Welcome readers! In the previous chapter we learnt that how jinnah decided to empower the military. Now, let's continue the journey.
The decisions taken by jinnah was not liked by the then prime minister of Pakistan, Liaquat Ali Khan. He widely opposed jinnah and his decisions but due to being less powerful he could not do anything. But, the destiny did not allowed jinnah to enjoy the post of Governor-General of his own created nation. After just 8 months of Pakistan's creation jinnah died due to tuberculosis. After jinnah's death, there was no any person in Pakistan who was as powerful as Liaquat. So, he took the advantage of the situation and appointed a puppet governor-general. Then the actual game began. All the powers that were given to the pakistani military were taken off by the orders of Liaquat Ali Khan. He also focused on the economic development of pakistan and because of his contributions, he is known in pakistan as Qaid-e-azam.
Now, let's took a glance on the contributions of Liaquat Ali Khan:-
1) After the first world war, the Soviet Union
and the USA emerged as the superpowers.
These nations fought a long diplomatic struggle which is also known as, Cold War.
During the cold war, both the nations were joined by a large number of other nations as their allies. Almost every powerful nation in each part of the world joined each of the two major alliances. It was then decided that which of the two alliances had a larger number of allies, would be given the official recognition of 'superpower' be the UN. At the end, the number of soviet allies was larger than that of the US by one nation.
So, the USA needed the support of only two nations to become superpower and the american presidents looked at India for this. The Indian government of Jawaharlal Nehru was given an offer to join the USA in the cold war. In return, India would be given a permanent membership in the UNSC (United Nations Security Council). But, India rejected this offer. Liaquat Ali Khan took this as an advantage and joined the American party in the Cold War. This led to the recognition of pakistan as a permanent member of the UNSC by the USA. The US president also signed an agreement with Liaquat Ali Khan, which is known as the
'Agreement of Goodwill'. As per this agreement, the american president agreed to support pakistan in any future war with India or any other neighbouring nation.
( Note : This agreement was abolished by Barack Obama after the assassination of the mastermind of 9/11 and the world's most infamous terrorist organisation al-Qaeda's founder, Osama Bin Laden in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan.
2) During Liaquat's reign, the GDP of pakistan was larger than that of India.
The pakistani army chiefs and commanders took liaquat's popularity as a global leader as a threat to their ambitions. So, they decided to launch a military coup and arrest Liaquat Ali Khan. This decision was taken by the then chief of army staff of pakistan, General Akbar Khan. But, Liaquat Ali Khan got information about the ambitions of the military so, he urgently borrowed military support from East Pakistan and arrested General Akbar Khan. All the commanders that were involved in the military coup were dismissed and tried in the courts.
In the next chapter, we will know how Liaquat Ali Khan was assassinated and within only one and half years of his assassination, the military imposed martial law in Pakistan.
