Swat is a disaster in all senses of the word. By not paying attention to credible intelligence reports about the activities of Maulana Fazlullah and his brutal henchmen, and the lamentations of civil society as to the danger of allowing the Talibaan free rein, we allowed this tragedy unfold to a bloody climax. Through the blood of our Shaheeds, both military and civilian we are paying the full price for vacillating. We have on our hands a human calamity of the greatest magnitude in the form of more than two million internally displaced persons (IDPs). One must ask ourselves what were our rulers upto in dereliction of their prime responsibility, protecting the life and property of our citi-rnzens? The Armed Forces have always done admirably in the field ie at the tactical level. In Swat itself the formations have fought extremely well, one has to question the strategy that allowed the insurgent leaders and a considerable number of their rank and file to escape retribution. The primary aim of counter-insurgency must be to eliminate the leaders and maximum of their cadres. One can only eulogize the sacrifices rendered by our young men on the battlefield, the officer-to-soldier combat ratio killed, which has normally been high in Pakistan during our wars, has been unusually high in Swat 1:5. This is a great moral vindication of our Armed Forces who have time and again been let down by lousy generalship at the strategic level. Who is ever going to hold such people accountable? One has to ask the question, is the blood being spilt by our youth meant only to support the lifestyle of the crooked and the unscrupulous? For the benefit of readers, I am re-publishing my recent article, "Credibility requires substance"
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