THE army, despite its Sharif chief, is not happy with the Sharif on Constitution Avenue. It is fuming about poor old Khawaja Asif who has spent the past week appearing on one television talk show after another to explain, mollify and laugh away the reports that he caused a brouhaha with his intemperate remarks.

But the problem is not just that poor old Khawaja can’t forget the bitter memories of how he was treated post October 1999 or that the military is not happy with the talks the government insists on holding with those who have killed soldiers and is in the grand old PML-N tradition not keeping anyone — including the military — in the loop.

Surely this is but a over-simplification.

Civil-military relations can be tense anywhere, but in Pakistan they are particularly fraught with friction because the reality jars rudely with what the system is theoretically.

Technically, the military should report to the civilian government. In reality it is a political stakeholder that until recently was the most dominant player on the stage. For multiple reasons, in 2007, it decided to abandon centre stage.

But despite this retreat (partly dictated and partly self-imposed), the military is not willing to give up entirely on the territory or influence it has carved out over decades.

At the same time, it is also not willing to take the government head on — and publicly. Remember Mirza Aslam Beg who as army chief publicly supported Saddam Hussein while the government had sided with Kuwait and Saudi Arabia?

But now neither side is willing to strike out like an Indian villain of yore.

This is where the media comes in as it now provides the battleground on which the military and political governments joust, post 2008.

Be it the Kerry Lugar bill or ‘memogate’ or even the latest fracas, it appears as if the military uses the media to pressure the government.

In memogate for instance, pressure was built up once the media published a spate of stories on the exchange between Mansoor Ijaz and then Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, Hussain Haqqani, which forced the government’s hand. The government called Haqqani back who then offered to resign.

Can one go so far as to say that had the military been in a position to demand an explanation from Haqqani behind closed doors, the story may not have been leaked to the press?

Who can tell? But the irony was not lost on many — a military, which could once send a government packing, had to wait three years for ‘memogate’ to happen before it could finally be rid of an ambassador to the US it didn’t like.

Similarly, this time around, if Gen Sharif could have simply told the PML-N government to stop his ministers from issuing anti-Musharraf statements or orchestrate the former general’s trip abroad, would there be the need for this elaborate charade? Consider.

The chief first visits the SSG commandos base, then an innocuous sounding press release is drafted and sent out. It is left to the intelligence and ingenuity of beat reporters and wire agencies to interpret the short statement and pick out the very last sentence about the dignity of the armed forces as the most important one to ‘miraculously’ reach the conclusion that the uniformed ones are unhappy with the elected lot’s treatment of Musharraf in the treason trial.

Only a Bollywood director would pick up this script, which requires so many ‘coincidences’, for the plot to move forward.

But assume that the chief is not able to make the prime minister heed him and the press release makes a little bit more sense.

However, there are three lessons to be drawn from this line of argument.

One, these public crises have and will continue to rock the polity as this is how the messaging from the relatively weaker military will be carried out and vice versa. (In the past, even the PPP was not averse to using this mode of communication — remember Gilani’s ‘state within a state’ speech in parliament?)

Second, none of these crises indicates a military intention to send the government home. The environment just isn’t suitable and the military realises this perhaps better than the civilians — and the anchors.

And last, the media will continue to be used as the battleground on which this tug of power will be played out. This is one case where the media is not a ‘stakeholder’ but simply a tool being used — for the agenda it is helping to further is not of its own making.

The writer is Dawn’s resident editor in Islamabad.