PAKISTAN: THE IDEA IS SELF-DESTRUCTING

Pakistan is an idea that was doomed to fail the moment it got the shape of a state. Although MA Jinnah himself divided India into two on the basis of religion, he held on to the exactly opposite belief that had it not been for the the "angularities" between Hindus and Muslims, and communities within them, "we would have been free people long long ago. No power can hold another nation, and specially a nation of 400 million souls in subjection; nobody could have conquered you, and even if it had happened, nobody could have continued its hold on you for any length of time, but for this. Therefore, we must learn a lesson from this." Ironically, these words by were uttered just three days before Pakistan became a reality.

For many reasons, Jinnah could not see that there was a fundamental and irreconcilable clash between what he had done and what he believed, not just for his Pakistan but for the whole of India that he belonged to till August 14, 1947. That is why, despite doing what he should never have based on a set of his own beliefs, he visualised Pakistan as a state that would have nothing to do with the only one dimension along which it had been created: Islam. He did not want his creation to fall into the same trap that had divided, weakened and subjugated India in the past, and that he had pushed it into, again.

One can only speculate what would have happened had Pakistan become a secular state and had not systematically driven out/converted almost all Hindus and Sikhs who became its citizens on August 14, 1947. May be the recurring fear in some sections of Pakistan that it would have re-merged with India would have come true. It is equally possible that it may have flourished as an Independent country.

The way events have unfolded over the last few decades, and as they are playing out right now in Pakistan, it is becoming increasingly evident that the new nation sealed its future the moment it decided to define itself only on the basis of Islam, after Jinnah's demise. It is worth repeating here that Pakistan is the only multi-ethnic, multi-lingual state created from nowhere on the basis of Islam. Perhaps Jinnah was aware that the Arabs from whose land Islam emanated, and who were all Muslims, had never been politically united by their religion. Despite one language, one race and one religion, they are now divided into 22 countries. In fact, it is likely that had it not been for oil and the Americans - who are there and keeping things under tight control because of their need for that oil - not only would Arabs have remained pathetically underdeveloped, the many countries that they have created would have been at each others' throats.

Those who guided Pakistan after Jinnah obviously did not learn any lessons even from subsequent developments in the Arab word. Had they done so, they would have seen that all efforts to unite Arabs ended in failure. The brief unification of Egypt and Syria as United Arab Republic lasted just three years between 1958 and 1961. The Arab Federation between Iraq and Jordan lasted all of five months in 1958. The effort that survived the longest was the Federation of Arab Republics between Egypt, Libya and Syria that lasted five years from 1972 to 1977. Why could people of one race and one language not come together? Why did Islam fail to unite them? Was it due to various erroneous, intolerant, conflicting and violent interpretations of Islam that the concept of Muslim brotherhood could not be translated into political unity?

The first jolt to the idea and ideology of Pakistan was given by the breaking away of East Pakistan in 1971. That division was not an aberration. It could not have happened any other way. West Pakistan would never have ceded control to the more populous Eastern half; religious affinity was not strong enough to reconcile the practical demands of political power. The remaining part of Pakistan, the one known as Pakistan today, could possibly have been kept intact after that split, had its leaders learnt the right lessons and not tried to 'invent' Pakistan as a logical entity by manufacturing India's history solely on the basis of Islam, with the attendant rejection of and hatred towards all other influences and developments that are integral to this ancient land, to which they still belong as much as any one else does, even though they want to pretend otherwise.

But, Pakistan's leaders decided to take what is going to prove to be a catastrophic turn, by turning towards Wahhabi Islam, the version of the religion that is followed in Saudi Arabia. As per William Dalrymple," Saudi Arabians have invested heavily in madrasas in the North-West Frontier Province and Punjab, with dramatic effect, radically changing the religious culture of an entire region." The Taliban and the Al Qaida are the visible militant faces of this version of Islam which is completely intolerant of all other faiths. They were encouraged to flourish in Pakistan and Afghanistan because they were thought to be the perfect ideological weapons, forged on an erroneous interpretation of the concept of jihad, that could be exploited to oppose both the Western world and India, with the ultimate aim of ushering in the political rule of Islam all over the world.

Wahhabi Islam is so radical that it rejects all other versions of Islam, including Shia, too. It should, therefore, have been anticipated by the handlers and trainers of the Taliban, Lahskar-e-Toiba etc that whenever these groups thought there was an opportunity, they would try to establish the rule of this version of Islam in the whole of Pakistan. It should also have been anticipated that men following this ideology would penetrate the military too. There is little doubt that has already happened over a period of time, with the military brass turning a blind, even indulgent eye to it. The extent of the penetration is not yet fully known to outsiders, and I suspect that this will prove to be critical in the months ahead.

In February 2009, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari had admitted that his country was fighting for 'survival' in the face of the onslaught of the Taliban. No one took him seriously then, given his dubious track record. But the speed at which developments have unfolded over the last eight months proves that he was speaking the truth. The danger is real and grave.

Pakistan first tried to bury disturbing developments in the Swat Valley by buying peace with the Taliban by handing it over to them and allowing them to introduce Sharia there. Within weeks, however, the army had to go in to clean them out and re-establish control of the state. In the middle of all this, over two million people fled Swat, creating a huge humanitarian crisis. That did little to get things under control and terror attacks have continued unabated till now.

In October, a number of terror attacks, including a day long siege of the army headquarters, took place in three of Pakistan's four provinces. More dangerously, they involved not only Pashtuns but also Punjabi and Kashmiri factions nurtured and trained by the ISI to fight India. These have forced Pakistan's armed forces to launch military operations in South Waziristan where the Taliban are based, employing jet fighters, attack helicopters and tanks and around 28,000 troops. They have captured Kotkai, home town of Taliban Chief Hakimullah Mehsud, and claim that militants will be flushed out within a month. Is the story going to end there? It has only begun.

The reaction of the Taliban to the latest military offensive has impacted the whole of Pakistan like never before. Schools and colleges were shut in all four provinces following an attack on the Islamic University in Islamabad. Terror is now no longer confined to Pakistan's wild west. Also, for the first time ever, Pakistani Army has made the startling admission that the country faces a serious threat from coordinated attacks by Punjabi, Al Qaida and Taliban militants who include soldiers in their ranks and span the whole country.

In July 2009, former Pakistan President Perez Musharraf, the cocky commando who invents victory even in humiliating defeat, boasted in an interview with Karan Thapar that he foresaw no danger to Pakistan from the Al Qaida or Taliban "as long as the armed forces are there".

In that assertion was the unspoken admission that Islam, instead of keeping Pakistan together, has achieved exactly the opposite, and that the state of Pakistan survives only because the military is in a position to hold it together through the use of force. 63 years after Pakistan was created, the glue that brought it together has turned into an explosive. There is now effectively nothing left to keep the people bound together in a natural union.

The military has held out till now, even though it is having to fight the very forces that it once created to act as its 'force multipliers', as weapons of the Pakistani state against infidels in the East and West of the country. Learning from history, it has reportedly deployed non-Pashtun troops in its ongoing operations in South Waziristan. But with Punjabi extremists also beginning to join the fight against the state in the form that it exists today, a state that supports the Satan US in its ground operations in Afghanistan and drone attacks in Pakistan against 'pure Islamists', it is perhaps only a matter of time before the military faces a serious rebellion from within. Whenever that happens, Pakistan will unravel even faster than we can imagine now. It is only a question of time.

Fatima Bhutto, niece of slain leader Benazir Bhutto, can also see that Pakistan is hell-bent on self-destruction. Manufacture of fear, she says, has become its chief industry and made it a country of debilitating Chinese whispers. "What happens to a Pakistan that can no longer defend itself from its own people?", she asks. The answer to that question must be haunting many Pakistanis.

History has already proved Jinnah wrong. No one has suffered more from the Partition of India than the very Muslims for whose empowerment Jinnah forgot his own secular understanding of the factors that led to India's subjugation. Divided in three countries, they have lost the power and influence that they would have wielded in a united India. Those who are now Pakistanis and Bangladeshis have also lost the opportunity of being a part of an India that is rapidly emerging as an economic super power. They are now huddled into two small nations. Bangladesh is an almost inconsequential country while Pakistan has made such an unpardonable mess of itself that, no matter what political shape its geographical area takes, bar the shouting their bankrupt country/countries will henceforth be remote-controlled by some external power or the other. Subjugation is back.

The "angularities" between and within religions that Jinnah spoke of have, thanks to the path Pakistan has chosen, become irreconcilable ideologies - Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilisations - with no common ground for peaceful co-existence. But, no matter what anyone might say, the harsh reality is that in a changed world, Al Qaida, Taliban, Lashkar-e-Toiba and similar Islamic extremist groups are not going get Pakistan anywhere by pursuing the violent path of intolerance of and confrontation with those whose beliefs and practices are at variance with theirs. On the contrary, as is already more than evident, they are only going to rapidly drive Pakistan into poverty, deprivation and eventual self-destruction.

Perhaps this is one of those lessons that will be learned only after a violent course has destructively spent itself fully.

Picture: The Guardian
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ZARDARI'S ADMISSIONS: NEW DAWN OR POWER PLAY?

A stunning admission like this, made not long after victory has been achieved but when the danger is still potent and life-threatening, takes a lot of courage. That too by the President of a country that has for decades employed terror as a means of achieving "strategic" national objectives. This is not the first time that Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari has spoken out against terrorists. But never before has any Pakistani head of government, or even senior politician, gone this far to admit the role of the state in actively promoting terrorism.

"Let us be truthful to ourselves and make a candid admission...militancy and extremism emerged on the national scene...because they were deliberately created and nurtured as a policy to achieve some short term tactical objectives." This is what Zardari openly said a couple of days ago.

These words would have undoubtedly created huge tremors in sections of the Pakistani establishment that still are on the old path, ongoing military operations against the Talban notwithstanding. At any rate, these words have raised hopes of a new dawn in Pakistan and indeed the whole of South Asia. But is such optimism justified? Or is there more to it than meets the eye in Zardari's continuing offensive against Islamic extremism and terrorism?

In an interview given to NBC on May 07, 2009, Zardari had said that the ISI and the CIA had together created the Taliban. In a similar vein, in his keynote address at the Socialist International Congress at Athens in Greece on July 01, 2009, he had blamed the US for exploiting Pakistan "as a tool of Cold War intrigue" and abandoning it after the Soviets were defeated in Afghanistan, "to the forces of extremism and fanaticism". It may be recalled that almost a year back, he had warned that the Taliban should be banned because Pakistan faced a grave danger from it, and had alleged that President Musharraf was taking their side while pretending to fight with the US against them. Then, in an interview to the Wall Street Journal in October 2008, he had gone to the extent of calling militant groups operating in Kashmir "terrorists" - something he later denied after there was a predictable uproar in Pakistan - and declared that India was not a threat to his country.

If we analyse all these statements together, it becomes clear that the wily Zardari is carefully laying the blame for all the fundamentalist mess that Pakistan finds itself in today at the feet of the military establishment without saying as much. And he is not resorting to any falsehoods to do that: it is the military that has been calling the shots always, even when civilian governments have been in power.

Examine the following facts:

• Zardari's latest and most startling admission was made in an address to senior bureaucrats where he made it clear that terrorists have challenged the state not "because the civil bureaucracy was weakened and demoralised" but because of the policy to use them to achieve short term tactical objectives. Who laid down the policy? General Zia-ul-Haq. And objectives? Other leaders, primarily military.
• What is the ISI that Zardari has blamed for creating the Taliban? It is a powerful intelligence outfit that is a part of the Pakistani military establishment. Army Chief Kiyani was, in fact, heading it before he took over his present assignment.
• Who first decided to send terrorists to Indian Kashmir to meet "tactical objectives"? The military again, under Zia-ul-Haq. That is why Zardari called them terrorists.
• The "heroes of yesteryears until 9/11" are the terrorists of today who have begun to haunt Pakistan, says Zardari. Evidently, as far as he is concerned, there are no "good" terrorists or "freedom fighters"; all of them, including those fighting the Indians in Kashmir, are now haunting Pakistan, and need to be eliminated.
• As far as the influential role of the army is concerned, Zardari says that he is in control of everything in the country, including the military, and that the Parliament has the final say. That is what Zardari wants. As everyone knows, it is the Army Chief who is the last word in Pakistan; he is the one every civilian President has to be wary of.

Had such encouraging statements which virtually echo what India has been saying for decades been made by a military ruler of Pakistan, one could have safely concluded that they reflect radically new thinking in that country and could well lead to a new dawn in the relations between India and Pakistan based on mutual self-respect and peaceful co-existence with zero tolerance for religious extremism and violence. But when a civilian President, and that too Zardari, once famous as Mr Ten Percent for the bribes he took when his wife Benazir Bhutto was PM, makes them, there has to be a sub-plot.

Zardari's admissions are best seen in the context of the power struggle that has been going on between the military and the civilian government that came to power last year. Initially, Nawaz Sharif and Zardari got together and got rid of President Musharraf. But after that, Zardari deviously made himself the President and left Sharif nursing his wounds. Sharif got one back later in forcing Zardari to reinstate the Supreme Court judges dismissed by Musharraf etc, and Zardari has not been able to recover lost ground since then. General Kiyani is keen to clip Zardari's wings even further and turn him into an irrelevant puppet while he pursues the military's agenda for Pakistan from behind the scenes. If he cannot be reigned in, Kiyani will want to replace him by a pliant individual or even himself, in keeping with the glorious traditions of some of his predecessors.

Zardari knows all this too well. So, what better insurance to safeguard his own position than speaking the anti-Taliban, anti-madrassa and anti-terror line that is soothing music to the ears of the the US and the rest of the moderate world, and putting Kiyani on the defensive by publicly all but blaming the dominance of the military for the mess that the country is in today?

May be Zardari is aiming even higher to ensure that the Army does not take over in future again and accepts the supremacy of the civilian leadership finally. He may even succeed, given the way things are beginning to shape, and the fact that Barack Obama is in the White House. But till he or any other civilian leader can fully demonstrate that it is his writ that runs in Pakistan and that the military has finally succumbed to the democratic will of the people, such admissions, no matter how dramatic, must be seen only in the context of the internal struggle that Pakistan is going through and not as a fundamental change in its basic outlook or attitudinal orientation towards its immediate neighbours.

A new dawn is not yet on the horizon.
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LAHORE UNDER ATTACK, PAKISTAN UNDER SIEGE

Terrorists have struck in the very heart of Pakistan once again, this time even more dramatically and more purposefully than when they had attacked the Sri Lankan cricket team on March 03, 2009. Wearing police uniforms, around 20 heavily armed terrorists attacked the Police Training Centre in Manawan area of Lahore this morning, killing at least 12 and wounding 70 others.

As per reports coming in as this is being written, the terrorists have taken control of the centre and are holding 800 policemen hostage. Attack helicopters are circling the sky, the city has been placed under curfew, armoured carriers have moved in and the Special Action Group of the Army is preparing to launch an assault to eliminate them and free the hostages. Almost seven hours since the attack was launched, firing is still on, one terrorist has been killed and a couple of them have been injured. This time, the terrorists are clearly digging in for a long fight to the bitter end. The similarities with what happened in Mumbai on November 26, 2008 are striking.

Pakistan is under attack. From within. Just a couple of days after President Barack Obama said that "Al Qaeda and its extremist allies are a cancer that risks killing Pakistan from within", unidentified jihadis have graphically demonstrated that the threat they pose is real and that the American President has his finger on the button about the danger that Pakistan faces to its very existence in its present form. Pakistani President Zardari has been saying for long that his country is in danger of being taken over by the Taliban. But his country has so got used to being in a state of denial since 1947 that it has simply lost the capacity to honestly accept the reality that has steadily hollowed the state from within and brought it to the brink of collapse.

When terrorists attacked the Sri Lankan cricket team, to me it was clear that the message of their attack was beyond the obvious and was far more dangerous and fundamental than was immediately apparent. Expectedly, Pakistan relapsed into a denial mode and there were even allegations that India was behind the attack. Certain that Radical Islam was now aiming for the very heart of Pakistan, for the state of Pakistan itself, I had then anticipated that the attack on the Sri Lankan team would be followed by a graduated increase in attacks on "un-Islamic" symbols like cinema halls, music shops, girls not fully covered up etc. to convert Punjab and Sindh also into fully Islamic territories. With the Taliban already less than 150 kms from Islamabad and operating with relative ease even in other parts of Pakistan, the danger was too stark to be dismissed.

Today's attack on the most visible symbol of the law and order machinery of the Pakistani state in the heart of Punjab province which itself is the heart of Pakistan shows that the Islamists are in a real hurry to devour the whole nation. Worse, the ease with which they have planned and executed this attack and the previous one proves that their tentacles have already spread deep and wide, including within many organs of the establishment. That is a disturbing fact that has to be faced squarely by not only sane elements in Pakistan but also the US and India. Only then can the challenge of radical Islamists be successfully countered.

The Americans say that the ISI is continuing to help the Taliban fighting NATO troops in Afghanistan by giving them money, supplies and strategic planning guidance. If the ISI is double-crossing the Americans so blatantly, is anyone under any illusion as to what it would be doing with terrorist groups that it has spawned to take on India? Why do you think there was such a coordinated effort to deny any involvement of Pakistan in the Mumbai terror attack till there was no choice but to admit it? Why do you think even after the admission that part of the conspiracy was hatched in Pakistan, the trail has gone cold? Why do you think that after the cosmetic arrests of a few Lashkar-e-Toiba leaders in the wake of Mumbai 26/11, the outfit is continuing its activities as vigorously as ever, as the recent encounter in Kashmir in which 17 terrorists were killed shows?

The fact that the ISI is able to do operate unchecked against both the Americans and the Indians without any fear of the state should leave no one in any doubt that support for its covert operations has the blessings at the highest echelons in the Pakistani military establishment. General Pervez Kiyani was heading the ISI under Musharraf before he took over as Army Chief from him. If he does not know how the ISI operates and what it is up to then who will? Musharraf himself has repeatedly being saying that it is the ISI and the Army that all but define the state of Pakistan. Need anything more be said? If both of them do not know what is happening in the ground beneath their feet, then it is either a shameless lie or Pakistan is inexorably headed into a dark, dangerous abyss.

Lahore is under siege. Jinnah's Pakistan is under attack. Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik says that this is an attack on the sovereignty of Pakistan. He believes that the elements operating in Afghanistan are most likely behind this attack. The Taliban have dramatically arrived in the heart of a seemingly helpless Pakistan much before any one thought they would. They could not have reached there in this manner without a measure of local support and the help and guidance of a section of the establishment.

This leads straight to the deduction that it is not the Pashtuns alone who have come under the influence of radical, Wahhabi Islam and the Al Qaida which is its most visible, militant face. There are many Punjabis too who have crossed over ideologically. They are the ones who are using the structures of the establishment that they are part of to destroy it and replace it with the set up that they had put in place in Afghanistan after the Soviets were driven out of that country.

What happened in Afghanistan earlier led to 9/11. What is happening in a nuclear Pakistan has frightening implications for the whole world, should Radical Islamists succeed in overrunning the remaining parts of the country, its heartland. The Americans already know that the Al Qaida and the Taliban are thriving in the Western parts of Pakistan. That is one reason why President Barack Obama has said that Pakistan is central to America's war in Afghanistan.

Today's attack in Lahore is a clear sign that Radical Islamists have moved into Pakistan's core. America's war on terror has now all but spread physically to the whole of Pakistan. More ominously, its enemy must soon include the ISI and will eventually include a significant chunk of Pakistan's military leadership, if not its rank and file. Fighting and defeating such elements who are part of and often indistinguishable from the liberal elements that define the state of Pakistan is not going to be easy. Nor is this war going to be short.

The the future of the whole world is inextricably linked to the drama of death that has been unleashed by the Al Qaida and similar Islamists who want to establish the rule of their version of Islam over Pakistan and the whole world. This is the one "world war" in which defeat is not an option, no matter what the cost.

UPDATE

Pakistani security forces have succeeded in ending the siege 8 hours and 40 minutes after it began. One terrorist has been killed, three have blown themselves up and one, believed to be a Pashtun, has been captured. The injured are being screened to find out if there is any terrorist among them. The interior Minister of Pakistan says that the attack was carried out by the Taliban.


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5. Attack on Sri Lankan cricketers: no room for pretence now

PAKISTAN'S LONG MARCH TO CHAOS CONTINUES

Nawaz Sharif and, as per some reports, his brother Shahbaz Sharif have been put under house arrest by Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari in a desperate effort to ensure that the Long March that the duo had started does not bring the country's capital to a halt. This long march will, in all likelihood, end in some sort of a compromise settlement between Nawaz Sharif and Zardari. Notwithstanding how it plays out, the harsh fact that cannot be escaped is that this standoff will strengthen and hasten the long march of the Taliban to Islamabad and the rest of Pakistan.

One would have expected that in the wake of the terror attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, all moderate mainstream politicians would come together to face the challenge that Pakistan faces from the Islamic radicals who have already overrun large parts of the country. That is what they had done after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and to remove Gen Musharraf as President. But no, they seem to have learnt no lessons from the mess they have been making right since the creation of the country. That feudal, tribal mindset is too deeply ingrained.

Zardari has been candidly admitting that his country is afflicted by the cancer of terrorism and that it is in danger of being run over by the Taliban. When the President of a country is alive to the grave danger his country faces, a reminder of which was graphically given in the Lahore terror attack, then it is but natural to expect that he will show a sense of responsibility and an understanding of his role as President in these difficult times whose reverberations are likely to be felt for a very long time. Unfortunately, he has not only been unable to shake free of the politics of blatant deceit that got him to the President's office but has now got into a war of petty political vendetta against the very Nawaz Sharif with whom had joined hands earlier.

The immediate provocation to the present crisis is the decision of the Musharraf-appointed judges of the Supreme Court to declare Nawaz Sharif ineligible to contest elections and also declare null and void the election of his younger brother, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, leading to the fall of his government and imposition of Governor's rule. There are reports that the Army, taking advantage of the situation, is planning to stage a coup. But, that possibility is remote, notwithstanding the noises that are emanating from different quarters.

For one, the current fight is between two of Pakistan's most powerful politicians and not between the military and the civilian government. Things have not deteriorated between Zardari and Kiyani to the extent they had between Musharraf and Sharif in the backdrop of Musharraf's misadventure in Kargil without keeping Sharif in the loop. In fact, it appears that even otherwise Gen Kiyani is already calling the shots. Imran Khan had said as much a few days back. The present crisis has made the General's position even stronger. Secondly, the US is now monitoring Pakistan closely almost in real-time, and holds all the cards too, with Pakistan now an economic basket case and with US forces in Afghanistan. Therefore, Kiyani cannot afford to take over unless the US gives him a green signal which it is not going to, at least for now.

Zardari has clearly bitten more than he can chew. But, given his great manipulation skills, it is inconceivable that he would have precipitated such a crisis unless he was dead sure of the support of the US. Such dangerous games cannot be played without very strong anchors. One thing needs to be understood: Zardari, no matter how dishonest he may be, is clearly a "dove" among hawks. In a sea of Punjabis, he is the face of a moderate Sindh. For the US, he is therefore the one valuable asset that it would not like to lose in its efforts to contain hard line and pro-Taliban elements in the Pakistani establishment, including its military.

That is the main reason why there will no coup in Pakistan, at least in the near future. That is also why, unless this crisis takes an unexpectedly dramatic turn, Zardari is not going to lose his job. That is perhaps why he has dug in his heels. He will give in, there is no doubt, but will not "surrender" to the pressure tactics of Nawaz Sharif. Also, both will agree to a deal brokered not between them but for them by Washington. Hillary Clinton has already spoken to both the warring 'lords'; Richard Holbrooke has been on the ball too, for quite sometime.

So, where is Pakistan already? On the one side, the Taliban are less than 90 miles from Islamabad, with a demonstrated capability to strike at will anywhere in the Pakistan still under the control of the federal government. On the other side is the United States, which has appropriated the role of a "super-government" that is the final arbiter of all important internal affairs of the country. A truly united and independent Pakistan has already passed into history. That Pakistan exists only in the minds of those who foolishly think that a few nukes, the ISI and a large military are enough to define nation-state of Pakistan and mark its independence.

A solution to the present crisis will be found. There is no choice. Pakistani leaders may not realise how high the stakes are and how foolishly they are ruining their country, but the US does, at least partially. It will keep Zardari in business for the foreseeable future and will accommodate the Sharif brothers too. No matter what the solution, no matter who loses more face or less, the stark fact is that this crisis will further erode the credibility of the Pakistani state and of its mainstream non-Islamic institutions, including democracy.

This is just what the radical Islamists in the Army, the ISI and other institutions of the state want. They are simply not programmed to live in peace with themselves and with Pakistan's size. They want to usurp Afghanistan and Kashmir, destroy India and be in the vanguard of the jehad that seeks to establish Islamic rule over the whole world. They want the US out of Afghanistan, for which they will try every trick in the book to force it to cut a deal with the artificially created "good" Taliban, as Fareed Zakaria calls the 'benign' elements who he believes want to wantonly behead people within Pakistan only and cause no harm to the US and others.

Pakistan's Long March to chaos continues unchecked. Whichever way one looks at it, one cannot shake the feeling that events are all moving towards an inevitable and bloody climax that will profoundly impact the future of the whole world. India needs to ready itself for the developments which will effect it, both before and after that flashpoint. For that, its leaders will have to do more than mindlessly keep saying that India is "worried" about the developments in that country and parroting that "a strong and stable Pakistan" is essential for the region.

UPDATE

The crisis has blown over. Nawaz Sharif has won. Zardari has given in. After a late night meeting between Army Chief Kiyani and Prime Minister Gilani, the government has ordered the reinstatement of former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Iftikhar Chaudhary and other judges who were sacked by Musharraf. He will take charge on March 21. Section 144 has also been lifted and arrested activists are being released. The disqualification of Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif by the court will be reviewed. The Long March has been called off by a jubilant Sharif. The Army, as I had assessed, has remained in the barracks.
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ATTACK ON SRI LANKAN CRICKETERS: NO ROOM FOR PRETENCE NOW

The inevitable has happened. This morning eight to ten terrorists armed with rockets, AKs and grenades attacked the bus carrying Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore, the capital of Pakistan's largest state Punjab. In the attack, five security persons were killed and three were injured. At least six Sri Lankan cricketers were injured too. The tour has been abandoned and the players are flying back home.

As per the driver of the bus in which Sri Lankan cricketers were travelling to the Gaddafi stadium, a rocket was fired at the bus but it missed it because the bus was turning at a roundabout. A hand grenade thrown at the bus went under it. After that, facing small arms fire, he drove the bus quickly to the safety of the stadium, due to which further casualties were prevented. Had the rocket hit the bus, the entire team would have been eliminated. In what appears to be a providential escape, Mahela Jayawardane, Kumar Sangakkara, Ajantha Mendis, Thila Samaraweera, Tharanga Paranvithana and Chaminda Vaas escaped with injuries. All are out of danger.

Another fact that has emerged is that the terrorists targeted only the Sri Lankan and not the Pakistani team. The attack lasted nearly half an hour after which all of then simply disappeared. Till now, no arrests have been made. Naturally, there are questions being raised that the terrorists had detailed inside information about the movement of the players. They also probably had support from elements either in the police or the military that enabled them to get so close to the stadium and then effect a clean get-away too.

As this is being written, there are unbelievable live visuals on the TV screen showing a military helicopter, not players, on the pitch of the Gaddafi stadium. It is there to fly out the Sri Lankan players straight to the airport. No one in Lahore is willing to take the risk of taking the players out of the stadium by road.

This is not Taliban country; this is not Swat or FATA or NWFP. This is the very centre of Pakistan, as it were, its Punjabi heart. This has been hit by terrorists in as dramatic a manner as was Mumbai on November 26, 2008. The dress and modus operandi of those who struck in Lahore today was chillingly identical to that of those who attacked Mumbai. Does the state of Pakistan have no clue about who they are and who their backers and trainers and ideologues are? Are they too isolated and undetected "non-state" actors like the Mumbai attackers were? Are these too "rogue elements" within the establishment that the establishment is blissfully unaware of?

There are some experts who are saying in TV studio discussions that this attack has the hand of the Pakistani Army behind it. The Army is going to use this incident, they believe, along with the mess that Zardari and Sharif have created between themselves like dim wits who should have remained in prison/exile, to get back into power. That may perhaps be correct. But what does the Army want to come back to and rule over? What will this attack do? It will ensure that all sporting contacts with Pakistan, in Pakistan, are broken by all other countries of the world. That is not what the Army should be looking forward to, if indeed this attack has been orchestrated just to impose military rule.

The message of this attack is perhaps far more dangerous and fundamental. Today it is sport, tomorrow it will be other symbols of a modern, progressive Pakistan. Finally it will be the sharia in full force in the whole country, if it still is one, just as it is in Taliban land today.

The deal between the Army and the Taliban in Swat to hand over that valley to the latter who are imposing the sharia there needs to be viewed in conjunction with what has happened in Lahore today. The slide is dangerous and it is gathering momentum. Pakistani President Zardari was not bluffing when he said that his country was in danger of being taken over by the Taliban. There is no room for pretence now.

There are clearly dominant elements in Pakistan Army and its subordinate organisation, the ISI, who are in favour of the talibanisation of the whole of Pakistan. They have grown up on that extremist ideology and have overseen its implementation in Afghanistan before 9/11. Like the terrorists that they are creating and training, they believe that the whole of Pakistan should follow the 'pure' Islam that they earlier had put in place in Afghanistan and that is now functional in large areas in the peripheral parts of Pakistan. It is also safe to assume that the these elements in the Army are not low ranking officers or men. They have to be senior officers with some serious clout and reach. For all you know Army Chief Kiyani might be one with them. Since the US is sitting on their head, they have to move undetected and with caution and then surprise the Americans somewhat like they did in Swat.

Make no mistake: the attack on the Sri Lankan team will be followed by attacks on cinema halls, music shops, girls not fully covered up etc. Radical Islam is now aiming for the very heart of Pakistan, for the state of Pakistan itself. There is an internal war brewing there, a war that will have a profound and lasting impact on the world. The world has a responsibility to ensure that the jihadi elements that have infiltrated large parts of the state of Pakistan and its structures are not allowed to consume any more of Pakistan than they already have. The rest of the world will be next.

It is time to back the retreating moderate and progressive elements in Pakistan so that they develop the stomach and the ability to fight and defeat those who are trying to turn Pakistan into a very dangerous fundamentalist Afghanistan. No matter what the cost. The world cannot just afford their defeat.

This post has featured in the News blog page of The Guardian
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1. All cylinders on fire, where is Pakistan heading?
2. Kashmir and Afghanistan are two sides of the same terror coin
3. India needs to ready itself for a post-Pakistan scenario
4. A vote to save Jinnah's Pakistan: Will it?
5. Pakistan: Dangers of the multi-ethnic Islamic state

ALL CYLINDERS ON FIRE, WHERE IS PAKISTAN HEADING?

Really, are Pakistanis that dumb? People with even elementary intelligence will not continue to fool themselves into believing for so long that they can keep playing with fire and making a fool of everyone else, and yet emerge triumphant at the end of it. Particularly when things are falling apart all around them. But that is exactly what the many actors who define the state of Pakistan are doing even though the whole world can see that the dangerous games they are playing are leading their country straight into the pages of history.

How can almost an entire nation be so blind? Or is it that it has come so far on the path of consciously plotting the destruction of others that it is now impossible for it to turn back and get onto a track it has never been on, never believed? Why hasn't the nation's survival instinct kicked in yet?

President Asif Ali Zardari, no less, tells the world openly that his nation is in danger of being run over by the Taliban, a possibility that is already beginning to look like a reality. The world, naturally, reacts with due understanding and sympathy thinking that the democratically elected government that he is heading is innocent and the real villain is the military. But, within days of making that chilling statement, Zardari supports the capitulating deal to hand over the Swat Valley to the Taliban saying that force is not the answer to defeat them. Simultaneously, he shows no qualms in playing dirty political games again to defeat his principal political opponent, Nawaz Sharif, with whose support he had got Musharraf thrown out.

It may be recalled that Zardari had earlier to manipulated his way to become President in a swift move that left Sharif stunned and fuming. Then, after getting into that chair, he went back on his two key promises of giving up the enormous powers that Pervez Musharraf had illegally given to the President, and reinstating the judges of Supreme Court who had been sacked by Musharraf to save his Presidency. In effect, Zardari is now theoretically as powerful a President as Musharraf was, provided the Army lets him be, which it won't.

If that dishonesty was not enough, he has now manifestly got the Musharraf-appointed judges of the Supreme Court to declare Nawaz Sharif ineligible to contest elections and also declare null and void the election of his younger brother, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, leading the fall of his government and imposition of Governor's rule. Predictably, protests have broken out all over Pakistan and the situation has once again become unstable and ripe for another former military takeover. Nawaz Sharif, in fact, is now talking of starting, yes, one more jehad in Pakistan, this time against Zardari.

Given this political turmoil, will the military seize power again or has the wily Zardari struck a double-deal with the Army and the US to ensure his survival in the Presidential Palace with Army Chief Kiyani calling the shots? The latter seems likely. But what has happened once again in Pakistan is that its civilian leaders have proved that they are no better than petty tribal chieftains who cannot see beyond themselves and are completely unfit to rule and run their country. That story, which began almost immediately after Pakistan was created, is having another sickening re-run. No one seems to have learnt any lesson yet even though the country broke in two in 1971 and is going to pieces now.

What about the military? Has it learnt any lessons from 9/11 and the spread of the Taliban into large parts of Pakistan? Has it realised that the double-game that it has been playing with the US since its troops landed in Afghanistan cannot be continued indefinitely? Or does it think that a few nukes and America's dependence on Pakistan to sustain its war in Afghanistan is sufficient insurance that will work till the Americans, like the Soviets before them, accept defeat and leave that country back in the hands of Pakistan, just like it was before?

It may be recalled that before 9/11, Pakistan's military was virtually in control of Afghanistan through an almost seamless relationship with the Taliban that it had nurtured and armed to overthrow the Soviets, with generous American assistance. For Pakistan, Afghanistan was then all but it own territory that, as per its military "thinkers", provided "strategic depth" to Pakistan. That view has still not changed. Pakistan cannot allow a strong, secure and truly independent Afghanistan to re-emerge before the US leaves that country. It wants it remain its private backyard. That why General Kiyani, who headed the ISI before taking control of the Army, talks of Talibani commanders like Jallaluddin Haqqani as "strategic assets". That is why, while pretending to be on the side of the the US, Kiyani continues to blatantly back the Taliban who are fighting US troops in Afghanistan. He reckons he will need them after the Americans leave.

David E Sanger has written in his book "The Inheritance" that as per an American intelligence report, "Taliban were making huge inroads into Afghanistan and... other militants saw an opportunity over the next two years to attempt the first violent overthrow of a nuclear-armed state: Pakistan. The country was ripe for the picking: Its weak, corrupt government faced national bankruptcy, an insurgency was at the doorstep of the capital, and the Pakistani government had no comprehensive strategy to confront either threat. Nor did it seem to want one...Pakistan’s aid to the Taliban was no act of rogue Pakistani intelligence agents, but instead was government policy".

If Pakistan's aid to the Taliban, despite the US on its back, is not an act of rogue elements but remains government policy, then is there any doubt as to what its policy about the likes of Lashkar-e-Toiba and other terrorist outfits operating against India will be?

The whole drama that Pakistan has been enacting since Mumbai 26/11, from the initial outright denial of its involvement in the attack to the slow and reluctant change to its acceptance of the involvement of only a few rogue Pakistanis operating in isolation is not a case of innocent ignorance as it is pretending. It is no less than a concerted effort on part of the government and the military from day one to prevent exposure of the damning fact that carrying out terror attacks on India continues to be a central part of government policy and that Mumbai 26/11 was just a visible manifestation of that. India needs to understand clearly that nothing has changed in Pakistan's avowed policy of bleeding India to death by inflicting on it a thousand cuts. All this official talk of Pakistan being a victim of terror etc is just to hide that ugly fact so that the international community does not react too harshly.

Unfortunately for Pakistan, Ajmal Kasab has provided enough clues to show that the attack on Mumbai was not done by "non-state actors", a new term coined by Pakistan to con gullible Indian media personalities and others. The charge sheet filed by the Mumbai Police points to the involvement of a serving Colonel, whose name Ajmal Kasab has revealed, and a serving Major General in the attack. It goes without saying that Kasab, a lowly operative, would not have been given direct access to Kiyani himself. But the fact that two senior officers were in touch with him at the lowest rung of the whole operation tells us that they in turn would have had been operating under the orders of much higher ranked officers in the military hierarchy. Mind you, we are not talking about the rogue ISI here. It is the Army that is directly involved. Col Sadatullah, whom Kasab has named, has already been traced by Indian media.

Who can believe that the Pakistani establishment has not known exactly who all were involved in the attack from the very beginning? If there were really a few small-time rogue elements responsible for the attack, would there have been such an elaborate exercise to shield them and deceive India and the world for so long?

It is amazing how a country that is a basket case, that is being torn apart internally, that is lead by warring political leaders with minds of petty, feudal tribal chieftains, and that has all but failed as the state it started out to be, can simply refuse to see reality and live in peace with itself and its size. Even as it is cracking apart, it still wants to make-believe that it can usurp Afghanistan and Kashmir, destroy India and be in the vanguard of the jehad that seeks to establish Islamic rule over the whole world. Somehow, its nuclear-tipped military thinks it is almost invincible and can successfully achieve all this and more. These sweeping and dangerous ambitions make even Adolf Hitler look benign, as indeed he was mistakenly believed to be by some before he launched the Blitzkrieg. Can there be a more explosive recipe for unmitigated disaster?

Barack Obama has already hyphenated Afghanistan with Pakistan. By now almost everyone in the US has come around to the conclusion that Pakistan is the ground zero for the central war on terror that the US is fighting. The realisation that there cannot be a peaceful and genuinely independent Afghanistan till there is a Pakistan in its present shape will also come soon. The same goes for Kashmir too, no matter what Pakistan might say to try and de-link it from what it has been doing in Afghanistan. From that will flow the logical understanding that the present state of Pakistan has to be fundamentally altered and reconfigured to give abiding peace in the region a real chance.

If all these illuminations come to Pakistan itself in time, then the country might yet survive in its present form and shape. Will Pakistan be able to see light and save itself from the inevitable? Tribal minds are perhaps the most obdurate of them all. Not only can they not see beyond narrow limitations, they are not at all amenable to being told what they should do in their own interest. Add to it the many jehads that have been unleashed by and in the country, and it does not appear likely that Pakistan will be able to transform itself as it needs to. On its own.

With all its cylinders on fire and no fire extinguisher in sight, Pakistan does not need a crystal ball to see its 'future'. It is staring it in the face. But its eyes are still wide shut.
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Readers may also read:
1. Kashmir and Afghanistan are two sides of the same terror coin
2. India needs to ready itself for a post-Pakistan scenario
3. A vote to save Jinnah's Pakistan: Will it?
4. Pakistan: Dangers of the multi-ethnic Islamic state

INDIA NEEDS TO READY ITSELF FOR A POST-PAKISTAN SCENARIO

When the Head of State of a nation admits unashamedly to the world that his country is under real danger of being captured by rogue elements, then it can no longer be pretended that the threat is remote. Nuclear weapons and missiles, and a huge military are no protection whatsoever against such assaults from within. Talibani termites have been eating away the woodwork that defines the state of Pakistan for a number of years, encouraged by strong pillars of that very wooden frame that mistakenly believed, some still do, that these termites were programmed to attack and weaken only other structures that were inimical to it. Now it can no longer be hidden that the hollowed structure is on the brink of collapse.

In an interview with CBS, President Asif Ali Zardari has said that Pakistan is fighting for “survival” in the face of an onslaught by the Taliban who have “established themselves across a large part of the country”. "We are aware of the fact it’s ... Taliban... trying to take over the state of Pakistan. So, we’re fighting for the survival of Pakistan. We’re not fighting for the survival of anybody else." The Taliban, he added, had been taken for granted for a long time. "It's been happening over time and it's happened out of denial. Everybody was in denial."

When were such words heard last from the President of a country? Some analysts believe that this admission is meant to get the US to give Pakistan more aid and even get Kashmir back into focus. It seems they are all missing the point. Pakistan is actually under a grave and unprecedented threat, a threat of its own making and a threat which powerful elements in the military and the ISI still want to deny. Zardari's statement also indicates that there is a bitter power struggle between him and Army Chief Kiyani who, as per Imran Khan and others, is effectively in control of the government. When Zardari says "We have weaknesses and they are taking advantage of that weakness,” he is probably referring to the nexus between the Taliban and the military which has allowed the former to get to a position where they can take over the whole country, with the help of elements of the military who are still supporting it

As per William Dalrymple, "Saudis have invested intensively in Wahhabi madrasas in the North-West Frontier Province and Punjab, with dramatic effect, radically changing the religious culture of an entire region. The tolerant Sufi culture of Sindh has been able to defy this imported Wahhabi radicalism". The Taliban and the Al Qaida are the visible militant faces of this version of Islam which is completely intolerant of all other faiths, including Shia Islam. They are, therefore, the perfect ideological weapons that can be exploited to oppose both the Western world and India with the ultimate aim of ushering in the political rule of Islam all over the world.

Since Wahhabi Islam rejects other versions of Islam too, it should have been anticipated by the handlers and trainers of the Taliban that, sooner or later, they would try to establish their version of the rule of Islam, the one they had in Afghanistan before 9/11, in Pakistan too. Up to a point, the military did have the Taliban and other militant groups bred with similar ideology by their "tooti" (penis), as a Pakistani general had once boasted. That was a long time back. Today it is clearly the militants led by the Taliban who have got the state of Pakistan by its "tooti".

President Obama is alive to the fact that terrorists are operating against US forces in Afghanistan from safe havens in the tribal regions of Pakistan. Quit naturally, he wants the state of Pakistan to fight and defeat them within its territory. Is that going to happen any time soon, if at all? If the world has heard Zardari right, that is almost an impossibility. Because the "weakness" is within, inside Pakistan's military and the ISI. And that situation is not likely to change on its own. The investment of these two organisations in the terror infrastructure is so heavy and so deep-rooted that it is realistically not possible for them to become enemies of the very men that they have trained and used for decades as their own, integral tools of state policy.

Is it, then, possible for Pakistan to continue to exist as one state with very strong elements pulling it in opposite directions? Will Pakistan succumb to Wahhabi Islam completely, with its military and the Taliban becoming indistinguishable from each other? Will the civil society of the areas still not overrun by the Taliban meekly surrender to the birth of an altogether 'new' country, a photocopy of the primitive and horribly oppressive Afghanistan that the world saw before 9/11? Or will Sindhis and Punjabis resist this speeding slide?

Will America and the world allow a nuclear power to become completely Talibanised and pose unimaginable danger to the whole world? The answer is a clear no. Is a strong and stable Pakistan possible with the Talibanis and Wahhabi ideology in control of large parts of the country and threatening the rest? Of course not. What, then, is likely to happen?

Will Pakistan suddenly and quietly collapse one day like the Soviet Union did and get confined to Punjab and Sindh, with most of its establishment and military intact? Or will it 'explode' first in one form or the other before it emerges from the fire and smoke in a new avatar that the world can comfortably live with?

India, indeed the world, has to start preparing for a post-Pakistan scenario that may be upon us sooner than we think. Before that, India needs to ready itself for any contingency that may suddenly arise necessitating the deployment of its combat power in support of elements in Pakistan in the highly possible event of an intense power-struggle and even a Bangladesh-like situation arising there.

Zardari knows what he is talking about better than most outside of Pakistan do. And he is clearly talking at a tangent with the dominant view in the military and the ISI. Pakistan's survival is perhaps no longer possible in its present form. Zardari's cry is probably one of despair and helplessness than of any realistic hope. India needs to listen to it very carefully and ready itself for a post-Pakistan scenario in which it may well find Zardari as the President of an Independent, Wahhabi-free, Sufi Sindh.
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Readers may also read:
1. Kashmir and Afghanistan are two side of the same terror coin
2. Understanding and defeating the ideology of terror
3. 9/11 to 9/19: Beads on a string that needs to be cut
4. A vote to save Jinnah's Pakistan: Will it?
5. A thousand cuts bleeding Pakistan
6. Pakistan: Dangers of the multi-ethnic Islamic state

KASHMIR AND AFGHANISTAN ARE TWO SIDES OF THE SAME TERROR COIN

A lot has been written about the real message that the people of Kashmir Valley have conveyed through their vote in the recently held elections in Jammu and Kashmir. For the first ever time, they defied the boycott call given by the separatists and militants, and came out to vote in record-breaking numbers. The verdict they delivered was split but in such a manner that only Omar Abdullah's National Conference could form a government in alliance with the Congress party.

Ethnic Kashmiri Muslims of the Valley are the face of the anti-India sentiment that the world sees and that Pakistan has been trying to exploit since 1947 to gobble up the part of the state which is still with India. Since 1989, the instrument of a low intensity war, also referred to as terrorism, has been used by that country to wear India down to the point that it is compelled to at least start the process of accepting Pakistan's claim on the state, even if it does so without appearing to.

As part of that strategy, separatist groups, ranging from those who demand merger of the state into Pakistan to those who want 'independence' from India, have been effectively used to discredit and dismiss all instruments of governance that symbolise the fact that the state is a part of a secular India. These groups have always opposed elections because they legitimise the state's relationship with India. That is what they did this time too smug with confidence that with the Amarnath Land issue still fresh in their minds, the people in the Valley would reject these elections en masse.

The unexpectedly overwhelming response of ethnic Kashmiris and people of all other ethnic groups stunned not only the separatists but also pleasantly surprised mainstream political parties and analysts. No one, it seems, had his finger on the real pulse of the people. Yes, ethnic Kashmiris voted differently from the the way voters in the other two regions in the state did. Yes, their vote was in sum not for India. Yes, most likely they did not even vote for secularism.

But, what was most significant was not what they voted for but what they voted against. And, what they clearly came out in large numbers to reject through the silence of their vote was Islamic extremism, the increasing Talibanisation of society and the jehadi culture that has not only proved to be Kashmir's curse but has also completely claimed Afghanistan and vast swathes of Pakistani territory along its Western border.

Somewhere in their souls, Kashmiris have understood that the road that Pakistan has put them on is not going to turn their Valley into the promised Islamic paradise. And they are clear that they do not want it to become what Afghanistan and parts of Pakistan have become. They do not want to regress further in that direction which, to all but the most fanatical, is a descent into a black hole of oppression, violence and intolerance of the worst kind. In the 21st century.

These elections, therefore, represent a victory of the ordinary Muslim over the fanatic Muslim represented by the Taliban and the various jehadi groups spawned by the state of Pakistan. The significance of this unexpected and remarkable victory that can change the course of history is not limited to Kashmir. It extends right into the heart of Pakistan. And into the whole world.

In Pakistan, free and fair elections were held in 2008, perhaps for the first time after 1950. In those elections too, Pakistani Muslims voted emphatically and dramatically to tell all those who had thoroughly messed up the ideology of Pakistan envisioned by its creator Jinnah, that they wanted the country to get off the road of religious extremism that was hurtling them all towards disaster. What was even more significant was the fact that despite the presence of the Americans next door in Afghanistan, the people of the Frontier, most affected by Islamic extremism, thrashed the extremists through the ballot.

Unfortunately, Pakistan has failed to live up to the promise that that was held out by the people's verdict. The events of the last few months, including the terror attack on Mumbai on November 26, 2008, have left no one in any doubt that Pakistan has relapsed into its old ways. The military is back in effective control, the ISI is still on the destructive pathway that has brought Pakistan to the brink, and the jehadi terrorists continue to be patronised and encouraged by powerful elements as an instrument of a state policy that has become Pakistan's cancer.

Pakistan is, thus, not defined by its people. It is defined by its military, including the ISI, with the help of an influential anti-India section of the Mohajir and Punjabi elite that is closely aligned with it. It is well known that the Sindhis, Baluchis and Pashtoons have never harboured the kind of anti-India feelings that have been made central to the very idea and existence of Pakistan by its military-led elite. The military cannot shed this positioning as then the very basis of its power and motivational underpinnings will fall apart. If that happens, it will lose its muscle and centrality in the power matrix of the state. That is something it is not going to allow to happen and that is something that no one in Pakistan has the power to make a reality.

As long as the the Pakistani military establishment, of which the ISI is a part, retains its primacy as the executor of the will the state of Pakistan as defined by it, there is going to be little real change in the country's views about its neighbours either in the east or west. That means that the same destructive, expansionist policies on both fronts will continue to be persisted with.

The presence of the US in Afghanistan has forced Pakistan's military to pretend to be America's ally while it continues to covertly support, encourage and promote the elements fighting against it. The tactic being used is conceptually the same as is being used against India in Kashmir.

Wear the Americans down in Afghanistan to a point where they are forced to seek an 'honourable' exit from there and leave it back in the hands of Pakistan through a new and improved Taliban, quite like it was before 9/11, minus the Al Qaida. This is the cornerstone of Pakistan's position on the 'war on terror' as the ally of the US. Pakistani generals reckon that the US will bolt from Afghanistan much faster than India will from Kashmir. Therefore, they will do everything to ensure that the Americans effectively lose their Afghan war, just like the Soviets did. They will, in fact try their utmost, without totally giving themselves away, to ensure that the US dose not achieve a decisive victory there, because that will probably deal a death blow to the Talibani and jehadi infrastructure that has been painstakingly set up by the military over decades. The rout of these elements will wind up being a body blow to the military itself.

It needs be understood, therefore, that neither the Americans nor the Indians can afford to lose their wars in Afghanistan and Kashmir respectively. These two flash points are the the last real battlegrounds of a retreating ideology that, as per Maulana Wahiduddin, is based in the mistaken belief that "Islam is a political system and that it is the duty of all Muslims to establish the political rule of Islam in the world".

What is happening in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and elsewhere and what happened on 9/11 is not due to "random terror", an aimless jehad, that Vir Sanghvi and, possibly, a few others have suddenly discovered it to be. As Maulana Wahiduddin explains, although terror attacks will not eliminate non-Islamic rule or bring down governments immediately, jehadis believe they can at least destabilise them and pave the way for Islamic rule. Due to lack of military power to force a change through open war, this strategy of chipping away has been adopted for bringing about the desired result of establishing Islamic rule in an open time-frame beyond what is normally considered by the US and others while developing responses to defeat it.

This ideological problem affects the whole world, as it does moderate Muslims in Pakistan, India and elsewhere, including the US. A defeat in Kashmir for India and/or the US in Afghanistan will have disastrous long term consequences from which no nation of any consequence will be immune. Even a notional defeat is not an option because it will be touted as a triumph of terror and used as a powerful motivator to attract more people from around the world to join the 'holy' cause and take terror to new levels.

This is the most fundamental aspect that needs to be understood and properly internalised so that myopic and disjointed political and military strategies can be avoided in future.

Viewed in this context, the proposal of the British Foreign Secretary David Miliband that a 'resolution' of Kashmir will stop terrorism against India from Pakistan, indicates that there is still no holistic understanding in the UK of the real dimensions of the problem of terrorism from which even his own country is not free. Implicit in Miliband's statement that appeared, much to India's discomfiture, in The Guardian even as he was being given a guided rural tourism tour by Rahul Gandhi in Amethi, is the suggestion that a resolution acceptable to Pakistan will necessarily involve India giving and Pakistan gaining. As almost everyone in India already knows, if that happens, Pakistan sponsored terrorism will only get fuelled further, not put out.

There is a view in India that a strong Pakistan is needed to keep Talibanis away from India's borders. This implies that Pakistani Punjabis and Sindhis will willingly allow such elements to convert their provinces too into another Afghanistan once the protective umbrella of Pakistan is removed, and join them in their holy war against India. This deduction appears to be completely erroneous. Ordinary Punjabis and Sindhis, like the Kashmiris in India, have no illusions about the fact that these elements have become their own cancer, a fact that has been admitted even by President Zardari. But, since they are seen to be fighting against India, they do get a measure of support due to a mindset created by the ideology adopted by Pakistan that sees a secular India as an enemy that has to be defeated.

It is, therefore, only natural that once ordinary Sindhis, Baluchis and the Punjabis are lightened of the heavy ideological anti-India baggage of the state of Pakistan, they will most likely vigorously cleanse their own provinces of these elements and ensure that they are confined to FATA. They may well take steps to weaken them there and in Afghanistan too by denying them the strong ideological and logistical base that the state of Pakistan has been providing to them, and without which they cannot survive for long.

The results of the recent elections in Kashmir Valley and Pakistan have clearly indicated that ordinary Muslims do not support this ideology of terror and the social repression it promises - if it affects their own lives. They may cheer it from the sidelines, but do not want it to reside in their homes. There is no reason to believe that the people of Afghanistan do not share the feelings that their ethnic brothers on the Pakistan side of the Durand Line have expressed in the elections there. But, they are themselves terrorised by ruthless AK47 wielding fanatics who can cross all limits of brutality without batting even the proverbial eye lid.

Ordinary Afghanis may hate the presence of US troops on their soil but that does not mean that love for the Talibanis and other jehadi groups is overflowing in their hearts. If the fear factor is decisively removed from their midst, they too will not opt for a Talibanised Afghanistan.

Both India and the US, therefore, need to work in unstated unison to ensure that Pakistan's military and the ISI are weakened to a point
where they are no longer able to hijack the agenda of the people of Pakistan again. Terrorism needs Pakistan's military and the ISI to survive; they need it to flourish to protect their relevance and the idea that Pakistan has become.

Strengthening of Pakistan's military to help the US in its war in Afghanistan is not going to yield the dividends that the US is hoping for. Rather than strengthen the war on terror, it is going to lengthen it. Worse will happen in the long run if the US pushes a deal favourable to terror in Kashmir in the hope that it will enable it to de-induct from Afghanistan after wiping the Al Qaida out from there by leaving that country in the 'safe' hands of the Pakistani military.

Kashmir and Afghanistan are two sides of the same terror coin. The war on terror has to be decisively won in both these places. The US cannot afford to make the mistake that it made when the Soviets had invaded Afghanistan. That mistake resulted in 9/11 and more. This time, the consequences of a mistake will be far worse for the US and the rest of the world.
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Readers may also read: Understanding and defeating the ideology of terror

MUMBAI 11/26: WILL INDIA USE THE MILITARY OPTION?

The saber-rattling that started after the terror attack on Mumbai on November 26, 2008, is now getting predictable and hollow. "All options are open" says Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee every second day, hoping to frighten Pakistan into giving India a face-saving concession so that it can climb down from this tiger of aggression it has mounted to placate very angry Indians. The more India shouts, the more uncompromising and bolder Pakistan gets. Why? By now it knows that India just does not have the balls to back its effete bark.

In 1999, after Pakistan committed blatant aggression by occupying chunks of Indian territory in Kargil, India did not have the guts to cross the LOC, fearing that the conflict would get out of control. After the attack on Parliament in 2001, India mobilised its military and threatened war. Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in fact, left no one in any doubt about India's resolve by declaring publicly while addressing troops in Kupwara, Kashmir, that "this time the war will be decisive". But, after one year of a stand-off which saw Pakistan making no concession whatsoever, India meekly backed off, and it was back to the same story of people-to-people contact and 'friendship' as if nothing had happened. General 'Kargil' Musharraf, in fact, became the toast of India's media, and its most trusted hope for a lasting 'solution' to Kashmir.

Asif Ali Zardari, the erstwhile Mr. 10 percent and now Pakistan's President, has successfully conned India's media luminaries after 11/26, quite like he did Nawaz Sharif to become the President. He has been lying to gullibly trusting fools and asking India to sympathise with him for being himself a victim of terror, and trust his statements that Pakistan would take action if it was proved that Pakistanis were involved in the terror attacks.

After Ajmal Kasab was caught alive, a lot of disconnected analysts thought that Pakistan would come clean and take action against the terrorists whom it now deceitfully refers to as 'non-state' actors. What has actually happened? That nation, Zardari included, simply refuses to accept that he is a Pakistani, no surprise, even though his biological father has accepted the bitter truth. It also refuses to accept the involvement of the Jamat-ud-Dawa despite the outfit having been banned swiftly by the UN for this very attack on Mumbai. Its Foreign Minister, after initially admitting that Maulana Azhar Masood was in custody, now says he is not traceable. Its government has also refused to hand over to India anyone, including Indian Dawood Ibrahim, out of the list of 40 'Most Wanted' that India wants it to extradite to India. Elements in Pakistan continue to mislead its people into believing that 11/26 was actually the handiwork of "Hindu-Zionists".

In sum, Pakistan is again showing India that very smelly middle finger that it has pushed repeatedly to respond to India's threats of war. It knows that its counter-threat of nuclear retaliation somehow petrifies almost everyone in India, and is the ready excuse given by India for its total lack of response to the proxy war Pakistan has launched against India.

Why is India so scared of Pakistan's nuclear blackmail while Pakistan shows no fear of India's nuclear capability?

Pakistan knows that India as a nation can comfortably live with provocation, aggression, defeat and humiliation. It knows that there is not one soul in India that is hurt any longer by what the Chinese did to destroy India's self confidence in 1962. On the contrary, India now bends over backwards to ensure that China is not provoked in any manner into humiliating it again. That cowardly psyche is responsible for India not doing anything at all to ensure that Bangladesh does not indulge in activities that hurts India. Bangladesh in no nuclear power; indeed it is no military power. Yet it continues to permit, even promote, terror groups like the HUJI and Pakistan's ISI to use its territory to pursue the proxy war against India.

A country which is 'scared' to act even against a small country like Bangladesh can scarcely be expected to get 'tough' with Pakistan other than through empty words that are meaningless. That is why India keeps "running to mommy", to borrow the words of Arun Shourie, to complain against Pakistan. To expect that the US will fight the war that India has to fight and deliver India from terrorism is a damning admission that our politicians and bureaucrats have failed to not only assess the threat that the nation faces but also to take nakedly evident steps that are needed to destroy it.

The ongoing war of words is going to end in words only. And it will end with India being humiliated again. Empty 'coercive diplomacy' is going to be the disaster it has always been. Pakistan is not going to back off or back down. Nor is it going to dismantle the elaborate terror infrastructure that it has created so deliberately. It knows that India simply does not have the courage to call its nuclear bluff. Worse, it knows that India has taken no steps whatsoever, despite decades of fighting a proxy war, to develop the crippling conventional military superiority that is needed to achieve a decisive victory short of the nuclear threshold swiftly.

It also knows that leading opinion makers in India are more than willing to live with, and die slowly of, a thousand cuts and with the deaths of thousands of more innocent Indians. No matter what the long term cost and damage, they are not willing to risk a one-time economic hit that an open war will entail. Their stance perfectly suits India's uninformed politicians and bureaucrats who have got used to treating their onerous responsibilities casually as routine jobs that have to be mechanically performed and the buck passed.

Pakistan has seen this fatal weakness, this cowardice far too often to take the fake howl of the sheep in a wolf's ill-fitting clothing seriously. Soon it is going to be back to cricket and music and mushairas. No lessons have been learnt; none will be learnt. And terror attacks will keep getting bigger and better and bolder.

An elementary aspect of diplomacy that India has not yet understood can be reasonably well explained by this limerick that came to me while I was writing this paper:

Coercive diplomacy without military might
Can never ever generate intended fright
A toothless mouth
Can only shout
Not once can it inflict the threatened bite.
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Readers may also read:
1. Understanding and defeating the ideology of terror
2. Mumbai 11/26: Wake up to Islamic terror, this is just the beginning
3. Making India safe: cosmetic changes will not stem rot

UNDERSTANDING AND DEFEATING THE IDEOLOGY OF TERROR

Maulana Wahiduddin Khan has said something about Islamic terrorism that most Muslims have always known. But, secular India has been shying away from facing that basic truth. The often parroted statement that terrorism has no religion has ensured that no response has been developed to counter an ideology that has already claimed the lives of thousands of innocent citizens, and is set to claim many more.

What does the Maulana who is a Delhi based Islamic scholar have to say about the terrorism that his fellow religionists are using as a tool to achieve their objectives? Writing in The Times of India of December 12, 2008, he says that the ideology of terrorism is "that Islam is a political system and that it is the duty of of all Muslims to establish the political rule of Islam in the world". A large number of Muslim youth, he adds, have taken to violence to achieve this objective thinking it to be their ticket to paradise. Even if they cannot eliminate non-Islamic rule, they can at least destabilise it and pave the way for Islamic rule.

In other words, the lure of real political power in this world for practical and smart leaders, and great sex with 72 virgins in heaven for gullible foot soldiers who die young, is the explosive and powerful combination that ensures that it is easy to keep attracting adherents to this violent ideology.

Had these self-evident facts been mentioned in India by a non-Muslim, there would have been a huge furore against that individual for communalising terror, followed by the usual talk that Islam is a religion of peace. Indeed the latter is what Maulana Wahiduddin Khan believes, as do many other Muslims, saying that "this kind of thinking" was not prevalent during the time of the Prophet or his early companions and is a later invention. This, he says, was developed over the last few centuries and has become widespread in the Muslim world today.

So, the first and most important thing to understand is that Islamic terrorism is not the handiwork of a few lunatics who "have no religion". It is the violent and widespread expression of the almost universal, even if erroneous, belief among Muslims that establishment of Islamic political rule over the whole world is the 'divine right', indeed the purpose, of the religion.

In this light, Pakistan's avowed objective of bleeding India to death by inflicting on it a thousand cuts makes nothing but sense and, more importantly, tells us why it can never be abandoned by that country, no matter what it says publicly. That is why, as long as it exists as one Islamic state, it cannot live in harmony with and in the shadow of a non-Islamic India. In the same light, the rejection in 1977 of the secular Indian state by the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) appears perfectly logical, as does its slogan, "Allah is our Lord, Quran is our constitution, Muhammad is our leader, Jehad is our way and shahadat (martyrdom) is our desire".

Why has terror become the preferred tool to achieve a grand political objective in the name of religion, and why is it getting increasingly out of hand?

Politically, Islam today is a pale shadow of what it was a few centuries back. From the heights that it had reached when the Ottoman and Mughal Empires were at their peak, the political power of Islam has reduced drastically and is now relatively insignificant across the world. In fact, had it not been for oil, even the economic prosperity that the Muslim world is enjoying would not have been able to camouflage this grievous loss of political power and dominance.

The one without-oil nation that has not been able to reconcile to the decline of the political power of Islam and is reacting the most to is Pakistan. It believes that it is the inheritor of the mighty Mughal empire that once ruled over almost the whole sub continent and has taken it upon itself to reclaim that lost political rule in the name of Islam. Since it does not have the size or military might to achieve that objective by overt use of force, it has created and deployed the tool of Islamic terror in the garb of jehad to chip away at India till it falls. Its success in defeating the mighty Soviets in Afghanistan and establishing its rule there through the Taliban gave just the fillip that the ideology needed to step up its terror attacks on and in India.

Osama Bin Laden and his Al Qaida had an identical global objective. Saudi Arabia, the country to which Laden belongs, and the rest of the Arab world are basking in the glow of petro dollars. They do not want to disturb their lands and lives to establish the political rule of Islam over the whole world. That is why Laden was forced to turn to Pakistan, the only Islamic nation that was willing to use terror as a destabilising tool to achieve this objective. He and the Al Qaida had a free run there and in Pakistan-controlled Afghanistan. As a result, his outfit grew stronger and stronger in that huge, protected sanctuary till 9/11, after which the US finally reacted with massive force.

9/11 also had a major impact on Pakistan. Faced with the possibility of being wiped off the map by the US, it officially abandoned the terror outfits it had created and nurtured for years, and joined the opposite camp! Today it is running unsuccessfully with the hares while pretending to be hunting with the hounds, a dangerous game that has turned its Frankenstien on itself and one that can be played only up to a point.

The 11/26 terror attack on Mumbai has woken up the world to the really serious threat that Islamic terrorism poses to world peace. After vehement denials about the involvement of his country men in the attack initially, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari cleverly deflected any responsibility for what those 10 Pakistanis did by saying that they were "non-state actors". The UN reacted swiftly and banned the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a front organisation for the Lashkar-e-Toiba, which was found to be responsible for the Mumbai attack.

Pakistan has yet to show on ground that it will reign in these elements. Till now, as India's Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherji said in Parliament, such "non-state actors", promoted and guided by the establishment, have simply been changing their signboard and carrying on with their business as usual. This time, however, no one is willing to let that country get away by its fake "we are victims of terrorism too" line, because it can no longer hide the fact that posturing apart, it is still not willing to roll back the ideology of terror that it has put in place as a cornerstone of its national policy.

This is something that has been known all along to India, but this country has perfected the art of the Ostrich response, despite the really heavy price it has had to pay for it again and yet again.

Maulana Wahiduddin Khan believes that the best way to counter this ideology of violence is through the ideology of peace that the Prophet practiced. Can there really be a willing return, under the present circumstances, to the ideology of peace that the Prophet preached? Is is possible for the Mullahs suddenly to abandon the political agenda that has given rise to terrorism and guide the followers of Islam in a spiritual direction, a glimpse of which given by Sufi saints? Is it possible for moderate Muslim scholars to risk their lives and take on those who have radicalised Islam and given it an almost wholly political twist?

There is little doubt that eventually this ideology will have to be countered and defeated by Muslims themselves. But that willing change is unlikely to take place unless a conducive environment is created for it to take firm root. And that can only happen if this ideology is weakened sufficiently through a string of decisive and crippling defeats that decapitate its ideologues and demoralise its foot soldiers. Till that happens, dramatic incidents like 9/11 and 11/26 are only going to attract even more cannon fodder, itching for heavenly sex, to kill innocent people and die.

The world has to act. Sooner the better.
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Readers may also like to read:
1.'Tackling religious terrorism in a democracy.'
2. Islamic terrorism: Muslims in India like Jews in Nazi Germany?
3. Pakistan: dangers of the multi-ethnic Islamic state