Darth Vader
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2011
- Messages
- 4,447
- Reaction score
- 3
- Country
- Location
"As long as his soldiers hold on to the high standards set by him, Pakistan will see a bright future"
by Burrāq
[Terminal X Desk]
It was July 24, 2010: Pakistan's army chief was given a three-year extension by the then Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, an announcement which drew a lot of criticism from many circles of the Pakistani society.
This was the time when General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani was at the height of his career. With two successful military operations being winded up in the country's north and west, the Pakistan Army in general and its chief in particular enjoyed massive public support. The military’s public image was restored after years of decline under General (ret) Pervez Musharraf’s rule; this was only made possible after some drastic measures were taken by General Kayani.
Fingers were pointed when the extension was announced, but not many people are aware of the fact that it took a series of meetings for the then President and Prime Minister to convince the General to accept this extension. There were a few reasons for this decision by the government, and its subsequent acceptance by Kayani, first being: The war against the Taliban militants was in a crucial stage and the situation required continuation of policy and secondly, the government had a good working relationship with the army chief. Despite repeated calls for another military intervention in 2009, General Kayani kept his Army away from politics as far as it was possible. This step was in sharp contrast to what previous chiefs were notoriously known for. Whether this was driven by fear or something else, the government surely seemed hesitant in naming a new army chief and decided to keep things 'as they are'.
Kayani, the spymaster
It was not the first time Kayani was trusted by the politicians. A few years prior to this event, during his days as the spymaster of Pakistan, he was given a task by the then President and army chief, General Musharraf, to negotiate a deal with the late politician Benazir Bhutto. He was very instrumental in the signing of the infamous ‘NRO’ between Musharraf and Bhutto, which led to the return of the self-exiled leaders and paved the way for a democratic transition in the country.
His tenure as the Inter-Services Intelligence chief came at a very tough time. Then Lt General Kayani was appointed as Director General of the agency in October 2004, right when Pakistan was facing a plethora of threats from all corners, from a rise of insurgency in FATA to the north and Balochistan in the west, to a global scandal of nuclear proliferation, involving the country's famous nuclear scientist, Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan. Leading the ISI in such a difficult time was not a job of ‘just another General'; it required the directives of a man with patience and the ability to deal with a crisis of such magnitude.
Kayani, the ‘Man of Crisis’
General Kayani surely is a 'Man of Crisis' and history will always approve of this. Before he dealt with domestic and external threats while sitting in the ISI Directorate, Kayani was commander of the elite X-Corps (10 Corps) of the Pakistan Army. Former President General (ret) Musharraf trusted him with the crisis management of the investigation of two back-to-back assassination attempts on him. Before he took matters into his hands, the high-profile probe was leading nowhere. This was the time, as Musharraf writes in his autobiography ‘In The Line of Fire’, that he started to put trust in the abilities of Kayani.
Though General (ret) Musharraf might have ascertained then Lt General Kayani’s capabilities back in 2004, Kayani had already made a name for himself in the military during the 2001-02 standoff with India.
Kayani, the strategist
December 20, 2001: When the Indian military's Operation Parakram began in a matter of weeks, the international border and the Line of Control in Kashmir witnessed the mobilization of around 500,000 Indian troops. It was Major General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the then Director General Military Operations (DGMO), who was responsible for the deployment of Pakistani troops along the frontlines.
Those were days of sleepless nights. The unified mobilization of the Pakistan Army was the top priority of Major General Kayani. As DGMO, he had to oversee every deployment, and so he did. The response time of Pakistan Army, where in a matter of days half a million troops had been deployed to their respective sectors, was one of the main reasons why the Indian Army never found the well-expected time and space it needed to launch a major strike into Pakistan.
Not much has been said about the role of General Kayani in averting a possible nuclear war that could have erupted between India and Pakistan, but observers credit him for his excellent handling of the situation where he stayed in contact with his Indian counterpart, after which the eight-month long high-intensity standoff came to an end without any major clashes between armies of the two nations. Several intelligence agencies, including the American CIA, reported there was a possibility of a nuclear exchange if war had broken out, pointing at the aggressive missile deployments by both the countries near the international borders. Therefore, General Kayani can be well credited to be one of those men who saved South Asia from becoming a nuclear wasteland.
Kayani, the army chief
Never before in the history of the Pakistan Army had a former ISI chief progressed to become the army chief. It was surely unprecedented but General (ret) Musharraf had full trust in General Kayani, who formally took charge as the Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) on November 28, 2007.
In about a month, all army personnel serving in civilian departments were called back. A strict directive was passed by General Kayani himself, which ordered military officers to cease involvement in civilian institutions and not maintain contact with politicians in the future as well. This action was highly praised by the people of Pakistan as the General Elections were approaching in the next few weeks.
The writing was on the wall: Pakistan’s new army chief was not interested in politics and his forces immediately understood it. One wondered when was the last time in which a General had assumed command whose focus was solely on his soldiers and the battles they were fighting.
Kayani, a soldier’s soldier
American military officials described General Kayani as, "a soldier's soldier". And these two words have a lot of background to them. Kayani's first move as the Chief of Army Staff was to visit his troops deployed in the tribal areas on the Islamic holy day of Eid. The signs were evident, the new chief knew exactly what he was supposed to do.
Pakistan's war
As the first year of General Kayani's stewardship came to an end, the Bajaur agency, a tribal region which was controlled by the militants of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), fell to the Pakistani troops; it was the first major defeat for the blacklisted terror outfit which almost had the control of entire Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) at the time. The Pakistan Army’s success resulted in a strategic blow to organized terrorism in the Bajaur agency and made way for future military offensives in neighboring regions.
The year 2009 can undoubtedly be called as the turning point for Pakistan's war against its home-grown insurgency. Troops were moved into the usually peaceful Swat valley when the Taliban violated the peace agreement with the government. What followed in months to come will always be written as the Golden Chapter of Pakistan Army's history. In a war which lasted for around 2 months, Swat was cleared of more than two thousand terrorists and the valley subsequently fell in Pakistan's control again. Today, it has become one of the least crime-affected regions of the country.
Right when the displaced people of Swat were returning to their homes, General Kayani was preparing his troops for a decisive battle in South Waziristan, hub of the terrorist organisation TTP and a place which was also symbolic for both the Taliban as well as for the military. The year 2009 ended with the reclaiming of South Waziristan, with terrorists there totally defeated and pushed out. The success of Kayani’s troops in these operations took him to the height of his professional career. With public opinion massively favoring him, things seemed good until the year 2011 knocked on the door.
The dark period
The year 2011 came with a lot of surprises, with most of them proving to be not so fortunate for the General. The arrest and subsequent acquittal of CIA contractor Raymond Allen Davis, including other events that occurred during the period, seriously damaged Kayani’s image as the army chief.
Right when the nation was trying to forget the Raymond Davis episode, on the night of May 2, 2011, a joint team of US Special Forces and CIA personnel flew into Pakistan on their stealth helicopters and supposedly conducted a raid on a compound in the garrison city of Abbottabad. The next morning, US President Barack Obama addressed his nation and claimed to have killed Osama Bin Laden. It was surely an embarrassing moment for the Pakistan Army and its chief; the public dissatisfaction had now transformed into widespread outrage and resentment. The Abbottabad raid proved to be one of the most darkest and controversial periods in history for the Pakistani military.
By then, Pakistan’s relationship with the Americans was at an all time low. General Kayani was facing the major brunt of criticismfrom the people as he was the one they trusted the most. The people's trust in their General was fading day by day. Right when one might think things could not get any worse, an American/NATO airstrike on the Pakistan Army’s border post at Salala in the Pak-Afghan border resulted in the martyrdom of 24 Pakistani soldiers.
The next day, people took to the streets to protest the killings of their soldiers in the hands of their so-called 'allies'.
As expected and to quite a justifiable extent, General Kayani, as the head of the army, was criticized for failure to protect the lives of his men. The entire nation was in mourning: 24 martyrs had sacrificed their lives in the face of sheer aggression by a perpetrator which was never acknowledged as an enemy, at least publicly.
People demanded action, and it was taken. NATO’s supply-routes to Afghanistan were blocked in a protest-cum-standoff which lasted for more than 7 months. Ultimately, the US was compelled to formally apologize for its actions.
The US apology did not do much to change the public opinion of General Kayani for quite some time, but eventually, his image started to get better.
Then and Now
Times have changed: 2013 has been a fairly good year for General Kayani. His support for democracy in the country and non-intervention by the military is not that popular with the masses as it should have been. However, the people understand and silently endorse his decision. In principle, he has just followed the orders of the one he proudly calls his leader, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founding father of Pakistan, who instructed soldiers to stay away from politics.
From the time he participated in the 1971war against India till the last year of his life as an active-duty soldier, Kayani has surely proven to be a professionally competent soldier, worthy of all the responsibilities he was given. A vast majority of Pakistanis seem to endorse this statement by still holding a largely positive view about him.
Kayani may have his shortcomings, some of his decisions as the army chief might have been disappointing for many, but then, it must be understood that a man who's leading the sixth largest army in the world has so much more to keep in view than just the public popularity of his decisions.
As he retires this winter, an era will come to an end, but his legacy will stay, and as long as his soldiers hold on to the high and refreshing standards set by him, Pakistan will see a bright future.
Farewell, General. You will always be remembered for your services to Pakistan.
The writer is a senior analyst on Pakistan's military and defence affairs for Terminal X. He uses a pseudonym for his writings and can be contacted at burraq@terminalx.org
Read more: http://www.terminalx.org/search?upd...results=2&start=2&by-date=false#ixzz2jLNDgEk5
