January 30, 2013--Take Cover!

Last week we focused some attention on Mali (where the French are attempting to thwart attempts by Islamist factions to take over this historic West African republic); on Libya (because Hillary Clinton appeared before Congress to testify about the killings in Benghazi of our ambassador and three other State Department officials); on Israel (where voters elected more members of a "centrist" political party than expected and this, it is presumed, will make it more difficult for Prime Minister Netanyahu to continue to lead from the extreme right); and then there was attention paid to Algeria where al Qaeda-linked terrorists held hundreds of petroleum workers hostage before executing dozens and killing others when the government stormed the facility and ended the siege; and more attention was focused on Egypt . . . and on Syria. . .  and on . . .

No wonder Hillary Clinton is leaving her post after four years of this.

Not much was mentioned, however, about India, Pakistan, and Kashmir; and even less--actually nothing at all--about Saudi Arabia, my pick for where the next explosion of Arab-Spring discontent will occur. After all, who has an attention span that can encompass all of this?

Well, we had better try to develop one.

I was indolently thumbing my way through the New York Times the other day when I noticed, buried at the bottom of the page, a piece about India warning Kashmiris to prepare for nuclear war!

We tend to forget that the main reason India and Pakistan are armed to the teeth with nukes and the rockets needed to deliver them is because (1) they hate each other and (2) they have for decades fought over the disputed borders of Kashmir.

Under the radar, while we have been paying attention to Benghazi, Beyoncé's lip-syncing the National Anthem, Te'o's imaginary girlfriend, and Michele's new bangs, it seems that the Indians feel that things have gotten so bad that they are alerting Kashmiris to dig fallout shelters and engage in take-cover drills of the sort we in America practiced during the decades of the Cold War.

As quoted in the New York Times, Indian officials urged that "people should construct basements where the whole family can stay for a fortnight," food and water should be restocked regularly, and shelters should have a supply of candles and battery-operated lights.

If Indians are caught out in the open when the Pakistanis rain nuclear bombs on Kashmir, "people should immediately drop to the ground and remain in a lying position. Stay down after the initial shock wave, wait for the winds to die down and debris to stop falling. If the blast wave does not arrive within five seconds of the flash, you were far enough from the ground zero."

Good advice, no?

Meanwhile, all is seemingly quiet in Saudi Arabia where the aging rulers continue to buy off radical factions in their kingdom. But these aging rulers will soon pass from the scene and there are few in the royal pipeline who have the authority and power to keep the vast majority of the struggling population either bribed or otherwise suppressed. With 20 percent of the world's oil supply, (surprisingly, second only to Venezuela), once protests erupt and strong-arm stability is threatened in Saudi Arabia, we may all need fallout shelters.

John Kerry has been preparing to become Secretary of State for his entire professional life. Let's hope that he and Barack Obama are up to the task of threading their and our way through this dangerous maze.