Time to fly

 It’s about time to start once again … 

I believe...

I believe in the word of mouth, a fight, a battle, a bloody bout, For a just, and noble cause, In a land with its well governed laws.

I believe in the wisdom of words, Spoken by Shepherds of so many herds, Not too long ago in time, When we still had reason in rhyme, When so many would lend a hand, While you were stuck in the burning sand.

I believe in a wishing star, Somewhere in space so far, Where wishes come true, Hopes and aspirations are nothing new, Where one can see the morning dew, Settle down on some lucky few.

I believe in the joy of spring, So full of life, every little thing, Result of some labour of love, Showered from somewhere up above.

I believe that the summer is near, as it will appear like every year, Drought, famine an epidemic fear, shifting our machinery to a lower gear.

 
I believe this too shall pass, Before the leaves of autumn amass, Before the chilly winter sets in, And the rains come in to wash our sins.

I believe it will be over then... No more thoughts to write with my pen, The cycle of life will start afresh, Not bound down by some wire mesh.

 
As I write from my lonely post, Guarding the country I love the most, Could some of you find the time, to believe with me and draw a line, And stop this world from going wrong, Show it a path now so forlorn,

Let me stop as its nearing eve, Try it and you'll believe, Like I believe...

 

Promises

Its past ten and most of the chairs and sofas on the elevated deck at the Novotel are occupied by revellers, who after a hard day at life, are making promises to some one they want to make promises with or with someone who they know they can’t. 

Either way, the place is swollen with promises. I can predict the length of the relationship and it’s honesty by the distance between the people. 

Those here on a date are, comfortably seated at arms length, some are closer... to hide discreetly, what’s never going to be... 

...some have just found love and are clinging to each other for dear life, while others are different husbands and different wives. 

I see this couple, the moment they step in and the lady looks at me and looks away... telling me ... that tonight she is taken... the man saunters of ahead, with a bulge in his pocket, telling me and the crowd, he is not going to spend legal money here. He looks for a place, where there is none, to make promises. 

After a futile attempt at scouring the deck, he looks at the bar... where I am seated with six other bar stools for company... walks to the bar man and asks for a place to take his woman. 

The bar man... who has seen it all and knows it’s so pointless, yet offers to find a place so promises can be made. 

I interrupt the melle to tell him to place his behind and that of his woman,  in a bar stool, ...now so forlorn, for no one comes asking for it anymore. Everyone wants a sofa and chair, since that’s where promises are traditionally made and broken 

He reluctantly sits next to a stool next to me and indicates to his muse for the evening to sit alongside. 

I order two of what I am drinking and then realise, he had probably planned to make promises over champagne. From the look of it, she is already regretting the promise she made to come out with him and he,  the fact that he doesn’t have a sofa or a chair to make his list of promises..

Tomorrow morning, it will all be gone .. the people, the bar stools, the sofas and the chairs... and the promises made over champagne. The spirit would continue to linger till its twilight again and another me,  comes along to look at people on chairs and tables ... making promises that won’t see the light of day. 

Another night at Gadda Da Vida is looking promising ..

Nocturnal penile tumescence

An ode to my brethren, who face a similar situation each day...

Morning erections are not my doing,

For no one was near, no one was cooing,

It is up long before, I open my eyes,

before  the rays even touch them skies,

It’s hard and long and hurts like a hell,

every morning, like a date with some belle,

Nothing needed,self encouraged I guess,

It’s a pain each day, to tell it to rest,

I think I need to see a physician, 

Some one to finally fix this condition,

It’s nearing nine and no trace of fatigue,

It played soft ball, now in a major league

This stuff was supposed to happen years ago,

When men are young and rearing to go 

All it needs, is a warm cosy place,

To enter, dead centre and win the race,

Just for this, I am willing to date

Any wretched woman in a similar state,

One who gets wet, at a touch and word,

Opens herself gently for she has been heard,

God before this day is through,

Please tell my Peter, what I am willing to do,

For I can’t go on like this through life

Each morning my body, a bundle of strife

Have mercy on me and send my way 

A willing woman, looking to play 

All it needs is a jolt and a tug 

As I awake, a kiss and a hug

Like and Idol waiting to perform 

Excited, lively early each morn

I am sure when I am dead resting at last,

This tally whacker will still be at half mast,

To show his respect to this body that endured,

Every morning a ritual...not cured

Shoot Don’t Talk

“Shoot, Dont Talk”

“So Commander Saab… where is that Mountain Strike korps (Corps) you told us about a few years ago? Asked my civilian friend. “Aren’t they going to strike…and Sir have they ever struck anything. Aur woh multirole Sukhoi fighter”? Where is that.. the one that roles to either side, every time on Republic Day... woh Kahan hai ? Sirji…that statement you made about Hollywood picture.. THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY..When you want to shoot..shoot..don’t talk!!  

You said that after the surgery in Balakot. But the next day, they came with 27 aircraft and and performed open heart surgery sir....once it was over ... all we wanted was our pilot back with all our hearts. Somewhere we lost the plot. Array stop, I said! You idiot” what are you saying? That was Pakistan and LOC. This is China and LAC. You don’t know your geography ..you bloody rascal.  But he continued.. Sirji, but why are the two Light Combat Aircraft squadrons stationed in Sulur. Is it because they are lightly armed and spares are less, so we can only use them for Limited Combat like against Sri Lanka,...but that conflict has ended. Sirji...you said the aircraft is good and we celebrated its birthday, IOC, FOC, induction, flypast. If all this is true and it’s a formidable fighter, then why is it in our backsides and not guarding are front!!!. Why are we talking about boycotting Chinese fireworks and lights during Deepawali, but burning our hands the rest of the 12 months”. “We are a peaceful nation, we are going to protest and the Defence Minister will do Kadi Ninda”, I replied.

 

I got up from bed with a jolt. It was six in the morning. The previous evenings news was still fresh in my head and I was hurting. I like many others, was angry. The morning headlines in the Times, informed me that the Col had spoken to his father the day before… Is this headlines?? Why this weak emotional meaningless headline. You guys…please write on how he fought valiantly and was martyred doing his duty for ‘izzat’, ‘namak and ‘nishan’. Then the reporters had reached the grieving families and then they played out the funerals and the works. The twitterati had been busy through the night. The eggs had hatched and the “Experts” had been born. Initially no news and only conjecture, then tit-bits and comical discussions, up until the free loaders joined in, and the evening fish fest rapidly graduated to a street side scuffle with the choicest of abuses. Sadly, this is the usual level most of our intellectual discussions reach, till it’s time to sleep. The social part of Social Media, is a misnomer... we usually aren’t. 

I turned to my father, a veteran himself, and some one who has written a book on China way back in 2005. The front cover on the hard back, has this written.... “Coercion, and if that fails, resorting to use of military force have been the logical and natural steps in China’s strategy.” The skirmish at Galwan has shown that we lack the resolve to do anything meaningful, either tactically or strategically. He keeps taking two steps forward... one step back and we keep agreeing to his disagreements. That “Fist” in the unit “Nishaan”(emblem) is just that ... where all it goes... who knows. The moment is right, the iron is hot and we all dive in to cool it or tell the others Chill maar yaar. Don’t be emotional, don’t be senti... 

I am not a war monger, but once in a while the local gunda needs to be taught a lesson and given a bloody nose. I am sure 16 Bihar, must have given them that initial bloody nose… Proud of you chaps..Now what ? The brave CO must have been on the red line, because Delhi must have been asking for the latest updates, only from him, not his operator or adjutant or officer. But what do they do with all this information. I am reminded of many peacetime exercises and mock battles in Staff College, where theatre commanders are given updates in a war room scenario. Then the plan, enact their parts and takes decisions to achieve clear objectives within limited resources. The two sides blue and red fight the war in sand model rooms with neutral umpires ... well mostly neutral, deciding and giving  results on the paper offensive. After a week of fighting with presentations and plans, both sides debrief and lessons are learnt. The air element and naval bouys also flypast or surface on the last ten minutes of the discussion if the tea is yet to arrive. 

So while we wait for tea, and while we learn lessons and investigate to find someone to blame, let us also do something else. 

So what are we doing right now ..? 

Are we priming the Tactical weapons, Arming our Triad, passing codes for a launch or are we wondering what to show the country at the next fire power demonstration at Pokhran/Balasore. Has going “Nuclear” prevented our adversaries from playing their usual games on the borders. Has it acted as a deterrent. 

Come on guys .. Wake Up ... Are we moving forward with a collective resolve to sort out our issues or relying on PCK, previous course knowledge (a key military term) in defence colleges. This one acronym and it’s voluminous collection, gets one through the hallowed portals of higher learning these days. Every new commander quickly reads and learns the narrative ...and then tows the line. So no one, well ok ... almost no one, wants to upset the apple cart. So a tenure is basically to beautify the cantonments, add artifacts from yester-years like old tanks, aircraft and submersibles, have garden competitions, redo the VIP rooms for the upteenth time in the Officers’ Mess, wine and dine the “whos-who from the local administration, quickly get your name written on the honour board behind your desk with no end date, act like a territorial doggy, raising one leg and letting go to mark your temporary province, grab from here and there and be self reliant, self sufficient. Sad ... this is what it has come to. 

“Wake up Chaps” ...Let us not look or worry about the pecking order, the ranks, kabhi haan kabhi na... let’s start by doing the job the right way. Let’s put in practice what we have been taught by the likes of ... well ehh...our predecessors. Let’s do justice to the rank on our shoulder. Let us plain speak and if required, dissent. Let the grand finale of the annual manoeuvres/Exercises/War Games not align with past results. Let us be asymmetric. Let us work for the  Effect, (yes remember EBO!!!) and not suffer the consequences of procrastination. Let us work on Jugaad, and teach them a lesson. Let us synergise, be “aatmanirbhar” not because we finally have a Chief of Defence Staff, but because we can do well... inspite of it. Let the Army have a free hand and let them establish their footprint across their respective areas of responsibility, and that means the entire strech.... for victory is still measured on foot… and so let’s not shoot our foot off.

 

…And finally Commander Saab, if you don’t know Air Power and know nothing about the employment of maritime Power, have never bothered to see the Blue Water Navy in action... and find yourself at C... (Sea)

...then don’t learn, don’t adapt and don’t employ. 

Just let the “chaps..FLY PAST and zap” the enemy instead of Rajpath, let the “whites.. LIGHT UP the nights” in the South China Sea and not at the Gateway... and let the Army “Bajao some one’s Band in hand to hand” but for COVID sake, do something. 

 

Akshay Airborne (Retreaded)

The Glourious Basterds

My apologies to Quentin Tarantino

“... Cap...Captain, Sir Thok Diya”. This is what I heard the CISF guy holler out to me, as I made my way past Immigration. I said “what” ?, Sir, Hamare, Fighter jets crossed over and dropped bombs in Pakistan”. It was enough to transport me to another world. For a minute or so I was just dumbstruck, trying desperately to get connectivity in Calicut Airport while I made my way to my steed, the Boeing 737. I couldn’t connect to the web at all and ... duty called… and it was time to go to Kuwait. How did I miss all this in the morning ride to the airport... Ah! I was finishing up with the last episode of Madam Secretary on Netflix in the cab... shit luck. 

We boarded, briefed, calculated the thrust required for the take off weight of 78 tons, fed the details in to the flight computer with the route and flight details, cross checked the fuel... 18.5 tons for what would be... a five and a half hour flight across the Arabian Sea and halfway to the Middle East. My copilot briefed me, since it was his sector for the day, I would be PM..Pilot Monitoring  and he would be PF Pilot Flying. Again shit luck. Safety brief done, we pushed back, started engine Number two, then one, said our byebye to the hard working Engineer and his sweaty tow truck crew on the intercom, followed procedural routine... slowly taxied to the main taxiway, backtracked at 20 knots down the entire length of Runway 10-28, turned around and lined up. Almost exactly the way it’s been, for the last six years.... very different then what the twelve Mirages and their Escort aircraft would have done, a few hours earlier. 

Once airborne, my copilot Sushant  engaged the autopilot and we settled for the climb. It took 23 minutes to reach our cruising altitude of 36000 feet. I handled the RT, radio telephony, took the necessary clearances, cross checked the parameters on the smart Multi functional displays, instantly telling me “Howgowzit”

Once at crushing level, we finished our cruise checks and I pushed my seat back about three notches, and pinged the crew. She came in with the menu, same stuff different person, different day... omelette and tea for me and some ‘special meal’ of boiled vegetables... uplifted for my co joe. We were soon oceanic, which meant that we were now more than two hundred miles of the Indian coastline, making our way right down the middle of the Arabian Sea. The Oman Coast, quite a distance away, would start showing up only after another hour and a half, and we would be led there by this superior navigation system from outer space called the GPS, the Global Positioning System, with an accuracy of a few feet. I knew my ETA, Expected Time of Arrival, almost five hours before I would arrive, give or take a minute. The winds were across from 11 o’clock at 170 kmph, with our flight control system effortlessly adjusting the heading of the nose, to track correctly on the route on ground. 

I then aimlessly picked up my phone never expecting any messages as there was no connectivity before we departed, and I had at some point switched to airplane mode, just to avoid oversees charges at destination. This too was routine, same story, different day. I glanced through the various messages that had come through and I read a few details about the early morning strike on my veterans group. In an instant, I was soon transported to early 2002, when after the attack on the Indian Parliament on 13 Dec 2001, a few colleagues and I, were airlifted from a flying training base in South India, to an active frontline base, in an effort to augment the local Squadron. The idea being that, in the event that hostilities broke out, we were expected to strengthen the rolls of the Air Defence and Strike Squadrons, on our Western Border. They didn’t break out and we went through the northern winter, then the summer and finally realised in Autumn, that nothing is going to ever come of it. We lost so many troops in those ensuing months to various factors. Shit Luck. I tried to recall and then imagine in my head, how yesterday’s limited strike in to Pakistan, would have shaped up at the tactical level. The Mission, the Preamble, the Composition, Orders, Tactical Battle Area planning, the coordination, the intelligence input, the weapon to target matching, the radar orbat, the equipment positioning, loading, the coordination with the refueller, the AWACS picture, the mission briefing with the entire “Package” and finally the flawless execution. All this in complete secrecy while the nation was crying blue murder. For the benefit of the uninitiated, it’s quite nice and almost like multiple ballets and sonnets dancing and playing out to clock work precision. The LGB, Laser Guided Bomb is accurate. In fact, one has to do a lot of stuff wrong to not get it right. A mention to the professionalism of the Special Forces operator on the ground with his portable laser designator, who would have sneaked in days earlier, not moving, hardly breathing, collecting intel and relaying it back to his command post while being firmly embedded in his own little office, or perhaps the unseen UAV internal pilot, who laced the target with lasing equipment/pod, in the final moments of the mission to guide the parcel to its intended target. Kudos to the Air Defence Escorts along with the Jammers who intentionally popped up on radar, to invite attention, putting themselves in harms way,  so as to allow, the strike element to go through, unhampered, exactly as it stated in the escort brief. 

Just one thought rang clear in my head... “You Glourious Basterds”  you....you... freakin Lucky, Glourious Basterds. I don’t expect any of you to understand and you simply can’t. The profanity here, is more a celebratory and congratulatory greeting to my brethren... my “Boys in Blue”, who now have, eternal boasting rights, to say... Fady Sir ... “Been there... Done that “, for, I have never been there and never ever, done that. In Fact, I am almost 48 now, and no other fighter pilot has done that in so many years. The lot of us, were always bragging from the safety of our side. I have worked and prepared long hours as part of various teams on numerous occasions, air combat exercises, playing out tactical and strategic war gaming scenarios, studied and answered fortnightly tutorials and tests on it at Staff College, Got my Masters, but this Nope. Never Ever... shit luck. 

But now as a veteran, I swell with pride, stand grateful with my countrymen and watch from the side, as you roll in again and again, and call “live” ... diving in towards your designated targets in the days ahead. I wish you my share of good luck, good josh, calmness, courage, fear, discipline, guts and promise to say a lil prayer for your safe return. 

While you enjoy the Hunt, this open season, ole fady will be ferrying passengers and cargo across the pond. 

“Good Hunting Chaps... Make us Proud”

Purely Embedded

So... I looked numerous times out of window to catch a glimpse. For it had appeared the other day out of no where. i had no idea it existed, no idea it would, and when it did eclipse, ...my guard dropped.

...and now something has no idea that He was playing dice......funny how HE plays. Just rolling them randomly with randomness for random people. I never knew that I could feel what I am feeling now. Been through the storm and thought I had shed it off. That emotion that would just never return again.

Don't get me wrong life, i don't want it.... It is already there ... Yeah! ...embedded.. The question is ...now what ?

Anyone or anything that fits in to a small niche deep inside, having slipped in effortlessly, needs to be just kept..
So until He rolls that dice again, I will keep this beautifully pure feeling deep inside..For thats where it appeared first, and thats where it shall remain.

Pure it is...