Chess Move – Retreat
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By Abdul Muqtadir(PE), Edited By Adam Rizvi, The India Observer, TIO: If you have played chess, you must be aware that if the opponent makes a move that forces you to retreat, you retreat to save the King or Queen. That’s exactly what happened to the Pakistan Army on September 6, 1965, as a formal war between India and Pakistan commenced.
It all began when General Ayub Khan, driven by personal glory (as noted in Air Marshal Nur Khan’s September 6, 2005 interview in Dawn) and emboldened by India’s defeat in the 1962 Sino-Indian War, decided to secretly send 80,000 guerrillas into Indian Kashmir under the code name “Operation Gibraltar” to wrest control of Kashmir from India
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When that operation failed, he followed up with a regular army invasion under another code name, “Operation Grand Slam.” However, no top officials from the Air Force, Navy, or civil bureaucracy were informed of General Ayub’s secret war in Kashmir. The Kashmir dispute between the two newly independent nations had been ongoing since their independence in 1947, with an earlier war over Kashmir fought between October 22, 1947, and January 5, 1948.
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Indian Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri initially pleaded with General Ayub to stop his actions in Kashmir, but Ayub ignored him. Shastri then repeatedly warned Ayub that if he did not cease his actions, India would choose any international border of Pakistan and launch an attack. General Ayub consulted with his Foreign Minister, Z. A. Bhutto, who advised him that India would not act on this threat. Confident in this assessment, Ayub disregarded India’s warnings. Another reason for Ayub’s confidence was his belief that India would invade East Pakistan, which was left largely unprotected, save for the circling of an Indonesian submarine as a favor from President Sukarno. (It’s worth noting that General Ayub harbored no love for East Pakistan and reportedly even wanted to separate it from Pakistan, as documented in the book Jinnah to Zia by Justice Munir.)
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On September 6, 1965, India, as predicted and warned, attacked Lahore, the heart of Punjab province, where the Pakistan Army draws most of its soldiers. General Ayub then addressed the nation on the radio, falsely claiming that India had started the war when, in fact, he was the one who initiated the conflict. To defend Lahore and, by extension, Pakistan, Ayub was forced to retreat from Kashmir and redeploy those forces to save Lahore. This move by India was a strategic masterstroke, compelling Ayub to withdraw from Kashmir after ignoring Shastri’s pleas and threats to do so.
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As the war continued, Pakistan’s ammunition supplies began to deplete. The United States, which had supplied Pakistan’s military equipment, halted further supplies because Ayub had breached the SEATO agreement, which stipulated that U.S. military aid could only be used in the event of an attack or takeover by Communist forces (such as China or the USSR). Faced with a dwindling supply of arms, Ayub grew increasingly worried about the sustainability of the war. On September 20, 1965, the United Nations passed a resolution calling for a ceasefire within 48 hours, and the war officially ended on September 23, 1965.
Following the ceasefire, General Ayub and Prime Minister Shastri met in Tashkent, where, under the mediation of the superpowers—the USA and USSR, led by Premier Alexei Kosygin—they signed the Tashkent Declaration on January 10, 1966. This agreement required both countries to withdraw their forces back to the pre-August 1965 lines no later than February 25, 1966.
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While officials and the public in both countries claim victory in the 1965 war, the reality is that General Ayub, who started the war to gain Kashmir, did not achieve his objective and was forced to retreat from Kashmir due to India’s strategic maneuvering. The war resulted in the loss of many lives, with 3,800 Pakistani troops killed. Additionally, there were significant material and financial losses, including 200 tanks and 40 aircraft, all due to General Ayub’s ill-planned war that achieved nothing—certainly not the acquisition of Kashmir.
Many civilians also participated and became martyrs, losing their homes, crops, and livestock, and becoming homeless. Their lives were shortened by General Ayub’s ego, selfishness, and poor planning—except when it came to saving his own son, Captain Gauhar Ayub, whom he conveniently retired ahead of the war he had foolishly planned.
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In Urdu, there is a proverb for such a situation, where you set out to achieve something but failed and instead suffered unnecessary losses: “Khaya pia kuch nahin, glass tor dia bara anna” (کھایا پیا کچھ نہیں گلاس توڑ دیا بارہ آنے). In English, we might translate this as “Much ado about nothing” or “Paying the price without any gain.”
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