On September 6, in a post on X, Pakistan’s jailed former prime minister Imran Khan drew a sharp historical comparison. He equated the present Army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, with General Yahya Khan—the autocrat whose reckless leadership culminated in Pakistan’s breakup in 1971. Khan’s remark was more than mere political rhetoric. As Munir approaches the close of what began as a three-year term—now extended to five years through constitutional amendments pushed by his civilian partners under Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif—his tenure is drawing concern, not only for the mounting human toll but also for what it signals about the country’s political direction.

In any military across the world, no statistic could be more closely watched, or more sensitive, than casualties in service. By this measure, Asim Munir’s tenure is already among the bloodiest outside of wartime.

The record tells its own story. Under Yahya Khan’s ill-fated five years (1966–71), Pakistan lost more than 9,000 soldiers, overwhelmingly in the Bangladesh Liberation War. Pervez Musharraf, who launched the Kargil military misadventure and presided over the early years of the “war on terror,” saw roughly 2,000 deaths across nearly a decade, or about 222 per year. Ashfaq Kayani, who commanded Pakistan Army at the height of counterinsurgency campaigns in Swat, Waziristan, and Bajaur, counted 2,500 deaths across six years, which is nearly 416 annually. His successors, Raheel Sharif and Qamar Javed Bajwa, presided over steadily declining losses of roughly 233 and 150 per year, respectively, during their tenures.

Table: Pakistan Army Military Casualties by Army Chief Tenure

Army Chief

By contrast, in just three years, Munir’s toll is already estimated at 2,500 soldiers, which is way more than the combined figure of approximately 1500 under Bajwa and Raheel. That equates to 833 deaths annually, second only to Yahya’s wartime rate, and even way higher than Musharaf’s war figures, despite the absence of a declared war. This surge has coincided with the military’s new campaign, Azm-e-Istehkam, against........

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