Undiminished Scars of 1971 Tragedy Part-3 by Brig.Gen(Retd) Asif Haroon Raja

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Undiminished Scars of 1971 Tragedy

Part-3

“Refusal to learn from history is not unique to a particular ruler: It is a general failing of governments and people”. George Hegel

Asif Haroon Raja

UN Resolutions vetoed by USSR

After 4 Dec, all the resolutions moved in the UNSC were vetoed by the Soviet Union. On 8 Dec, Bhutto as Vice PM had been sent to New York to find a diplomatic solution to the East Pakistan (EP) crisis by arranging a ceasefire. He took a circuitous route and reached there in 3 days. He chose a leisurely course and took things lightly when EP was falling. On 14th December Poland presented a draft resolution that obviously had the backing of the USSR. It called for the transfer of power to the elected representatives, followed by a ceasefire, withdrawal of forces and later evacuation of Pakistani forces.

On 15 Dec, Bhutto made an emotional speech that was hardly relevant and then rejected the Polish resolution in a theatrical fashion, tore his notes and walked out of the meeting in a huff. Lt Gen Jacob stated later on that passage of the Polish resolution would have been disastrous for India and that it was Bhutto who saved the day for India. (Lt Gen Joseph Jacob, Surrender at Dacca, p 146).

Dying Moments

Indian Eastern Command intercepted the flurry of confusing signals transmitted between GHQ and Dacca from Dec 7 onwards and directed Commander Communication Zone, Maj Gen Nagra on 15 Dec to race for Dacca and pull a fast one on Gen Niazi that the game was over. All the major Indian formations were behind the rivers. Not a single Pakistani formations/units fighting the war had capitulated.

Nature had given Gen Niazi a chance to stand up to the threat and enter his name in the golden Islamic history as a real tiger. He chose to give up under the plea of saving the lives of thousands of soldiers. Maj Gen Tajammul Hussain, my Brigade Commander on the Hilli front, who had given me a smashing war report, wrote is his book, “The Story of My Struggle, 1991, p 159, “Niazi was basically not a coward but he was made a coward by the cowards around him”.

No results could be achieved by the counter offensive launched on the western front where a ceasefire came into place.

“No General can vindicate his loss claiming that he was compelled against his better judgment to execute an order that led to the defeat”. Field Marshal Von Manstein

East Pakistan

The Aftermath

Biharis Abandoned

After the surrender, 35000 Pak Army all ranks and non-combatants serving in units and HQs, 13000 EPCAF and Police personnel and 48000 non-Bengali civilians including their families were taken into safe custody of the Indian Army and later shifted to already established PoW camps in India. The Biharis were left to fend for themselves. Gen AA K Niazi and his negotiating team didn’t insist on including them in the repatriation list. They were left at the mercy of marauding Mukti, Qadri, Mujib and several other Bahinis who massacred them brutally and raped their women. The occupying Indian Army made no effort to stop the bloodshed since they were busy in looting, in carnival pleasures and nocturnal merrymaking. Hundreds of mass graves were dug to dump their bodies. The dried wells were filled with their dead bodies. Brutalities of the MBs were lumped on Pak Army.

10% Bengalis wanted independence

According to Professor G.W Choudhury, a Bengali member of Yahya’s cabinet and a fellow of Columbia University writes in his book, (The Last Days of United Pakistan, Oxford University Press, p. 167), ‘The vast majority of the Bengali Muslims were not prepared to see Pakistan dismembered and their homeland become again a target of domination by the ‘Bhadralok (elite) from Calcutta. They were interested in having genuine regional autonomy. In fact, their basic demand was for the improvement of their economic lot. Mujib captured their imagination because he promised them a ‘golden Bengal’ if they would only vote for his six points —‘

Propaganda War

The bizarre figures of 3 million Bengalis killed and 300,000 women raped by Pak Army in 9 months were dispelled by several western and Bengali authors including Sharmila Bose in her book ‘Dead Reckoning. She said that during her ground investigations, despite her best efforts she couldn’t get any evidence that soldiers of Pak Army had targeted Bengali women and children. In her view the highly exaggerated figures were given to arouse the sentiments of the public. She also negated the story of mass killings of students in Dacca University saying her probe revealed that all schools, colleges and university were closed and no one was living in the university hostel except for AL militants who had stacked big dumps of arms and ammunition and used to impart military training to the students.

R.J. Rummel in his book ‘Death by Government’, writes about the atrocities committed by militant Bengalis against on-Bengalis: “In the whole of EP, non-Bengalis were attacked and were subjected to torture and ethnic cleansing. Thousands of Muslim families were wholly eliminated; women were raped and their breasts were cut with specially carved knives. The children of the victim women were also not spared. Thousands of surviving children had to live a torturous life. In Chittagong, Khulna, and Jessore, dead bodies of 20,000 Biharis were discovered. A cautions guess gives a figure of 2.50 lacs non-Bengalis killed at the hands of MB”.

Between 1972 and 1974, Indian military and civil writers with the assistance provided by the Indian government published 270 books on the 1971 War and this trend continued over the years. The purpose was to justify Indian military’s intervention into EP, hide their crimes against humanity and build a narrative to prove that the myths of slaughter of 3 million Bengalis and rapes of 300,000 Bengali women by the Pak Army were true, and that the numbers pitched against Indian Army were 93000.

Sustained Indo, Russian, Western propaganda together with publication of large numbers of books by Indian, western and Bengali authors helped India in portraying the Pak Army soldiers as bloodthirsty monsters and rapists and in convincing the world that Gen Yahya Khan’s regime and Pak Army were responsible for the dismemberment of united Pakistan and creation of Bangladesh (BD).

Their false narrative gained authenticity since Pakistan first remained mum over the slaughter of Biharis and non-Bengalis in March 1971, fearing that disclosure of the news would result in a backlash in West Pakistan (WP). After the surrender, Pakistan again chose to remain tightlipped till the leakage of Hamoodur Rahman Commission Report in 2001. Our silence helped India to convert their lies into truth. Our muteness and absence of authentic information gave rise to speculation, fabrication and distortion of facts by vested interests.

Looting by Indian Army

Soon after the creation of BD, the Indian Army went on a looting spree like hungry parasites. They took away war munitions, heavy guns, army vehicles, private cars of West Pakistanis, household items including bathroom fittings, fridges, ceiling fans, TVs, radios, electronic items, factories machinery, food grains, jute, yarn, canned food etc. Trains and thousands of trucks were looted and it was estimated that the loot was valued $ 2.2 billion. (Martin Woolla cott. The Guardian, Jan 22, 1972). Others who wrote in detail about the plunder were Sunil Gangapadhyay in his novel Purbha Pashchin, Maj MA Jalil MB 9 Sector Comd in his book (Araksmita Swadhinata-e-Paradhinata), Maj Shawkat Ali, MB 5 Sector Comd, Zainal Abedin in his book Rape of Bangladesh, J.N. Dixit in his book Liberation of Bengal: Indo-Bangladesh Relations.

In the truncated Pakistan, Lt Gen Gul Hassan and Air Marshal Rahim Khan forced Gen Yahya to resign and Bhutto sitting in New York was given a call to come and take over the reins of power. After taking over, Bhutto wore three hats of President, CMLA and Chief of Armed Forces. Yahya was interned and a probe under chief justice Hamoodur Rahman ordered the mandate of which was confined to the military debacle in EP, making the postmortem controversial. Mujib was released from jail on 8 Jan 1972 and sent to Dacca. Lt Gen Gul Hassan was appointed COAS but he and Air Marshal Rahim were sacked four months later on charges that they had Bonaparte tendencies. Superseded Lt Gen Tikka Khan replaced Gul. After fascist rule of Bhutto, he was ousted by Gen Ziaul Haq in a military coup in July 1977 and Bhutto was hanged to death on 4 April 1979. After General Zia’s death in a C-130 crash in Aug 1988, Benazir Bhutto was elected, but the ten-year democratic era saw power changing between the PPP and the PML-N under Nawaz Sharif four times. Gen Musharraf’s 9-year rule couldn’t upturn the economic fortunes of the country. Thereon, the 5-year each rule of PPP under Zardari and of PML-N under Nawaz dipped all the economic indicators of the country and exacerbated moral and social issues. So far the incumbent PTI regime has been unable to cure the diseases of Pakistan and the economy is declining and provincialism has gained ground.

In Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujib carried out witch-hunting of Bihars and patriotic Bengalis favoring One-Pakistan, and sought trial of 195 WP officers in alleged war crimes. He could survive for a few years only and on Aug 15, 1975, he along with 22 other family members were killed in a military coup led by Maj Farooq and Maj Rashid. Khondkar Mushtaq after remaining in the president’s chair for two months was deposed in another coup on Nov 3, 1975 which brought Brig Khalid Musharraf to power. After 4 days, he was toppled in a military coup and Maj Gen Ziaur Rahman was chosen to lead the country. After ruling for six years, he was assassinated and Gen Hussain Ershad ruled the roost till he was defeated by Mrs. Khalida Zia in elections in 1991. In the 1997 elections, Sheikh Hasina Wajid won and ruled for the next five years. She sentenced 15 army officers to death in Nov 1998. After another stint of Khalida, Hasina again came to power in 2008. She is still in the chair and has made impressive socio-economic improvements.

To be continued

The writer is Brig, war veteran, defence analyst, international columnist, author of five books, sixth book under publication, Chairman Thinkers Forum Pakistan, Director Measac Research Centre. [email protected]

's Treachery, Deaths of Biharis at the Hands of the Indian Army, Gen Manekshaw Lies, India's Destruction of United Pakistan, India's Propaganda Machine in 1971, India's Treachery, Sh Mujib

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Every recent US administration has performed a perverse ritual as it has come into office. All have agreed to undermine US law by signing secret letters stipulating they will not acknowledge something everyone knows: that Israel has a nuclear weapons arsenal.

Part of the reason for this is to stop people focusing on Israel’s capacity to turn dozens of cities to dust. This failure to face up to the threat posed by Israel’s horrific arsenal gives its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a sense of power and impunity, allowing Israel to dictate terms to others.

But one other effect of the US administration’s ostrich approach is that it avoids invoking the US’s own laws, which call for an end to taxpayer largesse for nuclear weapons proliferators.

Israel in fact is a multiple nuclear weapons proliferator. There is overwhelming evidence that it offered to sell the apartheid regime in South Africa nuclear weapons in the 1970s and even conducted a joint nuclear test. The US government tried to cover up these facts. Additionally, it has never signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.

Yet the US and Israeli governments pushed for the invasion of Iraq based on lies about coming mushroom clouds. As Israeli nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu said: the nuclear weapons were not in Iraq – they are in Israel.

Amendments by former Senators Stuart Symington and John Glenn to the Foreign Assistance Act ban US economic and military assistance to nuclear proliferators and countries that acquire nuclear weapons. While president, Jimmy Carter invoked such provisions against India and Pakistan.

But no president has done so with regard to Israel. Quite the contrary. There has been an oral agreement since President Richard Nixon to accept Israel’s “nuclear ambiguity” – effectively to allow Israel the power that comes with nuclear weapons without the responsibility. And since President Bill Clinton, according to the New Yorker magazine, there have been these secret letters.

US presidents and politicians have refused to acknowledge that Israel has nuclear weapons even though the law offers an exemption that would allow the funding to continue if the president certified to Congress that aid to a proliferator would be a vital US interest.

Israel’s per capita gross domestic product is comparable with that of Britain. Nevertheless, US taxpayer funds to Israel exceed that to any other country. Adjusted for inflation, the publicly known amount over the years is now approaching $300bn.

This farce should end. The US government should uphold its laws and cut off funding to Israel because of its acquisition and proliferation of nuclear weapons.

The incoming Biden administration should forthrightly acknowledge Israel as a leading state sponsor of nuclear proliferation in the Middle East and properly implement US law. Other governments – in particular South Africa’s – should insist on the rule of law and for meaningful disarmament, and immediately urge the US government in the strongest possible terms to act.

Apartheid was horrible in South Africa and it’s horrible when Israel practises its own form of apartheid against the Palestinians, with checkpoints and a system of oppressive policies. Indeed another US statute, the Leahy law, prohibits US military aid to governments that systematically violate human rights.

It’s quite possible that one of the reasons that Israel’s version of apartheid has outlived South Africa’s is that Israel has managed to maintain its oppressive system using not just the guns of soldiers, but also by keeping this nuclear gun pointed at the heads of millions. The solution for this is not for Palestinians and other Arabs to try to attain such weapons. The solution is peace, justice and disarmament.

South Africa learned that it could only have real peace and justice by having truth that would lead to reconciliation. But none of those will come unless truth is faced squarely – and there are few truths more critical to face than a nuclear weapons arsenal in the hands of an apartheid government.

Photographs –Courtesy

VANUNU’S PHOTOS OF DIMONA – 1985

Mordechai Vanunu brought his camera to work in late 1985, shortly before leaving his eight-year stint as a technician at Israel’s nuclear weapons factory at Dimona.

Acting on his conscience, he carefully took about 60 photos of the top-secret labs and unique production processes involved. When some of these photos were originally published in the London Sunday Times’ exposé, they confirmed his eyewitness testimony about the extent of Israel’s nuclear weapons program and revealed Israel to be one of the world’s top nuclear powers. To this day, the Israeli government refuses international inspection of Dimona and continues to deny the existence of its nuclear arsenal. [click here for more of Vanunu’s story: archive/story.html]

While their publication resulted in Vanunu being locked away for an 18-year prison sentence, his photographs of Israel’s nuclear weapons factory – a bold statement against nuclear secrecy and for the abolition of nuclear weapons – are here for all to see.

Click on the thumbnail views below to see the full-size photos in this selection.

	1) Looking inside a glove box for tooling nuclear materials
	2) Looking from outside into a glove box
	3) Control panel
	4) Control panel
	5) Control panel for lithium 6 production
	6) Control panel
	7) Workshop
	8) Looking inside a glove box at lathe for turning precision shaped pieces of plutonium or other components.
	9) Laboratory model of nuclear weapons core
	10) Looking inside a glove box at models of bomb components or containers for nuclear materials
	11) Outside of glove box
	12) Plutonium separation plant control room
	13) Shielded viewing portal for observing nuclear reactions
	14) Production model of nuclear weapons core
	15) Production model of nuclear weapons core