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Genocide in Pakistan
The state of Pakistan was originally funded by people who deliberately
immigrated to one of the richest parts of India (the Punjabi-province)
and created a state through genocide and war with India. The following
is a thorough calculation of parts of the genocides in this region as a
result of the creation of the state of Pakistan.
In
1971 the self-appointed President of Pakistan and Commander-in-Chief of
the Army, General Agha Mohammed Yahya Khan and his top generals prepared
a careful and systematic military, economic, and political operation in
East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). They also planned to murder its Bengali
intellectual, cultural, and political elite. They also planned to
indiscriminately murder hundreds of thousands of its Hindus and drive
the rest into India. And they planned to destroy its economic base to
insure that it would be subordinate to West Pakistan for at least a
generation to come. This despicable and cutthroat plan was outright
genocide.
After a well organized military buildup in East Pakistan the military
launched its campaign. No more than 267
days later they had succeeded in killing perhaps 1,500,000 people,
created 10,000,000 refugees who had
fled to India, provoked a war with India, incited a counter-genocide of
150,000 non-Bengalis, and lost East Pakistan.
This genocide is listed in Table
8.1 (lines 26 to 30), which gives an overview of Pakistan's war-dead
and genocide from 1958 to 1987, the period over which Pakistan has had
authoritarian rule, usually military governments. There have been
periods without martial law, constitutions have been drawn up, and
elections have been held. But these were hardly open and fair,
democratic rights and liberties were still absent, and the military
still largely controlled major policy from behind the scenes. In
Table 8.2 one finds details og
the sources and calculations for the 1971 West Pakistan genocide.
Table 8.1 lists several estimates of other genocide during the period of
military rule (lines 26-30). It also gives the population figures and
final genocide rates (lines 82 to 92). The latter is calculated for
Pakistan as a whole (lines 84 to 85), East Pakistan (line 88), and for
the Awami League in East Pakistan (line 91). Although it would be useful
to calculate how the proportion of the different ethnic or religious
groups were killed, such as the Hindus or Biharis, there is not enough
information in the sources to determine a reasonably credible figure.
Turning now to Table 8.2, it begins with estimates of war-dead (lines 1
to 21). While the estimates for the largely military war-dead in the
Indo-Pakistan War are reasonable, given the size of the forces and the
rapidity of the Indian advance (the war was over in two-weeks), some of
those for the civil war or military dead must include genocide as well.
The Mukti Bahini guerrilla forces numbered about 100,000, the Pakistan
army about the same. Some estimates give the civil war or overall
military death toll as equal to or even two times the combined armed
forces involved (lines 14, 15, 19, and 20). This is not credible, even
considering that many civilians were caught up in the war and guerrillas
were rapidly replaced by volunteers when they were killed. Accordingly,
we have consolidated the civil war estimates at a much more sensible
level (line 16) and summed this (line 21) with that for those killed in
the Indo-Pakistan War, ignoring the two overly inflated military dead
estimates (lines 19 and 20).
The next list is a variety of genocide estimates (lines 23 to 158). Some
of these have to be read carefully. There were two major genocides in
East Pakistan, one of the Hindu and Moslem Bengalis by Pakistan; the
other of the non-Bengalis (largely Urdu speaking Biharis) by the
Bengalis. Estimates often do not indicate whether they cover both
genocides, although the source and context of an estimate may suggest
that it is only for that by the Pakistan army. Moreover, some overall
estimates may also include combat deaths. With this in mind, various
subclassifications are used for the estimates, including putting those
that may include combat deaths under a war and genocide heading (lines
170 to 178).
The sources give a number of estimates covering only part of the
genocide period (lines 47 to 55). Theese are proportionally projected to
the whole period of nine months [(9 x estimate)/(months covered by
estimate)], except for two estimates that are for two months (lines 53
and 53a). Their result would have been 4,500,000 killed, obviously much
too high. In any case, these are simply and conservatively tripled to
cover the whole period. Regardless, the resulting low and high values
(line 56) do not depend on them. The mid-value, however, is the average
of all the projected estimates.
Malnutrition, disease, and exposure deaths among the refugees
constituted genocide. These deaths resulted directly from these pitiful
people, largely Hindus, fleeing for their lives before the murderous
Pakistan Army. The table (lines 59 to 62) gives some clearly
incomplete estimates of these deaths. They are low enough to assume they
are included in the estimates of the overall genocide.
Turning now to the overall estimates of the Pakistan genocide (lines 65
to 79), there are two that are clearly excessively low or high (lines 65
and 79) and that is ignored in the consolidation (line 80). While any
leader's admission that his country killed 50,000 people is to confess
to a terrible crime, some estimate this number were killed in the first
two days of massacres in Dacca alone (line 31). Casting out the unique
estimate of 8,000,000 dead hardly need be defended.
Beneath the consolidated overall toll is shown the calculation from the
partial estimates (line 81). These are rather close. Consolidating both
ranges, gives a final estimate of Pakistan's genocide to be 300,000 to
3,000,000, or a prudent 1,500,000 (line 82).
Then there is Bengali massacres of non-Bengalis, primarily the Biharis
(lines 84 to 158). How much of this was genocide (intentional killing by
government or its agents) is a question.
In this part of the world there is a history of
ethnic communal violence and massacres between Hindu and Moslems, and
Biharis and Bengalis.
The first set of estimates (line 86 to 93) cover only part of the
period. And these cannot be projected to cover the whole period, since
most of the killing took place in the first two months. Accordingly they
are simply consolidated into a minimum of 50,000. Note that two of the
lowest estimates are limited in place (lines 86 and 87) and to a body
count (line 86).
Many of those who collaborated with the Pakistan Army were killed by the
Awami League and its supporters during the civil war and after. Only one
estimate is available of this number (line 97), which seems very low
given the deep hatred on both sides and the pervasive killing.
Accordingly, an estimated low of 5,000 murdered (line 99) is given. This
is probably very conservative, but enough information is not awailable
to estimate how much to increase it.
A number of estimates of specific massacres are listed by town, city, or
district (lines 102 to 152). Most of these come directly from or are
based on the reports of survivors. Some of these are from different
sources apparently covering the same massacre (e.g., lines 105 and 106);
the great difference in the estimated number of victims is a warning as
to how seriously to take them. Since all are from two sources, the
estimates for each source (lines 153 and 154) are summed, and these sums
will be used below to derive an overall genocide (lines 164 and 165).
There are two overall estimates (lines 157 and 158). One of 500,000 dead
is an "impression" Aziz got from interviewing hundreds of repatriates
who survived the massacres (line 157). This is my high for the two
estimates (line 159).
The various estimates of the Bengali--Awami League--genocide (lines 162
to 166) can now be put togeather. Consolidating these, one gets a range
of 50,000 to 500,000 killed, more likely 150,000.
Finally we can turn to the overall results. First are those estimates in
the sources that appear to be covering both war and genocide dead (lines
171 to 178), which is consolidated (line 179). Then, we have the various
subtotals arrived at previously, which we can now bring together (lines
182 to 184). From these is calculated the total genocide (185) and the
sum of this and the war-dead figures (186). Then for comparison, the
consolidated total previously determined from the estimates (line 187).
The two are close enough to take the sum total (line 186) as the final
total (line 188) for this period. Note that its low is lower and its
high higher than the estimated total (line 187). One cannot average the
two mid-values or take the lower one from the estimate total, because
then the subtotals (lines 182 to 184) would not add up to the final
total. Were the mid-values radically different, one would have to
readjust the previous consolidations and calculation (such as for lines
21 and 167), but the difference does not justify that here.
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