“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”(Sun Tzu, The Art of War). Taking a leaf of wisdom from this quote, in 1990 I wrote an essay in which Pakistan’s national strengths and weaknesses were discussed vis-à-vis arch foe India. The lingering poverty, social inequality, poor education, scanty employment opportunities, weak industrial and technological base, low investment on the human resource, primitive agriculture, pathetic infrastructure, anaemic political institutions, fissiparous tendencies, ethnic & religious divisions, adynamic judicial system and short sighted federal policies were identified as Pakistan’s national weaknesses; and in comparison, India was not much better in most of the imperfections then. However, in 2024, while Pakistan’s national shortcomings have shown little improvements, however in comparison India has shown tremendous amelioration in all the fields. On the other hand, disciplined National Armed Forces representing the whole of Pakistan were identified as Pakistan’s strongest point (C of G) keeping the nation optimistic and cohesive; whereas a ‘foreign policy of non-alignment’ and ‘political notion of Unity in diversity’ were identified as India’s strength.
It goes without saying that a wise foe would always focus on exploiting the weaknesses of the opponent and sabotage her strengths. Who out of the two opponents has fared better doesn’t need comments. Except for the borders with China, Pakistan is facing incursions from all directions by the foreign terrorists/ proxies and local hired guns. The resource rich provinces of KPK and Balochistan are facing a perfect storm with all foes concentrating their evil energies to subvert CPEC projects poised to boost Pakistan’s trade and economy and to ensure water, food and energy security. The enemies would do what they had to do, but could anyone other than the venal people in the helm of affairs and the corrupted system rife in the state of Pakistan be held responsible for the prevalent political, economic and security mayhem? Pakistan’s intelligence agencies and Armed Forces have been embroiled on multiple internal and some external fronts to the joy of its foes and to the dismay of its people. Who is to be blamed for such a nose dive and national decadence; the permanent ruling elite or the hapless people?
Pakistan’s economy is surviving on crutches provided by the IMF, IFIs and petty loans by some sympathetic countries with national assets frittered away, named as sourcing out. Nevertheless, the government’s extravaganza continues unabated on public expenses, barefaced spending more on social, print and electronic media based self projections and slandering the political opponents rather than providing any meaningful relief to the people. The public disgust, hopelessness, fear of known and unknown with unmatched brute use of force by the state against the agitated political protesters as witnessed on November 29, 2024 and foolishly branding millions of Pakistanis as fitna, khawarij, terrorists, Jatha, tola, and traitors etc is like self-destructively fuelling the fire of separatism. The sycophancy, brazen lies, hate speeches and propaganda has broken all records in Pakistan and all national institutions stand fully exposed losing masses’ trust. Ironically, the controversial incumbent government widely believed to be based on stolen public mandate stays unsatisfied with wiping off their corruption cases, and instead continues to demonstrate unquenchable thirst for making more hay when the country is burning; and cleverly throwing the onus of their misdeeds on the establishment. The tendency to curb the sane advices or political dissent by coercion or by incentives is too menacing. Perhaps, today Pakistan’s greatest fault-line in one word is ‘Hypocrisy’ by all and sundry!
In the global and regional context, the joint wicked end-state envisaged for Pakistan by its foes and ‘ frenemy ' could be; one, “A polarised and geographically more manageable balkanised Pakistan”; two, "A denuclearised pliant Pakistan that is economically integrated with India with free borders”. Be that as it may, isn't the current state of affairs in Pakistan inadvertently pushing hard towards the same sinister goal, which tantamount to falling into the trap? Quite obviously, the contemporary precarious situation is the cumulative outcome of past haughty misadventures, high-handedness, short-sighted national policies and defective strategic decisions. Yet, one can just pray that Almighty Allah may bless the incumbent ruling elite to see the writing on the wall and undertake immediate political reconciliation by shedding the ill-fated tirade and brute use of state power to subdue majority of its own people, set free the incarcerated political leaders and workers and drop all politically motivated cases against them without any more delay. In 1970/71 it was PPP versus Awami League that resulted in the emergence of Bangladesh; in 2024, it is PPP & PMLN(PDM) versus PTI (on the anvil) with two other main organs of the state in the same mode; God forbid any more splintering. The most important component of a country are its people. And the security and well being of the people is the biggest national aim, which is to be ensured by the legislature, judiciary and executives as per the unadulterated constitution; that justifies their very existence and not the other way around.
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