| Tariq Majid | |
|---|---|
General Tariq Majid (right) meeting with United States Navy's CNO Admiral Gary Roughead (left) at Joint Staff Secretariat (JSS). |
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| Birth name | Tariq Majid |
| Nickname | Fire-X |
| Born | August 23, 1950 Lahore, Punjab Province, West-Pakistan |
| Allegiance | Pakistan |
| Service/branch | Pakistan Army |
| Years of service | 1970-2010 |
| Rank | General |
| Service number | PA – 12753[1] |
| Unit | 28th Baloch Regiment |
| Commands held | Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) X Corps, Rawalpindi Chief of General Staff (CGS) DG Military Intelligence (DGMI) 10th Infantry Division, Lahore |
| Battles/wars | Indo-Pakistan War of 1971 2001–2002 India–Pakistan standoff War in North-West Pakistan Siege of Lal Masjid |
| Awards | Hilal-e-Imtiaz (Military) Nishan-e-Imtiaz (Military) Légion d'honneur (Military) King Abdul Aziz Al Saud Excellence Medal (Military) Turkish legion of merit (Military) [2] |
General Tariq Majid, NI(M), afwc, fsc(m), psc, (Urdu: طارق مجید; born 23 August 1950 at Lahore) is a retired[3] Pakistan Army's four-star general who served as the Supreme Commandant of the Pakistan Defense Forces as the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) from 2007 to 2010. In addition to this, he also served as Rawalpindi based X Corps Core Commandant, Chief of General Staff (CGS) and DG Military Intelligence (DG MI), all premier posts of the Pakistan Army. He was replaced as CJCSC by another four-star rank general officer General Khalid Shameem Wynne.
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Tariq Majid, originally from Lahore, joined Pakistan Military Academy as a cadet in 1970 and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in 28th (Light Anti Tank) Battalion of the Baloch Regiment of Pakistan Army in April 1971. He is graduate of Command and Staff College, Quetta (1982); Malaysian Armed Forces Staff College, Kuala Lumpur (1985); Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, Honolulu, Hawaii; Armed Forces War Course (1991) from National Defence College, Islamabad, and holds masters of science in War Studies from Quaid-i-Azam University. He is a war veteran of the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.
On promotion to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in January 1988, he had the privilege of commanding the Battalion in which he was commissioned and later he also commanded a regular Infantry Battalion. In February 1994, he was promoted Brigadier-General, a first star general, and commanded two Infantry Brigades. On elevation to the rank of Major General in February 1999, he was appointed General Officer Commanding of 10th Infantry Division at Lahore.
The major staff and instructional appointments include serving as a Brigade Major of an infantry brigade and as a Lieutenant Colonel, he held the appointment of a General Staff Officer Grade 1 at Military Operations Directorate, General Headquarters. He has been on various instructional appointments at prestigious training institutions like School of Infantry and Tactics and Command and Staff College, Quetta. As a Brigadier, he was appointed Director Military Operations (Plans) in the Military Operations Directorate at General Headquarters and Deputy Commandant of Pakistan Military Academy. He served as the Director General of Military Intelligence (DGMI) from April 2001 to December 2003.[4]
Tariq Majid was promoted to Lieutenant General in December 2003, and given the post of Chief of General Staff, in place of Lt Gen Shahid Aziz, who proceeded as the corps commander Lahore.[5] The post of CGS is important in a sense that it heads the bureaus of Military Intelligence and Military Operations. In fact, the corps commander Rawalpindi and the CGS are to be staunch loyalist to the army chief, in order for him to carry a successful military coup, as in the case of military coup of 1999. He was swapped by Lt Gen Salahuddin Satti as the CGS in October 2006 as the Rawalpindi Corps Commander.
Tariq Majid's one year stint as the corps commander was eventful as it featured the suspension of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and the following mass protests, and the Siege of Lal Masjid. In the latter occasion, he was himself in charge of the armed forces who were to take down the armed militias stationed inside the mosque. He gained significant publicity from this event, and was soon predicted by the media and the analysts to be given the four-star posts of either VCOAS or CJCSC. These predictions were true, when in October 2007, he was made the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee.[6]
Tariq Majid was promoted as four-star general on 8 October 2007, the only officer from the Baloch Regiment after Rahimuddin Khan to ascend to CJCSC, in place of outgoing General Ehsan ul Haq who was due for retirement. At the time of promotion, Tariq Majid was fourth on the seniority list. Lieutenant Generals Khalid Kidwai, Ashfaq Parvez Kayani (who was also promoted as four-star and made VCOAS), and Malik Arif Hayat were all senior to him, all of whom stood superseded and sought retirement. It is noteworthy that Lt Gen Khalid Kidwai was already on a year's extension and Lt Gen Malik Arif Hayat had never commanded a corps thus virtually taking him out of the race for the top two slots in the army. Majid's three year term ended in October 2010, when he was replaced by General Khalid Shameem Wynne who was the senior-most general serving as Chief of General Staff (CGS) at the GHQ.
On October 30, a suicide bomber struck a police checkpoint in the high security zone of Rawalpindi, less than a kilometer from President General Pervez Musharraf’s camp office, killing seven people, three of them policemen, and injuring 31 others. The blast splattered check post of General Tariq Majid's official residence.[7]
| Military offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Shahid Aziz |
Chief of General Staff 2003 – 2006 |
Succeeded by Salahuddin Satti |
| Preceded by Ehsan ul Haq |
Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee 2007 – 2010 |
Succeeded by Khalid Shameem Wynne |