Articles from the author

In his first exclusive one-on-one comments made after the much-awaited January 12 address to the nation, General Pervez Musharraf annunciated the parameters he set out for himself.

Most Pakistanis have been aware since Agra that Pervez Musharraf's boots were meant for walking on the world stage.

The terrorist attack on the U.S. in the morning of Tuesday September 11 was at once horrific and devastating.

Despite being a frontline state, Pakistan fell from grace in the very hour of the free world's victory against Soviet communism.

To protect itself from both internal dissent and a foreign war, the then French Government imposed "Terror" as the order of the day on September 5, 1793.

Assuming that the war with the Soviets would be a long drawn out one, the CIA funded many of the religious schools, madrassas through the Inter Services Intelligence in the '80s as a future source of recruits.

Lt. Gen. Mohammad Yusuf Khan, Chief of General Staff (CGS), and Lt. Gen. Mohammad Aziz Khan, Commander 4 Corps at Lahore were respectively appointed Vice Chief of Army Staff (VCOAS) and Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (JCSC).

Ripples of the pounding of Afghanistan may travel far and wide to unexpected areas. Three cities were targeted in U.S. air attacks against Afghanistan, but most of the damage took place in Pakistan.

When diplomatic and economic initiatives fail, military means - war - is the only option to secure political objectives.

Despite the urgency of the air campaign, 30 days into the war there is no ground battle worth the name except around Mazar-i-Sharif, the capital of Balkh Province.

Mazar-e-Sharif's fall set off a chain reaction in the militarily untenable provinces, east, west and south of Balkh. They fell like dominoes.

Whenever military commanders fail to achieve their stated objectives, intelligence agencies are convenient scapegoats for their operational shortcomings, and it is likely that Pakistan's Afghan policy will be hung on just such a convenient peg.