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We are engaged in the Great Game in Afghanistan, we are told, because ‘strategic depth’ is vital for Pakistan due to the fact that our country is very narrow at its middle and could well be cut into half by an Indian attack in force.
Strategic depth, we are further informed, will give respite to our armed forces which could withdraw into Afghanistan to then regroup and mount counter-attacks on Indian forces in Pakistan. I ask you!
I ask you for several reasons. Let us presume that the Indians are foolish enough to get distracted from educating their people, some of whom go to some of the best centres of learning in the world. Let us assume that they are idiotic enough to opt for war instead of industrialising themselves and meeting their economic growth targets which are among the highest in the world.
Let us imagine that they are cretinous enough to go to war with a nuclear-armed Pakistan and effectively put an immediate and complete end to their multi-million dollar tourism industry. Let us suppose that they lose all sense, all reason, and actually attack Pakistan and cut our country into half.
Will our army pack its bags and escape into Afghanistan? How will it disengage itself from the fighting? What route will it use, through which mountain passes? Will the Peshawar Corps gun its tanks and troop carriers and trucks and towed artillery and head into the Khyber Pass, and on to Jalalabad? Will the Karachi and Quetta Corps do likewise through the Bolan and Khojak passes?
And what happens to the Lahore and Sialkot and Multan and Gujranwala and Bahawalpur and other garrisons? What about the air force? Far more than anything else, what about the by now 180 million people of the country? What ‘strategic depth’ do our Rommels and Guderians talk about, please? What poppycock is this?
More importantly, how can Afghanistan be our ‘strategic depth’ when most Afghans hate our guts, not only the northerners, but even those who call themselves Pakhtuns?
Case in point: the absolute and repeated refusal of even the Taliban government when it was misruling Afghanistan, to accept the Durand Line as the international border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, despite the fact that it was a surrogate of Pakistan — propped into power; paid for; and helped militarily, diplomatically and politically by the Pakistani government and its ‘agencies’.
Indeed, it even refused the Commando’s interior minister, the loudmouth Gen Moinuddin Haider when he went to Kabul to ask for the extradition of Pakistani criminals being sheltered by the Taliban. We must remember that the Commando, as chief executive of the country, was pressing the Foreign Office till just a few days before 9/11 to use every effort to have the Taliban regime’ recognised by more countries!
This poppycock of ‘strategic depth’ can only be explained by our great military thinkers and strategists and geniuses: it is not for mortals like yours truly to make sense of any of it. Particularly because this nonsense can only happen after the Americans depart from Afghanistan. And what, pray, is the guarantee that they will leave when they say they will?
Why this subject at this time, you might well ask. Well I have just been reading David Sanger’s The Inheritance in which he meticulously lays out the reasons why he believes the Pakistani “dual policy” towards the Taliban exists.
On page 247 he states that when Michael McConnell, the then chief of US National Intelligence went to Pakistan in late May 2008 (three months after the elections that trounced Musharraf and his King’s Party, mark) he heard Pakistani officers make the case for the Pakistani need for having a friendly government in Kabul after the Americans departed.
When he got back to Washington McConnell “ordered up a full assessment” of the situation. ‘It did not take long … Musharraf’s record of duplicity was well known. While Kayani was a favourite of the White House, he had also been overheard — presumably on telephone intercepts — referring to one of the most brutal of the Taliban leaders, Maulvi Jalaluddin Haqqani, as a “strategic asset”. Interesting, for Kayani’s former boss, Musharraf is quoted thus in Der Spiegel:
Spiegel: “Let us talk about the role of the ISI. A short time ago, US newspapers reported that ISI has systematically supported Taliban groups. Is that true?”
Musharraf: “Intelligence always has access to other networks — this is what Americans did with KGB, this is what ISI also does. You should understand that the army is on board to fight the Taliban and Al Qaeda. I have always been against the Taliban. Don’t try to lecture us about how we should handle this tactically. I will give you an example: Siraj Haqqani ...”
Spiegel: “... a powerful Taliban commander who is allegedly secretly allied with the ISI.”
Musharraf: “He is the man who has influence over Baitullah Mehsud, a dangerous terrorist, the fiercest commander in South Waziristan and the murderer of Benazir Bhutto as we know today.Mehsud kidnapped our ambassador in Kabul and our intelligence used Haqqani’s influence to get him released. Now, that does not mean that Haqqani is supported by us. The intelligence service is using certain enemies against other enemies. And it is better to tackle them one by one than making them all enemies.”
Well, there they go again!
But back to ‘strategic depth’. Will the likes of Sirajuddin Haqqani, son of Jalaluddin Haqqani, help Pakistan gain this ‘depth’ in Afghanistan? Are we that gone that we need these backward yahoos to save our army?
PS By the way what about our nuclear weapons? Are they not enough to stop the Indians in their tracks? What poppycock is this ‘strategic depth’?!
Pakistani?!
And yes, no need to bring in Bangladesh in this thread. We have indians to do this better, so let's leave it for them.
Because words sometimes fall on deaf ears.
Strategic depth revisited
By Lt-Gen (r) Asad Durrani
Published: October 19, 2011
The writer served as director-general of the ISI from 1990-92 asad.durrani@tribune.com.pk
Old friend and once a comrade-in-arms, Ejaz Haider could obviously take it no more. Fed up with the unrelenting war on strategic depth, unleashed even before the one on terror, he told off the hecklers to go first understand what the concept was all about in his article Pakistan needs strategic depth, published on these pages on October 7. He need not have bothered, because it is not the notion that they are gunning for, but our Afghan policy.
Indeed, a great deal has been stated about its fallout: proliferation of drugs and weapons; more violence in the region; millions of refugees constantly on the move; three decades of war (still counting); and much else. So, in case one was wondering why an innocent sounding concept had to be given a bad name to kill a dog already under fire, there just might have been a reason: to ascribe motives that otherwise could not be.
That we wanted to occupy Afghanistan and make it our fifth province, for example! After what happened to some of the mightiest who tried, no one in his right mind and certainly not the collective decision-making apparatus gave it another thought. But then we must have at least wanted to install a friendly government in Kabul (to secure this depth of course)! Yes; if only one knew how, and then keep all others who followed in line. After the Saur Revolution, the Soviets executed an installed president every three months in pursuit of that objective, till in frustration they moved in and became history.
Frankly, it is futile to argue when the hammer has already fallen. Thereafter, any distortion of a concept or of history, as long as it adds to the gravity of the charge and severity of the punishment, is kosher. We are supposed to have fought Americas proxy war in Afghanistan. That we took the plunge when the Yanks were still counting peanuts did not impress our nemesis; or for that matter the plea that, even if we did, we too might have had an interest in the Soviet withdrawal. And just in case any of us dared to suggest that some price had to be paid to achieve this sublime objective, the retort is ingenious: but that was not a very smart idea; it destroyed the global balance of power and now the sole surviving superpower is running amok.
Not to worry; the imbalance is being redressed, the US has already started suffering from Imperial Overstretch, and we are doing all that we can with help from the usual suspects. Our friends would still not relent: revisit your Afghan policy is their constant refrain; without ever suggesting a coherent alternative. In the meantime, I have to pick up the thread from where Ejaz Haider had left.
Strategic depth, within and without, is of course the need of every country. Friendly neighbourhood, near abroad, and buffers are some of the more familiar variants serving more or less the same purpose. And of course it is not merely a spatial concept (Israel has it in the US), it is also economic, political (alliance building), and is best provided by unity within. Now that Polands overtures towards Ukraine have been described by Stratfor as pursuit of strategic depth, maybe this doctrine can be placed in its right perspective.
If not, we might be tempted to use it for the ulterior motives we are being suspected of: nurturing the Haqqanis et al as our strategic assets against the archrival. The idea is attractive, but for a problem: the Afghans do not fight outside their country. We will therefore have to persuade India to give us a battle in Afghanistan. Next time the Indians come charging, we will simply get out of the way, and before one can say too little depth they will be in Afghanistan. Well, isnt that where all elephants go when their time comes?
Strategic depth
I believe that what I, Ejaz Haider and Durrani have argued (in terms of what Strategic Depth means for Pakistan and the Pakistani military) is the opposite of what the world generally describes Pakistan's strategic depth as.Pakistan has alwys tried to find Military soloutions to all problems it has faced . Such answers give the temprary impression of wellness but like steroids have long term and harmful side effects.
I don't believe so, and the articles in this thread, especially those by the Ejaz Haider and Durrani, arguing the Pakistani position, suggest you are wrong.It is easy to justify the " I told you so' and ' We are the saviours' attitude from inside. However when seen from outside the ' strategic depth ' line of thinking which obviously has a Military origin has functioned like a steroid - a temporary fix,more in the mind.
On the highlighted part above, one hopes it was in jest. The author appears to ignore the fact that the Elephant is amongst the most intelligent animals with a very long memory. What would happen if the elephant does not charge all the way upto the Durand line and simply devours the ' fields' it considers attractive and returns ?