Aditi Phadnis: The khaki didn't help

PLAIN POLITICS

Pakistan didn't need a Chief of Army Staff, it just needed a good home minister.

How many different phrases can you use to describe "taking off" a set of clothes without being ... um, misunderstood ? This is proving to be a challenge. The Western press has already exhausted 'doff", "remove", "shed" and "relinquish". Being 'stripped' of one's uniform has vaguely court-martial connotations, hardly suitable to describe Gen Pervez Musharraf's current dilemma: to keep the uniform or take it off? The dilemma springs from a choice he has to make. The US is telling him kindly but firmly to disrobe. He can do so and become America's best loved poodle in South Asia; or he can defy them, keep his medal ribbons "" and the Pakistani Army "" by his side to fight another day. For the Pakistan Army, the uniform is everything. If you're not the Chief of Army Staff, you're just another General.

Possibly conscious of this, Musharraf has indicated he will contest elections in January as a civilian but that the emergency will continue to be in force. This is insurance, presumably bought against unpleasant events that could occur when he has given up the uniform and the courts decide to punish him for past transgressions.

However, one thing is clear. Power may sit well on Generals, but politics is perilous business. Musharraf has shown a deplorable lack of finesse at the latter: consider his meeting with the leaders of the All Party Hurriyat Conference when he came to India for the Agra summit. Instead of patting them on the back for the good job they were doing to keep the flag of Pakistan flying in Kashmir, he told them to wake up and smell the coffee "" all they ever wanted was money, money and more money from Pakistan. "We have our own compulsions. We can't keep fighting your battles," he told them brutally.

There is something to be said for the bluff, hearty General act. He must have thought he would endear himself to the voting populace of Pakistan by publicly recounting the appalling private behaviour of Pakistan's higher judiciary. But kissing-and-telling is neither politics nor democracy.

The story of how the coup that put Musharraf in saddle took place is well known. In power, he set up a National Security Council (NSC), announced his hero was Turkish leader Kamal Attaturk who turned the country into a moderate Islamic state, and said he was ready to do battle with the jihadis. But the turning point was September 11, 2001. It didn't really go against Musharraf's grain to help the US. So he got not only the political and military support of the US but also some lovely lolly for Pakistan.

This was desperately needed. In 1999, Pakistan had an external debt of over $30 billion and a paralysing domestic debt of approximately the same amount. Debt servicing had outstripped defence expenditure, which had climbed by 24 per cent in 1998-99. The country was on the verge of default because of a balance-of-payments crisis.

Musharraf's appointment of Shaukat Aziz as Prime Minister was to get some control over the economy. But it cannot be denied that the aid from the US "" payments for operations in and around Afghanistan to fight the war on terror "" played a major role in stabilising Pakistan. India says he continued to support jihadis in Kashmir, and Afghanistan till today has a running battle with him for doing nothing to stop the Taliban traffic over the border. Musharraf could "" and did "" ignore all this because he had the US by his side. But his strategic mistake was to act too much as COAS and not enough as a good, old-fashioned interior or home minister.

Consider India's experience. When was India's nationhood weakest and most threatened? When the states on the periphery or the border unfurled the banner of autonomy "" whether it was Punjab, Assam or the north-eastern states. Today, India can say with some assurance that these states may have their grievances but their allegiance to India is not in doubt. The Centre has acknowledged that tribal loyalties are more fierce than religious ones and has taken care to respect these.

But Pakistan is, if anything, even more complex. It was formed on the basis of one religion and this is pretty much taken for granted. But there too, tribal instincts are strong. What is happening in Waziristan or Afghanistan is not jihad "" it is tribal warfare. In Pakistan, therefore, it is not controlling organised religion that is the primary problem "" it is the administration of the tribal areas.

To be fair to Musharraf, in the first few years of the military regime, he did try to reform organised Islam. Pakistan has some excellent madarasas for girls where thoroughly modern education is imparted. The administration of charity organisations was tightened. He said he wanted to de-Islamise the forces and make the Pakistan Army a professional one.

But all it took was one Lal Masjid affair "" the massing of arms in a mosque to which the Inter Services Intelligence turned a blind eye or collaborated in "" to show how hollow this claim was. Border "" and tribal "" management proved hopelessly inept (the absence of an IAS-type bureaucracy didn't help). And doing a deal with the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, the coalition of religious political parties, was really bad politics although at the time, it looked like such a clever thing to do.

Today, there is much that Musharraf can be proud of achieving. But mastery over politics is not one of his successes.