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ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan has
demanded that the United States
steeply reduce the number of
Central Intelligence Agency
operatives and Special Operations
forces working in Pakistan, and that
it put on hold C.I.A. drone strikes
aimed at militants in northwest
Pakistan, a sign of the near collapse
of cooperation between the two
testy allies.
The demand that the United States
scale back its presence is the
immediate fallout of the arrest in
Pakistan of Raymond A. Davis, a
C.I.A. security officer who killed two
men in broad daylight during a
mugging incident in January,
Pakistani and American officials said
in interviews.
In all, about 335 American personnel
- C.I.A. officers and contractors and
Special Operations forces - were
being asked to leave the country,
said a Pakistani official closely
involved in the decision. The cuts
threatened to badly hamper
American efforts - either through
drone strikes or Pakistani military
training - to combat militants who
use Pakistan as a base to fight
American forces in Afghanistan and
plot terror attacks abroad.
The reductions were personally
demanded by the chief of the
Pakistan army, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez
Kayani, said Pakistani and American
officials, who requested anonymity
while discussing the sensitive issue.
The scale of the Pakistani demands
emerged as Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja
Pasha, the head of Pakistan's chief
spy agency, the Inter Services
Intelligence, or ISI, was headed to
Washington on Monday to meet with
the director of the C.I.A., Leon
Panetta.
The Davis episode has plunged
relations between the two spy
agencies, always tentative and
distrustful, to a new low, and further
exposed the divergent interests of
the United States and Pakistan,
ostensible allies in the war on
terrorism, as the endgame in
Afghanistan draws closer.
The Pakistani army firmly believes
that Washington's real aim in
Pakistan is to neutralize the nation's
prized nuclear arsenal, which is now
on a path to becoming the world's
fifth largest, said the Pakistani official
closely involved in the decision on
reducing the American presence.
On the American side, frustration
has built over the Pakistani army's
seeming inability to defeat a host of
militant groups, including the
Taliban and Al Qaeda, which have
thrived in Pakistan's tribal areas
despite more than $1 billion in
American assistance a year to the
Pakistani military.
In a rare public rebuke, a White
House report to Congress last week
described the Pakistani efforts
against the militants as
disappointing.
At the time of his arrest, Mr. Davis
was involved in a covert C.I.A. effort
to penetrate one militant group,
Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has long ties
to Pakistan's military and intelligence
establishment, has made deepening
inroads in Afghanistan, and is
perceived as a global threat.
The C.I.A. had demanded that Mr.
Davis be freed immediately, on the
grounds that he had diplomatic
immunity. Instead, he was held for
47 days of detention and, the
officials said, questioned for 14 days
by ISI agents during his
imprisonment in Lahore, infuriating
American officials. He was finally
freed after his victims' families
agreed to take some $2.3 million in
compensation.
Another apparent price, however, is
the list of reductions in American
personnel demanded by General
Kayani, according to the Pakistan
and American officials. These include
a 25 to 40 percent cutback in the
number of United States Special
Operations soldiers, most of them
involved in training the paramilitary
Frontier Corps in northwest Pakistan.
American officials said last year that
the Pakistanis had allowed a
maximum of 120 Special Forces
soldiers to operate in Pakistan. The
Americans had reached that quota,
the Pakistani official said.
Pakistan is also demanding the
removal of all American contractors
used by the C.I.A. in Pakistan and
C.I.A. operatives who were involved
in "unilateral" assignments - like that
of Mr. Davis - that the Pakistani
intelligence agency did not know
about, the Pakistani official said.
On top of reducing American
personnel on the ground, General
Kayani has told the Obama
administration that its expanded
drone campaign had gotten out of
control, a Pakistani official said.
Given the reluctance or inability of
the Pakistani military to root out
Qaeda and Taliban militants from
the tribal areas, American officials
have turned more and more to
drone strikes, drastically increasing
the number of strikes last year.
The drone campaign, which is
immensely unpopular among the
Pakistani public, had morphed into
the sole preserve of the United
States, the Pakistani official said,
since the Americans were no longer
sharing intelligence on how they
were choosing their targets. The
Americans had also extended the
strikes to new parts of the tribal
region, like the Khyber area near the
city of Peshawar.
"Kayani would like the drones
stopped," said another Pakistani
official who met with the military
chief recently. "He believes they are
used too frequently as a weapon of
choice, rather than as a strategic
weapon." Short of that, General
Kayani was demanding that the
campaign return to its original, more
limited scope and remain focused
narrowly on North Waziristan, the
prime militant stronghold.
A drone attack last month, one day
after Mr. Davis was released, hit
Taliban fighters in North Waziristan,
but also killed tribal leaders allied to
the Pakistani military, an apparent
mishap that infuriated General
Kayani, who issued an unusually
strong statement of condemnation
afterward.
American officials defended the
drone attack, saying that it had
achieved its goal of killing militants.
But there have been no drone
attacks since then.
The request by General Kayani to cut
back the number of Special
Operations forces by up to 40
percent would result in the closure
of the training program begun last
year at Warsak, close to Peshawar, ,
an American official said.
The United States spent $23 million
on a building at Warsak, and $30
million on equipment and training
there.
Informed by American officials that
the Special Operations training
would end even with the partial
reduction of 40 percent, General
Kayani remained unmoved, the
American official said.
The program to upgrade the
paramilitary Frontier Corps and get
them to focus on counterinsurgency
warfare began in earnest last year;
American officials believed it was
essential to improve the capacity of
the nearly 150,000 Pakistani soldiers
deployed to fight the Taliban in the
tribal region.
But the Pakistanis were always leery
of the training, in part because the
United States is regarded with
suspicion by many of the Frontier
Corps soldiers, and because
Pakistani officials said they were
never sure if training, rather than
spying, was the real purpose of the
Special Operations soldiers.
The C.I.A. quietly withdrew all
contractors after Mr. Davis's arrest,
the Pakistani official said. Armed
American men in civilian clothes
believed to be C.I.A. contractors
were often seen around the United
States consulate in Peshawar, where
Mr. Davis worked at the beginning of
his stint in Pakistan, but are no
longer in evidence.
Another category of American
intelligence agents, declared
operatives whose purpose was not
clear, were also being asked to leave,
the Pakistani official said.
In an illustration of the severity of
the breach between the C.I.A. and
the ISI, two intelligence agencies
that were supposed to have been
cooperating since the Sept. 11 attack
in the United States but that have
rarely trusted each other, the
Pakistani official said: "We're telling
the Americans: 'You have to trust the
ISI or you don't. There is nothing in
between.' "
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demanded that the United States
steeply reduce the number of
Central Intelligence Agency
operatives and Special Operations
forces working in Pakistan, and that
it put on hold C.I.A. drone strikes
aimed at militants in northwest
Pakistan, a sign of the near collapse
of cooperation between the two
testy allies.
The demand that the United States
scale back its presence is the
immediate fallout of the arrest in
Pakistan of Raymond A. Davis, a
C.I.A. security officer who killed two
men in broad daylight during a
mugging incident in January,
Pakistani and American officials said
in interviews.
In all, about 335 American personnel
- C.I.A. officers and contractors and
Special Operations forces - were
being asked to leave the country,
said a Pakistani official closely
involved in the decision. The cuts
threatened to badly hamper
American efforts - either through
drone strikes or Pakistani military
training - to combat militants who
use Pakistan as a base to fight
American forces in Afghanistan and
plot terror attacks abroad.
The reductions were personally
demanded by the chief of the
Pakistan army, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez
Kayani, said Pakistani and American
officials, who requested anonymity
while discussing the sensitive issue.
The scale of the Pakistani demands
emerged as Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja
Pasha, the head of Pakistan's chief
spy agency, the Inter Services
Intelligence, or ISI, was headed to
Washington on Monday to meet with
the director of the C.I.A., Leon
Panetta.
The Davis episode has plunged
relations between the two spy
agencies, always tentative and
distrustful, to a new low, and further
exposed the divergent interests of
the United States and Pakistan,
ostensible allies in the war on
terrorism, as the endgame in
Afghanistan draws closer.
The Pakistani army firmly believes
that Washington's real aim in
Pakistan is to neutralize the nation's
prized nuclear arsenal, which is now
on a path to becoming the world's
fifth largest, said the Pakistani official
closely involved in the decision on
reducing the American presence.
On the American side, frustration
has built over the Pakistani army's
seeming inability to defeat a host of
militant groups, including the
Taliban and Al Qaeda, which have
thrived in Pakistan's tribal areas
despite more than $1 billion in
American assistance a year to the
Pakistani military.
In a rare public rebuke, a White
House report to Congress last week
described the Pakistani efforts
against the militants as
disappointing.
At the time of his arrest, Mr. Davis
was involved in a covert C.I.A. effort
to penetrate one militant group,
Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has long ties
to Pakistan's military and intelligence
establishment, has made deepening
inroads in Afghanistan, and is
perceived as a global threat.
The C.I.A. had demanded that Mr.
Davis be freed immediately, on the
grounds that he had diplomatic
immunity. Instead, he was held for
47 days of detention and, the
officials said, questioned for 14 days
by ISI agents during his
imprisonment in Lahore, infuriating
American officials. He was finally
freed after his victims' families
agreed to take some $2.3 million in
compensation.
Another apparent price, however, is
the list of reductions in American
personnel demanded by General
Kayani, according to the Pakistan
and American officials. These include
a 25 to 40 percent cutback in the
number of United States Special
Operations soldiers, most of them
involved in training the paramilitary
Frontier Corps in northwest Pakistan.
American officials said last year that
the Pakistanis had allowed a
maximum of 120 Special Forces
soldiers to operate in Pakistan. The
Americans had reached that quota,
the Pakistani official said.
Pakistan is also demanding the
removal of all American contractors
used by the C.I.A. in Pakistan and
C.I.A. operatives who were involved
in "unilateral" assignments - like that
of Mr. Davis - that the Pakistani
intelligence agency did not know
about, the Pakistani official said.
On top of reducing American
personnel on the ground, General
Kayani has told the Obama
administration that its expanded
drone campaign had gotten out of
control, a Pakistani official said.
Given the reluctance or inability of
the Pakistani military to root out
Qaeda and Taliban militants from
the tribal areas, American officials
have turned more and more to
drone strikes, drastically increasing
the number of strikes last year.
The drone campaign, which is
immensely unpopular among the
Pakistani public, had morphed into
the sole preserve of the United
States, the Pakistani official said,
since the Americans were no longer
sharing intelligence on how they
were choosing their targets. The
Americans had also extended the
strikes to new parts of the tribal
region, like the Khyber area near the
city of Peshawar.
"Kayani would like the drones
stopped," said another Pakistani
official who met with the military
chief recently. "He believes they are
used too frequently as a weapon of
choice, rather than as a strategic
weapon." Short of that, General
Kayani was demanding that the
campaign return to its original, more
limited scope and remain focused
narrowly on North Waziristan, the
prime militant stronghold.
A drone attack last month, one day
after Mr. Davis was released, hit
Taliban fighters in North Waziristan,
but also killed tribal leaders allied to
the Pakistani military, an apparent
mishap that infuriated General
Kayani, who issued an unusually
strong statement of condemnation
afterward.
American officials defended the
drone attack, saying that it had
achieved its goal of killing militants.
But there have been no drone
attacks since then.
The request by General Kayani to cut
back the number of Special
Operations forces by up to 40
percent would result in the closure
of the training program begun last
year at Warsak, close to Peshawar, ,
an American official said.
The United States spent $23 million
on a building at Warsak, and $30
million on equipment and training
there.
Informed by American officials that
the Special Operations training
would end even with the partial
reduction of 40 percent, General
Kayani remained unmoved, the
American official said.
The program to upgrade the
paramilitary Frontier Corps and get
them to focus on counterinsurgency
warfare began in earnest last year;
American officials believed it was
essential to improve the capacity of
the nearly 150,000 Pakistani soldiers
deployed to fight the Taliban in the
tribal region.
But the Pakistanis were always leery
of the training, in part because the
United States is regarded with
suspicion by many of the Frontier
Corps soldiers, and because
Pakistani officials said they were
never sure if training, rather than
spying, was the real purpose of the
Special Operations soldiers.
The C.I.A. quietly withdrew all
contractors after Mr. Davis's arrest,
the Pakistani official said. Armed
American men in civilian clothes
believed to be C.I.A. contractors
were often seen around the United
States consulate in Peshawar, where
Mr. Davis worked at the beginning of
his stint in Pakistan, but are no
longer in evidence.
Another category of American
intelligence agents, declared
operatives whose purpose was not
clear, were also being asked to leave,
the Pakistani official said.
In an illustration of the severity of
the breach between the C.I.A. and
the ISI, two intelligence agencies
that were supposed to have been
cooperating since the Sept. 11 attack
in the United States but that have
rarely trusted each other, the
Pakistani official said: "We're telling
the Americans: 'You have to trust the
ISI or you don't. There is nothing in
between.' "
Read comments (21) »
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MULTIPLE PAGES
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VIEW ARTICLE ON NYTIMES.C
