****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
Having finally finished reading the book, I find that the book is a high resolution insight into specific problems related to Pakistan and Afghanistan. The author has high credibility due to his years of work on the subject.The book details exactly why it will be difficult to achieve peace in Afghanistan. Pakistan's involvement has been relatively recent in the long history of Afghanistan. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan gave Pakistan new ideas and all of these have failed consistently. In spite of the failure to achieve "strategic depth" over the past few decades, Pakistan continues to pursue a path that has extremely high risk. At risk is the well being of the country itself... For Pakistan, it's almost as if the globalization of the late 80s and 90s didn't happen at all. The country failed to create new industries, generate new power or strengthen civilian government.Pakistan has a huge advantage in it's geographic location. Prior to the land grab of 1947, traders of Sindh and Punjab actually played a huge role in the Asian markets. Their trading activities and connections with other wonderful empires (Persian, middle eastern, etc.) is well documented. But the creation of Pakistan, the destruction of it's minorities, the radicalization of it's people, the destruction of it's middle class, the destruction of it's agricultural class over the past 40 odd years has taken a toll. Anyone who was capable of true governance (the Sikhs, Sindhis and Tribal elders in NWFP and Balochistan) have all be killed, converted or driven out of the country.The lesson here is that countries cannot be created simply on the ideals of hatred. The author ends with an interesting example of Turkey. Turkey made a smooth transition from a military government to a civilian government. It's an Islamic country with high tolerance for it's minorities and lives at peace with it's neighbors. There was a time when Pakistan viewed Turkey as a role-model. They've gotten very far from it.
