September 6th, 2013

Let me share a small personal experience of the 1965 war ! Yaum e Difaa Mubarak ! Prepare yourself. It is your turn to defend Pakistan now.

Let me share a small personal experience of the 1965 war !

In 1965, just before the war, my father Major Zaman Hamid was an artillery officer posted in Sialkot. Weeks before the actual war started on 6th September, tensions were high in Kashmir and some troops were already deployed along the working boundary near Sialkot though nobody expected an Indian attack on the city. While my dad was managing the artillery guns deployment, my mother would be alone in the house with my elder sister who was 5 years and me only a toddler at 1.5 years . Our faithful Cocker Spaniel dog Perdy would be the security guard while my mother keeping her .22 rifle loaded all the time in the house. Our house was also very close to the border and every night, my mom would be alone, staying awake all night, holding her two children and the rifle while the dog stayed guard outside the house. All officers and men had gone to the forward areas. In those days, there were blackouts too, so the entire region would be lonely, dark and very scary for a woman and her two kids. But Ammi, stayed on refusing to leave.

On 6th September when the full attack of the Indians came on Lahore and immediately afterwards on Sialkot also, which dangerously exposed our house to the Indian tanks, only then my mother abandoned the house and withdrew back to Pindi in an adventurous train ride which was constantly under threat of Indian air strikes.

All this time, my Dad was delivering hell through our own artillery guns on the advancing Indian tanks to prevent them from entering Sialkot. Abba Jan did not know where his family was and Ammi did not know if he was alive or not. But both stayed firm on their duties.

Then started the biggest tank battle in the world after second world war -- nearly 500 Indian tanks advanced with 50,000 troops on Sialkot but were pushed back and defeated by the defenders of Sialkot alhamdolillah. My father being one of the gunners who blasted the Indian attack and supported the ground troops through artillery fire. On the other front, Lahore was also being defended with equal ferocity by our tigers. Later, Indian army had to suffer huge humiliation in their own country for failing to capture Lahore and Sialkot!

Weeks later, after the war, when my mother came back to Sialkot with me and my sister, there were artillery guns placed all around our house, one even proudly dug in the main lawn as well

Even today, my mother proudly narrates the stories of that amazing war which the entire family witnessed from such a close range. History was repeated again in 1971 also when my father was again posted in Sialkot when the war started and the same saga started all over again -- war, enemy advance, family evacuation, defense of Sialkot..

Alhamdolillah, elders are still alive who have seen those times with their eyes and had seen how the nation gelled into a solid wall of steel to defend our faith, land and ideology. InshAllah, today and in future also, we vow to defend this medina e sani against all enemies, InshAllah.

Yaum e Difaa Mubarak ! Prepare yourself. It is your turn to defend Pakistan now.
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Now read the Indian and International accounts of the 65 war! This is classic MashAllah and a solid proof of how we fought the war and how Indians hit a disaster !

Now read the Indian and International accounts of the 65 war! This is classic MashAllah and a solid proof of how we fought the war and how Indians hit a disaster !

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"...a major battle the west of the Beas would end in the destruction of the Indian Army and thereafter allow the enemy (Pakistani) forces to push to the gates of Delhi without much resistance." 1965 WAR-The Inside Story by R.D. Pradhan

As Pakistanis honor the memory of their 1965 war heroes on Defense of Pakistan Day today, let us review some snippets of how the war looked from the other side. R.D. Pradhan and Harbakhsh Singh were both insiders who participated in the 1965 India-Pakistan war. While Pradhan was a civilian working for Indian Defense Minister Y.B. Chavan, General Harbakhash Singh was commanding Indian troops on the front-lines. Both have written books drawing upon their first-hand knowledge of how the war started, unfolded and ended in September, 1965.

In Chapter 8 titled "Of Cowardice and Panic" of his book "1965 War-The Inside Story", R.D. Pradhan describes the cowardice of Maj. Gen. Niranjan Prasad, the Indian general commanding officer in Lahore sector. When Pakistan Defense Forces counter-attacked the intruding Indian military and the general was fired upon on Sept 6, 1965, he "ran away". Here's an excerpt:

"On learning that, Lt. Gen. Harbakash Singh and the corps commander drove in a Jonga (Nissan P60 Jeep) to the battlefront. Army commander found that the enemy (PAF) air attack had created a havoc on G.T. Road. (Indian) Vehicles were burning and several vehicles of 15 Division abandoned on the road, the drivers having run away, leaving some of the engines still running. Maj. Gen. Niranjan Prasad was hiding in a recently irrigated sugar cane field. As described by Harabakash Singh: "He (Prasad) came out to receive us, with his boots covered with wet mud. He had no head cover, nor was he wearing any badges of his rank. He had stubble on his face, not having shaved." Seeing him in such a stage, Harbakhash Singh asked him: "Whether he was the General Officer commanding a division or a coolie? Why had he removed badges of rank and not shaved? Niranjan Prasad had no answer."

Chapter 12 of Pradhan's book is titled "Retreat to Beas" in which there is detailed discussion of Indian COAS's proposal for the Indian Army to retreat behind Beas in the face of Pakistan's fierce counter-attacks after India's attempted incursion in Lahore. Pradhan argues in this chapter that during the 1965 war with Pakistan, Indian COAS General Chaudhuri feared that "a major battle the west of the Beas would end in the destruction of the Indian Army and thereafter allow the enemy (Pakistani) forces to push to the gates of Delhi without much resistance".

Pradhan's book contains many different entries by Indian Defense Minister Y.B. Chavan. A Sept 9, 1965 entry reads:

Had a very hard day on all fronts. Very fierce counter-attacks mounted and we are required to withdraw in Kasur area. COAS was somewhat uncertain of himself. I suggested to him that he should go in forward areas so that he will be in touch of realities. He said he would go next day.

In Line of Duty: A Soldier Remembers, according to Shekhar Gupta, the editor of Indian Express, Lt Gen Harbakhsh Singh reveals that not only "did Gen Chowdhury play a very small role in the entire campaign, he was so nervous as to be on the verge of losing half of Punjab to Pakistan, including the city of Amritsar. Harbakhsh describes, in clinical detail, how our own offensive in the Lahore sector had come unhinged. The general commanding the division on Ichchogil canal fled in panic, leaving his jeep, its wireless running and the briefcase containing sensitive documents that were then routinely read on Radio Pakistan during the war. Singh wanted to court martial him, Chowdhury let him get away with resignation".

According to Shekhar Gupta, Harbkhash Singh recounts that a bigger disaster struck a bit to the south where the other division cracked up in assault, just as it encountered a bit of resistance. Several infantry battalions, short on battle inoculation, deserted and Singh gives a hair-raising account – and confirmation of a long-debated rumor – that Chowdhury panicked so badly he ordered him to withdraw to a new defensive line behind the Beas, thereby conceding half of Punjab to Pakistan. Singh describes the conversation with Chowdhury at Ambala where he refused to carry out the order, asking his chief to either put it down in writing or visit the front and take charge of the battle.

Beyond the Indian insiders quoted above, here is how several non-Pakistani journalists have covered the war:

The London Daily Mirror reported in 1965:

"There is a smell of death in the burning Pakistan sun. For it was here that India's attacking forces came to a dead stop.

"During the night they threw in every reinforcement they could find. But wave after wave of attacks were repulsed by the Pakistanis"

"India", said the London Daily Times, "is being soundly beaten by a nation which is outnumbered by four and a half to one in population and three to one in size of armed forces."

In Times reporter Louis Karrar wrote:

"Who can defeat a nation which knows how to play hide and seek with death".

USA - Aviation week - December 1968 issue:

"For the PAF, the 1965 war was as climatic as the Israeli victory over the Arabs in 1967. A further similarity was that Indian air power had an approximately 5:1 numerical superiority at the start of the conflict. Unlike the Middle East conflict, the Pakistani air victory was achieved to a large degree by air-to-air combat rather than on ground. But it was as absolute as that attained by Israel.

Alhamdolillah !! :))
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