An Hour in the Life of a Soldier

dostmittar.

your point about nukes is actually interesting. ulama have discussed it. eg shaykh hamza yusuf once mentioned that there is a case that islamically nukes would be haram becos of the indiscriminate killing they do (i suppose small tactical nukes wont come into this) and also that they kill with fire and only the Lord of Fire is allowed to kill with fire in islam; however he also said that there is a counter argument too in that if your enemy has the Bomb then it becomes permissible for you to have it to for defence and deterrence. He was actually talking specifically about pakistan india situation after both tested their bombs in 98. i think there is a case that most of modern warfare could be unislamic with its use of bombs and collateral damage. alas there is no going back to the times of man to man combat. that is real war. many ottoman ulama were against the use of cannons too for a long time for similar reasons in that it is not noble and cowardly as you cant face your enemy! subhan Allah! how noble our ancestors were and how far we have sunk from their standards of humanity. :-( now you can understand why imam hamza is not a big fan of modern technology...

ferozk#50:
I agree. I am aware of the contemporary reality. I posed that question to Naqshbandi because he is an intelligent, devout practitioner of orthodox Islam who said that he could work for the Pakistani army but not the British army.


Naqshbandi#51
I take no pleasure in your unease in addressing the question. The question would have served its purpose if it causes you to reflect upon the feasibility of applying the rules developed for a much simpler day and age to the contemporary world. Those rules of warfare could work at a time when war meant man-to-man combat and the enemy even had the choice to choose kalima over death.
Talking of Islamic rules of warfare, I sometimes wonder why no mullah has ever issued a fatwa against the so-called islamic nuclear bomb. The way I see it, a nuclear bomb has to be unislamic since it will kill mostly innocent men, women and children (and there was no concept of `collateral damage` back then!). The only known Muslim possessor of the nuclear bomb constantly threatens to be the first to use it in a future war without causing a ripple among the believers.

Re Tahmed 56

Thank you for throwing light on that sir. I`d heard tidbits but never the actual thing or name of the other brother. I hope he had a good career too. Indeed Sahibzada Yaqub Khan is one of the few living epitomes of the gentleman-officer and his conduct as the administrator of the former East Pakistan was a pointed example of his character. Notwithstanding his later service to a dictatorial regime as foreign minister, this is one military officer who is worth emulating by younger officers. This is the kind of man that the officer corps of the world`s finest army (the British India Army) was built of.

sigalph #54 It is indeed true that sahibzada yaqub khan`s brother major anis khan chose to India, while his brother moved to pakistan where he has had a distinguished career (the highlight perhaps being his refusal to turn the guns of the pakistan army against bengladeshis).
The US civil war provides countless examples of brothers fighting against one another from opposing armies.
Even more significant i think is that war pits good men on both sides against one another. After all, we are all descended from the same ultimate set of parents (this is what both science and religion agree upon). Also, when one considers that everyone knows everyone else on this planet - upto only six places removed - it becomes clear just how ridiculous war is all about. A joke played on the population by political leaders sitting in the comfort of their homes, their own sons out of harm`s way.

Deshpand3 #53 As I mentioned to dost mittar, the man who betrayed the trust of his fellow soldiers cannot be considered to suffer from a ``moral dilemma``. He suffers rather from a lack of morality altogether.
Naqshabandi and his kind are fundamentally hypocrites. To attribute any kind of morality of them is to not understand their mindset. These are strong words, I know, but I believe quite accurate: I have pointed out to N. on a number of occassions on chowk where his views are the antithesis of the Quran (the latest being in one of my posts on this board). He has consistently simply brushed these contradictions under the carpet generally by refusing to respond (as you can see for yourself on this board), or by providing a blatantly sidestepping my question. Since respect for the Quran is the defining characteristic of a muslim, N. and his kind (the mullahs who preach hatreds, the terrorists who violate the teachings of the Quran every time they launch a murderous attack) cannot be considered a muslim. As such, the question of a ``moral dilemma`` does not arise in his case. Just as the man who robs and kills people is simply the enemy of society and needs to be treated as such. Not as some kind of a tormented soul who supposedly kills innocent people while feeling sorry for them.

We have been too tolerant of evil in muslim societies. We need to recognize it for what it is, and to point out the purveyors and apologists of evil for what they are.

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re # 53

``If he were a soldier in the Pakistani army, how would he ensure that his bullets did not kill a Muslim soldier in the Indian army; ..``

I have a tangential question for anyone who can comment. Isn`t it accurate that two sons of the Nawab of Rampur were fighting on opposite sides in the 1948 KAshmir war, one being the future foreign minister and governor Sahibzada Yaqub KHan?

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dost-mittar,

i would say that if it was a religious war then it would be haram for a muslim to fight in a predominantly hindu army and therefore it would be allowed to kill such a person if he tried to kill me first but it is a difficult question cos according to the rules of islamic warfare, if someone reads the kalima as u are about to kill them you are no longer allowed to kill that person...

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tahmed: your argument is spurious because in a war there are 2 sides and whenever the quran talks about jihad or qital it is always referring to war with non-muslims and their killing. otherwise war in toto would be forbidden if we take verses in isolation such as the famous one which says that whosoever takes one life it is as if he has killed the whole of humanity. so obviously such verses do not refer to wartime.

and yes the life of a believer in wartime IS worth more than a life of a kafir. obviously.

re: Dost-Mittar # 41

Dost, this is a very muddled argument, but it poses a critical question. If you follow the traditional logic of the ummah, then there is a moral and ethnical problem in muslims killing muslims. However, the interests of the state, as manifested in armies, seeks to subordinate the religious doctrine to the whims of discipline, cohesion and clarity of purpose, which best serve the state`s interests.

Pakistani army never had any such qualms about and this could be seen in its operations in East Pakistan (1971), Baluchistan (1973-75) and Karachi in the 1990s. The recent arrest of Pakistani army personnel was primarily for this reason and that was, they put their religion over the internal discipline of the army. The Pakistani army tolerates religion, but not at the expense of undermining its internal cohesion; in that sense, it tolerates nothing. Indian muslim soldiers fighting and killing men from the Pakistani army in Kargil did not have this moral problem and niether did the muslims have this problem, when they were busy killing one another for power throughput history. Pakistanis killing Pakistanis over sectarian reasons have no problems and this problem, of muslims killing muslims, only exists in the minds of psuedo-religious intellectuals and it is an academic question - removed from the reality of the histrography of muslim combat.

Again, this moral dilemma depends on your definition of the state and your concepts of loyality towards it. If some one wants to join the British, Pakistani or Indian or German or American or French armies, with a such a pre-condition, they will never be allowed to join in the first place. Hence, to suggest a loyality over state interests is a moot point and no army will tolerate it. Period.

Ciao

Dear Fuzair

Heaven forbid, I am not a fan of the dragunov, I am not a fan of anything, if at all, give me a Yamato class battleship anytime. In fact, I am writing something on the battleship as we speak. The sole reason why I picked the dragunov instead of any other sniper rifle is because of the fact that there have been several captured and surrendered in Kashmir. I guess, a fallout from the afghan war (the soviet one)

Very interesting information on the Lee Enfield`s, Fuzair, thank you for that. I guess the optical or laser sights make all the difference these days.

fuzair,

Thanks for the interesting info about the Lee-Enfield. Never would have suspected it!
I did some surfing and found this:

Lee-Enfield:
muzzle velocity: 700 meters/s
barrel length: 25 inches
Rifling: 2-5 grooves, 1:10

Dragunov:
muzzle velocity: 830 meters/s
barrel length: 24 inches
Rifling: 4 grooves, 1:10

They do look pretty close except the higher velocity, which gives the dragunov the higher range of 4 km.

regards,

Saladin: How come you are back on Chowk? Did the welfare payments start back up?

Saladin: Why don`t you go the hell to Bangladesh? How many Hindus did your father kill in the Calcutta riots while shouting Suhrawardy Zindabad?

As far as not paying taxes is concerned, we don`t even expect any better from you lot. Let the Assamese take care of you like they did in Nellie back in 1983.

Farzana:

I will only comment on this:

``Look at the American guilt regarding Vietnam; it has spawned a whole industry of Hollywood movies, which at best portray and influence popular taste.``

Don`t forget that this is the only conflict that America lost and coincidentally the only war about which their is guilt. Right from the war of independence to now, outside of Vietnam, all American conflicts have ended in victory and are celebrated. Therefore, your statement about war is partially right, it is expressed after the fact and that too only when there is defeat. Soldiers die in all conflicts, but if the sacrifice is not considered futile, the death does not inspire guilt.