Rethinking the Khaki


Written by Chris Cork • Cover Stories • August 2011

Thus far 2011 has not been a good year for the Pakistan Armed Forces. Public confidence in what is generally acknowledged to be the most stable and effective of all the state institutions, has once again dipped. That confidence had been in large part restored with the successful operation to recapture the Swat valley from the Taliban; and the valiant rescue and relief work carried out during the 2010 flood disaster. Six months later and with the humiliation of the Abbottabad raid on May 2nd which saw the death of Osama bin Laden, and the raid on PNS Mehran which saw Pakistan’s anti-submarine and maritime surveillance capability effectively wiped out, the Pakistan military machine is looking distinctly careworn.

For the first time the military has been criticized publicly by the media, and by parliamentarians who generally take a ‘hands off’ approach to matters military. There are credible reports that the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Kayani has come under sharp questioning from within the officer cadre, and a normally quiescent civil society has found its voice and wondered openly if the people of Pakistan are getting value for money from the military.

With the souring of relations with the Americans post Raymond Davis affair and the bin Laden raid has now come a suspension of military aid worth $800 million by the Americans – much of which was owed under agreements within the Coalition support fund (CSF) and which America is substantially in arrears of payment of. The ‘Pakistan needs to do more’ mantra is the accompanying mood music as arguments rage about the use of the Shamsi airbase and bilateral intelligence sharing is undergoing a substantial overhaul as Pakistan adopts a more assertive posture.

The challenges faced by the Pakistan army in the short term are substantial – and not purely military. The success of the Swat operation was partial rather than complete, and many of the top Taliban leadership including Maulana Fazlullah evaded capture and have regrouped on the Afghan side of Pakistan’s northwestern borders with Afghanistan. From there they have been mounting an increasingly effective series of raids into Pakistan, allegedly in company with elements of the Afghan Taliban. Pakistan moved in mid-July to strengthen border defenses in the vulnerable Upper and Lower Dir areas as well as Mohmand and Bajaur tribal agencies. The Chitral valley is vulnerable to attack from Afghanistan and difficult to defend. And no matter what defeat may be inflicted on armed Taliban or extremists, unless there is an alternative narrative, a rethink of ideology in those who support them, then the battle is never going to be won.

In this the civil administration clearly have a lead role, but there are signs in Swat that they are slow to take over from the army and unwilling to move back into positions of civil administration. There is a danger that the Taliban will find a way back if the civil power is unable to assume effective control – in which case the army will have to fight them all over again.

A challenge which the army is being forced by circumstance to confront is that of extremism within its own ranks. Entities such as armies are microcosms of the societies that they draw their recruits from. If society has become radicalized and has moved towards an extreme position, then it follows that the pool of recruits is going to contain radicalized men and women who will join the army with an agenda very different to that of the recruiting sergeant.

Radicalization will also have been going on within existing members of the forces, and there will be sympathizers if not collaborators within those who are in touch with extremist elements. This was rumored though not yet proven to be the case with the attack on PNS Mehran. Zia’s children are in the ranks and the officer cadre – detecting, disempowering or re-educating them is a job that only the army can do for itself, but a job that must be done if the most effective (for all its faults) organ of state is not to become debased.

The army is currently stretched by the necessary support it offers for the civil power. Forces remain in Swat and elsewhere that there has been fighting, and they cannot remain there indefinitely. The military was pre-eminent in rescue and relief operations during the 2010 flood. It will be called on again in the future as that event is unlikely to be isolated and large-scale flooding will be a feature of the future problems faced by any government. As has been the case in the past (2005 earthquake for instance) the public profile and standing of the Pakistan armed forces rose almost in synchronicity with their relief efforts. In that sense a battered image was quickly and easily restored, in main because the Pakistani collective unconscious has a famously short memory. If the army is going to continue in this vital role it is going to need the resources and training to deliver the service the government and the public expect of it – and that may mean a realignment of tasks and priorities at a time when budgets are tightening everywhere.

And there lies both the rub and the greatest challenge for the military of Pakistan as well as the military establishments of many other countries, including those in the developed world. Armies are expensive everywhere, and war fighting is ruinously expensive as the EU is discovering yet again in its air campaign against Libya. Soldiers are paid and bullets bought with taxpayer’s money, but in a country like Pakistan where the taxpayer is a tiny fraction of the workforce and of that tiny fraction an even tinier fraction actually pays its taxes. The state generates insufficient revenue to support even the most basic of functions for a population that is growing far faster than is sustainable. How much of a military machine Pakistan will be able to afford twenty years hence when the population may almost have doubled; is a question that military planners need to be asking themselves now, not ten years hence.