WHEN in October 1999, the General seized power in Pakistan, he must have realized that he was about to begin the most perilous journey of his life.

With a Hindu nationalist party in power in India and huge economic, political, religious and social strife internally, one wonders what attractions he saw in his new role. Yet all that and the headache of Afghanistan has not deterred him. He still managed to 'persuade' an alarming 98% of the electorate to vote for him in the Presidential elections.

However he and Pakistan are now facing some extremely tough questions and decisions. The General's response to the present crisis has implications for Pakistan potentially for the next 50 years. The impact of war, whether a victorious one or one that is lost will always be hugely detrimental.

The pessimists are of course saying that war and therefore regression and degeneration, is inevitable. They can draw support of course from history and two previous wars. They say that all the signs of both sides readying themselves for the inevitable are there to be seen and rued. Nigh on a million troops are gathered on the 2000-mile border.

Trenches have been dug. Foreign citizens have been advised by their countries to leave the region. Embassies and consulates have been closed. One of the weightiest signs of war, are perhaps the announcements by the British and other western powers that they are considering banning arms exports to Pakistan and India. A far reaching and dangerous war, the theory goes, must be imminent if something is coming between the Capitalist West and its insatiable desire for profit.

The events at the recent, 16-nation, Asian summit in Almaty, Kazakhstan also provide glum reading. What some saw as the last real opportunity of constructive talks between Vajpayee and Musharraf degenerated instead into an angry exchange. 'We cannot condone the rapacious policies of certain states that forcibly occupy territory and deny freedom to peoples for decades' stated Musharraf.

Vajpayee continued to maintain that Pakistan was allowing and encouraging terrorists to function. He would not accept that fighting against forcible occupation was not terrorism.

President Putin was the Chief mediator between the two sides at the Summit. However, how much influence a man himself picking up Western and American scraps tossed to him, was going to have in such an emotive issue was debatable.

As it turned out his altogether meaningless and meagre efforts proved to be fruitless. Both leaders went back and surely told their armies to be ever more ready for conflict.

It's ironic that the nation, which could have avoided this conflict even raising its ugly head, is the only one making any sort of real effort to avert the war. Kashmir is only proving to be thorn in the side of Pakistan and India, because, it was lodged there by the British at the time of Partition.

Some very basic and fundamental rules were applied for partition purposes. A majority Hindu population, the state would be in India. A majority Muslim population Pakistan. Yet mischievously an anomaly was created in Kashmir. Even the parting shot from the British had the air of 'divide and rule' about it. Yet 50 years and two nuclear arsenals later that policy of leaving in the air such a massively important issue has proved to be nightmarish.