11-19-2006, 07:22 AM
<b>Glory hunter </b>
<i>The army chief tells the PM about the limits of history making.</i><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->17 November 2006: Around the time of the Pakistan foreign minister, Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri's insistence that a Siachen "solution" was days away, the prime minister had a quiet meeting with the army chief, General J.J.Singh. No ministers were present. It was just the general and his prime minister.
It is not clear which side sought the meeting. It is not that both sides are equal. If Manmohan Singh asks to see J.J.Singh , the general has to go. But the absence of ministers, just two men in a serious discussion mode, especially about a critical Indian Army concern, and taking place in the background of Kasuri's triumphalist proclamations, leads to only one conclusion.
This may be a wrong conclusion. But it seems to us right. Which is that the army chief sought the meeting, and the PM had to agree to it. This is no bending of protocol. While the PM has the authority to summon his army chief, the chief has the responsibility to be able to speak freely to the head of government, speak his mind even. We have a great precedent. General Sam Maneckshaw disagreed with Indira Gandhi on the timing of the 1971 war. She agreed to his dates. And he won the war for her.
..............
<b>Official sources said that General Singh asked the PM why the Pakistanis wouldn't agree to the Indian demand. Manmohan Singh apparently had no answer. When the PM couldn't answer, it dawned on him the extent of mistrust. General Singh understood. He said that in this environment of mistrust, the army could not be expected to make sacrifices in Siachen</b>. He emphasized on "sacrifices". He added that the army would be deeply demoralized if orders went to vacate Siachen. He said more and this put the PM in retreat from any "out of box" solution he had dreamed up with General Parvez Musharraf in Havana.
The army has a distressing high suicide rate in Jammu and Kashmir. Officer-soldier relations are on watch. General Singh said that the army was in demoralization mode since the failed Operation Parakram. After Pakistani terrorists attacked Parliament House in December 2001, the then PM, A.B.Vajpayee, ordered the largest mobilization of the Indian Army since the Second World War. Once mobilized, under intense US pressure, Vajpayee got them stuck on the frontiers with Pakistan. For nearly nine months, the army stood deployed without a shot fired. The then army chief, General S.Padmanabhan, was deeply distressed, and subsequently fell out with the government.
<b>That failed Operation Parakram has rankled with the military brass since. It lost India its last lever against Pakistani terrorism</b>. With that precedent, it was clear India could never mobilize against Pakistan without the world exerting pressure, and we succumbing to it. General Singh apparently said that the failure of Parakram had demoralized the army, and the subsequent happenings in J and K. <b>He said the army was finding it increasingly difficult to operate under this suspense of peace now, peace not now, even while terrorist infiltration was on the rise.</b>
<b>At some point, the PM said the government was still trying to understand Musharraf</b>. This is a man who grabbed power from an elected government in October 1999, and prosecuted the Kargil War months before that. He wowed Manmohan Singh in Havana, this Houdini who plays the ends against the middle, and is leading the US and Nato to destruction in Afghanistan, even while receiving US largesse (Commentary, " India & Chinese ambitions," 16 November 2006). After seven years in power, the government claims no continuous understanding of him. <b>And Manmohan Singh, who once famously said he could do business with Musharraf, now suddenly gets the cramps about the dictator. </b>
At this juncture, apparently General Singh said while the government cogitated on the trustworthiness of Musharraf, he be allowed to retain the status quo in Siachen. Officials don't say this. But anyone in the army chief's position would be barely able to disguise his contempt for a PM who fails to understand the snaky dictator of Pakistan.<b> With the army chief's forceful representation of the military objections to a Siachen withdrawal, the PM was forced on the backfoot</b>.
<b>On Siachen, the PM was willing to overrule the defence minister</b>. And he would not have listened to Pranab Mukherjee, who till recently held that post. Thus, General Singh had to do the tough articulation himself. <b>Once the PM realized the military disaster of vacating Siachen, the rest of the government went into denial mode.</b> Pranab was the first to scotch Kasuri's insistence on a Siachen "solution" within days. Others have followed.
<b>Why is Manmohan Singh hell bent on a Siachen withdrawal? Before he goes in 2009, he wants to make his mark in history. A deal with Pakistan, he is convinced, will get him into the history books.</b> So obsessed is he with making history, as Vajpayee disastrously was before him, Manmohan Singh is willing to court controversy and risks. <b>He is the cheapest kind of glory hunter we have. He forgets Nehru who came to grief hunting glory with the Chinese. </b>Manmohan Singh also disremembers Mrs Gandhi. She did what had to be done for the nation. The glory came on its own.
Nehru is fading away.
Indira Gandhi has grabbed history.
That's the way to go. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<i>The army chief tells the PM about the limits of history making.</i><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->17 November 2006: Around the time of the Pakistan foreign minister, Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri's insistence that a Siachen "solution" was days away, the prime minister had a quiet meeting with the army chief, General J.J.Singh. No ministers were present. It was just the general and his prime minister.
It is not clear which side sought the meeting. It is not that both sides are equal. If Manmohan Singh asks to see J.J.Singh , the general has to go. But the absence of ministers, just two men in a serious discussion mode, especially about a critical Indian Army concern, and taking place in the background of Kasuri's triumphalist proclamations, leads to only one conclusion.
This may be a wrong conclusion. But it seems to us right. Which is that the army chief sought the meeting, and the PM had to agree to it. This is no bending of protocol. While the PM has the authority to summon his army chief, the chief has the responsibility to be able to speak freely to the head of government, speak his mind even. We have a great precedent. General Sam Maneckshaw disagreed with Indira Gandhi on the timing of the 1971 war. She agreed to his dates. And he won the war for her.
..............
<b>Official sources said that General Singh asked the PM why the Pakistanis wouldn't agree to the Indian demand. Manmohan Singh apparently had no answer. When the PM couldn't answer, it dawned on him the extent of mistrust. General Singh understood. He said that in this environment of mistrust, the army could not be expected to make sacrifices in Siachen</b>. He emphasized on "sacrifices". He added that the army would be deeply demoralized if orders went to vacate Siachen. He said more and this put the PM in retreat from any "out of box" solution he had dreamed up with General Parvez Musharraf in Havana.
The army has a distressing high suicide rate in Jammu and Kashmir. Officer-soldier relations are on watch. General Singh said that the army was in demoralization mode since the failed Operation Parakram. After Pakistani terrorists attacked Parliament House in December 2001, the then PM, A.B.Vajpayee, ordered the largest mobilization of the Indian Army since the Second World War. Once mobilized, under intense US pressure, Vajpayee got them stuck on the frontiers with Pakistan. For nearly nine months, the army stood deployed without a shot fired. The then army chief, General S.Padmanabhan, was deeply distressed, and subsequently fell out with the government.
<b>That failed Operation Parakram has rankled with the military brass since. It lost India its last lever against Pakistani terrorism</b>. With that precedent, it was clear India could never mobilize against Pakistan without the world exerting pressure, and we succumbing to it. General Singh apparently said that the failure of Parakram had demoralized the army, and the subsequent happenings in J and K. <b>He said the army was finding it increasingly difficult to operate under this suspense of peace now, peace not now, even while terrorist infiltration was on the rise.</b>
<b>At some point, the PM said the government was still trying to understand Musharraf</b>. This is a man who grabbed power from an elected government in October 1999, and prosecuted the Kargil War months before that. He wowed Manmohan Singh in Havana, this Houdini who plays the ends against the middle, and is leading the US and Nato to destruction in Afghanistan, even while receiving US largesse (Commentary, " India & Chinese ambitions," 16 November 2006). After seven years in power, the government claims no continuous understanding of him. <b>And Manmohan Singh, who once famously said he could do business with Musharraf, now suddenly gets the cramps about the dictator. </b>
At this juncture, apparently General Singh said while the government cogitated on the trustworthiness of Musharraf, he be allowed to retain the status quo in Siachen. Officials don't say this. But anyone in the army chief's position would be barely able to disguise his contempt for a PM who fails to understand the snaky dictator of Pakistan.<b> With the army chief's forceful representation of the military objections to a Siachen withdrawal, the PM was forced on the backfoot</b>.
<b>On Siachen, the PM was willing to overrule the defence minister</b>. And he would not have listened to Pranab Mukherjee, who till recently held that post. Thus, General Singh had to do the tough articulation himself. <b>Once the PM realized the military disaster of vacating Siachen, the rest of the government went into denial mode.</b> Pranab was the first to scotch Kasuri's insistence on a Siachen "solution" within days. Others have followed.
<b>Why is Manmohan Singh hell bent on a Siachen withdrawal? Before he goes in 2009, he wants to make his mark in history. A deal with Pakistan, he is convinced, will get him into the history books.</b> So obsessed is he with making history, as Vajpayee disastrously was before him, Manmohan Singh is willing to court controversy and risks. <b>He is the cheapest kind of glory hunter we have. He forgets Nehru who came to grief hunting glory with the Chinese. </b>Manmohan Singh also disremembers Mrs Gandhi. She did what had to be done for the nation. The glory came on its own.
Nehru is fading away.
Indira Gandhi has grabbed history.
That's the way to go. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->