Good point. Macaulay’s colonial educational strategy for spawning euro-centric desi house slaves shamefully continues to work even after decades of “independence”.

I honestly don’t know, but I would guess that it would be political suicide for a regime still trying to find its feet (they’re trying to impeach Musharraf…I doubt they want to order the army ANYWHERE right now), that the conception of “order” here might need to be modified to more closely resemble whatever the status quo is in NWFP , and that it might have severe implications on the ability of Pakistan to hold together. Simply put, it usually doesn’t work if you try to impose state control through force when you don’t have the money and national ideology to maintain it. And this is assuming a unified state organization – which Pakistan clearly doesn’t have, whatever the different agendas might be of the different political parties, parts of the military, ISI, the local leaders there, not to mention the groups in Afghanistan. What’s victory for some parties might be defeat for others.

Simply put, why would Pakistan’s civilian government put its neck out as you’re suggesting unless it is forced to? And if it is reluctant (with good reason) and forced to through threat of force or loss of aid, what will happen to Pakistan? But again, this is pure speculation and conjecture – I’m sure someone else could provide more insightful analysis of it that’s based on stuff besides the random thoughts in one’s head

24 · Dr AmNonymous said

On a tangent (i.e. not directly related to your argument about NWFP), I just want to contest the comparison of the Mughal state to present-day nation-states in this analogy

Thank you for the thank you! My reference to the situation during the Mughals was merely in passing, because I had in fact been reading about this just a little bit earlier. It was not intended to set up a defensible analogy with present-day conceptions of sovereignty etc. The rest of the comment stands on its own without the reference to the Mughals. Thanks for the Irfan Habib insight, I will keep it in mind as I read more on the subject. I think the difference in authority structures between the rest of South Asia and the NWFP tribes came partly from the terrain. Traditional proto-state structures never got established – the kinship group was all there was. Given the nature of the terrain also, large land-holdings do not exist, or make sense, so that feudalism as we know it elsewhere in India and Pakistan, and which is the dominant form in the Indus Valley in Pakistan – never arose there. But the multi-level jirga system, that arose to regulate relationships between the tribes, approximates the Athenian conception of democracy quite well – participation and representation at the individual level, with the least amount of upward delegation. The much romanticized (individual and) tribal ‘honor’ codes also arose precisely because over-arching state structures don’t exist. Like in the Wild West, it simply doesn’t make sense not to be armed, or to appear to have even the slightest tolerance for the smallest slight, leave alone for the kowtowing, bullying or domination that is involved when dealing with a state, or a state functionary.

Also, the Loya Jirga judiciary system was introduced by the Mongolians. It resembles the Greek system, because you want it to. However, you could have also said that it resembles the Fulani’s code of tribal justice since all elements of society act as judges.

I meant the money and arms trail inside Pakistan. eg, Peshawar in NWFP and nearby Darra have open arms markets. The tribal areas might be outside the Pak army’s reach, but surely it can re-establish order here. If you cut off arms supply to Afghanistan, that is a huge victory, and not that out of reach. The Pak military did control these areas not so long ago, and still does to some extent.

I happen to believe that the U.S. pretty much bought permission to fire into the tribal areas by agreeing to upgrade Pakistan’s F-16. You cannot state that explicitly, but is the timing purely coincidental?

KXB, I think the F-16 deal (4 delivered to Pakistan) was a ‘consolation prize’ in view of the Indo-US nuclear deal. Pakistan wants one of its own, or at least, it wants to have India’s IAEA and NSG agreements loaded with severe conditions. It’s going to be a while before they get theirs. But they were persuaded to withdraw their motion in Vienna. The F-16 played a role. That’s the only timing that makes sense to me.

The ‘firing’ into the tribal areas has been going on for quite a while, almost since 2001. ‘Permission’ for that was ‘bought’ with the overall aid package from the US to Pakistan.

I have read this explanations of the NWFP and FATA, as the region that the Pakistan government does not have any power in. I feel that this is a convinient excuse. If the Pakistan Government does not have sovereignity over that area then why call it part of Pakistan?? Why not move to make them independant in a gradual process so that they can be dealth with as a nation??

RC, this may in fact happen. The ‘independent nation’ of Pakhtoonistan was in fact mooted in the late 1940s and 1950s, in part because Pakhtoons didn’t exactly like reporting to the Pakistan Government (then based in Karachi). They also probably wouldn’t have liked reporting to the Indian government in Delhi. The demand for Pakhtoonistan was articulated in some form by the ‘Frontier Gandhi’, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, who didn’t exactly get on with the Muslim League. At any rate the demand was suppressed by Pakistan, and the ISI was put into action to ‘manage’ the ‘separatist sentiment’ and the tribes. Much repression followed.

Six decades later, Khan Sahib’s grandson Asfandyar Wali Khan is the leader of the Awami National Party, which rules in NWFP. He may have finally convinced the Pakistan Government to rename the NWFP (known as ‘suba-e-sarhad’ or ‘frontier province’ in Urdu) as ‘Pakhtoonkhwaa’ earlier this year – in part to give vent to (and co-opt within Pakistan) any feeling of ‘distinctness’ Pakhtoons might feel.

But I don’t think that’s the end of the story. The idea in some form may yet come back, some time in the future. Such a Pakhtoonkhwaa could be distinct from (but federated with) both a (slightly truncated) Pakistan and Afghanistan, as part of a larger South Asian Union. Maybe.

To the larger point – the writ of the Pakistan Government is in fact weaker in the NWFP, and more especially FATA. And when convenient, they will use that as an excuse. They will make it look like they have even less control than they do. But there should be nothing new in that, for seasoned observers like yourself!

In fact even the exasperation expressed by US publicly is a show to the American public to get more money because Bin Laden is not the only priority in that region but also the ability to exert military influence in the strait of Hormutz ,Iran and Israel. Everything has to mesh in grand strategy even amongst individual acts of violation of international law. Pakistan is just a pawn in the game and both US and Pak’s military/ISI are feeding each other under the table. The problem will the mess created and who will pay to clean up in the long term. Note as Gates has rightly said -

Secretary Gates, who has called for greater emphasis on diplomatic and economic tools to further American interests, warned in a speech this month about the “militarization” of American foreign policy and repeated his calls for building new civilian capacity for strengthening fragile states

And more of such brazen acts (though successful this time) can cause more problems in the long term especially if they leads to collateral damage.

The real reason I believe is that majority opinion in Pakistan might be same as the opinions of the people of FATA (except the Karachi elites living in the “defence colony”). As a result the central Pakistan government, be it military govt or civilian, always hides behind this argument that we cant do anything, because they are “un-governable”.