Fighting Someone Else’s War

[marmar]

From Dawn, via Truthdig:



Fighting Someone Else’s War


Posted on Sep 5, 2007
Ayaz Amir

Originally published in Dawn.

The war the Pakistan army is being made to fight in the two Waziristans is not our war. It is a war calibrated to an American agenda. Pakistan being asked to pull the chestnuts out of a fire the Americans have started.

Yet so helpless is this government, so tightly held in America’s embrace, that it can do nothing. Even if it wants to, it cannot break free from this suffocating relationship, more like bondage, which is costing us dearly and will cost us more as time passes.

This is a war for Pakistan’s soul, we are told, a war between the forces of moderation and extremism. This is self-serving nonsense served up as justification for performing mercenary duty in defence of American interests.

Mercenary? Yes, mercenary, the Musharraf regime receiving about 100 million dollars a month in return for its military services to the United States. (Where this money goes and how it is accounted for few people outside the defence ministry or General Headquarters know.)

This is in addition to the nearly 700 million dollars annual subsidy Pakistan receives as part of the five-year military-cum-economic package concluded after 9/11. Into the equation must also be put the Bush administration’s political backing for the Musharraf regime. Indeed, what keeps Musharraf in power is control of the army plus American largesse.

But there is a price to pay for this alliance and it comes in the form of fighting a war against one’s own people. Close to 80,000 fighting men are now deployed in the tribal areas pursuing the ghostly shadows of al-Qaida and the Taliban. In this undeclared war a thousand soldiers have already lost their lives. For what?

The ultimate sacrifice is, of course, part of a soldier’s covenant when he signs up for service. But the ultimate sacrifice is for defending the fatherland, not fighting alien wars. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070905_fighting_someone_elses_war/