by G Parthasarathy
Criticising the military in Pakistan could be dangerous for Pakistanis. It is, therefore, rare to see Pakistani authors pick on the country’s military frontally, spelling out how disastrous and costly military rule and dominance have been for the evolution of Pakistan as a united, viable, peaceful and economically vibrant nation-state. Ayesha Siddiqa showed remarkable courage in exposing how Pakistan’s rapacious military has taken dominant control of vast sectors of the country’s economy, in her book Pakistan Inc.
Journalist-turned-diplomat Husain Haqqani’s book, Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military is likewise, a courageous, comprehensive and contemporary presentation of the excesses of the military establishment. Haqqani spells out in detail, how the military has led Pakistan to dismemberment, diplomatic isolation and religious fundamentalism, ever since the country’s birth as a self-proclaimed “homeland”, for the Indian sub-continent’s Muslims, in August 1947.
Each one of the book’s eight chapters deals with different periods and different aspects of Pakistan’s national life since 1947. Most importantly, it focuses on how the military, allied with the United States, sought to not only dominate national life, but also landed the country in disastrous conflicts with India in 1965 and 1971. Haqqani also does not spare the military of blame in the shortsighted strategy it adopted in trying to seize Jammu and Kashmir through force, almost immediately after Independence. Addressing the people of Pakistan, Jinnah loftily proclaimed on August 11, 1947: “You may belong to any religion, or caste or creed; that has nothing to do with the business of the State”. If this was indeed the case, what then was Jinnah’s rationale for a separate “homeland” for Muslims? According to a former British governor, Jinnah’s closest political ally Khwaja Nazimuddin, who succeeded him as Governor General of Pakistan, proclaimed: “He (Nazimuddin) did not know what Pakistan means”.
It was this confusion about what Pakistan “means”, since its very birth that led the country to disaster and dismemberment. It was Jinnah’s attempt to seize Kashmir by stealthy military action that led to senior officers like Major General Akbar Khan, using Islam as a justification for the army’s actions. This set the stage for the emergence of radical Islamic Parties like the Jamaat-e-Islami, which soon allied themselves with the military establishment. Islamic ideology also fitted in well with the Pakistani decision to join the American-led CENTO and SEATO to fight the Soviet Union’s “Godless” Communists. The seemingly endless flow of American arms and dollars led Pakistan’s arrogant military ruler, the self-proclaimed ‘Field Marshal’ Ayub Khan to declare: “ India is an external enemy, Islam is a national unifier and the US is the country’s provider of arms and finance”.
China joined the US as Pakistan’s backer against India after the 1962 Sino-Indian border conflict. It was this Sino-US complementarity on Pakistan that led to Ayub’s disastrous and failed effort to seize Kashmir in 1965. This, in turn, led to his forced exit from office. Haqqani thereafter describes at length how Ayub’s successor Yahya Khan massacred Bangladeshis in the name of “Defending Pakistan’s Ideological Frontiers”. The disastrous conflict that followed in December 1971 resulted in 79,200 officers and men of the Pakistan army and 12,500 civilian internees ending up in Indian custody. The Pakistan army’s myth that “one Muslim had the fighting powers of five Hindus” lay in tatters. No lessons were learnt after this disaster, with the Pakistan army, under General Zia-ul-Haq, again seizing control of the country in a coup in 1977. Haqqani explains how ever since then, the army has continued to control the country, particularly on relations with the India, Afghanistan, the US and China. Today, Pakistan is also the only country in the world whose nuclear arsenal is under military.
The country is effectively ruled by what Benazir Bhutto once described to me as a “Military, Mullah, and Madrassa Complex”.
Haqqani’s book contains details how the Pakistan Army continues to back radical Islamic outfits like the Taliban, the Haqqani Network, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed, in its effort to “bleed India with a thousand cuts” and install a radical Taliban-led government in Afghanistan. He very aptly notes in his concluding paragraphs: “For too long, Pakistan has defined its national objective as wresting Kashmir from India and, in recent years, establishing a client regime in Afghanistan. Unless Islamabad’s objectives are changed to focus on economic prosperity and popular participation in governance, the state will continue to turn to Islam as a national unifier”. As the Modi Government proceeds with its efforts to seek normalisation of relations with Pakistan, it would do well to keep a careful eye on whether there has indeed been any change in Pakistan Army’s propensity and passion to “bleed India with a thousand cuts”.
Those in India, who wish to have a understanding of policies and priorities of Pakistan’s military-led establishment, would do well to read this “insider’s account”. It would give a clear insight into what Indians should expect when India deals with a military dominated Pakistan.