14 July, 2008
Waziristan January 2008
Volume 7 Number 1
January 28, 2008
Orders of Battle - Orbat.com News (America Goes to War)
Major A.H. Amin (Pakistan Army, Retired)
Waziristan
Waziristan is the testing ground, the acid test of Pakistan Army's worth in the so- called war against terrorism.
What is the Pakistani intelligence ? An intelligence operative stated that they don't have the guts to go out of a fort of FC in Waziristan. They meekly step out of a Qila (fort) and stop some truck drivers and ask what's going on. From what they scramble all the guys from Military Intelligence, the ISI , the Corps Intelligence and the FC Intelligence sit down and make a generally similar report. The guy who compares all reports in GHQ jumps with joy when he sees all these reports and states that all reports can be cross checked and are correct. There is the Sab Accha mentality since Mughal times. Sab Accha means All Correct. So in the final summing it is gleefully concluded that the writ of the Pakistani Government is established in all parts of tribal areas! Glory be to Allah.
I recently met some mid-ranking and major-general level army officers and discussed Waziristan with them. We concluded:
Waziristan is a case of clash of interests among ambitious officers trying to get a good chit (report) and serious regimental officers who see soldiering as a way of life. The fast-track guys want to bash up some villages with artillery fire and do some dog catching for Americans and improve their career index called OEI.
The first major disaster was Lt.-Gen. Safdar, a Punjabi and a careerist. He wanted a fast-track approach for the problem, .His policy was bomb everyone, kill everyone and get the feathers in the cap for being a conqueror. This was counter-productive. The armed forces lost all credibility in this area. Safdar was finally packed off to the post of director logistics in the army Headquarters a post seen as waiting area for dumped generals.
Lieutenant General Hamid Khan, a Pashtun armored corps officer from 11 Cavalry was not effective. During his tenure the army was neither here nor there. He was serving for most of the time when the Waziristan accord had been signed.
The present corps commander Masud Aslam was a Kargil Warrior! (Major Amin is not being complimentary.) He again tried to introduce the Safdar policy with disastrous results.
One Major General level divisional commander stood out. Strangely it was a Shia officer, Major General Mir Haider. Although a Punjabi he understood the Pasthun psyche and did well. His modus operandi was psy war. Healing the tribal eg . Gifting copies of Holy Quran.
Another Major General Sahi was a failure. Again he was using the Safdar approach. Kill , batter , destroy and bomb. Sahi had close links with the Quisling PML (President Musharraf's political party: the writer believes Pakistan has sold out to the Americans) as his brother was a politician from that party. In words of a direct participant officer, he was also a total failure.
He was finally packed off as commandant of infantry school. Another resting place of dumped generals. In his dining out he said that he had established writ of Pakistani Government in Waziristan and was corrected there and then by a serving army officer that this was a white lie. He was challenged that he could not drive with his GOC's flag from Miran Shah to Bannu even with an escort! He was infamous in the Frontier Corps Officers for trying to prod them to attack this village or that because he wanted to get a good chit from his bosses.
A serving army officer in that area compared Pakistan Army and the FC in Waziristan to a mouse running from point A to point B while he said that the tribals were the lazy cat watching this despicable mouse.
We further concluded:
The great danger is not Pakistan but the fall-out after its demise.
The great danger to the West is not the hopeless Pakistani state but non-state actors
The more Pakistani Don Quixote are proved to be spineless clowns in Waziristan, the more dangerous the situation becomes.
Warfare has become cheap. It is easy to rock the boat and non-state actors are good at this.
The front is unclear. The distinction between friend and foe unclear. My assessment is that if the Americans decide to knock out Pakistan , in strategic terms , there will be no resistance in Punjab and Sindh ,only the Pashtuns will be their adversaries and the settled area Pashtuns will be as hopeless as the Punjabis and Sindhis.
Pakistan's military and political establishment is simply hopeless. This theme is discussed in my article "5 minutes over Islamabad" (the article details how the US forced Pakistan to join it's side in the GWOT.) The Pakistani military junta has already lost all credibility with the Pakistani population and cannot control the situation.
Even the Americans will not achieve much if they enter Waziristan. The terrain is bad and Americans will be a good cause for Jihad. The solution is withdrawal from Waziristan and regime change in Pakistan. The Americans should let the hopeless **** politicians do the dirty job of all this.
As an officer who served in Pakistan Army I would sum up the situation as following:
The Pakistani High Command a Punjabi-Mohajir (Mohajirs are Pakistans who migrated from India to the new country of Pakistan in/after 1947) team lacks the grey matter or resolve to deal with the tribals.
The troops they are commanding have lost faith in the cause they are fighting for. This is the worst thing for an army.All said and done the tribals can be dealt politically. Any Pakistani officer who is posted as commander 11 Corps is a job seeker. He is trying to be a Napoleon and a Punjabi cannot be a Napoleon with a tribal!
The present Governor of NWFP Owais Ghani has already miserably failed in Baluchistan. He is regarded as a non-Pashtun as he is the hated Hindko Punjabi (we dont know what Hindko means; Hind generally refers to India) speaking from Peshawar city just like General Kakar, whose first cousin he is.The whole situation requires a change in command in Pakistan from top to bottom.
