The “Kargil” operation was put on the drawing boards by competent military minds many years ago. But there was nothing extraordinary about this. Military men are paid to play war games in times of peace. “Kargil” was subsequently presented as a militarily “do-able” option, when the time was ripe, partly as military revenge for the loss of Siachin and partly as a political device to spur the Kashmiri mujahidin towards greater sacrifice and heroism. But the plan was not executed because one or more of the members of the “troika” of yore (President, Prime Minister, COAS) thought better of it and restrained the others.
Unfortunately, the troika was ruthlessly dismantled by Nawaz Sharif from 1997-98 in his quest for absolute power. Since then, Mr Sharif has listened to no one except sycophants and flatterers. Indeed, since institutional decision-making is anathema to him it was inevitable that we would have to swallow one bitter pill after another, with Kargil being the most poisonous of them all.
Of course, experts have offered all sorts of profound explanations of why Kargil “happened”. And they are probably more or less true. But, at the end of the day, the buck stops at the prime minister. Kargil “happened” only because Nawaz Sharif saw a mirage in which he was bathed in immortal glory. When the mountain turned ash-white, Mr Sharif was beside himself with joy. Fateh Chagai. When Pakistan swept into the World Cup finals, Mr Sharif imagined himself as Fateh Lords. When fate beckoned him to sleepwalk across the LoC, he saw himself as the Conqueror of all Conquerors. Greater than Field Marshal Ayub Khan who waged a war and lost at Tashkent. Greater than Z A Bhutto who vowed to wage a 1000 year war and lost at Simla without fighting a battle. Fateh Kashmir.
To be sure, Fateh Kashmir has “sanctified” the LoC and “internationalised” the Kashmir dispute. But what of the fact that for fifty years we have been desperately trying to change the LoC? Indeed, how can we come to terms with the fact that the international community seems irrevocably “tilted” towards India instead of Pakistan?
Mr Sharif has also rubbished the whole idea of the nuclear deterrent. The bomb, we were told, had to be sprung out of the basement and tested, not once but six times over, so that there would never be a fourth war with India. Now we have to thank Mr Sharif for “personally” averting a nuclear war by surrendering the deterrent in Washington! The final irony is that after fifty years of crying hoarse about the UN resolutions and ten years of screaming about the core issue of Kashmir, Mr Sharif is suing for “unconditional talks” with India. And the final humiliation is that the Indians have spurned his offer!
The right-wing religious parties and groups in whose company Mr Sharif grew up to political adulthood and whose backs he has been scratching through the various Hadood Ordinances and Islamic laws and Kashmir jehads are now up in arms against him. They are full of rage and fury because they believe they have been betrayed by “one of them”. This is a new situation. In the past, Mr Sharif could rest assured of his flanks in the event of an attack by the mainstream opposition because the Islamic groups saw him as a potential ally against the centrist, western-oriented, PPP and allied groups. Today, the fundamentalists see him as the very personification of the Western evil they have vowed to fight.
If that were all, we could live with it, arguing that Mr Sharif was simply getting the just desserts of his opportunist labours. But the situation is much more problematic and alarming. By crushing the mainstream opposition and by silencing all dissent within his own party, Mr Sharif has usurped the legal, democratic political framework of civil society, and handed over the parameters of political discourse to the fundamentalists. This is unprecedented. And it is very dangerous. It means that the coming battles will be pitched between the fascists and the fundamentalists while the great democratic defenders of civil society, of the law and constitution, of the independence of the judiciary, of human and minority rights and of press freedoms, are marginalised and made redundant. Consider.
The Jamaat i Islami has notched up the first impressive anti-government demonstration in Lahore since Mr Sharif assumed power. Mr Imran Khan and Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri are joining hands to put up a second “Islamic-minded” front. The various Islamic-jehadi organisations have banded together in a 15-member alliance and are vowing to extract revenge for the “surrender” in Washington. Retired army generals with Islamic agendas are exhorting an all-out war against India. Where are the centrist parties? Where are the liberal-democrats? Where are the representatives of civil society?
Nawaz Sharif has brought Pakistan to the precipice of civil disaster. To still imagine that he can turn the tide when he is responsible for making the wave is to court unmitigated disaster. The sooner this lesson sinks into everyone, the better. Pakistan cannot be allowed to become another Sudan or Ethiopia or Yugoslavia. Nor can it be “saved” after the event, as Algeria or Egypt, because it does not have the same “nationalist” state institutions as them.