Pakistan’s civil war has finally erupted, and in the worst possible circumstances. While the two sides kept talking some hopes of compromise remained. But troop reinforcements arrived with suspicious speed by boat after the talks broke down, and President Yahya Khan yesterday made his intentions clear by accusing Sheikh Mujibur Rahman of treason and by banning all political activity. He is dedicated in keeping Pakistan united at all costs. The President’s stance made Sheikh Mujib’s reported declaration of independence for Bengal inevitable. The strains have been building up with increasing intensity ever since last December’s elections. The President’s intention to turn back the fact of Pakistan’s division may be unattainable. Whatever the outcome, it will mean more misery, bloodshed, and economic dislocation.

Bengal’s secession means that the illogic of a united Pakistan - the hallowed Islamic inheritance from Mohammed Ali Jinnah - has shown itself again. The miracle is that it lasted so long, in spite of sporadic outbursts of regional tension. The backlog of ills harboured by the east towards the west may make reconciliation after this last outburst impossible. The east feels that its contribution to Pakistan’s economy - mainly through jute - has been used exclusively for the benefit of the west’s economic development and a massive defence budget. It has little feeling for the west’s prolonged quarrel with India over Kashmir. In reaction against this feeling of neglect and as a positive demonstration of its own identity, the east’s civil service has been responding fully to Sheikh Mujib’s calls to stop and start work. This gamble blocked the only hopeful way forward from December’s elections. For Sheikh Mujib’s majority and his position as Prime Minister could have allowed him to play directly on the west’s conscience about the east and to obtain a better deal for his region.

The three main political protagonists, the President, the Sheikh and the opposition leader-to-be, Mr. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, all miscalculated and made certain that this alternative could never come about. The election produced a political division matching the geographical separation exactly. This clear-cut result ought in no way to have encouraged military intervention, as a fissiparous and impotent coalition might have done. The extent of the eastern and western victories caught their leaders unaware. Sheikh Mujib was landed with an extreme Bengali six-point programme and a majority which made compromise unjustifiable to the more militant members of his Awami League.

Bengali nationalism has swept him along faster than his temperament or instincts intended. President Yahya Khan’s dedication to a united Pakistan when faced with a fairly elected Prime Minister with separatist intention induced vacillation. The postponement of a Constituent Assembly became for the east as much the postponement of attainable sovereignty. Mr. Bhutto’s interests have been confined almost exclusively to the west - and this has compounded the splits. The President appears unable to stomach the fact that Sheikh Mujib has for the past few weeks effectively been ruling Bengal independently of the central government. He has abandoned compromise and now seeks to store an unnatural order by force.

The immediate outcome will be a bloody reaffirmation of the east’s worst suspicions of the west’s intentions. But the problems do not stop there. Can Sheikh Mujib, a congenial compromiser, caste in the role of revolutionary, sustain his position against the more militant members of his party, or against the leftist National Awami Party, which boycotted the elections? He had little room in which to manoeuvre in the first place. He has even less now. Civil war will hamper further an economy which, before fighting started, was inadequate for its needs. India’s West Bengal will be watching the processes of disintegration and separation with close interest. All of Pakistan’s leading politicians have contributed to the slow-burning fuse on this tragedy. The pity is that President Yahya Khan would not see his way to accept Bengal’s separate identity and to crystalise it in some blood-saving form.