Nazar Khan July 26, 2003

Tags: war , indo-pak

rel="tag" href="/tag/war">war. You not only have to have a justifiable cause but should seem to be speaking the truth as well. For Pakistanis, the biggest news was that India had been capturing our similar peaks in the past but our governments had been playing dumb. By keeping the public in dark, they sought the short time goal of not losing public support. Had we been raising a hue and cry on those occasions, India would now be sharing that infamous title of ’Intruder’ with us. World is also fed up of conflicts based on ethnicity or religion – the two emotional causes that listen to no logic and can get easily out of hand.

Words such as Mujahideens, Talibans or religious zealots now enjoy a connotation bordering terrorism. Such militias also have a nasty habit of turning right back into you as Frankenstiens the moment their job is done. Entire Christian Europe is trying to get a handful of the Kosovoan Muslims back into their territory only to avoid another ethnic/religious war. It is time the Kashmiri militants, whether indigenous or imported, realized that the PLO and the IRA got what they got only when they openly renounced violence.

Militancy is a disliked strategy – be it of a government, a group or of an individual. Only a broad based peaceful struggle can hope to get the desirable results for the Kashmiris. We are also bubbling with credit for the ’Internationalization of Kashmir issue’. Besides the ’personal interest’ of Mr. Clinton, we have only become famous in a bad light. Topping that, India has the audacity to now demand that Pakistan should withdraw its support of muhideen inside Kashmir. So far the world kept quiet on our moral, political and diplomatic support to the Kashmiri cause. It might just be getting double minded. As for the intelligence agencies, they are paid to do the intelligence work; and not fight wars for the country or make the next foreign policy move. Our diplomatic isolation should not have come as a surprise. With so many marketable causes available, we chose the wrong slogans. Why talk about Muslims fighting a war for God when we have human rights, waters that flow from Kashmir or our territorial conflict out of unjust past treaties.

Much of the tragedy is our leaders, who are ordinary folks like us, with a knowledge base created out of the wisdom of Nawa-e-Waqt or the Readers’ Digest. Not surprisingly, their thought process churns in a small time and space dimension. These are not the statesmen who view the events in backdrop of the dynamic flow of history, the evolution of cultures or the development of the collective consciousness of the mankind nearing the next millennium. Some argue that the Super Powers have double standards. Very frankly, they can afford to do so. You build up a stable nation of strong institutions with a sound economic base; and the world would pay heed to you. The resolution of the Kashmir issue would automatically get closer. Living under day to day policies for the past fifty years has gotten us nowhere. So far, we have loved rhetoric, slogan mongering, fed to our new generation an ethnic hatred of the Hindus, distorted our history and tore away the Hamood-ur-Rehman commission report. And Kashmir has always come handy when our politicians ran out of other ideas.

The logic is simple. Nuclear option is unthinkable because it would destroy everything including Kashmir. Working on a safe figure of one Pakistani soldier being equal to one Indian soldier, winning a conventional war with India is out. That leaves negotiations. Negotiations succeed only when both parties compromise. Compromise requires big leaders with big hearts. Neither country has them at present. The only remaining option is to let Kashmir stay quiet for a few decades, get our house in order; and then go for the kill at the time and place of our choosing when everything else would work in our favour. Even more important, Pakistan has to come to terms with itself, feel confidant and need not have a perpetual India-hostile stance only to reaffirm its separate identity.

The new generation is under no such ego complexes. It treats India just as another big country . The only difference being that it can relate far easily with the Indians than with our other close friends like the Arabs or the Chinese. India is not wrong when it says that let us first talk on issues where we can cooperate. Pakistan can still continue to keep Kashmir alive but by using a more refined language – the way China does to others. Military exercises, refusing a visa, canceling a delegation visit. China does not launch ’Guzbattias’ into Taiwan. She knows that Taiwan will come to it as a ripe apple at the right time; and has no intention of capturing Taiwan as a destroyed island. Another ten years or fifty years makes no difference. West Germany did it even better. She simply accepted to forget the East Germany. And then West Germany rose to a level of such significance in the world affairs that the East Germans themselves broke the Berlin wall to join the West Germans.

Our little Kargil began with too many assumptions, false hopes and with many loose ends untied. It was a gamble that leaders took hoping to bask in its glory if it turned out OK. It did not. The military Commanders are not to wholly blame. They are trained to give only the military advice. In our case, sadly, at times, even the military men consider themselves expert in areas in which they are neither trained nor qualified. I can imagine the Military Commander, with a glint of wisdom in his eyes, flashing slides on Kargil to the decision makes. The bare bones plan is wrapped in fancy phraseology such as ’low intensity conflict’ and ’bleeding the enemy to an economic defeat’. In actual fact, our ’brilliant’ tactical move ’to capture the heights overlooking the supply route to the Siachin to suffocate the enemy forces at Siachin’ is a concept that is as old as the warfare itself.

Truth was the biggest casualty. Only the army men, in their military innocence, sounded somewhat credible - Brig. Qureshi and the Army Chief. ’’All were on board’’, said the Army Chief with a grimace on his face. There were many lapses on the Indian side as well. The Indian media went on a rampage. Every evening they conquered the same hill. Before we begin showering kudos on our media for its sobriety, let us not forget that we were never at war. It was only some indigenous militants, wearing the latest snow suits, dark goggles and equipped with solar powered batteries, who had climbed those peaks. The Indian politicians also came out as small men fighting for their elections. The world went with them because they were lucky to be victims of an aggression and subsequently did not make any wrong move.

So what are the remains of the day. The kindest word that outsiders have for us is ’Naughty’. Notwithstanding our differences, why can’t we – the eternal enemies in SAARC live in a working relationship the way the eternal enemies – France, Britain, Germany and Italy of the EC live. We have far more commonalties in us than those nations of the EC. Let the Lahoris have the pleasure of going to Amritsar and speak in Punjabi. Let us export dramas, pop and denim to India; and import music, choreography and books. Let us holiday in Simla , Goa and canoe in lake Dal in Kashmir. Let the Indians find for themselves why we look so well fed and so well dressed. Let Indian students join the Agha Khan and in the Indus Valley school of art; and our students go into the top Indian IT institutions. The new generation, on both sides, thanks to the media and modern technologies, already lives in the global village of internet chat, news groups, box office movies and Microsoft; and has discarded old insulting terminologies such as ’Bania’ or ’Musla’. Our leaders are behind the times. Forget capturing Kashmir for next few decades, get on the road of a friendly co-existence in the SAARC; and begin enjoying the fruits of Kashmir. Given a chance, a wait and the right policies, Kashmir will fall into our lap as a ripe apple – the way Taiwan will fall into China’s lap.