Introduction

In a war, the normal order of public morality is reversed: normally murder and loot is not allowed in any civilised code of ethics but in a war, they are rewarded. Hence, An Intimate History of Killing—a book which argues that war is neither glorious nor does it bring out the noblest in humans—starts with the line: ‘the characteristic act of men at war is not dying, it is killing’. ¹ After 375 pages, the book ends by making sure that the reader now knows that: ‘warfare was as much about the business of sacrificing others as it was about being sacrificed. For many men and women, this was what made it “a lovely war”’. ² For some, one learns with a shudder, the loveliness lies in ‘feelings of pleasure in combat’, that is killing others. ³ Others are horrified, still others go about obeying orders like zombies, and most justify their actions with reference to high ideals: duty, sacrifice, nation, regimental honour, personal honour, and manliness. And yet modern warfare is so terrible in the number of the dead, disabled, injured, mentally diseased, traumatised, etc. It leaves behind that it is a wonder why decision makers choose it at all. And yet, Pakistan, a small country, has fought many wars, most of its own choosing, against India since its creation in 1947. Most of these wars—the Kashmir war (1947–48), the 1965 war, the Kargil war (1999), and the ongoing low intensity guerrilla operations from 1989 till date—were fought for Kashmir. There was also a major civil war, which resulted in the creation of Bangladesh in 1971 but here too the major antagonist was India. However, Pakistan has also fought with the Taliban—radical Islamist militants—operating on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border (FATA) intermittently from 2005 onwards. There is a vast archive of material on all these wars: memoirs and biographies of participants, mostly senior military officers, diplomats, and politicians in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, the United Kingdom, and the United States. There are also scholarly studies of these wars. Indeed, the archive is too large to be mentioned here but it will be mentioned in the individual chapters about each of these wars and wherever it is required.