Historical simulacrum: ‘Bangladesh and Pakistan’ by William B Milam

William B Milam served as the US ambassador to Bangladesh from 1990 to 1993, during the first period of civilian rule after the rule of General H M Ershad. He also served as US Ambassador to Pakistan from 1998 to 2001, his last assignment before retirement. Needless to say, both of these periods were defining moments in the history of the two countries, and Milam had a dramatic front-row seat. During his time in Bangladesh, the diplomat witnessed the trials and tribulations of the first post-dictatorship Awami League government, led by a daughter desperate to rehabilitate a father and his controversial legacy. In Pakistan, Milam came in at a time when another daughter with, perhaps, a similar set of goals had failed at her second attempt in government; indeed, the merry-go-round of civilian governments in Pakistan was coming to an end at that time, ushering in what would be a decade of military rule. Its no wonder that Milam would be haunted by the similarities in the politics of Pakistan and Bangladesh, and would be tempted to write what amounts to a comparative history of two nation states that for a while enjoyed a common history.

After all of the rhetoric regarding 'Af-Pak' of recent months, it is a refreshing change to read about Pakistan in comparison with some other Southasian country. Milam's subtitle, "Flirting with failure", however, is depressing; his prognosis on Pakistan is indeed bleak. Bangladesh, meanwhile, fares a bit better, not least because of its appreciable progress in social development, largely fuelled by a vibrant NGO sector. Milam is particularly concerned about the extremist threat in Pakistan, and asserts that extremism is on the rise in Bangladesh as well, though nowhere near the scale that it has reached in the western country. Most of the book deals with how both countries got to where they stood sometime in mid-2008. (Milam's epilogue mentions President Pervez Musharraf's resignation of August 2008, but does not go much beyond that.) He does weave an interesting story.