12
speak up!
Hitting the ‘restart
button’ in Moscow
by Eric S. Margolis
RUSSIA has over 2,000 nuclear
warheads pointed at the United
States. That is America’s most
important national security and
foreign policy concern.
Compared to this potential Ar-
mageddon, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan,
al-Qaeda are trivial. Washington’s
first priority is maintaining cor-
rect, civilised relations with Mos-
cow. That means treating Russia
as an equal.
The Bush administration put
the US and Russia on a collision
course by expanding American
strategic influence into the Baltic,
East Europe, Georgia and Ukraine.
Bush’s plans for an anti-missile
system in the Czech Republic and
Poland (only 190km from Russia’s
border) to shoot down Iranian
nuclear-armed missiles that don’t
exist was a paramount act of stu-
pidity and belligerence. Moscow
was predictably enraged.
Last year, the Bush adminis-
tration encouraged Georgia’s not
so bright leader to invade the
pro-Russian breakaway region of
South Ossetia, sparking a short,
nasty Russo-Georgian fracas that
brought Washington and Moscow
Flashback of articles published last week
on the pressing need to scrap all nuclear weapons.
into dangerous confrontation.
President Barack Obama wise-
ly went to Moscow this week to
push what he called the “restart”
button on battered US-Russian
relations. The two powers signed
another nuclear arms reduction
treaty making modest cuts in their
nuclear arsenals over ten years to
1,500-1,675 warheads each – still
enough to destroy civilisation
thrice over.
This was a major disappoint-
ment. Neither side needs more
than a few hundred warheads.
In fact, the “anti-war” Obama
should have negotiated to scrap
all nuclear weapons rather than
cheese-paring. Every American
president since Dwight Eisen-
hower called for global nuclear
disarmament, mostly recently
Obama – to no avail.
The US and Russia are also
violating the 1968 Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty which called
on all nuclear powers to totally
eliminate their nuclear weapons.
Obama came away from Mos-
cow with the Kremlin’s curious
agreement to allow the US to
fly soldiers and supplies across
Russian territory to Afghanistan.
Either Moscow got some serious
secret payoffs from Washington, or
the Kremlin is happy to see the US
sink ever deeper into the Afghan
morass.
Obama was politely received
in Moscow by President Dimitri
Medvedev and Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin. But Obama’s golden
oratory did not move the Russian
leaders or people. Both remain deeply
sceptical of Washington’s professions
of friendship and its growing influ-
ence around Russia’s borders.
A just-issued World Public Opin-
ion survey finds that opinion of
Obama is generally positive. But 66-
68% of British, French, Poles, Ukrain-
ians, Iraqis and Egyptians surveyed
believed the US was abusing its great
power. In Russia, the result was 75%.
Ominously, in key US allies, Turkey,
86% and in Pakistan, 90%.
Russia and the Muslim world
are waiting to see Obama turn his
professions of change, friendship,
and improved relations into actions.
So far, they see the opposite. The US
is pressing ahead with the Polish/
Czech missile project, efforts to bring
Ukraine and Georgia into Nato, and
expanding US influence into former
Soviet Central Asian Republics. In
short, surrounding Russia on the
strategic chessboard.
These actions threaten both Rus-
sia and the US. Russia holds a nuclear
gun to America’s head, as America
does to Russia. The two great powers
cannot afford any confrontations and
crises when nuclear annihilation is a
button-push away.
The Bush administration’s machi-
nations around Russia’s borders was
extremely dangerous, and continue
today. Is Washington really ready
to risk a possible nuclear war with
Moscow over Georgia, Abkhazia,
South Ossetia or Luhansk, Ukraine
– places very few Americans could
find on a map if their lives depended
on it. Building anti-missile sites on
Moscow’s doorstep is a reckless and
pointless provocation.
Russians, peoples of the Muslim
world, and some Americans are
wondering if we are seeing Bushism
without Bush? Could the nasty old So-
viets’ fulminations against “imperial-
ist ruling circles in Washington have
been right?” Is an updated financial-
military-industrial complex of which
Eisenhower so presciently warned
still making US foreign policy – no
matter who is in the White House?
Hopefully not. But Washington keeps
kicking sand into Russia’s face. We
expected better from Obama.
Eric S. Margolis is a contributing
editor to the Toronto Sun chain of
newspapers, writing mainly about
the Middle East and South Asia. Com-
ments: letters@thesundaily.com
Finish what you
start
AS a parent with three children in
primary and secondary schools, I
would like to voice my concern over
the reversal of policy to teach maths
and science in Bahasa Malaysia.
My concern is over the disruption
to the children’s education. There is
no logic in reversing the policy after
only six years. The government should
finish what it started in 2003 in all fair-
ness to the children involved. Reverse
the policy only after this batch finish
their Form 5 in 2013. We have yet to
see the true impact.
Millions have been spent on the
training of the teachers to teach maths
and science in English. Can these
teachers be effective and perform to
reasonable expectations when they
revert to teaching in Bahasa Malaysia?
I doubt so.
More perplexing, what is the ra-
tionale to revert to Bahasa Malaysia
for primary and secondary schools
when English will still be used as the
medium of instruction in Sixth Form?
What about the Mara colleges,
universities and matriculation colleges
where English is the preferred medium
of instruction for all subjects?
Does this not show that the gov-
ernment actually acknowledges the
importance of English. Then why prac-
tise a different policy which will put
One village’s plea
for an English school
THE decision on the teaching of maths
and science in English has been made.
I shall not dwell on the merits and
demerits of it all as they have been
dealt with by experts and those in the
know.
I just want to share the joyful expe-
rience of bringing the English language
to a bunch of innocent and happy
kampung kids four decades ago, and
leave you to form your conclusion.
In 1969 when we first embarked on
our career as teachers, my friend and I
received our first posting to a primary
English school in a small village called
Ayer Baloi in Pontian Kechil. To our
surprise and utter confusion, when
we arrived at the village we were not
able to find the school.
After many anxious moments and
frantic inquiries we were told to report
to the headmaster of a Malay school
there. It was here that we found the
answer to the mystery of the “miss-
ing” school.
The folk of this small village had
made an impassioned appeal to the
education authorities for an English
school for their children. So when
there were enough students (includ-
ing a Chinese boy) for two classes, the
green light was given for the English
school.
And the two of us, fresh from col-
lege, were selected to pioneer this
school, together with one ustaz and
Be wary of feedback ploy
I HOPE Malaysians are not taken in
by Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad who
is asking for feedback on his blog
on the decision to revert to Bahasa
Malaysia.
As education minister, he insisted
on the usage of Bahasa Malaysia to
the exclusion of English. After taking
almost 20 years to realise his folly, he
brought back English to teach science
theSun | MONDAY JULY 13 2009
letters
letters@thesundaily.com
others, ie the rural and unfortunate
masses at a disadvantage in their later
years when they have to compete in
the job market?
However, back to the main point.
The most affected would be the stu-
dents who began Year 1 in 2003. After
studying maths and science in English
for nine years till Form 3 in 2011, do
you think it’s logical and fair for them
to revert to Bahasa Malaysia in Form 4
and take the SPM the following year?
Revert when this pioneer batch
finish their Form 5 in 2013.
The government can teach maths
and science in Bahasa Malaysia even
from next year, but please do not
change the policy until the 2003 batch
finish their secondary education.
Most parents depend on the lo-
cal education system and have no
choice but to send their children to
local universities. Not all can afford or
secure government scholarships to
study overseas.
The children from rural areas and
urban middle- and lower-income
families will be the ones who will be
at a disadvantage when they have to
compete with the English and foreign
educated children of the well to do.
JT
Kuala Lumpur
another teacher to handle Bahasa
Malaysia.
The headmaster of the Malay
school was kind enough to allow us
to use his facilities, but we could only
conduct classes in the afternoon.
So, as you can see, as far back as
the 1960s the villagers of Kampung
Ayer Baloi had understood the impor-
tance of English as a tool for learning.
Due to the prevailing political needs
and climate of that time, Bahasa Ma-
laysia was to be used as the medium
of instruction in all national schools,
starting from Standard One in 1970.
We followed up this class of ‘69, as
I would like to call it, for five years till
we were transferred out.
It was an enjoyable and meaning-
ful experience, bringing the English
language to a group of kampung
children and seeing them picking up
the language and doing well with it,
too.
How did they fare in secondary
school (or even at tertiary level)? They
would be all of 47 years old today! I
can still recall some of their names
– Ismail, Md Amir, Amir Hamzah, Na-
jibollah, Dzaimah, Fadillah, Lim Chong
Teik – unfortunately most have slipped
my mind.
I trust they are doing well in life.
Tam Yong Yuee
Muar
and maths. I don’t remember him ask-
ing for public feedback then as he is
doing now. Parents of today may not
remember the mischief he has done
to our children and nation. Do not be
taken in by this latest “feedback” ploy
of his.
Maniam Sankar
Kuala Lumpur