Could there be more than just morale here? Could it be that because of its pervasive involvement in the economy and administration, because of the enormous collateral perquisites that are given to officers — from plots to control of ‘heavy’ enterprises — the army, in particular its officer class, has softened? The performance of the army in Kargil, in Balochistan and now in NWFP certainly suggests that this is possible. The main debility, however, is different: the army has been reared to kill and prevail over ‘imbecile kafirs’, and it must balk at killing fellow Muslims.

It is often suggested that after 9/11 and his decision to join the American war, Musharraf cleaned out the bearded generals. He may have shunted out some individuals. But the American war and joining it have certainly put the ‘moderates’ in the army on the defensive. The Islamists have been proven right. One minor indication of this was visible in the Lal Masjid incident. Here is a mosque not in the far away, wild tribal areas, but in Islamabad itself. The entire country is under army rule. The ISI as well as intelligence agencies of the army itself are in each nook and cranny of the country. How could such a vast armoury have been accumulated in the mosque and the adjacent madrassa without the complicity of elements inside these organisations?

So, we have, on the one hand, half the territory going out of the writ of Islamabad, and, on the other, the one instrument through which it would have to be wrested back, drooping.

... contd.