Bharat Rakshak

ISLAMABAD: Talking to media personnel after being briefed by military officials on the progress of operation Zarb-i-Azb Thursday, NA Standing Committee on Defence Chairman Rohail Asghar said Pakistan Army will remain in the country's tribal areas till 2019.He said some Taliban militants had fled to Afghanistan, while others had joined the self-styled Islamic State for material gains.Earlier during the briefing, military officials told the NA body that since the start of operation Zarb-i-Azb in June 2014, forces have killed more than 3,500 terrorists.More than 300 military men and officers have also lost their lives during the operation, said military officials.Briefing the NA committee about progress on the operation, military officials said the army was conducting the final phase of operation Zarb-i-Azb in Shawal Valley of North Waziristan.They added that forces had control over peaks in Shawal Valley, and now ground and air forces were targeting terrorists in their hideouts.The committee was told that over 1,000 intelligence-based operations conducted throughout the country have eliminated major terrorist networks. Officials said no area had been left alone by forces after it was cleared.

@praveenswami Aug 28
Must we talk? Fab stuff from Ayesha Siddiqa on the India-Pakistan talks | http://bit.ly/1LDhoET

The failed National Security Advisers’ (NSA) talks indicate that Islamabad is now dealing with a different kind of government in New Delhi. It is unrelenting, unforgiving and cocky. Even Indians are surprised with its governance style in which institutions play second fiddle to the prime minister’s office and his small coterie.

But then realism and power politics is about increasing the cost for the other, not your own. Publicly parading those who are recognised internationally as terrorists or being seen as linked to these elements has negative implications. Some battles can become expensive even before reaching the actual battleground.

Tuvaluan wrote:

@praveenswami Aug 28
Must we talk? Fab stuff from Ayesha Siddiqa on the India-Pakistan talks | http://bit.ly/1LDhoET

The failed National Security Advisers’ (NSA) talks indicate that Islamabad is now dealing with a different kind of government in New Delhi. It is unrelenting, unforgiving and cocky. Even Indians are surprised with its governance style in which institutions play second fiddle to the prime minister’s office and his small coterie.

BlackHat
Aug 27, 2015 - 8:11AM
Reply
This is just a suggestion. By what the author is saying, it seems, before having a dialog between the governments of Pakistan and India, it is far more important to have a dialog between the government of Pakistan and the Pakistan Army to discuss all “outstanding issues”.
The pattern is very clear, when things go right, the Army takes credit, when things go wrong, civilian prime minister gets the blame (to such an extent that many think the PM is a plain idiot). In fact, it is the Army which is holding the civilian government hostage along with the people, the country, the region and the world. There will be no progress until civilian supremacy is firmly established.

This is absurd as CBMs are meant to create the environment for dispute resolution and must precede the latter. Special representatives must be appointed to deal with disputes, out of public view, via a back channel. Meanwhile, the Foreign Secretaries/Ministers can quickly finalise CBMs that are mature for delivery. Terror issues can be handed over to the intelligence chiefs of the two nations.

September-end, the two PMs will be in New York. They have an opportunity to break the logjam. PM Nawaz Sharif must refrain from playing to the international gallery. PM Modi needs to retrieve his Pakistan policy from the intelligence-security lobby for a safer South Asia.

svinayak wrote:

BlackHat
Aug 27, 2015 - 8:11AM
Reply
This is just a suggestion. By what the author is saying, it seems, before having a dialog between the governments of Pakistan and India, it is far more important to have a dialog between the government of Pakistan and the Pakistan Army to discuss all “outstanding issues”.
The pattern is very clear, when things go right, the Army takes credit, when things go wrong, civilian prime minister gets the blame (to such an extent that many think the PM is a plain idiot). In fact, it is the Army which is holding the civilian government hostage along with the people, the country, the region and the world. There will be no progress until civilian supremacy is firmly established.

JE Menon wrote:Ok boys, even I'm getting confused now. Someone kindly confirm:

1. Musharaff = Oiseaule
2. Pakistan = TOIlet
3. Pakistaniyat = Shyte

A_Gupta wrote:Meanwhile in Pakistan:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/national/0 ... an-india-s

Pakistan's missile and nuclear system are much advanced than that of India, said Dr Samar Mubrakmand – a veteran nuclear scientist.....He said that Pakistan was a peaceful country but if it wanted India can be eliminated from the world's map within a few seconds.

“jee haan, bilkul ho sakta hai (yes, absolutely possible)

Main nay apnay level per investigate kiya hai aur koi fraud waraud nahi kiya hai” (I have investigated the matter and there is no fraud involved).

“hum nay bhi iss pay kam karaya tha” (we had some work done on this too).

Tuvaluan wrote:KC Singh repeats the "India must talk to pakistan ASAP" already, and again repeats the claim made by Siddiqua that the NSA is overriding the IFS/MEA types and does not have their support.

http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/commen ... 27877.html

This is absurd as CBMs are meant to create the environment for dispute resolution and must precede the latter. Special representatives must be appointed to deal with disputes, out of public view, via a back channel. Meanwhile, the Foreign Secretaries/Ministers can quickly finalise CBMs that are mature for delivery. Terror issues can be handed over to the intelligence chiefs of the two nations.

September-end, the two PMs will be in New York. They have an opportunity to break the logjam. PM Nawaz Sharif must refrain from playing to the international gallery. PM Modi needs to retrieve his Pakistan policy from the intelligence-security lobby for a safer South Asia.

Rudradev, Please deconstruct and rebut this idiot.

Thanks in advance.

ramana

So KC Singh really thinks pakistan is interested in dialogue? Did they have advanced courses in Congenital Stupidity in the IFS school when KC Singh was in there? KC Singh must have aced that one, if so.

ramana wrote:Tuavalan, Read the message. The guy Blackhat is being sarcastic and saying TSP needs to have talks between themselves before they want to have talks with India.

The pattern is very clear, when things go right, the Army takes credit, when things go wrong, civilian prime minister gets the blame (to such an extent that many think the PM is a plain idiot). In fact, it is the Army which is holding the civilian government hostage along with the people, the country, the region and the world.

ramana wrote:Tuavalan, Read the message. The guy Blackhat is being sarcastic and saying TSP needs to have talks between themselves before they want to have talks with India.

K.C. Singh type of sarkari babus who got in by influence in the UPSC are just that, They want pomp and pelf and no substance. An unlearning system will collapse.

I think Swami is US compromised just like Rajamohan and will sing to HMV like the kutta.

So KC Singh really thinks pakistan is interested in dialogue? Did they have advanced courses in Congenital Stupidity in the IFS school when KC Singh was in there? KC Singh must have aced that one, if so.

Nawaz Sharif is no less hostile to India than the paki army --- this guy makes it seem as if NS and the paki civilian establishment will actually turn around 180 degrees. The reality is that NS disbursed 30+ crore paki rupees to the Lashkar-e-toiba after he became PM, and the paki civilian establishment is as pro-jihadi as the army...only difference is that the Army has more firepower and control over jihadi groups than the civilian establishment, and these civilians can pretend to be reasonable because they know they are stuck for ever in a subservient role.

he pattern is very clear, when things go right, the Army takes credit, when things go wrong, civilian prime minister gets the blame (to such an extent that many think the PM is a plain idiot). In fact, it is the Army which is holding the civilian government hostage along with the people, the country, the region and the world.

svinayak wrote: NS is the new 'leader' who has established contact with NDA PM Vajpayee and BJP. He is the official leader who can make any NDA PM visit Pak.

abhijitm wrote:Heard many paki army walas act as middleman via Dubai for trade between india and pakistan.

CRamS wrote:Well I am not sure. I have interacted with a fair number of SKs, and it does it does not seem to me that at the pee-pee level, SKs and NKs harbor any deep rooted hatred or ill will and vice versa. Furthermore, it seems to me that NKs and SKs are pretty much the same people. This, unlike TSPians who have irreversible hatred for anything Hindu, and despite the colonial propaganda, WKK cowardly talk, Bollywood Bhajrangi Bhaijaan garbage, Indians and TSPians are not the same people. Completely different and on different glide paths.

Amber G. wrote: Oh Dr Samar Mubarakmand!!! The Paki's most celebrated

Vipul wrote:Question here is how could Manmohan Singh and S K Lambah so blatantly act against India's interests? Can they be tried under anti-national laws?

SSridhar wrote: Vipul, first of all, it is coming from Kasuri, a Paki. Then, I doubt if GoI would have been so dense when everything seemed to be stacked in favour of Pakistan and nothing at all for us. Let us therefore wait for a response from people involved.

Tuvaluan wrote:The wannabe-paki mofo Praveen "grandmother" Swami finds this bit by paki Ayesha Siddiqua "very reasonable", not too surprising. The lines of ex-MEA types of KC Singh's ilk are being repeated by both Swami and Siddiqua, and provides the pakis an excuse for their behavior.

@praveenswami Aug 28
Must we talk? Fab stuff from Ayesha Siddiqa on the India-Pakistan talks | http://bit.ly/1LDhoET

partha wrote:

Amber G. wrote: Oh Dr Samar Mubarakmand!!! The Paki's most celebrated

Didn't he also claim long back that there are trillions of tons of coal in Thar region of Pakistan and that it will inshallah taala solve all energy problems of Pakistan forever and got funds allocated for the project which is still going on(?) after so many years? The energy problem of course has gotten worse and is now at the mercy of Chinese.

The most recent version of the non-paper, drafted in early 2007, laid out several principles for a settlement, according to people who have seen the draft or have participated in the discussions about it. Kashmiris would be given special rights to move and trade freely on both sides of the Line of Control. Each of the former princely state’s distinct regions would receive a measure of autonomy—details would be negotiated later. Providing that violence declined, each side would gradually withdraw its troops from the region. At some point, the Line of Control might be acknowledged by both governments as an international border. It is not clear how firm a commitment on a final border the negotiators were prepared to make, or how long it would all take; one person involved suggested a time line of about ten to fifteen years.

One of the most difficult issues involved a plan to establish a joint body, made up of local Kashmiri leaders, Indians, and Pakistanis, to oversee issues that affected populations on both sides of the Line of Control, such as water rights. Pakistan sought something close to shared governance, with the Kashmiris taking a leading role; India, fearing a loss of sovereignty, wanted much less power-sharing. The envoys wrestled intensively over what language to use to describe the scope of this new body; the last draft termed it a “joint mechanism.”

Manmohan Singh’s government feared that successor Pakistani regimes would repudiate any Kashmir bargain forged by Musharraf, who had, after all, come to power in a coup. The Indians were not sure that a provisional peace deal could be protected “from the men of violence—on both sides,” the senior Indian official who was involved recalled. And they wondered whether the Pakistan Army had really embraced the non-paper framework or merely saw the talks as a ploy to buy time and win favor in Washington while continuing to support the jihadis. “I remember asking Tariq Aziz, ‘Is the Army on board? Right now?’ ” the senior official recalled. “As long as Musharraf was the chief, had the uniform, I think he had a valid answer. He said, ‘Yes, the chief is doing this.’ ”

As the peace talks stalled and Musharraf’s power waned during the first half of 2008, the I.S.I., or sections of it, appeared to be reënlisting jihadi groups. On July 7th, a suicide bomber rammed a car loaded with explosives into the gates of India’s Embassy in Kabul, killing fifty-four people, including the Indian defense attaché. The United States intercepted communications between active I.S.I. personnel and the Taliban-aligned network of Jalaluddin Haqqani, which is believed by U.S. military and intelligence officials to have carried out the Kabul Embassy attack. Haqqani has a long history of collaboration and contact with the I.S.I.; he was also a paid client of the Central Intelligence Agency during the late nineteen-eighties. On September 4th, less than three weeks after Musharraf’s resignation as Pakistan’s President, Kashmiri militant groups, including Lashkar-e-Taiba, appeared at a large open rally in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-held Kashmir; the Pakistan Army has a heavy presence in this city, and it is unlikely that such an event could have taken place without the I.S.I.’s sanction. The rally seemed designed to send a message across the Line of Control: Musharraf is gone, but the Kashmir war is alive.

“We asked them specifically, ‘How is all this going on if you say the Army’s on board?’ ” the senior Indian official recalled. “They kept saying, ‘Give us a chance. We need time. Yes, yes, the Army’s on board.’ ”

In October, Durrani, who was then Pakistan’s national-security adviser, travelled to New Delhi and met with members of India’s National Security Advisory Board. Indian Army officers presented “some very nice colored charts,” as Durrani put it, documenting recent increases in ceasefire violations and jihadi infiltrations along the Line of Control. Durrani found the charts “a bit one-sided,” but when he returned to Islamabad he sought explanations about the violations from Pakistan Army commanders. In January, Durrani was fired after making public statements that were seen in Pakistan as too accommodating of India.

Peregrine wrote: Methinks P. S. & A. S. are from King's College London

Kasuri has also stated that all these points were negotiated for 3 years in the back channel through US, Britain and EU intermediaries and they have a record of all the documents that were exchanged.

To refine the non-paper, Musharraf relied intuitively on his college friend Tariq Aziz, a civil servant who had made his career in Pakistan’s federal tax department, a bridge enthusiast who seems to some of his colleagues to live precariously on tobacco and adrenaline. Aziz’s Indian counterparts—J. N. Dixit, Singh’s national-security adviser, followed by Satinder Lambah—worked more formally. The Indians typically brought note-takers to the secret hotel sessions overseas, whereas Aziz travelled alone, rarely carried a briefcase, and often had to scribble his notes on hotel stationery. Altogether, there were about two dozen of these hotel sessions between 2004 and early 2007, according to people familiar with them.

Indians, on the other hand, could choose to engage with Pakistan without appearing to be bent on rubbing their neighbor’s nose in the ground. So far, there is little sign that rationality will overcome Pakistan’s hate towards India and India’s disdain for Pakistan.

And finally, the security establishment and it's fear of irrelevancy and demotion: no such luck. This is not a valid fear at all. Guess who will get all the Amul franchises when peace breaks out? Yes, cousin Jimmy and retired Brigadier uncle! Money can be made in many ways. You can make it in peace rather than war. Collect tolls. Distribute movies. Arrange concerts. Set up businesses.You know you can do it. And security? it will be an even bigger headache after we betray the two-nation theory and try to hold Pakistan together for Chinese transit companies and Qingchi makers. Endless Islamist, Baloch and Mohajir insurgencies loom on the horizon. Maybe even a Maoist one will break out if poor people get shafted extra-hard. Your jobs are safe.

This is the case for peace. What is the hardline case?

Note that the two sides do not have symmetrical aims. Pakistan's aim is to force India to make concessions using the threat of renewed support for Jihadis, Khalistanis, Maoists, NE Separatists etc, to force India to make concessions. India's aim is to prevent Pakistan from making such an attempt. In order to see decisive change in this respect, India also wants clear and decisive action against the Mumbai attackers. Such action is not just desirable because a heinous terrorist crime was committed and its perpetrators have not yet been punished (though I personally think that is a good aim in itself) but because such action would be the best evidence that Pakistan is no longer committed to the Jihadist option against India. If Pakistan does this, India will almost certainly be willing to make at least a cold peace. Thus, when I speak of an Indian hardline case, I do not mean the extreme Hindutvadi case of wishing to reabsorb Pakistan "with extreme prejudice".

1. There is another sense in which the Kashmir situation is asymmetrical, though you do allude to this indirectly. There is a real separatist movement in Indian Kashmir with real buy-in from a significant (possibly growing) segment of the population. There is no such separatist challenge on the Pakistani side. Thus, in real terms, Kashmir is a much more "actual" problem for India than for Pakistan. It is true that Pakistan has failed to change the status quo of the borders, but the price of that "failure" has been paid more by India than Pakistan - if we do not count the jihadi menace afflicting Pakistan now as part of that cost. As long as this calculus obtains, I don't see the true decision-makers on the Pakistani side budging. India may think it can counter this by supporting separatism elsewhere in Pakistan, but it just isn't the same.

2. The hysteria created by the Indian TV news media is truly a phenomenon in its own right. There is a corresponding process in Pakistan, but it pales in comparison. This may have gone into overdrive post-Mumbai, but is not caused by that horrific event. I have been watching the evolution of this ultra-hyper-super-duper-nationalist media in India with considerable horror for many years since long before Mumbai. Unlike the jingoism in the Pakistani media which is: a) mostly incompetent; and b) leavened by a fair amount of serious punditry, a lot (not all) of the TV news media on the Indian side is superficial and "Fox-y". The print media, in contrast, is much better - better than Pakistan's - but we all know that print is dead

The world can barely survive a dysfunctional Pakistan; it cannot survive a dysfunctional India. As such, India has a greater responsibility to remain serious, gracious and sagacious even in the face of provocation. When it too turns to provocation, I think it is time for everyone to get very nervous.

@acorn
Now that the talk of "limited war" has rattled the Pakistanis, let's go back to restoring economic growth & social capital.

‏@acorn
Nice to hear that [pakistan is ready for war]. But it doesn't make sense for India to go to war in the first place.