Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Military Priority Index of Selected Countries









Serial No. Country
Name
Population
(2002 estimate)
Total number of military personnel (2001) People per soldier GDP per capita (U.S.$) (2000) Annual expenditure per soldier in US$ Annual expenditure per soldier as multiple of per capita GDP (MPI)
1 Nigeria 129,934,910 78,500 1,655 320 23,561 73.63
2 China 1,284,303,700 2,310,000 556 860 24,779 28.81
3 Yemen 18,701,257 54000 346 490 12,278 25.06
4 India 1,045,845,200 1,263,000
828 450 11,217 24.93
5 Zimbabwe 11,376,676 39000 292 590 11,574 19.62
6 Bangladesh 133,376,680 137,000 974 360 6,188 17.19
7 Sudan 37,090,298 117,000 317 370 6,256 16.91
8 Luxembourg 448,569 900 498 43,090 719,111
16.69
9 Brazil 176,029,560 287,600 612 3,490 57,976 16.61
10 Saudi Arabia 23,513,330 126,500 186 8,360 138,366 16.55
11 Philippines 84,525,639 107,000 790 990 13,264 13.40
12 Pakistan 147,663,430 620,000 238 450 5,800 12.89
13 Kuwait 2,111,561 15,500 136 19,040 238,994 12.55
14 South Africa 43,647,658 61,500 710 2,940 32,754 11.14
15 Uganda 24,699,073 60,000 412 280 3,100 11.07
16 Yugoslavia 11,206,039 105,500 106 790 7,962 10.08
17 Iran 66,622,704 513,000 130 1,650 15,336 9.29
18 Argentina 37,812,817 70,100 539 7,690 69,116 8.99
19 Sri Lanka 19,576,783 123,000 159 840 7,024 8.36
20 Russia 144,978,570 977,100 148 1,730 12,849 7.43
21 Australia 19,546,792 50,700 386 20,340 146,191 7.19
22 Malaysia 22,662,365 100,500 225 3,850 27,669 7.19
23 Indonesia 232,073,070 297,000 781 730 5,162 7.07
24 UK 59,778,002 211,430 283 23,680 158,918 6.71
25 Turkey 67,308,928 515,100 131 3,060 20,190 6.60
26 Canada 31,902,268 56,800 562 22,370 145,352 6.50
27 USA 280,562,490 1,367,700 205 34,940 214,959 6.15
28 Venezuela 24,287,670 59,300 410 4,980 30,354 6.10
29 Netherlands 16,067,754 50,430 319 22,910 137,442 6.00
30 Sweden 8,876,744 33,900 262 25,630 147,510 5.76
31 France 59,765,983 273,740 218 21,980 123,475 5.62
32 Qatar 793,341 12,330 64 24,740 137,591 5.56
33 Oman 2,713,462 43,400
63 6500 34,562 5.32
34 Japan 126,974,630 239,800 530 38,160 200,167 5.25
35 Mexico 103,400,170 192,770
536 5,860 29,802
5.09
36 Vietnam 81,098,416 484,000 168 400 1,940 4.85
37 Egypt 70,712,345 443,000 160 1,540 7,151 4.64
38 Germany 83,251,851 308,400 270 22,800 98,573 4.32
39 Thailand 62,354,402 306,000 204 2,010 7,987 3.97
40 Poland 38,625,478 206,045 187 4,080 15,307 3.75
41 Spain 40,077,100 143,450 279 14,150 50,659 3.58
42 Israel 6,029,529 163,500 37 17,710 60,095 3.39
43 Jordan 5,307,470 100,240 53 1,710 5,713 3.34
44 Syria 17,155,814 321,000 53 1,050 2,966 2.82
45 U. A. E. 2,445,989 65000 38 17,060 41,754
2.45
46 Lebanon 3,677,780 71,830 51 3,810 7,810 2.05
47 South Korea 48,324,000 683,000 71 9,670 18,743 1.94
48 North Korea 22,224,195 1,082,000
21 1,700


Tuesday, August 23, 2005

WORLD MUSLIMS PRESENT AND FUTURE

Based on the actual data for the years 1994 and 2002 and assuming that the trend will continue unchanged, the following projections can be made about the future of the Muslim world.
YEAR POPULATION IN BILLIONS OF PEOPLE GROSS DOMESTTIC PRODUCT IN BILLION US$ PURCHASING POWER PARITY PER CAPITA GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT US$
C.E. WORLD MUSLIMS % WORLD MUSLIMS % WORLD MUSLIMS WORLD MUSLIMS %
1994 5.660 1.033 18.25 25,267 1,084 4.29 100 8.98 4,464 1,049 23.51
2002 6.106 1.253 20.52 32,067 1,465 4.57 100 8.97 5,252 1,169 22.26
2004 6.223 1.315 21.13 34,036 1,580 4.64 100 8.97 5,469 1,201 21.96
2050 9.625 3.991 41.46 133,994 8,927 6.66 100 8.94 13,922 2,237 16.07
2063 10.887 5.462 50.16 197,370 14,563 7.38 100 8.93 18,128 2,666 14.71
2100 15.462 13.339 86.27 594,279 58,646 9.87 100 8.91 38,434 4,397 11.44

ISLAM AND THE MODERN WORLD

In the year 2002 there were nearly 6,2 billion people in the world. Of these 1.25 billion were Muslims, 90 percent Sunnis and 10 percent Shi’as. About 80 percent of all Muslims in the world lived in 57 countries who were members of the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC). Detailed statistics about these countries can be found in the Appendices. On average 80 % of the population of the OIC countries was Muslim. Thus there were as many nonmuslims in the Muslim countries as there were Muslims in the rest of the world. The following table gives the basic statistics:


World

OIC Members

OIC total as World %





Area sq km

130,295,148

31,209,703

23.95

Population

6,106,267,299

1,334,608,993

21.86

No of Muslims

1,252,754,259

1,047,815,624

83.64

Total GDP in billion US dollars

32,067.115

1,465

4.57

Purchasing Power Parity

100

9

8.97

Per Capita GDP in US dollars

5,251.51

1,097

20.90

Economic Growth rate percent

2.09

4

212.65

Inflation Rate percent

2.55

10

395.74

Population density, people per sq km

47

43

91.49





The 57 OIC countries include: AFGHANISTAN, ALBANIA, ALGERIA, AZERBAIJAN, BAHRAIN, BANGLADESH, BENIN, BRUNEI DARESSALAM, BURKINA FASO, CAMEROON, CHAD, COMOROS, COTE D IVOIRE, DJIBOUTI, EGYPT, GABON, GAMBIA THE, GUINEA, GUINEA-BISSAU, GUYANA, INDONESIA, IRAN I.R. OF, IRAQ, JORDAN, KAZAKHSTAN, KUWAIT, KYRGYZ REPUBLIC, LEBANON, LIBYA, MALAYSIA, MALDIVES, MALI, MAURITANIA, MOROCCO, MOZAMBIQUE, NIGER, NIGERIA, OMAN, PAKISTAN, PALESTINE, QATAR, SAUDI ARABIA, SENEGAL, SIERRA LEONE, SOMALIA, SUDAN, SURINAME, SYRIAN ARAB REPUBLIC, TAJIKISTAN, TOGO, TUNISIA, TURKEY, TURKMENISTAN, UGANDA, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, UZBEKISTAN, YEMEN REPUBLIC OF.

Economic Power

As can be seen in the table above the 57 Muslim countries that are home to nearly 22 % of the world population contribute less than 5 % of the World’s Gross Domestic Product in US dollar terms. The under-valuation of their currencies and their trading disadvantage can be judged by the fact that although their Purchasing Power Parity is nearly 9 % of the World, the GDP is only half that value. This means that their currencies are on average valued against the US dollar at nearly half the rate they deserve. Although there is much publicity about the economic power and affluence of the Oil exporting Muslim countries of the Middle East, they hardly play a significant role in the overall economic or trading scenario of the world. The reasons are simple. These countries are literally defenseless and have to depend on others for the exploitation of their natural wealth. The following Table compares the combined economic performance of the Muslim countries with other significant groups. Detailed statistics of the groups can be found in the appendices.

Groups*

Total Area as % of World

Total Population as % of World

Average per capita Gross Domestic Product US$

Combined Purchasing Power Parity World %

Total Gross Domestic Product World %

Ratio of World % GDP to PPP

Average Annual Inflation Rate %

Average Population density per sq km

Average Annual GDP growth rate %

G-7

16

12

30,112

44.02

66.5

1.45

1.63

22

1.47

22 Richest per capita

24

13

29,665

50

75

1.5

1.32

26

1.52

20 Largest GDP

54

60

7,556

77

86

1.12

1.73

51

2.05

20 Highest PPP

56

66

6,714

79

84

1.06

2.12

55

2.18

11 Oil Exporters

9

9

1,571

6.00

4.0

0.67

6.73

41

1.08

57 Muslim Countries

24

22

1,097

8.97

4.57

0.51

10.09

43

4.44

22 Deprived Countries

40

66

919

32

11

0.36

6.86

77

5.37

20 Poorest Countries

7

6

175

0.18

0.20

1.11

11.52

42

5.33

World Average

100

100

5,251

100

100

1.00

2.55

47

2.09

* For lists of countries in each group, refer to Appendix-1.

American World Empire

There is perception among many Muslims that there exists in the USA a clandestine organization of very rich and influential individuals that manipulates American policies. It gets presidents and politicians who get out of its line murdered, and creates scares, scandals and even catastrophes both within and out side the USA to mould public opinion to its liking. In the absence of an official name we shall call this so far hypothetical organization the American World Empire and abbreviate it as AWE.

Most Americans believe that the Diversity Visa program is an attempt to justly share the American affluence with all ethnic communities of the world, but many Muslims look upon it as an attempt to create an electoral college proportionately representing all nationalities of the world that would make the American president the rightful ruler of the World.

The Anthrax scare was timed to influence the public and the elected representatives of USA to pass the Homeland security Bill in violation of the US Constitution. The investigation to find its perpetrators was hushed up. It stands out as one of the most recent achievements of AWE.

The leaders of AWE seem to be aware that the spirit of freedom inherent in Islam will be the biggest obstacle to their megalomaniac aims and are keen to find ways to either crush it or to put it in a straight jacket.

The AWE considers any other entity having similar ambitions of world domination as its natural enemy. For this simple reason, the AWE fought against Nazism and Communism, and is now fighting against Islamic Revivalism.

Iran

George W. Bush in his State of the Union speech in January 2002 named three countries, Iran, Iraq and North Korea as the “axis of evil” for indulging in the development of weapons of mass destruction. The claim about Iraq has been proven false beyond all doubt. Iran and North Korea have been found to have legitimate nuclear technology development plans that can be used in more than one ways.

The only thing really common among the three so-called axis of evil countries was that they had single party totalitarian ideological governments. Iraq and North Korea had communist connections and Iran’s theocratic administration was very similar to the communist system.

Iran’s religious (and by default polirical) leaders who proudly call themselves Ayatulla and Ruhullah meaning ‘God’s word’ and ‘God’s spirit’ (terms used for Jesus in the Qur’an). They claim to be the direct descendants of Ali bin Abu Talib and hence a special breed. They are regarded as demigods by their followers. Shi’as belonging to the Iranian sect anywhere in the world have undivided loyalty to the Ayatullahs irrespective of their nationalities. Democratic Western nations can not discriminate against their citizens of Iranian origin, so they are trying to solve the problem at source.

The occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq on fraudulent pretexts was meant to surround Iran before the planned military invasion. If Afghanistan and Iraq had not been secured first, it could become another Vietnam. The irony is that it will inspite of everything!

Iraq

The 12 year aerial and naval siege of Iraq by the US and British forces was the longest in history. Saddam and the siege survived three changes of president and prime minister and military chiefs in US and UK.

If Saddam was able to deter the Americans and British for twelve years with a hoax of weapons of mass destruction, he will go down in history as the greatest military strategist ever.

The Americans and the British leaders attacked Iraq only after they were convinced by UN inspectors’ reports that there were no WMDs in Iraq. They used Saddam’s secondhand hoax of WMDs to fool their own people and the world and create an excuse for the land invasion.

General Tommy Franks, the front man in the run-up to the Iraq invasion and its execution mysteriously disappeared from the scene soon after the fall of Baghdad. The media did not take any notice, or was told not to.

It is also widely conjectured in the Muslim world that the plan for the invasion and control of Iraq had been prepared long before and during the 12 year siege, a team of Iraqi immigrants had been brainwashed and prepared to form the puppet government after the fall of Baghdad. It explains the opposition of the patriotic Iraqis to the interim regime put in place in Iraq by the Americans. It is commonly understood in the Muslim world that the Americans and the British are going to stay in Iraq until they have recovered all the expenditure of the siege, the war and the occupation with a hefty interest. The frequent attacks damaging the oil pipeline to Basra is meant to prevent the British occupation forces from stealing and shipping Iraqi oil to Britain.

Sunday, August 14, 2005

Israel and Palestine

A magnificent Palestinian Empire already existed when Moses led the tribes of Israel from Egypt into Sinai. The subsequent Jewish Empires of David and Solomon (regarded by the Muslims as Islamic Empires) were always at loggerheads with the Palestinians who have maintained their national identity over the millennia, although many of them converted to Christianity and Islam. The Palestinians are a freedom loving people who have become aliens and refugees in their own homeland, thanks to the torch bearers of freedom and democracy such as USA and UK.

The thorn in the Israeli psyche is their refusal to accept a minority status. They became unpopular all over the world because wherever they settled, they formed Jewish enclaves and tried to become a local majority imposing their own customs and ideology on others. They also led the money lending trade with all its attendant corruption. However, all Jews are not Israelis. There are still many good Jews living in all parts of the world who would not even dream of forcibly occupying the property of others.

Whereas the Jewish faith has all the paraphernalia of a religion, it contradicts its universality by insisting on its racial uniqueness. Ideologies always transcend racial, cultural and geographical boundaries. The bitter truth is that Israelism is just a fad like Nazism and Fascism. How long it will last depends on how well it can serve the purposes of others. European and specially Eastern European nations can change the course of history to a better direction by offering incentives to Jews trapped in Israel to return to their original homelands.

When the sympathizers of Palestinians see Israelis firing rockets on unarmed Palestinians from an American built helicopter, they hold everyone who was involved in the production of that helicopter, its components, the rockets and the explosives as a party to the gruesome murders. They see traces of Palestinian blood on the hands of every American and most other Westerners. So they attack them wherever they find them vulnerable. The war on terror will never end as it has created an unending vendetta.

Islamic Revivalism


During the past few years there has developed a significant Islamic revivalist movement across the globe. It is not the result of any conspiracy, but the obvious reaction to world events of the near past. The Muslims of the world have observed the failure of Muslim politicians, scholars and statesmen to forge unity among the many Muslim nations with their own cultures and traditions. At the same time, the nonmuslim nations appear to have connived together to deny freedom to a number of sizeable Muslim nations such as Palestinians, Kashmiris and Chechens who have age old distinct national identities. To the more sensitive and less sectarian Muslims the only way to unite the Muslims and pool their resources so that they may stand at equal footing with other religious nationalities is to create an Islamic order based on the traditions of a time before the divisions among Muslims started. This means the institution of the traditions of the Prophet Muhammad himself and the early Caliphs.

Unfortunately, the political model of the early Caliphates does not bode well with the democratic perceptions of modern times. In modern secular jargon the Caliphs were absolute autocrats. They had no ministers and no parliaments. There was no police and not even a regular army. The lack of public security in those days can be judged by the fact that the second, third and fourth Caliphs were all murdered in the public. The great conquests that created one of the world’s greatest Empires of all times were achieved by purely volunteer armies.

There was no economic policy in the Islamic State of Madinah, which most revivalists look up to as the model. Conquests were producing a constant flow of spoils of war that were distributed justly among the people of Madinah making their lives quite easy and comfortable. The only indigenous source of income for the state was charitable donations during the time of Prophet Muhammad and Zakat (2.5 % of accumulated surplus wealth and stock in trade) during the reign of the 4 earliest Caliphs. A certain amount of earning came from the blood money (mistakenly called ransom) paid by the relatives of prisoners of war taken in the battle field. Since there were no prisons in the Islamic state, prisoners of war who were unable to pay blood money were given as slaves in the custody of the relatives of the Muslim soldiers who were killed in the battles. Those conditions simply can not be recreated in the modern world.

Thursday, August 11, 2005

Cruelty in the name of the Merciful

Most of the gangsters like the Philippine Muslim guerillas derive their inspiration from literature published by the opponents of Islam which maliciously depicts the Prophet and his companions as bandits who robbed trading caravans and abducted people for ransom. Quite contrary to Islamic principles of universal justice and protection of all citizens, some illiterate Muslims still believe that heathens have no right to life, property or honor. Such people can only be regarded as enemies of Islam, as they are in league with those enemies of Islam who published libel about Islam centuries ago. It is the responsibility of every good Muslim to find ways to teach such perverted Muslims the true values of Islam.