India-Pak CBMs: US factor on May 20, 2012Two India Pakistan service chiefs, General Jehangir Karamat, former COAS (Pakistan), and Air Chief Marshal Shashi Tayagi have suggested a number of steps to implement Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) for the two archrivals (rather, de-hyphenated arch enemies) in a jointly written staff paper. I discussed that at some length in my previous piece (‘CBMs in […]
CBMs in South Asia I on May 13, 2012Two retired service chiefs, General Jehangir Karamat, COAS, Pakistan, and Air Chief Marshal Shashi Tayagi of the Indian Air Force, in a jointly written paper, have suggested a number of steps to implement CBMs in South Asia. Written at the level of two retired service chiefs, the paper makes yet another subtext for peace and […]
Siachen and the jihadi lore on May 6, 2012Print media is resonant once again with the passionate jihadi lore reminiscent of the 1965 war. As against the single PTV channel in 1965, however, there is now a cluster of channels, each projecting more or less the same jihadi image of a soldier, a mujahid, a holy warrior at the dizzy Siachen heights.What one […]
India: a likely coup or a false alarm? on April 29, 2012The sensational disclosure of an impending army coup sent alarm signals ringing throughout the Indian capital earlier in April. That was despite the fact that the coup, intended or imagined, traced back to January last, had been something quite dead and gone, yet the Indian parliament and the media magnified it beyond its existential reality. […]
General Singh: sad endgame or sorry confessional? on April 22, 2012What does General VK Singh have to show for his mandatory three year-tenure as the Indian Army chief? He lost two battles in a row, casting an unflattering reflection on his performance as the chief of a million-plus army. His first battle lost concerned his date of birth. He claimed it was a year short […]
Anatomy of military image: the political virus III on April 1, 2012“In a country still in the backyard of political, educational and economic development, the military and the bureaucracy — the pillars of the outgoing colonial power — emerge as the embodiment of all authority, power and perfection. The military establishment, as the best-organised and disciplined legacy of colonial rule, lends itself admirably to the professional […]
Civil-military faceoff: beyond reasonable doubt! on December 23, 2011The scandalous Memogate affair, regardless of the whole or half the truth, appears to have placed the civilian and the military establishments, at the apex, on the two seemingly irreconcilable ends of the argument. General James Jones, former US National Security Advisor, the self-confessed carrier of Mr Mansoor Ijaz’s memo to Admiral Mike Mullen, the […]
Martial law: adverse hypotheses on December 11, 2011Professional armies very carefully consider and weigh all the pros and cons of an operation, major or minor, before launching it. It would be especially true of a war-like operation like a martial law. The exercise includes a thorough examination of the chances of success and failure — more so of the latter to make […]
PPP and the army: a pathology of power I on November 26, 2011The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), an offshoot of Field Marshal Ayub Khan’s Convention Muslim League, emerged in 1967 as the single most formidable force against Ayub, under founding chairman Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Quitting the government as its youngest and about the brightest foreign minister, Bhutto, once like a son to papa Ayub, emerged as the […]
Imran: the sole warrior on November 20, 2011‘Reining in the army’ or rubbing the army and ISI the wrong way? Imran Khan: all noise and fury but not without significance. Why must he pick on the army and its associated institutions more than any other single institution in his pre-electoral campaigning? The question leaves one wondering, in its uncanny congruence, at the […]