Rethinking Islam with Sultan Shahin

War on Terror

23 Jan 2010, NewAgeIslam.Com

Dialogue? With unrepentant and exceptionally cruel and violent terrorists?

One is again hearing whispered preliminaries of the cowardly chorus of this being “not our war, after all”, despite the undeniable fact that Pakistani citizens and members of our armed forces are being blown up, shot and killed in a variety of dramatic ways. .... No less a personage than the prime minister has been heard asserting that force is not the answer to terrorism (sic) and that ‘dialogue’ is necessary. Dialogue? With unrepentant and exceptionally cruel and violent terrorists? For heaven’s sake, prime minister, what kind of company have you been keeping? Consider the previous others who have endorsed or demanded ‘dialogue’ with these treasonous savages. They have included General Pervez Musharraf (who signed away whole swathes of the sovereign territory of Pakistan that he had usurped when he illegitimately seized power), the likes of Generals Hamid Gul and Aslam Beg, the religio-political parties and their beardless fellow traveller Imran Khan, and such jelly-kneed politicians as NWFP’s Mian Iftikhar Husain who trembled at the suicide bombers standing allegedly behind them as they consigned the hapless people of Swat to a living hell. .... Counter-terror measures are not military in nature. They are a police matter — an issue of effective law enforcement. In his book, The Idea of Pakistan, Stephen Cohen remarked that while Pakistan was not, in his view, a failed or failing state, the corruption and incompetence of its police apparatus could well drag the country toward that direction. We have seen for example that, again and again, massive quantities of high explosives have been procured, processed, mobilised and utilised in one terrorist act after another; but no intelligence or investigation has been able to penetrate the elaborate financial, logistical and human trails involved. -- Salman Tarik Kureshi, Karachi URL of this Page: http://www.newageislam.com/NewAgeIslamWarOnTerror_1.aspx?ArticleID=2410 ----- Countering Terror By Salman Tarik Kureshi January 23, 2010 One is again hearing whispered preliminaries of the cowardly chorus of this being "not our war, after all", despite the undeniable fact that Pakistani citizens and members of our armed forces are being blown up, shot and killed in a variety of dramatic ways For nearly a year now, there has been strong and, indeed, enthusiastic public approval of the military’s anti-Taliban operations. Well, one thought, here is yet another example of the basic good sense of the common Pakistani. In spite of whatever claptrap our drawing-room chatterers, pulpit warriors, media jihadists and deluded politicos may dish out, Mister-Missus-or-Ms Average Citizen remains fundamentally humane, patriotic and tolerant. But is this still true? Does one not detect a degree of weariness? A wish that this whole damned war would go away? After all (one hears people saying) if the Americans would only pull out of Afghanistan, where they have no reason being in the first place, all these bombings of Pakistani citizens would stop, would they not? No less a personage than the prime minister has been heard asserting that force is not the answer to terrorism (sic) and that ‘dialogue’ is necessary. Dialogue? With unrepentant and exceptionally cruel and violent terrorists? For heaven’s sake, prime minister, what kind of company have you been keeping? Consider the previous others who have endorsed or demanded ‘dialogue’ with these treasonous savages. They have included General Pervez Musharraf (who signed away whole swathes of the sovereign territory of Pakistan that he had usurped when he illegitimately seized power), the likes of Generals Hamid Gul and Aslam Beg, the religio-political parties and their beardless fellow traveller Imran Khan, and such jelly-kneed politicians as NWFP’s Mian Iftikhar Husain who trembled at the suicide bombers standing allegedly behind them as they consigned the hapless people of Swat to a living hell. One is again hearing whispered preliminaries of the cowardly chorus of this being “not our war, after all”, despite the undeniable fact that Pakistani citizens and members of our armed forces are being blown up, shot and killed in a variety of dramatic ways. Let’s be clear. There are four linked conflicts going on at the moment. For one, there is the poorly named ‘war against terror’, mounted by former US President George W Bush against the al Qaeda organisation of Osama bin Laden. This comprises, on the one hand, highly successful civilian anti-terror measures within the US and other countries, which have prevented a recurrence of the spectacular earlier al Qaeda attacks in the US, Indonesia, Spain and Britain. On the other hand, having militarily driven al Qaeda from its Afghanistan base, piecemeal destruction of the organisation’s leadership proceeds with the use of deadly accurate hellfire missiles fired from unmanned drones. The connection of the anti-al Qaeda war to Pakistan lies in that al Qaeda is now located on Pakistani soil in the North Waziristan and Kurram agencies. The second conflict is in process within Afghanistan, where the government of that country, with the help of ISAF, is fighting an insurgency by the Afghan Taliban (originally spawned in Pakistan by Generals Aslam Beg and Hamid Gul, among others, in pursuit of what they called ‘strategic depth’). This war is a continuation of the 30 years of conflict in this region that has assumed different forms and engaged different countries at various times. The connection of Pakistan to this second war lies in, first, that these Afghan Taliban are said to operate out of ‘safe havens’ in Pakistan and, second, that their leader Mullah Omar and his ‘shura’ are said to be headquartered in or near Quetta. The comparative lack of success of NATO forces and the Afghan government against the Taliban is attributed to this Pakistan connection. And this brings us to the third conflict. This is the insurgency by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) against the people and the state of Pakistan. This third conflict threatens our most fundamental values and our very existence on the world map. It is unquestionably and solely Pakistan’s war. And those who say otherwise are either themselves culpable in this highest of treason or else stupid beyond belief. To their lasting credit, the post-Musharraf armed forces have mounted a spirited counter-insurgency (COIN) campaign against the TTP and have retaken much of the high ground earlier surrendered in the name of ‘dialogue’. The point to be noted is that this counter-insurgency was undertaken by the Pakistan military largely on its own initiative, support by civilian politicians being ex post facto and still largely left-handed. Moreover, despite the appalling savagery and insensate cruelty demonstrated by the TTP in the areas under their control, neither did the government, locked in its Islamabad ivory tower, nor the political parties, preoccupied with their power games, seek to educate public opinion about this menace or attempt to win the hearts and minds of the people away from the monstrous ‘ideology’ of the insurgents. This task was performed, with extraordinary skill and effectiveness, by the ISPR and the Army’s Psy-Ops department. The fourth conflict in which we are enmeshed is not a COIN, or counter-insurgency, campaign. It is a counter-terrorism operation. The numerous ‘Lashkars’ and ‘Jaishes’ that are not-so-clandestine fellow-travellers of the TTP have mounted a highly effective series of bombings, arson and other terror activities in Pakistan’s cities, from Peshawar to Karachi, and have even struck out as far away as Mumbai in India. This systematic campaign of successful terror attacks has succeeded in creating a fog of fear that is catching in the public throat. It has destroyed confidence and generated an atmosphere of generalised fear that is wearing down the will of the people to resist these mass-murderers and strike back at them with effective counter-terror measures. Into this atmosphere step the unwitting conscious purveyors of doubt and fear, to spread their poison of war weariness. And here, again, one must fault our government and other political leaders and functionaries of the state. Instead of rallying the spirit of the people, the government, along with its political rivals, is engaged in senseless internecine infighting. The army, however belatedly, is pursuing its military responsibilities by initiating and conducting a systematic COIN campaign. It cannot, nor is it meant to, conduct counter-terror operations in the cities. Counter-terror measures are not military in nature. They are a police matter — an issue of effective law enforcement. In his book, The Idea of Pakistan, Stephen Cohen remarked that while Pakistan was not, in his view, a failed or failing state, the corruption and incompetence of its police apparatus could well drag the country toward that direction. We have seen for example that, again and again, massive quantities of high explosives have been procured, processed, mobilised and utilised in one terrorist act after another; but no intelligence or investigation has been able to penetrate the elaborate financial, logistical and human trails involved. We have seen that even a political figure of the eminence of Benazir Bhutto could not be protected from attack on two separate occasions. We have seen, as during the attack on the Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore and the Ashura procession in Karachi, how the members of the law enforcement agencies simply melted away at the first sign of trouble. Let the military fight its counter-insurgency campaign. Counter-terrorist operations are a matter for the law enforcement agencies that come under the Ministries of the Interior at the federal and provincial levels. Law enforcement, let it be clearly understood, comes under civilian governments, which are responsible to civilian parliaments and assemblies, and which are called to task for shortcomings by civilian political parties, courts of law and media commentators. The writer is a marketing consultant based in Karachi. He is also a poet. Source: Daily Times, Lahore URL of this Page: http://www.newageislam.com/NewAgeIslamWarOnTerror_1.aspx?ArticleID=2410