1/ Lord Owen is profoundly misguided on @ChiefMI6 in #Iran. As #ForeignSecretary, he could've been more activist then by urging the @bbcworldservice to dial down #Khomeini's coverage which made this obscure #cleric #headlinenews.
rb.gy/xm94u 2/ #Khomeini's move to #France, after #Saddam ejected him at the #Shah's myopic behest, marked a turning point in the political fortunes of this exiled troublemaker, a grim #IranianStudies point in fact. @FCDOHistorians, #DavidOwen not once intervened,

1. @guardian 15 Oct 22, p 21 @tweeter_anita @EmpirePodUK, a cold-eyed, #critical #historian would've provided the #lowdown, and six of her best, to those boorish, blingy, visiting #Punjabis about the #Sikhempire or #ZulfikarBhutto. 2. #Kashmiris and #Ladakhis, unlike mawkish #Punjabis, don't quite share that lachrymose view of #Punjabi #history or #DuleepSingh. #Lamaist #Buddhists and #Muslims chafed under #Sikhrulers. Expelled former; forbade latter #fasting/#Fridayprayers.

1. My #SamarkandSummit orientalist🧵on its toponym and etymology. Incorrect is #Wikipedia's #Samarkand etymon entry and false analogy to #Tashkent. Both #Samarkand, like neighbouring #Bukhara, remain extensively debated in eastern #MiddleIranian #philology. 2. #Samarkand, contra #Wikipedia, is not 'stone city'. The first element /sm’r/ remains unexplained. On #Sogdian sm’rknδh [Ancient Letters], cf. Chin. Samojian 颯秣建 Gr. Μαρακάνδοι, scholarly consensus exists only on second compound, #Sogdian 'town, city'.

@tanjil_rashid_ @ZareerMasani @saliltripathi 1. #Partition1947 counterfactuals aren't counterintuitive. #Partition ended a zero sum game among the same stale set of interlocutors conducting a dialogue of the deaf #Simla, June '45 onwards. #CabinetMissionPlan's devolution did NOT solve #India's impasse. @tanjil_rashid_ @ZareerMasani @saliltripathi 2. #Jinnah accepted the #CabinetMissionPlan for an embryonic #Pakistan was assured, and permitted to secede, come 1957, if the #confederation was not to the #MuslimLeague's liking. Routinely overlooked by #Nehru's #Indian and #Pakistani baiters.

1. #MaxHastings needs to bone up before sketchily declaiming ‘#histrionics in the #West’ about #ChineseBeltandRoad #lending, @thetimes 30 July 22, p 33. Becoming, like that #LeCarré, another raging '#nationaltreasure' discharging disaffected drivel. 2. Surmises of #moralequivalence between #Chinese and #Western rapacity by #MaxHastings are tenuous. #Pakistanieconomists, long critical of the #BRI, would remind him how 27% of #Islamabad’s #externaldebt, $90bn as of April 2021, is now owed to #Beijing.