Strategic plans not based on outdated wisdom

Although the US State Department Spokesperson Jen Psaki has rebutted former ISI DG Durrani’s statement on Osama bin Laden, the DG ISPR, Major General Asim Bajwa’s explanation on the senior ex-serviceman on the same issue is more to the point and logical.
Psaki or for that matter the US State Department has rejected as entirely wrong a conjecture by Lt. Gen (R) Asad Durrani in a recent interview with Al-Jazeera that Pakistan might have known the location of bin Laden before the US special forces carried out the operation on May 1, 2011.
Bajwa says that Durrani was Director General of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) more than 20 years back, so there is little likelihood of the former spymaster being equipped with the latest, up-to-date information about the things as they have happened recently or as they are taking place during the current times.
The Intelligence veteran might be having inside information of the era when the agency had been under his command but expecting of him (Gen Durrani) to be in complete know of the latest, inside things, operational strategies and priorities and minute details of threats and challenges, was unnatural.
A similar reply was given by DG Bajwa a few months back during his interaction with media seniors when an editor of a prominent Urdu daily asked a question based on information given to him by another former DG of ISI, Lt Gen (R) Ehsanul Haq during a discussion. The DG ISPR neither challenged the credibility of the two Intelligence veterans nor did he doubt their knowledgeability or challenged their stature. He simply dealt with it logically and his answer was a natural answer because newer and newer developments are taking place every now and then in the country, especially in Fata and border areas and the dynamics that we experience now are altogether different from those of the past when the two ISI veterans had been holding the fort.
All this leads to one unambiguous conclusion that it is naiveté to try getting analysis (or to attempt analysis) of the happenings and their root causes on the basis of ‘outdated wisdom’. And not only that it is naivete, it is also dangerous. It is dangerous in the sense that it misleads the broad cross-section of society even though these dangerous effects are neutralized by the institutional wisdom. Yes, there does exist a factor which can be given the name of ‘institutional wisdom’. It has a significant role in the functioning of institutions all over the world including Pakistan. And in our institutional framework, it is comforting to note that strategization is not done on the basis of outdated wisdom or under the unverified, half-baked inferences and impressions. However, the practice of seeking analysis and guidance on different fora is continuing from such persons (or veterans) who are no more relevant to the area of strategic planning (and the rapidly changing ground realities attached to them). This is creating confusion among the public and although the strategic planners and operators are not influenced by these comparatively irrelevant viewpoints, the misled public opinion becomes an obstacle in efficient implementation of well-planned strategies.
Another key factor that needs to be discussed is the funding of terrorists by external quarters, as pinpointed by DG ISPR. No doubt, this type of financing ought to be stopped forthwith as the government has recently embarked on this path but one fact is being overlooked and that is the financial empowerment of armed extremists’ leaders. Given their outlawed armed might, safe havens and sanctuaries the extremists (especially their senior leadership and commanders) have been minting millions and billions for decades, even two, three decades before 9/11 by engaging in all sorts of illicit trade and business like kidnappings for ransom, car-lifting, high-handedness with and exploitation of business partners in settled areas, drug-pushing, human trafficking, weapons’ sale-purchase and fake currency (including some other fake things) and harbouring of desperadoes, killers and proclaimed offenders. All these activities constitute ‘lucrative’ businesses far more empowering than big industries. Then, for decades, these elements have been enjoying practical immunity against taxation or tax laws, what to talk of other laws of the land. The bare, undeniable fact known to every citizen of this country is that heads and second and third line of command of the militant outfits are either non-tax-paying millionaires or billionaires. And as much as they are more than self-sufficient in money that has helped them break the ‘external-aid-bowl’, they are equally more than self-sufficient in weaponry, both local and foreign as these elements have been building up and smuggling into the country armaments of all kinds and lethality since 1947 (not since 9/11) though Operation Zarb-e-Azb has destroyed much of their destructive equipment and apparatus.
One important myth that also deserves mention in this context is the rhetoric of militants as well as of their sympathizers about the killing of innocent Pakistani children at the hands of TTP militants or Mullah Fazlullah’s men. The rhetoric is that they kill Pak children to avenge the killing of their (the extremists in the tribal areas) children. This is a myth. Pakistani forces have never ever conducted any operation with the intention of killing innocent people, especially the children in areas under militants’ dominance. Moreover, Pakistani forces have never ever resorted to the first use of force (as a humanitarian measure and also as a precautionary measure to ensure minimum most collateral damage). And whenever the need has arisen under compulsion or in reaction, for an operation like Swat operation or Operation Zarb-e-Azb, the civilian population has been evacuated first.
A little study into the ground situation also reveals that none of the children of Mullah Fazlullah or any other leader of TTP or of other militant outfits have been killed in operations for which they claim to be on the vengeance track.