Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah asked a question to President General Ayub Khan in 1964. She asked that American military aid to India was the talk of the town. And India would use this aid against Pakistan. "I want to know how it happened." America was your friend. Why did you lose this friend? Everyone living in the East and the West Pakistan wanted to get the answer to this question. This question came up in the early era of Ayub Khan when industrial development was fast taking place. Now it had become clear that this progress was due to Pakistan's support to America against Russia. In return Pakistan had secured economic aid from America. This aid was being spent on the construction of Tarbela, Mangla dams and many other projects. But the Indo-China war in 1962, changed the scenario. America turned its face on Pakistan and started to give military aid to India. On the one side, America was giving military aid to India on the other, India was annexing Kashmir to its territo
History tends to repeat itself
and as terrain logistics and proximity to economic centers often dictate the
locations of battles. Many decisive battles have happened in the same places
for India. This location is Panipat. two battles that occurred there three
decades apart changed the fate of the entire subcontinent for the next three
centuries the expansion of the Muslim Caliphate changed the balance of power in
Asia and one of the results of it was the Islamization of the Turkic tribes in
Central Asia.
The Caliphate was slowly getting decentralized
and the Turkic nomads began their migration in all directions by the middle of In the 10th century the north of India was under constant Turkic raids
and in 1206.This slow invasion allowed
the warlord could Medina back to establish a state called the Delhi Sultanate
in the northern part of India.
this new state managed to stop
the Mongolian attacks in the 12th and early 13th centuries and by 1320 reached
its peak with most of India conquered by the Delhi Sultanate however
ineffective rulers local rebellions and the timid invasion weakened the
Sultanate and by the end of the 14th century only northern India was under its
control.
A new dynasty of Afghan descent the Lodi was
able to come to power and stabilize the Sultanate in the second half of the
15th century but the state was still in decline north-central Asia was in
turmoil as various successors of Tamerlane was vying for his empire. one of
them Zaheer ud deen Muhammad, he was just 11 years old when he inherited
Fergana from his father in 1494 this conqueror who would later be known as
barber which means taiga in Persian managed to take the traditional center of
the region the city of Sun weakened by his 16th birthday soon the
enemies of the BIR counter-attacked and he lost control of both of these
regions he had to find refuge elsewhere through many hardships Baber was
finally able to form a small army and took Kabul.
In 1504 Berber was too ambitious to be confined
to his small domain and he turned his attention to India, by 1519, he reached
the Chenab River in modern Pakistan. The Lodi dynasty was struggling with
internal dynastic strife and a few of its representatives rebelled against the
Sultan and Ibrahim Lodi. They appealed to Baber, who used this to start his
invasion. Punjab changed hands a few times until the war became the master of
this region. In 1525 Ibrahim Lodi left Delhi early the next year and started
moving to the north while Baber moves to Panipat on the 12th of April.
The two armies stood facing each other for 8
days and the battle that decided the fate of these lands took place on April 20th
1526. Beber's army consisted of Turks Mongols, Persians, and Afghans. It was
built around a veteran corps that had been campaigning alongside him for over
a decade and thus the troops and commanders were confident and familiar with
each other. Horse archers with their deadly Turco, Mongol composite bows formed
the main body of the army while his infantry consisted of foot archers also
armed with composite bows and matchlock Musketeers Berber also had twenty
cannons.0
He received his gunpowder weapons
either from the Ottomans or the suffering this according to different sources but
Baber’s army and his tactics were a mix of two military traditions the Ottoman
and the Mongol timur it. Meanwhile, the army of the Delhi sultanate was based
around war elephants and cavalry this army was of a feudal nature and had no
gunpowder units.
Ibrahim Lodhi at panty pant may be estimated to have had
fifty thousand men and four hundred war elephants, perhaps 25,000 of these were
the heavy cavalry of afghan descent the rest being feudal levies or mercenaries
of less value, the infantry was very much cannon fodder.
Babur had his cavalry in the
second line divided into three groups with his right flank next to the city of
Panipat and his left side protected by a ditch and stakes. He and his guard
were in the center the first line consisted of infantry which was stationed on wagons
changed to each other. Which turned each wagon into a miniature fortress and
gave arches and Musketeers much-needed elevation. There were gaps left between
the carts to allow cannons to shoot Ibrahim Lodhi's.
The army had elephants in the
vanguard with cavalry in the second line and infantry in the third the Sultan
himself with his 5,000 strong guards stayed in the rear. He was sure that his
numbers would decide the day so he ordered almost all of his troops to attack
head-on the elephants were scared by the unfamiliar sound of gunpowder and were
stopped in the tracks which bogged down the charge. Ibrahim cavalry on the left
flank attempted to attack the enemies’ right but the latter was reinforced from
the center and this attack were repelled.
as the elephants were either
getting killed or retreating in a panic any semblance of order was lost and Baber
sent both his right and left flank cavalry to attempt a pincer move that forced
his foes left and right flanks to turn towards the horse archers and the Sultanate The army was pinned leaving it open two shots from the wagons and artillery behind
it.
Babur himself joined the attack
moving his guard around the cart from the right side the Sultan's forces were
now hard surrounded and Ibrahim Lodhi stepped forward to help the morale of his
truth but it was too late to change the cause of the battle and when the Sultan
himself was killed the action was over the Sultanate lost.
More than 20,000 troops and
ceased to exist while Beber's Mughal Empire that replaced it had few casualties.
Delhi was now under Babers control and in 1527 he scored another impressive
victory against the local Rajput confederation at cava. This success once again showed the dominance
of the Mughals weaponry and tactics most of northern India was now part of
Babar's domain but his death in 1531 stopped the consolidation process.
His heir Humayun slowly started losing
territory under pressure from the newly formed sir Empire of Sher Shah Suri and
even had to take refuge in the Safavid court by 1540 one who million spent more
than ten years in exile and was only able to return to India in 1554.
The next year he defeated the new
ruler of the Suri Empire and re-established control over parts of northern
India. Unfortunately for the Mughals, Humayun died in an accident in 1556 which
allowed the Suri Empire to counter-attack. Mughal leader Akbar was just 13
years old but his guardian Bairam Khan was a capable commander he moved towards
Delhi in early November.
