Back to Islamabad (Indian perspective on Pak & U.S. - vy interesting)

Hindustantimes.com ^ | 3/22/2006 | PN Khera

[Dark Skies]

The allegation that Pakistani lobbyists successfully bribed the US 9/11 Commission to tone down the anti-Pakistani observations in their report is shocking. The fact that this has been reported by one of Pakistan’s most respectable publications, the Friday Times, makes the charge credible, and from the US point of view, indefensible. “The disclosure sheds doubt on the integrity and honesty of the members of the 9/11 Inquiry Commission and above all on the authenticity of the information in their final report,” according to a source cited by the weekly. The details of the Pakistani operation, masterminded by its Foreign Office were apparently revealed to the Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly.

One of the more controversial elements that was not probed was the charge, first reported in the media in October 2001, that the ISI chief Mahmoud Ahmed was behind the $ 100,000 transferred by Umar Sheikh to Mohammed Atta, leader of the hijackers who crashed their aircraft into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington DC. Ahmed was in Washington visiting his American counterparts at the time, and on the morning of the incident, was breakfasting with Porter Goss and Bob Graham, a Republican and a Democrat, then heads the House and Senate committees on intelligence, respectively. Goss has since been appointed CIA chief. They were later involved in the Commission, yet nothing has appeared on the Pakistani connection in the Commission report or its follow up.

Information on the transfer of money came through Indian diplomatic sources but was followed up by intelligence agencies tracking Umar Sheikh, since convicted for Daniel Pearl’s murder. Apparently the FBI has detailed knowledge of this, and this is what was left out of the 9/11 report.

Mahmoud Ahmed was subsequently sacked by Pervez Musharraf on October 8, 2001, when the smoking gun was revealed to the Pakistani leader. At the time it was put out that he had resigned because he had been superseded. However, it is now clear that it was a part of a purge of Islamist generals who had, ironically enough, actually helped Musharraf to come to power in October 1999.

The Friday Times report cited a Pakistani Foreign Ministry official who said that “dramatic changes” were made in the final draft of the 9/11 Commission Report “after Pakistani lobbyists convinced the commission’s members to remove anti-Pakistan findings.” Obviously, any direct connection between high-ranking Pakistani officials and the perpetrators of history’s worst act of urban terrorism would have had devastating consequences for Pakistan. Instead the Bush administration seems to have used the knowledge to pressure Musharraf to act against al-Qaeda. That his strategy has not worked is obvious, because rogue elements in the ISI have ensured that the so-called war against terrorism has gotten nowhere near capturing Osama bin Laden or Mullah Omar.

According to the Friday Times report, some 75 US Congressmen have been won over by lobbyists through the obvious process of bribing and inducements to support the Pakistani cause. If so, this is bad news for the Indo-US nuclear deal. Because if US Congressmen are willing to look the other way on an issue that directly affected their security such as the 9/11 tragedy, what will they not do to ensure that India does not gain on the nuclear front?

Pakistani officials now want to gloss over the charge, claiming that their efforts were part of the normal lobbying processes that go on in Washington. This may well be so. We cannot blame the Pakistanis from trying to save their skins. But what does it tell us about the US and its system ?

In these circumstances, India needs to watch its back carefully. While cooperation with the US on counter-terrorism or nuclear issue is fine, India must ensure that it retains its strategic autonomy to operate on both areas. The intelligence agencies must also take care about sharing information with the US, because some of it could flow back to the ISI. The Pakistani intelligence and the CIA have had links that go back to the Sixties. The CIA, of course, funded the ISI to create a jehadist army to take on the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, a fact detailed by Steve Coll in his book Ghost Wars. Even today, the two services have a high level of cooperation in fighting al-Qaeda, despite their differences in fighting the Taliban, a creation of the ISI.

While the US has suffered terribly from the terrorist acts of 9/11, India has been suffering terrorist violence almost continuously since the Eighties. Through draconian measures the US has insulated itself from terrorist attacks, but India remains vulnerable to terrorist violence whose base has now shifted to Bangladesh. Yet the outfit that is masterminding the violence remains in the same place — Islamabad.

Till date India has not been able to convince the US that the fight against terrorism must be united and that there can be no difference between the terrorists who plan strikes against India and those who attack the US. And that it is in our interest to ensure that the ISI is effectively dismantled.

[CarrotAndStick]

Profile: Pakistan's military intelligence agency

By BBC News Online's David Chazan

Pakistan's powerful military intelligence agency has been accused of propelling the Taleban to power in Afghanistan and supporting militants fighting India in the disputed territory of Kashmir.

Critics of the shadowy Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), believed to have worked closely with the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, say it is a "rogue agency" - functioning as an "invisible government".

Inter-Services Intelligence

Founded in 1948 by British army officer

Estimated to have at least 10,000 officers and staff

Officers seconded to it from armed forces

Said to be organised in six to eight divisions

Musharraf reported to have closed or restructured division responsible for Kashmir

Said to be deeply involved in domestic politics

Delhi accuses it of sponsoring rebels in Kashmir and other parts of India

Since the 11 September suicide attacks in the United States, Pakistan's President, Pervez Musharraf, has forced the ISI into an abrupt U-turn on Afghanistan - purging its leadership along the way.

Now the agency faces another, potentially even more difficult challenge.

Following an attack on the Indian parliament - blamed by Delhi on Pakistan-based Kashmiri militants - General Musharraf is now believed to have ordered the ISI to prevent further attacks by militants in India that could precipitate all-out war.

But India holds General Musharraf himself responsible for an outbreak of hostilities in Kashmir in 1999 - and there are questions about the extent of central control over the ISI.

Some Pakistani politicians have railed at what they claimed was the ISI's failure to answer to the government - or even to the army command.

ISI 'dictates policy'

"It is a state within a state," says Wajid Shamsul Hasan, a former Pakistani High Commissioner in Britain who is close to former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

"Pakistan's foreign policy has been run by the ISI rather than the foreign office," he said.

General Musharraf: "Better able to control the ISI than a civilian leader"

But former ISI chiefs say corrupt politicians have created "misperceptions" about the agency because they were trying to blame the ISI for their own failures.

"Politicians have always viewed the ISI in a doubtful light... especially when the ISI was reporting that they were plundering the country," said former ISI director-general Hamid Gul.

"Our foreign office created the impression that the ISI was a rogue agency out of control," General Gul said.

Shortly before the US air strikes in Afghanistan began, General Musharraf appointed a new ISI director-general - Lieutenant-General Ehsanul Haq.

He is seen as more liberal and moderate than his predecessor General Mahmood Ahmed, said to have been close to the Taleban - although he also enjoyed good connections in Washington and was in the United States on 11 September.

The Americans have always felt more comfortable talking to the ISI than to the government of the day

Wajid Shamsul Hasan

But there are questions about how far central control extends in the ISI, although General Musharraf - as a military leader - is probably better able to rein in the agency, which is part of the military structure.

"Under civilian rule the ISI had a fair amount of independence," says Gary Samore of the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. "Under Musharraf, they're answerable."

Mr Hasan, however, said: "Musharraf has made a few changes but the fact of the matter is that the organisation is too big and self-interested."

ISI officers are more likely to wear sunglasses and sharp haircuts than turbans and beards.

But because of ISI support for the Taleban, the agency is reported to have developed links with Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

This still taken from an Indian army video allegedly shows a militant training in Pakistan

"You can't develop ties over 10 or 15 years and then cut them off instantly," says Steven Cohen of the Brookings Institution - a Washington think-tank.

"It's a big bureacracy and changing its direction will take a while, Mr Cohen said, but added that "Musharraf has done a pretty good job on switching policy on Afghanistan."

Afghan Interior Minister Younis Qanooni has accused the ISI of helping Bin Laden to flee from Afghanistan.

That accusation is dismissed by the Pakistani Government, which views the new Afghan authorities as being pro-Indian, whereas the Taleban were seen as pro-Pakistani.

General Gul claimed that the ISI - said to have supported and funded the Taleban with help from the CIA - was only heavily involved in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation.

"It is wrong that the ISI created the Taleban," he said. "They were a spontaneous response and the ISI and the US started supporting them because everyone wanted an end to the in-fighting between the Afghan factions."

General Gul rejected accusations that the ISI or rogue elements within the ISI were to blame for the 13 December suicide attack on India's parliament.

"Somebody would be mad to prepare an attack like that," he said. "The ISI has not had full control over all the factions operating in Kashmir."

Kashmiri 'freedom movement'

Asked whether the ISI was sponsoring attacks in Kashmir, General Gul said: "I would say it's the freedom movement... They are fighting Indian occupation."

Another former ISI director-general who headed the agency during the early days of the Taleban, General Javed Ashraf Qazi, says: "There has been a change of policy on the Taleban and extremism in general."

He said the agency was much less of a law unto itself than generally believed because it was tied into the armed forces.

"No one can make a career out of the ISI," General Qazi said. "ISI people are serving armed forces officers and after three years they go back. The director-general is appointed by the prime minister."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1750265.stm

[butternut_squash_bisque]

Why am I not surprised, considering the lowlife scumbags who were on that commission?

[Dark Skies]

Thx for that post, CarrotAndStick. Good background on ISI.

[CarrotAndStick]

The ISI is one of the strangest agencies in the world. While it has some of the most brilliantly evil agents within its fold, it also has, often in the same individuals, the most idiotic minds.

Like the ones mentioned in this excerpt below:

As a faculty member at the Quaid-e-Azam University, Hoodbhoy found himself challenging the establishment during the 1980s when he noticed some bizarre, indeed hilarious, ideas creeping into the domain of science. It was the era of Zia-ul-Haq. The erstwhile army general had banned freedom of expression and had set Pakistan on the road to Islam. Hoodbhoy says the period also witnessed an Islamisation of science that Pakistan had never seen before.

Scientists began to write and discuss ‘scientific papers’ on such topics as the angle of God, the temperature of Hell, or the latent energy of jinns. One university professor of physics wrote a paper on the speed at which Heaven was departing from Earth. A nuclear reactor scientist argued that jinns were made up of methane gas and proposed that jinn energy may be tapped to meet Pakistan’s energy requirements.

The political climate in Pakistan has changed over the years — and the Zia-ul-Haq-inspired brand of science doesn’t get the encouragement or protection that it used to. But it hasn’t entirely gone away, either, says Hoodbhoy. In fact, he argues that signs of regression are visible on a global scale. He cites a US survey two years ago which revealed that 32 per cent Americans believe in lucky numbers, 40 per cent Americans think astrology is a science, and 60 per cent believe in extrasensory perception.

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1041128/asp/look/story_4043891.asp

[Dark Skies]

A nuclear reactor scientist argued that jinns were made up of methane gas and proposed that jinn energy may be tapped to meet Pakistan’s energy requirements.

lol...there's a great sci-fi short story in that!

[Savage Beast]

I don't know whether there's any truth to that allegation or not. Unfortunately, I cannot trust the American newsmedia to tell the truth.

An informed electorate is vital to representative government.

The American newsmedia has not challenged this axiom. However, it has implicitly challenged the assumption that representative government is to be desired and supported.

The American newsmedia has been commandeered by the Left. The Left is Marxist. And Marxism requires a totalitarian government.

The assumptions of the Left and its representatives in the American newsmedia are that representative government should be replaced by a totalitarian Marxist state; an uninformed populace favors this; and in fact a disinformed populace favors this even more and serves the Marxist agenda.

This is why we get constant disinformation from the American newsmedia. The newsmedia has become a propaganda organ that serves the Leftist agenda.