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A friend of mine recently told me a revealing little tale. To film a documentary, he had travelled up north into a tense battle zone where the Pakistan Army is fighting a bloody war against extremists.
There he met a soldier who startled him by saying: “Sir, since you seem to be an educated man I can trust, let me tell you that all these extremists were made by us!” He then added: “We are told so many lies about whom we are fighting. But we know who these people are. These are the people we have been feeding, and now they have turned against us. They kill women and children!”
The soldier was not saying anything new. Because barring, of course, the usual set of so-called ‘patriots’ (the ghairat brigade) who are ever-willing to lie through their teeth just because they believe flying fibs serve the country’s interests, by now most Pakistanis know that the vicious enemy the people of Pakistan and its army are up against are very much a product of our own strategic follies and misplaced arrogance.
Nevertheless, when one hears this coming from a soldier up in the front lines, one is not sure how to react. Whether one should rejoice over the fact that due to what the soldiers have been facing from an animalistic enemy, perhaps many have awaken to a reality that till now has been fed to them wrapped in the usual sheen of anti-India and pro-faith rhetoric; or should we see this as a warning?
The debacles faced by the US army in Vietnam and by the Soviet forces in Afghanistan should be taken as examples to be learnt from. It is much easier raising an army on certain myths about one’s foreign enemies and on an exaggerated sense of patriotism. These can work to charge up the soldiers during a sharp, short war (such as the one Britain fought in the Falklands in the early 1980s). But the post-World War II scenario in this regard is studded with examples where, in a long drawn-out armed conflict, there does come a time when armies involved in guerrilla warfare begin to lose touch with all the ideological hoopla that they were fed during training.
There are numerous accounts of how whole battalions of American marines and Soviet fighters ended up rebelling against their own superiors because after facing the kind of bloodshed and madness on the battlefield they completely lost any worthwhile contact with what they were told by their politicians and generals. All that began to melt away and they found themselves awkwardly exposed to a set of truths that they were conditioned to repress.
These are the kind of truths that a soldier, especially if he is being readied to take on a ruthless bunch of insurgents, should be briefed about up front. As one saw in Vietnam and Afghanistan, all that mythical talk about how the soldiers were fighting for a higher cause simply began to melt away and the soldiers were not only left stranded with a rude reality, but they had no clue what to do about it.
It is a bit unsettling to know that the army is preparing its men for the conflict against armed extremists by using rhetoric it originally devised for a possible war against India. But it is not Indian forces that the soldiers find on the battlefield up north. Instead, it is their own countrymen — legions of fanatics brainwashed to believe that they are the ones serving God and the country, even if that means blowing up women and children and chopping off heads with swords.
The enemy in this context is not the saffron-clad Hindu battalions on mechanical elephants fitted with nuclear warheads. The enemy is very much from amongst us. Most of them are Pakistanis who were given a free passage to breed the kind of vicious, short-fused hatred some of our generals, intelligence agencies and politicians thought would help them gain Kashmir and ‘strategic depth’ in Afghanistan — and if certain nut-jobs in the electronic media are to be believed, maybe raise the Pakistani flag in New Delhi.
Telling the soldiers the whole truth is better. This means re-orientation with a view to ready them to fight the extremists responsible for killing hundreds of innocent citizens and many soldiers too. They have been slaughtered by a terrible breed of Pakistanis who are not dropping from the sky or rolling in from across the border, but emerging from our very own mountains and cities.
a very nice, eye opener effort on the part of columnist
really appreciable
May Allah save our country from being perished
Ameen
I enjoy NFP's blogs.
I get a greater pleasure in Pakistan Army's discomfiture at the hands of extremists they trained…can't help it!
When the soldier asserts that we created the extremist I hope he is implying that we all have been part of this one way or the other over the last 20 years and have contributed towards the situation prevailing in Pakistan at the moment.
We all are to blame for allowing the Mullahs to ingrain such hatred and intolerant society.
Good and reality based article, the first article of Nadeem, which I liked out of those which I red.
NFP,
a very nice article. I always wonder what actually constitutes a 'normal' Pakistani population. Lack of sane voices in Pakistani media might give impression to one that blaming 'zionist' forces for all its failures is fairly deep-rooted in Pakistani psyche; and the theory has lot many takers. If that is not the case, how come you are the only rational voice coming out of a 150million strong country? We all want to believe that a normal Pakistani is in line with your thought process; but if it were true, there would be a lot many rational voices in pakistani media.
Would you be so kind as to provide dates and units of the "numerous accounts of how whole battalions of American marines and Soviet fighters ended up rebelling against their own superiors" I feel your statement is unfonded.
Thank you
Pakistan and India can live in peace if we have more people like this(Nadeem) on the both side of border who can rase their voice
Please NFP write something to save the PPP……………
Love the article. Has great insights for me as an Indian. This is also what can happen (and has happened) in India when we allow fundamentalists to dominate and condition minds
Nadeembhai,
Great article !
oh dear, another meeting between NFP and his imaginary friends.
Dear Nadeem,
Thanks for this great article.
Keep showing us the mirror and keep fighting with your pen!
Your fan
Goga Nalaik
Reply
A very relevant article.Keep it up NFP!
A great read , NFP writes sense ….!
Rock on!!! We need a NFP in India too.
Based on the replies it looks like more Indians read Dawn than Pakistanis. Neverthless commendable job by NFP.
I once asked a friend from Hyderabad (Pakistan), which newspaper he got his news from. He said, the Dawn and the Jang (Urdu). Encouraged by the first and frankly, discouraged by the second, I asked if he read the excellent columns in the Dawn by Irfan Hussain, Ardeshir Cowasjee and Nadeem Paracha? He said, that he didn't bother reading them, because his focus was on business.
Indians tend to read the Dawn because of the op-ed. But most Pakistanis read it to know about WAPDA, NWFP, Afghanistan, Pak-China-USA dynamics. Hence, while the Indians may assume that their feedback is being received. The reality is only very little of it is trickling back to Pakistan … and that too to a very small close circuit of journalists.
This is our collective pitiable state.
NFP has been driving home or at least trying to drive home this point for a long time. One positive thing coming out of this is that there are no hate responses from readers. Hope dawn is not blocking those messages.
Very well said Nadeem!
The head to western command in India is a muslim.. he commands kashmir to Gujrat.. he has an educated.. well trained army at his disposal.. Ideologically charged army can only be useful for short conflicts .. but for wars.. you need professionals…
Let the peace take the superseat.
Great Article NFP
Can we please VOTE you as the next president of Pakistan.
To all the Indians in this discussion, majority of the educated Pakistanis have nothing against India, I have more Indian friends than Pakistani friends and we get along just fine
Dear NFP
You are great . I salute your guts telling the truth.
Sir, excellent article.You are a genius.
Dawn is the highest circulated English Daily and NFP's articles are certainly not reaching the masses. Most students in Pakistan regard "A" is an alphabet but not a letter.
In such a situation it is highly recommended that his articles should be translated in Urdu and other regional languages.
Sir,,Good article.Over a period of time I hope most pakistanis will come out of their closed minds and become rational
Kudos to NFP once again for this great piece of honest writing. It is this introspection that is required by the powers that be in Pakistan if they do not wish to blow the country to smithreens.
Strong stuff once again, NFP. But are we ready to wake up and smell the coffee that you keep serving us?
Keep at it.
NFP as usual I couldn't agree more. You have an awesome gift of exposing simple reality in such a convoluted society. Keep it up.
This article is spot on.
Pakistan faces an existential threat. The threat comes not from without, but from within.
This is the result of decades of misguided policies brought by the trinity of corrupt politicians, self-serving army and hate espousing mullahs.
When will enlightenment come to this poor wretched nation?
The journey for progress and improvements starts when one is brutally honest and is able to see oneself in the mirror for what one is. Its very difficult and very few people are able to do it…the easy way out is denial and behaving like an Ostrich..
The enemy is not outside, it is within. When you fight the enemy outside, the enemy within gets stronger. And As it gets stronger you become the enemy.
Extraordinary.
Outstanding.
Succinct.
Bravo !
Thanks NFP,
Atleast you have the clarity.
Also thanks to you for trying to make it clear to 'normal' Pakistani population.
You are a genius.
The 'normal' Pakistani population does not read Dawn. What percentage of Pakistani population reads Dawn? Are there NFPs in Urdu print and electronic media?
Agent Smith, are you suggesting that people who read DAWN are not 'normal'?
It's Pakistan's largest circulated English daily, read by people who do have the power to make a change from above.
Three words – Extremely insightful article.