An excellent read.
The SWJ "Strategic Design Considerations for Operations in Pakistan’s Tribal Areasust-up along the North-West Frontier" by William S. McCallister is one of the finest articles that has covered the psyche that governs the lawless badlands of western part of Pakistan.
Indeed, Pakistan is a curious mix of tribalism, feudalism, modernity, military supremacy and an attempt at democracy. It is an interesting pot pourri that does not mix and exude a pleasant aroma.
Pakistan is a country that has a serious identity crisis. It rejects its Indian past and is struggles to conjure an exclusiveness of being a historical separate indentity called the Indus Valley civilisation. This in fact encourages a further schism wherein the Mohajirs (immigrants from India due to the Partition) are forgotten and slighted! Interestingly, this search for a new identity ignores the fact that a large part of the Moslem population of pre Independent India were low caste convertees (to be free of the horrid caste system) or those who were converted to avoid the subjugation through the jezia (unbearable tax on non Moslem) or because of the Sword!
Thus, Pakistan is actually at war with itself and seized with a national schizophrenia, in a manner of speaking!
Jinnah, the Founder of Pakistan, was initially with the Congress Party and was not really concerned about the Moslem cause. But like all politicians when he realised that he could not wrest power from Gandhi and others, he took up the cause of Moslem's and for a separate homeland for the Moslems. It was merely a power quest that worked itself into a powerful political movement that brought about the birth of Pakistan. It was but a fait accompli without a solid foundation in reality of existence.
It is important to note what Jinnah had said in the inaugural address of the Pakistan Parliament. He had said:
We should begin to work in that spirit and in course of time all these angularities of the majority and minority communities, the Hindu community and the Muslim community, because even as regards Muslims you have Pathans, Punjabis, Shias, Sunnis and so on, and among the Hindus you have Brahmins, Vashnavas, Khatris, also Bengalis, Madrasis and so on, will vanish......
Now I think we should keep that in front of us as our ideal and you will find that in course of time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of the State.
This indicates that Jinnah's main aim was for power and not for Islam!
The birth of Pakistan though rejoiced by the Moslems of India, actually put into place a power struggle amongst the various segments. The Mohajirs being more educated than those who were from the parts that became Pakistan took all the plum posts in the bureaucracy, judiciary, education etc. The actually population of what became West Pakistan, steeped in feudalism and power as the land owning "aristocracy" and the backbone of the Indian Army felt threatened. This is the genesis of the struggle in Pakistan between the military and democracy.
The Mohajirs , who were rootless but intelligent, realised that there had to be a common cause wherein their legitimacy as inheritors of the promised land was not up for the grabs, used Islam as the catch all for all eventualities. Given that Pakistan was created for Moslems, the military and the landed satraps could not contest this excellent ploy.
Kashmir came handy for the military, who used the Mohajir inspired identity of Islam to the hilt. The military sprang into action as the true defender of Islam and went to war. This ensured that the exchequer became military oriented and beholden to it for defending Islam, as the sword arm, and extracted their pound of flesh.
Islam being partial to an aggressive mindset accepted the military's domination over democratic norms and thus this psyche gave legitimacy to successive military govt and its stranglehold over the economy wherein the army put its finger in every economic pie. It also turned the Nelson's eye to the military's infiltration and thus stranglehold over the bureaucracy by appointing serving and retired military officers in important bureaucratic and economic appointments.
This unholy churn and mismatch of governance is the cause of Pakistan's woe wherein the democratic institutions and norms have been sabotage and totally put out of shape.
While Islam ruled supreme in Pakistan, it had not yet been encased ''in the show window''.
It was Zia, who ensured Pakistan breathed and slept Islam! It was again a Machevillian ploy of an illegitimate dictator to legitimise his regime and the US strategic interest in Afghanistan was his Allah given gift.
Zia's "vision" of Islamic predominance of all matters temporal is what has added to the identity crisis. Fundamentalist Wahhabism and the ummah, an unrealistic dream of all Moslems, has seized the people.
Therefore, all one can say is, Quo Vadis, Pakistan?
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