In the austere corridors of Rawalpindi’s General Headquarters—where power is measured not in votes but in veiled commands—Pakistan’s future is once again being scripted in ink darker than any democratic mandate. The nation stands at a familiar yet far more perilous crossroads: not simply between a general and a politician, but between two irreconcilable visions of statehood. Can Pakistan evolve into a republic governed by its people, or is it doomed to remain a democracy in name alone—subordinate to the whims of its ever-watchful military elite?

At one pole is General Asim Munir, a quiet man of iron discipline who now commands not just the military but, arguably, the country itself. At the other is Imran Khan—former cricket hero, once a darling of the same establishment that now seeks to erase his legacy. Though imprisoned, Khan remains a defiant echo in the national conscience, reverberating through street protests, encrypted apps, and the undimmed loyalty of millions.

What’s unfolding is not the routine fall of a prime minister or the reassertion of military dominance. It is the cracking open of Pakistan’s so-called hybrid regime—a brittle construct where civilian facades exist to give cover to military command, and where democratic rituals serve to bless, but never challenge, the entrenched architecture of power.

Imran Khan’s original heresy wasn’t that he defied the generals, but that he mimicked their methods too well. Installed in 2018 through what many believe was a carefully engineered political project—complete with........

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