Bot: robot: Create/update articles. If there is a mistake please report on my talk page.

2022-10-31T22:41:02Z

robot: Create/update articles. If there is a mistake please report on my talk page.

New page

{{Short description|Scottish journalist and author}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2021}}

{{Infobox person
| name = Myra MacDonald
| image = 
| alt = 
| caption =
| birth_name = 
| birth_date = 
| birth_place =
| death_date = 
| death_place =
| nationality = Scottish
| other_names =
| occupation = journalist and author
| years_active =
| known_for =
| notable_works = ''Heights of Madness: One Woman's Journey in Pursuit of a Secret War'', ''Defeat is an Orphan: How Pakistan Lost the Great South Asian War''
}}

'''Myra MacDonald''' is a Scottish journalist and author. She is an expert on [[South Asian]] politics and security,<ref name="toi">{{Cite web |title=Myra MacDonald |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/litfest/litfest-2017/speakers/myra-macdonald/articleshow/61113209.cms |access-date=6 March 2021 |website=[[The Times of India]] |publication-date=17 October 2017}}</ref> and has written three books on [[India–Pakistan relations|India and Pakistan]].

Born and educated in Scotland, she joined ''[[Reuters]]'' as a graduate trainee in 1984, and during a career spanning virtually three decades as its foreign correspondent, she worked in Middle East, Europe, and South Asia. Throughout her career, she held various positions at ''Reuters'', including stints as chief correspondent in France and bureau chief in India.

== Early life ==
MacDonald was born, and educated in Scotland; first at [[Hutchesons' Grammar School]] and then at [[University of St Andrews]].<ref name="orchardhill">{{Cite web |title=Myra MacDonald MA, author and former Reuters Bureau Chief, India |url=http://www.orchardhill.org.uk/content/pages/documents/1479228093.pdf |website=www.orchardhill.org.uk}}</ref><ref name="thebaron" />

== Career ==
After graduating from St Andrews University with a degree in Psychology,<ref name="macdonaldwordpress">{{Cite web |title=Myra MacDonald |url=https://myramacdonald.wordpress.com/about/ |website=myramacdonald.wordpress.com}}</ref> MacDonald joined [[Reuters]] as a [[Trainee|graduate trainee]] in 1984, spending a year in Paris.<ref name="trainee">{{Cite web |title=Trainees |url=https://www.thebaron.info/people/trainees |access-date=6 March 2021 |website=The Baron |publication-date=1 January 2013}}</ref><ref name="thebaron">{{Cite web |last=MacDonald |first=Myra |title=Going home |url=https://www.thebaron.info/comment/going-home-myra-macdonald |access-date=6 March 2021 |website=The Baron |publication-date=8 November 2013}}</ref>

Her early work years included a stint in [[Luxembourg]], followed by a posting to [[Cairo]]. In the 1990s, she was back in Paris as Reuters chief correspondent.<ref name="thebaron" />

In March 2000, she was assigned overseas as Reuters [[News bureau|bureau chief]] in New Delhi. She served in this position until 2003, when she took a [[leave of absence]] to research the [[Siachen conflict]].<ref name="rediff">{{Cite web |last=Vij |first=Shivam |title='Siachen: India must offer Pak a dignified solution' |url=https://www.rediff.com/news/slide-show/slide-show-1-siachen-india-must-offer-pak-a-dignified-solution-macdonald-shubham-vij/20121203.htm |access-date=6 March 2020 |website=[[Rediff.com]] |publication-date=3 December 2012}}</ref> In her own words, she described her stint in India as: <blockquote>When I left for India in 2000 I had little inkling that South Asia would become the region to which I would want to devote the rest of my career. Somehow having a car crash on the way into Delhi from the airport – and then piling out onto the side of the road with my nine-year-old daughter and French au pair while watching the cows go by – failed to put me off. We had a small earthquake the next day and a near-war a year later, so some might call me contrarian. I would prefer to say that in the years covering both India and Pakistan I have rarely met more generous people – in both countries.<ref name="thebaron" /></blockquote>

Her research took her to both the Indian and Pakistani sides of the [[Siachen conflict|war zone]] in [[Siachen]], and ultimately culminated in the publication of the book ''Heights of Madness: One Woman's Journey in Pursuit of a Secret War'' in 2007, the work which earned her acclaim.<ref name="rediff" />

In addition to her own research, she has also given presentation on Siachen to the [[Royal Military Academy Sandhurst]] and to the [[International Institute for Strategic Studies]] in London.<ref name="rediff" />

After the publication of her book, she turned her focused on writing about Pakistan.<ref name="warontherocks">{{Cite web |title=Myra MacDonald |url=https://warontherocks.com/author/myra-macdonald/ |access-date=7 March 2020 |website=WAR ON THE ROCKS }}</ref> By November 2013, when she left Reuters,<ref name="thebaron" /> she had been working as its foreign correspondent for almost 30 years.<ref name="toi" /><ref name="macdonaldwordpress"/>

=== ''Defeat is an Orphan'' ===
After leaving Reuters, MacDonald began work on a new book, ''Defeat is an Orphan: How Pakistan Lost the Great South Asian War'', which was published in 2017.<ref name="ians-review">{{Cite web |title=The 'Great South Asian War' and its salutary lessons (Book Review) |url=https://www.business-standard.com/article/news-ians/the-great-south-asian-war-and-its-salutary-lessons-book-review-117041300281_1.html |access-date=6 March 2021 |website=[[Business Standard]] |agency=IANS |publication-date=13 April 2017}}</ref> In the book, MacDonald focuses on the [[India–Pakistan relations]] over the past almost two decades since the two countries conducted [[nuclear weapon]]s tests in 1998 and declared themselves as [[nuclear powers]].<ref name="thehindu">{{Cite web |title=No winners in this battle |url=https://www.thehindu.com/books/books-reviews/no-winners-in-this-battle/article17647506.ece |access-date=7 March 2021 |website=[[The Hindu]] |publication-date=25 March 2017}}</ref> It is in this framework, she says that it is precisely this declaration that emboldened the [[Pakistani establishment]] into believing that it could continue with its "reckless reliance" on its "militant proxies" to target India and destabilize Afghanistan.<ref name="thehindu"/><ref name="foreign affairs">{{Cite web |last=Nathan |first=Andrew J. |title=Defeat Is an Orphan: How Pakistan Lost the Great South Asian War |url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/capsule-review/2016-12-08/defeat-orphan-how-pakistan-lost-great-south-asian-war |access-date=7 March 2021 |website=[[Foreign Affairs]] |publication-date=February 2017}}</ref> In the book, she explores the past many incidents of terrorism targeting India, starting from the hijacking of [[Indian Airlines Flight 814]], which was on its way to Delhi from Kathmandu, in December 1999 to [[2001 Indian Parliament attack|the December 2001 terrorist attack]] on the Indian parliament, [[2008 Mumbai attacks]], and terrorist attacks on the [[2016 Pathankot attack|Pathankot Air Force base]] and the [[2016 Uri attack|Indian army base in Uri]] in January 2016 and September, that same year, respectively, that were all executed at the behest of Pakistan by its proxies.<ref name="thehindu"/><ref name="foreign affairs"/>

MacDonald details how Pakistan's obsessive preoccupation with India, which has manifested itself in the form of a [[proxy war]], has undermined democracy in its own country and its economy, led to loss of opportunities for peace, and how it itself lost control over the militant groups that it had been fostering. And how India, on the other hand, used this time to make significant and rapid economic gains. MacDonald has also criticized U.S. policy in the region, which she says has been only somewhat sympathetic to India, but not to the degree to which she would like.<ref name="foreign affairs"/>

Writing in [[The Hindu|''The Hindu Book Review]], [[Suhasini Haidar]] found MacDonald's narration on the whole as "even-handed", but noted several lapses, which according to her are common to such India-Pakistan treatises of western and Indian scholars alike. First, she writes, is the inclination to look at the hostile relations between the two countries through a "time prism," taking the [[Pokhran-II|nuclear tests]] conducted by them in 1998 as a starting reference point for Pakistan's initiation of a reckless proxy war against India, using Islamic militants. As Haider puts it, "The truth is Pakistan's ‘reckless reliance’ on proxies did not begin in 1998, but all the way back in 1948, during the [[first Kashmir war]]. Later, the use of Sikh militants who [[Indian Airlines Flight 423|hijacked planes]] to Lahore in the 1980s, or the [[D-Company]] that has lived in Karachi after the [[1993 Bombay bombings|Mumbai blasts]] in 1993 were all part of a similar strategy."<ref name="thehindu"/>

Second, Haider notes, is the mistaken belief that the international players, particularly the US, out of naivety pursue a South Asia policy that makes it possible for Pakistan to continue [[Pakistan and state-sponsored terrorism|its sponsorship of terrorism]] against India. Haider says, "The U.S. is neither naïve nor foolish. If it has pursued a certain course for decades, then that must be seen for what it is: a policy."<ref name="thehindu"/>

[[Andrew J. Nathan]] reviewed the book in ''[[Foreign Affairs]]'', noting that the book "is a slashing indictment of Pakistani strategy by a journalist who has covered South Asia for decades."<ref name="foreign affairs"/>

== Books ==
MacDonald has written three books on India and Pakistan:
* {{cite book |last=MacDonald |first=Myra |year=2007 |title=Heights of Madness: One Woman's Journey in Pursuit of a Secret War |publisher=Rupa & Company |isbn=9788129112866 }}
* {{cite book |last=MacDonald |first=Myra |year=2017 |title=Defeat is an Orphan: How Pakistan Lost the Great South Asian War |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9781849046411 }}
* {{cite book |last=MacDonald |first=Myra |year=2021 |title=White As the Shroud: India, Pakistan and War on the Frontiers of Kashmir |publisher=Hurst Publishers |isbn=9781787383982 }}

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:MacDonald, Myra}}
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Reuters people]]
[[Category:Scottish journalists]]
[[Category:Scottish women journalists]]
[[Category:Scottish newspaper editors]]
[[Category:Siachen conflict]]
[[Category:Writers about the Kashmir conflict]]
[[Category:Year of birth missing (living people)]]

Myra MacDonald - Revision history

Bot: robot: Create/update articles. If there is a mistake please report on my talk page.