries thought of him, and the biographies and the academic work on him. The reader will be stunned by the Teutonic thoroughness of the author.

The photographs and cartoons add value to this exceptionally well-written book on a personality of abiding importance.

The book ends with “A Final Word’. “I have always believed that a good biographer should, for the most part, ascertain, not assert. Mine was not to vilify or deify” (emphasis added). The author has been true to his word.

Ambassador K.P. Fabian is Professor, Indian Society of International Law, Distinguished Fellow, Symbiosis University.

The above article written by Ambassador K.P. Fabian was initially published on Frontline Magazine

Credits:- https://frontline.thehindu.com/books/article31515845.ece

April 09th, 2020 | category:book-reviews, books, international-affairs, politics |
international-affairs

Here’s How Trump Led The U.S. Into The Coronavirus Disaster | Madras Courier

The United States is now the epicentre of the Coronavirus disease. With over 435,160 cases and 14,797 deaths, the country is facing one of the worst crises in recorded history. The world’s most powerful nation, with its economic might and the world’s most advanced intelligence gathering tools, could not help stop the spread of this disease. Why? The answer is simple: Bad Governance. The President of the United States, Donald Trump, has repeatedly ignored warnings issued by America’s intelligence agencies, epidemiologists, virologists and White House advisors, on the possible outbreak of a deadly infectious disease. By doing so, he has put his country – and his countrymen – in harm’s way. To figure out the enormity of the harm done to the country by Trump let us look at an abridged timeline:

The Early Years: Warnings Ignored

2017: Trump administrations officials are briefed on an intelligence document titled “Playbook for Early Response to High-Consequence Emerging Infectious Disease Threats and Biological Incidents.” The administration literally had an actual playbook for what to do in the early stages of a pandemic. Among the playbook’s protocols:
  • Begin early procurement of PPE materials for healthcare workers as soon as the threat is identified.
  • Concentrate on “early diagnostic capacity”— which is government-speak for have a mountain of tests on-hand so that you can monitor the spread of the disease.
  February 2018: The Washington Post writes “CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) to cut by 80 percent efforts to prevent global disease outbreak.” The meat of the story is “countries where the CDC is planning to scale back include some of the world’s hot spots for emerging infectious disease, such as China, Pakistan, Haiti, Rwanda and Congo.”   May 2018: At an event marking the 100 year anniversary of the 1918 pandemic, the Director for Medical and Biodefense Preparedness at the National Security Council Dr. Luciana Borio says “pandemic flu” is the “number 1 health security issue” and that the U.S. is not ready to respond. One day later her boss, Rear Admiral Timothy Ziemer is pushed out of the administration and the global health security team is disbanded. Ami Bera, Congressman from California, warns that “Admiral Ziemer’s departure is deeply alarming, especially when the administration is actively working to cut funds that addressed past pandemics like Ebola.” Beth Cameron, the former senior director for global health security on the National Security Council, adds: “It is unclear in his absence who at the White House would be in charge of a pandemic,” calling it “a situation that should be immediately rectified.” Note: It was not.   January 2019: The director of National Intelligence issues the U.S. Intelligence Community’s assessment of threats to national security. Among its findings:   Page 17: “The increase in frequency and diversity of reported disease outbreaks—such as dengue and Zika—probably will continue through 2018, including the potential for a severe global health emergency that could lead to major economic and societal disruptions, strain governmental and international resources, and increase calls on the United States for support. A novel strain of a virulent microbe that is easily transmissible between humans continues to be a major threat, with pathogens such as H5N1 and H7N9 influenza and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus having pandemic potential if they were to acquire efficient human-to-human transmissibility.”  

Page 21: “We assess that the United States and the world will remain vulnerable to the next flu pandemic or large scale outbreak of a contagious disease that could lead to massive rates of death and disability, severely affect the world economy, strain international resources, and increase calls on the United States for support.”

  September, 2019: The Trump Administration ended the pandemic early warning program, PREDICT, which trained scientists in China and other countries to identify viruses that had the potential to turn into pandemics. According to the Los Angeles Times, “field work ceased when funding ran out in September,” two months before COVID-19 emerged in Wuhan Province, China. On April 1, 2020, the US AID used emergency powers to reboot the program.   January 3, 2020: The CDC is first alerted to a public health emergency in Wuhan, China (This fact was revealed later, publicly, by Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.)   January 6, 2020: The CDC issues a travel notice for Wuhan due to the spreading coronavirus.   January 8, 2020: The CDC issues an official health advisory about COVID-19.   January 10, 2020: Former Trump Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert warns that “we shouldn’t jerk around with ego politics” because “we face a global health threat…Coordinate!”   January 18, 2020: After attempting to meet the President for two weeks, the Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar finally gets the chance to speak to Trump about the virus. But “even before the health secretary could get a word in about the virus, Trump cut him off and began criticizing Azar for his handling of an aborted federal ban on vaping products, a matter that vexed the president, according to the Washington Post.   January 20, 2020: First U.S. case is reported in Washington state.   January 21, 2020: Dr. Nancy Messonnier, the director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Disease at the CDC, tells reporters: “We do expect additional cases in the United States.”   January 22, 2020: In a CNBC interview in Davos, Switzerland , President Trump says:
We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. We have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.  
January 27, 2020: Top White House aides meet with Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney to encourage greater focus on the threat from the virus.   January 28, 2020: Two former Trump administration officials—Gottlieb and Borio—publish an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal imploring the president to “Act Now to Prevent an American Epidemic.” They advocate a 4-point plan to address the coming crisis:   • (1) Expand testing to identify and isolate cases. o Note: This did not happen for many weeks. The first time more than 2,000 tests were deployed in a single day was not until almost six weeks later, on March 11. • (2) Boost flu vaccination efforts to reduce the load on hospitals. • (3) Prepare hospital units for isolation with more gowns and masks. o Note: There was no dramatic ramp-up in the production of critical supplies undertaken. As a result, many hospitals quickly experienced shortages of critical PPE materials. Federal agencies waited until Mid-March to begin bulk orders of N95 masks. • (4) Vaccine development.   January 30, 2020: Dr. James Hamblin publishes another warning about critical PPE materials in the Atlantic, titled “We Don’t Have Enough Masks.”   January 30, 2020: Even with 7 confirmed cases in the U.S., Donald Trump, speaking at a Michigan manufacturing plant, said:
we have it very well under control. We have very little problem in this country at this moment — five — and those people are all recuperating successfully. But we’re working very closely with China and other countries, and we think it’s going to have a very good ending for us … that I can assure you.  
Late January, 2020: The Health and Human Services Secretary sends a letter asking to use its transfer authority to shift $136 million of department funds into pools that could be tapped for combating the coronavirus. The White House budget hawks argued that appropriating too much money at once when there were only a few U.S. cases would be viewed as alarmist.   January 31, 2020: Trump puts into action a temporary travel ban on China. Trump’s Chinese travel ban only banned “foreign nationals who had been in China in the last 14 days.” This wording did not—at all—stop people from arriving into America from China.   February 4, 2020: Gottlieb and Borio take to the WSJ again, this time to warn the president that “a pandemic seems inevitable” and call on the administration to dramatically expand testing, expand the number of labs for reviewing tests, and change the rules to allow for tests of people even if they don’t have a clear known risk factor. • Note: Some of these recommendations were eventually implemented—25 days later.   February 9, 2020: Donald Trump compared the Coronavirus to the common flu. “The flu, in our country, kills from 25,000 people to 69,000 people a year,” he said, suggesting that it dwarfed the 15 cases of COVID-19 that had been reported in the U.S. at the time.   February 12 ,2020: Even with 12 confirmed cases, the President assured everyone that the virus will die in April because of the heat. During a White House meeting with governors, he said:
As I mentioned, by April or during the month of April, the heat, generally speaking, kills this kind of virus.  
February 23, 2020: As the number of cases surged, with 51 confirmed cases in U.S., Trump told reporters:
We’re very much involved. We’re very — very cognizant of everything going on. We have it very much under control in this country.  
February 24, 2020: Trump tweeted:
The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. We are in contact with everyone and all relevant countries. CDC & World Health have been working hard and very smart. Stock Market starting to look very good to me!  
February 29, 2020: Even as the number of cases in the United States surged to 74, Trump did not stop chest thumping. At a Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland, he gloated:
We’ve done a great job. And I’ve gotten to know these professionals. They’re incredible. And everything is under control. I mean, they’re very, very cool. They’ve done it, and they’ve done it well. Everything is really under control.  
One attendee from that event later tested positive, and lawmakers who attended went under self-quarantine. The same day, at a White House Coronavirus Task Force briefing, he continued to brag:
We’ve taken the most aggressive actions to confront the coronavirus. They are the most aggressive taken by any country and we’re the number one travel destination anywhere in the world, yet we have far fewer cases of the disease then even countries with much less travel or a much smaller population.”  
March 9, 2020: Even with 959 confirmed cases in U.S., Trump once again compares Coronavirus to flu. The President tweeted:
So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common flu. It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on. At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that!
In the next few weeks, the number of Coronavirus cases in the United States spiralled out of control.   March 12, 2020: Even though the United States records over 2,200 confirmed cases, Trump, in a meeting with the Irish Prime Minister, brags about the low number of deaths.  
I mean, think of it: The United States, because of what I did and what the administration did with China, we have 32 deaths at this point. Other countries that are smaller countries have many, many deaths. Thirty-two is a lot. Thirty-two is too many. But when you look at the kind of numbers that you’re seeing coming out of other countries, it’s pretty amazing when you think of it. So, that’s it.
By March 13, 2020, over forty people died in the U.S., and Donald Trump declared an emergency. Even as he declared an emergency, he praised himself. At a press conference in the Rose Garden, he said:
We’ve done a great job because we acted quickly. We acted early.
As the Coronavirus raged, the White House was “beset by denial and dysfunction.” As an in-depth investigation by the Washington Post puts it, “by the time Donald Trump proclaimed himself a wartime president — and the coronavirus the enemy — the United States was already on course to see more of its people die than in the wars of Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq combined.”   As the virus continues to decimate the United States Of America, President Donald Trump continues to attack the press – and anyone who criticises him – calling them “fake news media.” Even as Trump’s boasts about managing the COVID-19 epidemic “very well,” we can be certain that he will go down in recorded history as a President who – with a toxic combination of unscientific temper and bad governance – has spectacularly mishandled the outbreak of the Coronavirus disease, causing thousands of deaths.   The above article written by Ambassador K.P. Fabian was initially published on Madras Courier Credits:- https://madrascourier.com/opinion/heres-how-trump-led-the-u-s-into-the-coronavirus-disaster/

April 09th, 2020 | category:international-affairs |

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