Milam ... and the dangers around us
William B. Milam, once America's ambassador in Bangladesh, is these days mighty angry with the government of Sheikh Hasina. Obviously, it is the Yunus factor which has him upset, to the extent that he now thinks if the government does not stop "haunting" the Nobel laureate, the international community, meaning the West, should stop providing aid to Bangladesh. Somehow the spectre of Cuba as it has been punished by the United States through sanctions for decades, only because Fidel Castro refuses to be dictated to by Washington, comes to mind.
Fundamentally, though, a Bengali will not be surprised by Milam's position toward Bangladesh at this point. There are all the historical parallels to be drawn where Bangladesh's relations with the United States are concerned. That infamous Nixon-Kissinger tilt toward Pakistan in 1971 hardly needs any retelling. But what does surprise you about 1971 is that not once did President Nixon or his administration condemn the Pakistani military junta of Yahya Khan over the genocide it had launched in occupied Bangladesh in March 1971. Worse, its despatch of a naval fleet to the Indian Ocean at the height of Bangladesh's Liberation War was a clear warning to the Indians and the Bengalis that they could break Pakistan apart at risk to themselves. In the event, neither the tilt nor the fleet could prevent the emergence of a sovereign Bangladesh.
One would have thought that that would put an end to American worries over Bengali aspirations. The reality was quite different, however. Henry Kissinger went around spreading the canard of Bangladesh being an international basket case. In 1974, as Bangabandhu's government tried desperately to cope with the famine threatening the national social fabric, America refused to respond to appeals for food aid because Dhaka had decided to trade with Havana. Later that year, when Bangabandhu met President Gerald Ford at the White House, Kissinger pointedly stayed away. The snub was not lost on the Bangladesh delegation. Sometime later, Kissinger was in Dhaka, where he held an excuse of a press conference for just fifteen minutes and showed no contrition over his and his government's behaviour toward Bangladesh. But he did have time to engage in a conversation with commerce minister Khondokar Moshtaque Ahmed during that trip.
And that was not all. It has now come to public knowledge that the US embassy in Dhaka, on the watch of Ambassador Eugene Davis Boster, knew from July 1974 onward that some junior Bangladesh army officers were conspiring to overthrow the government of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The officers maintained contact with mid-level embassy officials, who certainly did not promise any assistance to the conspirators. But neither did they discourage the officers. More outrageously, no one -- not Boster, not his subordinate officers -- felt it necessary to inform the Bangladesh government of the conspiracy that was afoot. The result was disaster for the Bengali nation. For the Americans, it must have been a pleasing spectacle seeing their friends Moshtaque, Taheruddin Thakur and Mahbub Alam Chashi, along with the soldier-assassins, commandeering the country.
Given such sorry aspects of history, in terms of Bangladesh's ties with the United States, it is hardly surprising that Milam is now on a mission to punish Sheikh Hasina's government over the Grameen affair. Observe the sheer audacity that comes through in his write-up for The Wall Street Journal sometime ago: "The US and European governments will have to threaten to cut off bilateral assistance programmess and other aid through multilateral institutions like the World Bank."
The audacity does not, of course, surprise anyone. Some years ago, Milam came forth with a book he called Bangladesh and Pakistan: Flirting with Failure in South Asia. His observations of the Mujib era, indeed of Bangabandhu's politics, come across as embarrassingly, for a diplomat, shallow. Observe an instance of what he writes: "Mujib especially distrusted the 'the repatriates,' who were professional soldiers who had not been able to escape the Pakistani army and were interned in West Pakistan until 1973 . . ." He does not know or care to know that these "repatriates," both in the civil service and in the military, were absorbed in service by the Mujib government. Milam is surprised that Ziaur Rahman, "a very successful professional soldier before the war and a freedom fighter," was not appointed army chief of staff by Bangabandhu. That such appointments are the prerogative of the head of government (as they are of the man in the White House) are factors that quite escape him.
What surprises you about that book is the inadequacy of knowledge Milam demonstrates about the Mujib government. He writes: "He nationalised a major Bengali-language newspaper and threatened others that might have the temerity to criticise him or his government." That Bangabandhu could threaten people is something Milam knows. The rest of us, having observed Mujib's career in politics, don't. Milam thinks "the nationalisation of industrial units and banks was widespread and indiscriminate." That is a typical attitude, with roots in the capitalism the American establishment has historically propagated. All capitalism is good; all socialism is evil. Not much of a difference here with George Orwell's exposition of the "four legs good two legs bad" theory in Animal Farm.
Milam is impressed with Ziaur Rahman. His sub-heading in a chapter of the book gives him away: "Zia is killed and hope for democracy dies with him." That it was the Zia junta which set about distorting Bangladesh's history, that the regime incorporated the notorious fifth amendment into the constitution, that Bangabandhu's assassins were sent off on diplomatic assignments abroad are truths Milam conveniently declines to make any mention of.
In his new avatar as a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars, William B. Milam is on a crusade against a legitimately elected Bangladesh government. And we had thought Henry Kissinger and the 1970s were a despicable story of the past. Milam's write-up is a huge reason why we must rally around our country today. It is a threat those in power can ignore only at peril to themselves.
Postscript: Isn't it rather curious that every time a strong government has been in office in Bangladesh, as in 1972-75, 1996-2001 and now, some people at home and abroad have always felt uncomfortable?
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