Notes in Anguish

It was towards the end of the 12th century that Genghis Khan united the Mongols, and forged from their ranks the most efficient and destructive army of the age. By the time this army had moved from the Pacific all the way to Hungary, millions upon millions had been beheaded, disemboweled, crippled, or made homeless.… →

Bajwa, having screwed Pakistan good and proper, has moved into his new house. And without loss of time, he has embarked on an exercise to repair his reputation. For this purpose, he invited the already charmed T.V anchor, Javed Choudhary, to his place to charm him all over again. And Javed Choudhary, the history buff… →

Today, Dec 27, 2023, the news of the passing of Brig Saadullah Khan, Hilal e Jurat, made the rounds. For those who knew him personally, his departure from the ranks of the mortals was nothing less than a deep and personal loss. This army produced no better soldier, and none brought such honour to the… →

I was transferred to the Pakistan Military Academy towards the end of Oct 1970. On Nov 12 the most devastating cyclone hit East Pakistan. By end Nov, 47th PMA, the course I was to take, reported to the Academy. My platoon received the largest number of Bengali cadets. And then we awaited the general elections… →

No general can prosecute a war when his soldiers are unwilling to fight. Good generalship is not only defined by victories won, but equally by defeats staved off. And often this is achieved by the generals having an accurate measure of the pulse of those who are under their command. Almost always those not in… →

Pakistan’s slide from an unhappy to a pitiful state continues unabated. Nothing better encapsulates the situation than, that ours is a country stripped of the rule of law, in which law and order are being enforced through bluster and illegal arm twisting with victims being chosen at random. The rule of law has been deliberately… →

Among the few “ideologically” driven supporters he can still count in his corner, Qazi Faiz Isa has long been projected as an indefatigable warrior in the cause of rule of law and constitutionalism. And he has not been shy of confessing that half a democracy is better than any dictatorship. I do not know where… →

The people of Gaza have lived under a brutal Israeli siege, in the world’s largest concentration camp, for the last 17 years. And periodically, in an act of resistance, they have hit back at the Israelis and drawn retaliation from them. Because Israel considers Palestinians to be sub-human, it has used the euphemism of “mowing… →

The course a country is set on cannot be corrected without implementation of the rule of law. In our case the biggest impediment in its way is mega theft. And mega theft leads directly to undermining the security of the state. There is a very strong connection between the three. Guarding state security has been… →

It was in 1299, from humble beginnings, that Osman1 laid the foundation of what was to become the mighty Ottoman Empire. But by the time of the First World War, after long expansion followed by a steady period of continuous dissipation, the Empire was in an advanced state of rot, and the sun was due… →

It was after World War II that the era of decolonization began. But following on its heels came the era of recolonization of the newly independent states. This did not involve invasion and takeover by armies, but subversion and enslavement by economic warfare. Among states thus taken over, some were extremely obliging and provided to… →

For years the generals of our army have decided our fate and our judges have been most obliging to them. Whenever the generals felt the need to step in and flex their muscles on a larger stage, the judges felt the need to fall in step. They bowed low, and invited them in on bended… →