Readers – After a few personal posts, I am back to politics and punditry. This post is inspired a little bit by and relevant to my current immediate surroundings in Pakistan. It intends to provide a balanced perspective on the Pakistan Army, an institution which is either altogether loved, or entirely despised. Enjoy the read – come to the center!
The Army is the single most powerful institution in Pakistan. General Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani, the current Chief of Army Staff is the 29th most powerful person in the world according to Forbes magazine, ahead of anyone else in Pakistan. He beat Mark Zuckerberg (of Facebook) by 11 places – take that Dogbert (See Exhibit A). And often, with great power follows great hatred. The Army was at one point, beyond doubt, the single most despised institution in the country (at the tail-end of Musharraf’s rule). Some still harbor hatred against it with the same zeal, although much of strong hatred against it has since receded. But at the same time, it has also been and continues to be a highly loved and respected institution. Love it or hate it – people hold strong perspectives on it.
Speaking of love for the Army, yesterday was the 6th of September, traditionally a public holiday in Pakistan, celebrated as “Defense Day”. This was the day in 1965 when the Pakistan Army launched a successful campaign to defend Lahore against Indian attack (after first “starting it” a month or so earlier, by trying to infiltrate into Indian Controlled Kashmir – Operation Gibraltar). Yesterday, as I was driving across Islamabad, the radio waves were crowded with patriotic and military songs, which I remember (rather fondly) from my childhood. Indeed, it’s every little Pakistani boy’s dream to join the Army and defend the country against India (I was part of this craziness as well – I must confess).
But what is “The Army” beyond the rather clichéd, tired and now largely irrelevant security considerations vis-à-vis India? Yes! Beyond the rhetoric, India is now too big and (let me say it) responsible for us to remain all obsessed with as a security threat. India has more important priorities now than conspiring against tired and failing old Pakistan to its west – such as lifting millions of its citizens out of poverty, and carving out a strong role for itself in a multi-polar world. Also, with nuclear weapons now in the game, the age old (but childish) dreams of conventional military gains against one another (such as those which inspired Operation Gibraltar in 1965, or the Kargil War as recently as 1999) need to be buried for good. Finally, with home grown terrorism now the most significant threat to Pakistan, some of which has been seeded by the Army, our national defense strategy and the role of the army within this strategy should change the story or the narrative which the Army plays to the people - or alternatively, which the people shape for the army (the way it should be).
Indeed the Army is a complex beast. As an objective and somewhat detached stakeholder in the game, it is very hard to hold a strong perspective on it (I am neither part of the Army, nor a full time civilian resident). On the one hand it has acted as a bit of a stabilizing and binding force for the country. On the other hand, it is accused of the same integrity issues as everyone else, and also of not being able to cleanly manage political intricacies and build institutions – a destabilizing force for the long-term. On the one hand, it is a huge resource drain, especially on an extremely poor country. On the other hand, its disciplined and stabilizing influence has been a wealth creator, especially in the land of Military Inc., a large empire of highly successful military assets and enterprises.
So what is the Army? It is the quintessential national middle-class institution in Pakistan. Wikipedia defines an institution as:
An institution is any structure or mechanism of social order and cooperation governing the behavior of a set of individuals within a given human community. Institutions are identified with a social purpose and permanence, transcending individual human lives and intentions, and with the making and enforcing of rules governing cooperative human behavior.
The Pakistan Army is a high disciplined and effective force which fits every word of the definition above. If there is any doubt what so ever, let’s contrast it with the Afghan, Iraq or Somali National Armies. In many ways, The Pakistan Army is the glue which holds the nation together – one of the reasons why Pakistan is not an Afghanistan, Iraq or Somalia (at least not yet – let’s be careful now – Somalia once had the largest and most powerful armies in Africa – now it’s a bunch of splintered tribes – the same pieces can be just as destructively potent as they were once united and powerful). Indeed, the US and its allies have been trying to build National Armies in these countries with little success, one of the reasons why they remain such fragile states. Most of all, the Pakistan Army holds years and years of tradition – with strong structures, well established processes and most important of all, good, strong values anchored around a shared sense of purpose.
Pakistan is often accused of being a “country” not a “nation”, with multiple ethnicities having been carved out of the Western belt of the Indian sub-continent and clubbed together (for example, it encompasses what some might consider random “Pashtun” areas, cut off from Afghanistan, and which are often questioned for their natural fit with the rest of the cocktail). Over the past 64 years or so, “nation building” has been centered largely around the threat from the enemy on the Eastern border, and The Army has been at the very heart of this nation building action. Also, as the paranoia from this threat built up, especially in the first two to three decades of the country’s existence (when it might actually have been real), the Army really got its act together and became inclusive and egalitarian – “values driven”, as I might deem it to be. Indeed, when the British managed the Army, and even a decade after they left the sub-continent, only designated “martial races” were allowed to be part of the military, an extension of the old caste practices of India. Over time, the Army was opened up to everyone. Farmers in the caste system, such as my tribe or family, were allowed to join. 2 of my 9 uncles joined the Army round about the time it was opened up to everyone, and served for over two decades each, something they take great pride in.
I contrast the Army with the other power players in Pakistan, which are largely devoid of institutional characteristics, especially good values. The (democratic) politicians started out largely as Feudal or Tribal lords and over time acquired industrial assets as well. Their power base is often anchored in the ignorance and tribalism of their “traditional” supporters and a vicious cycle of extracting rents from the system, and plugging them back to their support base (a sort of “leeching” on the system). The theocrats, which have never really been power players until recently (as they have started to use violence to try to impose their ideas and will as a minority on the majority), remain largely lost and without strategy or structure – they are short-sighted, disunited, and largely preoccupied with spreading hatred and violence to protect their petty little turfs.
With these sorts of players in the picture, it is no surprise that the Army has stepped in multiple times to replace civilian Governments to try to stabilize the country. I would strongly argue that they have had a stabilizing effect, at least in the short-term. The one intervention which happened in my lifetime was that of Musharraf. Now, I am no Musharraf supporter, but when he took over in 1999, the country was teetering on the brink of economic collapse. By 2005, it was ranked a top reformer by the World Bank, and was cited by Goldman Sachs as one of the 12 emerging markets to watch out for, a new set of future powerhouses in addition to the BRICs (GS got so carried away after the success of BRICs – most of those 12 countries have actually faltered).
Now, at the risk of passing judgment – Musharraf was a man with good intentions, trapped in the constraints of a hybrid regime, where many of these same crooked players influenced, or rather tightened his action space. That Government had to be disbanded. Civil society, which played a strong role in its disbandment, had to act. What followed it has been worse, much worse in fact, but nevertheless that Government (of Musharraf) had to be disbanded. Regardless of what you might think of Musharraf, one fact which is undeniable is that economic growth was strong under his government, as it has been under every military government, especially compared to civilian Governments (See Exhibit B). I pulled some data from the Federal Bureau of Statistics, which shows that not just overall GDP, but every component of GDP has grown strongly under military Governments, especially when compared with civilian Governments (See Exhibit C).
Now some accuse the Army of following short-term economic policies which stimulate “temporary” even “reversible” growth or worse, accuse it of fudging the numbers, but I think this is all hogwash. Simple counter argument – civilian Governments can do exactly the same thing, yet they continuously seem to plunge the economy into hopelessness (reminds me of that old saying – “Things can always get worse”). I got carried away with my analysis a little bit, and split economic performance by era of Government (See Exhibit D). Zia, Ayub and Musharraf are the top three performers in exactly that order. In sharp contrast, things have never been worse than the current era, which I have taken the liberty to label “Best revenge” (to quote a famous speech – “Democracy is the best revenge”). My conclusion – when the military is in power, animal spirits tend to pick up, and people seem to be ready to do business. A stabilizing force.
But the Army is also often accused of perpetuating many of the same ills which have been created by the civilian feudo-tribo-industrial power elite. Not only have they not used their windows in power as opportunities to carry out sweeping reforms, such as making the big push for universal high quality education (which shows their apathy), they have been accused of greed and corruption (which accuses them of lack of integrity). Whenever a civilian Government is toppled, virtually every senior bureaucratic officer is replaced by a Colonel, Brigadier or General, a practice which clearly does not help in sustainable institution or nation building. It is not easy, in fact it is impossible, to hold them accountable for gross corruption or misconduct, let alone their “actual performance” in these “civilian” positions.
And the Army has made several short-sighted tactical power plays in the political space, often seeding ethnic rifts, or worse terrorism and genocide. Indeed, many of Pakistan’s major issues today can be traced back to “the agencies”, whether it is the creation of the MQM, the gangsters who control Karachi today, and refuse to let it function humanely, or the creation of the Taliban, which we know all about. And let’s briefly mention the 1971 genocide in what was East Pakistan then, or Bangladesh today. So much concentrated power, especially when left unchecked, can be such a destabilizing force, especially in the long run.
In terms of resources, the Army is a huge burden on the national exchequer. It consumes 20% of the national budget. There is no good or productive service which the army is providing, so in economic terms this 20% is a “transfer payment” a pure tax or burden on the rest of the country. What the country spends on its defense amounts to roughly 3% of GDP. Now this is still lower than many countries such as the United States, Israel or South Korea – but still too much of a burden for a poor country like Pakistan. Education, which is the No. 1 investment a labor abundant country like Pakistan needs to make only gets 2% of GDP. Healthcare gets even less. When military expenses grow, as they have been in recent years, education and healthcare often have to suffer cuts.
Not only is this money not being spent productively, but some of the military traditions it is used to fund are fairly absurd – at least from my outside-in civilian lens. Walk into a military complex, even a non-military part of a garrison town in Pakistan, and you’ll find the bottom half of the barks of trees painted white, with a red stripe at the top edge of this white. Why are the trees painted red and white, when this is not how nature intended them to be? Because what else are all the soldiers going to do with all their free time. There are six hundred thousand of them, as a buffer for potential all-out conflict – they need to be provided with tasks to keep them sane. Who pays for the paint? The tax-payer.
On the other hand though, these garrison towns are impressive. As one of my cousins, who lives in DHA (or Defense Housing Authority) Lahore, interestingly pointed out a few years back, 90% of the top end residential developments in Pakistan today are either Army built or also Army managed. In fact, private real estate developers are fairly recent entrants into the market, after having been shown by the Army how value can be added to urban land. Most developments built or managed by civilian public institutions are falling apart, with Islamabad being the only notable exception. The Defense Housing Authoritys or DHAs are impressive. One cannot bribe their way to violating building codes, as is the case across virtually every civilian housing authority in the country. Parts of Karachi have been turned into high density eye sores, in violation of building codes and safety standards, because the discipline and core values are lacking in their management or core culture. I shudder to think what Karachi will go through the day an earth quake strikes. And it is highly likely to happen. Karachi lies bang on the intersection of the Indian, Euroasian and Middle-East tectonic plates. Not just any seismic zone – one of the most dangerous, densely populated, mismanaged and under-prepared seismic zones in the world.
And many of the Army Welfare Organizations are strong institutions in and of themselves, adding value to the Pakistani economy. These are manufacturing and service enterprises in such sectors as banking, insurance, cement manufacturing and even cereal processing. It’s not entirely clear whether all of them are sustainable on their own, given the lack of transparency around them (they could be getting subsidies from the Defense budget), but I highly doubt that very many of them are losing money. There is a book written by Dr. Aisha Siddiqua, a military analyst, titled “Military Inc.” which portrays a very negative image of these companies and this economic empire. But I take a more balanced, even favorable view. The Army imparts discipline and general management skills which are the foundation for any sustainable, even high performing enterprise. And if retired military professionals benefit from it (without dipping into the Defense budget), then it’s a win-win for all.
In conclusion, as polarizing an institution as the Army can be, it’s important to hold a balanced perspective on it. It deserves quite a bit of respect for being the only major functional and disciplined institution in the country. But it does wield significant power, and if that power is left unchecked, it can do more harm than good. And it’s our responsibility as members of the civil society to hold them in check – as we did towards the end of the Musharraf Government. Over time, we need to trim the army further, to reduce the burden it places on our national resources, and refocus it from the external threat on the Eastern border, to the external threat on the Western border, and the threat within. Should be do-able, if the Army is truly a reflection of our own security requirements and preferences as the civil society of this country (i.e. if the Army is not its own self-perpetuating power hungry monster machine, as some perceive it to be).
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