Reviews of books about an adversary army can sometimes be misleading and biased. Strongly resisting that temptation I read Christine Fair’s 347 page long book with increasing fascination and also discussed it once in a session at CLAWS with Christine Fair herself in the panel of speakers. That is when I learnt that she had spent almost eight long years researching what she finally produced in this book. Right at the outset it needs mention that the book does not exactly cover the Pakistan Army with glory and not many in the khaki uniform may want this book as part of their collection. Yet, what is fascinating is the fact much of the consultation that Christine did to write the book was with Pakistanis and used reference material from Pakistan’s National Defence University’s Library in Islamabad. The author has been extremely courageous with her analysis and her deductions without feeling constrained by the assistance she received from the Pakistan establishment.
December 2014, volume 38, No 12