Author: ops566320@gmail.com

Ivanka Trump left a note for Eagles’ Eli Ricks after his compliments.

Ricks called Ivanka beautiful and his type after a White House visit.

The note read, “Stopped by to say hi! Sorry to miss you! Go Birds!”

Ivanka Trump left a sweet surprise for Philadelphia Eagles cornerback Eli Ricks after he publicly gushed over her appearance. After Mr Ricks went viral for calling her “beautiful” and “exactly my type” following a White House visit, Ivanka visited the Eagles’ training facility on Friday with her family. She sought out the football player and left a note in the locker room that read, “Stopped by to say hi! Sorry to miss you! Go Birds!” The post showcasing the note garnered over 8.5 million views.

Notably, Ivanka’s post was in direct response to Mr Ricks’ original tweet that said, “Donald trump daughter is beautiful,” from April 29. He posted another tweer saying, “After seeing her in person Ivanka is exactly my type.”

Ricks, who was absent from the facility, responded to her post, saying, “My apologies, I owe you a glass of wine now.” 

Every family has stories of courage. My uncle, my father’s older brother, is one of the Adampur Tigers who bombed the Sargodha air base in broad daylight in the 1965 war, an audacious attack, still studied by the Pakistani Air Force. The future of war is no longer following that manual. While the heroism of Indian forces remains the same, this new paradigm comes with deceptive and fast-changing geopolitical realities. The mix could not be more lethal.

TRUMP NEGOTIATES FROM THE BULLY PULPIT

While India tries to decipher motivations behind Trump’s mixed messaging over the past week, wondering if it’s his usual bloviation, a shady Pakistan crypto deal with personal benefits, or a negotiating tactic for a lopsided trade agreement from his ‘Art of the Deal’ playbook, it is clear that Trump’s Plan A was having issues, so he moved to Plan B.

Plan A was Trump’s tariff war, primarily aimed at China. But the unprecedented speed of the US market crash and an uncooperative Fed led to Trump putting this plan on a snooze button, with the hope of reviving it when the Fed chair is replaced next year.

Plan B is pausing the tariff war and consolidating American influence by wooing states that already are or face the risk of going to the Chinese bloc. Trump’s Middle East trip this week sent out dystopian messages: the US president shook hands with an ex-Al Qaeda leader, considered accepting a luxury 747 jet from Qatar, a country he’s labelled as ‘funders of terror’, reached out to Turkey’s Erdogan, and hinted at a reversal of stance on Iran’s nuclear deal. Being overly lenient towards Pakistan seems part of that strategy. If India rightfully bristles about its out-of-nowhere hyphenation with Pakistan, so is Israel taken aback about Syria, and Europe about Putin. In this sudden flip, Trump wants to use India’s tense week to his negotiating advantage – an international bully wanting to claim victory for a strong US trade deal. But this seems to be a small reel in the bigger film, one that shows no signs of change.

“DE-CHINAFICATION”

At the centre of almost any major geopolitical event over the last decade, including what just happened between India and Pakistan, is the biggest macro trend the world is currently witnessing: de-globalisation, or, as I call it, “de-Chinafication”.

The hyper-globalisation that began in the 1990s is seeing its great unwind. Since the primary winner of this tide was China, the primary loser, as the trend reverses, will also be China. As the old Wall Street adage goes, facts follow stock prices. Since the Covid-19 crisis, the Indian stock market is up more than 300%, while China’s has fallen 20%. China’s post-COVID-19 growth has stumbled, and investments have stalled.

Adding to this, recent company earnings commentaries indicate that global supply chains long thought to be in China’s favour are, in fact, a lot more flexible and nimble than anticipated.

The dragon is seething. And in its direct line of fire is the country closest to being a challenger: India.

A DECELERATING CHINA LASHES OUT

It is a striking coincidence that the biggest terrorist attack India has seen since 26/11 eclipsed India’s biggest economic headline in recent years: Apple announcing it will move all its iPhone production from China to India. As the world’s largest company, Apple’s announcement is the ultimate stamp of ‘de-Chinafication’. Where Apple goes, sooner or later, most will follow.

Unable to stop this decoupling, China may be trying to make it harder for American companies to move to India. And Pakistan is its more than willing lackey.

INDIA WILL WEATHER THIS STORM

It is now well-established across global military and open-source experts that India emerged as a winner in this conflict. India’s new muscular, zero-tolerance doctrine for terror is the right and only choice.

But, as Beijing’s deception and denial continue to play out in war zones and in places and times New Delhi least expects, India will face a challenging task of simultaneously protecting both its people and its economic ascension.

In the midst of this storm, India will also need to weather a tumultuous Trump, who seems hell-bent on bullying his friends more than his adversaries.

As my fighter pilot uncle says, “When everything seems to be going against you, remember that an airplane takes off against the wind, not with it.” I believe India will do the same.

“We will definitely send a representative if they inform us. Why wouldn’t we? There is no point of controversy here. We are fully with the government,” Mamata Banerjee said

Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee has said her party will skip the all-party international delegation on Operation Sindoor, since the Centre had not consulted her party before naming three of its leaders as the country’s representatives. Ms Banerjee, however, said this is not a boycott and she would reconsider the matter if the government reaches out.

“We will definitely send a representative if they inform us. Why wouldn’t we? There is no point of controversy here. We are fully with the government,” Ms Banerjee told reporters today as she headed for the hill town of Darjeeling to escape the heat. 

“We have made it clear that we are endorsing all steps taken by the Union government to combat terrorism, safeguarding the country’s sovereignty, and protecting the national interest… If any delegation is going, which I think should go, my party can only decide who to assign for the delegation. The Union government cannot unilaterally decide,” said Abhishek Banerjee, the number two in the party after Ms Banerjee.

Mr Banerjee, however, attended the foreign ministry’s briefing in Delhi for leaders who are part of the seven delegations the government is sending out. So did Trinamool’s Sagarika Ghose, who is also part of another delegation. 

The matter apparently boiled over after cricketer-turned-politician Yusuf Pathan was named by the Centre, leaving aside his more senior party colleagues. He was supposed to be part of a delegation led by Janata Dal (United) MP Sanjay Jha that is set to go to Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, Japan and Singapore.

Mr Pathan opted out, leading to a BJP attack on Trinamool, accusing it of “partisan politics”.

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, the BJP’s BJP co-incharge for West Bengal Amit Malviya said, “It sends a subliminal message that Mamata Banerjee and her party are unwilling to speak out against Pakistan-sponsored terrorism”

In a detailed briefing about Operation Sindoor – India’s military response to the Pahalgam terror attack – Mr Misri also said the United States had no role to play in the May 12 ceasefire.

There was no ‘nuclear signalling‘ by Islamabad during the military conflict with Pakistan earlier this month, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri told Parliament Monday evening.

Mr Misri told the House’s Standing Committee on External Affairs the conflict remained “conventional” and that Islamabad’s use of Chinese-made weaponry – including the HQ-9 missile defence system – was irrelevant because “what matters is we hit their air bases hard…”

However, he declined to comment on any Indian fighter jets that may have been shot down, citing national security constraints. There were reports Pak shot down five Indian jets.

Concerns that nuclear facilities – for weapons or civil use – may be targeted, deliberately or inadvertently, were red-flagged during the conflict. Such concerns were also shouted out by Pakistan in an attempt to paint India as the aggressor and ‘blackmail’ the Indian armed forces into submission.

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