History of Psychological Warfare Against Baloch Resistance Movement

What is psychological warfare? It was Sun Tsu who originally said that the best kind of victory was one in which you never have to fight. This is very true, and a victory that only you know about will cost you and your opponent far less - it's simply tactical.

Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PSYOP), have been known by many other names or terms, including Psy Ops, Political Warfare, “Hearts and Minds,” and even Propaganda. Various techniques are used, by any set of groups, and aimed to influence a target audience's value systems, belief systems, emotions, motives, reasoning, or behavior. It is used to induce confessions or reinforce attitudes and behaviors favorable to the originator's objectives, and is sometimes combined with black operations or false flag tactics. Target audiences can be governments, organizations, groups, and individuals.

The U.S. Department of Defense defines psychological warfare as:

"The planned use of propaganda and other psychological actions, having the primary purpose of influencing the opinions, emotions, attitudes, and behavior of hostile foreign groups in such a way as to support the achievement of national objectives."

During World War II the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff defined psychological warfare more broadly stating "Psychological warfare employs any weapon to influence the mind of the enemy. The weapons are psychological only in the effect they produce and not because of the weapons themselves."

Pakistan and Iran also used to undermine the Baloch Struggle for Self determination and liberation from the illegal occupation from both countries. The main aims and objectives of this article is to overview briefly the different sort of propaganda techniques used by the enemies of Balochs in order to undermine, break and crush the movement as well as gather more support against the movement from the third party.

Let us begin with the propaganda initiated by Iranian government and rulers of different time, which was a direct attack on Separate Baloch Identity and they insist that Baloch are Iranian people who speak a polluted accent of Persian language due to the resemblance of Balochi language with persian, this was well planned and intentional attempt to create doubts over the very existence of the Baloch Nation. Even the Iranian government today discourages the use of Balochi language in Iranian occupied Balochistan and they are extensively working on extinction of the Baloch Identity. Balochs in Iranian occupied Balochistan have so far resisted this psychological attack on their identity due many factors e.g. Language, Cultural, History, terrain and religion. About 99% Balochs practice “Sunni” sect of Islam whereas the Persians practice “Shia” sect of Islam. Hence this change in sect also created difference in believes as a result it created a sense of resistance towards the enemy propaganda and armed offenses. After the 1979 takeover of Iran by “Shia” hardliners, an attempt to force Baloch people embrace the Shia version of Islam got momentum and refusing to which results in trouble and possible execution. Hence organizations like Jondullah based on the mixture of religion and nationalism took birth who used religion for safeguarding the rights and concerns of Baloch Nation. Hence the propaganda that Baloch is not a separate nation badly failed with time and the rift between the Iranian occupiers and Oppressed Baloch people is increasing with each passing day.

Pakistan was successful in convincing the British Rulers of Indian Subcontinent and British Balochistan that the weak state of Balochistan under the Khanate cannot resist the flow of communism and can join the communist bloc under USSR hence it was the first propaganda warfare initiated by Pakistani authorities against the Baloch which resulted in the support of Great Britain for forceful annexation of Balochistan.

The Baloch resistance and war of liberation in Pakistan occupied Balochistan are always misinterpreted in Pakistani media and text books, just for instance the forced accession was termed as volunteer merger. The armed rebellion of Nawab Nowroz khan was termed as a struggle against one unit.

In 1970’s Balochistan was declared a Province and the first provincial government was formed in 1973 and hence the issues of settling the employees of federal government were issued by sending them back to where they belonged and this was decision taken at the time of declaring Balochistan a province, but Shah-e-Iran Raza Shah Pehlavi and Z.A Bhutto took opportunity of using this as a toll of propaganda against the Balochs and hence staged a drama to topple the NAP Government and consequently the weapons found in Iraqi embassy were linked with a planning of armed rebellion in Balochistan. In order to get support from international community and USA specifically Baloch freedom resistance fighters were portrayed as communist party workers financed by USSR. Whereas the case was entirely different and the Baloch struggle was completely genuine and no foreign support was provided by anyone in the world to Balochs. According to a retired Pakistani colonel who took part in the genocide of Baloch told Pakistani television in 2006 that when he was a young captain in army in 1975 “I was sent to Kohlu for Jihad against infidels who were suppose to be Marri Balochs, atheist in Believes and Manifesto of Communist revolution in Pakistan, but in contrary to that we heard “Azan”(the call for prayers) and found nearly all tribesmen offering prayers 5 times a day.” Hence the Pakistani soldiers were motivated to fight, commit genocide and rape of the name of Islam and jihad against the Balochs bycalling them communists and atheists.

Since 1998-99 the Pakistan’s army/intelligence machinery with the help and support of electronic and print media started a psychological warfare against the Baloch Resistance movement and tried to interpret it as a war waged by Baloch Sardars for the sake of royalty and share in resources, and for this purpose all state machinery hundreds of Punjabi/Muhajir writers and intellectuals were paid to write articles and reports in order to made a wrong impression of Baloch Struggle of Independent Balochistan. Hence the impression the Pakistani masses in general is that the Baloch Sardars are fighting in order to save their status and increase share in resources. Baloch Freedom struggle was also associated with Indian RAW and Israeli MOSSAD. This attempt was made in order to portray that the pure indigenous war of liberation By Baloch is Indian sponsored. Despite of spending billions of dollars on this psychological warfare the Baloch leadership and political activists proved the resistance movement a genuine and the Baloch cause was recognized on international forums as genuine.

Another aspect of psychological warfare is, “Do not let your enemy find friends”. Using this principle, Pakistan intelligence agents announced the formation of Government of Balochistan in Exile with the help of Israel and it’s headquarter in Jerusalem. The motive was to make the Muslim countries and OIC members believe that Israel is making attempts in destabilizing Pakistan by supporting the Baloch Nation. But after all prominent Baloch leaders denounced this fake organization the propaganda was failed.

As earlier discussed how the U.S. Department of Defense defines psychological warfare i.e.:
"The planned use of propaganda and other psychological actions, having the primary purpose of influencing the opinions, emotions, attitudes, and behavior of hostile foreign groups in such a way as to support the achievement of national objectives."

Using this principle of psychological warfare the Pakistani and Iranian intelligence agents have intiated a series of attempts in frequent attempts of making division, influencing the opinions, emotions and attitudes of Baloch Nation by a planned psychological warfare, for this purpose Pakistan writers like Shireen Mazari, Ahmed Qureshi, Zaid Hamid etc are continuously writing articles, telecast tv shows and use internet blogs and websites, whereas their other agents are using the tribal differences among the Baloch tribe in order to ignite a civil war like situation in Balochistan among the Baloch Tribes as well as with the settled Afghans and Hazara Community (Originally refugees from Afghanistan).

It is the time for the Baloch Intellectuals to fail any such attempt of the enemy with better planning and careful implementation using every available media and technology and cornering the exposed and unexposed agents of enemy intelligence agencies.