Rightsizing of the Armed Forces

A NEW DIRECTION,

This is the first article in any pak media that nemes the jihadists as cannon fodder and mercenaries. There is also a noticeable change in the letter to editors of dawn, some are questioning the kashmir day, they are talking about basant celebrations. These are good beginnings, the next step is to call the jihadists terrorists and assign them jobs like the ones I am suggesting in my tipe for pakistan

TIPS FOR PAKISTAN,

Burried mines are the night mare for any deming operations. The claymore mines are the mosr devastating. These can be detected by metal detectors, but removing them safely is hazardous and this is ehere the jihadists can be put to use.

Each jihadist has to be given a black granite block, may be 6 inch cube. After detecing a mine by the metal detector, the jihadist can be sent there and told that there is a hindu idol, an elephant god, and he has to dif it out with his hands and smash it on the black granite block. Knowing the symbolic significance the jihadist will start digging.

One advantage is that the resulting explosion will not damage anything like showels as he will be digging with bare hands and the granite will survive the blast. The martyres name can be etched onit, of course in arabis and given to the next jihadist.

Finally when all the six sides are fully engraved, the cubes can be assembled into a massive black cube in honour of the jihadists which they can look back from heaven

CONERGENCE,

At last there is agreement by all pakistanis, romair to sameer about the need to cut down the pak army. Who else can you count on, except the ones who could have easily cut the numbers down by 90,000, allowing for inflation, that is easily 200,000 in the present day numbers.

There is hope for pakistan, across the borders.

harish_hyd at # 32 wrote:

``There`s a joke about the Pak. Army that it is the only Army in the world that hasn`t won a single war.``

Its just that they were able to snatch 1/3rd of Kasmir from India in 1949, defend Pakistan quite successfully in 1965 and deny one General Chowdhry of Indian army to have tea by afternoon at Lahore Gymkhana (source: Indian newspapers in 2001 - The Great Indian Debacle of 1965) and finally, run a very successful joint venture with Americans in Afghanistan that eventually resulted in crumbling of former Soviet Union that is the real tragic part.

The fun part about Pakistan army is the way that they decided to defend East Pakistan, about 1000 miles away, cordoned off by India from 3 sides who also had a strategic military treaty with the USSR that gave an everlasting feeling of ecstacy to the Indians.

Romair #31 In continuation of this post, I see Mr. Arjun referring to the ``average abdul``. Mr. Arjun is lucky he can write what he likes on the internet. In real life, this ``average abdul`` would probably not give a second glance to two-taka twits like Mr. Arjun. And probably wring Mr. Arjun`s neck if Mr. Arjun tried to act high an mighty ``english speaking man living in america`` in front of the ``average abdul``.

Romair #31 You refer to the middle class and the lower middle class of Pakistan. I have a request. Could we please start referring to ``income groups`` rather than ``classes``? This would get rid of the false impression that the richer people of pakistan possess more class than the poorer people? My humble personal observations lead me to believe that the poorer people of Pakistan have at least as much class and dignity, if not more, than the richer people.
Thank you in advance for your kind consideration of this humble request.

...... as usual our resident khaki has a brilliant solution :

`` Cut the number of General position to one third its number, across the board, from the current 160 (around 125 Army, 23 Air Force, 15 Navy) to 55. This can be done by the National Assembly.``

.......... the national assembly! ......a mna can`t even get through tthe main gate of the ghq !........ the defense minister has to stand in line to visit with a lowly major in the ms branch or the assistant qmg .......... national assembly indeed ! .......for god`s sake, these guys are not even allowed to park their car within two miles of the csd ............

The author is right on. So long as the military is promoted and regarded as a sacred cow there is little hope of making anything beyond a token investment in the basic needs of the the people, food, shelter, health care, education etc. Defence and debt-servicing (which is also largely the result of fueling the military machine) consume almost the entire state revenues year after year.
And the army`s claim to the status of a sacred cow rests on the twin myths of preventing Indian aggression and ``liberation`` of Kashmir. It is high time for tha saner elements of in Pakistan refuse to be hoodwinked, opt for peace with India and let the people of Kashmir define and lead their own struggle.

Pakistan Army was significantly smaller before the 1971 War

In 1970 we had about 2,500 gazetted officers and about 12 generals. Now we have more than 125 generals and over 12,000 bureaucrats.

To those countrymen eugolizing the military.

...After years of observing and writing about the antics of our military and political rulers, I have reached the somewhat cynical conclusion that no matter who is in charge, some things will never change. The reality of power in Pakistan is that the army has controlled the destiny of the nation for most of its existence, and is likely to continue doing so in the foreseeable future. The invisible `agencies` have huge, unaudited budgets and manipulate and malign politicians and control sections of the press. Incidentally, all this is a matter of public record: names of politicians and journalists who have received cash handouts from the exchequer have been published many times without any action being taken against those making the payments and those receiving them.

Under these circumstances, how can democracy possibly function? And if it can`t, what difference does it make who occupies the prime minister`s house in Islamabad? Before the elections, the received wisdom was that there would inevitably be friction between the elected PM and President Pervez Musharraf over the exercise of power.

In the event, the transition has been relatively smooth despite the hysteria in the press, although to be accurate, there has in fact been no transition as power remains firmly and securely with the president/chief of army staff. All that has happened is that the title of chief executive has passed to Jamali who is perfectly content to play second fiddle.

One major problem with the army`s role is that as an institution, it is convinced that its interest is identical to the national interest which it has defined without any semblance of a public debate. This leads to the conclusion that to justify our bloated defence budget, Pakistan needs an enemy. In our case, this means India. The logical inference to be drawn from this line of reasoning is that the Kashmir issue will never be resolved.

Another reason the army will never voluntarily loosen its grip on power is that the officer class is too accustomed to all the perks that go with running the country. Currently, literally hundreds of civilian jobs here and in our missions abroad are manned by serving and retired military personnel.

Housing estates and agricultural lands across the country have been parcelled out to officers as a matter of routine. Above all, they are virtually exempt from any sort of prosecution on charges of corruption. Every class has its own set of demands and requirements and normally, these are mediated with the state and some compromise is reached. In the army`s case, there is no mediation because it controls the levers of power.

Had the army`s monopoly on power meant simply the usurpation and waste of resources, we could have gritted our teeth and got on with life. Unfortunately, the assumption that GHQ is the source of all wisdom has many implications: for instance, when there is complicit relationship between religious extremists and the `agencies`, it is not possible for the enfeebled state to control the former. Their violent methods in Afghanistan and Kashmir cannot be switched on and off at will, and the result is the kind of hate-filled rhetoric and bloodletting we have grown so accustomed to...

http://www.dawn.com/weekly/mazdak/20030104.htm

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#37 by ahmadzai on February 8, 2003 6:56am PT
//...Its just that they were able to snatch 1/3rd of Kasmir from India in 1949...//

AFAIK, Kashmir wasn`t with India at that time. Its king joined India later to save his a**, when the invaders came close to Srinagar. ( Experts tell us that - but for that invasion in 1949, Kashmir would probably still be an independent territory, but that`s another story)

But, are you sure it was the great Paki Army which ``snatched`` 1/3 of Kashmir? Until today, pakis insisted that it was the brave ``tribals`` who did it. So who was it then?

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Please, listen to it, in particular the first five minutes, to have an idea what respect our militarymen have for the people and their will.

BBC`s Report with Musharraf`s Interview at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/rams/zafarye.ram

you will be appalled, to say the least.

Hello!

To my immense pleasure, the interaction so far has been very relevant and strictly to the point. A couple of clarifications would be in order.
An easy access to the Internet notwithstanding, [thankfully] I am pretty doubtful that I can be classified as “elite” by any measure. I stem from a simple rural set-up of northern Punjab with very mediocre financial standing. Obviously, not the lowest social strata, I can however claim to represent the mainstream society of Pakistan.
There is a gross misconception that the military is still revered by the 99 % [or for that matter even simple majority] of the Pakistanis. Presumably, some of the readers don’t have an idea that today even ordinary people -- right from illiterate lower working class to apolitical housewives -- have started squarely blaming Army for the sordid mess in the country. The intervening role of the army is no more a mere academic discussion. It is being discussed and denounced in remote villages as well as kachi abadis.

A pertinent question would be that why don’t we see any civil unrest in the country then? Please note, the [disappointment and] resentment of a common man against the junta is not equal to an approval for the political leadership either. In general, people are totally disillusioned on one hand and utterly despondent on the other. They have almost lost the hope and consequently vigour to stand up and fight for their rights. They are too pre-occupied with their daily life problems to partake in street politics. This silence is a sort of macabre indifference, not at all an endorsement of Musharraf & Co.

Now moving from the social/political issues to military aspects, I would warmly recommend a really nice thought-provoking article. Please, read it and have your own opinion.

Professionalism and Discipline of Armed Forces in a Society with Repeated Military Interventions — Case of Pakistani Armed Forces
http://www.defencejournal.com/2003/jan/military.htm

Regards,
Riffat Jahan