“War is a continuation of politics by other means,” wrote the most famous philosopher of war, General Karl von Clausewitz, in his magnum opus, Vom Kriege (On War). Clausewitz was no academic; he had cut his teeth during the Napoleonic wars.
It was perhaps just a matter of time before the simmering tensions between Muslims and Hindus in the Subcontinent that led to the bloody partition of British India would erupt into war between the newly independent dominions of India and Pakistan.
And, indeed, war did erupt, just within two months of independence. While the war remained confined to Kashmir — unlike the wars that came later — it was by far the longest war fought by the neighboring siblings, beginning in October 1947 and ending in January 1959.
As one expert put it, “Pakistan engineered a coup de main… in which Pathan ‘volunteers’ led by ex-Indian national army men invaded Kashmir at the ‘invitation’ of some Muslim rebels.” These operations later expanded into conventional infantry action between the armies of Pakistan and India.
Of Clausewitz’s nine principles of warfare, the most well-known principle states that “No war should commence without first seeking a reply to the question, what is to be attained by it?” In Pakistani history, this principle has been honored more in breach than in observance.
Field Marshal Muhammad Ayub Khan, who ruled the country from October 27, 1958 to March 25, 1969, was the architect of Pakistan’s Army in the early decades. In his autobiography, Friends not Masters, he states that the 1947-8 war with India “started as an irregular campaign. Soldiers and officers were out on their own with little direction from headquarters and with considerable responsibility placed in the hands of junior officers.”
“Pakistan engineered a coup de main… in which Pathan ‘volunteers’ led by ex-Indian national army men invaded Kashmir at the ‘invitation’ of some Muslim rebels.” These operations later expanded into conventional infantry action between the armies of Pakistan and India. Of Clausewitz’s nine principles of warfare, the most well-known principle states that “no war should commence without first seeking a reply to the question: what is to be attained by it?” In Pakistani history, this principle has been honored more in breach than in observance
In retaliation to the atrocities allegedly committed by Hindu forces against the Muslims living in the Poonch area, the tribal leaders of Pakistan’s Frontier province declared a jihad (holy war) and sent in a force of 2,000 Afridi tribesmen into Kashmir. These raiders operated under the guidance of regular officers from the Pakistani army.
The tribesman scored some initial successes and got to the town of Baramulla, about 35 miles west of Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir. As one writer has observed, nothing but their own greed stopped these “hoards of tribesmen from taking Srinagar with its vital airfield.”
Being untrained mercenaries, they soon lost their focus and resorted to looting, rape and pillage, and killing innocents, the very anti-thesis of the jihad that they had embarked upon. The worst of their crimes were committed at St Joseph’s College, Convent and Hospital — even patients, nurses, doctors were not spared.
Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah informed the UN Security Council on February 5, 1948 that “the raiders came to our land, massacred thousands of people — mostly Hindus and Sikhs, but Muslims, too — abducted thousands of girls, Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims alike, looted our property and almost reached the gates of our summer capital — Srinagar.”
Realizing that the tribesmen had failed to achieve their objectives, Governor-General Muhammad Ali Jinnah ordered his British commander-in-chief to send regular army troops to Kashmir. The latter demurred, saying he was unable to get the green light from his military superior, Field Marshal Auchinleck, who in turn was subordinate to Lord Mountbatten, the last Viceroy and later India’s Governor-General. In May 1948, Jinnah was able to prevail on his British commander-in-chief, and regular Pakistani troops joined the mission, dressed in civilian clothes.
But the opportunity had slipped out of Jinnah’s hands. India had flown in well-armed reinforcements by the thousands. The battleground came to a halt, as the much larger Indian forces, equipped with artillery and supported with fighter aircraft, stopped the invaders. The tribesmen had long since returned to Pakistan.
The desultory campaign concluded with a UN ceasefire in January 1949. The UN Security Council passed resolutions calling for a plebiscite to be held in Kashmir. The plebiscite was never held because it required both countries to withdraw their armed forces from Kashmir, something that neither country was willing to do.
The war left one-third of Kashmir in Pakistan’s hands and the remainder in India’s. Not only was the Indian share larger, it was also the most valuable. That division continues till today.
The failure to win Kashmir in 1948 had several blowbacks in Pakistan. Firstly, the Chief of General Staff, Major-General Akbar Khan, who had guided the tribesmen under the nom deguerre of ‘General Tariq’, continued to believe that a military solution of the Kashmir problem was possible. He mounted a failed coup against the government of Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan, who had been Jinnah’s right-hand man during the freedom struggle, simply because the latter refused to push through with a military solution.
Akbar Khan was apprehended and later convicted. Separately, Liaquat Ali Khan was assassinated while addressing a public rally in Rawalpindi. The assailant shot him at close range and was immediately shot dead by the police — the prime minister’s murder remains unexplained to this day.
Secondly, while the vast majority of the armed forces remained loyal to the civilian administration during this tense period, the primacy of parliamentary sovereignty in the country had been questioned. The failed coup of 1951 laid the foundations for Ayub’s successful coup in 1958, which ushered in military rule for the next thirteen years. It also laid the foundations upon which two other army chiefs would overthrow elected governments in the decades to come. Totally contrary to the Whitehall ideals of the nation’s founder, the military would go on to lord over the country for nineteen more years.
Thirdly, under Ayub, the military government, now wearing civilian garb, continued to believe that Kashmir, lost on the battlefield in 1948, could be won back by diplomatic means. Pakistan began to mobilise diplomatic pressures for holding a plebiscite, hoping that the Muslim majority in Kashmir would vote in favor of joining Pakistan. But when those diplomatic efforts failed, it began looking for a military solution to wresting Kashmir away from India.
Fourthly, a complete and accurate account of the 1948 Kashmir operations was never compiled. Thus the mistakes of then were repeated in 1965. After that war, President Ayub asked General Yahya Khan, who had replaced General Musa as the commander-in-chief of the army, to prepare a critical analysis of the 1965 War — that was never done. Thus, the mistakes of 1965 were repeated in a more aggravated fashion in 1971, with disastrous consequences.
Seventy years after gaining independence from colonial rule, India and Pakistan continue to distrust each other. They have been unable to free themselves from the communal hatred that led to the creation of the two nation states on the basis of the religion of their inhabitants. Perhaps, as Stephen Cohen from Brookings has argued more than once, Kashmir is just a symptom of a deeper malaise. Thus, even if a miracle occurs, and the imbroglio over Kashmir is settled, India and Pakistan may continue with their never ending arms race, driven on by their all-consuming insecurities, depriving their citizens of the basic necessities of life, such as clean water, public hygiene and universal education, and letting the world pass them by.
The writer is a defence analyst and economist. He has authored Rethinking the National Security of Pakistan (Ashgate Publishing, 2003)
Published in Daily Times, September 18th 2017.