You set too high a bar..
Evidence? what evidence? Considering that quite a few here are pretty much arguing that they won the war....sadly surrendered on technical grounds by the dastardly Nawaz Sharif, there is no chance of any evidence getting its due. Most Pakistanis here who make that argument
(of the Army winning & Nawaz Sharif surrendering) don't see the inherent contradiction of an army purportedly allowing the civilian government to lose a war that they won but refusing then to allow the same government to sack the CoAS. According to this warped thinking, the CoAS's job is more important than
"winning" a war.
@
Bang Galore,
You really should see the videos (links posted by Tameem) on that other thread. Till this news broke about Lt Gen Shahid Aziz's book, I did not even know who he was (though I had earlier found one referenceto his name).
Kargil was an event which occurred when I was not in India and when I visited India infrequently. So all I had access to at that time, was EM coverage. Much later I sought and found references to the conflict of which the most interesting ones were from Pakistan. Now Gen Aziz's exposition happens to be the latest addition to the compendium. But I hope to lay hands on the book too.
Gen Aziz in his statements in print as well as on TV again substantiates the fact that there is a strong constitency of "thinking Generals" in the PA just Musharraff exemplified the "Cowboy fringe".
Actually Musharraff must have been a dashing Company Commander in his time. It just so happens (unfortunately) that dashing Company Commanders do not turn into outstanding Generals; unless they evolve their skills over time or have latent skills all the time. That is precisely why soldiers undergo contnuous training/re-training over time to equip them for the requirements of Lower Leadership, then Staff, later Higher Command. Some get disposed out of the system while others make through. And some filter through multiple assessment layers in spite of lacking the attributes. Musharraff seems to be one such, but then the
Peter Principle comes into play when well established systems and norms are bypassed.
In the end, as has been famously stated in one study: "in the Kargil episode the PA was the victor; not on the heights of Kargil but in Islamabad, since it became the fulcrum for the PA to again resume political power in Pakistan".
But at the time of Kargil within the PA (when the hidden plan got exposed) the reaction was no less disturbed and serious. Hassan Abbas (in his book) says : "
Maj-Gen Javed Hassan, the commander on the spot, was being threatened by words and gestures of subordinates that could only be described as mutinous. Lt-Gen Mahmood, on whom reality started to dawn fatefully late in the day, saw his adequate jaw falling at an alarming rate. And though the conviction and inner reserves of Lt-Gen Aziz, helped by blissful ignorance, kept him as gung-ho as ever and also helped keep Musharraf’s optimism afloat, the Prime Minister had become a case stricken by fright."
“Under these circumstance, Nawaz was left to plead desperately for a meeting with President Clinton, who found that his schedule allowed him a few free hours on July 4, 1999.”
“The evacuation of Kargil was followed by a hum of resentment all over Pakistan. The loved ones of those who had given their lives on the desolate and remote slopes there wanted to know that if unilateral withdrawal was to be the end of the whole exercise, what the point was of sacrificing the lives of their sons and brothers? The people of Pakistan had been subjected to the largest whispering campaign in history to expect a great victory."
“When the operation fizzled out like a wet firecracker, they were a nation left speechless in anger and disbelief. Musharraf and the planners could not give any excuses in public, but privately they let it be known that the blame for the scuttling of a brilliant operation lay on a panic-prone Prime Minister, who could not stand up to the US president. Nawaz Sharif, too, could not say anything in his defence publicly, but privately he let it be known that his generals had taken him for a ride, and that he had to bend over backward to get the US President to help Pakistan out of a very sticky situation.”
The fact of the reaction within the Pakistani Military Estt. is borne out by many sources. The CAS made no bones about it as did the Defence Secretary (a retd Lt Gen) as well as the CNS. But as Lt Gen Shahid Aziz explains now that resentment was bottled up eventually. But it has erupted before and has again now.
More exposes will be forthcoming, you can be sure of that.
Oh wait he is a Hindu, that explains it.
