When Pakistan Defeated Herself...

Salt Lake Tribune

http://www.sltrib.com/06062000/commenta/55401.htm

macgupta #9: ``Pakistanis believe their own propaganda too much. 750,000 of the Indian army or even 500,000 are not in Kashmir. Perhaps the total of the J&K police force, the Border Security Force, the Central Reserve Police, the Army, the Air Force is 500,000 (or less).``

In a sense this is accurate. The total number of Indian, ``soldiers`` in Kashmir is now well over 500,000. This has been confirmed by the international press also. Peter Jennings just reported it during Clinton`s visit to India. India claims there are only 250,000 soldiers. It is true that all the soldiers do not belong to the Indian army. Many of them are probably BSF. This is probably more dangerous than having army soldiers in Kashmir, since Border Security Forces are usually less well trained, and hence more susceptible to killing civilians than a professional soldier.

RSexana #11: I am surprised you actually read what I write. I thought you belonged to the category of people who would ignore my comments. Sicne you have read it, could you point out where my comments are inaccurate. I want to make sure what I write is accruate. If you just don`t like the general theme since it is critical of India`s stance in Kashmir, then there isn`t much I can do about that.

As long as Indians continue to look at Kashmir as an India-Pakistan problem, they will continue to be able to justify the actions of India in Kashmir, by finding faults in what Pakistan has done. However, if they look at Kashmir, as a Kashmiri-Indian problem, then basically everything India is doing in Kashmir becomes subjugation of innocent people. Using reasons like Pakistan`s actions in Bangladesh to justify India`s actions in Kashmir makes no sense. Two wrongs don`t make a right. Also being secular (Indian govt. historically has been secular, although the BJP is the furthust thing from secularism) does not give one a green light to suppress people. There are too many other baseless arguments, like the above, that are being used to justify India`s actions in Kashmir.

Why don`t people just admit that India is carrying out its actions in Kashmir because it does not want Kashmir to break away from India, and India knows that if Kashmiris are given their free will, they will definitely break away. I think this should be quite obvious to everyone in India, Pakistan and Kashmir.

umairr,

[...``the last thing Pakistani Kashmris want to do is to join India (it was pretty ridiculous for anyone to assume that they would want to do that)...``]

lets not assume anything, shall we? i suggest we have a plebiscite in pakistani kashmir to ascertain their feelings. are you game? give them the right of self-determination already, will ya?

Oh Allah, here we go with Ummair`s old and tired monologue on Kashmir. What worse form of torture is there than to read one of these every time the word Kashmir is uttered.

When it rains, it pours. Articles have all of a sudden started going by extremely fast on Chowk. Just a few months ago, they were moving extremely slowly.

The only country that can solve the Kashmir problem is India, since the problem exists in Indian Kashmir. So the Kashmir problem will be solved (cease to exist is perhaps more suitable here) when one of the following happens:

a) India is albe to suppress and kill so many Kashmiris, that they finally give up, and accept Indian subjugation.

b) The Kashmir suppression becomes so costly for India in terms of finances and human rights issues, that India itself gives up and agrees to a solution.

c) Somehow or the other India is able to convince the Kashmiris they are better off with India than being independent (or with Pakistan).

Option c hasn`t worked for 50 years, so I don`t see it working now. The current situation is hanging in between option a and option b. If Pakistan`s economy stablizes then option b will occur. If it does not stabilize, then some form of option a will probably occur, in the long term. However, it is India which will have to decide whether a or b will be the final option.

Despite all the hoopla created in India, there isn`t much Pakistan can do to solve the Kashmir problem. Even if Pakistan accepts the LOC as the border, and stops giving any kind of small arms support to the freedom fighters, that still will not solve India`s Kashmir problem. It will just accelerate the outcome towards option a. Option a however, is only a short term solution for India.

As Senator Bill Bradley commented quite eloquently on Russia`s action in Chechnya (and on freedom movements in general); the country suppressing freedom movements is in a lose-lose situation. If the freedom fighters win, the human rights violations of the suppresors will be laid open to the rest of the world. If the freedom fighters lose, the suppressors will have converted a generation of freedom fighters into a generation of terrorists.

Pakistan has now officially declared it has no territorial ambitions in Indian Kashmir. Despite what Vajpayee says, the last thing Pakistani Kashmris want to do is to join India (it was pretty ridiculous for anyone to assume that they would want to do that); so that option is out. The only issue that now remains unsettled is in Indian Kashmir; a problem which India can solve in one hour, if it wants. Just pass a bill declaring some sort of self-determination to the Kashmiris.

What surprises me is the strong support of even educated Indians for the Indian soldiers killing the Kashmiris (yes they are killing innocent people in huge numbers, regardless of what kind of spin the Indian govt. attempts to put on the whole situation to convince the rest of the world and its own Indian citizens). I think the Indians` dislike for Pakistan is clouding their conscious. Instead of using Pakistan as a scapegoat for India`s actions in Kashmir, perhaps Indians should ask themselves the following question: How would Gandhi have handled the Kashmir sitution? Would he have approved of Kashmir becoming the largest civilian killing fields in the world? If the answer to the later question is, ``yes,`` then perhaps Gandhi isn`t all he is made out to be. If the answer is, ``no,`` then Gandhi is all he is made out to be, and every Indian supporting the supression in Kashmir becomes a hypocrite.

Regarding Kargil: Urstruly #4 has given a good account of why Pakistan carried out Kargil. It was a counter-offensive to Siachen. I am surprised once again, that educated Indians actually think Pakistan would launch an offensive with a few hundred men to, ``liberate`` Kashmir. Liberation of Kashmir by force would require hundreds of thousands of soldiers, with the whole PAF providing air support, the whole economy rationed to prepare Pakistan for war, etc. etc.

I think people (at least educated people) should be able to understand this, and not get caught up in all the propoganda created by the Indian govt. and media about Kargil. Kargil was as stupid an action on Pakistan`s part, as India`s action in Siachen, however it is nothing close to what everyone in India seems to think it was. It was definitely not an attempt to liberate KashmirI It was an attempt to get the Indian army to withdraw from Siachen (something that India refuses to agree to do through bilateral peace talks). I think Pakistan incorrectly assumed that since no country spoke up when Siachen occured, none would mind a Kargil.

Ironically, had Kargil been successful, the poor in both India and Pakistan would have been better off. The reason being that Pakistan would have eventually withdrawn from Kargil and Siachen, and India would have been forced to withdraw from Siachen. Both countries would have saved a lot of money. Unfortunately, India will now never agree to end the Siachen war; a war which due to logistical reasons, is costing India ten times as much as Pakistan.

Pakistan is currently offering talks to India, even though India is actively carrying out the Siachen offensive. India is not accepting the offer of talks, even though Pakistan pulled out of Kargil a long time ago. Doesn`t anyone see the irony in that?

Some comments on Crypto`s article :

1. The regions of Kashmir as given is wrong, unless Kashmir means only the Kashmir Valley. But the plebiscite that Pakistan is asking for applies to the whole state formerly ruled by Raja Hari Singh. As far as I know, Pakistan has never been willing to limit the plebiscite to the Valley of Kashmir alone.

The current division of Raja Hari Singh`s state of Jammu and Kashmir is as follows :

1. i-Kashmir : Indian Administered Kashmir

2. p-Kashmir : (so-called Azad Kashmir, this is the northern end of the Kashmir valley, and is only a small part of Kashmir that is held by Pakistan.)

3. The Northern Areas : these supposedly have already ``acceded`` to Pakistan. They are not administered by the Azad Kashmir government.

4. c-Kashmir : this is the area of Kashmir held by China. Most of it was captured by China in 1962, and part of it was ceded to China by Pakistan.

2. The Northern Areas already make it clear that Pakistan is after territory. As to what is going on there, one interesting thing to do is to go to the United Nations web pages, www.un.org, and find the search engine, and search for ``Gilgit``.

3. Foreign intelligence agencies have enough information about what is going on in Kashmir -- if you think that the Western powers rely on the story told by India or by Pakistan, you are sadly mistaken.

4. Please remember that in 1992, Pakistan was put on the terrorist watch list by the US, and then removed therefrom in 1993. The US have known all along what is going on. It is not the success of Indian propaganda that has changed US minds, but rather the US perception of its own self-interest.

5. Please remember that friends of Pakistan have changed their tune somewhat after being allowed to visit i-Kashmir.

6. I don`t think India tried to provoke Pakistan into the mistake of Kargil. I think India was taken quite by surprise.

7. I don`t think the Pakistani strategy was brilliant. The game Pakistan had to play before the international audience after denying its military was involved allowed India to use its air force; Pakistan could not. Once the IAF was involved with no PAF involvement, the Pakistanis lost the advantage of holding the high ground, and the eventual end came. I don`t think Sharif ``peeing in his pants`` had anything to do with it. If the Pakistani forces were winning, there would be no hesitation in making the official documents public now, especially with the military CE in place.

If Pakistan wanted to make the world fear escalation of the fight, it should have not denied its military involvement (especially when such involvement would have been obvious to the Western powers` intelligence agencies), and should have brought in its air force to deny India the advantage of the skies.

Pakistan would have run a risk of India then opening more fronts, and making significant and potentially fatal-to-Pakistan advances before the world intervened. But this would have been precisely the kind of escalation that would cause the world to fear a nuclear war and to intervene in Kashmir. Little risked, little gained.

8. Pakistanis believe their own propaganda too much. 750,000 of the Indian army or even 500,000 are not in Kashmir. Perhaps the total of the J&K police force, the Border Security Force, the Central Reserve Police, the Army, the Air Force is 500,000 (or less). People tend to exaggerate so !

9. If Pakistan had played the ``honest broker`` and brought the civil war in Afghanistan to a quick end after the Soviets left, they would have a much stronger hand. But they first backed one faction of the Afghan Mujahideen over the others, and later went with the Taliban.

10. Iran has won sympathy from the West in its war on drugs. Please look up the number of Iranian border guards killed by drug smugglers on the Baluchistan and Afghanistan borders. Guess whom the world blames for that lawlessness. Again, absolutely nothing to do with India or Indian propaganda, but only Pakistan shooting itself in the foot.

-arun gupta

#4 -

[...``The plan went well. Pakistani soldiers and Mujahideens held the strategically important heights right from the beginning and keeping occupation till September was not a problem at all...``]

yup! not a problem at all!

shareef peed in his shalwar simply because he had taken just a little bit too much alcohol. otherwise, things were going great!

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/88aug/obrien.htm

The Indian state came into being amid the scenes of communal-religious carnage that accompanied the partition of the subcontinent between mainly Hindu India and entirely Muslim Pakistan. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, had resolutely rejected the idea of a secular state that could encompass both Hindus and Muslims. In his presidential address to the Muslim League at Lahore in 1940, Jinnah declared: ``Islam and Hinduism are not religions in the strict sense of the word, but in fact different and distinct social orders, and it is only a dream that the Hindus and Muslims can ever evolve a common nationality.... To yoke together two such nations under a single state ... must lead to a growing discontent and final destruction of any fabric that may be so built up for the government of such a state.``



Yet in the event, the fabric of India`s secular state proved tougher than that of confessional Pakistan. Pakistan originally consisted of eastern and western sections, connected by a common religion but different in language and culture. The religious bond proved insufficient, and East Pakistan in 1971 seceded and became the independent state of Bangladesh. Secular India, however, has held together. There are now almost as many Muslims in India as there are in Pakistan. Muslims and Hindus in India may perhaps not have ``evolved a common nationality,`` but they -- and Sikhs also, so far -- have managed to live together, within one state, for more than forty years now, whereas the ``common nationality`` of the Muslims of Pakistan burst asunder after twenty-four years.

The viability of the secular and democratic system in India is a remarkable phenomenon, and one that has received less attention in the West than it deserves. Yet there have been continuing challenges, both internal and external, to India`s secular democracy, and to the very existence of an Indian state.

Dear Crypto!

It’s a well written article accept on one account i.e. Kargil. Most of the writers at Chowk refer Kargil only as a big mistake that Pakistan committed. Whereas I consider the whole expedition as a masterpiece of military planning and brilliant execution of this well thought off plan. I will not discuss in this post what were Pakistan`s political objectives and how much we were successful in achieving them. A lot of it has been written and still being written.

Not too many people are aware of the fact that Kargil Pass is the only land route to the Siachin Glacier (from Indian side). There is no other way to get there. In order to transport supplies to the soldiers stationed at Siacin India is bound to use that Pass. There is no air route since helicopters are not effective at the heights where Siachin is located.

The plan was to cut the supply route to Siachin and hold the occupation of Kargil till late September when snow starts falling and land routes are closed by it. Deficient of supplies for the winter, the Indian soldiers would have died from cold or surrendered the Siachin. The plan went well. Pakistani soldiers and Mujahideens held the strategically important heights right from the beginning and keeping occupation till September was not a problem at all. With 750 thousand army stationed at Kashmir India would have been very reluctant to open up another front, say somewhere near Sindh.

The plan was going right on the target until Mr. Nawaz Shrif peed in his shalwar. Everybody knows rest of the story.

Good article.

I think the approach taken by Pakistan was very wrong in the first place. Pakistan kept stressing on the human right abuses of Kashmiris in Indian administered Kashmir, instead of treating it as a border dispute. The track record of Pakistan with regards to human rights abuses is much worse than India (treatment of Bengalees and their massacre during the creation of Bangladesh. So the world community is not convinced that Pakistan is only interested in helping out Kashmiris.

India also has some other advantages in it`s favor. Democracy, comparatively large number of minorities which includes Muslims, Christians, Parsis, Sikhs etc. The other advantage of India is the fact that India can trumpet ``There are more Muslims in India than Pakistan itself``. India can boast that it has had Muslim Chief Ministers, Presidents, Politicians, Cricketiers, Film Personalities and can claim that Muslims are represented in all walks of life. It is very difficult for Pakistan to prove that minorites are safe in Pakistan forget occupying respectable positions.

Oh Crypto!

I apologise for being unfair to your article. Just a slice of life.

It is bleeding us to death and the Emperor is playing flute. Or saarangi. Or tabla. Or the public`s posterior. Or something!

rgds

t

.........(yawn)

..........over to you Umairr.


---t


PS: Hope this gets 100+ hits in its short span on page one, now that articles are raining down in quick succession.