Intelligence co-operation as a 'powerful tool'

Intelligence cooperation or liaison, as it is called, is not a game for the novice or the uninitiated. Only a select few in an intelligence organisation are normally allowed to handle the arrangements, that too, after having worked in the system for years.

Intelligence cooperation goes beyond mere exchange of information. It can include help to upgrade abilities and facilities in each other's countries. It is a vital and safe channel of communication, even in the absence of diplomatic relations or near rupture in the same. In today's world, intelligence liaison has become fair game for all. Spying on friends is not taboo in this game and the best time to make inroads is when relations are warm and comfortable.

Heads of government have quite often used their intelligence chiefs to convey sensitive messages to their counterparts or maintain contact with each other, especially when, in the absence of formal relations, there was need for political deniability. Effective intelligence is also a by-product of sound relationship and trust between the intelligence chief and the chief executive of a country.

Intelligence cooperation need not only be a bilateral arrangement. Immediately after the end of World War II, the English-speaking victors of the war - the US, Canada, Britain, Australia and Canada - got together to exchange information about the common threat, which was the Soviet Union at that time. Communications intelligence was exchanged by these countries. At times, this intelligence was extended to uncomfortable political opponents who could not be covered by agencies because of domestic laws that prohibited such espionage. In the Eighties, the exchange evolved into Project Echelon, which graduated from exchanging processed intelligence to 'raw' intercepts. Echelon monitors about 120 satellites all over the world and includes non-military communications of governments, business houses, private establishments and individuals.

When stories about the Echelon leaked - that one section of the allies was snooping on the other - the French and Germans were livid. There was uproar in the European Parliament and the US and British were accused of "State-sponsored information piracy". There were suspicions, even accusations, that the US used this system to advise its negotiators in trade talks with Japan. On other occasions, it was apparently used to help Boeing beat Airbus in the deal with Saudi Arabia and to clinch the Enron deal with India, beating the British bid this time. The volume of traffic intercepts is indeed huge; the volume of international telephone traffic, including that from cellphones, is now estimated to be approximately 200 billion seconds a year. Any communication sent into space is susceptible to monitoring. Thus, there exists the need for massive downstream activity to process this. Reliance on key words and voice recognition has its problems; the former can cause communications traffic jams and the latter is not completely reliable.

In addition, reconnaissance satellites - 'vacuum cleaners' that sweep in everything and take high resolution photographs - are used to keep the globe under watch. These can detect nuclear blasts, warn of missile launches and record the telemetry of missile flights. Bases located at varied points all over the world help download this data. It could, perhaps, be comforting that one lives in such a stratospheric cocoon. On the other hand, it could be highly disconcerting to realise that we live in Orwell's world.

The CIA and KGB maintained contacts with each other even when the Cold War temperatures were near freezing. At about the same time in the Eighties, the US had two listening posts in Qitai and Korla in the Xinjiang province to listen into Soviet Russia. The Germans also had an intelligence relationship with the Chinese service at least as far back as in the Eighties. French intelligence chief, Alexandre de Meranches, founder of the secretive Safari Club that included other friendly and trusted intelligence agencies, had foreseen Soviet intrusion into Afghanistan and had advised the newly-elected Ronald Reagan to prepare for a counter-offensive in Afghanistan.

Apart from the obvious influence mechanisms, the Western power elite functions in many secretive ways. In one of his earlier novels, Robert Ludlum had four powerful international individuals as the secret controllers of the world. It did not seem real then, as Ludlum's multitalented, covert cold warriors fought ruthless wars against enemies of the free world. But Ludlum obviously based some of his novels on the realities of the day and his fantasies were more real than those of General Musharraf.

There are other influential secret societies in the West, like the Bilderberg Group formed in 1954 by a small group of rich and powerful trans-Atlantic individuals to help keep Europe allied to the US and communism at bay. This group (named after the hotel in Arnhem, in the Netherlands, where they first met) remains an exclusive and secretive group that includes politicians, financiers, media moguls and the corporate world. The group allows no reporters, there is only an answering machine and no minutes are issued. This leads to various interpretations about its role. For instance, the Serbs blamed Bilderberg for the war that led to the ouster of Slobodan Milosevic.

Another secret society with a number of former intelligence officers as members is Pinay Circle (earlier known as the Cercle Violet). It is believed to be a secret Right-wing transnational intelligence and direct action group used to fight communism. The Circle is said to be mainly in the business of regime change in the West to keep the US and Europe close to each other. The group continues to exist although communism is no longer the threat it was. Its members have included Henry Kissinger, David Rockefeller, Zbigniew Brzezinski, (all three associated with the Bilderberg Group), George Soros, Paul Volcker, Turki Al-Faisal, former CIA chief William Colby, among other US, British and German intelligence officers. Nadhmi Auchi, a onetime Saddam Hussein confidante, was also a member of this secret group. British luminaries have included Lord Julian Amery and James Goldsmith. The Circle is also linked to other influential groups like the Heritage Foundation and Opus Dei, often through its members.

There were allegations that in the Seventies, the group helped in the downfall of British premiers Harold Wilson and Ted Heath, Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam and France's President, Francois Mitterrand. Beneficiaries included Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan.

Like any other system, intelligence functions best in a certain milieu. Many world powers have treated their intelligence services as an important sword-arm to provide internal security and to secure foreign policy objectives.

When the Mossad was hunting for the Black September terrorists in the Seventies, one of the agents had to masquerade as a woman. This agent was Ehud Barak, who later became the Israeli Prime Minister. Many others who headed their countries' intelligence services switched to overt governance with ease and distinction. Bush Sr in the US was one; Andropov, Primakov and Putin in Russia; Kang Sheng and Chiao Shi in China were members of the Politburo; Hosni Mubarak looked after the Egyptian Intelligence during Sadat's presidency.

In a world of globalised terror, economics and competition, the traditional threats to the developed world have changed. Democracy and its preservation is serious business, extending beyond the tinsel and glamour of the screen and the rhetoric at election rallies. The system of global surveillance with and against friends will remain, with all levers of control lying with the rich and powerful.

Enough is enough

There she was, a wisp of a girl in her teens, out in Mahim at 11.30 in the night, feeding strangers stranded after the bomb blast. This was her answer, and those of countless citizens of Mumbai, to the terrorists who thought they could break the city's indomitable spirit. Salaam, Mumbai.

For many who remember, this was March 1993 revisited, as the death toll begins to soar to nearly 200 at the time of writing this article. Surely, it will go up further. They also say that the reaction of the State was similar; meaning that the State seemed to have learnt nothing. If the omnipresent TV channels are to be believed, in the first one hour and more after the blasts, there were no ambulances and no policemen at any of the scenes. Everyone subconsciously knew or understood that these bomb blasts were something that would happen given the friendly neighbours that we have.

Therefore, it is strange that in the first hour of trauma and panic that grips such incidents, the State showed commendable presence of mind through absence of body. It is true that the State cannot be everywhere all the time, but it must be somewhere. It is also strange that when VIPs have to travel, the police force lines up the route in strength or when doctors on a peaceful protest have to be disciplined, they materialise wielding the baton with thinly disguised relish. So, where were they on the evening of July 11 as Mumbai bled?

Alas, and inevitably, we have politicians making a beeline for Mumbai for an on-the-spot survey. All this does is to stretch the strained resources of the local authorities at such times. But apart from this, it is a cynical exhibition of vote bank politics over dead bodies.

Terrorism is here to stay for a long time and the way we're handling the problem, it will probably stay forever. In which case, we may as well prepare ourselves. There can be no full-time, all-accurate intelligence covering all eventualities. Some terrorist group will invariably slip through. Mumbai 11/7 was obviously well-rehearsed and the terrorists had recced the area more than once, worked out the timing to perfection; there must have been dry runs before they chose the hour and targeted the upward-bound trains.

The latest Mumbai blasts took place following earlier aborted attempts and conspiracies that were unearthed when huge amounts of RDX were recovered in Maharashtra. The London Police were able to work out who the terrorists were from the CCTV recordings at the metro stations. We need to do that in India too. We also need to have body and luggage scanners like we do at airports. After all, more passengers travel in our trains and metros than by air. We need to have national identity cards. We need to have medical facilities, ambulances and police forces earmarked for counter-terrorist actions all the time - if we can spare them from VIP duties. We need to prevent similar strikes in other metropolitan cities. Crisis management must become routine - a part of our lives, not handled routinely.

Pakistan reacted quickly in condemning this act, even before we came out with our weak response, where we were neither angry nor had the courage to name an organisation we suspected as masterminding this attack. If the Pakistanis were covering tracks, they did a good job, as they immediately got favourable comments from the BBC alongside somewhat tongue-in-cheek remarks about the Indian reaction, where it mocked our comment that some 'terrorist' had committed the acts. Worse, we say the peace process will continue even after more than 200 have died in a single day. Possibly, these attacks were an attempt by the Pakistanis to divert attention from what is happening in Waziristan and Balochistan, just as the attacks in Srinagar the same day were a diversion from the fraudulent elections in PoK.

In the PoK elections held on July 11, it is estimated that in Muzaffarabad's 14 constituencies, the turn-out was less than 5 per cent by 4 p.m., an hour before closing of ballot boxes. The election booths were manned by rather overbearing gentlemen from the armed forces (read ISI); many voters found that their names were not on the list; and candidates advocating independence like those from JKLF and Apna were not allowed to contest. Thus, by creating violence in Srinagar, the fraud in PoK was depicted as peaceful activity compared to the violence on our side of the LoC.

Investigations will reveal the inevitable external connection acting with a certain amount of local help. Organisations like the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba may be involved in both the Mumbai and Srinagar attacks, but with cells and even masterminds operating independently. Just a few days ago, on June 28, the Amir of Jamaat ud Dawa and the ideologue of the Lashkar, Hafiz Saeed, addressed a huge rally in Rawalpindi and said that the best way to preserve the honour of the Prophet was through strengthening jehad movements in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kashmir. He added that conspiracies were being hatched against the jehad in Kashmir but the mujahideen would continue to fight the Indian army, and Kashmir would be freed only through jehad. This showed an unchanged mindset allowed to say what he likes in the unofficial capital of Pakistan!

Unfortunately, we look for solutions for this in India and, anxious to portray ourselves as the good boys of the region, are not even able to condemn the perpetrators of these acts or react strongly enough. The solution to this terrorist problem does not lie in India. It lies in Pakistan, it lies in the mindset of the Pakistan army, which will not relent unless it begins to pay a price. And now that Kashmir is not the prime mover for the people of Pakistan and Musharraf needs a quick victory, we can afford a relook at our policies.

In fact, we must.

Fighting terror: India's muddled approach

The Heathrow conspiracy is a measure of the deadly determination and resolve of the con spirators and their masters. It is a measure of their anger and hatred that they are willing to die and kill innocent people of all nationalities and faith, including their own. It is a measure of a world going mad. And this Heathrow anger predates Lebanon. So, logically, one should expect another wave. It is too early to say who masterminded the plot. Counter-terrorism experts are divided on whether this has Al Qaeda fingerprints but there is finally a realisation of the Pakistani connection. The suggestion that a Pakistani, Matiur Rehman, wanted for an assassination attempt on General Musharraf, was the mastermind has been denied by Pakistani authorities. British authorities suspect that more than a thousand people in Britain are involved with terrorism; there may be dozens of plots with hundreds of people involved so that the potential for more terrorist attacks is very real.

Had the terrorists succeeded in destroying even three of the 10 aircraft they wanted to bring down as part of their diabolical plot, the loss of life, the economic and financial costs and panic would have been unimaginable. British intelligence, the police and others worked overtime to prevent a catastrophe over the Atlantic Ocean. Within a day they released the names and addresses of those arrested. All this is in sharp contrast to our performance - where we have been running around without a clue about the Mumbai bomb blasts.

The British must have had the data and information to act upon. They would have had photographs, access to phone taps, bugs in rooms and surveillance reports charted over months. Suspects' bank accounts were checked and the trails led to the US, North Africa, Germany and, inevitably, Pakistan.

Some reports mentioned that the British intelligence had a mole in one of the terrorist cells. This time around the Pakistanis had a dual role - the ISI assisted in unravelling some of the terrorist links while others conspired to kill innocent people. Would Pakistan ever assist India in a similar situation? Pakistani authorities arrested three of the terrorists (all of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir origin) who had gone to Pakistan where huge sums of money were wired to them by a UK-based charity in December 2005. The money was ostensibly for 'earthquake relief ' but actually meant to help them carry out the Heathrow bombings. Pakistani authorities would like to see this as a possible al-Qaeda plot, but one has to keep in mind the possibility of a Lashkar-e-Tayyeba connection for two reasons. One, that al-Qaeda does not have members from South Asia and is primarily an Arab outfit. Second, the Lashkar is extremely active in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir from where, with ISI assistance, it launches its operations into India and has become immensely popular after the October 2005 earthquake. The Lashkar's mother organisation, the Dawa, was the first off the mark with relief assistance. It would be more natural for the three to gravitate towards the LeT rather than opt for Al Qaeda. After 25 years of terrorism in India, the question still is why we are not able to act in this fashion while the British have been able to. The Americans have ensured that there was no terrorist incident in the US after 9/11, there has been one in Britain and at least one calamity prevented. In India, we have had 100 major incidents in J&K alone and about 4,200 security personnel and civilians have died since 9/11.

Soon after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the Americans promulgated their Patriot Act and the British followed it up with a somewhat less severe Anti-Terror Act. We, on the other hand, abolished Tada, abolished Pota despite December 13, despite Kaluchak and left no single law in the hands of the counter-terror establishment.

But mere enactment of laws is not enough. Laws by themselves do not prevent terror any more than the Indian Penal Code prevents crime. One permanent federal law that is stern yet humane would enable prosecution of cases and hopefully, if there are fast track courts, assure speedy justice and be a deterrent to would-be terrorists. On the other hand, multiple laws lead to confusion and possible misuse. In all such cases, there have to be witnesses secluded by a fool-proof witness protection scheme. We have nothing like that and no witness is willing to risk his life. Our in-camera trials are a joke where almost every one plus one is present. Of course, there will be mistakes, horrible ones at times, or misuse; society has to decide what it wants - unabated terrorism and communal fires or peace and tranquility. Above all, there has to be the political will to sustain this campaign for decades and not use each crisis for political gains. The battle against the terrorist is a long haul. We cannot ask Bhutan to throw the Ulfa out of its territory and then call off our own operations against these secessionists.

The US and other Western governments realised that the counterterrorist establishment had to be equipped and reoriented to handle the new task. Western governments, therefore, strengthened their intelligence networks, spent huge sums of money to equip them, hired experts and strengthened coordination between the various agencies. For India, there is still a long road ahead and we have lost so much time. Our Multi-Agency Centre, designed to coordinate the fight against terrorism, is, from what one hears, languishing. We had a warning in February 1998 when Osama bin Laden formed his International Islamic Front with Pakistani participation. In 1999, Yossef Bodansky, Director of the House of Representatives Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, wrote in his book Bin Laden - The Man Who Declared War on America that bin Laden had struck a deal with the ISI, in the spring of 1998. This agreement enabled the ISI/Lashkar-e-Tayyeba combine to carry out attacks in India under the 'banner' of Al Qaeda while the ISI gave logistic support in Pakistan for al-Qaeda to carry out attacks in the rest of the world. Terrorist attacks in the rest of India would indicate that this agreement is in force. Bodansky also speaks of the Talibanisation of Pakistan and how Nawaz Sharif was warned by the Islamist army and the ISI that the only alternative to chaos was to Islamise in the extreme. Prophetic, one might say, for that is the way Pakistan is unfortunately headed.

Khalid Mohammed Sheikh, the master planner of the 9/11 attacks, surfaced in Pakistan. So did others - Ramzi Yousef, who carried out the first attack on WTC in 1993, was arrested in Pakistan. He had escaped from the Philippines after their Bojinka plot to target 11 aircraft over the Pacific in 1995 was discovered. Rashid Rauf, whose arrest in Bahawalpur (headquarters of Jaish-eMohammed) on August 4 triggered the arrests in Britain is another link in the Pakistani terrorist chain. Who knows, even the brains of the Heathrow conspiracy might surface in Pakistan one day. The Americans, blinded in their love for Pakistan, have refused to see the ugly warts while the Pakistani chest-thumping for its dubious contribution in the latest episode is a show of low opportunism and hypocrisy as they shelter and inspire terrorists. It is time for us and the rest of the world to take the Pakistani threat seriously before we run out of time and options.