The 6th of September is celebrated every year as the Defense Day by every Pakistani, as on this very day, Pakistan’s courageous Armed Forces and the entire nation stood united in 1965 for the defense of the homeland against India which had threatened the territorial integrity of the beloved country through an all-out war.
This very day has come at a time when Pakistan is facing multiple challenges and issues of grave nature externally and internally, which are worrying all the citizens.
Military thinkers agree that although the physical force will determine the type and scale of war, yet it is the ‘will to fight’ or ‘moral force’ which determines the outcome of war. Clausewitz puts it this way, “One might say that the physical force seems little more than the wooden hilt, while moral factors are the precious metal, the real weapon.”
In his book, “Fighting Power: German and U.S. Army Performance, 1939-1945”, Creveld identifies the elements of ‘moral force’, whom he calls “fighting power, the willingness to fight and the readiness, if necessary, to die”. The greater these elements, the less vulnerable an armed force will be to demoralization. ‘Moral force’, then, is the crucial factor in determining the combat power of any belligerent.
During the 1965 war such elements like will to fight and ‘moral force’ have been more found in the personnel of Pakistan’s Armed Forces then those of India.
When, on September 6, 1965, India started the war, and its forces crossed the international border, on the western front in Lahore, Pakistan’s Armed Forces quickly responded. Indian Regiment had also crossed the BRB canal and captured the town of Batapore (Jallo Mur). The same day, a counter offensive by Pakistanis soldiers, consisting of an armoured division and infantry division forced the Indian 15th Division to withdraw to its starting point. In this context, the huge credit goes to the all men of Pak Army, who were deployed in the Lahore areas of Wahgah, Burki etc. Without bothering for their lives, they fought bravely. Among them, Major Raja Aziz Bhatti played a huge role in the outcome of the Lahore battles and was martyred.
In case of Sialkot, several soldiers of the Pak Army sacrificed their lives to stop advancement of Indian tanks. The 1965 war witnessed some of the largest tank battles since World War II, and was fought at Chawinda in Sialkot sector-The Battle of Chawinda resulted into victory of Pakistan whose armoured forces destroyed 120 tanks of India.
Regarding aerial warfare between Pakistan Air Force (PAF) and Indian Air Force (IAF), the latter emerged as victorious in the I965 war because, at the cost of their personal safety, the personnel of PAF defeated India. During that war, PAF had destroyed 100 Indian aircraft on ground and in the air, while damaged more than 10-not counting the undermined losses inflicted by PAF’s night bombing. In this respect, Squadron Leader M. M. Alam set new records in history of air warfare on 7th September by defending Pakistan’s airspace, and shot down five Indian aircraft in less than sixty seconds at Sargodha.
Let us take the example of Flight Lieutenant Yunus Hussain who fought in air battles fearlessly. During one such engagement, he fought singly against 6 enemy aircraft and shot down 2 Hunters. On 6 September, while attacking Halwara airfield, his small formation was intercepted by a large number of enemy and, although his aircraft was hit, he refused to break off the engagement by disregarding his personal safety, and was martyred.
The role of Pakistan Navy in the Indo-Pak war of 1965 is also appreciable. Securing Pakistan’s coasts, it played a vital role in defeating India. The Operation Dawarka marked was launched by Pakistan on September 7. Indian town of Dwarka was chosen to be a target of the attack. The Pakistani operation was successful and its warships harboured in Bombay, making the Indian Navy unable to sortie. In this context, Ghazi, the only submarine successfully attacked heavy ships of the Indian Navy, aiding Operation Dwarka.
However, there were many national heroes like Brigadier Ahsan Rashid, Major Raja Aziz Bhatti, Sqn Ldr MM Alam, Sqn Ldr Sarfaraz Ahmed Rafiqui, etc., who fought courageously with the Indian forces.
In fact, it was due to the ‘moral force’ that despite Indian surprise invasion in 1965 and the qualitative and numerical superiority over Pakistan, while showing courage, and by sacrificing their lives, the Pakistani forces not only recaptured the territories from India, but also took Khem Karan from Indian forces, including various regions of Rajasthan, Sindh, and Chumb in Kashmir. Indian defeat was owing to demoralization of its soldiers.
On August 5, 2019, Indian prejudiced Prime Minister and leader of the BJP-led extremist government Narendar Modi abrogated articles 35A and 370 of the Constitution, which gave special status to the disputed territory of the Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK). New Delhi bifurcated Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories—Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh to be ruled by the federal government. On the same day, strict military lockdown was imposed in the IIOJK which continues unabated.
And the deployment of more than 900,000 military troops in the IIOJK, who have martyred tens of thousands of the Kashmiris, including women and children through brutal tactics-fake encounters, while closure of mosques, shortage of foods, medicines for the patients have further increased the plight of the Kashmiris.
In order to hide human rights violations, communication services have been cut off from the world and foreign journalists are not allowed to enter the Kashmir region.
While, under a well-planned hidden agenda, Modi-led regime has intensified, bringing ethno- demographic changes in the IIOJK. In this context, Indian various moves such as introduction of new laws, amendment of the laws to facilitate non-Kashmiris and outsiders in order to usurp the rights of the Muslim Kashmiris—issuance of domicile certificates to more than 800000 non-Kashmiris, registration of almost 2.5 million new non-local voters in the IIOJK—failure of fake drama to host G-20 summit on May 22-24, 2023 in the IIOJK, from time to time, violations of the Line of Control (LoC) by shelling inside Pakistanis side of Kashmir—in violation of the ceasefire agreement of 2003 might be cited as instance.
Very tension escalated rapidly between India and Pakistan in the aftermath of the false flag Pulwama terror attack in the IIOJK when on February 27, 2018, in response to the Indian so-called pre-emptive air strike near the town of Balakot, close to the border with Pakistan’s sector of Kashmir, which resulted into no causalities, Pakistan Air Force shot down two Indian Air Force fighter jets and launched aerial strikes at six targets in the IIOJK.
Islamabad also captured Indian pilot Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman who was released as a gesture of peace and handed over to the Indian authorities. It resulted into diplomatic victory of Pakistan over New Delhi.
Notably, Indian Prime Minister Modi’s party BJP had got a land sliding victory in the Indian general elections 2014 and 2019. During the election-campaigns, Hindu majority was mobilized on ‘hate Muslim’ slogans and ‘anti-Pakistan’ jargons. Hence, Modi continues anti-Muslim policies.
In this context, Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s recent threat to cross the LoC, Indian cross-border terrorism in Pakistan and backing the militant outfits to destabilise this country show that Indian unfinished agenda of partition still continues.
As regards internal challenges, by imbibing the same spirit of the 1965 war, Pakistan’s Armed Forces, during the successful military operations, Zarb-e-Azb, Radd-ul-Fasaad and Operation Khyber 4 have killed many terrorists through ground offensive and many of them surrendered before the Army. And during street to street fighting, without bothering for their lives, and by air-dropping commandos at the risky places, our forces made a great headway in disrupting the militant’s supply routes and links.
While country’s primarily intelligence agency ISI also recovered a huge cache of arms and ammunition from the possession of the terrorists. Thus, security agencies have successfully broken the backbone of the foreign-backed terrorists. Peace has been restored in the provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan Karachi, including other vulnerable regions.
Regrettably, under the cover of so-called democracy, some irresponsible leaders of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and recently-ruling alliance of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) have changed their political differences into political enmity. These rival entities also blamed each other regarding this year’s May 9 events—attacks on the military and civil installations, which have been condemned by every segment of society.
At this critical juncture, Pakistan is facing multi-faceted crises and challenges like corruption, inflation, soaring prices of commodities, energy-shortage, lack of investment, upsurge of the US dollar, increase in oil prices, load shedding, inability of the importers to open letters of credit (LC) due to lack of dollars etc., and continued dependence upon the US-led developed countries, IMF and World Bank for financial aid—and decline in the foreign exchange reserves of the State Bank of Pakistan.
Instead of decreasing, political unrest in Pakistan is rapidly increasing, taking the country towards lawlessness. So, the Defense Day demands that the former government of the PDM’s parties, the PTI, media owners, Army, including all other segments of society must show selfless national unity practically, which is very essential to pull the country out of the ongoing serious crises and, and to meet the Indian war-mongering designs.
