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| Swat: A crisis in hell | | | INDRANIL BANERJIE
The Pakistani Army is creating hell in Swat. Over two million people have been made refugees in their own country. This is the worst humanitarian crisis after Rwanda, according to the United Nations.
Regrettably, the refugees are not the issue. The turmoil in Swat is seen as an unfortunate but unavoidable outcome of the Pakistani military’s latest initiative against a formidable Taliban bastion in Swat.
The world is cheering the Pakistani Army as its offensive obliterates villages and leaves miserable millions scurrying for cover in the makeshift camps of the Peshawar plains. Conditions in the camps are reported to be appalling and the fear is that the refugees find it impossible to return home at any time in the immediate future.
Nobody is questioning the madness of it all — and least of all, what kind of anti-insurgency operation has the Pakistani Army launched? How come it has forced out two million refugees? And that too from an area where the total population could not be more than four-five million. The Indian Army has been fighting insurgencies in Kashmir and the Northeast for decades but nowhere has it precipitated such a catastrophic exodus.
The world is applauding when it really should be asking what is really going on. The problem is not just of refugees. It is about the war against the jihadists determined to seize political power in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The collateral impact could be due to two reasons.
One, that the Pakistan Army has no idea how to conduct anti-insurgency operations where the aim is to painfully but carefully separate the chaff from the wheat. The Pakistan Army appears to think that everything needs to be ground to dust. That is perhaps why it is using fighter jets, artillery and tanks in the operation. The savagery of such an approach can only be compared to the Sri Lankans against the Tamils or the Russians against the Chechens. Even the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) forces in Afghanistan, who are being accused constantly of causing civilian casualties, do not conduct this kind of operation. Afghanistan has not seen thousands streaming out of any conflict zone during the last eight years of Nato occupation.
The Pakistan Army, in contrast, wants as many civilians out of the operational area so that it can have a clear killing field. This might be permissible in a conventional war against an enemy country but is ridiculous in an in-country operation.
Sadly, this is the way the Pakistan Army has always handled insurgencies. The Balochis know it only too well — they first faced these tactics in the 70s and more recently under Gen Pervez Musharraf. The current Army Chief, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, appears to be in the same mould: brutal and unimaginative in combat.
The other possibility is that the entire affair has been deliberately choreographed. Perhaps it was no coincidence that the latest Pakistan Army operation in Swat coincided with President Asif Ali Zardari’s visit to Washington. US President Barack Obama had summoned the Presidents of both Pakistan and Afghanistan to demand cooperation, offer incentives and spell out some pretty tough disincentives. Thus, while the three Presidents "discussed" the vexed problem on the other side of the planet, the Pakistan Army once again began occupying positions in Swat, abandoned only in January of the previous year.
It can be recalled that the Pakistan Army has always been a little reluctant to take on jihadi militias in Swat and other parts of the Frontier. Their argument is that these jihadis are involved in local issues and not involved in the Afghan fighting. The civilian leadership too has tended to go along with this line of thinking, and made successive peace deals with the Swat jihadis. This kind of acquiescence has weakened both the authority of the Pakistan state as well as the power of the local lashkars and chieftains opposed to the upstart jihadis.
The fact is that the Swat jihadis, far from being local players, have always been neck-deep in neighbouring Afghanistan. The present chief of the Swat jihad, Maulana Fazlullah, along with his father-in-law Sufi Mohammad, and Bajaur Tehrik-e-Taliban chief Maulana Faqir Mohammad had gone headlong into Afghanistan in 2001 to fight against the Americans. That they were severely beaten is another story. They remain part of the Pashtun clan network fighting against Nato forces in Afghanistan.
The Pakistan Army has always been aware of the Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariah-Mohammadi’s (TNSM) proclivities, yet it has never quite come to destroy it. All its attempts can be described as attempts to cut it down to size, not extirpate it. Thus by 2007, Gen Musharraf, the supposed champion of the fight against terror, had assured the Swat jihadis, the Army would be out of their area by the beginning of the next year. Gen Musharraf kept his word.
Now a Pakistani Army unit — estimated to be hardly more than a division in strength — is making its way up to Mingora, the district headquarters, from two or three directions. This valley, which starts off from the north of Peshawar plains near Mardan, is barely 4-km in width. The Pakistan Army is blasting its way through, using artillery, aircraft and armour. It is also fighting its way from Buner in the east.
The Army claims it has killed more than a thousand Taliban fighters, losing very few men in exchange. However, it is far more likely that it is trying to bamboozle the world. This is not the first time that Maulana Fazlullah is fighting the Pakistani Army. He is far from being an idiot who would wage a conventional war against a superior force that will not hesitate to call in air and artillery support.
A number of reports have questioned the Pakistani Army’s claims. One Associated Press report (April 22, 2009) quoted Maj Gen. Saajad Ghani, commander of operations in Upper Swat, claiming that 200-300 fighters had been killed. The report went on to say that "there was no evidence of this, such as graves or blood. Capt. Kamal Butt, who led the final assault, said there were no bodies when he arrived, suggesting the insurgents had fled. There was no explanation of where the bodies might have gone." Such astounding stories are being repeated. The Pakistanis are fighting ghosts or fighters who have long taken to the mountains.
Clearly this is no way to take on an insurgency that has deep roots in the region. The only option is the long haul, with troops committed to hold ground for a fairly prolonged period. But this they won’t do. They will always claim they cannot spare troops from the eastern border (with India). The exasperated Americans will admonish India, and the Pakistanis will proclaim a huge military victory against jihadis in Swat and call the Americans ungrateful. In reality, very little would have changed, except the lives of a couple of million helpless refugees. It does not take much to figure out which side will be the psychological victor in this sordid drama. |
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