| November 03, 2007 | Saturday | Shawwal 21, 1428 |
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How to use a bayonet
IT is many years since I was last in Swat, but my memories of that magical holiday are still fresh. It was early spring on my last trip, and the peaks were covered in snow, as were the upper reaches of the valley. The river sparkled as it rushed alongside the main road, and rosy-cheeked children waved as we drove past.
I suppose it is because of these sharply-etched images that I feel especially disturbed by reports of violence there. For months now, news of extremist repression in Swat had been appearing in newspapers.
In fact, Maulana Fazlullah’s virulent broadcasts on his private FM radio had been making news for the last couple of years. In these diatribes, he railed against everything modern, from polio shots to education for girls. Naturally, the government remained a silent spectator.
Things went from bad to worse, with ancient Buddhist rock carvings being attacked, and Swat’s tiny Christian population being subjected to threats.
According to a recent article in this newspaper on the situation by Shehar Bano Khan, Maulana Fazlullah has gathered ‘a huge volunteer force called the Shaheen Commandos’. Not surprisingly, the 28-year old cleric regards the Taliban commander Mullah Omar as his role model.
According to this report, a local missionary-run girls’ school has been under massive pressure from an extremist group called the Janisaran-i-Islam (devotees of Islam). The students have been forced to wear all-enveloping black burqas.
The school has been threatened with closure, and gets no protection from the local administration. Many children have dropped out in the face of threats of suicide bombing.
All these brutal acts are reminiscent of the stone-age policies of the Taliban in Afghanistan. And in one form or another, these attitudes, backed by Kalashnikovs, are being thrust on ordinary Pakistanis over large parts of the country.
In Swat, several paramilitary troops were publicly beheaded. In Waziristan, bodies of soldiers have been viciously mutilated.
With so much lawlessness in a province they were governing until recently, you would have expected condemnation from the clerical alliance of the MMA. You would be wrong. Apart from a little hand-wringing, our religious parties have been sitting on the fence. Their only criticism is reserved for any action the federal government finally takes. But usually, the action is too little, too late.
The same pattern emerged during the slow-motion build-up to the Lal Masjid crisis. After six long months of vacillation and foot-dragging, Musharraf finally acted after militants kidnapped a few Chinese nationals.
When Beijing protested, army commandos sprang into action in July, triggering a bloodbath. Much of this needless loss of life could have been avoided by firm action when women students from the Jamia Hafsa madressah first occupied a children’s library in January.
Instead, militants were allowed to bring in arms as well as volunteers. Then, instead of simply cutting off electricity, water and gas, ministers gave the mosque clerics time by engaging in endless negotiations.
A couple of years ago, I had quoted Lenin to describe how the fundamentalists had been aggressively and successfully pushing their agenda to drag Pakistan back into the dark ages. The revolutionary theoretician advised: “Probe with a bayonet: if you meet steel, stop. If you meet mush, then push.”
For the last few years, the extremists’ bayonet has been meeting Musharraf, and they have kept pushing. In all the cases we have discussed here, the government has dithered instead of taking resolute action immediately after the law was broken. This inaction has given jihadis the impression of weakness in their enemies, and they have exploited it to the hilt.
As a soldier, I am sure Musharraf knows that the quick application of judicious force at the outset of an engagement often deters the enemy, thus making a later battle unnecessary. But this lesson has become blurred by his need for political support from reactionary forces.
So when jihadi elements ideologically close to the MMA and the PML-Q take the law into their own hands, Musharraf tends to temporise, not wishing to alienate his political support base.
However, the situation in Afghanistan, and the western presence there, does not allow him the luxury of endless inaction.
The fact that large swathes of the tribal areas of Pakistan have been turned into safe havens for the Taliban and Al Qaeda has put Musharraf on the spot. American demands that he do more to stop this cross-border movement brings him into conflict with Pakistani supporters of the Taliban.
Another self-created problem is the vacuum that has resulted from the half-baked devolution policies of this government. By replacing divisional commissioners and their district deputies by nazims and naib nazims, Musharraf has created an administrative void.
These elected officials tend not to take actions that might cost them support in the next election. The colonial system, although far from perfect, had officials located in the far-flung areas of the country that they administered while reporting to the provincial and federal governments.
In theory, at least, their decisions were not shaped by local political pressures.
While the established system in the settled districts of the NWFP (and elsewhere) was being destroyed, the authority of the political agents in the tribal areas was sharply eroded by the army that bypassed these federally-appointed officials. Meanwhile, the traditional respect enjoyed by tribal elders was usurped by warlords and drug smugglers with lots of money and guns.
Each time the government has reached an agreement, it has been broken by jihadis who use negotiations as a tactical ploy, and not with a view to making peace.
Lacking popular support, they can only advance their cause through the barrel of a gun. The truth is that the forces confronting us today do not want to compromise: with them, it’s all or nothing.
They will go to any length, including blowing themselves up together with hundreds of fellow-Muslims, in order to impose their benighted vision of Islam on the rest of us.Clearly, with such a ruthless foe, there can be no meaningful negotiations. Unfortunately, much of our civil society and many of our politicians and journalists still do not grasp the seriousness of the threat.
Until we develop a consensus, and the political will to confront the common enemy, the militant bayonet will keep pushing, and meeting mush.
