The Dispatches on War

re: wahi_to # 23

Wars are not just contests of brute force and modern wars are not about overpowering the enemy. Wars are ideological in nature; they can have political overtones and economic rationales. Wars have myriad reasons for their origins. My agrument about the poor nature of Arabs and their wars was not based on their 1400 history and neither was it based on their war fighting skills.

The Arabs, in my view, have a poor war fighting record, because most of the Arab wars lacked a political motive to them and were overtly religious. If you hold wars to a political reason for their execution, as most wars are understood, then Arab wars and the reasons for them do not have very strong political reasons behind their intents. Even as you have stated and I agree with you, that Islam was a resurgent religion and it was winning militarily till the mid 1700s, it still does not the answer the question explaining Islam`s political failure.

Wars and winning wars does not mean much if such a war is lost politically. History does not remember who started the war as much as history remembers how that particular war ended. Islam might have won wars for a thousand years out of its fourteen hundred year history, but it lost all those wars politically. In that sense, Islam has a very poor record of fighting wars.

Islam lost out politically, in a historic sense, because the wars of Islam were not about the creation of a political order, as much as they were about the sustainability of a personalizd rule of individuals. Islamic states and kingdoms had no institutionalized political legacies and were usually identified with the ruler and their sovereign power was in equal measure to the political power of the king/caliph. Even history and history of Islam identifies and discusses periods of Islamic powers not by the rise and fall of nations, but through the rise and fall of individual dynastic rules identified by the name of the person and not that of the state/kingdom.

Ciao

re: amit # 22

Amit, would you be interested in doing the honors and the work associated with such an undertaking? I would be really interested in reading a non-Muslim perspective of the Muslim invasions of India.

The points you mentioned about the varying nature of Muslim rule suggests that you have enough material to come up with a hypothesis and a thesis. I hope you will consider my suggestion. :)

I agree with you. A dispassionate analysis of Indian history does tell us that to rule India, there has to be an inclusion of all the groups in India. It is therefore not suprising that Mughuls would have co-opted the Hindus and Rajput in their administrations to rule India. I would also venture and state that it was the omission of this principle, which was responsible for the agruments leading to Pakistan. :)

re: Romair # 21

Romair, though I have no objections to your post or the information you have stated in it, I still hold the opinion that the opinion of the COAS in Pakistan matters more than the public opinion. I am well aware that the army has internal heirarchy of power and in many ways, it is more democratic than anything outside of the army. One only has to be invited to a few regimental meetings, in which the senior officer are made to account for their actions, to understand and appreciate the levels of open discussion within the armed forces.

Ciao

dost and feroz:

Re: early spread of islam

…i forget the source…perhaps hitti...could be rodinson, watt, hooker, hamidullah or rao…made an interesting observation…other than the obvious …circ 670ad both the persian and the byzantine empires were past their prime…a vibrant and dynamic islam appears over the horizon …the interesting observation had to do with the introduction of horses in their campaigns…speed and mobility…if memory serves the word was razzias… and i also recall within that early spread under discussion hardly any navy was used…any thoughts?

mr khan makes some wide raging generalizations that are not supported by facts, the arguments are more like his opinion rather than historical fact. I will make the following points:

Author mentions that ``Arabs have traditionally employed mercenary forces to guard their interests.`` I really wonder how did he come up with this conclusion. To my understanding Arabs have always fought their own wars. In the seventh/eighth century it was arab armies that fanned out in different continents and established muslim empires. Arab forces not rented soldiers defeated the crusades. And more recently Iraqis, not foreigners, fought Iran-Iran war. Based on ONE war (1990 gulf war) the author has generalized the history of arab warfare. The fact is there were 300,000 iraqi forces on the border of KSA in 1990 and total KSA army was 70,000. Outside help was the only option for KSA.

Author generalizes ``Islam had a difficult time and a very poor record of fighting wars``. Out of the 1400-year history of islam, muslim armies, generally, were victorious for the first 1000 years. It was in year 1707 that Mughal empire in India reached its zenith. Ottoman empire stretched over continents till first world war. I would suggest that muslim armies were immensely successful in their first millennia and stood unchallenged. It is the muslim backwardness in technology and sciences that led to downfall of muslim warfare.

Mr Khan contends that Islamic nations are correctly termed as rogue nations because ``In Islam, it is the individual authority and not the state’s authority that has the power to declare war. ``. This theoretical generalization holds no ground if we analyze it in light of present-day reality. The fact is that concept of nation-state has given us two world wars and enormous other conflicts. It is an absurd assumption that a state will necessarily behave in a civilized manner. Let us not forget that nazi germany was a nation-state with democratically elected government, so was serbia in early 1990`s and so is present day USA.

Re:ferozek#16

It would be quite valuable to analyze the muslim invasions of India in a dispassionate manner because the nature of these invasions varied quite significantly over time. I agree that initially the invasions were opportunistic in nature and mainly for plunder. At the same time, religious ideology was at work along with the plunder. The areas of Pakistan were the primary target of these invasions. The accounts of the invasions at that time not only mention looting and plundering but also talk a lot about destruction of temples and religious places as a means to establish the supremacy of religious ideology. In addition, the religious conversion of Pakistani people happened at the same time, although it was probably a combination of the invasions as well as the preaching of sufis who came along.

In the later years, when the invasions focused on the Indo-Gangetic plains, the nature of the invasions changed from plunder to empire building. At that time, religious ideology was given a complete backseat, since the invaders needed cooperation from the local people to consolidate their hold on the region and establish their empire. You no longer heard of destruction of temples etc. The Mughals actually collaborated with the Rajputs and the people of the Indo-Gangetic plains did not convert to Islam, in spite of nearly 800 years of muslim rule. I also suspect that the muslim rulers in Delhi did not really want all hindus to convert because they wanted to maintain the distinction between the rulers and the ruled. Given the egalitarian nature of Islam, it was unlikely that the Turko-Mughal-Afghan domination would work if every Indian converted to Islam. They would demand equal treatment under Islam and could even snatch power away from the elites. While Aurangzeb did try to bring back religious ideology in the picture, it was too late and also half-hearted. I do believe that in the end it is the lack of religious ideology that led to the eventual end of muslim rule in India because the ideological underpinnings disappeared.

Ferozek #20: There is no country in the world, where public opinion does not matter. It is just expressed in different ways. Public opinion does matter in Pakistan. This is exactly why Musharraf has not been able to send troops to Iraq, even though, it seems like he wanted to. This is also why the MMA brigade was not able to create an uprising in all of Pakistan, against Pakistan taking on the Taliban. At the same time, this is also why the MMA won in NWFP, because it did take on the American point of view.

The military that the Pakistan military officers have the closest relationship is neither Saudi nor Iraqi military. It is the US military. The whole high command of the Pakistan military was trained in the USA, at some stage of their careers. More so, they all work on US equipment, over a time span of decades. This means that they are constantly in touch with the various US corporations regarding this equipment. It is common for engineers in the PAF to be in touch with Boeing, Lockheed etc. on a regular basis, via mail, email etc., for spare parts, upgrades etc. Kind of like a Pakistani IT company working with a US IT company in a partnership for a long time. You tend to become personal friends.

Bonds between soldiers, due to various reasons, regardless of which country they belong to are very strong. When Musharraf carried out the coup, the first person he called was his colleague and friend Gen. Tony Zinni, the Centcom commander. I attended a few months of training in the USA, and I still have family contacts with my US classmates. We visit each other, when we have time. Also, my course mates who graduated with me in the Pakistan Army, Navy and Air Force will always remain my close friends, regardless of the differing careers we may have.

I have not seen anything like this in the civilian world, where friendships tend to be very short-term and profit-oriented.

It is true that Gen Baig preferred Iraq. But at a personal level, I am sure his closest contacts would be with Americans. However, he does not make decisions alone. He has a group of corps commanders who assist him. The govt. wanted to support Saudi Arabia. The population wanted to oppose the USA, and support Iraq. Pakistan took the middle road: it supported Saudi Arabia, but very mildly.

In addition, the Pakistan military is not a monolithic institution, like most people think. Like most professional organizations, it has a clear command structure, and it executes the orders given. However, internally all the soldiers have their own differing opinions, and they do express them. And even if the ruling General does not worry about the civilian public opinion, he does pay a great deal of attention to the internal opinions of his own constituency, i.e. the Army.

99.999% of the soldiers have no political power. I believe 90% of the military consists of simple villagers or individuals from lower financial groups who are serving in enlisted ranks. Their opinions, as well as the opinions of most non-General officers tend to be inline with the rest of Pakistan on foreign policy issues.

In addition, while a person may himself be in the Army, his parents, sisters, brothers, son-in-laws, etc. tend to generally be civilians. Hence he forms his opinions, from that point of view. Keeping that in mind, it needs to be understood that it is not as easy as most people think for a General to just send troops wherever he wants. He can get away with it, once or twice. But sooner or later, his own troops will turn against him. Especially for a General who is relying on the same troops to ensure he stays in power politically………

re Romair # 11

I think you have stated the facts quite clearly on the deployment of Pakistani armed forces in Saudi Arabia and the reasons behind their recall.

As to your comment about the public opinion being a factor in the decision of GHQ not to send troops to the Gulf in 1990-1991 and in 2003, I would have to differ from your view. Public opinion does not matter in Pakistan, when it comes to the military`s self-interest. In the first instance, it was the personal animosity of the COAS, General Beg, towards America and his fondness for Pan-Islamic causes, which was the main reason why Pakistan did not dispatch a force to the Gulf. In that war, if memory serves me correctly, Beg favored Iraq over the Allied Coalition.

In the second Gulf war, the GHQ would have send troops but it was not willing to risk the destabilization of its rule in Pakistan. GHQ was a willing participant in the military operations against Taliban in Afghanistan in November 2001. Another difference was that in 1990-1991 Pakistan was not under military rule, but in 2003 it was and there was an urgent need for the military to limit the fronts on which it was fighting. Also, in the First Gulf War, the military was not in a political alliance with the religious parties.

The reasons for not sending Pakistani troops varied during war in 1990-1991 and in 2003, but it was not influenced by public opinion as much as it was influenced by the army`s own calculations of power within Pakistan and the political consequences of its decision to send troops. In 1990-1991 the blame would have landed on the desk of Benazir Bhutto and in 2003, it would have landed on the desk of General Musharraf. Another point to ponder is that in 2001, it was not public opinion which made Pakistan join the war on terror; it was the army`s instinct of self-preservation. The first Gulf War did not threaten the existence of the army, but the war on terrorism did if Pakistan had refused the American ultimata and in both cases, the decision was made by an individual who happened to be COAS.

Ciao

re: Dost-Mittar # 18

You hinted towards some very interesting ideas about early Islam and I hope you will develop them a bit further. I agree with you that at the end of the 17th century, Islam and Europe went their own ways.

Pax Islamica? In the areas conquered by the Muslims there was a Pax Islamica and the reason it collapsed was economics. The economies of the Islamic kingdoms were not good at sustaining the political vision of Islam. Secondly, the lack of military modernization meant that Islam would not be a position to defend Pax Islamica even if it had wished. In many ways historically, it seems that Islam has ``missed the bus``.

I agree with your hypothesis that maybe the Prophet did not visualize the expanse of Islam outside of Arabia. Also, what is often overlooked is that Islam itself was influenced as it added more territory to its rule. This created different interpretations of Islam and Islam not only developed as a religion, but it also developed in a culturalal and political sense, which was seperate from Islam in Arabia and Arabia`s culture and politics.

Ciao

Hi Feroz:

You have provided an academic theory of the origins of war. My knowledge of that period of European and Middle Eastern history is quite limited, so I learnt quite a bit from this.

As for the state of islam and war, I think that you have underplayed the success of islam, which conquered a large swath of landmass from the present day Austria to India in less than a century. Could it be that Pax Islamia could not take place as the concept of the nation of islam broke down with the end of the khilafat? I believe that the early caliphs did play a role somewhat similar to that played by the pope in Europe until the 17th century; I remember reading about Mohammad bin Qassim seeking the approval of the caliph in certain matters. Unlike christendom, the concept of an ummah still holds a powerful apeal to the hearts of all practising muslims; in practice, however, it has remained largely a myth despite the formation of the Organisation of Islamic states. This was perhaps inevitable as the prophet was probably thinking of a homogeneous nation of arabs and did not foresee the success his religion would have in encompassing a vast diversity of races, ethnicities and the development of nation states.

I will wait for your future essays to make any comment upon the more contemporary art and science of war.

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re: amit # 10

Yes, those are the broad classifications, by which wars are judged and understood. However, there is a fourth classification and it is of economics. Traditionally, most histrographies had concentrated on the politics of wars and very few had sought to understand the role of economics behind the wars. The Muslim invasions were motivated by the economics and ideology, but between the two; ideology was always at disvantage to the reasons of economics.

As I mentioned in my article, but not in specific detail, the primary focus of Muslim raids into India seems to be good examples of opportunism. India was vunerable to invasions and it was invaded not for conquest but for plunder. It was after many years of such periodic raids, that the Muslims sought to build their political rule in India. Likewise, the same example applied to the British and the British East India Company in India in the 1700s.

As to the American invasion of India and Pakistan, the Americans would have to fight back the Indians and Pakistanis or increase the HI-B quotas or add two more new states to the American union :)

Ciao

re: #7 by ferozk

``Saudi Arabia has a long tradition of using proxy wars to fight for its interests. ``

With so much of petro-dollars around, I guess they can buy anything.

``Pakistan did not send its armed forces to fight Saddam not due to its India centric policy``

I used the word India centric because any flare up on kashmir would require Pak to be ready with the entire military strength. As happened a few years back, Pak was going to recall all its peace keeping force as well as depute the forces from the Afghan border to the east.

``because the hardware would have been provided by the Saudis and the Pakistanis would have simply manned the Saudi equipment.``

Now from where would the Saudis get there hardware from? I don`t think the F16 U.S. fighters fly are the same as the ones Saudis has or Pak will have. Also Osama also was ready to bring in his battle hardened, high morale mujahids to the rescue of Saudis.

``the prospect of earning hard dollars by being rent-a-soldiers for the Saudis was quite attractive to the officer corps in Rawalpindi. ``

Definitely, but my concern would be why take a chance. If the best fighting machine in the world is offering you help, why would you look some where else. U.S. and its allies not only discisively defeated Saddams army, they crushed his ability to even rebuild it by enforcing sanctions and no-fly zones. Also remember how Saddams army burnt the oil wells. American came in handy there too.

Coming back to The Treaty of Westphalia,
``......and how the balance of power was recreated, you will see that Europe wanted to remain politically fragmented and with a multipolarity of power centers. ``

Before the war too there were several power centers like the French, Spain, Hapsburg, and the Holy Roman Empire. Towards the end of the war the Holy Roman Empire was clearly in no position to carry on but neither could the Swedes or the French deliver a knockout blow from a military point of view. Hence this treaty was also called The Peace of Exhaustion.
And after 30 years of war the centers of powers changed. Along with the end of the supremacy of the Holy Roman Empire, France emerged as a dominant power.So even though there were several powers these were allies during the war just like present day U.S./U.K./Spain. Even though three new great Powers arose from this peace: Sweden, the United Netherlands and France, Sweden`s time as a Great Power was short lived.

But after the war definitely the Protestants were there to stay. In Islam more than 90-95% are sunnis, shias are hardly a match for them. Iran-Iraq 8 year war could be compared to the 30 year war. But it failed to bring any introspection in Islam. because of its rigidity it will never compromise on its principle. I had an experince with a Jordanian, we were in a seminar. After some data was presented and some conclusions drawn, the Jordanian who is a devout Muslim asked him why is he (the presenter) so much sure of the conclusion. Has he independently verified it? I started to think the same why is he blindly following his religious books. Has he independently verified it? I guess when you have faith, you don`t care for reason.

BTW, because of this article I did some more reading. It was really an interesting discussion.

Amit #10: I think you are correct.

The concept of ideology is very strong in Islam. Within the context of war, the concept of, ``Shahadat`` must be amongst the strongest concepts, of any kind, in the world. It is generally accepted by Muslims of all sides. This includes radical Muslims as well as the most Westernized ones. The Pakistani soldiers who couldn`t recite a single verse of the Quran, during the gora days of the 60s etc., still believed in the concept of Shaheeds. Even the non-Muslims who have died fighting for Pakistan, are refered to as Shaheeds.

Once a population is convinced they are going to heaven if they die, fighting for a cause they consider legitimate, they become extremely difficult to occupy. This is why it is difficult to take over a Muslim country. Even though, due to their backwardness it may not be too difficult to defeat them in a war. The Afghans broke the back of the mighty USSR. Even though, the USSR was able to invade much more powerful and developed East European countries as and when it wanted. It was the maulvis who fought in Afghanistan. While the secular forces joined up with the invading Soviets or fled to California.

Similarly, it is the maulvis who are leading the fight in Iraq. While most of the secular Iraqi leadership has joined with the occupying Americans, or have fled to Dearborn, Michigan. There is, as you said, an ideological Islamic resistance, alongwith a nationalistic Iraqi resistance to the USA in Iraq.......

``I wonder what would happen if the US had attacked Pakistan or India to wage such an ideological battle.``

Hmm... I don` think this can happen. No country that has nuclear weapons has ever been attacked by an Army, across its borders, in the history of mankind. The first indication that Iraq did not have nukes was the fact that the USA attacked it. If Iraq had nukes, it would never have been attacked. Much like North Korea will never be attacked........(sidenote: the Egyptian attack on Israel in the Yom Kippur holiday is an exception to the above rule. However, at that time, I am not sure how sure Egypt was about Israel`s nuclear power)......

Netizen, 98% of them were indeed converted and you are correct in your claim that they were taken from Christian areas. However, those Christian areas were economically and politicall subordinate to the Ottoman Empire and soon even fell to the Ottomon Collosus. Any hows, the 2% that were not converted were the elite bodyguards of the Sultan. They were exceptionally fine soliders and I even got a chance to see their bodyarmour and weapons when I was in Istanbul. I visited the Top Kopi Palace and a multitude of other historical sites.

it wont happen in Born-again Evangelical United States to the Ghettoized Islam........they will be segregated and pretty safe -- in the Land of the Neocons.....

The funny thing is muslims are not ghettoized in the US (with the possible exception of arabs in detroit, but even that is a stretch) while they are ghettoized in northern europe.

Ferozek #8: ``Pakistan did not send its armed forces to fight Saddam not due to its India centric policy, but due to the politics of GHQ in Rawalpindi. Had the COAS not been so politically against United States, Pakistani army would have had more than a brigade fighting Iraqi army. Pakistani brigade did not fight as it was stationed in the rear for ``logistical`` reasons. ``

Pakistan used to have a huge Army presence in Saudi Arabia. It was the (un)official protector of the Saudi royalty. I think the presence was around an Army div or so. Unlike the PAF, which has (had) a presence, for training purposes, in most Arab countries, the presence of the Army in Saudi Arabia was for non-trainnig purposes.

This presence was withdrawn during the Zia regime, when the Saudis demanded that Pakistan Army only send Sunni soldiers to Saudi Arabia. The Army obviously could not accept this, since it is a mixture of a large number of Sunnis and Shias, hence the Army presence in Saudi Arabia ended.

Pakistan did not send frontline troops in the first Gulf war due to the same reason for which it did not send them during this Gulf war. The population of Pakistan is always, overwhelmingly, against the USA, in any war. In this Gulf War, 98% of Pakistan is against it. In the previous one, I remember there were pictures of Saddam praying, as US jets flew over, his country, on the backs of vans in Pakistan.

The above is despite the fact that Saddam had attacked another Muslim country. And even moreso, despite the fact, that Saddam had always been more pro-India than pro-Pakistan. Iraq never supported Pakistan on Kashmir etc. While Saudi Arabia has traditionally been quite pro-Pakistan.

In the big scheme of things, I think anti-American feeling in Pakistan`s (non-Chowk) crowd, always supersedes anti-anything else feeling............People viewed the first Gulf war as a fight between USA and Iraq, not as a fight between Saudi Arabia and Iraq..........