WHAT does a social experimenter seek among other things? A confirmation of his theories or prejudices. With another experiment underway upon the body politic of Pakistan, what more fitting place for General Musharraf to visit than the enigmatic Republic of Myanmar? For Myanmar epitomises to perfection the political theories being bandied about (albeit with no small amount of confusion) in Pakistan today. It is a country cleansed of politics and subject to the unchallenged supremacy of the military.
Aung San Suu Kyi may be the darling of the western media, nd an icon of sorts to democrats the world over (certainly a towering figure compared to the democratic champions produced by us). But what does her star billing matter to Myanmar's dour generals as long as she remains safely behind lock and key? Dour I say advisedly because it would be hard to imagine anything more set and impassive than the features of Senior General Than Shwe. Even when greeting Musharraf scarcely the ghost of a smile flickered across his face.
We want to make a functioning thing of the National Security Council. In Myanmar the ruling junta styles itself as the State Peace and Development Council. Our constitutional experts in the service of the military (did I hear anyone say Mr Sharifuddin Pirzada?) could mull over this one. It sounds delicious if also a trifle more sinister. For what it truly stands for we could ask Suu Kyi.
By now aficionados of the Pakistani scene should have a fair idea of General Musharraf's foreign preferences. His liking for Turkey is no secret, not so much perhaps for Kemalist secularism as for the power exercised by its generals as the final arbiters of Turkish democracy.
Since Zia's time this has been the dream of the Pakistan army high command: to have its right of political intervention enshrined in the constitution. This accounts for Turkey's magnetic attraction. Turkish generals ride into the political arena as guardians of Ataturk's ideals. Pakistani generals embarking upon a similar mission possess no similar high-sounding legitimacy. So they cobble together whatever justifications they can--laboured excuses supported neither by the country's past nor by the beliefs of its founding fathers. This accounts for the deep sense of insecurity of Pakistan's periodic saviours.
Another country in danger of becoming a role model for Pakistan is Egypt with which, as all the signs suggest, Pakistan's ties have become warmer under Musharraf. Does its attraction lie in the example provided by Egyptian democracy in which the president reigns supreme and elected institutions are little better than rubber-stamp bodies? Or in Hosni Mubarak's longevity, he being around since Sadat's assassination in 1981?
Now streaking across the popularity charts comes Myanmar whose political landscape has its obvious pulls for the visionaries of the Musharraf government: a land where politics has been all but snuffed out, Suu Kyi's periodic outbursts of defiance notwithstanding. Just a day before embarking on his Myanmar trip Musharraf had this to say of Pakistan's politicians, "As they say in cricket, they have played their innings they have played useless innings, getting out at zero. They should stay at home" a sentiment with which Senior General Than Shwe would wholeheartedly agree.
But there is one salient difference with the Burmese model over which Pakistan's generals could usefully ponder. The Myanmar army is not embroiled in any foreign adventures. It has no extra-territorial ambitions. It is not into the business of exporting its ideology. All its energies are concentrated on its first priority, keeping an iron grip on the country. This economy of purpose accounts for the success of the Burmese model. Myanmar's generals are not interested in the IMF. They are not driven by the chimera of matching any other country, as we are by the need to counter if not match Indian capability in diverse fields. Their dictatorship is honed to a single purpose, at which it has proved remarkably successful.
I mentioned repression in relation to politics because otherwise, in relation to the nitty-gritty of everyday life, I am convinced Myanmar is a far more relaxed place than Pakistan. Even the sheikhdoms of the Gulf are more relaxed than us. It is just our luck to be a nation which is politically ebullient (there shouldn't be any doubts on this score) and, at the same time, socially retarded, which of course is no fault of the military government's. In fact with Musharraf's coming many things have eased up. But this is another story. For our present purposes suffice it to say that there is not much to choose between political or social repression because both can end up stunting a nation's growth.
Anyhow, I digress. I was talking of the Myanmar junta's obsession with internal control, the fact that single mindedness of purpose makes its grip on power unshakeable. Indeed as a rule wherever dictatorships have sacrificed unity of aim to embark upon foreign adventures they have come to grief. The Greek invasion of Cyprus in the sixties led to the downfall of the Greek colonels. The seizure of the Falkland Islands and the resulting war with Britain drove the Argentinian generals (the Galtieri regime) from power. Saddam's example is the exception which proves the rule. His dictatorship was secure and prosperous. He put everything on the line by invading Kuwait. To the chagrin of the West he survives but as much diminished figure.
Our own history is also instructive in this regard. The death-knell of the Ayub regime was sounded by the ill-conceived adventure of the 1965 war. From the debilitating effects of that conflict the regime could not recover. Yahya was the victim of another war. But we refuse to learn from the past and continue to be pulled in opposite directions, our energies fixed on no single aim but scattered in different directions: sustaining the Taliban, a thankless task doing no good to us; fanning the flames of jihad in Kashmir, a policy which we have yet to think through clearly, balancing nuclear capability with our unbreakable begging-bowl; and, simultaneously, trashing one political system and on its wreckage trying to raise the ramparts of a new one. For any army this would be a crippling diffusion of energy.
We may count our blessings in that Pakistan is not Myanmar. Long may it remain this way (although I do pray at the same time that we somehow become a less stuck-up country in social terms). But behind the smiles and good intentions lurk serious dangers. The body language of the Musharraf government suggests long-term plans: the invention of a model wherein all the shots are called by the president, much as in Egypt, and where the president is the consensual choice of the national security establishment, again as in Egypt. Elections, assemblies and a noisy press would be the window-dressings to this structure.
About the most useless thing in such a situation is verbal protest and empty analysis. Words matter when they have some relation to action or political activity. In present-day Pakistan there is a void where the political arena should be. Words thus have lost their meaning. Also much of their sting which is why Musharraf can just as easily shake off verbal criticism as he can pour contempt upon the political class.
With no meeting point between the army and public opinion the outlook is thus dismal. The political parties are ineffectual and waiting for handouts from the government. Public opinion is listless, neither willing to be swayed by the political parties nor putting much faith in the government's revolutionary capabilities. The government congratulates itself on minor improvements in the law and order situation or minor blips on the economic radar screen, forgetting that it is the larger picture it should be worried about. The larger picture shows it over-extended externally, a victim of too many cross-cutting ambitions, and at home embroiled on too many fronts and getting ready to play a long innings.
The national security state with its unvarying routine of power may be good for Myanmar and Egypt with their unidimensional, or at best two-dimensional, characteristics. It is no answer to the diversity of the Pakistani scene. Or the colourful turbulence of its people.