Speculations...

[Sn. Subrahmanya]

This is what Mallory writes in his Speculations on Xinjiang mummies
(JIES,Vol23,Fall/Winter95) --
" The tendency to prefer a north-south split in the Aryan languages
as envisaged by Burrow(1973) continues to some extent (with a 90deg
shift in orientation) in the more recent works of Parpola(1988,
and forthcoming) which confront one of the greatest problems of
Indo-Iranian origins, i.e it is far easier to find Indo-Iranian 'culture',
eg: chariots, horse sacrifice, pastoral economies, in the steppe region
from the Black Sea to the Yenisei than in the actual historical seats
of the Indo-Aryans, Persains & Medes  (Mallory in press, a). Any putative
Aryan migration into northwest India will find more archeological
evidence constructed from parallels with Central Asian urban sites than
with their steppe neighbours and hence the historically attested Indo-Aryans
or Iranians generally involves a model whereby the northern steppe tribes
come to dominate those of the Central Asian urban centres, and having
acquired the latter's material culture penetrate farther east. In this way,
for example Parpola ascribes the Timber-grave culture to the 'West Aryans'
while the more easterly Andronovo culture is regarded as 'East Aryan', i.e
the Proto-Indo-Aryans, who move into the area of Central Asian urbanism
during the period 1800-1500BC."

So with the 90deg shift in orientation, dominating urban sites,
acquiring material wealth the Aryans turn up in time in north-west India,
and all this using their chariot-tanks -- It sounds more like a panzer
blitzkrieg.
And we are told that the invasion theory is "out" and migration is the "in"
thing.
Only the terminology changes, the concepts remain.

Subrahmanya
Houston, TX