Pak Tea House » Al Qaeda » Not doubting, just concerned
Not doubting, just concerned
By RAJA FATAH ALI
What about our Nukes? Are they save enough? Who were they? They belongs to CIA, MOSSAD, even RAW. They can’t be Al-Qaida. Well after claiming the responsibility, if someone say, “How claiming the attacks means that Al-Qaida or Talban did that, even I can claim the responsibility of attack, then I am not sure about his mental health”. Because we all can judge in a minute or so that who were they, if we had a very good look at situation and anger shown by Tehreek-e-Talban Pakistan after OBL operation in Abotabad. But we were calm because we want some real proof and intelligence or investigation report which can confirm Al-Qaida or Talban or if we do not be so specific about them, then we want a solid proof which shows that even pro-Islamist thinking or people having soft corner about Islamist and Jihadis are involved in these attacks. Now who can deny this (link below)?
http://tribune.com.pk/story/177133/pns-mehran-suspect-arrested-in-faisalabad/
If we go against this or deny then this is clearly a go against our own Pakistani security agencies and our think is supporting those so called True Muslims for them all Pakistanis are Wajib-Ul-Qatal and they can kill us anywhere, even at shrines of Sufis doing Kufar in front of them.
But the real question is, in this situation, as a Pakistani, if I want to ask that our nuclear assets are growing day by day with mounting military and defense budget and most importantly we got a bunch of Missiles then what about on ground security? What about 36 Million Dollars? How a Qari can manage to attack on PNS Mehran type of place? Then people will put some big allegations on me, like traitor. But the thing is, first of all in this situation what can people do? Where they will go to ask these questions not against army but from the army of Pakistan? And the answer is, they actually cant really.
So that is why this a gesture of showing few concerns for Army that we want parliament to take over and control our military and defense expenses as well as political and defense strategy so that we can ask all these questions to our elected members of parliament. This will be a huge sigh of relief for the people of Pakistan who do not deserve to hear only terrifying news about our national security on media.
Filed under: Al Qaeda · Tags: al-Qaida, people, responsibility, security
24 Responses to "Not doubting, just concerned"
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My guess, ISI soon will eliminate AQ Khan.
Pakistan army is a political army and being involved in politics for so long, has had a serve degrading influence on the professionalism of the army.
Pakistani army is presently engaged in war for which it not trained and the nature of this war is asysmetrical conflict involving non-state actors.
Pakistani army has traditionally trained to fight India in a conventional war but this war is different in the sense that it is a religious revolutionary war fought to secure political power within the state of Pakistan itself and therefore, the axis of threat to the security of Pakistan comes from within its own loss of sovereign authority and not from a challenge to its sovereign authority from an external source. The problem is that the Pakistani army, like any traditional army, is a bureaucratic entity and being a bureaucratic structure, it suffers from a lack of interia in reforming itself.
Reforming the Pakistani army is simply not a case of instituting reforms and ordering them to be implement, but this process involves an admission of failures that arose from selective policies of the army itself. What the army is fighting in the present religious-civil war within Pakistan is not terrorism as an idea but it is fighting the outward end result of its policies and the ideologies it encouraged in the name of Pakistani security itself.
PNS Mehran attack is not a case of a lack of transparency but a manifestion of the problem indicative of the fact that the Pakistani army is at war with itself and its confused reponse to the problem is symbolic of its own sense of an intitutional confusion in how to deal with the problem, which was self-created in the first place, within the orientation of its own bureaucratic framework that still continues to see the policies, which has led the Pakistani army and the forces to this present cul-de-sac, not as a problem.
The idea that a civilian control of the military will be the answer to the problem is a misleading statement and a faux-security blanket of psuedo liberals in Pakistan. Military policy and the policy options dealing with the security of the state have their basis in the politics of the state. It is the political imperatives of the state which define the national security interests of the state and then, task its military forces to actualize those options or to protect them.
The codification of these interests by the state and its identification then allows for the creation of a military strategy and the purpose of a military strategy, for which it is created, is the decision to apply organized violence towards the successful conclusion of a political goal. Wars are an act of political violence intended to attain a political aim by lessening the adversary’s will to resist the political demand being forced on him and the end of a successful war is alway the revivial of dipomacy to pursue political interests and the task of a military in a war, and the a nation’s military strategy is always designed to faciliate this aim.
Therefore, all wars orginate as a result of a political impasse and all wars end in a political peace and it is diplomacy and politics, which ensure the longevity of peace and peace is never guranteed soley by military victories.
In the case of Pakistan, a civilian control of the armed forces is problematic because it raises the questions of the competency of the Pakistani political leadership as civilan-military strageists. This statement does not imply that civilians,in Pakistan, cannot make good managers of the nation’s security policies because they lack a military background. The caveat to the statement is the realization that in order for the civilian political leadership of Pakistan to effectively impose a civilian authority on the military in Pakistan, the civilian leadership needs to understand the limitations of military power in a political sense.
Politics operates on the virtue of rhetoric and the military operates on the neccessity of logistics and this means that the civilian politicans cannot create, support, encourage condone and demand fulfillment of such policy choices that are not militarily feasible. In other words, for the civilian leadership in Pakistan to control the military, it means that civilian leadership disabuses itself of the idea of seeking populist Pakistani aspirations on the issue of Kashmir and it needs to educated the Pakistani public that Pakistan’s political policy on Kashmir cannot be militarily attained.
This in turn implies that the civilian leadership in Pakistan has to openly reject, discredit and disown the military’s strategic vision.
The question is, is the civilian leadership in Pakistan capable of this feat?
[...] Not doubting, just concerned [...]
On the point of conventional warfare and that of War against Terrorism, I agree. Sri Lanka fought the war against terrorism for more than 30 years. Even USA looks helpless in this war. Pakistan cannot fight this war for a longer period. Period. But she has to fight any way. There is no way out. Musharraf government put us in up to our necks. There is one silver lining, USA can not leave this scenario half way (and they have realized this after getting out of intoxicating period of jubilation of killing Osama). There are other skyscrappers in USA and Osama legacy continues. Besides, the simple fact is if Pakistan is left in the desert what would happen to the nukes. So, they can not shake hands and say goodbye. Pakistan will remain a parasite of America.
On the role of Military being under civilian control, I beg to differ big time. Through philosophical explanations you can camouflage the fact but you can not erase it outright. After the demise of Quaid-e-Azam, who ruled Pakistan, who made the policies, who said “rains or storm, we want this billions of the budget”, who made Pakistan a Security state? First the security threat was from East (India) now from West (Afghanistan and North Waziristan). The domination over Pakistani masses always remained in the hands that have guns. To silence the world opinion, a facade of puppet or helpless civil governments were decorated on the political stage. In nut shell, what Mr. Feroze Khan has given the arguments have repeatedly been given during the last sixty plus years. What is the result. Are we flourishing? Do we feel safe enough? Has not USA proved to the world that we are liars No.1. Change the system now or it will be never. No country is going to occupy this horrible country. It will simply break into four pieces, if things were not mended today.
@feroz
i think u have confused the things. the thing is Awam is providing taxes n Army dun have any mechanism so that Awam can ask them. so we just want to develop a mechanism to include people of Pakistan as a stack holder in this process. because they deserve.
@ Raja Fatah Ali
First of all, I am not confused. The Pakistani armed forces are supported by the IMF and United States’ Coalition Support Funds and not by the taxes of the Pakistani people, who to begin with pay no taxes. The insignificant majority that has no choice but to pay taxes, are not supporting the armed forces because their taxed income is insufficient to support the operational tempo of the armed forces.
Secondly, due to the nature of the relationship, the Pakistani army is accountable to its paymaster, the United States, and not to the Pakistani people. Since the United States is paying for the salaries of the Pakistani army, it has a justified right to demand that it needs to “do more” in the war on terror.
Third, if the Pakistani people think that they “deserve” a process of transparancy, accountibility and a stake in the process, they need do something more concrete about it rather just wishing they “deserve” it! The army will never answer to the people unless the people stand up for their rights like the Egyptians did and demand their rights!
There are no free lunches in this world! “Deserve”! LMAO!
ciao
The Egyptians demanded their rights. They got martial law.
As for the Pakistan army, one would think that fighting the war on terror would work to Pakistan’s advantage. Draining the swamp of the vipers your country created would save Pakistani lives. Besides, the Pak army has already demonstrated it’s incapable of winning a war, but quite effective at raping and killing its fellow countrymen and women (see East Pakistan).
As for American paymasters, you are correct. I for one would be happy to keep those dollars in the U.S. instead of flushing them down the toilet.
@feroz
well i was not saying that you are confused but the thing is you tried to confuse the readers.
Secondly, we are giving even more than Punjab budget to army that is why we deserve it.
and we are quite mature people, politically, we will not do anything to destabilize our own country, or actually we don’t need any sort of bloody revolution yet. thing are getting better as we all see Pasha and Kiyani were there in front of our elected leader delivering their justifications. n we ll get our due rights very soon. so take it easy. don’t be panic or create it.:)
Just a note to the editors: The huge size of the font in the new format is severely hurting my eyes. Please make it much, much smaller so I can read it better. Thanks.
@ Raja Fatah Ali
I just spend an afternoon talking about this very subject with a friend in Toronto. He honestly believes that Pakistan is only existing because of the Pakistani army. He believes that the attack on PNS Mehran was carried out by American trained Israel agents from India to destabilize Pakistan. He believes that Pakistani politicans would have sold Pakistan to India had it not been their fear of the Pakistani army!
You may deserve the moon, but the army does not respect the citizens of Pakistan and as long as the citizens of Pakistan fawn at the army and overlook its sins, nothing will change for the better in Pakistan.
If Pakistanis are politically mature people than Mickey Mouse taught logic to Socrates! Pakistanis have helped to destablize their own country by turning a blind eye to every act of oppression and folly undertaken in Pakistan in the name of Islam and “national security”.
Recently, ISI arrested Syed Shahzad Saleem, the correspondent for Asia Times Online because he wrote an article that argued that the attack on PNS Mehran was an inside job. As usual, the Pakistanis are silent like mice in front of a cobra, quivering with fright, because the victim dared to challenge the self-appointed guardians of Islam and the protectors of Pakistani national security!
Pasha and Kayani standing in front of the elected representives, who then reposed full confidence in the armed forces and did not have the tecticles to say anything negative about the army to the point that investigation into OBL raid will be carried out by the army! This is like asking a kleptomaniac to guard the store!
What expletive deleted form of accountibility is that?
ciao
To the Editors
Please reformat PTH as the font is too small and there are no lines between paragraphs. The old version was much better!
ciao
well i think its the end of discussion. because sitting out there in Toronto and talking to a friend is not enough. we are here in Pakistan and we listened few groups claiming the responsibility of these attacks. n for confirmation see the link i shared in my piece above. but if u still wanna hide your head in sand then u can, because u r well away from all this. but we need peoples participation through our own elected representatives. or tell me any other way to include the most deserving stake holders which are people of Pakistan? Army don’t even know politics so they should do the thing in which they are good. which is just defending. policy making is a political thing. so elected politicians and Army both should have equal share in policy making. our elected representatives don’t just deserve a fax from GHQ to read in front of media.
@ Raja Fatah Ali
The point of the conversation in Toronto was the mind set of the Pakistani people which still glorifies the role of the army in Pakistan. You are the one who is denying the obvious if you really think your “elected representatives” are really elected on the basis of your vote. Since 2008, what has this government accomplished? I support this government, despite it being a brilliant failure, to finish its term of office in 2013 and I support the idea of the army returning to the barracks.
One way for the Pakistani people to become stake holders in Pakistan is to make up their minds as what kind of Pakistan they wish to see. Do they wish to see a Pakistan that is forever engaged in a global jihad and has made an enemy of the world or do they wish to see a Pakistan that is stable, prosperous, peaceful and tolerant and at peace with its neighours?
Policy making is a political thing and it is best left to the civilians who are elected to make policy. Policy making by the elected civilian representives should never be shared with the armed forces and your statement, “policy making is a political thing. so elected politicians and Army both should have equal share in policy making” is a contradiction. Armed forces do not make policy; they implement it as it was given to them by the civilians and it is the job of the soldier to die for his/her country and it is the job of the politican to tell the soldier where to go and how to die for his/her country.
The Pakistani elected representives will continue to read ISPR releases as long as they look towards the GHQ for quidance and do not look towards the people for guidance. The representives of Pakistan should represent the interests of the people of Pakistan and not the whims of the corps commanders in Rawalpindi. As long as the so-called elected representives of Pakistan seek their mandates from the generals, they will respond to the needs of the GHQ and the people of Pakistan will never develop stake in the ownership of Pakistan.
Asif Ali Zardari had a golden opportunity in this crisis, but he lived up to the promise that a Pakistani politican never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Zardari should have fired Kayani and Pasha on the spot but he dithered and lost the chance to impose civilian control over the military.
ciao
PTH Editors:
The new format and the lay of the land are not quite user friendly
@feroz
at some point you are saying the same thing as i said. i agree your point that policy should be made by politicians and implemented by Army. this is the right way, and the direction is good but i am focusing on a milestone. when politicians will decide our army budget will be decided by parliament. look after Nukes and a bunch of missiles even Dr AQ Khan have said in his interview that Israel or even India will not impose war on us. but our enemies are within our self. at this point in time, we need to improve our on ground security and identify our enemies and friends both. so the money which we should spend on development, health or education, we are using that to increase missiles and nukes. i also read Tarek Fatah from Toronto. he clearly said that ISI and Army is misleading the nation and unable to device a strategy to get away from troubles created by themselves.
to readers
hold CTRL button and press + two or three times. this ll get the font right for the time being.
In America, politicans don’t make policies or even write the bills.
All is done by the lobbyists, think tanks, corporate elites, even military corps. all thru consensus.
Obviously pakistan is missing the elites who are separate from the military.
landlords are tied to the military, corporations are tied to the military
so there is no one independent. only bunch of liberal arts professional middle class
who don’t really have any clout. Asking politicians to stand up for your rights
is fool’s gold. politician looks first which way the wind is blowing then does a kabuki
dance to placate both sides. In other words you are asking for revolution which is
initiated by someone else.
Even your land has been sold to the arabs. you are foreigner in your own land.
http://caravanmagazine.in/Story.aspx?StoryId=912
I agree that there is a dire need of transparency in matters concerning the armed forces. We have already suffered on the hands of different dictators and politicians who have plundered millions just because of the lack of transparency.
The discussions on the PTH are a sad affair with pakistani muslims displaying a general inability to recognize their own real interests. USA, China, Saudi Arabia – each is an imperialist power. The USA represent capitalist fascism, China represents their own Han-chinese imperialism and ethno-fascism, Saudi has its own saud-family-centred fascism and islamic totalitarianism and imperialism. Pakistanis are only motivated by hate of everything hindu. That is what islam (exported from Makkah) teaches them mainly. This hate makes them blind to their own hindu identity, origin, roots, self-respect and brotherhood with India.
So we have a venomous cocktail here. The blinded-arabized sunni-fascists who “own” and control Pakistan are ready to be minions of USA, China and Saudi Arabia in order to hate India and bleed India. “Pakistan ka matlab kiya – hate and bleed Indiya.”
Most pakistanis are too frightened or uneducated or poor or islamically-arabically indoctrinated to realize this.
But even educated Pakistanis are blind and cowardly. How come USA and China do not realize which dirty game they are playing? Saudi Arabia will stick to its islamic fascism and arabic superiority complex.
The first victims of this are the pakistani people and the next are the indians. USA, China and arabs laugh over us who live in the indian subcontinent.
@ Raja Fatah Ali
Pakistan has no tax culture and the politicans pay no taxes but cheat on their taxes. For the politicans to control the military budget, they will have to first develop a practice of paying taxes and set the example themselves. The idea of citizenship and civic responsibility comes more from paying taxes than holding a passport.
Parliament is useless in Pakistan. The reason is that the politicans do not take it seriously and this lack of respect can be seen in the manner in which decisions are made in Pakistani politics. All major decisions in Pakistani politics are made outside of the parliament in the palatial houses of the politicans and never in parliament. Nothing is debated in parliament expect empty speeches full of empty promises. The sovereignity of the parliament is a joke and it is daily undermined by the very politicans elected (read nominated) to it.
Then, another issue is the unrepresentative leadership of the major political parties. Nawaz Sharif and Altaf Hussain are both heads of major political parties that are not elected to the parliament and therefore, technically speaking, are not accountable to the people or the parliament. There is no tradition of parliamentary politics in Pakistan.
Isreal and India do not have to impose war on Pakistan because Pakistan will implode under its own contradictions.
Pakistni army will continue to spend money on nuclear weapons and armaments until the idea of militarism itself is discredited in Pakistan.
ciao
http://tribune.com.pk/story/179397/wikileaks-isi-asked-saudis-to-stop-funding-nawazs-campaign/
Saudis fund Nawaz Sharif’s election camapign in 2008. Saudi Arabia is an enemy of Pakistan. Pakistanis should realize that Saudi Arabia has ruined Pakistan.
ciao
here is deadlock, if u ll not give them responsibilities then why should they take it seriously. when they got to know that they are elected to stand up front and just bear the criticism then what’s the point in taking their job seriously.
@ Raja Fatah Ali
What is the point of critism? Accountibility! Rights are never given away willingly and power is never given away – it is taken! If the so-called representative of Paksitan wish to be taken seriously, then they need to start acting serious and start legistating on the issues, which matter to the people and NOT TO THEMSELVES!
ciao
But for this we just need to support Democracy and don’t support few people who are trying to destabilize the things. Give democracy in Pakistan its due right. that is it.