Is America Hostage To ISI In Afghanistan

Terror in Kabul

At about 8.30 a.m. on the morning of July 5, 2008, a Toyota Camry laden with explosives rammed into two cars outside the fortified gates of the Indian Embassy and exploded just as Embassy staff was entering the building. 58 persons, including the Military Attache and a diplomat of the Indian Embassy, and many of the visa seekers who had lined up outside the Embassy gates, died. Three days later, a bomb was found on a bus that was taking Indian construction workers to their worksite on the Ziranj-Dilaram road being constructed with Indian assistance. Quiet obviously these two terrorist acts were specifically aimed at India.

By the end of August that year it was quite evident that the all powerful Pakistani intelligence agency, the Directorate of Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) had a role to play in these attacks. There was enough evidence of Pakistani involvement in the Kabul bombing. The Afghan secret service, the Riyasat-e-Amniyat-e-Milli, had warned India on June 23 of an imminent attack. Its report said terrorists linked to al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamist warlord Jalaluddin Haqqani from his base in North Waziristan under Pakistani shelter, had planned a suicide assault on the mission. The Indian Intelligence agency, Research and Analysis Wing also had similar information three days and later corroborated by US intelligence reports.

Towards the end of July, The New York Times had reported that the CIA had provided wireless intercepts of communications between Pakistan’s ISI and the Kabul bombers. More than that, the US intelligence began to suspect that foreknowledge about this attack went as high as Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff, Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayani.

More than a year later, a large bomb exploded outside the Indian embassy in Kabul on October 8, 2009, killing 17 people and wounding 76. The Taliban claimed responsibility for this terrorist act. Obviously the Taliban, whose cause had been championed by Pakistan since their creation by the ISI and, even after being toppled as Afghanistan's rulers in 2001, were acting on behalf of their masters.

Fears about India

Most of Pakistan’s anxiety to dominate over Afghanistan is India-related in trying to seek what it called strategic depth against the much larger India, ensure a friendly Afghan government in Kabul that accepted the Durand Line dividing not only the Pushtun living on both sides of the border but also the two nations. It has always been important for Pakistan that Afghans accept the Durand Line to prevent any irredentist claims by Afghanistan or demands for ethnic independence by Pushtun nationalists. Pakistan had a virtually unimpeded role in Afghanistan once the US-led Afghan jihad started against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in 1979 and especially in the 1990s when it championed the Taliban. Till September 2001 it assumed that its position in Afghanistan was unchallengeable. But today Pakistan is concerned that the aid policy of India which contributes US $ 1.3 billion to the Afghan infrastructure would make India more popular than before. This would make it more difficult for its surrogates, the Taliban, to assume control when eventually the US/NATO leave Afghanistan.

What happened in Kabul in 2008 and 2009 was part of a three pronged policy of the Pakistan government mainly implemented by the ISI. It was to terrorise and intimidate the Indian workers and Embassy in Afghanistan through these sponsored attacks by the Taliban and the Haqqani networks. The second plank has been to constantly level charges of Indian interference in Pakistan through its consulates in Afghanistan so that the Indian presence in Afghanistan could be reduced through US/Western pressure. Third, give sanctuary to the Taliban in Balochistan and other parts of Pakistan, including as it seems even in Karachi as Quetta had become vulnerable to possible drone attacks.

The ISI develops its claws

The ISI’s role in the Afghan jihad and beyond, leading to the growth of the Taliban in the 1990s has been covered by Steve Coll in his famous book Ghost Wars – The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and bin Laden, From the Soviet Invasion to September 11, 2001. This monumental work recounts how the Taliban first rose and, with the help of the ISI, attained power in Afghanistan and the emergence of Osama Bin Laden. It is more than the history of the CIA. It is a history of collaboration between the two intelligence agencies where the ISI supplied weapons, funds, logistics and refuge to the mujahedeen operating in Afghanistan from Pakistan. The money came primarily from Saudi Arabia, the weapons and logistics from the US and other allies and the volunteers came from all over the Islamic world. Close association with the mujahedeen leaders like the ISI favourite Gulbuddin Hekmetyar of Hizb-e-Islami was the favourite of the Pakistani intelligence establishment and was groomed by them to succeed in Kabul after the Soviets left. There were other fall back options like the second favourite, Jalaluddin Haqqani of the Hizb-e-Islami (Yunus Khalis faction) and who today heads Haqqani networks with his son Sirajuddin leading the charge and operating from North Waziristan in Pakistan.

The aftermath of the departure of the Soviets did not lead to the results that Pakistan expected. They could not reach Kabul with their favourite, Hekmetyar beaten back first by President Najibullah’s regime that lasted longer than expected and then by the lightening takeover of Kabul by the Tajik leader and former ally, Ahmed Shah Masood in 1992. Pakistan’s dream was fast becoming a nightmare as it was unable to control the warring groups and chaos reigned.
It was then the Taliban – obscurantist and xenophobic - was born, manned almost entirely by the mujahedeen and young Afghans from the madrassas of NWFP and Balochistan in the autumn of 1994. The Taliban from the religious schools of Akhora Khattak in Peshawar, NWFP and the Binori chain of madrassas headquartered in Karachi were seen by the ISI as an alternative of the failed experiment with Hekmetyar.

Ahmed Rashid’s book Descent Into Chaos in an authoritative and detailed account of Pakistan’s support to the Taliban with refuge, funds and arms more or less on the same pattern as had been given to the Afghan mujahedeen is the previous decade. The CIA had lost control of the Afghan jehad by allowing the ISI to determine which mujahedeen faction would receive how much money and how many weapons. American money for hunting Al Qaeda was diverted by the ISI to finance Taliban activities in Afghanistan. Therein lie the failures of the West to control Pakistan, by allowing it to nurture forces like the Taliban and subsequently even the Al Qaeda.
By 1996 the Taliban of Mullah Omar were in control in Kabul, just a few months after Osama bin Laden returned to Afghanistan following a four-year absence in the Sudan. Before going to the Sudan, Osama was in Pakistan, a useful hangover from the mujahedeen days. However, as the Pakistani author, Amir Mir points out in his book The Talibanisation of Pakistan-from 9/11 to 26/11,(2009) ‘The proximity between the ISI and the Taliban and the intimacy between the Taliban and Al Qaeda necessarily raises the question of the nature of relations between the ISI and Al Qaeda. It is generally believed that the link between the ISI and Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden goes back to almost 25 years ago.’ It is believed that Osama’s initial meeting with Mullah Omar was set up by the ISI and eventually brought him to Kandahar. When Al Qaeda was formed along the Afghan-Pakistan border its first camps in Afghanistan were set up in Haqqani’s territory whom both the ISI and CIA had seen as an important fighter in the Afghan jihad. It was Haqqani who was encouraged to raise funds for Al Qaeda from Saudi Arabia and rich Arabs.

In an intricate web of arrangements the Taliban continued to remain dependent even after September 11, 2001 on an infrastructure of religious parties like the Jamaat ul Ulema Islami (Fazlur Rehman) and other sectarian groups like the ultra-Sunni Sipaha Sahaba that were important clients of the ISI. The fact that Pakistan had close links with the Taliban before the September 11 attacks is well documented. The report of the US National Commission on the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks stated that “Pakistan, not Iraq, was a patron of terrorism and had closer ties with Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda leading up to the 9/11 attacks. The Taliban’s ability to provide the Al Qaeda chief a haven in the face of international pressure and the United Nations sanctions was significantly facilitated by Pakistani support. Pakistan broke off with the Taliban only after 9/11 even though it knew the Afghan militia was hiding Osama bin Laden.”

The Pakistani agenda widens

In the 1990s, Pakistan however had another triple agenda of encouraging Al Qaeda to expand its activities for a global jehad while focusing its own attention on the Indian subcontinent and strengthening the Taliban in Afghanistan. The ISI co-operated and aided Al Qaeda in establishing training camps inside Afghanistan which would help in spreading the Al Qaeda message and also indoctrinate foreign fighters in these camps who could in turn reinforce the faith in the Pakistani Punjabi but Kashmir specific Lashkar-e-Tayyaba fighters.
Lt General Hamid Gul at that time the head of the ISI was, and still is, a fervent Islamic fundamentalist and anti-West – a feeling that was shared by some of his successors like Lt Gen Javed Nasir and Lt Gen Mahmood Ahmed who was the DG on September 11, 2001. After decades of close association with the Taliban, Al Qaeda and India-specific terrorist outfits like the Lashkar e Tayyaba, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Harkat-u- Mujahedeen, Harkat-ul-Jihad-i- Islami, it was impossible for the ISI to remain unaffected by the feelings and sentiments of its fundamentalist surrogates.

It may have been politically inexpedient to admit this publicly but US intelligence agencies had done their homework about Pakistani activities. The Defence Intelligence Assessment of 1999 made the stark assessment that bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network had been able to expand under the safe sanctuary extended by the Taliban in keeping with Pakistani instructions. Osama’s Zawaha camp on the Afghan Pakistan border which was targeted by US cruise missiles in 1998 had been built with ISI funds by Pakistani contractors and protected by the local tribal leader Jalaluddin Haqqani. The “real host of that facility was the Pakistani ISI,” the report said.
By 2000, there were half a dozen ISI officers deputed to the Taliban headquarters in Kandahar. By the middle of 2001, Pakistan was providing to Afghanistan more than a hundred high frequency phone lines and major cities were accessible through the Pakistani network. Around that time about thirty trucks were crossing the Pakistan border carrying armaments for the Taliban in violation of UN sanctions. Senior Pakistani military and intelligence officers were involved in planning Taliban offensives.

The ISI was less than co-operative with the CIA on issues relating to the Al Qaeda or Osama. When in May 2001, Director CIA visited Pakistan and asked his Pakistani counterpart Lt General Mahmood Ahmed to share intelligence on Osama, the Pakistani refused. A few months before 9/11, the ISI had intelligence that two prominent nuclear scientists, Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood Chaudhri Abdul Majeed had met Osama and Ayman al-Zawahiri Mahmood Ahmed did not feel it necessary to share this information with the US. On a visit to Washington in the week beginning September 4, 2001 Mahmood stalled all American requests to co-operate on Taliban and Al Qaeda. One day after the Twin Towers fell, Richard Armitage the Deputy Secretary of State had delivered the famous threat to Mahmood and the Pak Ambassador when he said “Help us and breathe in the 21st century along with the international community or be prepared to live in the Stone Age.” Gen Mahmood Ahmed was sent to the Taliban to suggest to them to surrender, but he did no such thing. Instead he is said to have advised them about how to resist the Americans and promised them full support. Gen. Musharraf who had got an equally stern message “Are you with us or against us” from Washington and before October 7, 2001, Mahmood Ahmed was relieved of ISI command.

CIA’s and Gen Musharraf’s limited options

Despite the stern warnings, the CIA had very little choice. When the September 11 2001 catastrophe struck the US, accompanying the rage in Washington was the knowledge that the US had no intelligence inputs on whatsoever on the AL Qaeda and Taliban activities in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The uncomfortable truth was that the US intelligence agencies had little or no human source intelligence, its other intelligence collection capabilities had shrunk during the Clinton Presidency and there was very little military to military contact between the two countries. The truth was that it needed Pakistan and the ISI and the Pakistanis, who had been active in Afghanistan for a decade , knew this as well. That is how the relationship was sought to be re-established but has till date remained an uncomfortable one with a huge trust deficit. The suicide attack on the CIA camp in Afghanistan (Camp Chapman Khost, December 30, 2009) where seven CIA operatives were killed showed that even eight years after the launch of the war on terror in Afghanistan, showed that the American intelligence footprint was still faint and perhaps even amateurish.

Although Gen. Musharraf accepted the US diktat almost immediately after it was delivered to him, its implementation would prove to be difficult. It was easy to clean the higher echelons of the ISI where senior officers worked on tenures that lasted a few years. The difficulty was at the middle and lower levels where ISI operatives handling the jihad or the Taliban had been working for ten years or even longer. They were closely associates not only with the Pukhtun leadership but had begun to identify themselves with the cause as well. A kind of a Stockholm Syndrome had set in even among those who were not religiously inclined. The Pakistan Army, years after General Zia ul-Haq was killed in 1988, still maintains the same jihadi slogan that was given to it by Zia – Jihad Fi Sabillah which translated means ‘Jihad in the name of Allah.’

By the time a change of heart was demanded from Musharraf and his military government, the ISI had been able to build enough identification of interest between the young of Pakistan and the Taliban so that when the American pressure came on the Pakistan government there was a desire among the young to defend the Taliban and their ideology rather that the outsider. The other dilemma was that the terrorist infrastructure that targeted the Indians and Kashmir like the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, Jaish–e- Mohammed and Harkat-ul-Mujahedeen in their various reincarnations had to be protected at all costs. The break with these groups in Afghanistan was going to be troublesome and slow. The US had to apply considerable and constant pressure for the Pakistanis to yield on the Al Qaeda front in the next few years. By 2003 most of the Al Qaeda including many big names, had been handed over/arrested/killed (about 600). There are even reports from Asian News International quoting Karachi based Pakistani political sources that Osama, Zarqawi and Mullah Omar have been given shelter in Karachi by the Pakistan government. But the Taliban and the India-specific outfits were not to be touched. Imtiaz Gul in his book The Al Qaeda Connection –Taliban and Terror in Pakistan’s Tribal Areas and Amir Mir in his book Talibanisation of Pakistan- from 9//1 to 26/11 give detailed and chilling accounts of the Pakistan ISI-Taliban –Al Qaeda nexus. They describe how the Pakistan government played an elaborate game of charade with the US following the US ultimatum and continued to play this almost till the other day.

This frustration with Pakistani tactics has led the US to follow the Iraqi example of drawing in private military company for armed support and intelligence activities. According to Jeremy Scahill of the Nation, (November 23, 2009), his investigations had found that “At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which they plan targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives, "snatch and grabs" of high-value targets and other sensitive action inside and outside Pakistan”.

It is possible that the three US Special Forces officers killed in NWFP in November 2009 were from one such private military company. It is also possible that the raid conducted by the Pakistani intelligence and US forces that led to the arrest of Abdul Ghani Baradar (Karachi mid February 2010) may have had an component from a private military company.

Pakistan obfuscates and prevaricates

Pakistan was a reluctant participant in President Bush’s global war on terror. Circumstances had forced general Musharraf to accept this course of action much against the wishes of many of military commanders. Thus, while they began to co-operate in the operations against Al Qaeda the same co-operation was not available against the Taliban. Operations against India-specific terrorist outfits were not even on the table nor did the West push this agenda.

A complex and a dangerous agreement was worked out between the Taliban and the Pak Army. The Taliban were allowed to push their agenda in Afghanistan and could even remain active in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) in the NWFP so long as the Pakistan Army was acknowledged as supreme. But the FATA Taliban, angered by the assault on their territories by US Predator drones and by Pak Army co-operation with the US broke ranks and attacked to occupy the Swat Valley. This was out of bounds and so was the Taliban foray into Buner barely 100 km from the capital, Islamabad. The Pak Army had to counterattack but the intention never was to destroy the Taliban; it was only to discipline the force, reassert its own supremacy and keep it intact for the future. Action was to be taken against the Taliban or will be taken against any force that threatens the Pak Army’s own security and not because this is part of NATO/US agenda. David Rhode the NY Times journalist who spent more than 7 months in Taliban captivity wrote in 2009 that in North Waziristan in FATA the Pak Army had allowed the Taliban to run their own “state”.

There were other instances of Pakistan duplicity. During a fierce battle in Afghanistan in 2007 the Americans learn from their own and Afghan intelligence inputs that Pak military flew repeated helicopter missions to resupply the Taliban forces. In the first five years till 2006 while 600 Al Qaeda were picked up not a single Taliban was arrested. There were two ISI training camps near Quetta in Balochistan for the Taliban and there is documentation to show that 2,000 rocket propelled grenades and 400,000 rounds of ammunition were supplied for one Taliban campaign. By 2008 caustic comments were being made by a frustrated and angry US administration. For instance, Bruce Riedel at one stage in 2008 angrily referred to Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf’s attempts to fleece US for billions of dollars while it allowed Al Qaeda to regroup in Pakistan. “We had a partner who was double dealing us,” he said.
There have been endless visits from Washington of very senior administration and Pentagon officials to apply pressure on the Pakistan government to live up to its word. This constant stream has included virtually all of President Obama’s inner group of senior advisers and military practitioners for the last year in particular – the Defence Secretary Robert Gates, NSA Dennis Blair, DNI James Jones, CIA Chief Panneta, Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mullen and Commander CENTCOM David Patraeus as well as Richard Holbrooke. In an interview in March 2009, Holbrooke when asked if the ISI was assisting Al Qaeda and Taliban-linked extremists was extremely skeptical because he felt that not only was there hardly any co-operation between the two intelligence services We cannot succeed if the two intelligence agencies (the CIA and ISI), they seemed to be inimical to each other, there was no trust and the Americans were concerned that that the other side was colluding with the Taliban.
There have been some signs of a better co-operation following the recent arrest of the Afghan Taliban leader and Mullah Omar’s deputy, Abdul Ghani Baradar, as a result of joint intelligence operations between the CIA and ISI. However, the Pakistani authorities are reluctant to hand Baradar over for further interrogations for fear that he would reveal far too much. A recent announcement that the US/NATO forces will now target the Haqqani networks in North Waziristan either means that the Pak Army is fully on board with this and has realized the danger it faces from these factions is real and imminent or that the US has decided to go it alone, despite Pakistani prevarication. Time will tell whether this is a game changer or simply a period of greater uncertainty.

One of the main reasons why the Soviets had to vacate Afghanistan in the manner they did was because they did not take the battle to the source of the trouble, which was in Pakistan. It was so then, and it is so today. If the world needs to prevent another attack like that on September 11 or the Madrid train bombings, the London train-bus terror or Mumbai 26/11 then the US led forces in Afghanistan-Pakistan have to succeed. What could prevent this from happening is continued Pakistani assistance to these groups.

With the implementation of the surge of U. S. forces in action in the Helmand province in the battle of Marja, others in the region are waiting to see how this plays out. There has also been talk of concerted action against the Haqqani forces in North Waziristan following the arrest of the Taliban deputy leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar. At the same time the general belief in the region is that the US/NATO forces will begin to leave by mid-2011. Should this become a general assessment the policy of the Taliban, presumably at the advice of the Pakistanis could be to lie low. One can be fairly sure that where the US with its powerful war machine could not succeed in Afghanistan a smaller force is hardly likely to succeed. The US frustration is partly the result of inadequacy of force levels, Pakistani duplicity and the traditional Afghan resistance to foreigner. After thirty years of involvement, it is natural that if the US/NATO were to leave the region without stabilising Afghanistan not merely as a pro-western nation but as an Afghan nation, then the instability will spread rapidly.

The fallout on Pakistan will be the quickest and is inevitable. The one thing the Pushtun on both sides of the Durand Line will ask is that they did not fight together against foreign forces for three decades to become minorities in both countries. That is a question both Pakistan and Afghanistan will have to answer.


Source : Appeared in Italian journal "Limes " , 30th March ,2010 Former Head of R&AW

Pakistan , Saudi Arabia and the Bomb - Brothers and Arms

In evaluating Pakistan’s relations with its major benefactors we tend to consider only the US and China but normally overlook Saudi Arabia’s role. The Kingdom provides ideological succour and nowadays Wahhabi sustenance, financial support and exerts influence on Pakistan’s domestic politics. There has to be some mutuality of interests in this bilateral with Pakistan playing on the Kingdom’s insecurities in relation to Iran and Israel, its own domestic dissidence and its vulnerabilities as an oil rich country in a turbulent neighbourhood. While the rest of the world talks of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the issue of Saudi-Pakistan nuclear tie ups never got proven but never quite disappeared. Suspicions remain especially because Pakistan, a Sunni country sold nuclear secrets to Shia Iran with whom its relations were never on the same plane as with Saudi Arabia. Logically, Saudi Arabia should have been Pakistan’s market of first choice and gratitude. Although concrete evidence about Saudi intentions to acquire nuclear weapons’ capabilities is not there the story continues to attract international commentary.

The controversial father of Pakistan’s nuclear bomb Abdul Qadeer Khan was back in the news when we heard earlier this month that the Pakistan government had sought permission to ‘investigate’ his clandestine nuclear bazaar. It made some sense to announce this on the eve of the visit of a high powered Pakistani delegation to the US where they planned to seek (and in fact did so) a civilian nuclear deal of the India-US kind. Pakistan could not be seen to be seeking CNE while one of its national heroes remained an unpunished clandestine peddler of nuclear weapons secrets to an unrepentant Iran.

However, A Q Khan’s travel itinerary during his days as the merchant of Armageddon was very instructive. In the ten years till his network was ‘discovered’ in 2004, Khan visited Dubai more than forty times apart from visiting eighteen other countries. Among the destinations were Syria, Egypt, Sudan Turkey and probably most often, Saudi Arabia. The role Saudi Arabia paid in the early years in the development of the Pakistan bomb in the 1970’s is well known. A grateful Zulfiqar Bhutto renamed Lyallpur, Pakistan’s third largest city as Faisalabad to acknowledge the Saudi monarch’s generosity.

The Saudis had established a nuclear research centre at Al-Suleiyyal south of Riyadh in 1975 and by the mid-1980s was providing financial assistance to Saddam Hussein’s nuclear projects and offered funds to rebuild the Osirak reactor after the Israelis had destroyed it in June 1981. Saudi scientists were being trained in Baghdad. The agreement between King Fahd and Saddam apparently was that some of the bombs would be transferred to Saudi Arabia but this agreement broke down after Saddam invaded Kuwait in 1990. It also seems that the Americans were aware of this transaction at some level. By 1986, the Saudis had also acquired 36 CSS-2 intermediate range ballistic missiles from China. It was presumed at that time that these were for delivery of nuclear weapons.

In 1994, a Saudi diplomat at the UN, Muhammed Khilewi, defected with about 10000 documents. Among them there were some that showed linkages between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia and a pact had been signed by the two countries that in case of a nuclear attack on Saudi Arabia, Pakistan would retaliate against the aggressor. It was during the 1990s that the Saudis began to provide financial assistance for Pakistan’s nuclear and missile programme when North Korean missiles were traded with the financial backing from Saudi Arabia. The Saudis also came to Pakistan’s rescue after the 1998 nuclear tests when they provided Pakistan with 50000 barrels of oil per day free to overcome the effect of sanctions.

In May 1999, Saudi deputy premier Prince Sultan bin Abdel al-Aziz, on a visit to Pakistan, was shown the Kahuta uranium enrichment plant, a privilege that was not granted by Pakistan’s military to their Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto some years earlier. A Q Khan had briefed the visiting Saudi minister. Prince Sultan also visited the Ghauri missile factory. Later in the year, during his visit to Saudi Arabia, A Q Khan discussed possibilities of co-operation in the peaceful use of nuclear energy in agriculture and genetic engineering.

The US withdrawal of its forces from Saudi Arabia to relocate in Qatar in August 2003, led the Saudis to seek to strengthen its strategic relations with Pakistan and welcome Pakistani troops in replacement. There was probably a strategic review by the Saudis which examined the need to acquire nuclear capability as a deterrent, forge an alliance with an existing nuclear power that would offer protection. This was doubtless denied officially in September but there were also reports that the Saudis were considering replacing their outmoded CSS-2 with the nuclear-capable 500 km range CSS-5 missile in an oil-for-missile deal with China.

In October 2003 Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz led a huge delegation to Pakistan. At the end of the visit, the Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, said in a press conference that India-Israel defence co-operation would inflame the region, escalate the arms race and trigger instability. This clearly left unsaid that Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were going to react to this ‘threat’. A few years later, a German magazine Cicero, in its April 2006 edition alleged that Pakistan had been collaborating with Saudi Arabia for several years to build a “secret nuclear programme.” Citing western experts, the report stated that Pakistani scientists had travelled to Saudi Arabia for the last three years. They would come disguised as Haj pilgrims and then disappear for weeks at a time to work on this programme. Further, that the al-Sulaiyyal missile base was being upgraded and that there was a “secret underground city” with dozens of silos to house Ghauri missiles

According to assessments in 2008 and 2009, Saudi Arabia as a signatory to the NPT, is unlikely to move towards open nuclearisation for fear of international reactions but at the same time should Iran go nuclear, Saudi Arabia may do likewise. Meanwhile, Pakistan would remain the main proliferator in an era of non-proliferation.

A great deal would depend on how the US reacts to these developments and it is reasonable to assume that the US is aware of this Pakistan-Saudi co-operation since 1994. American reactions would depend on how Washington sees the international geo-strategic situation. It is by no means guaranteed that the US will react harshly. National strategic interests will overweigh issues of morality. Recall that the US government had encouraged the spread of nuclear knowledge through its Atoms for Peace programme in the 1950s to counter Soviet influence. President Carter abandoned sanctions against Pakistan in 1979 after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. His successor Reagan routinely certified that Pakistan was not going nuclear in the 1980’s despite evidence to the contrary, because Pakistan was indispensable to the Afghan jihad. Pakistan was left alone in the 1990’s as A Q Khan went about his nuclear Walmart. When the war on terror was to be fought after September 11, 2001, President George Bush was benign towards General Musharraf and the entire A Q Khan expose was hastily swept under the carpet.

Adverse US reaction against a Saudi nuclearisation following an Iranian nuclearisation, is not a given. Pakistan, as a cash strapped country, could sell its lethal goods to an insecure regime and acquire nuclear depth.

Source : Hindustan Times, 30 March 2010, Former Head of R&AW

Policy on Pak terror craven and confused

THERE SEEM to be some early signs of winds of change in Washington DC but maybe this is only early spring, and the breeze could be blown away after the US and Pakistan discuss joint strategies. Earlier this month, Lisa Curtis of the Heritage Foundation in Washington said in an essay, “ Seeking to negotiate with the Taliban leadership ( primarily based in Pakistan) before U. S. and NATO forces gain the upper hand on the battlefield in Afghanistan would be a tactical and strategic blunder with potential serious negative consequences for U. S. national security.” This makes eminent sense because, as I have been saying all along, a state cannot negotiate with terrorists unless it has substantially defeated/ exhausted them; otherwise it is appeasement. She concludes her essay with the equally sane advice that “ U. S. over- anxiousness to negotiate with the senior Taliban leadership in Pakistan would likely undermine efforts to coax local fighters into the political mainstream, thus jeopardizing General McChrystal's counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan and prolonging instability throughout the region.”

Threats

In his testimony to the US Congress on March 12, Ashley Tellis from the Carnegie Endowment for Peace made the following accurate observations:

The Lashkar- e- Tayyeba ( LeT) is— with the exception of al- Qaeda— arguably the most important terrorist group operating from South Asia and was the mastermind of the November 2008 Mumbai attacks. It remains the spearhead of the Pakistani military’s campaign against India.

LeT remains primarily Pakistani in its composition, uses Pakistani territory as its main base of operation, and continues to be supported extensively by the Pakistani state, especially the Army and Inter- Services Intelligence ( ISI).

LeT’s capability to conduct terrorism multi- nationally has increased: it does not need constant operational support from the ISI to be effective.

LeT’s ambitions extend beyond India.

The organisation’s close ties with al- Qaeda in Pakistan and its support for the Afghan Taliban’s military operations pose a direct threat to U. S. citizens, soldiers, and interests.

Tellis’ recommendations to US policy makers are forthright. He urges that the US should be candid and stop pretending that LeT is an independent actor. A recognition that the organisation receives protection and support from Pakistan would go a long way towards solving the problem. Tellis also stressed the need for a greater India- US intelligence co- operation and joint counter terrorist operations.

Finally, and this is the most important recommendation, the US should be prepared to take action if Pakistan is unable or unwilling. “ If Pakistan cannot or will not take decisive action against LeT, then the United States and its allies should be prepared to act in its place. Doing so may be increasingly necessary not simply to prevent a future Indo- Pakistani crisis, but more importantly to protect the United States, its citizens, its interests, and its allies,” says Tellis.
All of us should read these two reports as they state what the US interests would be and if the US were to adopt the policies recommended, India would be the gainer. So would Pakistan, but its ruling elite is so caught up in its anti- Indian- ness which secures its continuance that it will not see the rationality of these arguments.

Then we had US Congressman Gary Ackerman go even further when he said “ Public estimates suggest LeT operates some 2,000 offices in towns and villages throughout Pakistan, as well as maintaining ties with the Pakistani military. There is, in fact, no reason to doubt that Pakistan’s military is likely paying compensation to families of terrorists killed in the Mumbai attacks.” In what was widely reported in the Indian media Ackerman went on to say, “ LeT has been attacking US forces in Afghanistan almost from day one and their forces are present throughout Afghanistan. LeT has been slaughtering Indians by the score for decades. LeT has put the world on notice that they intend to escalate the carnage and spread it world- wide.”

Magnanimity

It is after many years that so many have spoken so strongly about developments that reflect our worries. There is greater interest in terrorist organisations like the LeT because they are now perceived as threatening US interests globally. However, the advice is that US interests should be protected and advanced. There is a danger of exulting in national self- congratulation as if the battle has been won. In the David Headley case, for instance, we will get precious little despite all the optimistic dossier talk in New Delhi. US attitude towards Pakistan is not going to change and we have to understand that these are the rules of the game. Nevertheless, it is in our interest to now press home the advantage with those opinion makers who see the dangers that lie ahead for US interests and to ensure that this trend in American thinking is not lost in the mist of Foggy Bottom. No one else is going to defend our interests unless we learn to seriously protect and enhance them ourselves.

On the other hand, we seem to consider magnanimity as a policy option. Each time we do an Agra, Havana, Sharm el Sheikh or New Delhi, the Pakistanis presume we are caving in and simply get more adventurous and truculent. Besides it does not suit Pakistan to make peace with India at this point in time because doing so would mean that the Pakistan armed forces and intelligence would have to get more committed in Obama’s war in Afghanistan. All indications are that Pakistan is preparing the ground to raise the temperature across LOC as we hear of increased violations and encounters.

The rest of India would remain a soft target and the periodic terror alerts that one hears are serious business.

Capitulation

Pakistan has suddenly begun to use the water issue to whip emotions in Pakistan.
There are two reasons for this. Pakistan is going to face a huge water deficit this summer, with its own domestic consequences, at a time when there is already unhappiness inside the Punjab as terror related violence continues. It would be difficult for any administration to use a Punjabi force against its own Punjabis without having a revolt on its hands. The steady outpouring of Rehman- speak in the past few months which blames India for all that is going wrong inside Pakistan is part of a fairly useful and successful exercise of make belief.

Yet one of our foremost political analysts has recommended at this juncture, a day after we heard fulminations from Syed Salahuddin, that we should exhibit largeness of heart, grand strategy and breadth of vision by inviting Gen Kayani to India and give him comfort about India’s policy in Afghanistan. Never mind the thousands of Indians killed by terrorists trained, indoctrinated and equipped in Pakistan. We are a big country and can take these losses or an inert sponge that will continue to absorb because Indian lives are cheap, so runs this argument.
The logic of this grand gesture is not understood. For decades we have been arguing that the LeT is a regional menace and is fast becoming a global menace, we have repeatedly argued that Pakistan is the epicentre of terrorism. just when the world begins to accept this as the reality along comes this strange suggestion to extend hospitality to the person whose military doctrine is based on unmitigated hostility towards India.

Thinking out of the box is fashionable but what is this one? Is this breadth of vision, height of folly or preemptive capitulation?

Source : Mail Today , 25th March 2010 , Author is the Former Head of R&AW

The Decline of America

America’s rich and ubiquitous CIA, through its National Intelligence Council, periodically collects some of the best brains in the US and after considerable debate they publish a detailed treatise predicting the future and the last one — Global Trends 2025 — came out in November 2008. The report’s most important assessment is that in 15 years there will be a gradual decline in the US’s pre-eminence along with the rise of new powerhouses China and India. The report says “although the United States is likely to remain the single most powerful actor”, the country’s “relative strength — even in the military realm — will decline and US leverage will become more constrained”.

In actual fact the decline has been far more rapid and has gone unnoticed because this was obscured by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. American predominance in the information technology sector of the global economy also covered the country’s decline as a manufacturing hub. Several other moves and events in recent years point to the direction of America’s decline.

At the Pittsburg global economic summit, the mantle of looking after the functioning of the economy passed on from G-8 to G-20, which includes China, India, Brazil, Turkey and other developing countries. It is not yet certain that this group can exercise any really effective control, but the move is significant in that it took place. The true significance, as Geoffrey Sachs put it, was not that the baton had passed to G-20 but that it had actually passed on from G-1 — the US which had really called al the economic shots in the past 30-odd years of the G-7 forum.

There are increasing reports that major countries who are America’s economic rivals have been discussing among themselves, sometimes in secret, to explore a diminished role for the US dollar in international trade where it is losing value. Saddam Hussein in 2002 tried to move away from the dollar to the Euro but that was more political than economic; the Iranians, too, have tried to establish oil bourses in Euros for the same reason.

But this one is different. Major trading countries China, Japan, Russia, Brazil and the Persian Gulf states are considering the Euro or a basket of currencies as an alternative to the US dollar. Obviously, if this is accepted it will adversely impact on American dominance in international economic matters. Link this to BRIC and we have a new international economic paradigm.

The international order has always been about control and dominance. The old Palmerston dictum about permanent interests and not permanent allies has changed. In the new international order there are permanent interests but no permanent enemies. Diplomatically and strategically, the US has had problems. American actions in West Asia, for instance, have given room for others to walk into the space provided by the US’s misadventure. The invasion of Iraq was as brainy as a World Wrestling Federation bout.

Russia and China have refused in recent months to accept the US’s proposal that Iran be placed under sanctions, even though President Barack Obama tried to assuage Moscow by cancelling plans to deploy an anti-ballistic missile system in eastern Europe. The US can no longer press for sanctions on Iran while condoning similar action by Pakistan.

In fact, Iran, China and Russia seem to have worked out an energy-sharing /distribution map that largely excludes the US from it. These three countries have been the biggest gainers from America’s Quixotic adventure in Iraq which has ended making Iran the strongest power in the region.

The US will lose ground in the economic sphere as well. American GDP in 2005 at US $ 12.4 trillion exceeded that of Latin America and Asia. By 2020, the combined GDP of Asia and Latin America will 40 per cent greater than that of the US and growing. By then, the US will be deeply indebted to the more solvent nations. It will be dependent on them for funds needed to pay for budgetary deficits which have been there since the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, meeting the annual Pentagon budget, and so on. Nevertheless, the US will remain the world’s pre-eminent economic and technology power, but it will be a military power that will be unable to undertake significant military missions abroad of the Iraq and Afghanistan variety on its own.

The stalemate in Afghanistan is really a strategic defeat for a superpower. A superpower cannot be seen to have tried to find ways of getting out of a quagmire without a resounding victory. Support for the war is grudging both at home and abroad among allies. The US is in the unhappy situation where one of its prominent allies in the region — Pakistan — has been duplicitous, while another — Saudi Arabia — stands for creeds that are the very antithesis of all that America stands for, and the third — China — is simply waiting for the US to get sufficiently unpopular before it will move into the vacuum that will unavoidably occur once American troops leave.

The US could have had three friends and allies — Russia, Iran and India — who do not want Afghanistan to become a Talibanised Wahaabi state. But the Americans chose otherwise. What the Americans were slow to understand was that whatever be the merits of the case, and in Afghanistan defeat of terrorism was one, Washington can no longer say, “I am in Afghanistan to make America safe” and it does not matter if some Afghans die in the process.

Perhaps the last setback may be symbolic but it was powerful. The US could not win the race for the Summer Olympics for 2016; worse, it got eliminated in round one.

That said, the US is still the most powerful state in the world and will remain so for the foreseeable future with the strongest military force, the largest economy and the most highly developed technological capabilities. However, those days when it was possible to take unilateral action are over; there are limitations to power — military and economic — as well as influence, as other powerful players begin to assert themselves. The US predicament in Afghanistan is the most recent example of these new disabilities.


Source : The Pioneer , 19th march 2010 , Author is the Former Head of R&AW

India-Pakistan Talks -- The fiasco that need not have been

The India Pak talks were followed by the usual Prime Time agony on TV on February 25 as wise men and women dissected what went wrong. There was considerable surprise and consternation at how events and strategies unfolded that day. It was obvious that the theatrics by the Pakistan Foreign Secretary caught us by surprise. It was equally obvious that we had not done our homework. Actually what Salman Bashir did was a scaled down version of what Musharraf did at the India Today Conclave a year ago in New Delhi and much more scaled down version of his antics at the Agra Summit. It should have been déjà vu.

I had written about these tricks last year, pointing out that whenever Pakistanis want to launch their careers or burnish their fading images, they come here. The artiste performs to gushing audiences while the politician, general, or civil servant addresses his domestic audience in Pakistan. It pays or, is indeed expected, that he should act tough while in New Delhi. Rare is the case that a man comes to New Delhi and talks reasonably in public. One eminent journalist of a well known Pakistani magazine made that mistake some years ago and the agencies got to him pretty quickly when he got back with their gruff midnight knock. So this should have been anticipated and prevented unless this was a deep Brahmanical ploy and the Pakistanis are still trying to figure this out.

The game plan was obvious the moment we announced that we would resume dialogue. The first thing Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi did was to jump onto his high horse, fulminate in Multan about how Pakistan had brought India to its knees and proclaim victory. This was a novel way of restoring normalcy. It was then the turn of the jihadis to warm up to the act. Hafeez Saeed was off the mark first when he announced that one Mumbai was not enough and that jihad was the only way. Wanted in India, this outburst was described later by the Foreign Secretary as Saeed’s exercise of his democratic right of free speech. Just before the Delhi tamasha got going, the Pak Foreign Minister offered his Chinese hosts a blank cheque to help improving India Pak relations. The astute Chinese did not bite the bait, knowing that such cheques could bounce.
Abdul Rahman Makki, brother in law of Hafiz Saeed, and the new face of terror against India, was jingoist about jihad in Kashmir on February 4 when he also warned that Pune would be the next target. So it was on February 13. We did not withdraw the offer to talk. Two days before the talks were to commence 23-year old Captain Devendra Singh Jass and two soldiers died combating terrorists in Sopore. Before the talks commenced the Pakistan Foreign Secretary assures Syed Ali Shah Geelani, that secessionist who does not want to live in Pakistan, continued support. He says this after meeting him in our country. We allow the meeting therefore say nothing. We did not call off the talks. How could we do that anyway? We had already announced that talks and terrorism could continue simultaneously. Moreover, we have this great desire to look good and seek approval from the West.

Two days after the talks were over, Pakistan sponsored Taliban or Haqqani networks or Lashkar e Tayyaba terrorists or all three put together, hunted and killed Indians in a guest house in Kabul. The message they are giving us - if we care to decipher it -- we can hit you in Kashmir, in Maharashtra and in Kabul; we will do it again and there is nothing you can do about it.

It is not that one should not talk to one’s neighbour, after all they cannot relocate. The talks had been called off after an angry India demanded that Pakistan breakdown the terror infrastructure and stop cross-border terrorism after 26/11. The question is simply whether that has been achieved and if Pakistan has given India adequate satisfaction on this? What has been achieved between November 26, 2008 and now, that we felt compelled either on our own or under gentle nudging to be magnanimous and resume this dialogue of the deaf?

The other issue is that our Candlelight Brigade never tires of telling us about the oceans of goodwill that the people of Pakistan have for us and that they want nothing but peace with India. It also claimed that there is a representative government in Pakistan now that should represent this sentiment. If that be so, then what is the need for the Pakistani establishment to play to the hard line lobby that prefers to wage jihad in India not just Kashmir in preference to waging peace? This leads one to conclude that the leadership, pumped up today even more, post Istanbul and London, feels that their moment both in Afghanistan and against India has come. Happily placed as America’s indispensable ally, even as they allow anti-American sentiments to flourish, they can do no wrong. It is very clearly a successful foreign policy in the short term and they can continue to play the hardline act.

Therefore, to talk peace with India at this juncture is dangerous for the corporate interests of the Armed Forces and their allies in the bureaucracy, the politicians, feudal landed class and the mullah all of whom depend upon the Army for their survival. All get their dividends from this state of affairs. The peace dividend is much weaker for them. The US would no longer give them any good boy bonus. Besides, peace with India means having to divert troops away from the Indian frontier to the west and participate in acting more diligently against their own protégés, the Taliban. It also means admitting that India does not pose an existential threat to Pakistan adversely affecting the Army’s primacy is based on false strategic premises bur very sound sectional interests.

Our efforts to enlist Saudi Arabian support (or interlocution) in the Pakistan context may not yield the desired results. Having supported Wahhabi Islam in Pakistan and Afghanistan, contributed heavily to the Taliban cause and having always described the Kashmir issue as a freedom struggle, it makes sense only if there is a change of heart in Riyadh. Saudi-Pakistan relations are too deep to expect the Saudis to intercede on our behalf. Anyhow no harm in trying to enlist support and hope to succeed where others have failed –like Indira Gandhi when she tried to get Saudi support against the Khalistanis operating from Pakistan.

In dealing with Pakistan we need to remember a few things. They will blame us for all their ills and also complain that we do not help them solve their problems. They have also assessed that we will not do anything more than what we have done so far and the US will not say more than they have so far. It was Pakistan who believed in the two nation theory. There was no reason for us to convert this into a Hindu-Muslim issue by constantly trying to deal with Pakistan by assuming that India’s Muslims wanted India to be lenient with Pakistan because of their religion. What Indian Muslims want is to be treated as Indians –no matter what their problems -and we should therefore treat people of Pakistan as Pakistanis and not simply as Muslims. When we learn to treat them so, just as we treat French or Germans as French and Germans and not as Christians, we will find a different way of handling this issue. Last year, I wrote elsewhere, that “Let us not forget that the largest number of Muslims that has ever lived in a democracy anywhere in the world for such a long time is in India. In Pakistan they are now saying that Islam and democracy are incompatible. The word secularism does not exist in the mullah’s vocabulary, not even in the minds of some self proclaimed moderates like General Musharraf.”

This is our strength and we should learn to use it.

Source : Hardnews , 6th March 2010, Vikram Sood , Former Head of R&AW from 2001-2003

National Counter Terrorism Centre in the Indian Context

It took the United States less than three years after the Twin Tower attack in September 2001 to get its National Counter Terrorism centre up and away. From our first major internationally organised terror attack in Mumbai in March 1993 it took us 17 years to think of setting up a similar centre. During these 17 years we went through a series of internationally organised high profile terror attacks. We did establish another agency as we always did after every crisis. After Kargil we established a Multi Agency Centre as recommended by the G C Saxena Intelligence Task Force. This failed to deliver because like all things Indian, the concept was wonderful but the implementation was flawed. It merely ended up being another office of the Intelligence Bureau.

The urgency to do something was apparent after the Mumbai massacre of 2008. Like the WTC attack in the US Mumbai 26/11 was about “us” because there was no such empathy after the several high profile serial attacks in the country. We hurriedly established the NIA in order perhaps to be seen to be doing something although this organisation was in no way going to stop terrorist attacks. Now that there is talk that an Indian version of the NCTC is on the anvil, many wonder what shape it would take.

There are two aspects that it must not attempt. One, aspire to become a super-intelligence organisation and following from this, take over the operational aspects of intelligence organisations. Intelligence agencies have far wider briefs than only ensuring national security arising from terrorist threats. What it must, however, do is to co-ordinate, evaluate and analyse all intelligence reports that relate to terrorism. The NCTC must then decide on a course of action and then task the intelligence agency or any special forces that are available for whatever action is necessary to abort the terrorist mission. Intelligence agencies must not become a part or even subordinate to the NCTC. They would function best in their existing role with greater co-ordination (not the easiest of tasks, admittedly) at the NCTC.

The US NCTC, for instance, integrates all foreign and domestic analysis to produce detailed assessments designed to support senior policymakers and other members of the policy, intelligence, sigint, elint, techint, law enforcement, defense, homeland security, and foreign affairs communities. These include items for the President’s Daily Brief (PDB) and the daily National Terrorism Bulletin (NTB). Besides this, the US NCTC is required to conduct strategic operational planning for CT activities, integrate all instruments of national power, including diplomatic, financial, military, intelligence, and law enforcement to ensure unity of effort. This is a tough ask and sounds difficult even in theory.

Despite the best of regulations, problems of co-ordination, managing ego battles and struggles for turf will always remain. It would thus be left to the genius of leadership to handle these. The best of superstructures will be rendered ineffective if the intelligence inputs are below par and the response mechanism from detection, pre-emption, prevention and destruction are flawed. Sound intelligence is a powerful tool in the hands of decision makers but they also must be understood that there are limitations. It cannot predict the future with certainty but can, with experience and understanding of the subject, provide the ability to see behind the wall. In the case of terrorism, where the enemy is invisible and unpredictable, this is the most difficult task.
The NCTC should be located institutionally in the system independent of personalities involved. In India we may think of a Ministry of Internal Security with both the Coordinator of Intelligence and Intelligence Chiefs reporting to the Prime Minister with sections of their organisations co-ordinating with this new Ministry.

Source : Hard News , March 1, 2010 Vikram Sood , Former Head of R&AW from 2001-2003

Afghanistan - What India should expect and what it should do

Afghanistan has been at the cross roads of great empires and thus a scene for frequent/brutal conflict but never under the control of any outside power for long. In the last 30 years Afghanistan has seen the effects of a Communist takeover promising liberation from feudalism and assuring equality, a religious bigoted group establishing itself spearheaded by US led Islamic zeal, followed by the US attempts to give the hapless country liberty and equality. Today we once again see the return of the Taliban and the US eager to negotiate with the same ideology and the same people they wanted to overthrow in 2001. There are many who say that this is actually a display of ethnic nationalism under the guise of a religious movement.
Situation in Afghanistan is a very complex one with a number of actors - internal and external, conflicting interests and capabilities. It is not likely to change in the next few years.
• This includes the various ethnic nationalities of Afghanistan.
• The warlords and their vested interests in the production and smuggling of narcotics, and arms. • Corruption alone is a US $ 2 billion industry. A weak government in Kabul without any viable succession option visible.
• Its inability to exercise any control outside Kabul is well known. Has weak army and law enforcement machineries; their growth is hindered by factors of corruption and local ethnic interests. Attempts to establish an ANA and ANP have been slow and arduous.
• Most importantly, there is more than one group operating inside Afghanistan and many from Pakistani soil.

There are any number of external players and their own interests. The US and its allies want to make US free of any terrorism emanating from Afghanistan which is a threat to them and their allies. To do this they rely on Pakistan whose interests are different from the American interests and whose co-operation is less than forthcoming. Having made Pakistan totally indispensible to their cause they US has allowed Pakistan to play the spoiler. Pakistan, obsessed with India, has assumed that the control of Kabul slipping into the hands of the Taliban and that the Taliban being under their control would leave them in an advantageous position vis-a-vis India. The Pak establishment has endeavoured, successfully so far, to keep India out of any international arrangement aimed at solving the Afghan tangle.
That being so, a solution to the problem is equally difficult.

There are several kinds of insurgencies afloat in Afghanistan since 2002.
The Quetta Shura in south and east Afghanistan . Sirajuddin Haqqani in Pakhtia, Pakhtika, Jalalabad . Salafis of Hayatullah in Kunnar and Nooristan. Hizb- e-Islami of Hikmetyar but have now mostly been fighting under the banner of Taliban. The Pakistani Taliban, their own sub groups according to region and clan, and their various associates from the LeT , JeM, SSP, LJ. And then, there is the Al Qaeda.
For the present Pakistan may exult. It presumes that the inevitable and hopefully substantial departure of the US/NATO would leave it with the much sought after strategic depth.

It is difficult to predict if and when the US will change its decades old policy of pardoning Pakistan all its transgressions. What we need to take into account is that one of these days the US will carry out its much vaunted but ridiculously inadequate much delayed surge, declare mission accomplished and thin out. Its long-term policies are dictated by election year compulsions. Once the coalition forces begin to pull out a few things will inevitably happen as other interests try to fill the empty spaces. It is a retreat by another name. It is different from the Vietnam quagmire because the Vietnamese did not come after the Americans for vengeance. The Afghans will. Istanbul and London are the markers for the retreat. Although US may put whatever spin it may want to.

Pakistan will naturally assume that its moment has come again and it could now acquire its much dreamt strategic depth, throw the Indians out and be the overlord in Afghanistan.

• The Iranians are unlikely to remain idle spectators as a Sunni Wahabbi neighbour is going to be unsettling factor for them.
• Saudi Arabia on the other hand would want a Wahhabi regime in Afghanistan that would check the Iranians and hopefully also keep the anti-Saudi extremists in Afghanistan.
• The Chinese have already begun to move in with their commercial and resource interests into Afghanistan as they would see an opportunity to move closer to the Persian Gulf, given their steady relations with the Iranians. The Chinese would see themselves moving into empty spaces up to the Persian Gulf vacated by a retreating American empire without having fired a bullet and lost a man. They also need to keep the Islamist extremists away from sensitive areas like Xinjiang so their presence in Afghanistan and image might be an insurance against the marauding extremists.
• The Central Asian Republics and Russia have their concerns about the dangers of Talibanised ideology spreading into their countries. Russia is realigning; so is Japan..
• Finally, the absence of a strong centralised authority will only create more confusion in a country that has been run on drug money and foreign doles.
• Pakistan’s exultation may be temporary. Unable to control its own territory it is unlikely to be able to run Afghanistan in the way it may want to. It does not have the resources to do so and the US, hopefully, may not sub lease Afghanistan to Pakistan this time. The other very real danger is that the Pushtuns on both sides of the Durand Line, joined together in a common fight for decades, may well ask if they fought all these years only to end up being minorities in both countries. The departure of the Coalition Forces will only add to the instability of the region and India needs to prepare itself for this eventuality.

It is an accepted fact of history that the Taliban were the creation of Pakistan. But what is not known today is the degree of control Pakistan exercises on the Taliban.

Either way it is feared that there will be a destabilising effect on PK. One would doubt if the Pushtun/Taliban will rest after assuming power in AF. A victorious Taliban in Kabul is less likely to accept the Durand Line. Please do not pooh pooh this, ridicule it, ignore it as an IN dream; do please look at it as a PK nightmare.
Rahimullah Yusufzai in a recent article in the News (Feb 2, 2010) made this very astute observation when he said that the “Return of the Afghan Taliban to power whether by force or some peace process, would definitely raise the spirits of the Pakistani Taliban and likeminded jihadis and thus lead to fallout on the situation in Pakistan.” He added that “There is bound to be fallout on Pakistan when the world's most powerful armies are involved in the longest war in the US and NATO history in neighbouring Afghanistan. And the fallout is to be expected because the US and NATO consider Afghanistan and Pakistan's tribal areas as theatres of the same war and have thus deliberately named their strategy to deal with the challenge as Af-Pak.”

If the Taliban succeed in Afghanistan then one can expect a repeat of what happened in India after the retreat of the Soviets from Afghanistan. There will be far too many unemployable jihadis in Pakistan and besides the jihadis would want to continue their jihad having defeated another superpower.

The status of the ANA and ANP

The dilemma is that losing is not an option for the US; stalemate is strategic defeat for a superpower; troop augmentation to the extent required is unacceptable, and even a surge of 40000 is difficult. The much talked of Afghan army is still a ghost army. Ann Jones in her report in the Nation (Sep 21, 2009) had described the Afghan Army as a figment of Washington’s imagination. It does not exist in the numbers claimed, it is poorly trained, many of the recruits/trainees are repeats who come back with new names for the money, the food and the equipment they can take away and sell. It is a frightening thought to have a man trained with rubber guns for three weeks, then given the real gun and sent off to fight battles for his country.

This became apparent when the Helmand campaign began last July and the ANA could muster only 600 men, far short of the 90000 that are supposed to be enlisted. The hope that Afghanistan will suddenly have an efficient 134000 strong army in two years is very much a false hope. What should worry Washington is that there have been reports of demoralisation and self-doubts among some sections of the US forces. The state of the Afghan police is even worse with 60% suspected to be on drugs. Ill equipped and ill trained, they are easy pickings for the Taliban. No wonder Pakistan will continue to hedge its bets with the Taliban, targeting only those that they see threatening them. They are aware also that NATO countries may not be able last out in Afghanistan much beyond 2010.

There are many Afghans who do not see the Taliban as necessarily bigoted or evil; they see the possibility of a more rational Taliban regime once the US has left.

Striking deals with the Taliban

It is presumed that some kind of a deal will be attempted in the months ahead. Mullah Omar will accept to negotiate only after the US /NATO leave. If the US objective is to get rid of foreign militants then the Taliban may be more willing to talk. But the trust deficit is huge.

The Afghan/Pushtun/Taliban fear is that the surge and augmentation of ANA/ANP would eventually mean more targets, more damage more explosions - more deaths and destruction. This would be a part of the surge.

All indications are that the US/NATO will commence withdrawal/disengagement around mid-2011. It is necessary for us to think of the post-US situation. The West had made it their business 8 years ago to get rid of Al Qaeda and Taliban from Afghanistan to make America and its friends safe. Today, they rationalize and prepare for a dignified exit by saying that AQ is not really in AF while the Taliban are a reality, so the world must deal with this reality.

There is talk of good/moderate Taliban and the hardcore/bad Taliban. These are essentially rationalisations to set the new discourse. Moderate Taliban or those who will be weaned away from the main Taliban may not have the authority to deliver what they promise. It is doubtful, if Taliban would strike a deal with the US under pressure from the Pakistanis on terms that are more favourable to the Taliban than to Mullah Omar. Attempts to divide the Taliban have essentially failed. In India we should stop post-event rationalisations on behalf of the Americans.

Pakistan’s options
One sees a new mood in Islamabad post Istanbul and London. A new mood of assertiveness, self confidence and aggression is visible in Kayani’s statements and Qureshi’s choreographed obduracy prior to the talks and collective theatrics afterwards. Pakistan will up its demands with Washington in the months ahead. For India it will do likewise. The cue this time will be water. Pakistan will buy additional insurance for itself in Afghanistan while keeping its options in India open and up the ante in Kashmir. This will be to provoke an Indian reaction and get out of having to take sterner action against the Taliban in Balochistan and Afghanistan.

• One can expect the following in the next few months from Pakistan:
• Intefada type protests in Kashmir
• Provocations to keep Indian Army engaged yet seek their withdrawal
• Terrorism in the rest of India.
• One can expect continued terrorist attacks in Afghanistan against Indians and Indian assets to frighten away India from Afghanistan since persuasion through the US has not succeeded.
• Water will be the issue that will be used to unite the people against India as the temperature in Kashmir is raised.
• Consolidate in Afghanistan by making itself a party to any negotiations that the Americans may have with the Taliban, so that Pakistan remains in control
• Insulate and preserve India-specific terrorist organisations for use from time to time.
• Talk to India patronisingly as a favour to the US

What should India do

• Indian primary interest is to prevent Pakistan from using Afghanistan as a base for terrorist activity in India.
• The other interest is to seek access to Central Asia through Afghanistan and Iran, since Pakistan will not oblige.
• It would be self defeating to withdraw from Afghanistan at this juncture after the attack in Kabul because this is what the Pakistanis want India to do. India must therefore continue with its present policy of providing infrastructure and financial assistance to the Karzai government something which has earned India tremendous goodwill in that country.
• It is hoped that by staying on and continuing this assistance under greater safety guarantees from the Afghan government could help strengthen Karzai’s hands.
• India needs to develop contacts/strengthen them as the case maybe with all sections in Afghanistan, with different power centres and ethnic groups, including the Pushtun and the Taliban too.
• Russia, China, the Central Asian Republics and Iran are all extremely wary of the spread of Wahhabi Islam and its destabilising consequences for their region and their own countries. These are the other interested regional powers with whom India must seek common ground to address common problems.

Source : Hard News , 6th March 2010 Vikram Sood , Former Head of R&AW from 2001-2003