The 6th of September is being celebrated every year to pay homage to our Shuhada and Ghazis who stood steadfast in of the wake of heavy odds to defeat India which had enjoyed overwhelming numerical and technological superiority. No doubt the day holds a significant place in the history of our country, when Pakistan’s courageous armed forces and the entire nation stood united in 1965 for the defence of the homeland in thwarting the nefarious designs of the enemy which had threatened the territorial integrity of our beloved country through an allout war. This time, the day had come at a time when we are at war internally and externally, while enemy is different, waging a different war. Pakistan’s armed forces which have successfully achieved a landmark victory by dismantling the command and control structure of the Taliban in Swat, Dir and Buner, forcing them either to flee or surrender are now fighting in the South Waziristan.

Unlike the past, our security forces are facing boldly an invisible enemy—the militants who mostly fight anonymously. Their command and control system is still not completely known even to the US-led powerful states which have failed for the last eight years in fighting these insurgents who act upon the strategy of ambush attacks and suicide bombers as found in case of Afghanistan. Instead, within a very short time of four months, Pakistan’s armed forces and intelligence agencies have broken the backbone of the Taliban militants and suicide bombers. In the last six weeks, surrender of militants’ commanders and arrest of a number of suicide bombers, foiling their attempts verify this fact. It is notable that military commanders and strategists of warfare give credit to moral force, being far more important to victory than physical force. Clausewitz puts it this way, “physical force is a factor in war only as long as it remains animated by moral force…the physical force seems little more than the wooden hilt, while moral factors are the precious metal, the real weapon.” In his book “Fighting Power: German and US Army Performance, 1939-1945”, Martin van Creveld identifies the elements of moral force, whom he calls “fighting power… cohesion, morale, courage and toughness, the willingness to fight and the readiness, if necessary, to die.” There is no doubt that such elements like will to fight and moral force have been more found in Pakistan’s defence forces than the US military troopers who have badly failed in fighting the insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact, they mostly depend upon sophisticated arms and weapons, while Pak Army mostly depends upon moral courage. In this regard, many soldiers of our armed forces have scarified their lives for the integration of the country during this new style war, and compelled the militants to escape or run from the war-zones.

At present, although our armed forces and security agencies are engaged in fighting a different enemy, yet every citizen of Pakistan is also at war. It was owing to the brutal acts of the Taliban that majority of the Pakistani people, civil societies and religious parties including PPP, PML-N and ANP backed the military operations which were launched to restore peace in the terror-hit areas and to establish the writ of the government. The general masses of the affected region and the IDPs, themselves, wanted that our security forces must eliminate Talibanisation totally. They know very well as to who is responsible for their plight. The different war which every Pakistani has been facing is not confined to militancy only, there are a number of external elements like India, Israel and America whose secret agencies are in collusion to destabilize Pakistan. In the past few years, nefarious designs of these foreign elements can be gauged from a number of anti-Pakistan developments like insurgency in the Frontier Province and separatism in Balochistan coupled with subversive acts all over the country. In fact, saboteurs trained in Afghanistan with money and weapons in their hands are being inserted into Pakistan to aggravate extremist passions and to feed into the religious movements including separatist elements in NWFP and Balochistan.

Regarding the ongoing military operations, ISPR spokesman, Maj-Gen. Athar Abbas has repeatedly revealed evidence in connection with foreign agents, infiltrating from Afghanistan in helping the militants in NWFP and Balochistan. Besides, Indian pressure on Islamabad in relation to Mumbai carnage through self-concocted evidence, blame-game, propagating false links between our Intelligence agency, ISI and Al-Qaeda-related Taliban, intermittent drone strikes on FATA, accusation of cross border terrorism etc. clearly show future aims of the US-led countries which want to ‘denuclearise’ Pakistan.

Unfortunately, it is due to lack of unity among some politicians and leaders entailing propaganda campaign of internal and external hostile elements against Pak Army and ISI that foreign opportunists have been manipulating the chaotic situation of Pakistan in order to fulfill their secret agenda.

However, today our nation stands at the crossroads of its destiny, facing multidimensional challenges to the security of the country which are themselves part of this new kind of war in the 21st century In this connection, the Defence Day serves as a motivating force for the civil and military personnel in giving new lessons in fighting the new dangers at this critical juncture. On this occasion, by imbibing the 1965 spirit of unity, if our defence forces can cope with internal and external threats which are not only worrying all the citizens, but also putting the very integration of the state at stake as to why every one cannot consider himself as a soldier. For example, terrorist-experts agree that there is no way-out to control the suicide attacks. Although our army, ISI and other security agencies have broken the network of the militants due to their coordination and level of suicide events have been reduced to the minimum as compared to the past, yet all this demands cooperation of general masses. In this sense, every one is at war against internal and external enemies.

Meanwhile, being a professional soldier, Chief of Army Staff, General Ashfaq Pervaiz Kiyani had already determined the new role of the army by de-linking it from the civil affairs. It could be judged from the recent past when the crisis had deepened between President Asif Ali Zardari and Nawaz Sharif, the Chief of PML-N, who started a long March from Lahore to Islamabad to support the cause of lawyers—till the restoration of the sacked Chief Justice of Supreme Court, Muhammad Iftikhar Chaudhry as the government was unwillingly to accept the demands.

While the ongoing multi-faceted crises have enveloped the country from all sides, during this Defence Day of Pakistan, we must reflect a greater spirit of cooperation and courage, learning lessons from the events of September 1965, when the major factor which led to our success was the fact that the nation and the armed forces stood as an united entity by displaying the principles of Unity, Faith and Discipline given to us by the Father of the Nation, Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Today in wake of the different conflict of history, an impregnable defence of the country demands that there must be a strong coordination among our defence forces to cope with new threats to the security of Pakistan. Learning a positive lesson from the past memories, the entire nation along with armed forces must pledge on the Defence Day to uphold the dignity and sovereignty of Pakistan at every cost as we are at war.


Pakistan Observer