Gandhi the Man: The Story of His Transformation
Author: Eknath Easwaran
A vivid account of Mahatma Gandhi's spiritual transformation from timid young man to world leader that can serve as an inspiration for our own transformation. In 1893, Mohandas Gandhi left India for South Africa at the age of 23 – a man whose past was full of failure. Ten years later, called a saint even by those who opposed him, he grew to become the acknowledged leader of 400 million Indians in their struggle for independence. As a young man, Eknath Easwaran visited Gandhi – not to observe his political style, but, "because I wanted to know the secret of his power." Easwaran shares what he discovered in this book. The chapter by Timothy Flinders, "How Satyagraha Works" shows how to use Gandhi's nonviolent techniques to solve contemporary problems.
Argus-Courier
Gandhi the Man is a compelling and relevant account of the man many consider to be the most important figure of our age. It is perhaps the most accessible work on Gandhi that has yet been published
About the Author
Eknath Easwaran grew up in Gandhi's India in an ancient Hindu matrilineal family in Kerala state. He had not been long out of college when he made his first visit to Gandhi to discover the secret of his self-mastery – the secret not of Gandhi the political leader, but of Gandhi the man. Years later, in the midst of a busy career as a writer and professor, Easwaran began to practice meditation earnestly in order to bring about a similar spiritual transformation in his own life. He was chairman of the Department of English at a large Indian university when he came to the United States on the Fulbright exchange program. In 1961, he established the Blue Mountain Center of Meditation in Berkeley, California.
Bill McKibben
It comes closer to giving some sense of how Gandhi saw his life than any other account I have read. . . . Gandhi mastered his own life – took charge of his mind and his body. As a result he knew no fear, only great and undifferentiated love for the rest of creation. And so he was able to powerfully affect that creation.New York Post
Noetic Sciences Review
Provides an inspiring example of the reaches of human possibility when infused with spiritual insight
Noetic Sciences News
Provides an inspiring example of the reaches of human possibility when infused with spiritual insight
Brain/Mind Bulletin
The illustrations are stunning, the biography vivid. Easwaran places Gandhi within a spiritual as well as historic context.
Go to: Fibromyalgia Advocate or The Portion Plan
Foxbats Over Dimona: The Soviets' Nuclear Gamble in the Six-Day War
Author: Isabella Ginor
Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez’s groundbreaking history of the Six-Day War in 1967 radically changes our understanding of that conflict, casting it as a crucial arena of Cold War intrigue that has shaped the Middle East to this day. The authors, award-winning Israeli journalists and historians, have investigated newly available documents and testimonies from the former Soviet Union, cross-checked them against Israeli and Western sources, and arrived at fresh and startling conclusions.
Contrary to previous interpretations, Ginor and Remez’s book shows that the Six-Day War was the result of a joint Soviet-Arab gambit to provoke Israel into a preemptive attack. The authors reveal how the Soviets received a secret Israeli message indicating that Israel, despite its official ambiguity, was about to acquire nuclear weapons. Determined to destroy Israel’s nuclear program before it could produce an atomic bomb, the Soviets then began preparing for war--well before Moscow accused Israel of offensive intent, the overt trigger of the crisis.
Ginor and Remez’s startling account details how the Soviet-Arab onslaught was to be unleashed once Israel had been drawn into action and was branded as the aggressor. The Soviets had submarine-based nuclear missiles poised for use against Israel in case it already possessed and tried to use an atomic device, and the USSR prepared and actually began a marine landing on Israel’s shores backed by strategic bombers and fighter squadrons. They sent their most advanced, still-secret aircraft, the MiG-25 Foxbat, on provocative sorties over Israel’s Dimona nuclear complex to prepare the planned attack on it, and to scareIsrael into making the first strike. It was only the unpredicted devastation of Israel’s response that narrowly thwarted the Soviet design.
Foreign Affairs
The revisionist label is too often used to describe a reinterpretation of past events from an unorthodox political perspective. Here is a book that is truly revisionist, challenging what we thought we knew about the origins and conduct of the Six-Day War, Israel's crushing victory over Egypt, Jordan, and Syria 40 years ago. The exact role played by the Soviet Union has always been murky. The authors work their way through the murk, meticulously using every snippet of relevant information from an extraordinary range of sources, most effectively Soviet military personnel who can recall what they were up to in 1967. Where there are gaps, they make a careful case for conjecture and inference. They demonstrate how anxiety about Israel's imminent nuclear capability and an unwarranted confidence in Arab military strength led Moscow to develop a plot to provoke the Israelis into striking first before being overwhelmed by a devastating riposte, in which Soviet forces would participate. The plan never recovered from the quality of Israel's first strike, although bits of it were implemented as Israel appeared to be marching on Damascus. By its nature, this is an impossible case to prove, but Ginor and Remez have succeeded to the point where the onus is now on others to show why they are wrong.<
Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments ixMaps xii
Historiography as Investigative Journalism 1
Threat or Bluster 10
Antecedents and Motivations 15
The Nuclear Context 28
The Spymaster and the Communist: A Disclosure in December 1965 36
A Nuclear Umbrella for Egypt 49
Converging Timelines: Syrian Coup and Party Congress 58
The "Conqueror" and "Victor" Plans: Soviet Signatures 68
The Naval and Aerial Buildup 78
Mid-May: Disinformation or Directive? 88
Escalation and Denial: 14-26 May 104
The Badran Talks: Restraining an Ally 113
Foxbats over Dimona 121
Poised for a Desant: 5 June 138
Un-Finnished Business: Preemptive Diplomacy 153
Debates, Delays, and Ditherings: 6-8 June 164
The Liberty Incident: Soviet Fingerprints 180
Offense Becomes Deterrence: 10 June 191
Aftermath 207
Notes 219
Works Cited 265
Index 275
No comments:
Post a Comment