September
23, 2005
September -
A Witness to Wars
Several world conflicts have
started or ended in the month of September. The
Second World War, the biggest of the twentieth century
and in world history, started on September 1, 1939
and ended six years later on September 2, 1945.
The latest, the war on terror, also started in September
following the plane-bomb attacks of 9/11 four years
back. Its end is still not in sight. September has
also witnessed some significant episodes in the
almost perennial Arab-Israel conflict. The eight-year
long war between Iran and Iraq started in early
September 1980. The Indo-Pakistan war of 1965 started
on September 6 and ended seventeen days later on
September 23, 1965.
WAR ON TERROR: From the viewpoint of a Pakistani-American,
the ongoing war on terror, whose fourth anniversary
is being currently observed, is perhaps the most
significant. This is the first time that a war is
being waged, without formal declaration, against
a vaguely defined enemy and without dedicated efforts
to eradicate the root cause that was not even acknowledged
for a long time as the instigator of 9/11. The road
map for the solution of the Palestine issue was
presented after the occupation of Iraq. That too
has unfortunately foundered on the rock of obstinacy
by the concerned parties. Although not a single
Pakistani was involved in the plane-bomb attacks
of 9/11, immigrants of Pakistan have borne the brunt
of the new restrictive immigration legislation.
Of the 2,760 persons deported in 2002 under this
dispensation, as many as 961, over 34 % were Pakistanis.
Like the traditional wars, the war on terror too
has had severe negative impacts. The extent of its
astronomical cost to the US taxpayer is still to
be worked out. The expenditure on the operations
in Iraq alone is costing the exchequer one billion
dollars a week. The war on Iraq was vehemently opposed
throughout the world. The demonstrations against
the war were unprecedented in world history.
There isn’t any Kuwait or Saudi Arabia to
pick up the bill this time. President Bush has been
urging the UN and world community to share the physical
and fiscal burden of pacifying the Iraqis and re-establishing
law and order in that war-torn and outraged nation.
Moral: the days of gunboat diplomacy are gone.
INDO-PAKISTAN WAR (Sept 6-23, 1965): Carried away
by their chauvinism and enthusiasm, the spin-doctors
of that period projected the outcome of the ’65
war as a great victory of a small army over a five
times bigger force. The claim was not without substance:
Pakistan’s armed forces did give an excellent
account of their courage and mettle. But, the war
could not succeed in its basic objective of wrenching
Kashmir from the grip of India.
The media, which had been totally tamed and made
to abdicate its adversary role, continued to play
up the euphoria of victory on the behest of official
media managers. In such a milieu came the Tashkent
Declaration of January 1966 signed by President
Ayub and Prime Minister Shastri. This statesman-like
act elicited an adverse reaction, an anti-climax,
in West Pakistan which was in a victorious, celebratory
mood.
The Tashkent Declaration was characterized as Ayub
Khan’s unnecessary capitulation to India.
The people of East Pakistan, on the other hand,
had felt abandoned during the war and left in the
lurch by the Punjab-dominated armed forces. The
seeds of secession had started germinating.
The political parties, particularly the newly set
up PPP of Z.A. Bhutto, jumped upon the opportunity
to pressure Ayub to quit. Within a month of the
Declaration, a national conference was held in Lahore
where opposition parties convened in February 1966
to identify points of common interest. The ensuing
agitation forced President Ayub to quit. He handed
over power to the then C-in-C, Gen.Yahya, instead
of the Speaker of the Parliament as required under
the Constitution. A power-seeking Bhutto maneuvered
this aberration of Ayub to take the country to a
war with India leading to the independence of Bangladesh,
surrender of Pakistan’s army and presentation
of power on a platter to Bhutto.
SECOND WORLD WAR (Sept. 1, 1939 to Sept. 2, 1945):
More has been written about this than about any
other war. It claimed more than 50 million lives,
decimated great centers of civilization, cost an
enormous amount of $1.154 trillion, and changed
the course of history such as few events before
or after. Its legacy still grips mankind. It ended
the ascendancy of Europe that had endured since
the collapse of Muslim Spain in 1492 and the halt
to the expansion of the Ottoman Empire following
the death of Suleyman the Magnificent in 1566. The
war sapped the intellectual vitality of Europe,
brought its vast empires to the brink of collapse,
and passed world leadership to two new giants –
the USA and the Soviet Union.
The war also served as a midwife for inventions.
Its role as a catalyst for change, innovation, research
and development has really changed the shape of
things as never before in human history.
For the US, the war was a blessing in disguise.
The demand for consumer goods, apart from arms and
ammunition, transport and fighter planes, war vessels
and other equipment, pulled the country out of the
ruined and colorless landscape of the Depression.
It cemented its final rise to world power with relatively
light losses, about 300,000 casualties. This figure
is dwarfed when compared with the losses of Germany:
5.6 million, Japan: 2.3 million, China: 10 million,
and the Soviet Union: a staggering 20 million. The
US was unique among the combatants in being neither
invaded nor bombed.
Germany and Japan, though defeated and humiliated
in the war, have succeeded, over the past 60 years,
in emerging as economic giants of modern world.
They have vindicated the finding of Prof. Arnold
Toyenbee, the well-known historian, that the rise
or fall of a nation depends on how it responds to
a critical national challenge. It was evidently
the unremitting struggle of these two great and
gifted nations that enabled them to come out of
their darkest period. Both have been registering
for years enormous surpluses in their trade with
the US. And, both have had a great advantage. The
disarmament imposed on them by victorious allies
had obviated the need for them to spend money on
defense. They have achieved in peace what they had
failed to get through war – a substantial
share in world market. The victors of Europe, on
the other hand, lost their colonies and the captive
markets.
SOME CONCLUSIONS: * War is the “story of senseless
butchery” in the words of historian John Green.
Tolstoy’s epic “War and Peace”
portrays eminently the horrors of the Napoleonic
war in which the great military leader’s army
was ruthlessly destroyed in 1812 in Russia. No army
is thus invincible.
* It would be in the national interest of the US
to re-evaluate the fruits and failures of its policies
in Iraq and Afghanistan. Perhaps the US objectives
could have been better achieved through peaceful
measures in concerts with the world community. The
Bush administration is now seeking UN cooperation!
* The war in Iraq has aggravated further the antipathy
of the Arab states towards Israel which has to,
in all circumstances, survive in that very region.
* The challenges posed by the 1965 and 1971 Indo-Pak
wars could have been turned into fruitful responses
of an inherently dynamic people of Pakistan had
they been led not by intellectually ill-equipped
Generals or self-serving politicians who fooled
the people by drawing visions of a glorious future.
The leaders must be made to realize that they should
come clean with the people and take them into confidence.
The people will astonish them by rising up to the
challenge and working harder than expected to achieve
national goals.
* Many of the ills of Pakistani society may be traced
to poverty and illiteracy. Priorities of national
effort and expenditure will have to be reworked
to overcome these. Feudalism which thrives on the
illiteracy of the serfs will have to be done away
with. Defense expenditure will have to be cut down
to divert the savings towards education. What is
needed is a well-planned army of scientists, technicians,
engineers of the lowest to the highest level.
