Mother of all battles?

Correction: This post was written on the false premise that Wana is the hub of TTP. In fact, as Rabia has kindly pointed out, Wana is controlled by groups that have promised to stay neutral to the fight. One of the three prongs of the army offensive has taken off from Wana (the other two originating from Razmak and Tank). The post also erroneously identifies Ladha as the focus of the operation instead of Makeen. I make the point that so far the operation has been a cat and mouse game with the Taliban never sticking around to put up a serious fight, which means that the real fight will begin once the army settles in and the Taliban can go on the offensive with its blitz attacks. That assessment I would stick to despite the factual errors in this post.

This "mother of all battles" looks to me like little more than a cop out. The army's three-pronged strategy is set to converge not on Wana, which is the centre of South Waziristan, but on Ladha, which is on the border with army-controlled North Waziristan. They are going west/north-west from Tank and south from North Waziristan. Maybe after capturing Ladha, they'll head down towards Wana but for now there is no mention of any such plan or of Wana at all in news reports.

After a week of steady "we killed ten, they killed three" press releases, the army trumpeted its capture of Kotkai. Everyone got very excited because its Hakimullah's birthplace but really Kotkai is little more than a hamlet on the way to Ladha. Somewhere between Jandola and Ladha, Kotkai was not the theater of the great showdown either. From the body count the army gave, it seems like most of the militants fled the area. If I had to make an educated guess, I'd say they went for Wana seeing as fleeing to Ladha would have them cornered.

Now it seems like the army has its eyes set on Sararogha, another pit stop on the way to Ladha. But time is running out rapidly. If you can tell that winter is coming in Karachi, then it most certainly has to be freezing in the mountains of Waziristan. At the rate that the army is going, I have a feeling that they'll capture Ladha in several weeks by which time winter will make further advance impossible. There will be no major battle in Ladha either as the 10,000 militants of South Waziristan will all have packed their bags and moved to Wana. The army will declare victory and settle in for the winter, leaving most of South Waziristan in TTP's hands.

And of course only once the army roosts will the battle really begin. Attrition is the Taliban's tactic of choice and they're damn good at it too. Their part of South Waziristan would be a perfect base to launch suicide and fidayeen attacks on the army for the rest of winter. All we'll be able to do is sit there and take it or retreat.

(Map taken from BBC.)

How will it all end?

After decades of careful effort by the military, we have thoroughly institutionalized violence in our country. Pakistani terrorists have turned their violence on our own people and on three of our four neighbours. We now have a most bewildering patchwork of militant groups, each out to kill someone or the other in the name of Islam, bankrolled at some point or the other by the army and its supporters. Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Muhammad, Jundollah, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, Tehrik-e-Taliban (itself a coalition of dozens of militant factions), it seems like we have more militant organizations than NGOs.

We carry out an operation against Swat Taliban and there are reports of Jaish-e-Muhammad expanding its hold in southern Punjab. We start an operation in South Waziristan and there are reports of Taliban and al-Qaeda entrenched in Quetta. It seems like every time we muster up the resolve to deal with one faction another springs to prominence. How we will stamp out all these groups, I have no idea. Does the army even want to dismantle all the militant organizations? How does it end?

Bringing the fight to the GHQ

The Taliban have thrown down the gauntlet. The final showdown in South Waziristan can't be too far. What is unclear is whether or not the months-long blockade and the hesitant skirmishes were a strategic blunder on the army's part. But whether it gave the Talib a breather or a blow, they seem ready for the impending fight. Now that the GHQ has been attacked, the army will be galvanized into action too.

The road ahead is tough. The casualties many. But its time that we steel ourselves and clean up our mess.

War of attrition?

Dawn just reported that the army will need several more months to launch a ground operation against Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan in South Waziristan. It cites Lieutenant-General Nadeem Ahmed who addressed the press after meeting with Richard Holbrooke, America's point person for Pakistan and Afghanistan. Lt Gen Ahmed gives a whole bevy of reasons including shortage of equipment and the lack of availability of planes, which are currently in use in Swat, and so on.

But Lt Gen Ahmed also talks about creating the right conditions before a ground operation. His direct quote in Dawn is "Once you feel that the conditions are right and you have been able to substantially dent their infrastructure and their fighting capacity, then you go in for a ground offensive." To achieve these optimal conditions, the army seems to have laid siege to South Waziristan, blocking roads, bombing militant hideouts and such.

I sincerely hope that the army is keeping in mind the human consequence of this approach. A war of attrition will disproportionately affect civilians in South Waziristan. Adopting such an approach just days after the collective punishment clause of the Frontier Crimes Regulation was substantially diluted is extremely unfortunate. With ominous reports emerging of extrajudicial killings by the army in its Rah-e-Rast Operation in Swat (see here and here), another ethical and human rights crisis is the last thing it should be courting.

Lashkars

Since September, the newspapers have been awash with news about pro-government jirgas and lashkars being assembled by tribesmen in various areas of FATA to resist the Taliban. This is good in that after nearly seven years, the locals are taking a firm stance against the militants, whom they initially treated with much hospitality. Support of the people of FATA will be key to success in what has now become a full-fledged war on the militants there. The locals' knowledge of the area and the simple fact that they will no longer give refuge to militants will help tremendously.

But this whole business of the lashkars fighting a proxy war for the government makes me very uncomfortable. Tackling the militants is the government and the military's responsibility and not of civilians living in that area. For the government to garner their support and make sure they are not harboring militants is one thing, but for it to use these armed tribesmen as a buffer against the ruthless militants is inhumane.

To make matters worse, not only is the government encouraging lashkars, it is, as the Herald reported this month, also arming them. Our experience of arming the mujahideen to fight the Soviets and the Taliban to fight in Kashmir should be proof enough of the folly of such endeavors. These groups that the state arms have a tendency of using those very arms against the state later. When the militants have been controlled, I am sure, the last thing we will want is to have to fight another war to check armed lashkars.

On a related note, I find it hard to be very enthusiastic about the so-called "vigilance committees" that have sprouted up in Buner. These committees are basically armed vigilante groups that guard villages in Buner against militants. The Herald speaks of these committees in glowing terms, calling them "a miracle" and encouraging people of Swat to follow suit and "become the masters of their own destiny". Such glorification of vigilante groups is quite unnecessary. They are a woeful symptom of the state's failure to protect its citizens and can become a threat to the state's authority. The media was right in condemning acts of vigilante justice in Karachi and in calling on the government and society to address its root causes. In an editorial, Dawn called the burning of robbers by civilians in Karachi a "terrifying new phenomenon". They should be consistent and do the same with the armed and organized vigilante groups in NWFP.

"We should not let these corrupt politicians win."

An hour ago I got this SMS from some random number:

"Its time to backup our President Musharraf! We should not let these corrupt politicians win. So send sms to Dawn news poll for rating impeachment measures. Write "DOP NO" and send on 6622 to support the man who dared to stand up against worst situations, when others were sitting in the lap of luxury!"

A case in point of the bias against politicians in the upper classes. I am not saying that politicians are not corrupt. Far from it. The evidence against Mr. Ten Percent, the late Shehzadi, the not-so-Sharif brothers and the Chaudharys of Gujrat is undeniable. What really annoys me is people's blind spot when it comes to corruption in the army.

It is common knowledge that a huge chunk of the many billion dollars in military aid given to the army during the 1980s and again in the 2000s did not go towards strengthening the army but instead went to fill up our oh-so-brave army generals' McScrooge-like vaults in the big bad firangi lands. Yet, defying all facts and logic, the army has somehow managed to remain a symbol of honesty and patriotism, and is expected to rescue Pakistan from corruption. Hah!

Corruption is pervasive in every institution of the country: bureaucracy, judiciary, law enforcement, politics, armed forces. You name a public institution and you will find corruption there. But people only rant and rave about corrupt politicians.

I am not saying that people should stop criticizing them. Go right ahead. But do please realize that the army, the institution that is to deliver our country from the greedy politicians, is just as blighted by corruption.

What makes matters worse is that the public does not have access to the records of military spending. Even our legislators, it seems, do not have access to it. So if the politicians are looting the country in plain sight of the people, one can only imagine the plunder going on in total absence of public oversight.

Then we come to Musharraf's personal reputation as Great (and Upright) Avenger aka.  Scourge of Corrupt Politicians. One must wonder where he was while the opportunistic hordes in the King's Party stuffed their pockets and bought thousands of acres of land for mere pennies. And let us not forget the unscrupulous politicians who were ushered in under Musharraf's grand devolution of democracy dreams.

While Musharraf selectively prosecuted his political rivals in the beginning of his reign through the NAB, our Great (and Upright) Avenger demurely looked the other way when his own coterie abused their positions of power. Then in the latter years, when the going got tough for our principled Scourge of Corruption, he backtracked with amazing speed and acquitted those very corrupt politicians whom he was prosecuting earlier through the NRO.

Let us also not forget the ex-President's non-negotiable and undebatable budget for the President House this year. Rs. 353.84 million! A 12% increase over the previous year. And that too when the Prime Minister prudently cut his own expenses by 30% in view of massive governmental overspending.

So people who, handkerchief in hand, are wondering how their knight in shining army fatigues abandoned them in the clutches of corrupt politicians, have heart. We have been in the hands of corrupt leaders, autocratic and democratic, for 61 glorious years. Things really can't get much worse as far as looting goes.

David Milliband, UK's foreign secretary, said something I really liked on the occasion of Musharraf's resignation. He said that strong institutions, not strong individuals, are what Pakistan needs. He is right. For the long-term solution of most of Pakistan's governance problems strong institutions are exactly what are required, and the chances of institutional development are definitely brighter under a democratic government, which is compelled to listen to the public, rather than an autocratic one. So have a little faith, people, and stop sending me hysterical SMSes!