By Pervez Hoodbhoy
10 October
2020
Gen Ayub
Khan, president of Pakistan 1958-1969, was a simple man. His solutions to
complex issues could sometimes take your breath away. On page 101 of Friends
Not Masters — his autobiography written while in office — he complains that
student indiscipline is rampant because “there are far too many students and
not enough buildings, laboratories, and libraries”.
File
photo | Pakistan PM Imran Khan with Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa |
Facebook/ImranKhanOfficial
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His
suggested fix: “One instructor on a platform with a loudspeaker can take a very
large body of students at one time, and just half an hour a day should build up
their bodies and minds, and take the devil out of them.”
Actually,
the business of purging devils is called exorcism, not education and sending PT
masters to colleges or universities is absurd. But Ayub Khan’s charming modesty
buys him reprieve. He readily admits that: “I was not a very bright student,
nor did I find studies a particularly absorbing occupation.” In 1926, his
father, a risaldar-major in the British Army, paid his fees for the Royal
Military Academy Sandhurst where “life was spartan” and there was much rough
and tumble among cadets. In keeping with the academy’s tradition to create a
privileged officer class, he was duly assigned a British soldier as orderly.
Ayub’s
cockeyed views on education owes to Sandhurst where physical drill and
discipline came first and foremost. This would ensure that “the cadet has a
graceful carriage, stands easy and erect, and shows by his bearing that he is
manly and self-reliant. Mr Molesworth, an English authority, has said: The
contrast between Hyperion and a Satyr is scarcely more striking than that which
exists between the loutish bearing of a Lancashire lad and the firm, respectful,
and self-respecting carriage of the same person after he has been disciplined
and polished by the drill.”
Had
Sandhurst-trained UK officers run British organisations they too might have
failed like PIA, PSM, etc.
Hyperion (a
deity who holds the cosmos in place) rather than Satyr (a goat-like man) was
how the handsome young Ayub thought of himself. Although he never won any war,
a strong self-image encouraged him into becoming the world’s first
self-declared field marshal. It also gave him sufficient confidence to launch
the coup of 1958, dismiss President Iskander Mirza from office, and spend the
next decade steering the country. While these were years of extraordinary
movement, they were not always in the right direction.
Ayub firmly
hitched Pakistan to the American wagon and, flush with American weapons,
launched Operation Gibraltar. This started the 1965 war but with all options
gone he had to end it inconclusively. He irreversibly alienated East Pakistan
from West Pakistan. In 1968, widespread agitation finally ended his so-called
Decade of Development. Nevertheless Ayub Khan is popularly rated higher than
the generals who succeeded him: Yahya Khan, Ziaul Haq, and Pervez Musharraf.
Fortunately,
British military academies have produced very few Ayub-like putschists.
Certainly several British officers must have had Ayub-sized egos. Many an
officer must have preened himself before a mirror and seen Hyperion there. But
a military coup in the British system was and remains unthinkable. Why?
Successful
societies know that those who fight wars well are not always best suited for
running industries, academia, or government. Therefore British military
officers, whether serving or retired, are not given preferential treatment
outside of their specific skills. It is broadly realised that men in uniform
can be heroic fighters in wartime but in other situations they can be just as
clueless and bureaucratic as their civilian counterparts.
Imagine for
a moment that the British military ran Britain or had a big hand in running it.
Would British Airways survive cut-throat competition if its CEO was a retired
RAF air marshal rather than some tech-savvy hi-fi business type? In working out
complicated Brexit policy options, would a retired lieutenant general negotiate
British interests better than a PhD in economics from Cambridge? Should the
British Electricity Authority look for some distinguished electrical engineer
or for a British army colonel instead? And would a Royal Navy admiral — serving
or retired — be best placed to protect Britain’s interests in North Sea oil?
Fortunately
for Britain, such an experiment has never been tried and military officers are
not automatically made heads of organisations upon retirement. Else the result
would be a graveyard of failing or flailing institutions similar to chronically
sick organisations such as Pakistan Steel Mills, PIA, Suparco, Wapda, PCSIR,
and countless others. In these places merit is regularly superseded not just at
the very top but inside departments as well.
Military
mindsets undeniably contain some exceptional qualities. The testing conditions
of war require that militaries develop a spectrum of capabilities stretching
from command and control to logistics and materiel management. Many develop
their own engineering and medical facilities that are very useful when a
natural or man-made disaster strikes. In fact, most countries have legislation
requiring armed forces to support civilian authorities during emergencies and
war.
But what
can keep a military from wandering into civilian and administrative affairs
during peacetime? At the end of World War II powerful militaries in the Western
world were flush with victory. Adoring publics showered rose petals upon hero
generals who, at some point, could have asserted themselves and become
dangerous. That is why president Harry Truman had to sack Gen Douglas
MacArthur. The political scientist Samuel Huntington wrote in 1957 that
asserting civilian control is crucial and requires professionalising the
military by setting it apart from the rest of society while teaching it to
execute but not formulate policy.
Although
military men in the age of electronic warfare have to be smarter and better
informed than their predecessors, a graduate from some military academy is no
substitute for those who have spent their careers honing specific skills in
academia, industry, commerce, and a plethora of technical fields.
All
Pakistani institutions are desperately short of competence and sorely need the
right people in the right places. Retired officers when put at the head of
organisations can make cosmetic changes and may superficially improve
institutional discipline but not much else. Soldiers should stick to what they
are good at and paid for — fighting wars rather than running businesses or
making movies.
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Pervez
Hoodbhoy is an Islamabad-based physicist and writer. Views are personal.
Original Headline: Pakistan’s retired officers
shouldn’t head civilian organisations. Military is only for war
Source: The Print
URL: https://newageislam.com/current-affairs/military-only-war,-running-industries,/d/123135
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