East meets West Pakistan’s fighter Aircraft
Not many modern armed forces unite in their inventory, and particularly among their key assets, technology from two – in political terms – entirely opposite origins. It is more common in the countries of the former Soviet bloc where, since the fall of the iron curtain, Western technology slowly but ever increasingly found its way into countries primarily equipped with Russian weapon systems. In the past two decades the Middle East and southern countries of the Asian continent have become areas in which Western state-of-the-art weapon systems competed next to weapon systems from Russia or other former antagonists to lead these countries’ armed forces into a new age – globalisation in the political and industrial defence world.
These countries – not only geographically in between history’s current major players – slowly revolve the old political and economic structures in a natural process and, with their growing political self-confidence, create a new link between the cumbersome super powers which, mostly from behind the scenes, will shape the next decades.
Pakistan is one of these interesting examples, however, with a very unique character. Just as its neighbour and long-lasting political antagonist, India, it develops an increasingly emancipated character in its choice of new weapon systems as well as in its desire to further develop its domestic R&D as well as production capabilities. India currently is in the process of extensive trials for its future fighter aircraft programme (MMRCA) in which aircraft from the US compete against European as well as Russian solutions of the latest generations (see http://www.defpro.com/daily/details/380/). The final choice in this particular race will be a forward-looking one for the face of the Indian Air Force.
On the other side of the Thar Desert, the Pakistani Air Force (PAF) brings together an interesting mix of aircraft from all over the world and, in particular, from the US and China. Due to its historical development, the first aircraft to be used by the Pakistani Air Force were US- and UK-built aircraft. However, in 1965 Pakistan received its first fighter aircraft of Chinese origin: the Shenyang J-6. Since, fighter aircraft of the US as well as from France (the PAF still strongly relies on its French Dassault Mirage IIIs and Mirage Vs) have been operating next to Chinese fighter aircraft. A clear political development can be deduced from the history of fighter aircraft of the PAF: from the post-colonial influences to a regional power at the mercy of the political gravities to a growing national identity and self-determination.
Today, Pakistan is expecting to take delivery of its first of 18 ordered Lockheed Martin F-16C/D Block 52+ very soon (older versions of the F-16 have already been operating in Pakistan since 1982), bringing the total number of Pakistani F-16s to 54 when the last aircraft will be delivered as scheduled in December 2010. Furthermore, as various press sources have reported mid-November 2009, Pakistan has signed an agreement with China for the procurement of 36 Chengdu FC-20 (J-10 export version) to be delivered by 2015. Finally, Pakistan is also in the process of introducing a growing number of FC-1/JF-17 fighter aircraft, jointly developed by China’s Chengdu and the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex (PAC) Kamra. With the first two small batch production aircraft having been delivered in 2007, Pakistan has since received a good dozen of these aircraft and, as reports Flight International, is expecting to introduce at least 150 domestically produced fighters into service (the number has increased to an estimated 200-250 aircraft).
This development would not only provide Pakistan with a significant number of state-of-the-art air combat assets but also brings together technology from the Far East and the West in an interesting unity. Many eyes of these two political and industrial camps will be glued to the PAF to gather information on this process and the other’s craftsmanship.
F-16 … FC-20 … JF-17
As outlined above the PAF has been combining Western and Chinese aircraft since the 1960s, including bombers and trainer aircraft and is, furthermore, expecting to receive four Chinese Shaanxi Y-8W airborne early warning & control (AEW&C) aircraft equipped with AESA radar by 2011 that will be operating next to Pakistan’s brand-new Saab 2000 Erieye AEW&C aircraft. But let’s take a look at the three state-of-the-art fighter aircraft that will be racing Pakistan’s skies in the near future.
Pakistan’s newest member of the F-16 family, a two seat F-16D Block 52, has been unveiled on October 2009 at Lockheed Martin’s Fort Worth, Texas, facility. The ceremony was attended by the PAF Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal Rao Quamar Suleman. The current order, dubbed “Peace Drive I”, is for 12 F-16Cs and six F-16Ds, powered by the Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-229 engine, with an option for another 18 aircraft.
“The Pakistani and U.S. leadership has worked very hard to develop a strategic partnership between the two countries in order to achieve our common strategic interests,” said Rao Qamar. “If this relationship is to succeed, it has to be built on a solid foundation of trust between the two allies. This F-16 is not just an aircraft, but a capability for Pakistan. It is a symbol of trust and the relationship between Pakistan and the U.S.”
As the PAF explains on its homepage, “the PAF had originally planned its force structure to include than a hundred F-16s by the end of the century, but these plans could not be implemented because of the US embargo [of the 1990s due to Pakistan’s testing of a nuclear bomb]. The service is, thus, currently in the process of evaluating other high-tech fighter aircraft for procurement.”
The outcome of this process is quite clear: a stronger co-operation with China which obviously offers Pakistan not only to possibility to acquire new combat aircraft but also of jointly improving its domestic industrial capabilities. The Chengdu FC-20s to enter service in 2015 will replace the aging fleet of combat aircraft such as the Chinese F-7s (a version of the MiG-21 which has been recently upgraded) as well as the extensive fleet of Mirage IIIs and Vs. As the PAF explains, “Chinese systems such as the F-7s provide the staying power to absorb losses and to take punishment in the face of a much bigger adversary. Planned upgrades to equip these less capable fighters with modern radars, better missiles and ECM equipment will help enhance the PAF’s combat capability.”
The FC-20 is not among these less capable fighters. It is the export version, modified to Pakistan’s requirements, of one of China’s most capable multi-role fighter aircraft with a delta-wing and canard design. It was introduced into the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) in 2005 and in April 2006 the Pakistani cabinet approved the procurement of 36 of these aircraft which can be compared to the aircraft generation of the F-16, the Gripen or the Rafale.
Although a greater challenge for the Pakistani Air Force than the mere purchase of new assets, the development and introduction of the JF-17 (Pakistani designation for “Joint Fighter”) has continuously and obviously successfully proceeded. The first aircraft of this type took to the skies in 2003. The first small batch of pre-production aircraft was delivered to Pakistan for operational evaluation purposes in March 2007. The first Pakistani-manufactured JF-17 was rolled out and handed over to the PAF on 23 November 2009. On the occasion of the hand-over ceremony Rao Qamar said that 40 JF-17 would be produced by PAC Kamra within next three years and would be inducted in PAF replacing the existing aircraft. Furthermore, he confirmed that the first JF 17 Squadron would be established shortly. The JF-17 is a lightweight and low-cost multi-role fighter aircraft with a high manoeuvrability and beyond visual range (BVR) capability. It has advanced aerodynamics configuration and high thrust.
PAF Early Warning System Saab 2000
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Air Force on Tuesday received first of its four Saab-2000 Airborne Early Warning and Control aircraft from Sweden. According to an official announcement, the aircraft landed at one of main operating bases, marking a major milestone in PAF’s overall modernisation plan.
With the induction of the Swedish system, PAF has become one of the few air forces in the world to have Airborne Early Warning capability. Besides detecting high- and medium-altitude aircraft, this state-of-the-art system is also capable of detecting low-level flying objects over land and sea at extended ranges. The system is capable of picking even the surface targets over the sea. By virtue of these features, PAF would be able to boost its operational capability manifold by achieving requisite early warning for efficient and meaningful air defence of its airspace.
The Erieye AEW&C mission system radar is an active, phased-array, pulse-Doppler sensor that can feed an onboard operator architecture or downlink data (via an associated datalink subsystem) to a ground-based air defence network. The system employs a large aperture, dual-sided antenna array housed in a dorsal ‘plank’ fairing. The antenna is fixed, and the beam is electronically scanned, which provides for improved detection and significantly enhanced tracking performance compared with radar-dome antenna systems.Erieye detects and tracks air and sea targets out to the horizon (and beyond due to anomalous propagation)—instrumented range has been measured at 450 km.
Typical detection range against fighter-sized targets is approximately 350 km, in a 150° broadside sector, both sides of the aircraft. Outside these sectors, performance is reduced in forward and aft directions.Other system features include:Adaptive waveform generation (including digital, phase-coded pulse compression), signal processing and target trackingTrack While Scan (TWS)Low sidelobe values (throughout the system’s angular coverage)Low- and medium-pulse repetition frequency operating modesFrequency agilityAir-to-air and sea surveillance modesTarget radar cross-section displayThe radar operates as a medium- to high-PRF pulse-Doppler, solid-state radar, in E/F-band (3 GHz), incorporating 192 two-way transmit/receive modules that combine to produce a pencil beam, steered as required within the operating 150° sector each side of the aircraft (one side at a time). It is understood that Erieye has some ability to detect aircraft in the 30° sectors fore and aft of the aircraft heading, but has no track capability in this sector
Zaid Hamid in Situation Room With Ayla Malik
FACEBOOK SHOWS BIAS: TAKES DOWN POPULAR PAKISTANI FAN-PAGE
The page titled ‘SYED ZAID ZAMAN HAMID: OFFICIAL’ has been taken offline for what Facebook calls ‘violation of terms and conditions’, without providing details as to exactly what term or condition was violated.
Zaid Hamid is one of Pakistan’s most popular figures and has in a very short time become the voice of the youth of Pakistan who feel frustrated at the incompetence of the US installed democratic government. In his tv programmes, Zaid has constantly called for a complete review of Pakistan’s relations with the United States, due to the latter’s inability to purge the influx of weapons and funds from Afghanistan directed to terrorists in Pakistan.
Zaid’s facebook page, launched just over a month ago, had reached almost 20,000 members before it was taken offline by facebook, and was used mainly for updates on upcoming television and public appearances, and sharing photographs and videos of Zaid’s TV appearances.
Facebook have yet to provide an actual explanation as opposed to a generic automated message. Untill the time that facebook provides the exact reason for taking down Mr.Hamid’s page, it will be considered as yet another attempt to silence the critics of the US-backed government of Pakistan and will only add to the disenchangtment of Pakistan’s youth with the current establishment.
Join the protest group:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=197788883468&ref=nf
Pakistani Police Officer Puts End To Violations By US Diplomats
Ahmed Quraishi
A young Pakistani Assistant Superintendent of Police [ASP] chased a fleeing US embassy car for two kilometers after it sped through a police checkpoint on the outskirts of the Pakistani capital on Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2009.
When the diplomats refused to stop, the ASP drove past them and then sharply turned his car to force the US embassy vehicle to screech to a halt. He and his senior police officers insisted the US diplomats return to the police picket, apologize to the Pakistani police officers and submit to a security inspection of the inside of the car like all cars passing through the checkpoint, according to the exclusive report published by Lahore’s The Nation newspaper.
The incident is significant because of the meteoric rise in incidents of public bullying by US diplomats and privately armed security contractors in Pakistani cities. At least three incidents have been registered by Islamabad police this year where armed Americans in plainclothes assaulted Pakistani citizens.
There is growing evidence that Pakistan’s pro-US government has let tens of Blackwater-type private US security contractors into the country without taking the Pakistani public opinion into confidence. The Pakistani ambassador in Washington, who is strongly backed by US government and military, is suspected of having leaked confidential documents to the Indian media in September 2009 in order to embarrass Pakistan’s military intelligence community.
Hours after a terrorist blast at a busy market in Lahore killed over 50 women and children on Dec. 8, two US Consulate Land Cruisers caused a traffic jam because US diplomats locked themselves inside to prevent Pakistani Military Police officials from inspecting the cars. The military did not release the cars without first taking them to an unidentified location for questioning.
In October, Pakistani media reports said ISI Chief Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha told CIA chief Leon Panetta during his secret visit to Islamabad that Pakistanis have evidence that implicates CIA operatives in Afghanistan in supporting terrorism inside Pakistan.
Pakistan is facing a deadly and sophisticated wave of terrorism targeting civilians in public places. The wave coincides with US attempt to shift its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to Pakistan on the unsubstantiated ground that Islamabad is responsible for the looming US failure in Afghanistan.
India Faces Backlash Over a New State
NY Times
India’s governing Congress Party faced an angry backlash on Friday against the possibility of dividing one of the country’s largest states, Andhra Pradesh, with opponents staging protests in southern India even as advocates for creating other new states began agitating elsewhere in the country.
The police tried to break up a tussle between lawyers in support of a Telangana state, left, and those against it Friday outside the court in Hyderabad, India.The political crisis has dominated the news in India this week, as Congress Party leaders in New Delhi agreed late Wednesday night to start the process of creating a new state out of the Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh. National leaders made the decision in response to a 10-day “fast unto death” by an advocate for Telangana statehood that had evolved into a national melodrama.
But even as Telangana supporters were rejoicing, the crisis quickly shifted in the opposite direction, as opponents of the proposed partition protested in other regions of Andhra Pradesh. Meanwhile, 130 members of the 294-member State Assembly tendered their resignations. In much of the southern and coastal regions of Andhra Pradesh, daily life came to a standstill on Friday as general strikes were called to protest dividing the state.
“All the leaders and others are sitting in the town’s main square to oppose the division of the state,” said a journalist in the Anantapur district of the southern part of the state. The situation presented the Congress Party with a dilemma of its own making. The party’s high command in New Delhi had agreed to start the process of creating the new state as a concession to end the hunger strike by K.Chandrasekhar Rao, a regional political figure. Mr. Rao’s fast had led to student demonstrations in Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh, and a two-day general strike that almost completely shut the city down.
But the late-night concession by leaders in New Delhi apparently caught Congress Party lawmakers in Andhra Pradesh unawares. The state is divided into three distinct regions, and many lawmakers from the two regions outside Telangana found themselves pinned between a decision made in New Delhi and angry constituents at home.
“I am sandwiched between my supporters and my high command,” said J. C. Diwakar Reddy, a six-term Congress Party assemblyman from the Anantapur district. “In that situation, I just submitted my resignation. My main grievance is that we were not consulted before they made this decision.”
Nallari Kiran Kumar Reddy, speaker of the State Assembly, confirmed that 130 members had resigned, including 76 from the Congress Party, though none of the resignations had been accepted. “I am consulting constitutional experts on the issue,” the speaker said. “I will also call them one by one. There is no time limit for me to accept these resignations.”
In New Delhi, Congress leaders seemed to backpedal slightly. The Indian news media quoted unidentified officials as saying that a “broad consensus” would be necessary for the statehood movement to proceed. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told a delegation of Congress Party lawmakers from Andhra Pradesh on Friday that “nothing would be done in haste,” according to one person who attended the meeting. In Andhra Pradesh, Konijeti Rosaiah, the state’s chief minister and a member of the Congress Party, tried to play down the situation by telling local journalists that no oral or written commitment had been made. He also beseeched all political parties to demand that their supporters abjure from any violence on the streets.
“We have to be peaceful,” Mr. Rosaiah said during an appearance before the State Assembly. “Political parties should take responsibility that protests are peaceful.” The architecture of India’s political system has been evolving since the country became independent in 1947. Initially, leaders used linguistic divisions to carve out large states, but as the country has continued to grow, new states have been gradually added in response to different claims. Three new states were added in 2000, bringing the total to 28 states and 7 territories controlled by the national government. Even now, some Indian states — notably Uttar Pradesh, with more than 160 million people — are larger than most countries.
Andhra Pradesh itself has more than 77 million people and stretches over a huge swath of land along the country’s southeastern coast. It was born from a political shotgun marriage in 1956, as leaders in New Delhi merged the coastal regions with the interior region of Telangana, which also included the city of Hyderabad. The arrangement was conditional to ease the fears of discrimination or exploitation by people from the Telangana region, who were outnumbered in the new state.
But in the decades that followed, Telangana advocates say the promises of equitable treatment were never fulfilled. Riots broke out over the issue in 1969, and a statehood movement simmered for decades until it finally exploded this week during Mr. Rao’s hunger strike. Indian news media reported that advocates for statehood in other regions also had started agitating. The reports included accounts of some people beginning new hunger strikes.
Creating a state can be a lengthy undertaking here. In Andhra Pradesh the process is supposed to start with a vote on a resolution for statehood by the State Assembly, though the resignations make this uncertain.
CIA asked us to eliminate Dr. A Q Khan: Blackwater chief
LAHORE: In a stunning revelation, US private security service agency, Blackwater’s founder, Erik Prince, has claimed that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had asked the agency to kill Pakistani nuclear scientist, A Q Khan.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, Prince said the CIA had asked the Blackwater to eliminate Khan, however, authorities in Washington “chose not to pull the trigger.”
“Dr Khan’s inclusion in the target list would suggest that the assassination effort was broader than has previously been acknowledged,” Prince said.
Prince has also admitted to Blackwater’s participation in some of the CIA’s most sensitive operations, including raids on suspected militants in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Prince said Blackwater’s, which now known as Xe Worldwide Services, role changed remarkably after its officials started providing security cover to CIA operatives in the field.
Raids on suspected insurgents in Iraq, known as “snatch and grab” operations, were mostly carried out during nights between 2004 and 2006.
Pakistan arrests 3 US embassy employees
Pakistani security forces have arrested another three US citizens working at the American Consulate for filming sensitive installations in the eastern city of Lahore.
Police arrested three American nationals including a woman in the Sherpao bridge area of Lahore as they were filming sensitive government buildings, a Press TV correspondent reported.
According to Pakistani police all three were employees of the US embassy.
The US citizens were taken to a police station and later released after a three-hour inquiry.
Police have impounded their vehicle for legal action as it was bearing false license plates.
The woman, identified as Morgan, works for the press department at the American Consulate in Lahore. She was arrested while actually taking pictures of a check-post near the Sherpao Bridge.
The Pakistani daily The Nation reported that after a thorough search of the woman, the security personnel recovered 11 pictures in her possession, which included photos of different police check-posts in the area.
The Pakistani foreign affairs ministry was not available for comment when contacted by Press TV.
The move came just days after authorities arrested five US nationals from the eastern city of Sargodha, believed to have gone missing in Washington D.C. last month.
The US nationals, with alleged links to al-Qaeda, were arrested on suspicion of plotting a terror attack.
Reflections On India
If you are Indian, or of Indian descent, I must preface this post with a clear warning: you are not going to like what I have to say. My criticisms may be very hard to stomach. But consider them as the hard words and loving advice of a good friend. Someone who’s being honest with you and wants nothing from you. These criticisms apply to all of India except Kerala and the places I didn’t visit, except that I have a feeling it applies to all of India, except as I mentioned before, Kerala. Lastly, before anyone accuses me of Western Cultural Imperialism, let me say this: if this is what India and Indians want, then hey, who am I to tell them differently. Take what you like and leave the rest. In the end it doesn’t really matter, as I get the sense that Indians, at least many upper class Indians, don’t seem to care and the lower classes just don’t know any better, what with Indian culture being so intense and pervasive on the sub-continent. But here goes, nonetheless.
India is a mess. It’s that simple, but it’s also quite complicated. I’ll start with what I think are India’s four major problems–the four most preventing India from becoming a developing nation–and then move to some of the ancillary ones.
First, pollution. In my opinion the filth, squalor and all around pollution indicates a marked lack of respect for India by Indians. I don’t know how cultural the filth is, but it’s really beyond anything I have ever encountered. At times the smells, trash, refuse and excrement are like a garbage dump. Right next door to the Taj Mahal was a pile of trash that smelled so bad, was so foul as to almost ruin the entire Taj experience. Delhi, Bangalore and Chennai to a lesser degree were so very polluted as to make me physically ill. Sinus infections, ear infection, bowels churning was an all to common experience in India. Dung, be it goat, cow or human fecal matter was common on the streets. In major tourist areas filth was everywhere, littering the sidewalks, the roadways, you name it. Toilets in the middle of the road, men urinating and defecating anywhere, in broad daylight. Whole villages are plastic bag wastelands. Roadsides are choked by it. Air quality that can hardly be called quality. Far too much coal and far to few unleaded vehicles on the road. The measure should be how dangerous the air is for one’s health, not how good it is. People casually throw trash in the streets, on the roads. The only two cities that could be considered sanitary in my journey were Trivandrum–the capital of Kerala–and Calicut. I don’t know why this is. But I can assure you that at some point this pollution will cut into India’s productivity, if it already hasn’t. The pollution will hobble India’s growth path, if that indeed is what the country wants. (Which I personally doubt, as India is far too conservative a country, in the small ‘c’ sense.)
The second issue, infrastructure, can be divided into four subcategories: roads, rails and ports and the electrical grid. The electrical grid is a joke. Load shedding is all too common, everywhere in India. Wide swaths of the country spend much of the day without the electricity they actually pay for. With out regular electricity, productivity, again, falls. The ports are a joke. Antiquated, out of date, hardly even appropriate for the mechanized world of container ports, more in line with the days of longshoremen and the like. Roads are an equal disaster. I only saw one elevated highway that would be considered decent in Thailand, much less Western Europe or America. And I covered fully two thirds of the country during my visit. There are so few dual carriage way roads as to be laughable. There are no traffic laws to speak of, and if there are, they are rarely obeyed, much less enforced. A drive that should take an hour takes three. A drive that should take three takes nine. The buses are at least thirty years old, if not older. Everyone in India, or who travels in India raves about the railway system. Rubbish. It’s awful. Now, when I was there in 2003 and then late 2004 it was decent. But in the last five years the traffic on the rails has grown so quickly that once again, it is threatening productivity. Waiting in line just to ask a question now takes thirty minutes. Routes are routinely sold out three and four days in advance now, leaving travelers stranded with little option except to take the decrepit and dangerous buses. At least fifty million people use the trains a day in India. 50 million people! Not surprising that waitlists of 500 or more people are common now. The rails are affordable and comprehensive but they are overcrowded and what with budget airlines popping up in India like Sadhus in an ashram the middle and lowers classes are left to deal with the overutilized rails and quality suffers. No one seems to give a shit. Seriously, I just never have the impression that the Indian government really cares. Too interested in buying weapons from Russia, Israel and the US I guess.
The last major problem in India is an old problem and can be divided into two parts that’ve been two sides of the same coin since government was invented: bureaucracy and corruption. It take triplicates to register into a hotel. To get a SIM card for one’s phone is like wading into a jungle of red-tape and photocopies one is not likely to emerge from in a good mood, much less satisfied with customer service. Getting train tickets is a terrible ordeal, first you have to find the train number, which takes 30 minutes, then you have to fill in the form, which is far from easy, then you have to wait in line to try and make a reservation, which takes 30 minutes at least and if you made a single mistake on the form back you go to the end of the queue, or what passes for a queue in India. The government is notoriously uninterested in the problems of the commoners, too busy fleecing the rich, or trying to get rich themselves in some way shape or form. Take the trash for example, civil rubbish collection authorities are too busy taking kickbacks from the wealthy to keep their areas clean that they don’t have the time, manpower, money or interest in doing their job. Rural hospitals are perennially understaffed as doctors pocket the fees the government pays them, never show up at the rural hospitals and practice in the cities instead.
I could go on for quite some time about my perception of India and its problems, but in all seriousness, I don’t think anyone in India really cares. And that, to me, is the biggest problem. India is too conservative a society to want to change in any way. Mumbai, India’s financial capital is about as filthy, polluted and poor as the worst city imaginable in Vietnam, or Indonesia–and being more polluted than Medan, in Sumatra is no easy task. The biggest rats I have ever seen were in Medan!
One would expect a certain amount of, yes, I am going to use this word, backwardness, in a country that hasn’t produced so many Nobel Laureates, nuclear physicists, imminent economists and entrepreneurs. But India has all these things and what have they brought back to India with them? Nothing. The rich still have their servants, the lower castes are still there to do the dirty work and so the country remains in stasis. It’s a shame. Indians and India have many wonderful things to offer the world, but I’m far from sanguine that India will amount to much in my lifetime.
Now, have at it, call me a cultural imperialist, a spoiled child of the West and all that. But remember, I’ve been there. I’ve done it. And I’ve seen 50 other countries on this planet and none, not even Ethiopia, have as long and gargantuan a laundry list of problems as India does. And the bottom line is, I don’t think India really cares. Too complacent and too conservative.
A REQUIEM FOR THOSE WHO SHALL LIVE FOR EVER
Contributed by Brigadier Raashid Wali Janjua
Gallant men who are cut off by the sword
Move rather our veneration than our pity
(Richard Steele)
In blossom today than scattered, life is so like a delicate flower. After all how can you expect the fragrance to last for ever. The above couplet sums up most succinctly the ephemeral nature of life. Everybody here travels diurnally towards our ultimate abode. Some go early some go late but go one must. And what better way to go defending your national ideals against a menace that spares neither a mosque nor a school. The following lines are a humble tribute to few gallant souls who faced the evil stoically leaving a shining example for all who follow in their noble foot steps in this war against madness and extremism. Poetry indeed is the highest sublimation of our noblest instincts. The verses below conjure up the image of an intrepid warrior who revels in self immolation for defending his noble ideals.
Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the Gate:
To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late;
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his gods.”
In my mind’s eye I could envision the tall muscular visage of Major General Bilal rushing pell mell into the inferno that the inner compound of parade lane mosque had become and accosting the heavily armed terrorist with his characteristic courage. I could clearly imagine a faint curl of smile playing on his lips, as it always did, even as his brow knotted in justified indignation at the sacrilege being committed in the holiest of the places, as he grappled with the armed brute. While others fell around him he faced the fearsome fusillade with disdain lunging at one of the attackers knowing fully well that the terrorist was wearing a suicide jacket. He managed to overpower him in a fair fight, an act he had repeated with aplomb throughout his life, whether playing a game of tennis, squash and polo or tank maneuvers. His last act of life was emblematic of a charger spirit imbibed as debonair armoured corps officer.
His gallant act served as a foil for other victims of the grisly attack who scurried for safety while he wrestled with the armed attacker. The terrorist who found himself vanquished shot him by stealth before blowing himself up in desperation. The general died as he had lived, altruistically, fairly and gallantly. All this came to the fore after the event but I knew the way it ought to have happened without anyone telling me. The eyewitness accounts bore an uncanny similarity to his last act. Why must that be? The logical query can be answered by taking a look at his personality traits.
I go back to those heady days as a young Captain in Lahore. During one of the army tennis championships in late eighties I came across tall strapping Major Bilal Omar. We initially belonged to opposite teams and played a closely contested match. He being a squash player had tremendous stamina but lacked tennis match practice. I had expected a cake walk. He instead proved a tough customer making up for his lack of match practice through aggressive volleying and pugnacious net game. On one of the match points the chair umpire gave my service out. I shook my head in visible exasperation. The umpire remained unfazed. I slowly started walking towards the ad court side for another serve. To my utter surprise I saw major Bilal moving towards the net instead of moving back towards the service line to receive the serve. He motioned to the umpire that the serve was right and came up to the net for a customary hand shake with the winner. This was quintessentially Bilal, fair, aggressive and scrupulously honest. We came across each other on several fora in professional as well as non professional capacities and on every instance his above traits shone forth.
As a General Officer Commanding Lahore I heard several tales of his leadership style where he led the young officers in physical training, sports and tactical manoeuvres. He was a stickler for discipline, loved traditions, led a spartan life, and commanded respect through personal example and charisma. His last act of intrepidity reminds me of a couplet by Byron, “I see before me the Gladiator lie: He leans upon his hand – his manly brow consents to death, but conquers agony.
The mosaic of memories features a tall major of wiry frame who as a platoon commander in PMA lay on a grassy patch during a break in the training manoeuvres of the cadets regaling the younger lot of instructors about the lighter aspects of life in Army. His free spirited insouciance was peppered with nuggets of wisdom for us who listened intently to his useful tips for clearing Staff Course entrance examination. To the accompaniment of musical soughing of cool AbbotAbad pines his parting advice sounded almost surrealistic;” And remember, at the end of the day it is God’s will and you will be better served if you learn to take a failure in its stride.” He quickly mitigated the fatalistic tenor of his advice by a humorous wisecrack, “And remember palls, all of my tips stand canceled till the time I receive my own Staff Course exam results.” This frank admission brought peals of laughter from all around as he had not yet cleared the exam himself.
We never came across each other till that fateful Friday night when after the gruesome attacks on the mosque I went to see the injured in intensive care unit of CMH. I found him lying in the right most corner of the ward almost in an existential pose staring at the ceiling. I walked up to his bed and he looked at me with a knowing glint in his eyes that contrasted strangely with the poignant moment of our reunion. I had known by then about his son Waleed’s demise, a brilliant student of first year, in the dastardly mosque attack. For a moment I was at a loss for the words. He recognized me clearly and remarked with his usual humour after greeting me by my full name that I should accept his apology if he had not recognized me properly after such a long time. I muttered the perfunctory condolence sentences. He just said he was satisfied in the God’s will. After some quiet moments his eyes shone with a glint of wistfulness and he remarked,” My only regret at that moment is that my son has gone so quickly. It would have been great to enjoy his company for some more time.” Before I could say anything he looked heavenwards and said, ”O God please do not consider this statement as defiance. I bow to your will.
The superhuman equipoise and faith displayed by Brigadier Mumtaz was simply out of this world. The Abbottabad advice and the post trauma resolve all seemed to coalesce as an epiphany of faith mitigating the somberness of the moment. He true to his advice eighteen years ago was taking a worst trauma in its stride.
As I headed off towards my next port of condolence call I was reminded of a world about which famous explorer and writer John Keay had said, “There is something profane about organized war fighting at these heights”. I was on my first visit to an operational area across the famed Burzil Pass in Astor Valley as a battalion commander in March 2000. I met Brigadier Masood Aslam who put me through my paces as an engineer battalion commander giving an in depth analysis of the weather, terrain and enemy. I was struck by his simple demeanour and forthcoming nature. He was already a war hero with a Sitara-e-Jurat in the Kargil operations whose wartime leadership had earned him the respect of seniors and juniors alike. During that tenure we came across each other frequently, sometimes under tense conditions but on every occasion I saw him offering advice and solutions with a serene smile. With that smile imprinted on my mind I made my way towards his residence expecting a distraught visage. He had lost his only son the nineteen years Hashim Masood, a NUST student of electrical engineering, in the grisly carnage during the Friday prayers at the parade lane mosque. Threading my way through a throng of mourners I approached him gingerly groping for the right words. As I embraced him I viewed the self same composure and serene smile that I had found in the mountain fastnesses nine years ago. Neither the smile nor his composure had deserted him in that hour of ultimate grief. He inquired after my welfare politely and appeared as solicitous of my presence he had been nearly a decade ago.
The above examples of grit, gumption and super human composure got me thinking about the inward source of strength that enabled those officers to display a rare integrity of character in the face of adversity. The source of strength was surely a lifelong fidelity to those ennobling ideals of altruism and courage that had made them join the challenging profession of arms in the first place. The designs of providence are indeed too inscrutable to let a peep into this cycle of life and death. After each untimely death what lingers on in the air is an emptiness and a painful sense of loss for the affected families. Nothing perhaps can assuage the anguish of their bereavement better than the knowledge that their grief is shared as a common loss by the entire nation that stands together in this hour of trial as one big family ready to make a meaning out of this madness for a cause that transcends us all. The courage of Major General Bilal, the composure of Lt General Masood and the faith of Brig Mumtaz embody a national spirit that refuses to yield to the menace of terrorism.
Drug money saved banks in global crisis, claims UN advisor
Drugs and crime chief says $352bn in criminal proceeds was effectively laundered by financial institutions
Drugs money worth billions of dollars kept the financial system afloat at the height of the global crisis, the United Nations‘ drugs and crime tsar has told the Observer. Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said he has seen evidence that the proceeds of organised crime were “the only liquid investment capital” available to some banks on the brink of collapse last year. He said that a majority of the $352bn (£216bn) of drugs profits was absorbed into the economic system as a result.
This will raise questions about crime’s influence on the economic system at times of crisis. It will also prompt further examination of the banking sector as world leaders, including Barack Obama and Gordon Brown, call for new International Monetary Fund regulations. Speaking from his office in Vienna, Costa said evidence that illegal money was being absorbed into the financial system was first drawn to his attention by intelligence agencies and prosecutors around 18 months ago. “In many instances, the money from drugs was the only liquid investment capital. In the second half of 2008, liquidity was the banking system’s main problem and hence liquid capital became an important factor,” he said.
Some of the evidence put before his office indicated that gang money was used to save some banks from collapse when lending seized up, he said.
“Inter-bank loans were funded by money that originated from the drugs trade and other illegal activities… There were signs that some banks were rescued that way.” Costa declined to identify countries or banks that may have received any drugs money, saying that would be inappropriate because his office is supposed to address the problem, not apportion blame. But he said the money is now a part of the official system and had been effectively laundered.
“That was the moment [last year] when the system was basically paralysed because of the unwillingness of banks to lend money to one another. The progressive liquidisation to the system and the progressive improvement by some banks of their share values [has meant that] the problem [of illegal money] has become much less serious than it was,” he said.
The IMF estimated that large US and European banks lost more than $1tn on toxic assets and from bad loans from January 2007 to September 2009 and more than 200 mortgage lenders went bankrupt. Many major institutions either failed, were acquired under duress, or were subject to government takeover.
Sw
Kashmiris protest against reports of women’s case
SRINAGAR: A protest strike shut down Indian-administered Kashmir on Tuesday after investigators said two women allegedly raped and murdered had actually died by drowning, triggering angry claims of a cover-up. Public anger and outbreaks of violence shook the region in May after the bodies of the two Muslim women were found in a stream. Locals said they had been sexually abused and killed by the security forces.
The strike closed shops, offices, banks and post offices in the Kashmiri summer capital of Srinagar and other Muslim-majority towns, including the victims’ home town of Shopian, witnesses said. Hundreds of Kashmiris held noisy anti-government demonstrations in Shopian overnight as authorities deployed riot police to avert any new mass unrest over the case.
‘We urge the people of Kashmir to observe a complete shutdown against the concocted story presented by the CBI (Central Bureau of Investigations) before the court,’ Abdul Rasheed Deva, one of the protest leaders, told AFP. Police initially said the 17-year-old girl and her 22-year-old sister-in-law had drowned, but later agreed they might have been raped and murdered. In September, the CBI took over the case. In a report for India’s high court on Monday, the federal agency concluded that the two had drowned, ruling out rape and murder. Even some pro-India politicians rejected the CBI’s conclusions.
‘The whole charade of investigations by multiple agencies was aimed at shielding the culprits rather than bringing them to book,’ said Mehbooba Mufti, the leader of the main opposition People’s Democratic Party. The government has yet to react to the report.
Blackwater is involved in bombings in Pakistan: Gen. Durrani
“My assessment is that they — either themselves or most probably through others, through the locals — do carry out some of the explosions”.
Former chief of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) General Mohammad Asad Durrani sits down with Press TV and talks about the presence of Blackwater in Pakistan. The following is the transcript of the interview:
Press TV: General Durrani, US intelligence officials say that the CIA has cancelled the Blackwater contract but other reports indicate that there are at least three thousand Blackwater agents in Pakistan. What do make of these conflicting reports?
General Durrani: This may be true that the Blackwater’s contract has been cancelled but then this is also understood that such people are under a different name, whether it is Xe or Dyncorp or in any other form of private contractor-ship that they can be employed. In our case, such people have been around for a number of years now. Lately their number has increased. Some rationalization had been made that these people were required to provide security to more Americans coming because of the package they have worked out for Pakistan. But then on ground, there [are] a number of them, some of them in training facilities trying to suggest that they are there to train the police or the army or the air force.
Of course, I can also add that none of these organizations are very happy that they have been offered. Some of them have even refused training because they believe that they can be trained by them. But, in that form they are there. Others are certainly providing security and there is also a third group, which goes around, especially in the frontier area, with the NGOs and bring(s) the intelligence collection. So, the number I am not aware of but there is a contingent which is present in Pakistan.
Press TV: Analysts say that Blackwater agents are involved in bombings and that they are fomenting insecurity in Pakistan. What is your opinion?
General Durrani: My assessment is that they — either themselves or most probably through others, through the locals — do carry out some of the explosions. You see the idea is that there are other groups that are not acting on their behalf, which are acting locally because of so many reasons. They are not happy with our policy. They are not happy with whatever is happening in Afghanistan. The idea is to carry out such actions, like carrying attacks in the civilian areas to make the others look bad in the eyes of the public. Even those groups who are not targeting the civilians or were not going essentially for Pakistani targets … people should turn against them. And the second idea, which I think more or less they have succeeded, is to force the Pakistani [government] to even under take such operations where I was not initially willing to go.
Press TV: CIA officials say Blackwater has been in Pakistan to help with drone attacks. Is this the only reason why the CIA has hired Blackwater agents?
General Durrani: You see I am not aware of this statement as [of] yet. The headquarters, some of them come here to direct or carry out what we call target identification. I doubt it very much that this would be the job of people whom I consider to have been understandably involved with Blackwater operations. These operations of target identification have to be done un-reclusively. They should not look like Americans; they are people who are trained to match with the background. Intelligence work; and I cannot say that the Blackwater’s people are trained in such manner, learning the language, learning the local customs, so that they can go into those trouble areas.
Press TV: Blackwater is known for killing civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. Why has the Pakistani government allowed such a notorious US security firm to operate in the country?
General Durrani: You’re absolutely right. I think this is about the best question that one can pose. People either were naive that they did not believe that these were Blackwaters or these people would not get involved in it. The second theory goes around that they may have come with the consent and with the knowledge of some of the people that we have in the government — among which I do not know, I cannot say very much. If it is not the ambassador of the United States who has cleared them, who has sent them, or people here, these agencies, who have accepted them. But that is one of the perceptions. But essentially it is correct that anyone who comes and we allow those people [to] come without proper security clearance, without proper vetting and investigation, then it is indeed our fault.
