Abstract
The history of Pakistan and Turkey has been marked by several common features with respect to the military’s predominant role in politics. The Armed Forces in both the states many a time intervened in the politics either directly by toppling down the elected civilian governments or indirectly by forcing the elected popular governments to step down. In the history of the two countries, military has been playing a crucial role in the political arena, and it has been considered by majority of the society as the savior in uncertain situations like civil wars, political chaos and natural crisis in the country. In this paper, the author attempts to examine comparatively the causes of the military tutelage and dominancy in the politics in Turkey and Pakistan in a historical perspective. And in the second part, the author attempts to compare and contrast the similarities in the nature of the military’s involvement in politics in both the states. In the last part of this paper, the author also discusses some common dissimilar features between the armed forces of the two countries with respect to their political role and suggests some measures to be taken to reduce the pre-dominant role of the military in the political arena.