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Military brains plot Pakistan's downfall
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - Al-Qaeda has been in the process of a decisive ideological and strategic debate over the past few years. At times it developed fault lines that brought forward extremists in the organization, whom the Sunni and Shi'ite orthodoxy of the Muslim world calls takfiris. [1]
This rise of the takfiris within al-Qaeda gave an unprecedented boost to its anti-establishment drive. This concept is based on the philosophies of 13th-century Muslim scholar Ibn Taymiyyah, who threatened to revolt against the Muslim sultan if he did not give up his neutrality toward the invading Tartars and eventually forced him to fight to defend Damascus. [2] It also draws on General Vo Nguyen Giap's guerrilla strategy against French and US forces in Vietnam.
The aim of the takfiris now is to extend the current insurgency against the establishment in the North Waziristan and South Waziristan tribal areas of Pakistan into a large-scale offensive to bring down the central government or force the government to support their cause.
The US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and Pakistan's post-September 11, 2001, about-turn into the camp of the United States led to a marriage of convenience among the flag-bearers of Ibn Taymiyyah's ideology, zealots of al-Qaeda and experts in Giap's guerrilla strategy - former officers of the Pakistani armed forces who were upset with Pakistan's policy reversal, which included abandoning the Taliban.
These groups joined forces to take control of the state through a popular revolt or by using violent means, or force on the state apparatus to support the battle against the Western coalition in Afghanistan. The alliance has had some success, notably in the Waziristans, where in effect a rigid Islamic state prevails beyond the control of the central authorities in Islamabad. Indeed, the highest level of casualties in the history of the Pakistan Army has forced Pakistani leaders to speak of stopping operations in the Waziristans, saying it is a wrong war.
But while there have been several serious popular outbursts against President General Pervez Musharraf - and attacks on his life - his military government remains in power since staging a coup in 1999.
Meanwhile, after a long lull, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden resurfaced recently with three video and audio tape messages. His emergence on the horizon of the jihadist audience came at a time when Islamic militants of varied backgrounds (in the Waziristans) had finally sorted out their conflicts on issues such as revolt against a Muslim state and fighting Muslim armies.
Those groups include the Taliban (led by Mullah Omar), the command of the Pakistani Taliban (led by a shura - council - of mujahideen in the two Waziristans), leading Arab scholars in the Waziristans, such as Sheikh Essa, Abu Waleed Ansari and Abu Yahya al-Libbi, the command of Pakistani jihadist organizations in the Waziristans under Maulana Ilyas Kashmiri and its allied group of former officers of the Pakistan Armed Forces who resigned to join the Afghan resistance.
Bin Laden has always spoken out against the Western world, but in his most recent audio message last week, for the first time he urged Pakistanis "to fight against Musharraf, his army, his government and his supporters". This was the first endorsement of his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri's anti-establishment theory under which war should be waged first against the un-Islamic Muslim states before fighting infidel armies. In the past, Mullah Omar and bin Laden have always avoided stirring revolt within countries such as Pakistan.
Pakistan immediately dismissed bin Laden's call. Army spokesman Major-General Waheed Arshad was quoted as saying, "If Osama bin Laden has spoken to the people and urged them to rise, and the people were really following him, they would have done so much earlier. He doesn't have much following here."
However, this was clearly for public consumption. Asia Times Online has learned that these new developments were so seriously viewed on the intelligence radars of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia that they devised a joint strategy.
Islamabad is so concerned over the latest developments that it asked Saudi Arabia to approach al-Qaeda to abandon its anti-establishment policy.
The Saudis are concerned that should their erstwhile son bin Laden succeed in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia would be one of the next logical targets. So a joint strategy was devised to confront the threat.
According to a witness who spoke to Asia Times Online, last month a Saudi consul visited North Waziristan in the first such interaction with the al-Qaeda command since the US invasion on Afghanistan in 2001. The consul was meant to meet Zawahiri or bin Laden, but he was not allowed to see them and instead met second-tier al-Qaeda leaders.
The consul wore traditional clothes of the region and a Pashtun-style hat, and carried several gifts, mostly food items, especially dates and figs. He also carried with him messages from Saudi royal family members. He spent two days in North Waziristan before returning safely to Islamabad. Immediately after, the Saudi ambassador to Pakistan, Ali Awad al-Asiri, went to Saudi Arabia. He was not carrying good news - the Saudi offer of a ceasefire with al-Qaeda for both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia had been rejected, as the al-Qaeda leadership is determined to pursue its policy of bringing down "un-Islamic" governments and imposing their own policies or alternatively getting Pakistan to change its policies in favor of the militants.
Pakistan is the first stepping stone in al-Qaeda's global strategy. Once the organization and its allies take control of the country or force the decision-makers to promote global Islamic resistance, the first direct impact will be on the Afghan insurgency, where support would multiply against Western coalition forces there.
Jihadis take aim
The September 13 attack on Zarrar Company's Tarbella Ghazi camp in northwestern Pakistan in which 20 military men were killed raised alarm bells in Islamabad. Zarrar Company is involved in anti-terror operations.
Pakistani jihadis have launched many attacks on the establishment and against Musharraf, but now they face a well-coordinated "guerrilla" strategy, spearheaded by former army officers.
The former military men are operating out of the Waziristan camp of former Pakistani jihadi commander Maulana Ilyas Kashmiri. They are mostly ex-middle cadre (captains, majors, colonels) who resigned upon Pakistan's U-turn after September 11.
Initially, the architect of the struggle against Pakistan's alliance in the US-led "war on terror" and the operations in the Waziristans against the Pakistani military was an ex-captain of Pakistan's Special Services Group (he served in Zarrar Company). Captain Ahmed (not his real name), who also served in Pakistan's peacekeeping mission in Sierra Leone, was killed a few months ago in the Garmser district of Helmand province in Afghanistan fighting against British troops.
The captain had also taught Kashmir separatists the guerrilla concepts of Sri Lanka's Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. These proved successful in the Kashmir Valley.
In Afghanistan, he oriented the fighters to adopt the three-phase guerrilla tactics of Giap in the southeastern provinces of Khost, Paktia and Paktika. These are now being adopted against the Pakistan Army in the two Waziristans.
The first phase involves armed opposition to the Pakistani forces in the two Waziristans. This has been going on for some years, and has proved successful, with the troops even being withdrawn at one point, leaving the militants in peace.
In the second phase, which has now begun, the militants are targeting isolated security posts and enemy personnel. This had a spectacular result recently, with more than 500 Pakistan Army soldiers being captured in different phases, mostly from the 7 Baloch Regiment (most of them were also released in phases).
At the same time, the insurgency has to spread. This it has done, into the adjoining Mohmand and Bajaur tribal agencies, as well as Tank, Dera Ismail Khan and Swat Valley in North-West Frontier Province. The intensity of the opposition will be raised to include large-scale attacks, centered in Swat Valley, which will be Waziristan's outpost of insurgency and from where the insurgency is planned to spread into the federal capital.
The only parallel in Pakistan's history was the 1970 insurgency in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) when a colonel, along with a few other middle-ranking officers in the Pakistan Army, formed the Mukti Bahni (separatist group) for the separation of East Pakistan. Later, Bengali officers of the East Bengal Rifles mutinied against Pakistan and joined the separatists.
For the final stage, the ex-army planners aim to take the battle to Islamabad. The trigger for this will be presidential elections scheduled for next month in which Musharraf will run - and while still wearing his uniform.
Notes
1. Those who consider non-practicing Muslims as infidels.
2. Ibn Taymiyyah fought against the Tartars who attacked the Muslim world and almost reached Damascus. The people of Syria sent him to Egypt to urge the Mamluke Sultan, the sultan of Egypt and Syria, to lead his troops to Syria to save it from the invading Tartars. When he realized that the Sultan was hesitant to do what he asked of him, he threatened the Sultan by saying: "If you turn your back on Syria we will appoint a Sultan over it who can defend it and enjoy it at the time of peace." The strategy was successful and the Sultan was eventually forced to fight against the Tartars.
3. Vo Nguyen Giap (born in 1911)was a Vietnamese general and statesman.
Asia Times Online :: South Asia news - Military brains plot Pakistan's downfall
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - Al-Qaeda has been in the process of a decisive ideological and strategic debate over the past few years. At times it developed fault lines that brought forward extremists in the organization, whom the Sunni and Shi'ite orthodoxy of the Muslim world calls takfiris. [1]
This rise of the takfiris within al-Qaeda gave an unprecedented boost to its anti-establishment drive. This concept is based on the philosophies of 13th-century Muslim scholar Ibn Taymiyyah, who threatened to revolt against the Muslim sultan if he did not give up his neutrality toward the invading Tartars and eventually forced him to fight to defend Damascus. [2] It also draws on General Vo Nguyen Giap's guerrilla strategy against French and US forces in Vietnam.
The aim of the takfiris now is to extend the current insurgency against the establishment in the North Waziristan and South Waziristan tribal areas of Pakistan into a large-scale offensive to bring down the central government or force the government to support their cause.
The US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and Pakistan's post-September 11, 2001, about-turn into the camp of the United States led to a marriage of convenience among the flag-bearers of Ibn Taymiyyah's ideology, zealots of al-Qaeda and experts in Giap's guerrilla strategy - former officers of the Pakistani armed forces who were upset with Pakistan's policy reversal, which included abandoning the Taliban.
These groups joined forces to take control of the state through a popular revolt or by using violent means, or force on the state apparatus to support the battle against the Western coalition in Afghanistan. The alliance has had some success, notably in the Waziristans, where in effect a rigid Islamic state prevails beyond the control of the central authorities in Islamabad. Indeed, the highest level of casualties in the history of the Pakistan Army has forced Pakistani leaders to speak of stopping operations in the Waziristans, saying it is a wrong war.
But while there have been several serious popular outbursts against President General Pervez Musharraf - and attacks on his life - his military government remains in power since staging a coup in 1999.
Meanwhile, after a long lull, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden resurfaced recently with three video and audio tape messages. His emergence on the horizon of the jihadist audience came at a time when Islamic militants of varied backgrounds (in the Waziristans) had finally sorted out their conflicts on issues such as revolt against a Muslim state and fighting Muslim armies.
Those groups include the Taliban (led by Mullah Omar), the command of the Pakistani Taliban (led by a shura - council - of mujahideen in the two Waziristans), leading Arab scholars in the Waziristans, such as Sheikh Essa, Abu Waleed Ansari and Abu Yahya al-Libbi, the command of Pakistani jihadist organizations in the Waziristans under Maulana Ilyas Kashmiri and its allied group of former officers of the Pakistan Armed Forces who resigned to join the Afghan resistance.
Bin Laden has always spoken out against the Western world, but in his most recent audio message last week, for the first time he urged Pakistanis "to fight against Musharraf, his army, his government and his supporters". This was the first endorsement of his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri's anti-establishment theory under which war should be waged first against the un-Islamic Muslim states before fighting infidel armies. In the past, Mullah Omar and bin Laden have always avoided stirring revolt within countries such as Pakistan.
Pakistan immediately dismissed bin Laden's call. Army spokesman Major-General Waheed Arshad was quoted as saying, "If Osama bin Laden has spoken to the people and urged them to rise, and the people were really following him, they would have done so much earlier. He doesn't have much following here."
However, this was clearly for public consumption. Asia Times Online has learned that these new developments were so seriously viewed on the intelligence radars of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia that they devised a joint strategy.
Islamabad is so concerned over the latest developments that it asked Saudi Arabia to approach al-Qaeda to abandon its anti-establishment policy.
The Saudis are concerned that should their erstwhile son bin Laden succeed in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia would be one of the next logical targets. So a joint strategy was devised to confront the threat.
According to a witness who spoke to Asia Times Online, last month a Saudi consul visited North Waziristan in the first such interaction with the al-Qaeda command since the US invasion on Afghanistan in 2001. The consul was meant to meet Zawahiri or bin Laden, but he was not allowed to see them and instead met second-tier al-Qaeda leaders.
The consul wore traditional clothes of the region and a Pashtun-style hat, and carried several gifts, mostly food items, especially dates and figs. He also carried with him messages from Saudi royal family members. He spent two days in North Waziristan before returning safely to Islamabad. Immediately after, the Saudi ambassador to Pakistan, Ali Awad al-Asiri, went to Saudi Arabia. He was not carrying good news - the Saudi offer of a ceasefire with al-Qaeda for both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia had been rejected, as the al-Qaeda leadership is determined to pursue its policy of bringing down "un-Islamic" governments and imposing their own policies or alternatively getting Pakistan to change its policies in favor of the militants.
Pakistan is the first stepping stone in al-Qaeda's global strategy. Once the organization and its allies take control of the country or force the decision-makers to promote global Islamic resistance, the first direct impact will be on the Afghan insurgency, where support would multiply against Western coalition forces there.
Jihadis take aim
The September 13 attack on Zarrar Company's Tarbella Ghazi camp in northwestern Pakistan in which 20 military men were killed raised alarm bells in Islamabad. Zarrar Company is involved in anti-terror operations.
Pakistani jihadis have launched many attacks on the establishment and against Musharraf, but now they face a well-coordinated "guerrilla" strategy, spearheaded by former army officers.
The former military men are operating out of the Waziristan camp of former Pakistani jihadi commander Maulana Ilyas Kashmiri. They are mostly ex-middle cadre (captains, majors, colonels) who resigned upon Pakistan's U-turn after September 11.
Initially, the architect of the struggle against Pakistan's alliance in the US-led "war on terror" and the operations in the Waziristans against the Pakistani military was an ex-captain of Pakistan's Special Services Group (he served in Zarrar Company). Captain Ahmed (not his real name), who also served in Pakistan's peacekeeping mission in Sierra Leone, was killed a few months ago in the Garmser district of Helmand province in Afghanistan fighting against British troops.
The captain had also taught Kashmir separatists the guerrilla concepts of Sri Lanka's Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. These proved successful in the Kashmir Valley.
In Afghanistan, he oriented the fighters to adopt the three-phase guerrilla tactics of Giap in the southeastern provinces of Khost, Paktia and Paktika. These are now being adopted against the Pakistan Army in the two Waziristans.
The first phase involves armed opposition to the Pakistani forces in the two Waziristans. This has been going on for some years, and has proved successful, with the troops even being withdrawn at one point, leaving the militants in peace.
In the second phase, which has now begun, the militants are targeting isolated security posts and enemy personnel. This had a spectacular result recently, with more than 500 Pakistan Army soldiers being captured in different phases, mostly from the 7 Baloch Regiment (most of them were also released in phases).
At the same time, the insurgency has to spread. This it has done, into the adjoining Mohmand and Bajaur tribal agencies, as well as Tank, Dera Ismail Khan and Swat Valley in North-West Frontier Province. The intensity of the opposition will be raised to include large-scale attacks, centered in Swat Valley, which will be Waziristan's outpost of insurgency and from where the insurgency is planned to spread into the federal capital.
The only parallel in Pakistan's history was the 1970 insurgency in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) when a colonel, along with a few other middle-ranking officers in the Pakistan Army, formed the Mukti Bahni (separatist group) for the separation of East Pakistan. Later, Bengali officers of the East Bengal Rifles mutinied against Pakistan and joined the separatists.
For the final stage, the ex-army planners aim to take the battle to Islamabad. The trigger for this will be presidential elections scheduled for next month in which Musharraf will run - and while still wearing his uniform.
Notes
1. Those who consider non-practicing Muslims as infidels.
2. Ibn Taymiyyah fought against the Tartars who attacked the Muslim world and almost reached Damascus. The people of Syria sent him to Egypt to urge the Mamluke Sultan, the sultan of Egypt and Syria, to lead his troops to Syria to save it from the invading Tartars. When he realized that the Sultan was hesitant to do what he asked of him, he threatened the Sultan by saying: "If you turn your back on Syria we will appoint a Sultan over it who can defend it and enjoy it at the time of peace." The strategy was successful and the Sultan was eventually forced to fight against the Tartars.
3. Vo Nguyen Giap (born in 1911)was a Vietnamese general and statesman.
Asia Times Online :: South Asia news - Military brains plot Pakistan's downfall
Where did this rubbish come from? What idiocy is this? What "groups" of officers joined the terrorists??? When has the insurgency spread to Dera Ismael Khan and god knows where? When did Saudi and Pakistan start having anti-terror ties because of fear of Pakistan falling? This article is utterly stupid and says nothing useful... there seems to be absolutely no truth in it. Infact the lenght which this idiot seems to be willing to go to support his claims is surprising!
