July 10, 2026.

Some months back, a Pakistani friend from the U.S returned to America after a visit to the homeland. I was extremely keen to find out from him how Pakistan was doing. He was an ex-Army chap with clear-cut, uncomplicated views. He was very optimistic about our country. Most of this optimism came from the restaurants of Islamabad, which he had visited and also the many new Malls. These, he said, were filled to overflowing every day of the week. So, he concluded that economically there was nothing to worry about, and when a country was doing well economically, there was little else to worry about. What gave a further boost to his optimism was his belief that our Field Marshall had planned to come down real hard on corruption, which would make a huge difference to the country.

"This", I thought to myself, " I had to see." And so, within a couple of weeks, after a prolonged absence, I was on my flight to Pakistan.
I began with the restaurants and the malls of the capital, and was stunned to find that they were indeed chock-a-block full. This was indeed a surprising experience. But then I saw the other side. Driving home late winter nights, I saw something that I had never seen before. It was normal to find rows of people, some with flowing white beards, sitting along side-walks with their pickaxes and shovels, in the hope that someone would come and reserve their labour for the following day. Never did I see our poor man more despondent or hungry than this.

I asked about the state of corruption in the country. I asked hundreds of people. There was near unanimity of opinion that Pakistan had never been so corrupt before. So it was not difficult to understand why our restaurants were bursting at the seams. These were the most convenient outlets for opulence brought in by ill-gotten wealth, while those from whom the money was stolen waited on the sidewalks with their picks and shovels, selling their labour to earn a pittance to fill their stomachs! After all, when the army shamelessly handed over the country to the most corrupt elements, what better could be expected?

I met no one who denied the fact that even the higher judiciary was a sold institution, or that bureaucrats and the police had any truck left with their obligations to their offices. Never had the lower classes been so mercilessly abandoned. The middle class had become a cowering, whispering, silent class, completely reliant on "good" behaviour lest the police or the intelligence goons swoop in and abduct them. And indeed, abductions had become the norm. Abductions of men, one had heard of before. But who would have thought that break-ins of homes and abduction of housewives would also become the new normal?

The other huge change was that hardly did I meet anyone who spoke well of the army. The army, once revered, was now despised and cursed by most, and not least by the retired veterans as well. This was not a day I ever thought I would see. And worse, the standard operating procedure to disperse protestors was a resort to free firing, whether it was the police, the rangers, or the army that was pulling the triggers. Massacring the average citizens had become the expectation of rulers who wanted "law and order" to be restored.

One had heard that because of the insurgency, Quetta had become marooned and isolated. But when I talked to many army officers whom I had no reason to distrust, I learned that the insurgency had spread and deepened significantly and that very large parts of Baluchistan were now similarly isolated. The insurgency in KP had also seen a sizable expansion. And because of army action, seeds of an insurgency had been sown in Azad Kashmir's in the Sudhan area as well, from where the army gets some of its finest soldiers. One can almost foresee the Indian intelligence beginning its work there, where our people have created fertile soil.

Only military genius could have achieved this. It is now almost a sure bet that the next insurgency will erupt in Gilgit-Baltistan. And in a year or two, the Afghan revenge on Pakistan will come in terms of drone attacks in our largest towns. Those who decided to bomb Afghanistan should have known the consequences of this action. No border was more important for Pakistan than ours with Afghanistan. For a people who have "badla" [revenge] as a core value, Pakistan should have been advised more by circumspection than by brazenness. Serious diplomacy should have been our main tool, rather than a gung-ho resort to F-16s.

As the insurgencies in Pakistan are spreading and gathering steam, similarities between the Pakistan of today and that of 1971 need to be taken note of. In both, it was the policies of the army that were providing oxygen to the insurgency. In both cases, it was the army's hunger to rule that was the main engine that was driving policy. In both cases, when disaster could be seen coming, by the average Pakistani, all the generals remained blind to this. And in case there was a general who could see where the army was driving the country, both in 1971 or in 2026, he did not speak loudly enough to be heard.

Every time there is an election in Pakistan, even a by-election, protests are the result. And then the army resorts to killing the protestors. So, the situation that has evolved is one of the people of Pakistan versus the army. It would be so much better, therefore, that elections be done away with, and so also the hypocrisy of it all. Let the army establish a dictatorship, and call it thus, because this is what they have been running. Compared to the two systems, the latter would be more desirable. Better to do away with the wounded hopes of the people, and its substitution by no hope at all.
Towards the end of my six-month stay in Pakistan, we became mediators in the Iran war, and the Field Marshal's stock began to rise.

People liked this because they wanted hope and to begin believing in something. But then came the case of the two foreign women who were abducted, looted, and gang-raped multiple times by Ishaque Dar's grandson.

People began to take bets. Most believed that this time the Field Marshal would fall on the culprits like a ton of bricks. But nothing happened. The Field Marshal therefore reclaimed his status as the man the people of Pakistan most wanted to wish away.
The path Pakistan has taken is clear. Spreading insurgencies may or may not coalesce into civil war. But in either case, as in 1971, the generals will ensure its destruction, before they take flights to distant havens.