"The CIA had a blunt explanation for this "incredible" migration: "many if not most of the Hindus fled for fear of their lives." Lieutenant General Tikka Khan, Yahya's military governor, evidently thought he could quickly frighten the Bengalis into submission. The Pakistan army, the CIA noted, seemed to have singled out Hindus as targets. Although the CIA refrained from crying genocide, it did insist this was an ethnic campaign, with 80 percent—or possibly even 90 percent— of the refugees being Hindus. So far, out of eight million refugees, over six million were Hindus, and many more might follow—ending perhaps only when East Pakistan had no more Hindus left. Yahya's recent efforts to curtail such attacks had been of little use in a "virulent atmosphere" where loyalists got used to persecuting the Hindu minority... As a respected U.S. development official reported, the Pakistan army, driven by anti-Hindu ideology, was clearing East Pakistan of Hindus. Even Major General Rao Farman Ali Khan, the senior military man ruling East Pakistan, agreed with this U.S. official’s assessment that some 80 percent of the Hindus had left East Pakistan. Off the record, the Pakistani general admitted there were roughly six million refugees, and that another million and a half would eventually flee into India—roughly the number of Hindus still remaining in East Pakistan."

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