Where is Pakistan heading towards? Break-up? Dissolution? Is it going to be the end of Mohammad Ali Jinnah'sdream? Consider what Pakistan'sPresident Asif Zardari told CBS News. He said: ?The Taliban have a presence in huge amounts of land in our side? We are aware of the fact that the Taliban is trying to take over the state of Pakistan. So we are fighting for Pakistan'ssurvival?. According to a correspondent of the British daily The Guardian ?nuclear armed Pakistan is in serious danger of implosion?With the economy teetering, political tumult building and social conditions ripe for extremists, Pakistan faces critical threats to the rule of law and governance of the state?.
The paper also noted that large parts of Pakistan have been snatched from government control, and most of the tribal area, the semi-autonomous sliver of land that runs along the Afghan border is now firmly in the control of the Pakistani Taliban. The vast Swat Valley has also been taken over by the Taliban guerilla. In Baluchistan, Pakistan'slargest, but most sparsely populated province, the threat of Taliban elements?mostly from Afghanistan?is worse confounded by a nationalist rebellion. To top it all, so precarious is Pakistan'seconomy that late last year it was compelled to borrow $ 7.6 billion from the IMF to meet the threat of bankruptcy.
In Punjab, which is the heart of Pakistan, Taliban can act at will. The Marriott Hotel has been under suicide attack twice resulting in great damage. In mid-August 2008 at least 65 people were killed and over 100 injured in twin attacks at the gates of Pakistan'smain military ammunition factory by the Tehreek-e-Taliban, whose spokesman, Maulvi Omar warned Pakistan government that more such attacks can be expected. And now we have seen the sad spectacle of a police training camp near Lahore attacked with some 22 cadets killed. Since January 2009 terrorists like Lashkar-e-Jhangvi have claimed the lives of at least 129 Pakistani civilians, leaving another 133 injured.
Pakistan is not just a failed state; it is more likely to break up?implode?in the not too distant future, and no one can save it. Not the Zardari government which is impotent; not the Pakistani Army which itself supports the jehadis; and certainly not the United States, the guiltiest of parties. Unwisely, Washington is planning to give Pakistan over 100 fighter jets as well as airborne warning and air-to-air refuelling aircraft supposedly for Pakistan to maintain numerical parity with the Indian Air Force. This is the best way to help Pakistan destroy itself.
The Taliban apart, there are three forces operating in opposition to each other: The Pakistani Army led by Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, Zardari, the President and head of the PPP and Nawaz Sharief, the PML-N Chief. That domestic struggle can only add chaos to confusion. The civil government has no power over the Army and nobody knows which way the latter will go. Kiyani once ran the ISI which currently has lost its control over the Taliban. For all one knows, many in the ISI may even have joined the Taliban. Of Pakistan, nothing can be said with any authority. When on February 16 the Zardari government entered into an agreement with representatives of the Taliban for a cease-fire in the Swat Valley of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and further agreed to observing Sharia-based laws in the region, it had signed its own death warrant.
The local Taliban leader, Maulana Fazlullah has since ordered demolition of over 200 schools and the banning of girls? education. The Taliban has also destroyed government offices, police posts and tourist infra-structure. In the Swat Valley and in most of NWFP, Pakistan is an illusion. Then what is left? If one takes out NWFP and Baluchistan out of Pakistan, what is left is a Punjab where peace is a dream and Sindh where the Army is hated. According to one British journalist, who worked in Pakistan during the days of Benazir Bhutto, Sindhis would any day prefer to join India, given a chance. The possibility of Pakistan making the grade is unlikely. More likely is the chance of its breaking-up in the not-so-distant future.
A country which was planning to destroy India with a thousand cuts is now on the verge of self-destruction. This leaves India in a dilemma. What should India'sstand be in the weeks and months to come? Even granting that the United States is willing to pour in a few billion dollars to save its long-term client, would that help? Would the break-up of Pakistan lead to large-scale reverse migration to India through the porous Sind-Gujarat border? Under no circumstances should India get involved militarily, either in Afghanistan or Pakistan. Nor should it give shelter to migrants. We have enough problems to handle, to take on one more problem. One possibility is that, once again, as of before, the Pakistan Army will step in, throw out the Zardari government which, in the words of S Akhbar Zaidi, a social scientist based in Karachi, has led to ?a growing sense of frustration over the impropriety, confusion, incompetence and paralysis? among the people.
And who knows, if not Musharraf, then Gen. Kiyani may take over power. But will that make any difference? Can an Army chief turn the Taliban clock back? The plain truth is that the Army has no desire to force a showdown with the jehadis which it had long supported. Musharraf has gone on record as saying that ?if we want to resolve our common problems we should adopt a new path of peace and harmony? When he refers to ?we?, he means not Pakistan and the Taliban, but Pakistan and India. Of what use is a beleaguered and much-divided Pakistan of any relevance to India? The question may be asked: Why should anyone care for either a Musharraf or Kiyani, if all that he represents is a truncated Pakistan consisting of a troubled Punjab and a questioning Sindh?
Of what relevance is such a Pakistan? On the other hand, should we rest content with the fact that a broken Pakistan can no more be challenge to India and let it stew in its own juice? It was the United States that did the utmost damage to Pakistan by pitching it against India. It should be Washington'sresponsibility now to advice a truncated Pakistan to make peace with India and forget Kashmir. It is Washington'sresponsibility to cut the Pakistan Army to size, seize Pakistan'snuclear establishment and confiscate its store of nuclear bombs, the likelihood of their falling into the hands of the Taliban which cannot be underestimated.
India can then offer its hand of friendship to Pakistan and include it into a South Asian Confederation ushering a new era of peace and prosperity in the sub-continent. It was the United States which created the Taliban and indirectly the Al Qaeda. It was the United States which for long supported Pakistan'sunjustified claims to Kashmir. It is about time it is hauled up by the United Nations. A country has a moral right to safeguard its interests?but it cannot be at the unacceptable cost of other countries. India has paid a heavy price all these years because of US support to Pakistan. And it is continuing to do so even now. Washington should be held accountable.
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