The armed forces of today are far superior to the ones that fought the 1965 and 1971 wars and are certainly far better than those in service in 2007, observed panelists of a meeting organised under the auspices of the Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors (CPNE) on Friday, according to a press release.
Expressing his views on the subject “The Transformation of the Army Post-2008 and Accelerating Post-2013”, Lt-Gen (r) Ali Kuli Khan said Pakistani armed forces were second to none in fighting militants and they had proven far better than the western armies fighting the self-styled Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and other militant factions without much success throughout the Middle East.
“The command of army is in professional hands now; there is line of senior officers capable of taking command from the present chief to carry on their legacy to future generation,” observed Kuli Khan, who is also the president of the Pakistan Ex-Servicemen Association (PESA).
The panelist was of the view that blaming the army alone for the fall of East Pakistan was not correct, and said “I do not want to start a blame game but the war in East Pakistan was lost even before it began. The army did make a lot of mistakes but unfortunately the military debacle overshadowed the political catastrophe building over years.” Kuli however observed that “our leaders have been robbing Pakistan and rampant corruption has damaged us beyond repair”.
Praising the army of today, Shuja Nawaz, author of “Crossed Swords”, said instead of relying on theoretical text books, real-life experience was being written by battle-hardened instructors. He said “the facets of war have now changed from conventional warfare to asymmetric warfare; this is reality to the hilt”.
Nawaz said the armed forces and people were together again as they were during the 1965 war and could now fight the enemy in a perfect unison inside and outside Pakistan. “As Commandant PMA, Gen Raheel Sharif started training of ‘quick reaction forces’ to deal with militants and terrorists. The present COAS today is a product of hard training and reflection of past experience,” he remarked.
Expressing similar views, CPNE President Dr Jabbar Khattak said the army was playing a positive role inside Pakistan in addition to their duties on the border.
Sharing his thoughts on the subject, Ikram Sehgal said that after 2008, there was a tremendous change in army’s achievements and that the army and paramilitary Rangers had done an exceedingly good job in Karachi. He said if the army was to succeed they must be sensitive to their credibility and must carry out self-accountability and rationalise some perquisites at the higher level.
