Tampa (Florida): Pakistan Army chief Asim Munir has threatened to plunge the region into nuclear war should his country face an existential threat in a future war with India, even if it means taking half the world down.
According to The Print, Munir was speaking at a dinner hosted in his honour by businessman Adnan Asad at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Tampa. Asad serves as honorary consul for Pakistan there.
This is known to be the first nuclear threat ever known to have been delivered by a foreign national from US soil against a third country. Munir is also said to have threatened a missile strike against the Sawalkote Hydroelectric Power Project that India proposes to build on the River Chenab.
“We are a nuclear nation. If we think we are going down, we’ll take half the world down with us,” Munir apparently said in a chilling statement.
“He also spoke on the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) that India has put on hold after the Pahalgam terror strike of April 22 that resulted in the deaths of 26 innocents. Munir said that India’s decision could put 250 million in Pakistan at risk of starvation.
“We will wait for India to build a dam, and when it does so, phir 10 missile sey faarigh kar dengey (we will destroy it with 10 missiles). The Indus river is not the Indians’ family property. Humein missilon ki kami nahin hai, al-Hamdulillah (We have no shortage of missiles, Praise be to God),” he said.
The event was attended by around 120 members of the Pakistani diaspora in that part of the US. Guests were not allowed to carry mobile phones or other digital devices, and no text of the speech was circulated. The Print claims that it reconstructed the contents of the speech from the memory of several participants who were present.
Munir was in Florida to attend a retirement function for General Michael Kurilla, the outgoing commander of the United States Central Command (CENTCOM). The media house has revealed that a ‘representative’ of the Israeli defence forces was also present at the event.
The function began with a recitation of As-Saf verse 4 from the Quran, which asserts that “Allah loves those who fight in his cause in a row as though they are a (single) structure joined firmly.”
Pakistan had named its operations during the Four-Day war of May Bunyaanum Marsoos, after the verse. After the Quranic recitation, Pakistan’s national anthem was played, the sources said.
“Ek tweet karwaya tha with Surah Fil and a picture of Mukesh Ambani to show them what we will do the next time,” Munir said.
The verse Surah Fil describes how Allah dispatched birds to drop stones on an enemy’s battle elephants, reducing them ‘to chewed-up straw’.
“We’ll start from India’s East, where they have located their most valuable resources, and then move westwards,” he added.
Munir, the first chief of the Pakistan Army to have a seminary education, is a known religious conservative and frequently uses theological points to support his arguments. However, he also resorted to simpler metaphors for the benefit of his diaspora audience.
“I am going to use a crude analogy to explain the situation. India is a shining Mercedes coming on a highway like a Ferrari. We are a dump truck full of gravel. If the truck hits the car, who is going to be the loser,” the Pakistan Army chief said.
He is said to have taken the opportunity to make the case for military involvement in Pakistani politics and strategic decision-making, directing many of his comments personally to Pakistan’s former ports and shipping minister Babar Khan Ghauri, who served under Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani. “They say war is too serious to be left to the Generals, but politics is also too serious to be left to the politicians,” Munir said.
This clearly indicates his political ambitions.
Allah, he went on, would bless Pakistan with his bounty, because it is one of only two states founded on the basis of the Kalimah, the Islamic profession of faith. The first, Munir argued, was the city-state of Medina founded by the Prophet Muhammad himself. The second such state, Munir said, was Pakistan, and God would reward it with energy and natural resources, just as the earth under Medina had been. He described finds of rare earth metals, minerals and hydrocarbons that are purported to have recently been made in Pakistan.
He did not let go the chance of poking fun at India’s ongoing trade issues with the US and joked that Pakistan should begin offering masterclasses on balancing rival powers.
“The real reason for our success is that we are not misers. If someone does good work, we praise and appreciate them. That is why we nominated president Donald Trump for the Nobel Prize,” he said.
