General Headquarters (Pakistan Army)

General Headquarters
Part of Joint Staff Headquarters
Chaklala, Rawalpindi, Punjab in Pakistan
General Headquarters Show map of Punjab, Pakistan General Headquarters Show map of Pakistan
Coordinates	33°36′N 73°02′E / 33.600°N 73.033°E / 33.600; 73.033
Type	HQ
Site information
Owner	Ministry of Defense (MoD)
Operator	Secretariat-I Army
Controlled by	Chief of the General Staff
Open to the public	No
Website	Facebook
Site history
Built	1851; 173 years ago (1851) (By British Indian Army)
Built for	National Army HQ of Pakistan Armed Forces
Built by	Corps of Engineers (Construction and expansion since 1947)
Garrison information
Current commander	Lt-Gen. Avais Dastgir
Designations	Army GHQ[1]

The General Headquarters (abbreviated Army GHQ^{: 230 [2][3][4]}) is the direct reporting and the command post of the Pakistan Army, located in the Chaklala at the vicinity of Rawalpindi, adjacent to the Joint Staff Headquarters (JS HQ).^[5]

In 1851, the British Army in India made an permanent headquarter in Rawalpindi when Marquess of Dalhousie decided to stationed the 53rd Infantry Regiment to protect India from Afghan intervention.^[6] In 1854, Robert Milman from the Diocese of Calcutta had built the city's first Garrison Church and a telegraph office.^{: 189 [7][6]} It is also the site where Robert Milman is buried following his death in Rawalpindi in 1876.^[6]

On 14 August 1947, Commander-in-Chief of the Pakistan Army General Frank Messervy decided to establish the army headquarters of the Pakistan Army at the Rawalpindi, which was also the headquarter of the Northern Command of the former British Indian Army; Gen. Messervy established it as "GHQ Pakistan", which he derived from GHQ India.^[6][8][9] The Army's GHQ was viewed as a temporary post in Rawalpindi since its where Gen. Messervy was based in.^{: 51 [10]} Since its establishment, the Army GHQ in Rawalpindi has faced many problems in civil–military relations context and criticism at broader level since the nation's capital was based in Karachi in past, and now in Islamabad.^{: 51 [10]: 75 [11]} Until 2006, the Army GHQ's command post was based in Rawalpindi but later moved to Chaklala, near the vicinities of the PAF Base Chaklala and the JS HQ military headquarters.^[10]

Since 2017, the Pakistan Army has been slowly moving its headquarters to nation's capital, Islamabad to be able to merge with the air force and the navy.^[12]

The Pakistan Army's GHQ is a command post of the Pakistan Army where the secretariat of the Chief of the Army Staff functions to ensure the ceremonial and operational command of the army.^{: 47 [10]}

There are ten branches of the Pakistan Army that are headed by the lieutenant-generals and multiple administrative corps that are commanded by the director-generals who are ranked at the major-general.^{: 47 [10]} Each of the army's branches and the director-generals of the administrative corps works under the Chief of the General Staff (CGS).^[13] The chief of general staff, who usually heads the Army GHQ Staff, reports directly to chief of army staff on daily routine basis.^[13]

There are ten branches of the Pakistan Army that are headed by the lieutenant-generals and multiple administrative corps that are commanded by the director-generals who are ranked at the major-general.^{: 47 [10]}

The Chief of Army Staff Secretariat is not considered as a part of the army branch but functions separately as an office of the chief of army staff.^{: 47 [10]}

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "General Headquarters" Pakistan Army – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (January 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Source:

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "General Headquarters" Pakistan Army – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (January 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

In 1970s, the Army's GHQ became a focal point of massive arrests and incidents of military police's baton charge on protestors when politicians Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (in 1970) and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (in 1977) were taken into custody.^{: 115 [14]}

The Pakistani Taliban have repeatedly attacked the headquarters. The first attack took place in 2007.^[1] Others followed in 2008, resulting in Operation Janbaz; the 2008 Lal Masjid bombing; the December 2009 Rawalpindi attack; and the 2014 Rawalpindi suicide bombing.

To prevent the Taliban's repeated infiltration and to address the issue of increase security, the headquarters, together with Joint Staff Headquarters, has been slowly moving to Islamabad to integrate with the navy and air force's headquarters that are located in much safer zones of Islamabad, since 2017.^[15]

• Joint Staff Headquarters (Pakistan)
• Air Headquarters (Pakistan Air Force)
• Naval Headquarters (Pakistan Navy)
• Pakistan Armed Forces
• Operation Janbaz

• Cloughley, Brian (2000). A History of the Pakistan Army: Wars and Insurrections. Oxford University Press: Oxford University Press. p. 435. ISBN 978-0-19-579374-1. Retrieved 2 January 2024.
• Nawaz, Shuja (2008). Crossed Swords: Pakistan, Its Army, and the Wars Within. Karachi, Sind, Pakistan: Oxford University Press. p. 655. ISBN 978-0-19-547660-6. Retrieved 30 December 2023.