Adil Najam

Music is on my mind again. Literally. This song has been playing non-stop in my mind as well as in my headphones for two weeks now (ever since I did my last post on Arieb Azhar’s music). I thought it would be overkill to write, yet again, about him and his music, but the lyrics of this song are just not letting go of me. Not right now. Not with all that I am thinking on Pakistan right now. Not with all that is happening in Pakistan right now.

Imran H. Khan

The recent US mission to get Osama Bin Laden without the knowledge of Pakistan Air Force was a success because of PAF’s lack of investment in sensors that can detect low flying aircraft in undulating and hilly terrain. People are thinking hard about the political and military lessons in this, but they should also be thinking hard about what this means for technology and science development and education in Pakistan.

This is not the first time that PAF has been caught in this embarrassing situation. Indian Air Force was able to penetrate deep into Pakistani territory in 1971, knowing that PAF did not have low level radar coverage in many areas.  At that time PAF depended on mobile observer units (MOUs) for human visual and aural detection of planes.  This human-intensive brute force effort only worked in limited areas and only during war. Despite investing in limited low altitude radars and airborne radars it is obvious that there are gaping holes in the air defense system as exemplified by the unscathed operation of multiple large rotor helicopters for hours in Pakistani airspace deep into its territory.

This story is specially poignant to me because way back in 1977 when I graduated from College of Aeronautical Engineering in Korangi, Karachi, I had won the best project award for designing a device for acoustic detection of low to medium altitude flying aircraft. The Chief of Air Staff Air Marshal Zulfiqar Ali Khan was the chief guest at the graduation and, knowing the vulnerabilities that PAF had experienced during the 1971 war, instructed that PAF should productize and widely deploy and advanced version of the device that I had designed. I was posted to a squadron that was dedicated to developing electronic warfare equipment with this goal in mind. Unfortunately ACM Zulfiqar retired and ACM Anwar Shamin became the new Chief of PAF. He and some of his coterie of senior officers were unfortunately more interested in getting commissions from buying radars and other equipment from foreign countries. Not only was my project canceled but I was also not allowed to design or develop other electronic warfare equipment locally.

Tamashbeen

The Al Qaida and Taliban are stupid. Here is why.

Fact: Osama Bin Laden was killed by the Americans. Pakistan had nothing to do with that particular operation. This evident from the great soul-searching in Pakistan and chest-thumping in USA on this.

Yet, who is Al Qaida, Taliban and Co. “punishing” for Osama’s death? Pakistan and Pakistanis? Either they did not get the memo on what really happened in Abbottabad, or they just like killing Pakistanis and Muslims!