Columnist Col (Retd) ABDUL QAYYUM talks about the ideas that have shaped the growth of the Pakistan Army.

The MUSHARRAF era began a year ago. It has yet to run its course and evaluation must wait. For the while, all one can say is that Pakistan is in the cauldron, the army along with the nation, and no one can tell what shape things will take until the cooking is done. Of one thing, however, we may be certain. This is a cauldron vastly different from anything that we have previously known and its impact on the army will be no less profound than on the nation as a whole. The AYUB KHAN and the ZIA-UL-HAQ eras touched only the fringes of the army, but this time around the army as an institution is involved.

Consider the way MUSHARRAF came into power, not as an act of individual enterprize but as the consequence of an institutional response from the army he commanded. Musharraf was in mid-air when the army moved in and the “crowning ceremony” took place in “that interregnum of some seven hours on the fateful night of 12/13 October (1999).” I recorded my thoughts in my personal diary shortly after the incident and since they are no different from what I hold today, I shall reproduce now what I wrote then, warts and all (a few factual errors of little or no consequence, all in any case now better known after the ATC trial presided over by judge REHMAT HUSSAIN JAFFERY.

Musharraf’s 7-point agenda takes a big bite. Some of it will stick in his throat if he does not spew out in time what he cannot chew. What the agenda states is clearly beyond dispute but the people of Pakistan, long-suffering when oppressed but short on patience when it comes to waiting for the fruits of honest endeavour, will not allow him the time he needs. The international lovers of electoral democracy, unaware of the dire straits we are in, will continue to raise a hue and cry. The “operational environment” calls for swift action, getting the ball rolling in the right direction and leaving it at that. No trend, good or bad, is irreversible. When so much and no more can be done under the given constraints of time and circumstance, it would be wise to stop and bow out. The rest is faith and prayer.

What is immediately most worrisome is the economic situation, the cloud that will continue to hover over every other endeavour of the Musharraf regime. As an individual citizen, I was ready for some bitter medicine but as a people we remain much too soft, particularly the layer which has never known what hardship really is. This is part of a wider “moral malaise” which the Musharraf regime will be hard put to isolate and contain, let alone destroy or eliminate. What is being attempted is courageous but prudence will set the limits. Musharraf will do the army a great service the day he walks out with honour and relieves the army of what it has “gotten itself into”. Unlike Zia-ul-Haq, the entry was not of his choice. Unlike Zia-ul-Haq, the exit can (and should) be.

Presently, the army is into everything, almost everything, in the driver’s seat on the winding way ahead. It started during the civilian regime with “ghost schools”, WAPDA, the National Census. Now it is into railways, highways, canals, NSC, NRB, NADRA, NAB, “monitoring cells” and what have you. One understands the compulsions that flow from the agenda but sooner rather than later Montgomery’s “narrow front” must take precedence over Eisenhower’s “broad front” policy, with Kesselring called to remembrance for a masterly withdrawal from “the toe of Italy”!

Hopefully, the army will come out of this bizarre twist in its destiny with honour in tact and the stamina, along with the vision, to regroup, reorganise and reorient itself for the kind of army that it should be in the future. Boy, this will be a “war” to have behind us, no less than the trauma of 1971! All ancient mariners must contend with their albatross, and the Pakistan Army must rise “a sadder and wiser man the morrow morn”. What will matter is its new mosaic of ideas and ideals freed from the drag of past events.

24.X.99.

Could you have thought, even thought, of anything more bizarre, immoral and illegal? Well, it has happened. The Prime Minister of Pakistan ordered the hijack of a PIA plane with more than 200 of his countrymen on board, among them 40 school children and his own chosen Chief of the Army Staff. Go land anywhere, even India if you please, but NOT Pakistan! It was not to be. With only 7 minutes of fuel left, the plane landed safely in Karachi —thanks to the swift intervention at the ATC by Commander 5 Corps (General USMANI) who was presumably around waiting to receive his Chief. Commander 10 Corps in Rawalpindi (General MAHMUD AHMAD) handled the rest in Islamabad and surrounding area. At 0300 hours ( 13.X.99.), we heard the immediate story from the Chief himself — the only occasion when I have waited for PTV to come on the air.

No need to felicitate the Army on the swift success of its counter-coup, it had no option in the matter. There are times a decision cannot be delayed, when THUGS are on the loose and many lives are at stake. USMANI and MAHMUD have no cause to be contrite, and PERVEZ MUSHARRAF has every reason to thank God for the effectiveness of his command. The State is in disarray, the Army survives to salvage what it can.

Please do not quote the Constitution to me, I have read it with care. Instead, ask NAWAZ SHARIF to do some reading while in protective custody, think if he can and ponder over where his “heavy mandate” has led him and this wretched land. Whoever heard of an Army Chief being sacked in mid-air? This is third-rate cloak and dagger stuff, not even exciting except for its colossal ineptitude. AYMAN, our grandson, home on a weekend from the PMA, regaled us with some details — all very funny but for the sadness which naturally overtakes men of my age. Why did NAWAZ have to be so stupid, I asked. Because he is so stupid, Ayman replied. Not really, my son, I ventured to add. The deeper reason may be that NAWAZ was never SHARIF. To be clever is one thing, to be wise quite another. It takes courage to be wise, only crooks try to be clever. All NAWAZ had to do was to let MUSHARRAF come home, call him to his office and hand him his marching orders across the table. Things being what they are at the turn of the century, not even the grandfather of this army would have intervened. Only those who observe the law can compel others to submit to its majesty. NAWAZ killed the law the day his goons desecrated the Supreme Court. He stayed on to drag the corpse to the incinerator, and now while  he cools his heels in the Attock Fort (not much coolness there), we are left behind “as on a darkling plain, where ignorant armies clash by night”.

The Pakistan Army has been drawn into the fray even as it was learning to be wise. As I said, it need have no qualms of conscience but it has every reason to be fearful, circumspect, swift and clean in all that it does. We are in a mess of horrendous proportions. Let MUSHARRAF get on with his 7-point plan, involving as few men in uniform as possible. Meanwhile, the THINK-TANK at the NSC (both yet to take shape) has its job cut out for it: (1) the immediate formulation of an EXIT STRATEGY, clearly stipulating “bounds and report lines” for the operation to progressively come to a close within a rigid time-frame; and (2) the formulation of policy papers on each of the seven points, starting with “das Ganze” (ALL that needs to be done) and arriving at what is categorically imperative (what MUST be done WITHIN the specified time-frame). Within each sector, it would be wise to restrain the urge to perfection and do WELL what CAN be done WITHIN the time available.

Should the CE tell the people  how long he thinks he will take? I think not, not at this stage, so long as his inner resolve is clear. The people will be with him so long as he continues to deliver and he would do well to depart “on the hour” while he is still delivering. Everyone does not have to be kicked out. Someone must have the wisdom to leave while many are still clamouring for him to stay. Even prophets leave behind an unfinished agenda. Let ordinary mortals, very ordinary at that, attempt no more.

PERVEZ MUSHARRAF concluded his two addresses on TV, so far, with a prayer. Going back to our Staff College days (1974), I had tears in my eyes. If I see him again, I’ll remind him of the exact words of the Prophet (as revealed to him in the Quran):

27.X.99.      

For a year (1998-99) I worked as a Consultant with the IBHI (Independent Bureau for Humanitarian Issues, Islamabad) and early last month (Sept ’99) our study (“Role of the Armed Forces in Socio-economic Development: Case Study on Pakistan”) was handed over to the Swiss authorities in Berne. Since then, WAJAHAT LATIF (Resident Director, IBHI Islamabad) will have made some headway placing copies in the hands of people in Pakistan who matter.

The sudden turn of events in Pakistan (since 12.X.99), with the Army now in command of the country as a whole, shows how an army wrongly handled can spill over the bounds of constitutional propriety and assume tasks way beyond the compass of its legitimate role. Even in this highly negative situation, our report would make for some useful reading as a reminder of the ideal use of the Armed Forces (particularly in developing countries) through a pattern of civil-military collaboration which strengthens civil society, promotes national cohesion and preserves the supremacy of the civil authority in all civil affairs. Members of the NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL and the THINK-TANK attached to it (both yet to take shape) may cull much that is of relevance to their immediate task from just the “Introduction” and the “Summary of Major Conclusions” contained in the report. Of particular concern calling for urgent consideration is the foremost principle applicable to all military involvement in civil affairs viz. the principle of “steadily in and swiftly out”. The wider the involvement, the more crucial is the need for a clear-cut EXIT STRATEGY within a rigid time-frame. The advance to contact with the goal, the restoration of constitutional rule, must proceed with the same precision as a military operation through a series of “bounds and report lines” expressed in terms of economic, social and political objectives. I have no idea how the various parts of the legal cover necessary will add up to a package that facilitates the eventual restoration of the Constitution. MR. SHARIFUDDIN PIRZADA should know — this time, I trust, with a greater measure of integrity than the phoney referendum which did no service at all to either Zia-ul-Haq or the people of Pakistan.

The clock ticks on, the hour-glass emptying ominously before our eyes. Those who pin their hopes on a “soft revolution” will be disappointed if they expect of it what only a real revolution can bring. As a people, we are just not ready to initiate, sustain and survive a revolution. The Army cannot do for the people what only the people can do for themselves. I, for one, have no great expectations of the army. If it can get out quickly leaving behind a more manageable mess, we must remain ready to contend with what is left undone. The Army itself would be stupid to think it can do more, let alone attempt it. To be an optimist is good, but to be a realist is even more important.

03.XI.99     

PERVEZ MUSHARRAF’s first press conference two days ago was more revealing of the man than the shape and course of his future policies. He came through, in my perception, as a man of integrity, simple and forthright, naturally careful in his choice of words and brief, no cant, no deceit, thank God not even clever, and in no hurry to be understood in full by his many questioners. He was cool, with an easy smile on his lips, not twitching with suppressed emotion as on the occasion of his first five-minute address to the nation (0300 hours, 13.X.99). His handling of questions was dexterous, more precise when he spoke in English. Urdu, his mother tongue but obviously not his forte, leads all too easily to hyperbole and he was instinctively aware of it. He was calm, relaxed, no frown on his forehead, no unnecessary raise in the pitch of his voice, clear about what he could foresee and ready to admit what he could not. I think he was modest, with a steely resolve which sets its eyes on action, not promises rosy of hue. He came out strong and not wily, transparent, stable, resolute without being overbearing. He did not wear Islam on his sleeve but the core issue, I think, was clear to him: to bow before none but God. He did not have to say it and he did not say it, and his seven-point list of objectives was Islamic enough in the context of our present predicament. The difference between PERVEZ MUSHARRAF and ZIA-UL-HAQ is clear to me, and I wish him every success.

That success won’t be easy to come by. Obviously, he is placing much reliance on the NSC and its associated THINK-TANK, both of which are as yet not even embryonic, still encrusted in a “three-fold gloom”. The search for a dream team goes on with care and caution, with “selection on merit” and “continuation on performance”. A fine principle to follow and I, for one, have no doubt that he means business. Equally of immediate concern is the working relationship between the NSC, identifying issues and devising strategy, and the CABINET (of ministers) formulating plans and overseeing implementation. A clear delineation of responsibility will be necessary, with a clear set of rules of business and procedure. With the focus of the NSC on the prioritisation of issues on a national scale and the formulation of broad guidelines for a concerted multi-sectoral assault on each one of them, the CABINET will have enough on its plate drawing up plans and programmes to implement (launch and oversee) what the NSC passes on to it by way of guidance and a strategic orientation. The military mind readily accepts this as a logical structure and sequence in which strategy flows into tactics, a CONCEPT OF OPERATIONS paves the way to an OPERATIONAL PLAN, an OP INSTR leads to a series of OOs vertically animated and laterally in mutual support. The civilian mind sees this as placing the NSC “above” the CABINET, violating the traditional concept of a parliamentary democracy in which the CABINET remains the supreme governing body. To my mind, the argument is facile, not only because there is no constitutional democracy in the country today but also because experience has shown that Pakistan’s national security problems (particularly the INTERNAL dimension) are so perennial and grave that they cannot be left to the exclusive care of a merry-go-round of politicians — mostly corrupt and selfish, just as incompetent, not focussed on good governance but intent on amassing ever more personal wealth and power. Nonetheless, one important question remains. Should the “wisdom of the elders” (Upper House, Senate, NSC or a President armed with 58 (2) (b) etc.) come into operation AFTER the Lower House (including the CABINET) has exercised its initiative or BEFORE: in the first case  to restrain, contain or modify a worsening situation; in the second case to provide such guidance as would hopefully pre-empt any slide into disaster? In the personal domestic sphere, I have had the privilege of opting for the first alternative because I had already done my bit in bringing up my children well. In the public domain, it may be a luxury we cannot afford. Only mature nations with a high degree of civic sense can go by the text book on democracy. It would have been easier had we been just children, but we are a retarded nation 50 years old — worse, we are perverted across many generations and all segments of the population. The NSC with its THINK-TANK will not be a panacea for all our ills, but in structural terms it is worth a shot. Till the return of a viable democracy with a more traditional structure, the NSC will have enough to do by way of a guide and guardian (“Court of Wards”?) and the CABINET enough to do by way of further planning and vigorous execution.

04.12.99.

PERVEZ MUSHARRAF came to power through a sudden and bizarre twist in the turn of events, what some would call an accident of history. His continuation at the helm of affairs is an extension of that accident, not the outcome of any discernible process of steady evolution. This bothers me. Are we condemned to bum along from accident to accident with no control over our destiny, no hope beyond the temporary as we chase the mirage of a miraculous change?

MUSHARRAF himself has no choice in the matter, not now, not any longer. The die was cast during that interregnum of some seven hours on the fateful night of 12/13 October. It was no easy decision to take, a case of damned if you do and damned if you don’t. I would have been tempted, I think, to catch NAWAZ SHARIF by the scruff of his collar and hand over my badges of rank to him, regardless of the mighty mess that would have followed. The ball would have been squarely in the court of the people of Pakistan, the people at liberty to play it as they wished. With the army reduced to a rabble and elected thugs on the loose, we would at last have come close to the kind of chaos which paves the way for a revolution. How it would have gone from that point onward, no one knows. For better or for worse, the people would have been the architects of their own destiny.

MUSHARRAF  acted under the imperative of his foremost duty as the COAS: to preserve the institutional integrity and unity of the army. That done, “the rest” (happily an emergency, not martial law) followed as an inevitable corollary. My personal inclinations notwithstanding, this may have been the lesser evil to have opted for. Chaos does not necessarily lead to revolution and I am not sure if as a people we are ready to withstand the rigours of a revolution. So we are in for a little more of tinkering hoping to find our way out of the labyrinth with steps more cautious and moderate. With just about two months behind him, MUSHARRAF has made, I think, a steady start, although some are already saying that he is too slow. Typical of a soft and wishful people wanting the gains of a revolution without having to go through one!

MUSHARRAF says the elite of this country have been the cause of its ruin. As depraved governors, they must share much of the blame. But why blame them alone? The elite of any society are, by definition, the cream of that society and if our top men and women are as sour as they are, what are we to say of the masses below? The problem. that MUSHARRAF faces is an awesome one: the salt having lost its savour, what shall the salt be salted with? There are no DISRAELIS, WASHINGTONS, ATA TURKS  or QUAIDS langishing by the village pond and Musharraf must make the most of the best that he can lay his hands on. If that means the

SHARIFUDDINS, the ATTIYAS, the TANWEERS or anyone else that one may name, let linesmen not cry foul. The referee has to keep the game going and will do little good if he is continuously blowing the whistle. The spectators may howl and holler, but the game has to go on. After all, we are not at the

WIMBLEDON but somewhere in the middle of MANDI BAHAUDDIN!

We praise “the people” way beyond what we really deserve. It keeps alive the myth of a vast potential, a sop to assuage the pain of our sordid performance. We need to focus on the fact that we are an uneducated and impoverished people, shouting slogans as a substitute for honest effort and achievement. The people are no less to blame than their leaders: IS HAMMAM MEIN HUM SAAREY NANGEY!

29.X.99.

Dire says of economic hardship lie ahead of US. The upper class will descend to the level of the middle, the middle will sink into the seething mass below — not because of a social revolution, but because of a rapid collapse of the economy. It may and should compel the Armed Forces to switch from tanks to G-3 rifles, from destroyers to patrol boats, from supersonic aircraft to our own version of the L-19. Circumstances will cut us down to size, circumstances fashioned by our own profligacy. The wind will be taken out of our sails and we will be left standing “as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean”. I’ll be glad to see the back of the last of the PAJEROS, and since I am no longer strong enough to ride a cycle, I shall walk. The apartment in which I live will continue to decay but will probably not crumble before I die. My 8 LACS in the AWT will be reduced to two, and although there will be no butter and cheese on the table, I’ll survive. I’ll survive because I have lost my appetite and I am ready to go hungry. I’ll still be more affluent than millions in this land, because I have no children to support. I shall walk to my mosque, I shall give thanks for NAILA and MUNIER far away in Virginia.

Frankly, there is not a cloud on my personal horizon. At 67 (23.xi.99), I have cause only to be grateful. Parveen does not keep too well but that does not bothers her and it bothers me only a little. If I survive her, as I want to, I shall bury her with my own two hands and walk back to the mosque for what remains of life. We have lived too well to complain and the future does not worry me, not personally. But what of Pakistan, the dream gone sour, the journey to disillusion of 70 million people now close to 140? BOSNIA, KOSOVO, even CHECHNYA will rise from the ashes; we have done nothing to even die peacefully. Just one line from the Quran’s portrait of hell says it all: therein they shall abide, unable to live, unable to die.

I know of no one with any sense who can be upbeat about anything in Pakistan today. The present mess, to take only the economic, is way beyond the ingenuity of the best of our managers, and PERVEZ MUSHARRAF will not find one too many no matter how long be delays matters. Like the fat belly of the SUMO wrestler, it will continue to elude the grasp of the longest arms in the ring. What may resolve matters in the end will be the capacity of the people to bear with privation and the wisdom of our policy makers to make the axe fall where it should, on the stinking rich and those who whine even after two square meals a day. Privation equitably shared is privation so much the easier to withstand.

As for the moral malaise, not all the material accountability will wash away the stain on our souls. We are soiled, across many generations and in all segments of the population. Who will teach us to tell the truth, to bow before none but God, to stand erect and never to stoop, to stand in line and never to push or pull, to share, to hold hands, to read with care, to play with joy, to love, to give thanks, to pray, to smile and to shed our tears only on the prayer mat? If we have not learnt all this by the time we are 10 years old, a life-time of martial law will be of no avail. So, what can PERVEZ MUSHARRAF do about it? NOTHING, except for a few symbolic gestures which place education at par with food, even in the dire straits we are now in. This land will not die of starvation. It is dying under the sheer weight of ignorance: the learned nonsense of the elite and the vast emptiness of the masses. Some day we must get our primary and secondary education systems right; make both decent, universal and compulsory.

PERVEZ MUSHARRAF did well to be pertinent in his brief reference to Islam. With so many pedlars of Islam buzzing in the land like drones, he did not have to join the ranks of those whose tongues await “scissors of fire”. I hope he will come down hard on sectarianism and eliminate their culture of violence. His 7-POINT statement of objectives is formidable enough and if the NSC (with its THINK TANK), the CABINET and his key managers can help him maintain a run-rate of about 4 per over he will have made his mark. The crowd will be crying for manhattans. He must get the right mix of boldness and caution. Performance must race way ahead of works, as he is will aware. In the end, it is performance (NOT Sharifuddin Pirzada) which will blunt the edge of the horrendous legal problems which lie ahead of him.

Finding men of competence and integrity, with the right orientation, is going to be far more difficult than what many glib Islamists think. Cedars and Cinars do not grow in the wilderness. This land is more barren than we are ready to admit. We cannot run even municipal councils properly, let alone a sprawling nation of 140 million people. A fragmented society throws up fragmented personalities, disharmony within the individual as in the group as a whole. Diverse streams will not flow into a single current without a common orientation. What is more, the orientation needs to be right, because if it be wrong the faster we run the wider we shall go astray. In his selection of men, MUSHARRAF has been slow and tentative so far. He will not be hustled, I think wisely, and we may be sure he has his eyes on the clock. Not all will agree on every selection and I would not comment unless specifically asked to do so. In the final analysis, performance will count for more than past reputation, action will speak louder than curriculum vitae.

The wind bloweth where it listeth. MAHMUD, I have been told, has already taken over as DG, ISI. He has a stable to clean. When MUSHARRAF himself moves out of GHQ and operates from Islamabad, the umbilical cord will be stretched. Some day it has to be cut and in SAEED-UD-ZAFAR he has an able substitute for himself. Unlike Zia-ul-Haq with his three hats, MUSHARRAF would be well advised to be only CE and CJSC. He can afford to be bolder and more forthright than Zia-ul-Haq ever was, because of the manner of his entry and the mood of the Army as an institution: MUSHARRAF has become what he is because of the ways of NAWAZ SHARIF, not because the army is hungry for power. This Army does not want to be dragged out of the barracks, it wants to be left alone to focus on its own mission in a national environment that is stable. Many of my civilian friends will not agree. I would submit that I am neither dumb nor partisan. I believe this Army knows that it cannot survive without the nation and its self-interest is not of the same order as the selfishness of those who come forward to “serve the nation” and slink away in the dark with such spoils as they can gather. This Army has nowhere to run away to. The crown thrust on its head has more thorns than roses. It will choose to die only when the people of Pakistan decide that they do not need an army any more.