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At the
time when President Zardari was on US visit along with
ISI head, a heavy military operation started in Swat.
This operation is different in nature than the previous
ones. Firstly, because this operation was launched in
hast after US threatened to attack Swat with drones if
Taliban are not stopped from advancing to Dir and Boner.
Secondly, this time army is hitting Taliban. Another
important aspect is that the capitalist media and main
stream political parties are openly supporting this
military action against Taliban. The general public
perception is also turning out to be against Taliban.
Few interviews of Sufi Muhammad and Muslim Khan have
done the trick which ANP and PPP, NATO and White House
could not do. It happened first time that spokespersons
of Taliban negated their own words and media mujahidin
faced such a difficulty in defending Taliban that some
of the anchor persons are now writing against and
predicting defeat of Taliban in their columns.
Swat
can be taken over from Taliban but they will not be
defeated by the way military operation is going on in
Swat. This time army will have to take over Swat for the
sake of their honour as well. Trotsky says, "every army
presents itself as invincible". If army could not take
over Swat, their presumption of being invincible will be
damaged but taking over of Swat will not mean that
Taliban are defeated. Firstly, Taliban will vacate Swat
when they see their defeat; secondly, Taliban cannot be
defeated in one district or division or one area;
thirdly, Army believes that Taliban are their "assets"
with which help they will at least be able to carry on
proxy war on Kashmir and Afghanistan if not able to
conquer. Therefore it is not possible that Taliban are
taken care of in Punjab and Sind and are eliminated by
war in Pakhtunkhwa. We cannot have any hope from army
against Taliban.
It is
also important to note that Taliban cannot be defeated
militarily. US tried to do this in Afghanistan and the
result is that they are knocking on the doors of Kabul
and are sighting Islamabad also. We have been
presenting this view in Mazdoor Jeddojuhd repeatedly
that very radical measures are needed to defeat Taliban.
First of all we need to defeat ideology of Taliban and
then we need to eliminate those economic and social
bases which are helpful in creating Taliban.
Practical measure that can be demanded
are end of US occupation of Afghanistan, separation of
religion from state, free education, equal and same
education system for all by nationalizing private
education institutions and madrassas, land reforms and
economic reforms which help in improving living standard
of masses. With all these measures, we need to develop
organizations of workers and peasants and peoples'
militias which can protect themselves against Taliban.
This all is possible only when a new movement emerges
all over Pakistan on same lines on which the lawyers'
movement was developed. This is not impossible. We have
seen some initial glimpses of this in Lahore. If people
can defeat mentors of Taliban, the military dictator who
used to say that uniform is his skin then defeating
Taliban must not be that difficult.
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