Pakistani Army commentary

[omarali50]

There may be situations where immovable objects face unstoppable forces with tragic results. The writers of this report assume that "countries and their interests" are natural and eternal categories, but such may not be the case. I would submit that Pakistan has already lost control of the Islamic Emirate and does not possess the military force or the political will to reconquer it on its own terms. Eventually, it will settle for a strategy of holding the "settled areas" and I would not be surprised if one day the indo-tibetan border police is being asked to come and help defend Islamabad. Stranger things have happened. The US will inshallah create a reasonable facsimile of a regime in Afghanistan and this regime will contend with the Islamic Emirate for territory and influence for the next generation or so. China, US, EU, even India, will continue to subsidise corrupt "pro-western" regimes in Pakistan and Afghanistan and will wait for time to work its healing magic. This is the best case scenario. Other possibilities include the humiliation and withdrawal of the great satan, followed by an orgy of violence and an expanded Islamic emirate surrounded by India, China and other local powers and at war with all of them. OR, if India and China fail to cooperate, China may use rump Pakistan or the islamic emirate to humiliate and destroy India, but will be left holding the most explosive bag in history, allowing the United States to recover from its near-terminal decline while China tries (unsuccessfully) to pacify Southwest Asia. OR, we could see the triumph of rationality and peace will reign as Pakhtuns buy Chinese HD players to play Indian movies while eating Ramen noodles. My apologies for being flippant, but its than kind of day...

[davidbfpo]

The role of the Pakistani Army Chief of Staff is pivotal in Pakistan's future and as an indicator what may happen internally. So it is no surprise to see the current CoS General Kayani may have his two year term of office extended beyond the compulsory retirement age; not to overlook the ISI chief and the Chief of General Staff too.

http://watandost.blogspot.com/2010/0...ef-kayani.html

The move has been made to ensure continuity in Pakistan’s policy on the war on terror and it also has a nod from Washington as the Army has achieved remarkable successes in the war on terror under General Kayani’s command.

I have a longer analytical comment via an email that will posted soon.

[davidbfpo]

Hat tip to Zenpundit for his exposure of the Q&A session Secretary Gates had with a Pakistani military forum on his visit recently: Zen's comments:http://zenpundit.com/?p=3338

Zen's closing, calm remarks:

Pakistan, or at least an autonomous part of its military, is our enemy in Afghanistan and have been since 2001. Let’s accept that reality and revise our policies accordingly. Being an enemy of the United States ought to come with some costs rather than aid packages.

A (partial?) transcript of the Q&A
:http://duckofminerva.blogspot.com/20...-national.html

The frank talk was apparently a bit heated. At one point, one of the Pakistani military officers asked Secretary Gates point blank: "Are you with us or against us?"

The transcript reveals a deep level of distrust between the US and the Pakistani military. It also shows that some junior officers of the Pakistani military do not take ownership of their government's current offensives against militants in the North West Frontier Province and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan.

This could fit on the thread 'The US & others working with Pakistan (a joined up thread)', but fits here too:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=2313

[davidbfpo]

I posted earlier in this thread some comments / analysis by an observer of the Pakistani Army's ways and attached is their latest - just in time as the succession issue has come to the fore. The author is identified, he is not a SWC member, his work has appeared on SWJ before and has given his permission for this item to appear here.

[davidbfpo]

This is a cross post and was originally on the 'Round Up Taliban' thread.

Lieutenant General Ahmad Shuja Pasha, director general of the military's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency, was due to retire this month but will remain in office for another year, Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani's office said in a statement.

From:http://watandost.blogspot.com/2010/0...extension.html Which has links to two Pakistani press comments and one adds:

The extension in service to generals, now four in number, by the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, raises important points.

From:http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default...1-3-2010_pg3_2

[davidbfpo]

An excellent article IMHO and some good quotes:http://www.nationalinterest.org/Article.aspx?id=23214

Opens with:

VOLTAIRE REMARKED of Frederick the Great’s Prussia that “where .some states have an army, the Prussian Army has a state!” The same can easily be said of Pakistan. The destruction of the army would mean the destruction of the country. Yet this is something that the Pakistani Taliban and their allies can never achieve. Only the United States is capable of such a feat; if Washington ever takes actions that persuade ordinary Pakistani soldiers that their only honorable course is to fight America, even against the orders of their generals and against dreadful odds, the armed forces would crumble.

Or:

....when it comes to the Pakistani Taliban and their allies. The military as a whole and the ISI are now committed to the struggle against them, and by the end of 2009, the ISI had lost more than seventy of its officers in this fight—some ten times the number of CIA officers killed since 9/11, just as Pakistani military casualties fighting the Pakistani Taliban have greatly exceeded those of the United States in Afghanistan.

[davidbfpo]

A short interview of a US-based Pakistani analyst on the next Army Chief of Staff, a decsion due by November 2010, or an extension for General Kayani: http://watandost.blogspot.com/2010/0...ext-chief.html

I have two questions: a) can the USA stand aside and let Pakistan make its own decision and b) will the civil power, President Zadari, make the decision?