Coup in a soup!

 

 

The increasing spate of military coups in the 20th century and in this millennium shows that this world still has a long way to go before democracy is accepted more of a norm rather than an exception. This year has already seen two major coups, one by the Royal Thai Army overthrowing the regime of Thaksin Shinawatra, and the most recent one in Fiji, preceded by a similar coup in Nepal in 2005. This millennium itself has seen around 22 coups (both successful and attempted) preceded by an unprecedented hundred plus attempts of coups in the last century. The justification given most of the time was that democracy or the monarchy was mired in corruption and that the nation was being compromised. Yet, historically, most coups by the military failed to better society and created dictatorial regimes, which either got defeated by similar military coups or became stronger to create an even more ruthless society. And ironically, those are the democratically elected leaders (in Iran, Venezuela) who are the ones castigated by the western world, eh!