InterNational Churchill society. The result of a collaboration between the society and the George Washington university, the library is the First Research facility in the Nations Capital to go into the study of Winston Churchill. Here students and visitors have access to a vast range of primary and secondary materials, an interactive touch screen exhibit, and starting next month, displays of original manuscripts and artifacts. As i have said many times before, the nclc is more than just a place for study. It is also a venue for discussion and debate. And in the short time since we opened our doors, we have explored not just the legacy of Winston Churchill, but the very nature of leadership itself. I hope youll return on april 26th at 6 00 p. M. , when we welcome former British Foreign secretary david owen, now lord owen, who will discuss his new book cabinets finest hour the hidden agenda of may 1940 and also the current state of brexit. Let me take this opportunity to encourage you to learn more about the International Churchill society by visiting our website, www. Winstonchurchill. Org. Members receive a subscription to our quarterly publication finest hour and many other benefits. I would like to take a moment to recognize raza bukari, adviser to general musharraf and elliot burke, adviser to the International Churchill society for making this event possible. Born in delhi in 1943 to a family that later migrated to pakistan after the 1947 partition, general Pervez Musharraf served as president of pakistan from 2001 to 2008. The general, who was at the time the head of the Pakistani Armed forces, came to power as the result of a military coup against thenPrime Minister sharif. As president , general musharraf supported the u. S. Led war on terror that followed the september 11 attacks. This, combined with his attempts to liberalize pakistani culture, earned the ire of fundamentalists islamic leaders and made him the target of numerous assassination attempts. His autobiography in the line of fire was published in 2007. Under threat of imprisonment in pakistan, he currently lives in dubai and london. Our guest has graciously agreed to take questions from the audience at the end of our conversation. Those with questions should approach the microphone and those with speeches should not. Ladies and gentlemen, its an honor to welcome general Pervez Musharraf. [ applause ] thank you very much, indeed, for inviting me here for this very interesting gathering of especially a q a, but before the questions, suggest i put it on. A modification to the team you decided that is countering terrorism, countering radical islamic terrorism. May i suggest not to associate islam with terrorism . Terrorism has no religion. I know of many, many terrorist organizations, even the United States has declared about 11 in the world, in the christian world and the buddhist world, in japan, in germany, in greece, in italy, in uk. There are bad terrorist organizations which are is it not functioning . Okay. Dont tell me you werent hearing what i was saying. So ill continue. I was just saying that we should not associate religion with terrorism. Terrorism has no religion. We can call it terrorism carried out by some misled muslims, but dont associate the religion islam with terrorism. Islam is as peaceful as any other religion of the world, if not more. So with this beginning, im open to any questions. Well, general, were very honored to have you here. Welcome to the National Churchill library and center. This institution is named for a statesman whose connection to the indian subcontinent was longstanding and very controversial, even by the standards of his own age. Although he was very prophetic about the violent aftermath of partition, and as one historian notes, if jenna is regarded as the father of pakistan, churchill must qualify as its uncle. Id be interested in hearing your thoughts, especially as one who held supreme power during wartime about churchills legacy in that region. Churchill certainly led an Important Role in the transition of pakistan, and that was it was his time and with the lord as the viceroy in india when partition took place. And i believe churchill was the one who endorsed the partition of the subcontinent and creation of pakistan. To that extent, as far as we are concerned, we hold Winston Churchill in high esteem, other than his own performance as the Prime Minister of United Kingdom. By the way, Winston Churchill had also served as a very young officer in pakistan, where a post is named churchill post even now. So, therefore, that is the standing of sir Winston Churchill in pakistan. Thank you. Our focus here at the Churchill Library is not only on the biographical details of churchills life, but also the concept of leadership itself. The circumstances of your coming to power were fraught, certainly, but youre recognized for both fighting terrorism and resisting extremism at home at great risk to yourself. What does this say about the future prospects of democracy and Democratic Institutions in the muslim world . Yes, this is an important question which has been agitating the minds of the world when we see what is happening in the muslim world. What we have to realize is the entire muslim world was really colonized. It was colonized for two to three centuries and became independent after the second world war. All of it. Maybe less turkey and iran. All of us were colonized, so in the late 40s and early 50s we become independent. And when we became independent, we were all backward, most illiterate, having very obscure views, very religious. So this which we became independent and the west required us to become democratic. We were a Tribal Society and a feudal society. Within the Tribal Society and feudal society, autocratic rulers always succeeded in holding the place together. So, therefore, now after independence in the late 40s, early 50s we started imposing democracy, and that was democracy without balancing it, without tuning it. To national requires. It was everywhere. It failed because it was counter to the ground realities within each country. So, therefore, now we are faced with a problem of whether democracy is really applicable to certain societies. I personally believe it requires a certain degree of education level, and it certainly requires a society which is more homogeneous and not divided into small ethnic tribal divisions, because within these tribal divisions, lets take the middle east. By the way, until 1924, there was no country in the middle east. None of those iraq, syria, jordan, lebanon, saudi arabia, none of these existed. These are all creation of after 1924 through i think its called the peace accord with the french and british and drew a line. North of it french control, south of it british control. This is how the country started coming to be. Lebanon got created because they wanted to create a christian country. However, leaving that aside, so in this environment, demanding democracy becomes sometimes counterproductive. You have to tailor it to national requirements. And an autocratic ruler running democracy tailored to their particular government is always more successful than politically elected government, as they say. Politically elected governor or leader who is not really attuned to the grand realities. Thank you. President trump surprised the world and many of his passionate supporters, most of all, by attacking the syrianarab force base with 59 tomahawk missiles in retaliation for a recent chemical weapons attack. Was this a necessary and long overdue punishment for the use of Deadly Weapons against civilians, or a strategic mistake . What would you do in a similar situation . Well, i think it was certainly very serious aggression by the syrian government. Although there is doubts whether they keep claiming and russia keeps claiming that its not Bashar Al Assad whos done that, but the world believes it is the government and the president involved in this chemical attack. That be so, it is certainly a violence of international laws, and violence of humanity, i think. So, therefore, the whole world certainly was against whatever happened and whoever did it. So, therefore, when the United States went against them, it has been accepted by the world. They deserve that punishment. However, since the world is divided now, the world has is transforming from a world where the United States was the sole superpower to a multi power world where china and russia are trying to emerge as a superpower. The United States needs to balance its objectives with those of the other emerging superpowers. So, therefore, what has happened is, the other emerging superpowers who happen to be on the other side has countered that with a threat of tearing the United States not to do it again. Now, that escalates the situation, certainly. Saying United States, dont do it again. Obviously, it would anger anyone whos strong. Ill do it again, let me see what you will do. So it keeps escalating and a warlike situation gets developed. Therefore, while i think the response was correct, but it could lead to escalation, which we need to guard against. Thank you, sir. Recently retired chief of staff of the pakistani army, general sharif, has agreed to become the first commander in chief of the Islamic Military Alliance to fight terrorism, a proposed coalition of 39 countries. What some are calling a muslim nato. That will have its headquarters in riad. What are the challenges and opportunities facing such a coalition and how might it be employed . Well, yes, this is a very important issue. That is agitating the minds of everyone in pakistan also and the muslim world. If we see this, the 39 nations and the center being riad, saudi arabia, and what they are expecting to achieve has sectarian overtones. In the muslim world, theres a big sectarian divide between shia and sunnis. And what is emerging in the syria and iraq and yemen is a sectarian conflict. The shia side is led by iran, and their accomplices are syria and iraq and hezbollah in lebanon. Now, on the sunni side, the leader happens to be saudi arabia. So i would say this, force being created if it is a combination of shia and sunnis both addressing the bigger menace of isis and al qaeda and terrorism within that region within islam, within the islamic world, then it would be positive, but if it is a combination of sunni states going into iraq and syria, which has absolutely sectarian conflict, it can be dangerous. So when an exarmy chief of pakistan goes inside, he has to take into consideration two elements. If i was leader there, i was first of all see what is the force under me, what is my task, am i capable of achieving my task successfully . Will i bring victory to the task that ive assigned . And if i cant do that, i will never accept it. The second thing is whether it has sectarian overtones, like i said, because pakistan happens to be after iran the only country which has the second largest opposition of shias, so we have a sensitivity domestic, internal sensitivity of our own. So, therefore, that can only also be effective. So you need to really balance out these two elements before accepting going into such a situation, so i leave it to the ex army chief and his best judgment. I hope he takes these two elements into consideration. Thank you. Theres been a recent discussion in Indian Nuclear policy circles of the potential need to reexamine the retaliationonly doctrine currently held by the indian government. What factors do you think could be driving this dialogue, and what does it say about the Modi Government and the current status of pakistaniindian relations . Yes, sir, the current status of indiapakistan relations is most terrible. I think confrontation is close, and may i say i dont know how many indian and how many pakistanis are sitting here, but i always believe in talking honestly. It is purely because of the very aggressive stance of Prime Minister modi, unfortunately. Now, on the nuclear issue, clearly it was india which went nuclear in 1974 when they exploded their First Nuclear device and called it a Peaceful Nuclear device. I dont know how a Nuclear Explosion can be peaceful. However, the world swallowed it. But that was the time when pakistan decided that we will match them. Because we believed in our military strategy is based on a strategy of deterrence. Deterrence meaning maintaining a force level which through military weve seen about a defensive force should be at least onethird the force of the aggressor, so we were maintaining that level of a conventional force. When they went to unconventional, that strategy of deterrence stood, so we had to balance it out again. Therefore, we also went nuclear. India has always been saying and proposing a strike because they had a very superior conventional force. We have a smaller conventional force. So we have not been saying that we are in favor of use, although weve been saying we should denuclearize the region. So this has been a conflict between india and pakistan on the nuclear issue, but may i say as far as pakistan is concerned, we are nuclear because we are we have an existential threat, and, therefore, we have a right to protect ourselves. We are threatened. Our existence is threatened. Just like israel. Israel is threatened, therefore, they are nuclear. So we also are nuclear because we have an existential threat. Pakistan is historically maintained an important relationship with the United States but is also a Strategic Partner with china. As the rhetoric contention between the u. S. And prc has elevated as of late, the maralago summit notwithstanding, how can pakistan balance its relationship with both of these great powers . Yes, indeed, an absolute need of balancing this relationship. Pakistan right from the time of its independence decided to in the cold war period when it was a bipolar world and soviet union versus United States, east versus west, we decided to get into the camp, we have parts of central defense pacts with the United States. And then we have been having ups and downs throughout. Our relationship has been going up and down. It has been a roller coaster. It was up until 1965 when we went to war with india and used the weapons given by the United States. Sanctions, then went down. 79 soviet invasion, we were needed, so, therefore, it went up again. But the whole decade was a very good relationship. Soviets were devoted, so, therefore, amendment came in and we were put on sanctions again, we went down again. Then comes 9 11, we are needed again, come up again, so now it is down again. So this situation is terrible. Now, we have to learn that as far as pakistan is concerned, United States is very important to pakistan. We have very broad ranging relationship with the United States, military and social economic, and we have been getting a lot of assistance from the United States, which we must be grateful about. Theres no doubt about that. But then there are certain strategic compulsions that are the emerging realities of china and the United States interest visavis china with india very well. Therefore, United States relations with india, visavis china, has become important, but we have an enmity with india, we have an existential threat with india, so how do we balance out this whole confusion of relationships and National Interest . I would say bilateralism. We should maintain relations on a bilateral basis. Pakistan should not be concerned or should not be overly bothered about u. S. Relations with india as long as it does not go against our national security. So also, United States should not bother about our relations with china as long as we dont impinge on United Statespakistan relations, so let us try to maintain bilateral relationship and balance it out with our relation with other countries wherever sensitivities are involved on both sides. Its a type, but diplomats must learn to do it. Thank you very much, general. I wanted to leave as much time for questions as possible, so now i would like to invite the audience, those in the audience with questions, to approach our two microphones and to ask, as i say, very brief questions of the general. Please, come up to the microphone and ask your question here. Over here, yes. Thank you very much. Yes, thank you for coming. I wanted to ask you, you sort of touched on it, but how do you see the pakistaniiranian relations going, especially since the former chief of Pakistan Army i know this directly pakistan and iran have had friendly relations, but how do you see that going after this incident . Thank you. Yes. Iran and pakistan are neighbors, so we cant undo neighborhood. Geography demands that we coexist, and we have been coexisting very well. Now we have to balance our relation here. Pakistans special position, may i say, not tha