ISLAMABAD/NEW DELHI – In an explosive revelation, Colonel (r) Ashfaq Hussain has accused former president General (r) Pervez Musharraf of aggression against India in 1999, saying the former army chief had himself crossed the Line of Control (LoC).
Hussain, in his book Witness to Blunder, said the Kargil mission was masterminded by Major General Javed Hassan, General Mehmood and General Aziz. “They made Musharraf agree to the plans which later led to a limited conflict between India and Pakistan,” he wrote. Hussain claimed Musharraf had himself crossed the LoC and spent a night on the Indian-controlled side. “On March 28, 1999 General Pervez Musharraf crossed 11 kms beyond the LoC on a helicopter and was escorted by Colonel Amjad Shabbir at a location named Zakriya Mustakar.” He wrote Pakistan began its operation in Kargil on December 18, 1998 when Captain Nadeem, Captain Ali and Hawaldaar Lalak Jaan crossed the LoC to carry out a recce.
“On May 17, 1999, Nawaz Sharif was given the Kargil briefing,” the book said. Another former army officer, Lt Gen (r) Shahid Aziz, who headed the analysis wing of the ISI during the Kargil conflict, recently revealed that the operation was masterminded by a group of four generals led by Musharraf.
Musharraf, in response to the allegations, has said the 1999 Kargil operation was a big success militarily, adding that if then prime minister Nawaz Sharif had not visited the US, the Pakistan Army would have “conquered 300 square miles of India”.
Rejecting the suggestion that he had willfully put a “tight lid” on details regarding the Kargil War operation, Musharraf told a news channel that Nawaz was solely to blame for the defeat.
“Nawaz lost a political front which we had won militarily,” the former president said, adding that the “prime consideration for actions like the Kargil operation is security and secrecy”, so the army leadership decides who is to be informed and when. As the operation progressed and the proper time arrived, a briefing of the corps commanders was held,” he said.
Musharraf said the country lost only 270 men against India’s 1,600 soldiers in the conflict.
He said “blaming the nation at this juncture of time, as Lt Gen (r) Shahid has done, seems to be part of a conspiracy”.
Musharraf has said he would return home some two and a half months before the forthcoming elections to boost the electoral chances of his party – the All Pakistan Muslim League (APML).
However, Colonel Hussain, who was then part of Inter-Services Public Relations Directorate, said, “How can Musharraf call it an excellent operation when there were no Indian troops on that location during winters? He crossed the LoC when Indian troops were not present at all. He assumed that Indians won’t come to know until June. The ones who were launched into the operation didn’t know the aims and objectives of the operation which is strange.”