US Luxuries and Pakistani Compulsions

One of the biggest surprises of the 2003 Iraq war was how everything thing went as planned till an unexpected sand storm forced the US army to dig in and wait it out. This predictability irked the generals as their experience shows that in a combat zone nothing is expected to go as planned and something must be wrong if it was. Other Generals warned that the objective in Iraq should be clearly defined and once it is achieved the US must withdraw. Removing Saddam from power was a byproduct not the objective of the war as this could have been achieved without any incremental cost. Infact the US allowed Saddam to quell the 1991 uprising in Karbala by allowing Saddam's air force to operate despite the declaration of "No fly zones". We all know that no weapons of mass destruction was found either. Now six years later US finds itself with the huge burden of an expensive war with nothing positive to show for it.

Today we also find ourselves in an similar situation where we are fighting a war without a clearly defined enemy or a clearly defined objective. Depending whom you ask the enemy can range from the almost omnipotent abstraction known as the "hindu zionist" lobby to the CIA-RAW-MOSSAD nexus that has somehow converged on a single objective and support people who, if ideology means anything, are their sworn enemies. There are also the good Taliban and the bad Taliban, the Afghan Taliban and the Pakistani Taliban. One group also blames a
morally and financially bankrupt government as the real enemy that fails to stop terrorist attacks among other things. The definition of winning is also equally vague. Some claim that victory has been achieved and that all "backs that need to be broken" are already broken. Would victory be declared (by any side) when we have drawn a
line between us and them or continue to fight till every bolt in the jihadi machine has been identified and melted down. Would this be followed up by a comprehensive strategy to ensure that the mistakes of the past are never repeated and there are no rational reason for any one to take up arms against the state.

The last armed conflict on US soil ended in 1865 (Indian Wars of (1865–1870) should not be considered a war. Pearl Harbor (1941)and New York (2001) being two further exceptions). All US wars since then have been on foreign soils. Therefore, no matter how big the debacle there are always enough helicopters to fly from Saigon to waiting aircraft carriers in the South China Sea. This luxury allowed US forces fire bombed Dresden and Tokyo knowing fully well that no matter what the result of  second world war no retaliation of consequence was
possible.

Pakistanis don't have such concessions and an ill defined strategy is  already being translated into a rising body count. The death toll of  the 1965 India-Pakistan war is estimated to be about 6,800 on both sides. The known casualties during 2006-2008, by some estimates, is 17,000 dead (both sides) and as the figures for 2009 are tallied the number shall be well over 20,000.

This war even lacks a clear communication strategy. It does not even have a name. Where is the daily briefing given to the people of Pakistan about the progress of the war and where are the identities of the people who are attacked and where is the list of casualties (is there a plan to build a Black Wall)  that have been killed in this
conflict? Why are we not identify every spot where a suicide attack happened so that our children learn from our mistakes and hopefully never repeat them? The impression one gets is that this war is not a classic battle between good and evil but an embarrassing family feud in which only what cannot be hidden is known and no further discussion happens in polite circles at least. The consequence is a mixture of juicy intrigues, conspiracy theories and street rumor that can hardly be used for analysis. More problems are created by indecision than by
bad decisions and at the current death rate every hour spent in procrastination cost about 0.97 lives.