CPTnet::PAKISTAN REFLECTION: Resistance to military rule
"12 November 2007
[Note: The following piece by CPT Director Emeritus Gene Stoltzfus is adapted from a longer reflection, entitled "Pakistan," available at http://www.gstoltzfus.blogspot.com/]
In late 2001 and early 2002, I was in Pakistan as part of a trip to Afghanistan. The people I met in the northwest frontier city of Peshawar and surrounding areas are much on my mind these days as Pakistan continues its sixty-year long rhythm of military rule alternating with constitutional government.
Since Alexander the Great, foreign forces have met defeat at the hands Pashtun people in this border region. When their life was threatened by the Soviets in the 1980s, their fighters welcomed the outpouring of U.S.
support, largely channeled through Pakistan's military. Today the rebellious and independent inhabitants of those mountains have been temporarily renamed "Al Qaeda supporters" or "Taliban protectors," and the U.S. Special Forces plan to work with the Pakistani military to rid the area of "terrorists." The Pakistani generals know that quelling Pashtun resistance may be an unrealistic goal. But they are willing to carry on perfunctory counterinsurgency efforts to keep generous U.S. military aid flowing.
Resistance to emergency measures and military rule is not the sole prerogative of the Pakistani lawyers demanding constitutional rule, whom we have seen clashing with the police on the news. Pakistan has a civil society connected to the historic nonviolent struggle against British colonialism.
Badshah Khan was a devout Muslim Pashtun who worked with Gandhi as part of that effort. Khan founded the Khudai Khidmatgar (Servants of God), whose 100,000 participants became one of the largest nonviolent armies in history.
The organization's soldiers were legendary for dying at the hands of the British Empire's police and military.
When I visited Peshawar in 2001, I found threads of curiosity and interest in this nonviolent struggle weaving their way through Pakistan's world.
Little reported because of the world's fascination with terrorism and entertainment violence, the legacy of Badshah Khan survives, although the man and his nonviolent army are long forgotten. This legacy is a restraining influence on unbridled military domination, and gives legitimacy to Pakistani lawyers advocating the rule of law rather the rule of the gun.
One day in Peshawar, I went to visit a private organization that provided educational programs to remote villages in Afghanistan during the long night of Taliban rule. The director's first words to us were, "Peacemaker Teams, where have you been all these years?" We felt those words coming from the deepest chambers of his heart. He described the enormous levels of violence that people were going through and invited us to think together about peacemaking and building a culture of peace.
Now as the violence in Afghanistan increases, and the military gains even more power in Pakistan, I remember my Pashtun friends in Peshawar and Kabul.
I remember their invitation for us to come and work with them. And I remember our inability to respond then with teams of trained and committed people. The absence of sustained support for grassroots peacemaking is one factor that led to conditions for emergency military rule and initiatives to send U.S. Special Forces.
Oh Lord how long?"
[Note: The following piece by CPT Director Emeritus Gene Stoltzfus is adapted from a longer reflection, entitled "Pakistan," available at http://www.gstoltzfus.blogspot.com/]
In late 2001 and early 2002, I was in Pakistan as part of a trip to Afghanistan. The people I met in the northwest frontier city of Peshawar and surrounding areas are much on my mind these days as Pakistan continues its sixty-year long rhythm of military rule alternating with constitutional government.
Since Alexander the Great, foreign forces have met defeat at the hands Pashtun people in this border region. When their life was threatened by the Soviets in the 1980s, their fighters welcomed the outpouring of U.S.
support, largely channeled through Pakistan's military. Today the rebellious and independent inhabitants of those mountains have been temporarily renamed "Al Qaeda supporters" or "Taliban protectors," and the U.S. Special Forces plan to work with the Pakistani military to rid the area of "terrorists." The Pakistani generals know that quelling Pashtun resistance may be an unrealistic goal. But they are willing to carry on perfunctory counterinsurgency efforts to keep generous U.S. military aid flowing.
Resistance to emergency measures and military rule is not the sole prerogative of the Pakistani lawyers demanding constitutional rule, whom we have seen clashing with the police on the news. Pakistan has a civil society connected to the historic nonviolent struggle against British colonialism.
Badshah Khan was a devout Muslim Pashtun who worked with Gandhi as part of that effort. Khan founded the Khudai Khidmatgar (Servants of God), whose 100,000 participants became one of the largest nonviolent armies in history.
The organization's soldiers were legendary for dying at the hands of the British Empire's police and military.
When I visited Peshawar in 2001, I found threads of curiosity and interest in this nonviolent struggle weaving their way through Pakistan's world.
Little reported because of the world's fascination with terrorism and entertainment violence, the legacy of Badshah Khan survives, although the man and his nonviolent army are long forgotten. This legacy is a restraining influence on unbridled military domination, and gives legitimacy to Pakistani lawyers advocating the rule of law rather the rule of the gun.
One day in Peshawar, I went to visit a private organization that provided educational programs to remote villages in Afghanistan during the long night of Taliban rule. The director's first words to us were, "Peacemaker Teams, where have you been all these years?" We felt those words coming from the deepest chambers of his heart. He described the enormous levels of violence that people were going through and invited us to think together about peacemaking and building a culture of peace.
Now as the violence in Afghanistan increases, and the military gains even more power in Pakistan, I remember my Pashtun friends in Peshawar and Kabul.
I remember their invitation for us to come and work with them. And I remember our inability to respond then with teams of trained and committed people. The absence of sustained support for grassroots peacemaking is one factor that led to conditions for emergency military rule and initiatives to send U.S. Special Forces.
Oh Lord how long?"
posted by dm at 12:08 PM
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