The newspaper was so much harassed by the Musharraf junta that he refused to publish anymore of my articles although his father late Tajmir Shah was a friend of mine !
This sets at rest all fiction about freedomn of press in Musharraf dictatorship !
A.H AMIN
11 OCT 2003
THE GATHERING STORM PUBLISHED IN DAILY STATESMAN PESHAWAR
The Gathering Storm
A.H Amin
In October 1947 Mr Jinnah initiated a strategic masterstroke known as “ Operation Curzon ? under which for brigade groups i.e Razmak Brigade Group , Bannu Brigade Group,Wana Brigade Group and Gardai Brigade Group were withdrawn from the Trans Indus Tribal Areas later more familiarly known as FATA etc ! Operation Curzon constituted a brilliant culmination of a senseless Frontier Policy dating from Mughal times and inherited by the British from the Sikhs in 1849 during which many billions were lost in pointless Frontier Expeditions and in construction of innumerable picquets , roads , and forts !
In 2002 Pakistan came back to square one once pedants spurred by USA reversed the entire brilliant policy initiated by Jinnah ! The tribesman who had greeted the withdrawing Pakistan Army Brigades during Operation Curzon with harmless playful sniping are today all set to resist an unjust policy initiated by an unelected military junta !
If the entire tract between Draband and Malakand was a land of death for the occupying Mughal , Sikh or British Indian Army , sadly history is witnessing a repetition in 2003 ! What was won by an elected founding father has been driven into a bottomless quagmire by unelected men who govern without accountability reinforced by Draconian coercive powers of arbitrarily initiated laws like NAB ordinance !
Unfortunately vision and forethought are not the hallmarks or cardinal attributes of the personality of many of the know all experts sitting on the pinnacles of organizations dealing with strategy and intelligence ! Conversely intelligence has been reduced to serving US policy interests and into coercing politicians to change party loyalties ! Thus the gathering storm of dissent and possible armed insurrection on Pakistan’s Western borders is naievely underestimated by pedants who as some great Victorian poet stated have never set a squadron in the field nor know the division of battle more than a spinster !
Under the prextext of fighting the war on terror and with the naieve aim of acquiring limited military aid an idea is being rationalized that Pakistan’s regular army must take over the tribal areas of NWFP and Baluchistan ! Outwardly neat and theoretically sound as far as staying inside cosy sand model rooms in military schools or colleges of instructions or in briefing halls in high sounding agencies dealing with silent warfare and information wars , the whole idea is dangerous, explosive and essentially counter productive !
The Tribal areas of Pakistan had been a blessing for this country in war ! In 1965 and 1971 Wars Pakistan Army could forget about their Western Borders ! In the Afghan war of 1979-99 these areas were a strategic asset ! Now alas some experts by virtue of institutional power bull dozed into practice out of short term vision and running after petty awards are all set to initiate a dangerous policy which may prove to be the Spanish Ulcer of Pakistan Army !
Similarly in Baluchistan the same thinking is being advanced and Pakistans policy pundits are all set to introduce the police system which has already miserably failed in settled areas of Pakistan ! Part of the motivation of this naieve decision springs from personal ambitions of some high officials who are unhappy with having only 5 % control over their provinces total area !
While these pedantic decisions are put into practice another fatal combination is full effect ! Once again the Indian RAW and the old elements of Afghan KHAD are combining to wage a deadly low intensity war in Pakistan’s Western Borders ! It is common knowledge that the Afghans are the largest and most invisible minority in Pakistan with strong presence in key economic sectors like transport construction etc .Thus recruits for sabotage are no problem in any likely covert operation ! Ironically many are daily launched by this deadly combine like the sectarian assassinations !
Wars in this age are essentially low intensity wars ! It is logical that Indians would seek their strategic redress of grievances of losses suffered in Kashmir in NWFP and Baluchistan and in Sindh ! Ironically their task has been made easier by Pakistani military junta’s naieve policies in NWFP and Baluchistan’s tribal areas !
Pakistan has already come to grief in 1971 ! Thanks to naieve policies of the military usurper Ayub which alienated the Bengalis ! The next low intensity war may be fatal ! In 1971 there was West Pakistan to fall back upon ! In the next conflict the existence of what remains of Pakistan may be at stake ! Baluchistan and NWFP can absorb thrice as many Pakistani troops as Indian Held Kashmir can absorb !
Lastly it would be most appropriate to quote Tolstoy about the harms that military juntas inflict ; The military juntas are like entities which sit on a man’s back , choking him and making him carry them and yet assure themselves that they are very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means—except by getting off his back ! Allah be praised !
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