American History Of Exporting War

American History Of Exporting War

American elections are perhaps the most followed elections in the world, with Democrats and Republicans being projected as diametrically opposite over immigration, taxes, gun control etc. However, the two parties share a major aspect besides their belonging to the US: foreign ‘intervention’ (which, if any other nations do, may successfully qualify as ‘war’). With Biden continuing the American tradition by bombing Syria, let’s take a look at every intervention (read: war) that the US has been a part of since its inception.

Crux of the Matter

Note: Most of the supposed ‘interventions’ are not officially recorded as ‘wars’ in US history. However, with the blatant disregard of rules and humongous casualties involved, assessing them as such would not be an exaggeration.

19th Century

20th Century

21st Century

Stats

  • 117 “partisan electoral interventions” in other nations by US (1946-2000) as per Channel 4.
  • 46 US military interventions (1948-91) increased to 188 (1992-2017).
  • As per The News International, US “has been at war for about 225 of the 243 years since its inception in 1776”.

“In the US, there is basically one party – the business party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations on the same policies. By and large, I am opposed to those policies. As is most of the population.”

Noam Chomsky, Linguist, Cognitive Scientist, Political Activist and Social Critic

Read about the role of America in Korean war here

Curiopedia
  • The CIA Tibetan program was a nearly two-decades-long anti-Chinese covert operation focused on Tibet which consisted of “political action, propaganda, paramilitary and intelligence operations” based on U.S. Government arrangements made with brothers of the 14th Dalai Lama, who was not initially aware of them. The goal of the program was “to keep the political concept of an autonomous Tibet alive within Tibet and among several foreign nations”.
  • The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to United States President Barack Obama for his “extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between people“. Obama accepted the prize in Oslo on December 10, 2009. In a 36-minute speech, he discussed the tensions between war and peace and the idea of a “just war”.
  • Just war theory is a doctrine of military ethics studied by military leaders, theologians, ethicists and policymakers. The purpose of the doctrine is to ensure war is morally justifiable through a series of criteria, all of which must be met for a war to be considered just. The criteria are split into two groups: “right to go to war” and “right conduct in war”. The first concerns the morality of going to war, and the second the moral conduct within war.

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All About The $6.6 Million Video Clip And NFT

All About The $6.6 Million Video Clip And NFT

In October last year, art collector Pablo Rodriguez-Fraile spent $67,000 on a 10-second video artwork made by Beeple, that could have been watched for free online. The latest is that he sold it for $6.6 million last week. Let’s see more about how this digital asset works as a valuable NFT.

Crux of the Matter

What’s New About This Video?
Created by digital artist Mike “Beeple” Winkelmann, the video was publicly authenticated by blockchain tech and became a valued collectible.

Is This An NFT?
Yes, this video is called a ‘non-fungible token’, i.e it is unique and so cannot be exchanged. This is in contrast to other ‘fungible’ assets like stocks, gold, dollars, and even bitcoins.

What All Comes Under NFTs
They can be anything from domain names, virtual gaming items, and even tweets. The most popular NFT is digital art, like images, audio, and video clips.

One Of A Kind?
Unlike traditional online objects that can be endlessly replicated, NFTs have this digital signature, that securely certifies whose original work it is. 

Where Can We Find NFTs?
One popular marketplace is OpenSea. It has reported growth of monthly sales from $8 mn in January to $86.3 mn in February. Twitch’s co-founder, Justin Kan launched his NFT collection recently.

Memes, Cartoons And More
YouTube star Logan Paul sold $5 million worth of his NFT – his avatar as a pokemon trainer. Nyan Cat meme from 2011, was sold for $590,000 in an auction last week.

NFTs represent the future of digital ownership i.e a world in which people live, socialise, and make money in virtual environments.

Curiopedia
  • ‘CryptoKicks’ is a blockchain-based NFT-sneakers by Nike.
  • Digital art is an artistic work or practise that uses digital technology as part of the creative or presentation process. Since the 1960s, various names have been used to describe the process, including computer art and multimedia art. Digital art is itself placed under the larger umbrella term new media art.
  • Conceptual art is an art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called installations, may be constructed by anyone simply by following a set of written instructions.
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Hunger For Social Media Likes = Animals Seeking Food?

As per a new study published in the journal Nature Communications, parallels can be drawn between behaviour of animals in seeking food rewards and human’s seeking social media likes. Let’s learn more about how this “reward learning” works.

Crux of the Matter

Reel Over Real?
These days, some people choose positive online social feedback such as “likes” and “shares” over socializing with actual people and basic needs like eating and drinking.

What Is This New Study?
To examine these motivations, 1 million+ social media posts were analysed, from over 4,000 users on Instagram and other sites and apps.

Why Do We Do What We Do?
They found that people post less, in the case of lower likes. Computational models revealed that this is similar to reward learning, which uses incentives to change the behaviour of a human or an animal.

Food First For Animals…
Animals like rats maximize their food rewards in a Skinner Box. It is a tool in which the subjects placed in it accesses food by taking certain actions like pressing a lever.

  • A Skinner Box, Source: GI

And Likes For Us?
These results were further tested in an online experiment, where humans could post memes and receive likes as feedback. So they posted more when they received more likes.

Dopamine Boost
It’s not the reward itself, but the expectation of a reward that powerfully influences our emotional reactions and memories. The spots are parts of the brain that are activated on getting a reward.

What’s Next?
These findings can help researchers understand more about social media addiction and how we can become more self-aware about it.

Curiopedia
  • Attention economics is an approach to the management of information that treats human attention as a scarce commodity and applies economic theory to solve various information management problems. According to Matthew Crawford, “Attention is a resource—a person has only so much of it.”
  • The first like button was created in 2005 at Vimeo, with a team comprising Andrew Pile, Jake Lodwick, Kunal Shah, and Zach Klein. It was meant to be a more casual alternative to “favorites“, and was heavily inspired by “Diggs” from the site Digg.com.
  • In 2017, a man was fined 4,000 Swiss francs by a Swiss regional court for liking defamatory messages on Facebook written by other people which criticized an activist. According to the court, the defendant “clearly endorsed the unseemly content and made it his own“.
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Timeline Of India-Pakistan Conflicts

Timeline Of India-Pakistan Conflicts

As India and Pakistan recently announced to adhere to the ceasefire agreed in 2003 after a war, let’s look at the conflicts between the two nations since partition.

Crux of the Matter

Recent Ceasefire
India and Pakistan recently announced to follow ceasefire. The ceasefire, originally in 2003, was also brought after a war. With that in the background, now would be the right time to look at the two nations’ conflicts.

October 1947- 1st Kashmir War

  • 1st Indo-Pak war as Pakistani tribesmen invaded Kashmir.
  • Kashmir sought Indian aid and acceded to India.
  • 1 Jan 1949: LoC established after the ceasefire.

August 1965

  • Retaliation by India after Pakistan initiated ‘Operation Gibraltar’.
  • In the operation, Pakistani soldiers attempted to start an ‘insurgency’ in Kashmir by disguising themselves as local Kashmiris.
  • War ended in January 1966.

1971 – Bangladesh Formation

  • Early 1971: East Pakistan (Bangladesh) declared independence from West Pakistan.
  • As India announced support for East Pak, West Pak attacked Indian airbases.
  • India invaded West Pak and defeated it in 13 days. Also, East Pak is now officially Bangladesh.

Read Summachar coverage of India-Bangladesh ties: History Of India & Bangladesh

May 1999 – Kargil War

  • Pakistan occupied territories across LoC on the Indian side.
  • India launched airstrikes.
  • July 1999: India regained the occupied territories.

Read Summachar coverage of the Kargil War: 21st Kargil Vijay Diwas

February 2019 – Balakot

  • In a car bomb attack in Kashmir by Pakistan’s terrorist group Jaish-e- Mohammed, 40 Indian officers were killed.
  • 26 February: India launched air strikes on Jaish camps in Balakot, PoK.
  • Pakistan captured Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman as his jet was destroyed – returned to India after 60 hrs in captivity.
Curiopedia
  • An armistice is a formal agreement of warring parties to stop fighting. It is not necessarily the end of a war, as it may constitute only a cessation of hostilities while an attempt is made to negotiate a lasting peace. It is derived from the Latin arma, meaning “arms” and –stitium, meaning “a stopping”.
  • The United Nations Security Council Resolution 47, adopted on 21 April 1948, concerns the resolution of the Kashmir conflict. Both India and Pakistan raised objections to the Resolution. However, they welcomed mediation by the UN Commission.
  • During World War I, on December 24, 1914, there was an unofficial ceasefire on the Western Front as France, the United Kingdom, and Germany observed Christmas. There are accounts that claimed the unofficial ceasefire took place throughout the week leading to Christmas, and that British and German troops exchanged seasonal greetings and songs between their trenches.

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What Led To The Carnage On Dalal Street Last Week?

What Led To The Carnage On Dalal Street Last Week?

There was absolute bloodshed on Dalal Street last week, with the benchmark index Sensex falling almost 2,000 points on Friday. Well, the equity market was shaken by its relatively less risky investment counterpart – Bonds. How? That’s what we’re here to explain. Read on.

Crux of the Matter

The Fall
On 26th Feb, Sensex lost 1939 points and stood at 49,100. While Nifty plunged 568 points to reach 14,529. Cumulatively, in the past week, Nifty was down by 3.02% while Sensex shredded 3.51%.

Why A Sharp Drop?
Rising Covid 19 Cases, increasing geopolitical tensions and weak global signals can be attributed to the fall. However, the major reason for the dip was soaring Bond Yields.

  • The 10-year yield on US bond climbed to 1.6%.
  • Indian benchmark bond yield also rose to 6.22%.

What Does This Mean
Investors sold their equity and purchased bonds in order to benefit from the latter’s increasing – but relatively safe – returns. In simple terms, investing in the bond market was more profitable than investing in the equity market.

What Is A Bond?

  • A bond is an instrument of debt – a loan taken by a company from public investors.
  • Usually, they are secured, tradable assets in the hands of the lender.
  • The borrower pays a fixed interest/coupon rate to all bondholders.
  • Similar to a typical loan, bonds bear a maturity period.

What Is Bond Yield

  • Bond Yield is the actual return that the investor realises on a bond
  • – Yield on Bond = Coupon Payment/ Bond Price.
  • Unlike coupon rate, the yields are not fixed and are determined by fluctuations in macroeconomic factors like inflation and interest rates.

Types Of Bonds

Sovereign Bonds
– Bonds that are issued by the Government to support a nation’s spending.
– Can be issued in foreign or domestic currency.

Overseas Bonds
– Also known as a foreign bond, it is issued in a domestic market by a foreign entity in the former’s currency.

Perpetual Bonds
– These have no maturity date and are thus are more like equity than debt instruments.

Convertible Bonds
– Can be converted into predetermined units of equity shares of the issuing company or equivalent cash.

Zero-Coupon Bonds
– Does not bear any coupon payment but are issued and traded at deep discounts while redeemed at face value to avail profit.

Read more about Dalal street here: Wall Street Mimics Dalal Street Nosedive

Curiopedia
  • Country Coverage indices represent the performance of the stock market of a given nation—and by proxy, reflects investor sentiment on the state of its economy. The most regularly quoted market indices are national indices composed of the stocks of large companies listed on a nation’s largest stock exchanges.
  • The FTSE Global Equity Index Series is a series of stock market indices provided by the FTSE Group. It was launched in September 2003 and provides coverage of over 16,000 stocks in 49 countries.
  • The term Sensex was coined by Deepak Mohoni, a stock market analyst in 1989. BSE Sensitive Index then was at about 750 points. It is a portmanteau of the words ‘Sensitive‘ and ‘Index‘.

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