1- Pakistan's Army Chief Is in
Washington -- Embarrassing His Prime Minister
2- Pakistan Military Expands Its Power, and Is Thanked for Doing So
Both must have been written are very specific topics
Why is General Raheel Sharif, Pakistan's army chief, visiting Washington right
now? Wasn't his Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, in the nation's capital less than
a month ago? I know you are confident about your guess: The Americans must have
invited him to come and discuss the unfinished war on terror. Oops! You got it
wrong. According to the Voice of America, the United States government has not
invited Pakistan's powerful army chief. To borrow a phrase from the Hindustan
Times, Raheel has invited himself to the U.S. The invitation does not matter
much but this trip once again highlights the army's brazenly tight grip on the
country's democratic government, specifically its foreign policy. A smug Raheel
is in Washington with a straightforward message to D.C.'s policymakers: Forget
about what was discussed between President Obama and Prime Minister Sharif last
month. Let's talk again. I decide my country's foreign policy, not the prime
minister.
Before his arrival to Washington, Raheel's army, on November 10th, had solely
taken credit for the "improved security situation" but rebuked the democratic
administration that the "progress" it had made in the fight against terrorism
could not be "sustained without matching betterment in governance and
administration."
Although the army has historically been in full control of Pakistan's external
relations, Raheel, since becoming the army chief, has staged sort of a foreign
policy coup. Prime Minister Sharif, a victim of a military coup in 1999, has
been so cautious in avoiding another military takeover that he has even not
appointed a foreign minister two years after becoming the prime minister for a
third term. On the foreign policy front, the army is explicitly intimidating the
prime minister. He cannot take bold decisions or fulfill the promises he makes
during meetings with foreign heads of government. The army chief has entered
into an undeclared competition with the prime minister over foreign trips.
According to Zahid Hussain, a senior Pakistani journalist, the army chief "has
perhaps travelled to more world capitals over the last two years than even the
prime minister, reinforcing the perception that not only does the military call
the shots on security matters it is also actively directing the country's
foreign policy."
"From a democratic perspective," wrote the respected Dawn newspaper, Raheel's
trip to D.C. "is discouraging."
Every time the United States negotiates with a general while snubbing a
democratic government, it becomes complicit in undermining democracy in
Pakistan. The United States has designated Pakistan as one of its non-NATO
allies but it does everything that is in contrary to making Pakistan as
democratic as its western allies. In a democratic Pakistan, the army chief
should practically be answerable to Secretary and Minister of Defense, whose
boss, the Prime Minister, is elected by the people of Pakistan. The civilian
government's alleged incompetence is no excuse to allow the generals dictate
domestic or foreign policies. After all, the United States did not call the
National Guard when incompetence and obduracy on behalf of the Republicans and
Democrats literally led the United States to a two-week long government shutdown
in 2013. The generals at the Pentagon did not intervene or take control of
Congress. We let Congress figure it out. That's how you, slowly but steadily,
learn the art of democracy.
While ing Raheel's trip to Washington, veteran journalist Ahmed Rashid,
surprisingly cited the army chief's "excellent reputation" because of his
"highly effective military operation" against the Taliban. Writing in the
Financial Times, Rashid argues, "terrorism across the country [in Pakistan] is
much reduced since the army action began 18 months ago."
Let me dispute Rashid's flattering account of Raheel's excellence.
For several decades, Pakistani lobbyists and scholars sympathetic to the army in
Washington have convinced American policy makers to do businesses with the army
because it is quicker and more efficient than the democratic governments to
"deliver". Deliver? Deliver what? That's where we need to step back and see what
the two countries actually expect from each other. The United States wants
Islamabad to fight "terrorism". The people and the neighbors of Pakistan want it
to fight "terrorism" and Pakistan also claims to be fighting "terrorism". But
all of the three parties are referring to absolutely different kinds of
"terrorism". Amid all this confusion, [fighting] terrorism has transformed into
a profitable industry for the Pakistani army that continues to receive hefty
American amounts to fight the elusive war on terror. Hence, those receiving
monetary benefits keep perpetuating the menace of terrorism so that flow of
American dollars is not interrupted.
While Washington's emphasis continues to remain on action against the Haqqani
Network and the Pakistani army keeps flaunting over its successes against the
Pakistani Taliban, here is why journalist Ahmed Rashid is wrong in arguing that
[extremist] violence has decreased under the leadership of General Sharif.
• On October 23rd, 2015, 22 Shia Muslims were killed in a suicide bomb blast in
Jacobabad, a district in the Sindh province.
• On October 22nd, 2015, 10 people, all Shia Muslims, were killed in a suicide
bomb blast in Bolan District of Balochistan province.
• On May 13th, 2015, 43 Ismaili Muslims were killed in Sindh province when
religious extremists opened fire on pilgrims.
• On June 9th, 2014, 23 Shia pilgrims were killed in an attack on their bus by
militants affiliated to the Jaish-ul-Islam in Balochistan province.
• On January 21st, 2014, 22 Shia pilgrims were killed in a bus bombing in
Balochistan province.
The dates and figures cited above will probably not worry or surprise the
policymakers in Washington because neither the attackers were America's direct
enemies (such as Al-Qaeda) nor were the victims Americans. However, these events
are important to review as they reflect the larger gruesome picture of Jihadist
infrastructure that still exists in Pakistan. By receiving money from the United
States and fighting the local Taliban, the Pakistani army is apparently working
as a mercenary force for the Americans. Inaction against Jihadist groups like
the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Sunni extremist group the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi suggests
that Pakistan is selectively fighting the war against Islamic extremism. This
approach will eventually pave the way for a new grand alliance between these
relatively small jihadist groups and the big ones such as the Islamic State (I.S.)
and the Taliban. At this point, these groups appear different and disconnected
from each other in their organizational structure, areas of operations but let's
not forget that they all mostly have similar backgrounds (for instance,
education from the same conservative seminaries) and identical end goals
(imposing radical Islam through brute force). In the United States and the West,
these Jihadist networks see a common enemy and in radical Islam they find a
common binding force.
Thus, those who believe Washington should patronize Raheel for his heroic
contributions in the war against Islamists because, in journalist Rashid's
word's, the Prime Minister is "slow and overweight and never deviates from his
written text", they are making a historic blunder.
Military actions are helpful as long as they remain only one component of a
larger strategy to eliminate religious extremism. In the long run, Pakistan
needs liberal education, curriculum reforms, democratic stability, civil
liberties, stiff action against mosques and clerics who preach hatred, religious
schools (madrassa) that mostly produce jihadists and provide sanctuary, food and
shelter to some of the world's dreaded terrorists.
No military action is needed to curb and freeze the funding channels for these
terrorist organizations. These are administrative measures that the civilian
government should take. The task becomes much complicated or unachievable when
units of the Pakistani military covertly collaborate with the same terrorist
groups. The army must come clean in order to disprove charges of collusion with
Islamist terrorist groups, playing double standards while working with the
United States and simultaneously abetting the Haqqani Network. Remember the
frustrated Admiral Mike Mullen who called Haqqani Network a "veritable arm" of
the ISI, Pakistan's primer intelligence agency?
Pakistan needs an army that is transparent and accountable to the Parliament. In
order to be a strong and confident country that is capable of fighting Islamic
extremists, Pakistan needs strong democratic institutions, separation of the
majority religion (Islam) from politics, and deeper commitment to fight
terrorism perpetrated in the name of religion. This should be done not for the
United States but for the better future of the people of Pakistan. On its part,
the United States should help Pakistan achieve democratic stability and the
supremacy of the Parliament instead of vanquishing the dreams of its
democracy-loving people who voted for a Prime Minister, not an army chief, to
represent them overseas.
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The most popular man in public office in Pakistan does not
give speeches on television, rarely appears in public and rejects news
interviews.
He is Gen. Raheel Sharif, the Pakistani Army chief, who has presided over the
country’s armed forces at a time when they are riding high after curbing
domestic terrorism and rampant political crime.
Aided by a new-media publicity campaign, the military command’s popularity has
helped it quietly but firmly grasp control of the governmental functions it
cares about most: security and foreign affairs, along with de facto regulatory
power over the news media, according to interviews with Pakistani officials and
analysts.
In a country with a long history of military coups, the current command has
gotten what it wants, edging aside the civilian government of Prime Minister
Nawaz Sharif, who is not related to General Sharif, without the messiness or the
international criticism a complete takeover would bring. And it is being thanked
for doing it.
“I wouldn’t describe it as a soft coup, but I would definitely say the civilian
leadership has yielded space to the military — for their own survival and
because there were major failures on their part,” said Talat Masood, a retired
lieutenant general and military analyst.
General Sharif, known as General Raheel here, took over the military command
late in 2013. He was appointed to the post a few months after the new civilian
government was inaugurated, and the country was in trouble. There were suicide
bombings, political party killings, rampant crime and violence in its big
cities, and assassinations of political leaders. Some politicians were calling
for negotiations with the Pakistani Taliban as military efforts to set the
militants back appeared to have stalled.
Then the Pakistani Taliban carried out a cruel attack on a school for army
families in Peshawar last December, killing 145 people — including 132
schoolchildren methodically gunned down in their classrooms. Supported by a huge
public backlash against terrorism, the army ramped up its crackdown on some of
the militant groups sheltering in the country’s northwestern tribal areas,
especially in North Waziristan.
Capital punishment was restored, and the military was handed new power, starting
its own counterterrorism court system alongside the badly backlogged and
compromised civilian justice system.
This year, the Pakistani Taliban have managed to carry out only a single major
suicide bombing. The army’s success against the Taliban emboldened it to take on
violent political parties and criminal gangs in the country’s biggest city,
Karachi, through a paramilitary group known as the Sindh Rangers. Despite
complaints of human rights abuses in Karachi, and millions of internally
displaced people from the tribal areas, most Pakistanis were simply relieved to
see the violence hugely reduced.
Through it all, General Sharif’s public appearances have been less ostentatious
than those of some of his predecessors. But at the same time, his face has
become ubiquitous on social media, after giving a free hand to the officer
commanding the Inter-Services Public Relations office, the military’s media arm,
to modernize that service
The ISPR had long been headed by lower-ranking officers, and it remained
decidedly lodged in the analog era. But by this year, the leader of the office,
Asim Saleem Bajwa, had been promoted to lieutenant general — a three-star rank
normally reserved for corps commanders — and his agency had become an
impressively slick machine.
General Bajwa’s Twitter account has more than 1.5 million followers, and the
agency’s Facebook account has more than 2.8 million likes. A film division is
pumping out offerings for television, as it had long done, but it has added
short videos tailored to YouTube-style platforms.
The social media accounts show in daily detail the commander’s movements —
visiting the front lines in Waziristan or reviewing troops. Video links showed
army units in combat, sometimes the same day it occurred, and troops helping
earthquake victims. Professionally produced martyr-style videos show, for
instance, a mother mourning a son killed in the field, who returns from the dead
to present her with his beret.
The ISPR declined to comment for this article unless a draft of it was submitted
to the office for advance review, according to a spokesman for the agency.
The Pakistani news media is clearly reflecting the shift in influence. When
Prime Minister Sharif visited Washington on Oct. 22, for instance, the visit did
not get nearly the attention of General Sharif’s current five-day visit to
Washington.
In recent weeks, General Sharif has seemed less circumspect about the new
pecking order. The military press office noted, for instance, that at a meeting
of army corps commanders last Tuesday, the general was “concerned” that the
civilian government was not doing enough to follow up the military’s success at
clearing out the frontier areas with effective governance. The clearly implied
scolding sent shock waves through the political establishment, but few dared to
criticize the military — something even opposition parties rarely do now.
The Pakistani news media, in particular, has largely stopped open questioning of
the military’s increased power. Pakistani journalists say the military no longer
has to bring intimidation to bear, as it long had, because most of the criticism
has gone quiet. At the military’s insistence, a government watchdog body has
ordered broadcast media to stop airing anything that could be viewed as support
for terrorist groups — a notably broad definition.
The military’s triumphant crackdown on militants has had little effect on the
war next door in Afghanistan, however, and the command still appears to be
playing a double game when it comes to using some militants as proxies.
In particular, military analysts said, the pressure does not extend to the
Afghan Taliban, many of whose leaders live openly in the Pakistani city of
Quetta. And the military has avoided tangling with the Haqqani network, a close
Afghan Taliban ally whose members have carried out some of the deadliest attacks
in Afghanistan but are mostly based in remote districts of Pakistan near the
border.
The double standard led to the blocking of one American military aid payment of
$300 million to the Pakistani military this year, under a congressionally
mandated requirement to certify progress in fighting the Haqqanis. An additional
$1 billion in military aid under a separate program this year was not affected
by that requirement, however.
Amid the Pakistani command’s clearly ascendant streak, Mr. Masood, the military
analyst and former lieutenant general, worries that the military may go too far,
preventing the country’s still-immature democratic institutions from developing.
“Success speaks for itself. They did clear Waziristan, and General Sharif does
get credit for that,” he said. “But success can change. If they overplay the
military card and continue to build an inflated image, it could boomerang. They
need to allow civilians their space. But I’m afraid the lust for power is such
that they don’t always understand that.”
(Note: special thanx to Mr.Malik Siraj Akbar & ROD NORDLAND of NY Time for this
Column)