On Monday, May 2, 2011 at 0745am, President Obama annnounces the death of Osama bin Laden in his late-night speech to his nation. He said:
"Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. A small team of Americans carried out the operation with extraordinary courage and capability. No Americans were harmed. They took care to avoid civilian casualties. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body."On Tuesday, May 3 2011, DAWN which is the largest English newspaper in Pakistan, publishes a piece from Reuters about the operation that took place in Abbottabad on May 2nd 2011. The following is an extract from that report:
"'They (Pakistani officials) are expressing as great a surprise as we had when we first learned about this compound, so there is no indication at this point that the people we have talked to were aware of this, but we need to dig deeper into this,' White House counterterrorism chief John Brennan said in an interview with National Public Radio."Rather than addressing his nation at this crucial moment, Asif Ali Zardari (not going to call him President from this day onwards) uses all of his language skills and vocabulary to write an op-ed piece for the Washington Post in which he said:
"He was not anywhere we had anticipated he would be, but now he is gone.
"Although the events of Sunday were not a joint operation, a decade of cooperation and partnership between the United States and Pakistan led up to the elimination of Osama bin Laden as a continuing threat to the civilized world."Furthermore, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani rushed to France for three-day official trip. During his trip, Gilani addressed a gathering of business leaders where he exclaimed:
“Certainly, we have intelligence failure of the rest of the world including the United States. There is intelligence failure of the whole world, not Pakistan alone.”
Spot on! Had I been in that gathering, I would have presented a pair of shoes to Mr. Gilani for a such statement. Maybe the cake got into his head because only a soft-headed person could have said something like this. It seems that Pakistani civil leadership has other things on the mind. The Prime Minister takes a joy ride to France and achieves nothing whereas "the President" does not find the words to talk with his people but finds the time to jot down an opinion column for Washington Post. What this situation leaves the public in confusion.
Apparently, there has been talks of the Army and the Intelligentsia failing to act properly in the case of Osama bin Laden, and that lead to so many articles, op-eds and columns discussing the whole event. However, someone has not apparently seen that looking can be deceiving. Buying into the story of the Army, of not knowing about the operation, is fairly illogical. It is my perception that the Army and the ISI had an idea about this plan but chose not to react on it. An operation by the Army could have costed them a lot than the current scenario. Indeed, the glory would have been endless but does it serve any purpose if it causes pain to the public in general. Furthermore, the operation has emotional risks too. The perception of a Muslim army, either capturing or killing bin Laden, would have surely caused trouble. The followers of bin Laden would have vowed for revenge against the Pakistan Government and its people as in their eyes, all of us would have been "infidels." Like human nature, some elements of the Army would have minded the operation too.
The general perception these days is that the Pakistani Army was sound asleep on the night of May 2, 2011. But there are certain events that we are not catering to look at. Unusually, two different kind of short-range missiles were tested; Ra'ad (Hatf-8) and Nasr (Hatf-9). The very untimely tests of these missiles now make sense. These tests were a type of strategic message for anyone thinking about any military misadventure on Pakistani soil. Being the fifth largest Army in the world, surely it does not sleep unless it chooses to ignore.
So who should get the blame? The blame I guess lies with the current political leadership. The army and the current leadership are only adjusting because it keeps things a bit more stable in the era of on-going instability. Informing about the current political leadership would have been like throwing water over the whole plan as it is common knowledge that it loves to cash-in any chances it gets. The President who heads the the National Security Council tries to "make up" with his American masters rather than taking his people into confidence.
It seems that it would be very illogical if we start pressurizing our Army for no reason. The Army has been trying its best to battle out everything that is possible. It is trying to keep Balochistan together. It is trying to clear-up the wild North West of Pakistan from terrorists. It helps when a natural calamity hits for e.g. the Army was here during the 2010 Pakistani Floods whereas we found certain someone in some European destination which once had a cake-eating monarchy. All in all, taking the blame just to keep people safe is not a piece of cake, its hard-work that no one can do except the Army.
Apparently, there has been talks of the Army and the Intelligentsia failing to act properly in the case of Osama bin Laden, and that lead to so many articles, op-eds and columns discussing the whole event. However, someone has not apparently seen that looking can be deceiving. Buying into the story of the Army, of not knowing about the operation, is fairly illogical. It is my perception that the Army and the ISI had an idea about this plan but chose not to react on it. An operation by the Army could have costed them a lot than the current scenario. Indeed, the glory would have been endless but does it serve any purpose if it causes pain to the public in general. Furthermore, the operation has emotional risks too. The perception of a Muslim army, either capturing or killing bin Laden, would have surely caused trouble. The followers of bin Laden would have vowed for revenge against the Pakistan Government and its people as in their eyes, all of us would have been "infidels." Like human nature, some elements of the Army would have minded the operation too.
The general perception these days is that the Pakistani Army was sound asleep on the night of May 2, 2011. But there are certain events that we are not catering to look at. Unusually, two different kind of short-range missiles were tested; Ra'ad (Hatf-8) and Nasr (Hatf-9). The very untimely tests of these missiles now make sense. These tests were a type of strategic message for anyone thinking about any military misadventure on Pakistani soil. Being the fifth largest Army in the world, surely it does not sleep unless it chooses to ignore.
So who should get the blame? The blame I guess lies with the current political leadership. The army and the current leadership are only adjusting because it keeps things a bit more stable in the era of on-going instability. Informing about the current political leadership would have been like throwing water over the whole plan as it is common knowledge that it loves to cash-in any chances it gets. The President who heads the the National Security Council tries to "make up" with his American masters rather than taking his people into confidence.
It seems that it would be very illogical if we start pressurizing our Army for no reason. The Army has been trying its best to battle out everything that is possible. It is trying to keep Balochistan together. It is trying to clear-up the wild North West of Pakistan from terrorists. It helps when a natural calamity hits for e.g. the Army was here during the 2010 Pakistani Floods whereas we found certain someone in some European destination which once had a cake-eating monarchy. All in all, taking the blame just to keep people safe is not a piece of cake, its hard-work that no one can do except the Army.
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