Is the rotten Pakistani Politics at daggers drawn?

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BrassTacks -- Pakistan’s National Security Analysis -- for those who are NOT deaf, dumb and blind!! 

Taking advantage of the anarchy, chaos, confusion and weakest leadership in Pakistan, Indian tried to change the geography of the Line of Control on the Kashmir front. A short, fierce battle ensued but Indians failed and were pushed back though the environment in the area remains tense. For many months now, Indians have been focusing on supporting the insurgencies, TTP and BLA against Pakistan and had not been directly engaging Pakistan army on the eastern sector. This attempt by the Indians is a feeler to test the waters and the preparedness of Pak army. In the coming months, Indians will be conducting more on such probing attacks as the situation within Pakistan is expected to get more and more chaotic. 

With the political anarchy spreading across the entire country, the levels of violence, terrorism, urban insurgency and chaos is also rising exponentially. This week also, we saw insane levels of violence in every corner of the country. There is definitely urgency within the insurgents to exploit the political and judicial anarchy.  Security forces are fighting back with all the resources in a war which is a high intensity conflict in an urban environment. From jet fighters to special operations by covert means, all axis of force is being deployed. 

There is no doubt that the CIA backed TTP has been badly bruised and pushed back into Afghanistan after a long bloody slog by the Pakistan army. Now the insurgent group is weakened, isolated, dislocated and suing for peace to gain time to regroup. Signing any peace deals with the dreaded terrorist group when they are at their weakest would be a catastrophic military blunder and army is cautioning the government not to rush into any offer by the militants. 

But the mission of Pakistan army has been made near to impossible by direct CIA involvement to destroy any pro-Pakistan assets in the region to fight the TTP. There is absolutely no doubt now that CIA is fighting Pakistan through the proxies of TTP and BLA and is actively eliminating all those tribals who sign peace deals with Pakistan or show their willingness to fight the TTP. This treacherous betrayal by the CIA is still NOT acknowledged at the official levels though everyone knows about it at all levels. The secretary defense Lt General Asif Yasin Malik had even mentioned this last week. 

This week, CIA eliminated a strong pro-Pakistan local militant commander, Mullah Nazeer, who had earlier survived an assassinating attempt by the TTP. Once TTP failed, CIA sent in a drone to finish the job. In another attack, another pro-Pakistan commander belonging to Hafiz Gul Bahadur group was targeted and eliminated. It is actually that dirty war where CIA is directly fighting Pakistan but the government and the army leadership still remain silent. 

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While the 4th and 5th generation wars rage within Pakistan, the politicians remain busy in petty squabbles, power grabbing, turf wars and preparing for elections, creating more and more anarchy every day. There is absolutely no concern for the national security, economic collapse or the political or ideological vision. It is a fish market with a bloody touch. MQM and the new entrant Dr. Tahir ul Qadri are threatening a “drone attack” on Pakistan within the next week and turning Islamabad into another Tehreer square.  The ruling PPP’s alliance with other parties is now in a chaos also with all other parties flexing their muscles and looking for best opportunities to grab more power and wealth. Downright dirty it is. Zardari is genuinely concerned now as the date of the “long march” approaches. 

Meanwhile, the common citizens and the society suffer staggeringly as the government destroys the last remnants of the state and the economy. It is an artificially created crisis of gas to protect and “bless” the cartels in power to make windfall profits through imports of oil. 

As the “last straw” on the camel’s back, the government plans to deploy 150,000 troops for election duties, drawing the already over stretched army from counter insurgency operations and defense of the country on the East. Drawing such a huge number of troops from the strategic reserves or from the active duty troops would mean depleting the national defense to dangerous levels. For now, Pakistan army is going along the PPP regime’s plans but in our assessment this is a fatal mistake which will have staggeringly high cost later on. 

The next two weeks would be very critical and decisive in the country. On January 14th, “tehreer square” styled sit-in is planned in Islamabad by “millions” of followers of Altaf Hussian and Tahir ul Qadri – the gangster and the priest have joined hands in a most bizarre alliance which is threatening not just the remains of the government but also the entire decayed political system! 

If the march goes ahead, then the field would be open for all forces to intervene. The terrorists would have the sitting ducks to target. The government would deploy its resources to stop the marchers from reaching the parliament. Army would watch in silence with troops ready close by for any intervention if needed. 

We would advice no traveling even within Islamabad after 12th January. The game is wide open now but the government and the judiciary as well as the media and the army remain focused on the elections for now or the spoilers who have come from outside to change the rules of the game. The national security and the 4th and 5th generation war is definitely not the priority of any of the power brokers for now. That is the real tragedy.

(By Zaid Hamid)

Pakistan Cyber Force

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