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| Kargil ghosts haunt Pak Opposition, again | | Is Nawaz ignorant of India's intelligence failures? | | B L KAK
NEWS ANALYSIS
NEW DELHI: AUGUST 7
India, of course, is a strong, vibrant country. India is universally known for its great achievements and successes in economic, scientific, industrial and technological areas. And 'Mera Bharat Mahan' is also widely known for quite a few intelligence failures so far.
The big intelligence failure of India was in the summer of 1999 when Pakistani troops took the Indian intelligence community by surprise after capturing a portion of the Indian territory in the Kargil sector. Nawaz Sharif, who was then Pakistan's Prime Minister, like many others in his country, was not ignorant about louder noises within India against the "grave" failure of Indian intelligence community in Kargil.
If the Indians in general and government of India in particular knew about Pakistan's Kargil gameplan, then the bloody clashes between the armies of the two countries over the inhospitable Kargil hills would not have taken place in 1999. But Nawaz Sharif's organisation, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) has now come out with the tale, which has failed to have takers in India.
A 'White Paper' released by PML-N, the main political foe of Gen. Parvez Musharraf, has stated that India knew about the Kargil operation plan at leat "11 months before its launch". However, the 100-page document does not indicate how India got to know of the plan, except saying New Delhi had made all necessary preparations "to turn this battlefield into a deadly trap for Kashmiri freedom fighters and Pakistan".
Headed by Nawaz Sharif, the PML-N hopes to use this document against President Musharraf in the run-up to the parliamentary elections next year. Gen. Musharraf, on his part, has already responded to Sharif's claim of being kept in the dark about the operations in an Urdu book, 'Gaddar Kaun?'
The White Paper, 'Kargil adventurism - another huge defeat after Dhaka fall, who is responsible?' was released in Karachi on August 5. Pakistan's dismemberment as a result of Bangladesh's separation in 1971 remains a dominant debate on the role of the military and the Kargil operation was seen as a way of avenging it.
The White Paper alleges that Gen. Musharraf forcibly removed Nawaz Sharif in 1999 as he feared being court-martialled for the Kargil defeat. It repeats the demand for a high-powered commission on the Kargil debacle at the earliest. The 100-page document has made a pointed reference to a significant development in India after the end of the Kargil war. It asked if the Indian government, despite winning in Kargil, had constituted a commission highlighting the pluses and minuses of the operation, what prevented Gen. Musharraf from constituting a commission in this regard.
The document said: 'A naive military adventurer General Pervez Musharraf launched the operation without proper planning on May 8, 1999, causing loss of life of officers and jawans of the Northern Light Infantry (NLI) and Kashmiri Mujahideens while India suffered a negligible loss of 474 soldiers'.
Gen. Musharraf will not find it difficult to deal with his politcal foes, particularly the ones from the PML-N. But it will not be easy for him to brush aside two things. First arises from the accusation by the PML-N that he wilfully avoided constituting a commission to fix the responsibility for this huge military defeat that had demoralized the entire country (Pakistan).
Second, the deposed Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, had constituted a military inquiry committee that recommended court-martial of Gen. Musharraf but the general overthrew the government and ‘stole’ the report from the Prime Minister’s House to save his face. Is it a fact? And will Gen. Musharraf offer an honest reply?
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