THE TASK BEFORE BANGKOK

The focus of world attention and interest has for the time being shifted to Bangkok where the SEATO Powers’ representatives are meeting to find an answer for the challenge of Communism. Pakistan is to be represented on the conference by a fairly large contingent, led by Prime Minister Muhammad Ali. The struggle between the free world and Communism is one of ideologies. Guns can stop physical aggression, but ideas can penetrate behind the most well-fortified line of defence. The threat of Communism lies more in its infiltration and subversion than armed aggression. This is not to belittle the need of building up a military bulwark against possible armed aggression. That will, of course, be done. But experience in Europe should show that defence organisations alone cannot stop Communist expansion. Italy and France, two leading members of the Democratic group are seething with Communism. The disadvantage of the free world is that it has no cut-and-dried way of life to match the Communist way. Communism is a regular philosophy of life. There lies its main strength and appeal. On the Democratic side, all that is done to offset this initial advantage is to pick holes in Communism and its achievements. This kind of negative approach is no substitute for the binding force which Communism has in its peculiar ideology. It will be well for the politicians meeting at Bangkok to realise this basic disparity between the two forces arrayed against each other. On the ideological level it is an unequal fight – Communism well-armed with an elaborate ideology but Democracy practically empty-handed. It is wrong to say that the eradication of poverty by itself can kill the germs of Communism. Poverty is a fertile breeding ground for these germs, but the eggs of these germs must be looked for at the mental level. In Pakistan it is the intellectuals and leading aristocratic families mostly that have fallen victims to Communist propaganda. Building up of regional defence or raising the people’s living standards, essential as they are, are not all in all. If Communism is to be effectively “contained” there is a third front which must be equally consolidated – the mental front. The Conference must devise ways and measures to wage a war for winning men’s minds for the Democratic way. This Democratic way however, though so much talked about, is too nebulous an expression, without a definite content, to match the Communist philosophy. Unless a comprehensive integrated philosophy of life is presented by Democracies, Communism is bound to have the upper hand. When this State was founded, there was much fanfare of Publicity that the Islamic way which it symbolised was the only answer to the challenge of Communism. There was great enthusiasm that Pakistan would be a laboratory of a third way of life, striking the golden mean between the two conflicting ideologies of the day. Soon, however, the vision was lost, and the enthusiasm subsided in the squabbles for less worthy and sordid objects. This was a betrayal of Islam by the State founded in its name. The fact is Islam alone has a clear-cut, detailed philosophy of life and a social and economic system which can board Communism in its own den. Bangkok should be a reminder that unless Communism fought on that ideological level, it may be checked, but it will not be completely liquidated. A higher, richer, and fuller way of life alone can push the Communist way out of man’s intellectual horizon. Communism though rooted in the denial of religion, has paradoxically become a regular religion by itself, evoking right “religious” fervour, even fanaticism among its votaries. It can be fought only if matched by a higher form of religion. Revealed religion which gives a fuller and more comprehensive view of life as compared to the dialectic philosophy of Communism is the only true answer to the question mark that overhangs Bangkok. Western civilisation itself rooted in a materialistic interpretation of life, is ill-equipped to fight Communism. The two are in fact the two faces of the same coin. The answer lies in the truths embodied in revealed religion. May we expect that our Prime Minister who represents an Islamic State will press on the Conference the Islamic answer to Communism? Among the Muslim masses at least who form quite a bulk in the SEATO group of countries, the anti-Communist drive must be directed along this channel. Besides bread to feed them and guns to defend them, they must be equipped with the light of faith and the higher values of life which constitute even in this age of Atom, the greatest discovery of all times.

Maulana Muhammad Yaqub Khan

(The Light – March 1, 1955)