Military Action Begins in Afghanistan

SameerJB #197
I donot know about `true` Indian or `true` Pakistani. But I agree with your comments. Could you pl. consider writing an article about how `true` corp commanders of Pakistan(with umblical cord tied to longtime strategic/ideological dogmas) and `true` elected leaders of India(with umblical cord tied to necessity of majority in Parliament) can find common ground for `friendship` :)?

tahmad, Shammi, Stuka: Everything I have written is based on personal experience.

How can a person be made to run outside an airplane, you ask? Quite simple. The aircraft lands, clears the runway, gets on the taxi track, and stops. The instructor opens the canopy, orders the student to unbuckle and get out and to the side of the aircraft. He then starts taxiing slowly. The student has to hold the edge of the wing and run all the way to the parking tarmac. Happens all the time.

The debate between being civilized, physical military punishment, verbal abuse, and hitting people in the cockpit is old and already exhausted. The general consensus result was that it produces better pilots, who can handle stress, not make mistakes while flying, hence it is alright. I don`t know whether I agree with this, but this is how it is. Till this time, I thought the PAF is the only one in which all of the above were common practice. However, it is good to know the same occurs in the IAF :-)

Now how will the female training pilots fit into this routine is something that someone needs to point out.

#198 RanaRasher

I`m honored you`ve graced me with your attention and potty mouth.

I was refering to the warlords & their sponsors. Did you visit the website i cited? It`s by RAWA (revolutionary association of the women of afghanistan).

SameerJB

Corp Commander = war lord?

The more I read you, I more convinced I have become that you are not able to use reason because you have too much malice, too much hatred, in your heart.

What are seem as difficult choices in a difficult situation, are seen by you as an opportunity to malign. It is your privelage and right to obscure and malign, however; do stop to consider, whether or not anyone is helped or the issues made clearer, by such activity.

re: soysauce.
``Pox on all their houses!``

you scumbag, dushman mare taaN khushi naa kariyee
ik din sajnaa vi marjaanaa ae
(don`t rejoice when your enemy dies, cause one day your love will die too)

nasah #191: Mazar-e-Sharif is not fallen yet, but likely to fall to Uzbek warlord, Rashid Dostum in 48 hours. Dostum is more like other central Asisn leaders, former communists turned nationalists with the fall of communism. His defection from Najib Ullah government brought down his government in Kabul, much more than ISI backed Islamic terrorists/ obscurantists/ mujahideen/ freedom fighters/ uloo ke pattheys.

He thinks himself as modern day Taimur Ling, another historical Uzbek. Once you cross into Pakistan, warlordism dies down and replaced by another type of warlords, called core commanders. Whatever happens in Afghanistan in the future, the tribalism is not going to die down. It has been there and rest of central Aisa from pre-Islamic days. These people refused Buddhism for being at odd with their brand of lootmar based tribalism. They happily accepted Islam as god send seal of approval for their brand of lifestyle-with tribal chiefs benefitting most both in war and peace times. Fortunately their brand of tribalism helped by Islam remained cutaneous for majority of desi converts-less beardos, less homo, less vulgar with respect to women and less barbaric.

Majority of Pakistanis give a damn about this central Asian and Afghan heritage in the name of Islam. The Islamists and mullahs are falling in the trap of being seen as more loyal to Afghanistan and Ummah than Pakistan. Why don`t they go and join their fellow ummah in Afghanistan and leave Pakistan to Pakstanis. A true Pakistani will be less hostile to India and a true Indian would be less hostile to Pakistan. There is really no serious reason to be hostile while plenty of reasons to be friendly. Any material and moral gains for Pakistan will come to naught, if poured into the blackhole of India-Pakistan animosity. Pakistan can and will grow better without Afghanistan mess sticking to the tail but can not succeed economically with a constant hostile relationship with a more powerful, nuclear neighbor with similar culture. A good neighborly relation with India is the second best thing next to the fall of Islamic........since Islam is not likely to fall anytime soon, go for the second best. Islam and progress can not take place together in modern world until the next ice-age comletely destroys the non-religious gains of last several centuries. Choose one, ignore other.

Re: Stuka

``... Physical and verbal abuse makes you a tougher person. Didn`t you undergo ragging in college?...``

Actually, I did and in a hostel. I found it to be quite demeaning, and not the way to build character. I had a coursemate who refused to bend to any senior, and it worked! He received the respect that he deserved, and also the President of India`s Gold Medal winner for academic excellence.

I think that the IAF, too, should rethink looking the other way while cadets are demeaned -- what worked in the 19th century, is not necessarily good in the 21st.

Romair #187 I dont have much knowledge of PAF training conditions nowadays, but I dont see how one can punish someone by having him run next to the aircraft at midday - are you sure it wasnt a joke about the SAF (Sardarji Air Force)? You know, where the pilots get out of their planes at 12 o clock and start running alongside (if their plane is taxiing at the time) or eject and start flapping their arms like a bird (if the plane is airborne). Just so the world knows that this is the Sardarji Air Force.

(Sikh readers to please maintain their usual sense of humor, and Romair not to be offended for making fun of what you wrote but I could not resist it).

Shammi:

``Re: Romair

``...Instructors physically beat up the students in

the cockpits...``

In an otherwise perfect airplane? Are you serious?

Regarding the use of abusive language -- the solution is to get civilized. One does not fight more bravely if the language is abusive.``

Romair`s statement is equally valid for IAF training. The instructor can slap you, curse you whatever it takes. As far as being civilized is concerned, u can`t be serious. Physical and verbal abuse makes you a tougher person. Didn`t you undergo ragging in college?

Winter is approaching in Afghanistan. Due to the bombing campaign, apparently, the relief agencies are not able to deliver food aid to Afghans.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1604000/1604317.stm
``.. It is estimated by relief agencies that up to 7.5 million Afghan refugees face starvation if aid does not reach them. ..``

The delivery of aid in time to avoid a humanitarian disaster seems to depend on both the US military campaign and the world`s political efforts to replace the Taliban regime succeeding in a few short weeks!

Not only they must remove the Taliban, they must put in place another government and the requisite military muscle to protect it from falling apart in civil war between factions. The replacement government has to be broad-based to be acceptable to all Afghan factions, and to be credible, the military muscle to protect it probably needs to be (as has been said elsewhere) from Muslim countries like Turkey, Morocco etc, which donot share a border with Afghanistan.

If all this doesnot happen in a few weeks, Afghans will face severe food shortages and will die in large numbers, and the `anti-Taliban coalition` will face political disaster and erosion of support. Already there are reports of civic disorder and looting as the Taliban regime is wekening.

Does it seem any player in this(the US Defense dept, the State dept, the various Afghan factions including the former King, Pakistan and Musharraf) realise this urgency or even mention it?? Or everyone is parrotting their own wishlist. How can you have strategic depth if there are no Afghans left?

Re: Romair

``...Instructors physically beat up the students in

the cockpits...``

In an otherwise perfect airplane? Are you serious?

Regarding the use of abusive language -- the solution is to get civilized. One does not fight more bravely if the language is abusive.

News Flash

``Northern Alliance commander Abdul Rasheed Dostum has captured Mazar-e-Sharif, with the assistance of 4,000 Taliban fighters who switched sides after joining his ranks.``

Three cheers for the Northern Alliance and six cheers for George Bush.

Bravo! -- Murhabaa!! -- Mubarrak!!! -- Khush Amdaid!!!

Now girls pick your books -- throw your burqaas on ``maurdoN ke Aql pur`` and get out of the JAIL HOUSE -- and head straight to your schools and colleges.

The nightmare for Mazare Sharif`s women is over.

hobbytv, tahmad: I posted this article on a different thread. It is definitely quite interesting. I wonder if it is accurate.

Women have been in the PAF for a while. They are in the ground branches. The closest they come to operational branches is in their roles as Air Traffic Controllers. I don`t know whether there are any in Air Defence Command.

There are two female pilots in PIA, I believe. They should be relatively senior, by now. Perhaps Captains. It will be interesting to see how the PAF is going incorporate these female pilots into its force. I have been trying to think of how this will happen, and cannot come up with any ideas.

In the USA, women and men train together, live in the same buildings, and are part of the same squadrons. The PAF training program is extremely hectic, demanding, and somewhat brutal. Quite a bit more so than the USAF`s. The most abusive language, by far, I have heard anywhere is in the cockpit of a PAF plane. It makes the language used in Lahore`s fist fights, seem like a romantic interlude. Instructors physically beat up the students in the cockpits, when they make a serious mistake. This is combined with an extremely high amount of physical punishment, outside the cockpit. Under training pilots are made to get out of the aircraft on the runway and run behind the airplane, while it is taxiing, holding onto the wing, for miles, in hot Pakistani afternoons. It is about as close to a real wartime training situation, as possible. Flying the jets is really the easy part. Making it through such brutal training is the hard part. It makes US flying training look literally like Club Med.

So, based on that, while I have to say the idea of including females as pilots is quite good, I am still unsure on how it will be fitted into the training routine. Maybe a compeletely separate training system for girls.

I urge everyone to visit this site

http://rawa.fancymarketing.net/gallery.html

to get a feel for how the beautiful people of afghanistan have been used and abused by their neighbors and the various gangs and warlords sponsored by them.

If the west, after pounding afghanistan back to prehistory, abandons it again it will have deserved everything coming its way.

Pox on all their houses!

re: nasah # 183

You can say that again, nasah. One need not be a fan of Musharraf to realize that at this point in time he is the best thing that could have happened to both Pakistan and India. If he can strengthen Pakistan and keep forces of extremism at bay, we will all come out the better for it in the long run.

hobbyty:

Thanks for providing the details of the article with PAF`s new recruitment policy. That`s indeed a great news!

Thanks.