Sharjeel Shahab
18110227
Writing and Comm(sec-7)
Aamna Khalid Critique on “Wither Pakistan? A Five Year Forecast” “Islamic Republic of Pakistan”, the full name of this Islamic state clearly shows that Pakistan was bestowed by Allah to us for independent practicing of Islamic principles. After 60 years of sustenance, Pakistan has achieved the hallmark of being a dominant nuclear power but despite of being strong arsenal bank, terrorists have hit the state with full force and their atrocities have prevailed over most of the Northern areas of Pakistan. Pervez Hoodbhoy has written his article “whither Pakistan? A Five-Year Forecast” in this context and this article was published on 3rd June, 2009 in the magazine “Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists”. This was the time when Pak army was totally engaged in wiping out the terrorists from Northern Areas. Pervez Hoodbhoy is an eminent physicist and political-defense analyst, and his concentration in this article is quite coherent with the present condition of terrorism in Pakistan. The lack of interest of Army during the initial advancement of terrorists in Northern areas has led towards a serious demise of national interests. Although the writer has written this article in a great sequence and coherence and the various tactics used in this article urges reader to be convinced but the lack of evidence in the arguments , biased assumptions and inefficient solutions doubt the credibility of the author’s claim. This article discusses the invasion of Taliban and so called Mujahidins on the Northern areas of Pakistan like Swat, Malakand Division, Waziristan, and Buner etc. The author has reflected that these terrorists are being trained in the Madrassas of Pakistan by Mullahs, who are religious extremists and are misinterpreting the Islamic values of Jihad in training the adolescents. The rhetoric styles used by the author like “: The clouds hanging …….darker” (Paragraph 3) show that how progressively author describes the sensitivity of the issue. The writer has also used pathos to swing the moods of reader in paragraph 19 “Pakistan’s support lifeline must not be cut”. The specific annotation in this article is the statement of forecast made by American think-tanks, who predict the demise of Pakistan in the near future due the prevailing threats of TTPs. The author has also claimed that Army is responsible for the current strength of terrorists because it had not made any advancement in communicating with the terrorists during the time of their origin. The author’s view about the solution is to make an alliance with the America, India and other neighboring countries to eradicate terrorism from Pakistan. The author has also addressed the actual issues which should be pondered upon instead of terrorism, i.e. the economic issues and political aspects of Pakistan. The main audience of author is the people of Pakistan but somehow, he has also taken in account the global community as in (Paragraph16). The important feature of this article is that it has differentiated the TTP from Afghan Taliban, where Afghan Taliban are fighting against the American intruders while Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan are the tribal agents, being somehow produced in the madrassas. Whether directly or indirectly, most of the religious extremists are showing the virgin adolescents, the dreams of fairies which they will get as a reward from God after a suicide attack. US govt. has set economic sanctions on a madrassa in Peshawar as it was found to be engaged in developing terrorists in there. Lal Masjid is very famous for training women and children and it was demolished just because of the fact that it engaged in destroying certain buildings and flaring the oppression on the name of religion. These terrorists are dwelling in the mountains of Waziristan and it is very hard for the armed forces to get a clue of their presence. The TTPs are spread all over the northern mountain range and Northern cities of Pakistan and their network istrengthening since 2007. These terrorists have now placed their camps in southern Punjab by the name of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and such others like these. The article also refers to how the religious extremists have shown their rage towards education and hospitals, which clearly shows that their motives are never positive and they seem only to harm the roots of Pakistan. These terrorists were first considered to be fundamentalists and supported by general public but the terror attacks in Swat and Malakand had unveiled the true faces of these terrorists. The word “en masse” in paragraph 7 shows how brutally these terrorists had crashed the public and armed entities and while imposing their own form Islamic laws in these areas, they had led towards a devastation of socio-cultural community in Northern Areas. The destruction of schools in Northern Areas in a large number and forcing the women to wear hijab is seriously a thrust of forcing the nation to become extremist. These terrorists want an anti-secular state and even then they do not have any clear motive that why they are all doing this kind of brutality. Moreover, when talking about the schools, most of the co-education institutes had received serious threats from Taliban that their culture must be changed or these institutes will be bombarded. NUST, LUMS and other such institutes had received such threats. Only in June 2013, three schools were bombarded in KPK and a school principal was assassinated by terrorists. Now, there are such flaws in the article when the author is unable to give a logical reason. The author has described in paragraph 9 that army did not nurture the terrorists during their initial outbreak but reality is that Taliban never wanted to talk to army and they opened fire on forces where they killed 23 soldiers during encounter with army troops. Pakistan Army had launched “Operation Rah-eNijat” in 2009 after having disagreements with tribal leaders involved in this fight, and today, “Operation Zarb-e-azb” continues to eradicate terrorism from Pakistan. This operation and other similar operations also started during the first attacks of terrorists but according to Hoodbhoy, the army is responsible for the increasing number of “Taliban” and “Mujahidins” because it did not communicate with the terrorists earlier. Some of the Hoodbhoy’s statements are fallacious as they have been either countered or they lack evidence, as he has stated in paragraph 12 “Tribal insurgents cannot overrun Islamabad and Pakistan's main cities, which are protected by thousands of heavily armed military and paramilitary troops” which clearly shows that author is pretty firm on his believes that these insurgents cannot reach out towards the important and high security areas of Pakistan but the attacks on General Head Quarters (GHQ) Rawalpindi, Mehran Base and Chaklala Air Base has put a question mark on the author’s idea. These places are the most critical places with respect to the Army’s major defense related areas and these areas have the highest security that it is most improbable to cross the check posts of these places but then the terrorists break into these places and hit the most secured territories under Army. He has also indicated towards some “”rogue elements” in the same paragraph 12 which implies that there are some religious extremists in the army who are responsible for these attacks on army areas because these areas are under strict surveillance of armed forces and breaking the locks of army is only possible if someone does so from the inside. This statement of Hoodbhoy seems fragile as there is no proof that any army officer was involved in these activities. Now coming towards the biased statement that the author made i.e. the author has only depicted the American view about the terrorism in Pakistan. Here, we cannot forget the fact America made alliance with Pakistan to break down Soviet Union and at that time, America ordered Pakistan to produce the tribal insurgents which it named as Mujahidins and the fight was called Jihad. America after completion of its goal, left Pakistan behind to suffer with the post-war circumstances. The result was furious and all those Mujahdins which Pakistan produced went against Pakistan as they were misused by Americans on the behalf of Pakistan’s government and army. America portrayed Pakistan as a terrorist country and spoiled its image in front of global community. Pakistan had to face this loss and up till today, Pakistan is engaged in a war with those Mujahidins and America calls it a war against terror. However, even If yet someone believes that Pakistan is yet a country promoting war, terror, rage and harassment, then he/she must take in account for the history of Soviet Union break down and then he will come to know that who is the real terrorist. The solution devised by the author is not suitable at this moment because our nation is Anti-American but the author is only taking the political scenario of Pakistan in account, where our government has somehow managed to establish good relations with the American president. The author is only looking at one side of the picture, where a healthy relation between the ministries of both countries are depicted and America is being portrayed as the only Omnipotent country, which feels for Pakistan and really wants to help it. Giving aids and calling Pakistanis “terrorists” at the same time, is not acceptable by the nation. Drone attacks are done blindly on the Northern areas wherever any house or shelter is detected and many innocent people have lost their lives in these brutal attacks by America in the name of fighting against terrorism. Civil arrogance has flared up against America after such a response from this country and now, it is better to keep America out of this issue. In such circumstances, proposing a reductionist solution where alliance with America is the only way to eradicate terrorism from the root is not acceptable. Also, the neighboring countries have not taken any positive step against terrorism in Pakistan so far, so we can only expect to wait for their modesty.
However, the author has written a well-organized article and the structure of the article is coherent. The reader seems to be bound to the author’s ideas due to the issue raised in the article and the arguments made. This article is yet a need for the current era of Pakistan because the terrorism has not diminished yet but because of the generalized assumptions and lack of evidence in the arguments, the article yet seems to be a question in the head of the reader. Terrorism has not ended yet. After beautifully describing the problem, the author has stuck into an inappropriate solution which is not feasible for Pakistan at current.

-:Work cited Page:-
1. "US Names Peshawar Madrassa as 'terror Training Center'" N.p., 20 Aug. 2013. Web. 3 Dec. 2014. <http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dawn.com%2Fnews%2F1037141>
2. PEHRC Releases Full List of "Terrorist Incidents in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa since PTI Came to Power in June 2013." LUBP. N.p., 7 Feb. 2014. Web. 02 Dec. 2014. <https://lubpak.com/archives/304005>
3. Roggio, Bill. "Taliban, Pakistani Army Clash in Swat and Shangla." Taliban, Pakistani Army Clash in Swat and Shangla Read More: Http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2007/11/taliban_pakistani_ar_1.php#ixzz3KpZ9sexC. N.p., 15 Nov. 2007. Web. <www.longwarjournal.org>.
4. Hoodbhoy, Pervez. "Search." Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. N.p., 3 June 2009. Web. 03 Dec. 2014. <http://thebulletin.org/whither-pakistan-five-year-forecasthttp://thebulletin.org/whither-pakistan-five-year-forecast>