Inbox

Oil’s Curse
Re the cover story “Africa’s Oil” [June 11]: Africa is still the least developed of continents. It has to be given a chance to rise without dictators who are groomed, financed and put in power by the West. From Gabon to Nigeria to Guinea, it is the same story: a hundred cronies surround a dictator who connives with oil companies to amass wealth while millions live in dire poverty. Western governments and their oil companies must step in and stop the looting. Just as Western banks do not accept al-Qaeda’s money, so too should they refuse African dictators’ stolen money. Those funds should be used to emancipate African children and help them grow up like other children.
Moses Nsubuga,
Dublin

Remembering the Fallen
“One day in Iraq” gave a perfectly pitched and very moving account of the loss felt by families of servicemen killed in action [June 4]. Your insistence on referring to the soldiers’ last names in virtually all the accounts, however, was disturbing. The warm human qualities of the men killed—love of family, God or music—perhaps called for more subtlety than adherence to your editorial stylebook, which in this case was cold and harsh. Referring to the servicemen by their first names would have been a gentler act of respect.
Jez Abbott,
Hastings, England

The photographs of the young soldiers reminded me of similar portraits that appeared in TIME during the Vietnam War. How many more photographs will it take before President George W. Bush admits the mistake and brings the troops home?
Geoff Walton,
East London, South Africa

Were the six U.S. service members killed defending their homeland? No, they were in Iraq as aggressors and occupiers. They were certainly not defenseless. God knows how many Iraqis they killed with their bullets. Scores of ordinary citizens die each day because of U.S. folly. I won’t shed any tears for the six Americans, since they should have been at home with their families who now mourn them. All my tears and sympathies are for the ordinary, nameless Iraqis.
Zameer Alam Khan,
Lahore, Pakistan

Up to the Challenge
In “India without the Slogans,” Simon Robinson complained about being let down by the “Incredible India” marketing campaign, since so many problems remain [June 4]. No one claims India is without troubles, but we’re working to fix them. Unfortunately, Robinson does not see the opportunities in each challenge and the enormous impatience of 1 billion people seething to take the country forward. We are doing it on our terms and in our time.
Vandana Chatterjee,
Herzliya Pituach, Israel

Living in the West, where democracy is taken for granted, I tend to forget how hard some countries must fight to hold on to it. With a population of 1 billion people, Indians have to fight at least 10 times as hard as any Westerner to be heard. And even then, most of their voices are drowned out by the shouts of corrupt investors and politicians. Yet wondrously enough, each citizen wakes up every morning with the perseverance to keep India afloat. Robinson claimed that unfulfilled expectations raised by marketing campaigns such as “Incredible India” only make Westerners realize “the lack of progress.” As an Indian citizen living abroad, I see the very reason we continue to fight.
Arundhati Ray,
Lund, Sweden

I was amused by how Robinson let little hiccups like power outages and cell-phone failures distort the big picture of India. The very fact that India’s remote and hilly northeastern terrain has passable roads, SUVs, cell-phone service and hotels speaks of momentum and progress. India offers abundant opportunities to get rich quick. Indeed, the countless foreign businessmen and -women who come to India are worried more about cell connectivity in Delhi than malnourished children in Noida. I am a regular visitor to China and a keen follower of Chinese progress. One must realize that that country opened up its economy much earlier than India did. And China still has many more slogans than India has!
Dukkipati Nageswara Rao,
Hyderabad, India

India is the largest democracy, and it encompasses such a variety of mind-sets almost beyond imagining. The country is undergoing a transformation and will eventually become phenomenally different. I appreciate Robinson’s criticism, as it inspires us to prove that he is wrong. We are struggling to create a developed India, and I pray that God gives strength to everyone and inspires them to transform their outlook.
Prashant Mishra,
Bangalore, India

There was a time not too long ago when the wait for telephone service in some areas of Delhi territory was 15 years. Today it’s different: I haven’t heard any reports of cell-phone-signal dropout in the area Robinson mentioned. Yes, India has problems, but it has come a long way in the past few decades. And far from being a burden, democracy is our biggest insurance against momentum being gained in the wrong direction.
Sunil Bajpai,
New Delhi

Reshaping Singapore
Your article “Singapore Soars” mapped out Singapore’s aspiration to be what former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew called “a tropical version” of New York City, Paris and London all in one [June 4]. Indeed, Singapore has been trying to remake itself into a vibrant, fun place by allowing nightclubs to remain open around the clock and casinos to operate within resorts. It will also become a stop on the Formula One Grand Prix circuit. But Singapore has managed to attract low-skilled workers from developing countries and a much smaller group of talented foreigners who are here only for the short term. Citizens tend to be apolitical and have a groupthink mentality because of the government’s tight grip on civic and political activities. Singapore loses talented people who think and act differently to cities like San Francisco, New York, London and even Hong Kong, where they have more freedom of expression. We need mavericks, bohemians and social activists. It is time for Singapore to truly loosen up the social and political environment.
Jerry Siah Eng Kiat,
Singapore

We Japanese should learn from your cover story on Singapore’s morphing metropolis. Our country is going to suffer from a decreasing population and soaring competition from neighboring countries. Our government tends to envision more prosaic reforms. We need to beef up cultural power to make our cities more attractive to younger generations and foreigners. Our overemphasis on cost-benefit evaluations has precluded investment in cultural matters.
Hiroaki Goda,
Fukuoka City, Japan

New York City, Paris and London followed different models to become cosmopolitan cities. Singapore doesn’t have the throbbing cultural and art ethos that continues to lure immigrants to New York City; the creative, warm and human landscape that is Paris; or the universal language and literature of London. Perhaps the Los Angeles model of rich settlers and the Las Vegas model of transient spenders have inspired Singapore more than the three big world cities Lee mentioned. I hope that museums, creative ambiance and Old World charm are somewhere on the agenda. Nevertheless the challenge is huge, especially considering the ambitious timelines.
Bala Shankar,
Singapore