Using terrorists to fight battles The Statesman 17 Sep 19
https://epaper.thestatesman.com/2331259/Kolkata-The-Statesman/17TH-SEPTEMBER-2019#page/7
Using terrorists to fight battles 17 Sep 19
Historically Pak has been conveying a weird logic on Kashmir to its people. It has been stating that despite the Maharaja of J and K, Hari Singh, acceding to India, it should have rightfully been with Pak due to it being a Muslim majority state. Hence, its army exists to regain Kashmir and prevent India from further disintegrating the state. It thus needs to be strong and appropriately funded. Realistically without Kashmir, Pak is insecure and vulnerable. The true reason is that it needs Kashmir to survive as water for Pak’s survival flows from Kashmir.
This induced belief enabled the Pak army to gobble a large share of the limited funds of the country and exploit national power. Every war which Pak launched was aimed at annexing Kashmir. In three major wars, solely aimed at annexing parts of Kashmir, it kept its own army behind ill-equipped and ill trained volunteers, seeking to exploit their success or making them battle on their behalf. In 1948, it employed tribal militia from Waziristan, to capture Kashmir, an attempt which failed.
It launched operation Gibralter in 1965, which was led by a force termed the Gibralter force, comprising of a mixture of few army volunteers, mainly from POK regiments, and fresh POK residents who had been brainwashed. The aim was to infiltrate them and push for an internal uprising in Kashmir, which could then be exploited by the Pak army.
Its attempt failed and Indian forces captured heights threatening Muzaffarabad, capital of POK. In desperation the Pak army commenced the war, launching attacks in the plains sector. It gained nothing, on the contrary lost key posts like Haji Pir. Yet it twisted history and declared 06 Sept as defence day, the day the Pak army defended itself against India.
1971 was a different story as India sought to free Bangladesh from the clutches of a Pak army which was carrying out genocide and rape of the Bengali population. It led to the largest surrender post the second world war. The Shimla Agreement signed post Pak’s surrender in Bangladesh and subsequently reiterated in Lahore Declaration made the UNSC resolution on Kashmir of April 1948 null and void.
Pak nationals are made to believe that India, holding 93,000 POWs forced Pak at gunpoint to accept Kashmir as a bilateral issue, ignoring the UNSC resolutions. They miss the fact that it was reiterated in the Lahore Declaration, where there was no gun on Pak’s head.
In 1999, it again used irregulars and the Northern Light Infantry, a force comprising of Shia’s from Gilgit Baltistan, whom they could disown as they are not Sunni Muslims from Pak’s Punjab province. Again, it failed and had to withdraw in defeat. Such was the panic within the Pak military hierarchy that they even refused to accept their casualties, which were buried by the Indian army with all military and religious honours.
Over the years, as the Pak army began expanding more into commercial activities, it began handing over national security to terrorists. This was a low-cost option and kept army personnel happy as they earned fat salaries and did nothing, except exploit poorly paid and brainwashed Jihadis. It realized that by keeping neighbours internally involved, it could concentrate on expanding its internal businesses. Its Fauji Foundation’s net income in 2017 was over USD 1700 Million.
Thus, the Pak army was dumbstruck when India launched retaliatory strikes post attacks in Uri and Pulwama. It struggled to hide the truth of the Indian strike, fearing loss of face before the nation, which it has directly or indirectly ruled since independence. The truth remains suppressed as Pak controls the media and none can embarrass it in public.
Further, the Pak army determines its own budget and salaries, which the government accepts unquestioningly. Simultaneously, since they command all forces within the country, whether it be the Rangers or Janbaaz, there is no civil power which can curtail their activities or actions. They have over time, rewritten their history books and converted defeat in every war into victory. Such has been their power that Musharraf the architect of the launching and withdrawing in defeat in the Kargil war of 1999, took over the reins and ruled the country for eight years. In any other nation he would have been sacked and spent his life in penury but not in Pakistan.
When India retaliates to Pak misadventures and targets their camps, they seek to call the Indian High Commissioner to register protests, claiming India is targeting Pak villages. They are neither interested in war nor keen to challenge Indian military power.
The Indian decision to revoke Article 370 placed the Pak army in a difficult situation. Its narrative, carefully built over seventy years, had suddenly been rewritten. It knew it lacked resources and conventional capabilities and hence began talking of employment of nuclear weapons, something no nation ever refers to. It was evident that they lacked conventional capability and were unwilling to militarily challenge India.
It was therefore compelled to adopt diplomacy as its major tool and approached every nation seeking support to push India to withdraw the resolution. One after another, it kept changing approach, hoping for some international support. Every time it was rebuked. Their army chief was left with the only option of promising to continue support to Kashmiris in their fight for independence.
Since the army was neither keen to get involved in a conflict nor did it have the capability, it again turned to old Jihadist hands. There have been reports of regular meetings between the ISI and multiple terrorist groups, whose help it again seeks to target Indian forces in Kashmir, an action which it itself fears to do.
This is the Pak army, who’s chief and head of public relations talk big, threaten India, but hide behind terrorist organizations. It fears Indian firepower and avoids direct encounters. How effective would be an army, which concentrates on corporate ventures instead of professionalism, and outsources national security and defence to brainwashed and illiterate Jihadi’s?
About the Author
Maj Gen Harsha Kakkar
Retired Major General Indian Army