War of Attrition

While it's not exactly a war of attrition, there is little choice but to see the fight against the Taliban and the Pakistan state reach a logical end with control of all territory under the country's security forces and laws.

There will be many more terrorist attacks by the Taliban such as the one in the university in Islamabad. However, by attacking soft targets, the Taliban have shown their desperation. Universities across Pakistan have closed for the rest of the week as a result. However, the hardening perception against the Taliban only adds to the determination that this fight should continue till these terrorists are wiped out or made subservient to the laws of the Pakistan Constitution.

Till this is done, we'll just have to take the blows as they come.

Kerry-Lugar Bill: The cat out of the bag

President Zardari's been called a whole lot of things. Manipulative. Conniving. Corrupt. Devious. Shrewd.

Perhaps no one has felt the blows of these alleged traits more than the Pakistan Armed Forces after the passage of the Kerry-Lugar Bill. KLB will provide $1.5 Billion in annual assistance for five years to Pakistan. The problem however, for 'beggars who want to be choosers', is that KLB writes stipulations and conditions that need to be met for Congress to approve this aid every year. While there has been a lot of bru-ha-ha over these conditions in the Pakistan media calling the bill, drafted, signed and approved in a foreign land, as an act of 'selling the nation's sovereignty', the entity that has come out all guns blazing is the Pakistan Army.

The bill asks for various assurances that are more or less already in place. However, what disturbs the khakis is that the bill presses for an assurance that the Pakistan Army is under 'civilian control'. While this stipulation is a blatant act of reaching well into the sovereign realm of Pakistan the objective is something the 'civilian' governments of Pakistan have always had an impossible time in achieving.

The Army has called the shots in areas like the nuclear program, Kashmir policy as well as the policy for Afghanistan. It does not want to see an end to its jurisdiction in these areas.

Thus no surprise to see the armed establishment display horror at the passage of the Kerry-Lugar Bill that in no uncertain terms, delves into the sacred realm of the armed forces.

The opposition parties in Paksitan may cry foul, but the opposition that currently matters, PML-N is offering criticism that intentionally have no sting. It's leader Nawaz Sharif is safely away in London, away from the centers of storm. He thinks he is in a win-win situation. He failed to subdue the Army despite the 75% majority in parliament during his last stint in power. He now sees Zardari attempting it by bringing in the American 'carrot-and-stick' approach.

The Zardari-Army standoff cannot persist for too long. One of them will have to bow out or bow down. Nawaz would be happy with either, though I would assume he may be hoping that the Army, even if victorious, ends up significantly weakened in this stand-off.

The Pakistan parliament has asked that the 'disputed conditions' be scraped out. The American Congress has no real need to listen. The cat is out of the bag. The Army will unlikely stand for this and will make a move.

The contemptuous figure of Zardari has put his hand in the lion's den. While realizing that the center of power should be in the hands of the parliament, it would be a cruel twist if the current situation eventually results in a ubiquitous thief posthumously turning into a hero (after achieving 'martyrdom').

Waltz with Bashir

Waltz with Bashir. Just saw the film. The gut of the film is gut-wrenching. Perhaps because of the association so many more Palestineans than Israelis (my roomate and neighbors were Palestinian) I immediately took this film in the political context. But that personal bias only enhances my appreciation of this film and the people who made it.

Tim O'Brian un-peeling his journeys in Vietnam leads to this sense of alienation and loss. Perhaps I've forgotten many aspects from "The things they carried", but "Waltz..." leads you, rather hallucinates you and draws you to face a horrific tragedy that has been suppressed.

The Shatila and Sabra massacres being identified with pictures of Jewish Warsaw ghettos being cleaned by Nazis is meant to make a statement. "Waltz...", (as Ariel Sharon is no more) is a late but necessary movie - not for the world but for the Israelis. The narrator having 'forgotten' and failing to recollect the sequence of events, either willfully or through mental obstructions, reveals a nation trying to survive yet not lose its sense of self-conscious and more importantly humanity. The hidden/suppressed guilt of the documentary film maker is really a cry of a people of a nation who feel they cannot be seen to be weak and crying over a tragedy it was complicit in. Yet, it is a trauma that needs an outlet.

Then the sequences reminiscent of "Apocalypse Now" with cowboy-rock star soldiers was spectacular. How does one explain a war? Do you think that Vietnam's greatest cinematic gift is how it denied the celebration of war, of war heroes and rendered victory parades an exercise in the bizarre? It unburdened world's history and its consciousness from the tales of chivalry, of valiant warriors and their bravery in the battlefields.

Sure, we will still get lots of the old stuff, but post-Vietnam cinema has changed everything. Waltz with Bashir is another brilliant why.

[Response to an email to a friend.]