Category Archives: Kazakhstan

by | August 23, 2017 · 12:47 AM

“Russia in Ukraine: Enemy or Friend?” by Eric Walberg

My good friend Eric Walberg sets the record straight on the Ukraine War. Bottom line is every single thing you are being told in the Western media is propaganda of some sort. It’s either a distortion, misleading or out and out false. The number of Western media outlets offering the truth of what is going on over there is zero. This is what I mean by our controlled media and why I say that there is no dissident press in the West.

Russia in Ukraine: Enemy or Friend?

Eric Walberg

Putin is either an aggressive schemer, to be opposed and vilified at all costs, or a wise, restrained real-politician, balanced irreconcilable forces next door. Which is it?

The 2014 coup in Ukraine succeeded due to the fierce campaign led by neo-fascists, heirs to the Banderistas of 1940–50’s, now lauded as freedom fighters, but seen at the time as terrorists, murdering Ukrainians and Jews, and sabotaging a Ukraine in shambles after the war. They had almost zero support then, having collaborated with the Nazis to kill tens of thousands, but their hero, Stepan, was honored with a statue in 2011, erected by the godfather of the current anti-Russian coupmakers, the (disastrous) former President Viktor Yushchenko. Ukraine’s Soviet war veterans were outraged and the statue was torn down in 2013, just months before the coup, bringing the Bandera-lovers back to power.

The eastern Ukrainians, mostly native Russians, centered in Donetsk and Lugansk, saw the coup as a surreal rerun of WWII, this time with Banderistas triumphant. They had no real plan, but panicked at the thought of what was to come, and seized government buildings and declared themselves mini-republics, calling on Russia to come and rescue them, as was happening in Crimea.

A tall order. Putin empathized with his fellow Russians, now being bombed and boycotted by the Ukrainian forces, with a death toll of 10,000 so far. Between 22 and 25 August 2014, Russian artillery, personnel, and what Russia called a “humanitarian convoy”, crossed the border into Ukrainian territory without the permission of the Ukrainian government.

This state of stalemate led the war to be labelled by some a war of aggression against poor Ukraine, a “frozen conflict”. The area has stayed a war zone, with dozens of soldiers and civilians killed each month. Close to 4,000 rebel fighters and the same number of ‘loyalists’ have been killed, along with 3,000 civilians. 1.5 million have been internally displaced; and a million have fled abroad, mostly to Russia.

A deal to establish a ceasefire, called the Minsk Protocol, was signed on 5 September 2014 but immediately collapsed. It called for reincorporation of the rebel territories under a federal system, with full rights of the Russian-speakers and open relations with the Russian Federation. Russia stands by the principles of the protocol, calling for Ukrainian borders to stay as they are, despite the pleas of the rebels. This restraint pleases neither side. The Russians clearly will not abandon their fellow Russians, but at the same time, refuse to invade and start a war with their unpredictable, basket-case of a neighbor. Russians are surely thinking: Ukrainians — you can’t get along with them or without them.

The Russian position is clear and firm: give Russian Ukrainian their rights, make our borders porous for locals and their relatives, revive shattered economic links among common peoples with a thousand years of common history. Get on with it.

The Ukrainian position is mostly hysterical, calling for NATO and Europe to fight off the Russkies, salvage the bankrupt economy, and ignore the creepy fascists. WWIII if necessary. The coupmakers are unrepentant as Ukraine slides deeper into insolvency, and corruption is getting worse (if that’s possible). Poroshenko is as unpopular as a leader can get, and only the threat of a Ukraine shattered in pieces gives him a life preserver among his citizens.

WWII replay

The West incited the coup and quickly embraced it, ignoring its unsavory origins in nostalgia for fascism. While it feigns shock and anger at Russian actions, it certainly can’t ignore that the Russians really had no choice, that their actions were/are both necessary and measured.

It looks suspiciously like the West is sitting back and enjoying the fisticuffs, reminding one of how the West sat back and let the Russians do the dirty work in WWII, defeating the Nazis, with the ‘Allies’ joining in the last year to warrant their claims (now the official story) that the US won the war — with a little help from its friends and even the nefarious Russians.

A messy conclusion to that war, the ultimate ‘frozen conflict’, the Cold War, that spawned the current many mini-frozen conflicts (Trans-Dniester, Abkhazia, Ossetia, Kosovo, not to mention ones farther afield, like Taiwan and Somaliland — all legacies of the Cold War).

‘No Pasaran!’

The plan is evolving, depending on what the Russians do. Putin’s red line is that Ukraine cannot – will not — join NATO. The NATO creep eastward, a violation from 1991 on of the implicit understanding with Gorbachev and Yeltsin, will not be tolerated.

The Ukrainian coup created a new scenario. If Russia had moved to support the rebel territories, form a customs union with open borders, aimed at eventual incorporation in the Russian Federation, that would have given the NATOphiles their trump card, and NATO and the EU would be hard pressed not to move in and try to salvage a bankrupt dysfunctional state, with the final coup as its prize: NATO now lined up surrounding Russia, the last real holdout against US world domination.

The Baltic ministates and (almost all) the Balkan ministates are now in the NATO fold. There are a few loose ends for the EU in the Balkans, but EU hegemony economically and US hegemony militarily are the new playing fields. Then there’s Turkey as a key NATO ally.

Whether this is an actual conspiracy or not only Russian hackers can tell, but the logic is there. Putin sees this logic and is not biting the bullet. Better a tolerable federated Ukraine where Russians are left in peace or another frozen conflict than NATO breathing fire on Russia’s borders.

The West played the ‘shock and anger’ card over Crimea, ignoring the fact that Crimea has been a key part of Russia since Catherine the Great incorporated it in 1783, the heart of Russian naval power, thoughtlessly given to Ukraine when Soviet internal borders were meaningless, populated by mostly Russians and Tatars.

As Ukrainian nationalism heated up after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia still maintained its bases there, paying rent to Ukraine. But dreams by Ukrainian Russophobes to join NATO and the desire of NATO forces to occupy Crimea or that somehow Russia and NATO could share Crimean bases are nonsensical. Russia’s only option was to accede to Crimeans’ pleas.

‘Remember 1856!’

As if to taunt the Russians on Crimea, a British missile destroyer and a Turkish frigate docked at the port of Odessa in July for a joint NATO maritime exercise , several days after the US, Ukraine and 14 other nations deployed warships, combat aircraft and special operations teams for the ‘Sea Breeze 2017’ exercise off the Ukrainian coast.

It looks like a reenactment of western policy following the Crimean War in 1856, when Russia was denied its naval presence in the Black Sea, as Britain and France were preparing to take the Ottoman territories for themselves and keep Russia out in the cold. Combined with the NATO creep in the Baltics and Balkans, it also looks like a replay of the build up to WWII but without the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. To Stalin’s (sorry, Putin’s) discomfort, there is no split among the imperialists anymore. Germany et al are postmodern nations, nations without a foreign policy, beholden to the world hegemon, the US. There is only one thousand-year Reich (sorry, Pax Americana) on the table these days. History may repeat itself but in its own ways.

Frozen conflicts have a bad reputation, but peace is always better than war. Tempers cool over time, and past wrongs can be ironed out with reason and compromise. Donetsk and Lugansk will not hoist a white flag to Kiev given the bad blood. They will continue to get electricity and gas from Russia and revive their economies by reviving trade and industry with their real ally. Kiev should be careful in its game of trying to starve the rebels into submission. Russians as a people have never backed down when faced with a hostile enemy.

The longer the freeze continues, the more willy-nilly integration with the Russian economic sphere will proceed. Or rather the Eurasian Customs Union (EACU) that Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan formed in 2010, eliminating obstacles to trade and investment that went up after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Moscow stands to benefit as a natural hub for regional finance and trade, and Ukraine is welcome. Win-win. A free trade pact as an economic strategy elevates the prospects of the entire region where Russia is a natural center of gravity. In 2015 the EACU was enlarged to include Armenia and Kyrgyzstan. Russia imports labor from the ‘Stans’ and could well help Ukraine by inviting Ukrainians to work as well.

Sensible realpolitik by the West would take NATO away from Russian borders and push Ukraine to make an acceptable deal on a federal state structure to keep its own Russians and its neighbor happy. Sensible realpolitik by Ukraine would be to join the EACU, bringing ‘Little Russians’, ‘White Russians,’ and plain old Russians back together. This would be welcomed with relief by EU officials who have no military ax to grind and are not happy about the billions it would take to get Ukraine off life support.

More here and here.

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by | September 17, 2016 · 9:34 PM

The Race of the Original Turks

I won’t be able to do that as I sit on the peer review board of a journal of Turkic linguistics out of Turkey. I also have a chapter coming out in a new book about Turkic linguistics. In the chapter, I mostly talk about language, but I did talk a lot about history and origins too.

It’s pretty clear the original Turks from Northern Kazakhstan/the Altai were probably not White people, though that is probably in dispute. The later homelands, around the Altai where China, Mongolia, Russia and Turkey all come together were probably much more Asiatic. If you look at the Siberian Turkic speakers like Siberian Tatars, the Altai, the Chulym, the Shor and the Khakas, those are probably a good bet for what the original Turkics looked like. A good way of describing these people is half-Asiatic (Mongolic) and half-Caucasian.

This group also was apparently the base for the Amerindian populations as well. The Amerindians are fully Asiatic. So the people who birthed the Asiatics later birthed the Turks. However, there was some Caucasoid mixing in between with groups such as the Caucasian Tocharians. Later, Iranic groups mixed heavily with Turkics in the Stans.

The Tuvans also look like a very early Turkic group, and they are very Asiatic (Mongolic). The real pure Turkics from the Turkic homeland appear to be at least 50% Asiatic. The only reason they look Whiter as the get further west is that the Turkic Muslims conquered many of these people in Islamic jihads. These conquered Caucasians were then converted to Islam in the usual manner.

 

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Filed under Amerindians, Anthropology, Asia, Asians, China, Eurasia, Europe, Europeans, Kazakhstan, Mixed Race, Physical, Race/Ethnicity, Regional, Russia, Siberians, Turkey, Turks

by | September 9, 2016 · 9:39 AM

Race and Phenotype of the Early Aryans

Devrat writes:

So called Aryans were not white. The most elevated of all gods, Lord Krishna, is described as the black one in the Vedas, and in the Upanishads, he’s known as “Shyam,” meaning the dark one. Aryan is not even a race or group of people. The word Arya is more of an adjective than a noun. So called Dravidians – in the Ramayana the King of Lanka, that is Southern India, Dravida is addressed as Arya by his wife. Arya means noble, wise, Lord, a sign of respect like the Japanese use -san at the end of name while addressing a person. Get over it White people. Everything’s not White created.

30-40% of the Aryans had blond hair and blue or green eyes. We know this because this is what Indo European speakers in Russia looked like 5,500 years ago before they moved down into India 3,500 years ago. So 5,500 years ago, Aryans indeed often were blond and blue/green. The question is whether and how much they changed moving down from Southern Russia through Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan (where they formed a huge civilization), Iran, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Northern Pakistan and Northern India.

Did they suddenly get much darker in the ensuing 2,000 years? I tend to doubt it. And actually the caste system they set up was very much race-based with the lightest folks at the top descending to the darkest Shudras and Dalits at the very bottom. It very nearly resembled other colorist systems such as the Jim Crow South, Apartheid South Africa, and Casta in New Spain. The Aryans were practically proto-Nazis and proto-crackers.

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Filed under Afghanistan, Anthropology, Asia, Eurasia, India, Indo-European, Iran, Kazakhstan, Language Families, Linguistics, Pakistan, Physical, Race/Ethnicity, Regional, Russia, Sociology, Tajikistan

by | July 16, 2014 · 10:44 PM

The Future According to ISIS

ISIS 5-year expansion plan. Parts of Europe are not included on this one.

ISIS 5-year expansion plan. Parts of Europe are not included on this one.

The map below includes parts of Europe.

Isisplan

This map labels the various vilayets of provinces of the future ISIS Caliphate. Yaman is Greater Yemen, Hijaz includes much of Saudi Arabia. Sham is Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Sinai and parts of Arabia. Iraq includes Iraq and parts of Arabia and Kuwait. Kordistan is Greater Kurdistan, in this case extending far down into eastern Iran. Anathol is the western half of Anatolia. The Maghreb is a well known term for northwestern Africa, usually applied to North African states such as Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria but in this case, also includes all of the Sahel and West Africa.

Andalus includes all of Spain. Khurasan is an old term for Iran and Afghanistan. On this map it also includes Tajikistan,Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kirghistan, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal at the very least. I am not familiar with the terms Alkinana (northeast Africa), Qoqzaz (apparently means the Greater Caucasus as you can see in the spelling), Orobpa (southeastern Europe) and Habasha (much of Central Africa above the Equator. There is an unnamed province in Southern Iran.

I honestly do not see how they conquer India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Armenia, Georgia, all of Eastern Europe, all of West Africa, Spain, Iran, Azerbaijan, or even Lebanon and Israel for that matter. I am just not seeing this, sorry. If I were an Indian though, I would be frightened of these maps.

 

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by | March 27, 2014 · 11:34 AM

Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Iran and India from a Socialist Perspective

SHIH writes:

You must know that none of these countries you mention are socialist in any shape or form. A capitalist pig like Donald Trump would be quite at home in Uzbekistan, hell, he could be Islam Karimov’s home buddy (a real poster boy of capitalism – Trump is a big asshole, an asshole with capital letter A — I really don’t like him)

The ground reality is that countries in Central Asia have really gone to hell and people want to escape from these countries only if someone agrees to take them. Even a failed nation like Pakistan has to deal with a lot of refugees from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, that tells you a lot. Uzbekistan is one of the largest sources of women sold into sex slavery and prostitution including in Indian cities and unemployment figures are sky high. Unless you happen to be a rich businessman well-connected to the government, your life is pretty much hopeless. Child labor is rampant.

Kazakhstan is somewhat in better shape that’s because it’s indirectly controlled by Russia and the current government is a puppet of Putin.

As for Iran, that country has gone to hell…..it came in news recently that the government had to pressurize advertising companies not to promote chicken on billboards and television. That is because the chicken prices are so high that average Iranians can’t afford it any longer. Prostitution is rife and people are unemployed; check out this documentary where middle-class women in Iran are forced to the world’s oldest profession because the economy is in worst shape  – a really heart-wrenching video series.

Russia and Ukraine of course, do not fall in the categories I mentioned but neither are they socialist at par with the EU which is a real welfare, socialist economy. Belarus in fact is as good as say Czech Republic or Poland. Nice countries to live in.

Well if you want to live in this former Communist paradise called Uzbekistan, let me know as I still have excellent contacts there. Trust me, even with enough money in your pocket, you would want to run away as quickly as you can. KIDNAPPING of foreign tourists is quite common and I came close to being abducted by an Islamist, Taliban-style group. Had I not been sober that day, it would have been all over and I would probably have been spending the rest of my life in a cold dungeon with no electricity and might not have never heard of the iPhone. That is if they didn’t decide to behead me for being an infidel.

India has its share of problems and it’s an unjust, unfair society where poor people get the stick for being born poor. But it’s still one of the best places to live for middle-class Indians. There are over 1 million high net worth individuals in a city like Mumbai (also known for its slums) which creates a bustling city with positive vibes, in terms of wealth creation Mumbai ranks among top 10 cities of the whole world. There are lot more opportunities for growth. In capitalism parlance, the trickle down works quite well here. Lot more liveable than Uzbekistan.

However, as far as HEALTH, MALNUTRITION, INFANT MORTALITY, EDUCATION and other parameters are concerned, India is still a third world place. And it will always remain — the problem is not a lack of money. The problem is cultural — Indian rich are real guttersnipes and a very selfish country where poor are allowed to die on the streets and it concerns no one. This country needs Jesus to be on the right track.

The question to ask is — would you be HEALTHY, EDUCATED and Poor, unemployed in Iran/Uzbekistan or have to buy health insurance in the India but still live in a land of opportunities. There’s absolutely no comparison.

I believe the poster has made an excellent critique of the Stans from a socialist POV. From a Left or socialist POV, clearly these places leave much to be desired. Sky-high unemployment, child slavery, sex trafficking? Good Lord. It it looking like the Stans got rid of Communism but put in its place some particularly monstrous alternative system. It seems that what they put in after Communism is neither socialism nor capitalism but instead is some awful hybrid containing the worst of both systems.

However, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Iran, etc. all have superb education, health and nutrition figures. Maternal mortality, child mortality and malnutrition rates are very low in all of the Stans. You do not get great figures like that in a free market capitalist country. Great health and nutrition figures like that can only come from a great socialist sector of the state which supplies food, schooling and nutrition for the people. In a free market capitalist state, all schooling is private and all health care is privatized. Nutrition figures are usually bad as food is not subsidized for the poor so they go hungry.

So in that sense, the Stans are still socialist countries in some very important respects. I do not have any updated information, but I assume that health care and education are free or very cheap in the Stans. They also have good road networks, few slums, and good housing.

Compare them to the capitalist states like India and Pakistan around them. Malnutrition rates: India – 50%, Pakistan – 34%. Health figures in Pakistan and India are horrific. The slums of Pakistan and India are nightmarish. The roads in both countries are shit. Health care is awful in both lands, and the education systems are horrible. In fact, in rural India and much of Pakistan, there is simply no education system to speak of!

Iran is doing ok. The education system is good and the people eat well. Malnutrition in Iran is very low, the health care system is great and the road networks are excellent. There are few real slums in Iran. The 1979 Revolution was socialist in many respects and since then, Iran has been a socialist country in a lot of ways. Ahmadinejad pretty much ran as a socialist last time around and that was why he won.

I do not agree that the wealth is trickling down well in India. In fact, I do not agree that wealth trickles down anywhere, nor do I agree that it ever has or will. Trickle down theory is simply a lie.

I could care less how many rich folks there are in India. Who cares! Imagine if Jesus came back today and looked at India. Do you honestly think he would cheer  for all the rich people in India? Hell no. Jesus cared nothing whatsoever for the rich because there is no reason to care about such folks at all. Jesus cared only and always for the poor and only the poor. In fact, Liberation Theology which I support believes in “the preferential option for the poor.” This is my philosophy. The rich do not need our support, encouragement or cheers. They do well enough on their own. It is the poor who need our sustenance.

I am not interested in countries where it is horrific to be poor but great to be rich or middle class. Who cares! Do you honestly think that we socialists value such things?  What good is India’s “land of opportunity” for it’s 1 billion poor people? It’s worth fuck all.

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Filed under Asia, Capitalism, Christianity, Economics, Education, Health, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Left, Marxism, Nutrition, Pakistan, Regional, Religion, Social Problems, Socialism, Sociology, South Asia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan

by | March 25, 2014 · 8:06 PM

Socialism Bests Capitalism in Central Asia

SHI writes:

I can tell that from experience. I had spent a month in Uzbekistan 5 years ago and ate nothing else but meat because it was really cheap at less than 50 US cents per meal. In India, a similar portion size would cost me $10-15.Now that’s a poor country but people in Uzbekistan eat meat morning, noon and night. I mean that country is pretty much fucked up due to Communist rule, Islamism and poor economy. Average wage is among the least in Asia but the people look MUCH BETTER FED than your anorexic Hindu Indians.

Compared to the rest of Central Asia, I would say that Uzbekistan is probably doing all right. I do not know Uzbekistan very well, but I believe that the health figures (maternal mortality, infant mortality, malnutrition rate) are very low. Sounds like a good society to me.

You really need to find a highly non-Communist Central Asia and compare Uzbekistan to that. So we should compare Muslim Uzbekistan with the capitalist paradises of Afghanistan and Pakistan. A cursory glance shows that Uzbekistan totally destroys the competing Central Asian capitalist states.

Muslim Iran, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are all more or less socialist countries, and they all have a similar economic level. I believe that nutrition and health figures in all of these places is pretty good.

What has really failed in Central Asia is capitalism. Look at Afghanistan. Look at Pakistan. Now tell me that capitalism is working in Central Asia.

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Filed under Afghanistan, Asia, Capitalism, Economics, Health, Iran, Kazakhstan, Left, Marxism, Nutrition, Pakistan, Regional, Socialism, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan

by | September 18, 2012 · 12:23 AM

The Whites of Asia

South Asia and Central Asia, to be precise.

Most of the people in this video are children, and the real Mighty Whitey types claim that these folks are not really White because kids are naturally paedomorphic in terms of skin, hair and eye color. What that means is that kids can have blond hair, light skin and maybe even light eyes that darken later on with age. I don’t particularly care about that. All I know is these are my people!

I was particularly interested to see very White looking people even India, probably the darkest country in the video.

The video is correct. These people are indeed the true Aryans. Germans Nazis are morons. Nordics are not Aryans. Nordics are Nordics. Aryans are Aryans. Their homeland is in northern Kazakhstan 4,500 years ago. Then they moved down into Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Iran, leaving their languages and genes behind.

On a closing note, I must say that these kids are so beautiful! I love their eyes especially – they have such beautiful eyes!

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Filed under Afghanistan, Asia, Asians, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Nordicism, Pakistan, Race/Ethnicity, Racism, Regional, South Asia, White Nationalism, Whites

by | March 27, 2011 · 2:43 PM

The Whites of Asia

From the Pastmist site. It’s in French, but you can muddle through.

A truly amazing site with a wealth of photos showing very European looking natives from all around the Central and South Asia region.

Areas covered include Afghanistan, Tajikistan, northern Pakistan, northern India, Iran, Kurdistan and Xinjiang.

Peoples covered include Uzbeks, Kirghiz, Tajiks, Iranians, Kurds, Indians, Pashtuns, Chitralis, Nuristanis, Burusho, Kalash and Uighurs.

It’s quite clear to me that these are by and large the remains of the ancient Indo-Europeans. Most are probably related to the Indo-Aryans, but the Uighurs are probably related to the Tocharians. The Tocharians later received an infusion of Mongoloid genes, the result of which is the mixed people you see today.

Most people in Kazakhstan and Kirghistan probably looked like this until 1300 YBP when Mongolian hordes moved through, bringing Asiatic genes and Turkic languages.

The Burusho complicate the IE-European look theory, as they speak a non-IE language that is not related to any other language. However, languages related to Burushaski were probably widely spoken in the region before the Indo-Aryans moved through. So how did the Burusho get so White looking? It’s a mystery.

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by | March 20, 2011 · 9:26 AM

Last Word on the Aryan Migration Theory: More

I have added 12 more points to my original article. I will print them here since most will not go back and read the original article again. Some of you may find these additions interesting. As you can see, I have totally immersed myself in this debate over the past few weeks or so.

1. Archeoastronomy. OIT proponents like to push this theory. Supposedly, the positions of stars are mentioned in the Vedas. By analyzing the positions of stars in the Vedas, we can make claims about when the Vedas were written via tracking the movements of stars in ancient days.

However, archeoastronomy is a field in poor standing. All we can learn for sure from archeoastronomy is that the Vedas were written some time in the past 8,000 years. All else is up in the air.

The Indian astrophysicist Rajesh Kochhar has clearly mentioned that the astronomical data in the Vedas is not reliable.

2. The association of Andronovo culture with Indo-Iranians is controversial. So say the OIT proponents. This is not true.

Andronovo is a culture associated with the proto Indo-Iranians that stretched, in its formative location, around northern Kazakhstan and and west into Russia to near Samara, then down to the Caspian Sea, covering most of the northwest quadrant of Kazakhstan.

Later its borders enlarged.

At maximum, its northern boundary was from Samara in the Volga Basin east to Anzhero Sudzhensk northeast of Novosibersk in southern Siberia.

The eastern boundary bordered on the Afansevo Culture in eastern Kazakhstan, southern Siberia and Xinjiang. Andronovo did include part of Xinjiang in the far north where the Altai Mountains come down into China.

The eastern border then encompassed most of eastern Kazakhstran except the area east of Balquash Koli, moving down to the border with Kyrgyzstan in the south, encompassing most of Uzbekistan except the far south and the northern half of Turkmenistan all the way to the  southeastern shore of the Caspian Sea. The Aral Sea was the realm of the Andronovo People.

The relation of Andronovo to the Indo-Aryan people in particular, as opposed to Indo-Iranians in general, is more controversial, but has been suggested by some experts.

3. Chariots could not go over the Hindu Kush. Another OIT argument. But as noted above, the Aryans did not move down through the Hindu Kush; instead, they came east from the BMAC through northern Iran to Herat in west Afghanistan east to around Ghazni in east Afghanistan over to the Bannu region in the NWFP of Pakistan. That’s a much easier route than the Hindu Kush.

4. There was no invasion. The invasion scenario has been replaced in the past 40 years to a migration scenario. It seems more likely that instead of defeating the Dravidian people and pushing them to the south, or destroying the Indus Valley Civilization (IVC), instead the Aryans merely profited from the collapse of the IVC that was already underway.

5. There was no genocide of the Dravidian people; all Indians look alike genetically. No one ever said there was a genocide of the Dravidians by the Aryans. Instead, the Aryans moved in, and there was intermingling and intermarriage with the Dravidians, the combined result being the culture of the Vedas.

6. The linguistic evidence. The case for the AMT and the total non-case for the OIT is made by the linguistic evidence. Everything else is secondary. The case was clinched by Hock 1999 (see references).

7. Indians descend overwhelmingly from the Paleolithic population of India. It’s true that 80% of Indian genes go all the way back to the Paleolithic era. But 80% of European genes go all the way back to the Paleolithic too. Same in Britain. Therefore, Europe and Britain has never experienced any migrations of invasions in the past 10,000 years?

The Aryan genetic footprint on Indian genes, if it exists, is doubtless less than 10% of the total. It’s well known by now that the Aryans left language but few genes in India. Identifying genetic history with linguistic history is naive.

Keep in mind that the Aryans were probably installed as a superstrate over the existing Dravidian population. The Aryans were probably no more than 10-15% of the population genetically, and the remaining 85-90% were Dravidians.

8. How could the language of a more primitive people like the Aryans replace the language of the more civilized people, the IVC Dravidians? So ask the OIT theorists. However, let us note that Greek speakers in the Levant, Aramaic speakers in Mesopotamia, Coptic speakers in Egypt and Romans in northern Africa all got their languages replaced by the culturally inferior Bedouins of Arabia. This sort of thing happens all the time.

9. There is no solid proof an Aryan migration to India in archeological terms. This is true as far as it goes, but all it means that is that archeologists typically refuse to characterize migrations in terms of who is migrating where. While there is no archeological proof for an Aryan migration, there is also no proof for Greek, Germanic, Italic, Celtic or Armenian migrations in those branches of IE either.

10. The Rig Veda says that the Sarasvati River flows to the sea. According to OIT folks, since the river dried up 3900 YBP, if the Vedas discuss it flowing the sea, they must have been written before 4000 YBP. However, this statement is only in one sentence of the Vedas, and the word “sea” in question is actually samuda, which Sanskrit experts say can mean lots of things, but in this case means an inland sea or lake as formed by a river emptying into a desert. Which is what the Sarasvati did. The Sarasvati never emptied into the sea at any time.

11. Horses. OIT proponents keep claiming that they have found horse bones or evidence of horses on seals or objects at some early date. None of this has been confirmed, and some cases have involved overt fraud by Indian nationalist “scholars.” The earliest confirmed horse in the region is at Pirak 3800 YBP. Many horse remains have been found after that, but none earlier.

12. The AMT was invented by Max Muller in 1848. Muller was a British spy – agent – whatever who was sent by the British to falsify the history of India so the Indians would lose their national pride. Hence, the AMT is a British conspiracy. Yes, OIT supporters actually say this. The long version is that he was hired by the British East India Company as part of a nefarious plot to denigrate Hinduism.

First of all, the theory was not invented in 1848 nor was it invented by Muller, as it substantially predates 1848, and Muller was not the first to come up with it.

There is no evidence at all that the AMT was hatched as a British conspiracy (other popular theories say that the entire linguistic community was in on this conspiracy), nor has anyone offered any reason how the British could profit by making up the theory of a Bronze Age culture in India. Or why the British, who supposedly hated Indians and thought they were inferior, would invent a theory that said that Indians were in part related to the great British people.

References

Hock, Hans H. 1999. Out of India? The Linguistic Evidence. In: J. Bronkhorst & M. Deshpande, Aryan and Non-Aryan in South Asia: Evidence, Interpretation and Ideology, 1-18. Harvard Oriental Series. Opera Minora, Vol. 3. Cambridge, MA. 

Kochhar, Rajesh. 2000. The Vedic People: Their History and Geography. New Delhi: Sangam Books. 2000.

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by | March 20, 2011 · 8:56 AM

The Rapid Spread of a Great Idea

The spread of chariots in all directions from their birth in northwest Kazakhstan 4000 YBP.

Wow! Look at how fast a great idea spreads. The spoke-wheeled chariot was invented by the Indo-European (IE) people in NW Kazakhstan 2000 YBP. The culture was called the Andronovo culture and appears to be proto-Indo-Iranian. From there, next it goes to the BMAC in Turkmenistan only 200 years later.

Next, 3600 YBP, all the way to the coast of China, probably via the IE Tocharian people.

Then, 3500 YBP, to Swat in Pakistan, all the way through Iran to Anatolia and then all the way down through the Levant to Egypt!

Then, 3300 YBP, to Greece and all the way to northern Europe around southern Sweden, northern Germany, Denmark and Holland. Note that there were not yet any Germanic people in that area yet. I am not sure if the ancient Greeks were yet in Greece. They may have just arrived from parts unknown.

By 3200 YBP, they were in Punjab writing the Rig Veda.

By 2600 YBP, chariots had spread all the way to France and the lower half of Iberia.

By 2500 YBP, all the way to southern England.

Once you come up with a great idea, it spreads pretty fast!

The horse was domesticated on the Pontic Steppe about 6000 YBP. The Pontic Steppe extends about from Ukraine across southern Russia through the Volga Basin past the Urals and down into Northern Kazakhstan. This area is known as “the steppes.” The horse was not particularly important militarily for the next 2000 years.

However, the invention of the chariot suddenly made the horse very important for military reasons. Near Eastern empires show an intense interests in the chariot for this reason from 3800 YBP. It’s not often stated, but the chariot was probably one of the great military inventions of all time.

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