Coward or courageous.

Dr Lord Wilson C. McMorran, who served as a medical officer during WWI and earned the gallantry award, military cross (MC), carried out a study on the psychology of soldiers in combat. Based on his studies he published his book, the 'Anatomy of Courage.' In his book, he asserts that the physical courage of a person converts into moral courage when he grows older and his physical strength weakens. He maintains that the courage of a leader or a commander should be judged by his decisions based on his moral principles and character traits. It is ironic that some people claim General Ayub Khan was a coward due to his alleged poor performance during the WWII Burma campaign. Ostensibly, he was demoted and declared a coward in his war report. The roots of this assertion originate either from some sort of personal vendetta by a few people or out of ignorance. In this article, we shall focus solely on these allegations of cowardice made against the late general, leaving aside the legitimacy of his assumption of power, the political aspect of his tenure, and his statesmanship.

In January 1945, while Ayub Khan was serving in the 1st Assam Battalion as a major, his commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel W.F. Brown was killed. Consequently, officiating command of the battalion was handed over to him being the senior most major; the second in command. This was a temporary arrangement till the arrival of the new incumbent, the commanding officer. Being part of the divisional troops, the unit was directly under the command of the General Officer Commanding (GOC), Major General Thomas W. Rees, commanding 19 Indian Division, Burma. Meanwhile, the unit was ordered to take part in an offensive action. Major Ayub Khan, showing probity, rightly suggested that the unit was unfit for war due to losses suffered during previous engagements. This was done with complete sincerity and loyalty to the unit and to the cause. In his view, pushing the unit in that inadequate condition would not only have resulted in fighting a loser's battle but also caused a high rate of casualties.

Major Ayub's assertion was unprecedented in those colonial days. It was based on ground reality and required a lot of moral courage. The English GOC was not accustomed to these kinds of suggestions from a native officer. He, therefore, removed him from the officiating command and defined Major Ayub's proposition in his report as, 'tactical timidity'. In case the meaning of timidity is taken as...