General Jehangir Karamat NI(M) HI(M) TBt (Urdu: جہانگیر کرامت ; born 20 February 1941) is a retired four-star rank military officer, diplomat, public intellectual, and a former professor of political science at the National Defense University.

His tenure is regarded as his pivotal role in enhancing the democracy and the civilian control when he staunchly backed Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's authorisation of atomic-testing programme in 1998.

[3] On 6 October 1998, Karamat was forcibly relieved from his four-star commands by Prime minister Nawaz Sharif over a disagreement on national security and reforms of the intelligence community.

[5] After his resignation, he accepted the professorship at the Stanford University in California and appointed as to head Pakistan's diplomatic mission as an Ambassador but was later removed due to strong advocacy for democracy.

[1] After the third war with India in 1971, Major Karamat was one of the last military officers who were sent to the United States to study at the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas.

[25] In 1971, Major Karamat commanded the company of the Aromoured Corps on the Western Front of the third war with India, defending the territories of Punjab, Pakistan against the approaching Indian Army.

[38][39] In 1995, Lt-Gen. Karamat rose to public prominence when he had the Military Intelligence (MI) to infiltrate within the Pakistan Army to apprehend the rogue culprits for attempting a coup d'état.

[41] As per Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto's approval, President Farooq Leghari confirmed the promotion of Lieutenant-General Karamat to the four-star rank and was appointed as the Chief of Army Staff when General Kakar was due to retire on 12 January 1996.

[43] As Chief of Army Staff, General Karamat tried to work with the Prime minister and President at once, but soon came to understand that the misconducts of politicians and bureaucrats would eventually lead to the dismissal of Benazir Bhutto's final government.

[44] General Karamat reached to then-Speaker of the National Assembly Yousaf Raza Gillani and "leaked" an intelligence information and tried convincing Benazir Bhutto and President Leghari to resolve their issues, and emphasised to focus on good governance.

[49] At the NSC cabinet meeting, the Pakistani government, military, scientific, and civilian officials were participating in a debate, broadening, and complicating the decision-making process.

[49] Although, General Karamat debated towards presenting the national security and military point of view, the final decision was left on Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's say.

[47] As the nuclear tests were conducted, there was a strong feelings in the military all together that any concession to India on Kashmir policy and other related issues would lead to a decline in the prestige and standing of the armed forces.

After the failure to pass the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution, there were concerns raised by Benazir Bhutto and the Pakistan Peoples Party on Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's absolute control over the politics, national security, and foreign policy.

[51] On 6 October 1998, General Karamat who lectured at the Naval War College in Karachi on the civic-military relations and presented the idea on reestablishing the official National Security Council (NSC) where military could have representation in the country's politics.

[52] General Karamat openly spoke on the role of the internal intelligences, such as FIA and IB, carrying out vendettas-like operations against political opponents and insecurity-driven and expedient policies while Pakistan capsized, at the behest of the politicians.

[55] Prime Minister Sharif's further suffered with wide public disapproval after appointing much-junior General Pervez Musharraf at the both capacity, overruling the Admiral Bokhari's turn as the Chairman joint chiefs.

[19] Among his notable students included Pervez Musharraf, Ali Kuli Khan, Fasih Bokhari and Abdul Aziz Mirza who studied under his guidance.

[36] In addition, he was selected as a scholar and awarded research associateship on civil military relations at the Brookings Institution based in Washington, D.C., United States.

[61] While his stint as Pakistan Ambassador, Karamat made the pro-democracy statements at the different Pakistani American gatherings, while passing critics to President Musharraf's style of running the civilian government.

[62] In private, Karamat confided in Washington based U.S. journalist that "General Musharraf had made up this story to create wedge between Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and him to get him fired in 1998.

"[62] After his ambassadorship, General Karamat founded a socio-political policy and analysis institute, Spearhead Research, which focuses on social, economic, military and political issues concerning Pakistan and Afghanistan.