The convenient curtain of myth

Recently, I met some jihadis who have been in the business of holy war since the 1990s. I was surprised to hear that even though they were in support of the jihad in Afghanistan and Kashmir, they were opposed to the idea of destabilising Pakistan itself. When asked who was responsible for the suicide bombings and target killings they had an overarching theory to explain the tricky business. According to them, India, the United States, and Israel had colluded resources to create a super-agency to dishevel this entire region. Though they admitted that convincing a hardened jihadi that the government of Pakistan was also part of the enemy collaborative wasn’t too much of a stretch, they also added that a true jihadi would not be involved in the killing of innocent people.

Surprisingly enough, this whole India-US-Israel theory has a lot of popular currency these days in Pakistan, a country whose national sports should be lounge room politics and conspiracy theorising instead of cricket and hockey. The myriad of television talk-shows on every news channel are heavily relying on this theory of a triangulated axis of evil out to destroy Islam and Pakistan with one nifty stone’s throw of insurgent terror.

I don’t mean to dampen Pakistan’s highly built up superiority complex laced with self pity at the whole world’s always being out to get us, but has anyone ever thought of questioning why we always situate Pakistan at the centre of our world view? It is true that Pakistan is in the news a lot these days, and that the location of our borders in terms of resources and trade routes present significant geopolitical interests. But isn’t it a bit much to consider the current conflict in terms of issues that lie beyond the immediately obvious uses of Pakistan’s soil, and therefore hurl the current conflict in to the realm of myth and conspiracy?

Islamic mythology has obviously played a huge role in the formation of our national identity. It is telling that the history books we’re taught in school start from Mohenjodaro and Harappa, jump to the life of the Prophet in pagan Arabia, and then an interlude of early Islamic history until the likes of Muhammad bin Qasim finally brings Islam to the subcontinent. After that, the Muslim personalities involved in South Asian politics are closely followed up until the creation of Pakistan as a homeland for the Muslims.

Given this strange mix of religious indoctrination and nationalist propaganda, it isn’t a shock that our national identity is hopelessly intertwined with religion. The great ups and downs of our history are also then viewed though the mirror image of early Islamic Arabian history, starting with the Partition of 1947 where the oppressed Muslims in the land of infidels partake in a hijrah-like migration to greener pastures. This is also responsible for similar coinages as mohajir’s for people who migrated from the other side of the border, and of course the Muttahida Quami Movement as well. Looking across the border with the same deeply rooted scepticism through which we historically view pagan Mecca also comes with the national identity combo-meal.

After two wars with our neighbour that have been cloaked in the same historical-identity mirror as jihads which the Prophet Muhammad participated in – the 1965 war, where a small number of Muslims beat a larger threatening army of infidels akin to the scenario in Jang-e-Badar, and the 1971 war being similar to Jang-e-Uhad, where the Muslims suffered heavy losses owing to their greed and indiscipline. Kargil would then be seen as the Battle of the Trench, had it not ended with such a national disaster.

The idea of martyrdom has been historically very close to these times of crisis when national unity is a must. The list of the dozen or so shaheeds who gave their life for the country is also present in every textbook. Unfortunately, the idea of the martyr as a member of Pakistan’s armed forces has become one that is hotly contested in recent times, as the right to declare a martyr isn’t the sole prerogative of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The ISPR’s version of a shaheed in Waziristan is diametrically opposed to that of the TTP’s version of shaheed.

The same mujahids who valiantly fought in Kashmir and Afghanistan for Islam and Pakistan, seem to have turned on the Islamic Republic as the very fabric of propaganda which binds Islam with Pakistan is ruptured beyond repair. With the popularly elected government being portrayed as infidel rule propped up by the Americans, and the culture of the modern, westernised elites is labeled as shamelessness and excessive debauchery, it seems we’re caught in the middle of a storm where the hero can no longer be told apart from the enemy.

For decades, the enemy image coined in our heads has been that of the Islam-hating, darker-skinned Hindu at the eastern edge of our border. One can imagine how much violence the average Pakistanis’ worldview must have been subjected to when the heroic mujahid suddenly became the enemy, in less than a decade. A painful readjustment of the conventional enemy image is needed in order to re-galvanize the nation behind these destroyers of the idea of Pakistan.

This interesting transposition was evident in an armed forces award ceremony in which shaheeds from the current conflict were inducted into the ranks of those martyred in Pakistan’s conventional wars. The reenacted footage telegraphing each incident showed a mysterious tribal as the concealed enemy. The army also seems to be relying on foreigners being involved in the tribal areas as a way to distance the conflict from civil strife. The circulation of reports of large containers of alcohol belonging to Uzbek militants also seems to be a way of distancing Islam from the enemy.

However, it appears that instead of reevaluating things through a more rational approach, we’ve stuck to our patchwork quilt of mythological identity through a couple of quick-and-easy adjustments. As a matter of convenience for our security establishment, the principal enemy obviously remains India. But those polygamous infidels couldn’t possibly be the solely responsible for such an ingenious plan that redirects our tactics against them and literally brings the country to its knees? No, that’s not possible. So who could they possibly be in cahoots with?

Once again the answer is conveniently available from early Islamic Arabia, where the Meccan pagans were conspiring with scheming Jewish tribes. A simple transposition of the historical onto our mythological identity yields the result of India and Israel collaborating for the destruction of Pakistan, with the US sitting on the fringes like the Holy Roman Empire.

I think it’s time we quit hiding behind the convenient curtain of myth, and take the bitter pill of reality. For once, for that might help us frame this conflict in more rational terms and possibly lead us closer to a solution, rather than further feeding propaganda to the conflict. If the present reasoning of global evils out to destroy Islam and Pakistan continues, then the only answer is the apocalyptic war which is talked about in fringe mythologies related to the arrival of the Antichrist.

The last thing we want is for this to be a self-fulfilling prophecy! We need to step away from viewing this as a clash of civilisations, in terms of Islam versus the West. This is a misinformed dichotomy, since the West is not a religion, and Islam isn’t a geographical location. The more hopelessly intertwined our nationality becomes with a faux mythology, the more susceptible it becomes to being hijacked by those wishing to extract temporary gains from this vulnerability.



Lahore-based Asif Akhtar is interested in critical social discourse as well as the expressive facets of reactive art and is one of the schizophrenic narrators of a graphic novel

Exposing Pakistan: terrorist incubator since 1947

Pakistan & Terror: Part 1 (1947 – 79)

As I write this, the Pakistani army is on the verge of taking Mingora, the largest city in the Swat Valley located in the North-West Frontier Province – a victory which could deliver a percussive blow to the Taliban in a conflict that has so far produced 1.9 million Pakistani refugees. Meanwhile, a top U.S. general in eastern Afghanistan said he is seeing “some very interesting movement” of insurgents crossing into Pakistan this spring, possibly to join the Taliban militants. Um, yes…possibly. One step forward …and two back.


The Taliban’s rise in Pakistan should shock no one, especially after reviewing the history of this perpetually failing incubator of global terrorism – it is a story with which the U.S. should empathize. Because the United States is all too familiar with Frankensteinian endeavors, especially the case in which, during Afghanistan’s struggle against the Soviets in the 80s, the U.S. funded and supported the Afghanistan mujahedeen which would later became al-Qaeda. Sharing in this sad historical irony is Pakistan, whose Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency was the conduit for channeling U.S. funds to Bin Laden and company during this same time period. Thus, Pakistan both directly and indirectly helped spawn al-Qaeda, which in turn helped create the Taliban. As the U.S. did on 9/11, it is Pakistan who is now reaping the whirlwind from a beast they helped actuate.

Pakistan’s problems began at its birth in 1947. As India achieved independence through nonviolent means, Pakistan was partitioned off as a separate state by the former ruling Brits, and India complied to avoid a bloody civil war sure to ensue should the “achieve Pakistan” movement not get its way. Because the first time India tried to block an agreement to form a Pakistani state, the Muslim League incited the Great Calcutta Riot on August 16, 1946 which killed 4,000 Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs.

Ironically, the founder of Pakistan and leader of the Muslim League, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, wanted to establish a secular democracy. But after Jinnah’s death in 1948, instead of a state for Muslims, Pakistan was eventually transformed into a Muslim state.

In addition to the theocratic element, Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid says that Pakistan inherited a “security state” from British rule, described by scholars as “the viceregal tradition” or “a permanent state of martial law”. Christopher Hitchens describes how the country was doomed to be a dysfunctional military theocracy from day one – beginning with the very name of the country itself:

But then, there is a certain hypocrisy inscribed in the very origins and nature of "Pakistan". The name is no more than an acronym, confected in the 1930s at Cambridge University by a NW Muslim propagandist named Chaudhri Rahmat Ali. It stands for Punjab, Afghania, Kashmir, and Indus-Sind, plus the suffix "-stan," meaning "land." In the Urdu tongue, the resulting word means "Land of the Pure." The country is a cobbling together of regional, religious, and ethnic nationalisms, and its founding, in 1947, resulted in Pakistan's becoming, along with Israel, one of the two "faith-based" states to emerge from the partitionist policy of a dying British colonialism. Far from being a "Land of the Pure," Pakistan is one of the clearest demonstrations of the futility of defining a nation by religion, and one of the textbook failures of a state and a society.

And from day one the new nation of Pakistan was knee deep in blood, at first due to the crown’s untidy exit. The British brilliance of leaving the question of a Muslim-dominated Kashmir undecided, combined with the Pakistan government’s ever growing militant Islamic fundamentalism led to the 1948 Kashmir War, the first of three with India between 1947 and 1971.

Pakistan periodically attempted civilian rule, only to be usurped by the military throughout its history. In 1956, Pakistan actually became a Republic, but it was short-lived, because General Ayub Khan executed a coup d’état and then made himself president from 1958 to 1965. Yahya Khan then took over, and in 1971 sent troops into East Pakistan, touching off Bangladesh's War of Independence. He also attacked India on 12-6-71, and was defeated on 12-21-71.

Civilian rule resumed under Zulfikar Ali Bhutto from 1972 to 1977, a period during which a parliamentary system of government was implemented, although Bhutto was no reformer and was hung for murderig a political opponent. Bhutto was deposed by General Zia-ul-Haq who became the country's third military president. Zia introduced Islamic Sharia legal code, banned politics, censored media, and implemented public floggings and torture. Rashid has called Zia’s 11-year rule the most damaging to Pakistani society.

Hitchens sums up Pakistan’s history nicely: “Pakistan has been a fiefdom of the military for most of its short existence: as was once said of Prussia, it is not a country that has an army, but an army that has a country.” So, taking all of this in, once more, current events in Pakistan should not shock.

What does shock, however, is the role the U.S. has played in assisting Pakistan go from bad to worse. Since 1957 the U.S. had provided Pakistan hundreds of millions of dollars per year in military aid to help fight the Soviets. Reagan supported General Zia’s administration because we needed Pakistan’s help to beat the Communists, while turning a blind eye throughout the 80s to the fact that this mad tyrant was ruling over a repressive Islamic theocracy that was going nuclear. As I will discuss in my next article, it was during this time that the United States also began building another marvelous creation that would haunt them years later, that being one of the most formidable intelligence agencies in the world: the ISI.

'Rat people' forced to beg on Pakistan's streets'

Outside a Muslim shrine in this dusty Pakistani city, a "rat woman" with a tiny head sits on a filthy mattress and takes money from worshippers who cling to an ancient fertility rite.
Nadia, 25, is one of hundreds of young microcephalics -- people born with small skulls and protruding noses and ears because of a genetic mutation -- who can be found on the streets of Gujrat, in central Punjab province.

Officials say many of them have been sold off by their families to begging mafias, who exploit a tradition that the "rat children" are sacred offerings to Shah Daula, the shrine's 17th century Sufi saint.

"These are God's children. We are proud to look after her," said Ijaz Hussain, the shrine's government-employed custodian, as Nadia shrieked unintelligibly and put coins in a battered wooden box at her side.


According to local legend, infertile women who pray at Shah Daula's shrine will be granted children, but at a terrible price. The first child will be born microcephalic and must be given to the shrine, or else any further children will have the same deformity.

Hussain said Nadia was just a young child when she was dumped at the shrine 20 years ago in the dead of the night. Her parents were never traced, he says.

"Since that day we have taken care of her, she is like family to us. People come here for prayers and seek fulfilment of their desires but they are respectful towards her," added Hussain, 56.

Pakistan's government says it has tried to crack down on exploitation of the "chuhas" (Urdu for rats) and says it plans to set up a shelter in Gujrat to rehabilitate them.

The shrine stopped officially accepting microcephalics in the 1960s when the government took over the site.

But not only does it still keep Nadia at its gate, the town's beggar masters also keep the superstition alive.

"Get lost! I don't want to talk to you," shouted a bearded beggar master in Gujrat's main bus station, grabbing a microcephalic woman by the hand and leading her through the crowds when asked to comment on his actions.


Bus passengers gave the woman money, as many believe it is bad luck not to.

Another microcephalic man stood with his handler in the wilting afternoon heat, staring into space.

The high incidence of microcephalics in Gujrat, an industrial city of around one million people, has long been a bone of contention.

The popular belief among many Pakistanis -- that cruel beggar gangs clamp the children's heads in infancy -- is strongly denied by government and advocacy groups, who say there is no evidence to support this.

Recent medical studies say the most likely cause is that the normally rare recessive genes behind many microcephaly cases crop up with greater frequency because of the common custom of marrying cousins in Pakistan.

But finding the cause is easier than stamping out the exploitation of "rat children" in the name of religion, says Pir Nasiruddaula, a descendant of the saint who has written several books on the shrine.

"The myth of the chuhas has been exploited by beggar mafias and religious groups," said Nasiruddaula, a former science professor in his 70s.

"They roam the villages and if the real chuha is born they give them some money and they take them," he said.

"But what kind of saint would really curse issueless women with the 'blessing' of deformed children?"

Rakhshan Sohail, of the Punjab provincial government's Child Protection and Welfare Bureau, said his department planned to establish a centre in Gujrat to stamp out exploitation of microcephalics.

"Some of these children, the handicapped ones especially, are accompanied by relatives," he told AFP. "But begging gangs also look for poor parents who will sell them because they are a burden to feed and shelter."

Sohail said his department had busted more than 30 gangs across the province involved in exploiting street children, some of which had broken the limbs of children so that they would earn more as beggars.

But the "rat children" are symptomatic of hardships faced by up to 100,000 street children nationwide -- and an economic crisis caused by spiralling fuel and food prices is hurting his department's efforts, he said.

"It's a critical issue," he said. "When people are living on less than a dollar a day, they are more likely to put their children on the roads and make them beg."

DIVIDE PAKISTAN TO ELIMINATE TERRORISM

Civilized Nation

I am writing to you as I believe that you can play a very significant role in reshaping of the geography of South Asia in order to combat international terrorism. The entire terrorism network has been managed by terrorist forces stationed in Pakistan under the safe umbrella of Government of Pakistan. These terrorist forces have taken the shelter of Islamic identity in order to implement their dangerous designs of dominating South Asia and make it an Islamic territory altogether thereby driving out Christians, Hindus and Sikhs living in India. The ultimate scheme was first made during the lifetime of late General Zia-ul-Haq who can be termed as the main actor towards this direction. The said General Zia-ul-Haq took advantage of the then Afghan-Russian war and made it possible to develop a terrorist network in the region by sponsoring extremist Islamic groups and providing them all necessary military training and ammunition. The atomic program of Pakistan was also part of this endeavor. However, General Zia-ul-Haq died in a military plane crash in 1988 and there was the beginning of a new democratic era in Pakistan. But this democracy was itself fake in the sense that same old faces appeared to rule the country for their own monetary benefits. Consequently, Pakistan became yet another victim of terrorist forces which acted from the strong base of Pakistan Army which has been the main principal of all terrorism in the South Asia. It was Pakistan Army which does not want any peace in the region so as to keep the region under stress in general and to keep India being their hostile neighbor under a constant military threat. The coming back of Pakistan Army in power through General Pervez Musharraf from the back doors on October 12, 1999 was yet another attempt to continue with the same old plan of Islamic domination in South Asia as masterminded by late General Zia-ul-Haq. This conspiracy had enjoyed assistance of China as China needed a strong Pakistan to keep an eye on India so that India should not become any problem for China in her traditional desire to win the regional supremacy which may pave way for her becoming another super war. Pakistan is the central headquarters of all terrorist activities under the authoritative command of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) an organ of Pakistan Army who have been sheltering Islamic terrorists organizations in the country through military as well as financial support. Their objective is simple that is to rule the region under an Islamic system of their own brand and elimination of non-Muslim communities and culture. They believe that unless they use power they cannot fulfil their ambitions and as such they have found terrorism as the most convenient method for accomplishment of their political agenda. In order to promote this terrorism through religious recognition and some historic significance with a view to make it attractive for the youngsters, they misinterpreted the concept of Jihad (holy war) and since the Muslim masses living in that region are totally illiterate and ignorant about their own religion, they were misguided by the help of hypocrite Islamic scholars who motivated and induced the foolish young Muslims to fight against non-Muslims. These fools did not even think that if it was the question of Muslim and Non-Muslim, then they should also fight China being totally out of the religious orbit. But, in that case, their brains do not work because it is but China itself which is assisting the Pakistan Army in such activities. Hence, the entire phenomenon is not to propagate the Muslim beliefs but to conquer the whole world through the assistance of China. Pakistan right now is the puppet of China and therefore it has become inevitable to address this issue on top priority. Chinese experts in connivance with the Pakistan Army have worked very intelligently to use the religion of Islam as a tool very useful to be used for extracting cheap fighting force in the name of holy war. On the other hand, the whole Pakistan Army getting salaries in millions of dollars per annum is not coming forward for this s-called Jihad simply for the reason that they know that it has nothing to do with any Jihad but to implement certain long-term political plans. It is, therefore, very essential to focus from a different angle without wasting any further time on Osama Bin Laden who is nobody but a well-trained puppet of Pakistan Army being used extensively for the purpose of masterminding the terrorist schemes and implementing them through the technical co-operation of Pakistan. Inter Services Intelligence Agency (ISI) is the real government in Pakistan. In the present situation it is the ISI, which is devising the self-made covert policies for the Government and also ensuring its implementation. It is part of the ISI’s well-established policy to organize violent pro-Taliban protest demonstrations against the United States in the provinces of Sindh, Balochistan and NWFP (North West Frontier Province) and keep the province of Punjab away from these demonstrations and strikes. After the terrorist attacks of 11th September 2001, the United States and the international community declared in clear words that we would now see that “who stands with us or against us”. The United States and international community assured the Pakistani rulers that if they extend co-operation to United States and international community in the war against terrorism, Pakistan would get the legitimate fruits of such co-operation. After these assurances of the International Community, the ISI conspired to activate the religious and so-called Jihadi groups on their payroll to use the provinces of Sindh, Balochistan and NWFP (North-West Frontier Province) provinces as their battleground against United States and International Community. This conspiracy to use the minority provinces was aimed to give the United States of America and the International Community a completely wrong impression that people living in these provinces are against USA while the real situation is totally different. Pakistan Army through its terrorism network called ISI has made an attempt to tarnish the image of small provinces of present Pakistan on one hand and on the other to deceive USA and the International Community. It is a bitter truth that the province of Punjab is the hub of all the fanatical and so-called Jihadi groups and the Headquarters of all the fanatical and extremists groups are situated in different cities of the province of Punjab like Lahore, Multan, Jhang, Faisalabad and Nankana. The ISI’s “game” to deceive the United States and international community would not last long and this act of deception would reach to its logical conclusion. When that happens the world would know who actually benefited by deceiving others and who lost, whereas who was deceived by whom and who was hoodwinked. It is not understandable as to why the Americans are not addressing the real issue. The real issue is Pakistan itself. In Pakistan, there is no religious disintegration right now. Rather all the religious groups are having mental equation when it is about the religion. There is no conflict among them if it is about Islam. Although they advocate a different Islam which was never the one introduced by Muhammad Bin Abdullah in Mecca some 1500 years ago, yet they are together under the supervision of ISI. ISI has sponsored this new brand of Islam with ulterior motives and to implement its hidden agenda. This new brand of Islam does not enjoy any recognition from the Muslims who really believe in Muhammad. It is indeed unfortunate that Islam has always been victimized throughout by the people who terms themselves as Muslims. Muhammad's Islam was hijacked even in his own lifetime when there were people who disliked Muhammad's relatives and wives. Such miscreants even accused Muhammad's wife Ayesha of adultery. People like Amir Mawiya hated Ali, the nephew of Muhammad so much so that Ali wrote to him several letters condemning Amir Mawiya to be a hypocrite. The revenge came exactly 50 years later when son of Amir Mawiya called Yazeed killed Hussain brutally who was the grand son of Muhammad and son of Ali at the place called Karbala (Iraq). The shia sect of Islam condemn this brutal murder of Hussain and do not recognize Ami Mawiya as Muslim for this arbitrary act of his son Yazeed. Today, Iran is the shia state while a large number of Shias live in Iraq also. It was one of the evil designs of late General Zia-ul-Haq that he made Pakistan a difficult place for shias and the formation of certain militant religious organizations was yet part of this plan. Today we have yet another Yazeed bin Amir Mawiya called Osama Bin Laden and several followers who have changed the very fabric of Islam in the new century. These are religious demons representing the Satan and not Islam. It is, therefore, necessary to disintegrate Pakistan if we want to collapse the terrorists' network altogether. Unless we destroy the root cause of the whole terrorism tree, we will not be able to eliminate terrorism from the region which has been transformed into a centralized processing unit working under an integrated system not conveniently accessible unless Pakistan is divided in at least four parts. It is essential to divide the northern part of Pakistan into two countries that is Punjabistan and Pakhtoonistan. The Punjabistan will be on the eastern side and the present province of Punjab can be converted into Punjabistan while the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) having its borders with Afghanistan should be made another country called Pakhtoonistan. The new Pakhtoonistan will be a country loyal to the international comity of nations and shall not harbor any terrorists within its geography. Punjabistan shall not have any access to terrorist camps now being run by Pakistan Army in Afghanistan and NWFP as Pakhtoonistan will be a hurdle between Afghanistan and Punjabistan. The Pakistan Army mainly belongs to Punjab and hence the creation of Punjabistan and Pakhtoonistan will break the integrated network between Afghanistan and ISI (Pakistan Army). On the southern part of Pakistan, two new countries Sindhudesh and Jinnahpur can be made. The Sindhudesh will comprise of Sindhis living in the province of Sindh while Jinnahpur will be a country to house the urdu speaking immigrants from India who had migrated from India after partition of 1947. The population of urdu speaking community living in Karachi (the main commercial city of Pakistan) is around 15 Million. This new country called Jinnahpur can be a secular state of its own kind. The idea is that some 10 million Christians from India may also voluntarily migrate to Jinnahpur to form a pure secular state in South Asia so as to keep a political balance in the region. In Karachi alone (which will be transformed into a new country called Jinnahpur), we can have as many churches as we want along with awarding rights of preaching Christianity and Islam in parallel terms. There will be no extra-ordinary religious resistance in Karachi for the sole reason that the new countries Pakhtoonistan and Punjabistan will have no immediate links with Jinnahpur and as such the terrorist network would not be effective at all. The preaching groups like Tablighi Jamaat (Muslim Preaching Organization based in Raiwind near Lahore-Pakistan) will no more be as effective as now after losing their linkage with their country-wide network. This linkage can only be broken through disintegration of Pakistan. The religious schools called Madressas will no longer be connected with each other. The so-called religious scholars will be confined to their own areas of birth and permanent residence and shall not freely move to other cities in the region presently called Pakistan. Jinnahpur will be a purely secular state with a significant Christian population. We can have permanent airbases of USA and other military set-ups in Jinnahpur to keep a sound military control in the region to safeguard the entire humanity from the threats of terrorism. The geography of South Asia has to be revised to combat the terrorism and to prevent further loss of lives in the name of Jihad. The region has become very dangerous to spark 3rd world war and if not checked at this hour of need, country like Pakistan, which has attained nuclear technology due to assistance of China, can become dangerous for the whole humanity. Today we have some loyal people in Pakistan Army who would prefer to favor anti-terrorism drive initiated by the Americans. But what about the religious groups within Pakistan Army which are equally responsible in promotion of terrorism in the name of Islamic domination and are still busy to destabilize the international efforts towards the direction of elimination of terrorism altogether. How can such religious groups destroy their own puppet government called Taliban whom they helped right from its inception and are still harboring their leaders and terrorists like Osama Bin Laden. They may come into power and remove General Pervez Musharaf from his present status. What the Americans will do when a more religious-minded foolish army man captures power in Pakistan? Will they think of bringing back of democracy in Pakistan? It will be too late at that time. It is therefore better to act now. Pakistan should be divided into four parts as immediately as possible under the supervision of United Nations in the best interest of humanity. This would not be any sort of denying any sovereign country of its right to exist. Pakistan is comprised of five nations and there is no problem in giving these nations their new countries to enable them to have a more realistic identity of their own. This is necessary to eliminate the roots of terrorism completely. This geo-political surgery has become inevitable to save the humanity from the cruel hands of terrorists who will come again to strike and they have no other place to hide and conspire but Pakistan. I request the entire humanity to join me in this campaign of disintegrating Pakistan in the best interest of the whole humanity. If we break Pakistan today, we are disintegrating the entire terrorist network headquartered in Pakistan. This terrorist network works through a very technical integration in terms of Islamic militant groups, Islamic preaching organizations and Islamic schools called Madressas. A divided Pakistan will destroy the spinal cord of the terrorism and there will be no training camps, no more Osamas and no more threat to humanity. Say YES to this petition and support international fight against terrorism and against those who harbor terrorists and their supporters. Disintegration of Pakistan will pave way to divide the forces busy to make new designs to conquer the world through terrorism. A divided Pakistan will bring peace to the region and shall facilitate destruction of terrorist training camps and elimination of terrorism altogether. Also read http://www.PetitionOnline.com/MQM47/petition.html

Pakistan: Failed State by 2015

I was reading through the Hindustan Times (two days ago), an Indian newspaper, when I found an article entitled Pakistan Will Be a Failed State by 2015:

What makes this particularly ominous is that although the report was compiled by American intelligence agencies, it has not appeared in any western media other than a blurb in the Washington Times. Certainly the collapse of a nuclear power and key American ally should garner more media attention.
The question remains, is it true? Is Pakistan heading for a "Yugoslavia-like" fate?
First, a few statistics: Pakistan is the sixth most populous country in the world (approx 150 million people) and is the second most populous Muslim nation in the world (after Indonesia). It is also one of the poorest countries in the world.
Pakistan certainly has one of the strangest histories amongst modern nations (for a good map of Pakistan click here). To understand it, we need to rewind back to the 1800's.
By the mid 19th century, Britain had subjugated most of what is modern day Pakistan and India under its control, either directly or indirectly. Before this time, these areas were divided into smaller kingdoms along ethnic and religious lines. Despite what many people think, there is no such thing as an ethnic "Pakistani", which is important to remember.
To the west, Britain had less colonial "success" in subjugating Afghanistan, fighting a disastrous war there in 1842. In 1892, the British signed a treaty with the Afghan ruler Abdur Rehman Khan on the border between Afghanistan and what was later to become Pakistan. This border became known as the Durand Line and was designed specifically to weaken the power of the ethnic Pashtuns, who lived in roughly equal numbers on either side of that line. The Pashtuns, both now and then, were striving for their own homeland which they refer to as Pashtunistan.
By the 1920's, British hold over what is now India and Pakistan was weakening. Muslims, a sizeable majority in these territories, were beginning to push for a separate state. The name "Pakistan" itself was coined in 1933, being the first letters of all the territories the Muslim separatists desired to be included in their state: Punjab, Afghania (now the NWFP), Kashmir, Iran, Sindh, Tukharistan, Afghanistan and Balochistan. The word "Pak" also means "pure" in Persian languages. The official language spoken in Pakistan today, Urdu, is related to the Farsi spoken in Iran and the Dari language spoken in Afghanistan.
Britain offered several different models for future relations with their colony, including granting India "domain status" in the British Commonwealth, but these were all rejected. By 1942, Gandhi's independence movement was gaining steam. On June 14, 1947, the British parliament passed the "India Independence Act" which created two independent "dominions" that the various states could join - one being what is now India and the other what is now Pakistan.
Incidentally, it is because the ruler of Kashmir could not decide whether to join India or Pakistan that this area is still hotly contested. India and Pakistan have fought two wars over this territory, the first in 1949.
On August 14, 1947, Pakistan and India became formally independent. What happened next was that panic struck in both of these territories, which each minority fearing prosecution in the other's territory. Hundreds of thousands of Hindus and Sikhs left the Muslim Pakistan and hundreds of thousands of Muslims left India. Making matters even more complicated, "Pakistan" was two non-contiguous bodies of land, with the part known as East Pakistan breaking away and becoming the sovreign nation of Bangladesh in 1971 (Bengali is an ethnicity and the majority of the people in Bangladesh are Bengalis as are the peoples in the Indian state of Bengal).
Pakistan today is comprised of various groups and it's important to know who these are:
Tribal peoples who have always lived in the region, many of whom continue to live in autonomous areas with little central government control. These include the Dir, Chitral, Amb and Hunza peoples;
Ethnic Pashtuns, who are culturally and linguistically connected to their kin who live in neighboring Afghanistan;
Urdu-speaking Muslims who migrated to Pakistan after independence. Over half the population in urban areas came from these migrants (called muhajirs or refugees from India);
The Sindh peoples, whose city of Karachi became the first capital; and
The Punjabi peoples, who have played a dominant role in the national governments
The Baloch peoples (see below)
Ethnic Bengalis, whose traditional homeland is Bangladesh and the Indian state of Bengal
The Durand Line originally caused extremely sour relations with Afghanistan, which was the only nation to vote against Pakistan's admission into the United Nations. It's worth noting here that the treaty establishing the Durand Line had a duration of 100 years which means that technically Pakistan should have acceded this territory in 1993. Many Afghans today believe that Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province is rightly Afghan territory.
Furthermore, the boundaries between Pakistan and India were established by the British and this caused not only the dispute over Kashmir but also gave Pakistan only one major port, in Karachi, which is in the state of Balochistan. Balochistan originally wanted to be an independent nation from either Pakistan or India but the Pakistani military invaded in 1948 and forced it to join the country. Balochistan tried to succede again in 1956 but was crushed once again by the Pakistani military.
Complicating matters even further, the leadership of Pakistan came almost entirely from the British Officer Corps, disenfranchising some of the more "native" population from the outset.
And furthermore, the majority of Pakistani Muslims are Sunni but Pakistan is also home to a sizeable Shi'ite population, approximately 20% of the population.
Therefore right from the beginning Pakistan had the difficulty of juggling a wide variety of religious and ethnic difficulties, highly contested and bitterly disputed borders, a large immigrant population and the nation of India squarely between its western and eastern portions.
The history of independent Pakistan is a long and tortuous one, including many military juntas, imposition of martial law, military repression and the dissolution of democratic rule. Bangladesh seceded from what is now Pakistan in 1971 after fighting a very bitter war with the central government. Estimates range between 200,000 and 3 million Bengalis died during this struggle. The independence of Bangladesh became the Third India-Pakistan War because India intervened on behalf of Bangladesh.
By the 1980's, Pakistan had become a key ally of the United States after the Soviet Union invaded neighboring Afghanistan. During this time, the military dictator Mohammed Zia ul-Haq was the president of Pakistan and expanded martial law. He also pushed Pakistan to be a more Islamic state. In 1978, Zia announced that all Pakistani law would have to conform with Islamic law. Differences between Sunni and Shi'ite interpretations of Islamic law upset many Shi'ites.
Zia also established "shariat" or courts to try cases under Islamic law. Strict rules began to be enforced against alcohol and other un-Islamic activities, as well as diluting women's legal rights such as their ability to testify in court. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia spent enormous sums in Pakistan, establishing madrassas or religious schools, often the only educational choice available to people in impoverished areas. It was in many of these madrassas that the future leaders of Afghanistan, the Taliban, got their start.
It is estimated that 2 billion dollars in aid, including advanced weaponry such as Stinger missiles, was funneled from the United States to the anti-Soviet Afghan forces known as the mujahadeen, with the majority of it delivered by proxy via Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Agency (ISI), their version of the CIA. In an interview in 1998, the National Security Advisor to President Carter at the time of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Zbigniew Brzezinski, admitted that the funding of the mujahadeen predated the actual Soviet invasion. The Soviet invasion, which prompted the U.S. to boycott the 1980 Moscow Olympics, was justified by Moscow because the American government was "interfering" with the pro-Soviet Afghanistan government.
Brzezinski clearly wanted the Soviet Union to invade Afghanistan in an effort to weaken that nation. There are other credible reports that the CIA wanted the mujahadeen to expand the war into the Soviet Union itself. The CIA also worked to inflame the Muslim peoples of Uzbekistan and other areas of the Soviet Union with anti-Soviet propaganda and delivering thousands of Qur'ans (the "Bible" for Muslims).
The CIA (via the ISI) did not just provide cash and weapons but also extremely detailed training on military guerilla tactics such as sabotage, how to move weaponry without being detected, how to identify and destroy key economic targets, and how to communicate covertly. Saudi Arabia also provided funding and coordinated with Pakistan's ISI to assist the mujahadeen.
Many Muslims from around the world, including wealthy children from Arab nations such as Saudi Arabia, came to Afghanistan to fight in the "jihad" or holy war against the Soviet Union. The most famous scion of a wealthy family to fight in in Afghanistan was Osama bin Laden. This battlefield experience, which fostered pan-Muslim militancy, has contributed to conflicts in Chechnya, Dagestan, Uzbekistan, Bosnia, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan and Iraq.
In 1988, General Zia ul-Haq died in a plane crash and Pakistan returned to a democratic government when Benazir Bhutto (a woman) was elected. From 1988 to 1998, Butto and Nawaz Sharif were each elected president of Pakistan twice and removed twice on corruption charges.
The Soviet Union withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989. Various factions within the mujahadeen began fighting each other for control over the country, many of them with battlefield experience and weaponry from the era of Soviet occupation.
Because of Pakistani and Saudi influence over the mujahadeen, the more fanatical adherents to militant Islam gained leadership positions amongst the Afghan warlords. The "Islamization" also had repercussions in Pakistan itself, fostering more support for militias and guerillas to attack Indian forces in the portion of Kashmir it controls. Many Pakistani militias were trained in the same camps using the same techniques that had earlier trained Afghan mujahadeen.
The Taliban eventually gained control over most of Afghanistan in 1996, enforcing its now infamous strict brand of Islam. While most of the world shunned the Taliban government, it was officially recognized by three countries: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Pakistan's ISI continued to have strong ties to the Taliban leadership. There are reports that many Pakistani ISI leaders funded the Taliban and Al-Qaeda right until September 11, 2001.
It's worth noting here that Mullah Omar, who later became the Taliban's "spiritual leader" and a key associate of Osama bin Laden (and who remains a free man today) had to flee Afghanistan in 1994. He went to the Pakistani province of Balochistan and returned with a militia of 1,500 followers to aid the Taliban's rise to power.
In 1999 in Pakistan, the military rose to power in a bloodless coup and General Pervez Musharraf became the president. Musharraf maintained a semblance of a democratic parliament, although he got his supporters to retroactively legitimize his coup. It's important to note here that the United States imposed sanctions against Pakistan because of the installation of General Musharraf as President.
The attacks on September 11, 2001 greatly affected Pakistan. Most people are unaware that one of the first pieces of legislation passed in the United States after 9/11 was to "waive" restrictions on aid to Pakistan (Public Law 107-57). The most important section of this waiver was that it was now legal for the United States to send military aid to Pakistan as part of the "War on Terrorism".
Pakistan quickly became the recipient of billions of dollars in aid as well as billions in debt relief and restructuring, making it third behind Israel and Egypt in terms of American assistance.
I cannot find a total for all the military and economic aid that Pakistan has received, but I can tell you the recently unveiled Bush administration budget for next year is 691 million dollars of which 300 is specifically military aid. The United States is also considering selling F-16 fighter jets to Pakistan. Furthermore, Pakistan will receive 1.2 billion dollars in military aid this year alone, including P-3 Orion aircraft, Phalanx weapon systems and thousands of missiles.
All of this military aid is justified on the theory that Pakistan is a friend of the United States and because its help is "essential" to the campaign against the Taliban. It is however propping up the illegitimate dictatorship of Musharraf who has steadfastly refused to step down as head of the military despite having previously pledged to do so, saying it would dangerously "destabilize" the country.
Musharraf faces significant political opposition domestically as there have been repeated calls for him to step down and resign. Musharraf has also removed politicians and judges who threatened his power and gets his supporters to change the laws to suit him, including passing a law allowing him to be the president indefinitely. You can read more about the political situation here.
Pakistan is also facing an armed insurgency in Balochistan. A gas pipeline was blown up Sunday night in Muridke, three power stations were blown up the day before, a powerful bombing in Quetta occurred at the end of 2004, various rocket attacks and the Army is now setting up "cantonments" in the province, referring to a semi-permanent military presence there. The attacks are being conducted by the Balochistan Liberation Army which, as evidenced by its name, wants Balochistan to revert to the independent tribal kingdom it was before the colonial period. A good explanation of the situation in Balochistan can be found here.
Musharraf himself has nearly been assassinated twice and bizarrely enough the principal suspect escaped from jail earlier this year.
Elsewhere, Pakistan has been wracked by sectarian violence with Shi'ite and Sunni mosques being targeted by bombs in 2002 and 2004. A bomb went off in Karachi near the U.S. consultate, killing 11 and injuring more than 50 people. Plus a host of other suicide attacks, rocket fire, bicycle bombings, bus bombings, massacres of Christians, the gunning down of Protestant ministers and other assorted violence and attacks against minorities.
If that weren't enough, the Pakistani military has been conducting attacks in the tribal areas of the NWFP along the border with Afghanistan, causing bitter resentment amongst the people who live there who had previously maintained near independence. The ongoing fighting, especially in Waziristan, is part of the "War on Terrorism" to root out Al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters who have taken refuge there. Despite all the military aid and advanced weaponry, the Pakistani military has not done well against the tribes in the region. Indeed, Pakistan has had to resort to paying off tribal leaders to get them to quit sheltering Al-Qaeda members.
The fighting in Waziristan has further aggravated the relationship of many in Pakistan with the central government, which is increasingly becoming seen as a "puppet" of western interests as it conducts military operations against its own peoples.
It must also be remembered that Pakistan has functioning nuclear weapons. Should the Musharraf government collapse, it is possible that renegade groups could acquire control over these weapons. During Condoleezza Rice's confirmation hearings, Senator Kerry made several allusions to this being a distinct possibility, basing this on briefings he received during his presidential campaign:
"If you were to have a successful coup in Pakistan, you could have, conceivably, nuclear weapons in the hand of a radical Islamic state automatically, overnight," said Senator Kerry.
"And to the best of my knowledge, in all of the inquiries that I've made in the course of the last years, there is now no failsafe procedure in place to guarantee against that weaponry falling into the wrong hands," he said.
Is Pakistan close to a Yugoslavia-like defragmentation? It's too difficult to say but the current situation is a recipe for disaster: ethnic and sectarian violence, poverty, an authoritatian leader who refuses to compromise and a large influx of military weaponry and aid from a country widely seen to be anti-Muslim.
I hope the CIA report becomes more widely reported in the western press so that awareness can be raised on these vital issues.
Peace
Update: Indian and Pak papers have been all over this story with the addition that India would be directly in the crosshairs if Pakistan fails or feels threatened by Indian forces:
Islamabad also faces a high risk of its nukes being stolen by the terrorists within the next 15 years, according to a CIA report.
Given the possibility that terrorists could acquire nuclear weapons, the use of such weapons by extremists before 2020 cannot be ruled out,'' said the report titled ''Mapping the Global Future: Report of the National Intelligence Council's 2020 Project''.