U.S-Pakistan Brainstorm on WoT

[batmannow]

U.S.-Pakistani Brainstorming on Border Violence
By ERIC SCHMITT
Published: August 27, 2008
NYTimes.com


WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff secretly convened a highly unusual meeting of senior American and Pakistani commanders on an aircraft carrier in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday to discuss how to combat the escalating violence along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Times Topics: Northwest PakistanWhile officials from the two allies offered few details on Wednesday about what was decided or even discussed at the meeting — including any new strategies, tactics, weapons or troop deployments — the star-studded list of participants and the extreme secrecy surrounding the talks underscored how gravely both nations regard the growing militant threat.
The leading actors in the daylong conference were Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, chief of staff of the Pakistani Army.
Joining them aboard the carrier Abraham Lincoln were Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, who will soon become the senior officer in the Middle East; Gen. David D. McKiernan, NATO’s top officer in Afghanistan; Adm. Eric T. Olson, head of the Special Operations Command; Lt. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, acting commander of American forces in the Middle East; and Rear Adm. Michael A. LeFever, the senior American military liaison to Pakistan. General Kayani was accompanied by ranking officers from Pakistan.
The meeting was prompted by a series of ominous developments: continuing political turmoil in Pakistan, increasingly deadly attacks against Afghan and Western targets in Afghanistan and American complaints that the Pakistani military has been ineffective in stemming the flow of militants who launch attacks in Afghanistan from Pakistani havens.
American officials pointed to two major Taliban attacks in Afghanistan last week — a coordinated assault by at least 10 suicide bombers against one of the largest American military bases and another by about 100 insurgents who ambushed and killed 10 elite French paratroopers.
“The meeting was mainly to continue to discuss ongoing operations against extremists in the border region and to work together to find better ways to solve those problems,” said one American military official who was briefed on the talks.
Admiral Mullen met with General Kayani just a month ago in Islamabad, Pakistan. It was then that this week’s meeting was scheduled, the military official said. In Islamabad, he said, Admiral Mullen had bluntly warned General Kayani that Pakistan had to do more to combat militants in the restive tribal areas.
The gathering aboard the Abraham Lincoln was less confrontational in tone, aides said. “It was one of those meetings to help clear up the situation, get an understanding of the issues, and look for a way forward,” said a senior Pakistani officer briefed on the discussions.
Military officials from both countries declined to say whether commanders had reached any new agreement to allow American Special Operations forces greater access to Pakistan’s tribal areas to conduct missions to kill or capture top leaders of Al Qaeda who have found sanctuary there.
Ted Gistaro, the American government’s senior terrorism analyst, said this month that Al Qaeda’s success in developing closer ties to Pakistani militants had given it an increasingly safe base in the mountainous tribal areas, where he said its leaders had recruited and trained “dozens” of militants capable of blending into Western society and carrying out attacks.
“They were military-to-military discussions focusing on what more the Pakistanis could do and what more we could offer to help,” the American military official said.
The official said that Tuesday’s meeting had allowed Admiral Mullen to “better understand a complex problem in a critical part of the world, and try to do that through the eyes of the leadership who live and work and fight there.”

American commanders in Pakistan and Afghanistan have sounded alarms about the growing militancy in both countries.
Maj. Gen. Jeffrey J. Schloesser, the top American commander in eastern Afghanistan, said in a telephone interview last week that American and allied forces continued to see a growing number of foreign fighters flowing into Afghanistan from Pakistan. These foreign fighters — Arabs, Uzbeks and Chechens — were carrying out ever more sophisticated strikes, he said.
General Schloesser said that recent Pakistani military operations in Bajaur and other border areas had had no impact thus far on the influx of foreign fighters. “We’ve yet to see a lessening of the movement,” he said.

 

[Kasrkin]

I think this meeting on an aircraft carrier might have been intended as a bit of a show of force, for General Kayani's benefit that is. Its good that they are having meetings, I just hope General Kayani is holding his own though. He does look like the sort of guy who knows how to deal with 'em Americans...

 

[Munir]

Crap, the US bombed several times weddings and funerals and kept saying they killed Taleban. I am not convinced that their information is 100% reliable. But if they can not guard the border why do they expect Pakistan to do for less? And since when are their few soldiers killed much more valuable compared to the hundreds of Pakistani soldiers?

The fact is that Sun Tzu already said that bigger powers cannot win if they fight this way. And what can you expect if you blaim muslims for spreading terror while the invading of nations, terrorizing mass population, setting up secret prisons and skip Geneva conventions leads to? Terrorists with flowers? I thank god that terrorist do not have big brains either otherwise we would have dirty boms all over the world.

The fact is that this war will not be over anytime soon. De rhetoric of blaiming Pakistan is purely to hide their own mismanagement. Whether it is on the warzone or the political arena. It is a shame that people rather go for killing eachother but forget the cause... Even a dumb person should ask why these people fight... Somehow that seems to be not the reality so mankind moved even to sub-dumb fase...

 

[IceCold]

I wonder if Kayani told Mullen to stop differentiating between terrorism that is going on in Pakistan with the one that effects the US. This dual game of the US will serve no purpose at all other then just making sure that they will loose another ally. US and NATO so far have failed miserably in Afghanistan and all they come up is running their loud mouths against Pakistan for not doing enough. And as far as the on going military operation is concerned, it holds importance within Pakistan, why should we give a damn if it has not resulted in lessening of the movement in Afghanistan. Clearly people that we are fighting have nothing to do with Afghanistan, they have one goal and that is to destabilize Pakistan and those people, people like Mehsud and his ilks are our problem and we should focus our energy in dealing with them first. I like to quote Musharraf's words here that Pakistan comes first.

 

[fatman17]

I think this meeting on an aircraft carrier might have been intended as a bit of a show of force, for General Kayani's benefit that is. Its good that they are having meetings, I just hope General Kayani is holding his own though. He does look like the sort of guy who knows how to deal with 'em Americans...

my appreciation of Gen. Kiyani is "tread softly but carry a big stick". let me narrate you something...in my conversations with a young capt who is adc to a GOC (maj.gen). he told me that Gen. Kiyani circulated a memo to all formation commanders and above (maj.gen and up) asking them their opinion about the role of the CoAS under our situation. to a man all responded that they support his stance as mentioned above. so i would not fret too much. the PA is in good hands (batmannow are u reading). Kiyani and Musharraf are too different kettle of fish.

 

[batmannow]

my appreciation of Gen. Kiyani is "tread softly but carry a big stick". let me narrate you something...in my conversations with a young capt who is adc to a GOC (maj.gen). he told me that Gen. Kiyani circulated a memo to all formation commanders and above (maj.gen and up) asking them their opinion about the role of the CoAS under our situation. to a man all responded that they support his stance as mentioned above. so i would not fret too much. the PA is in good hands (batmannow are u reading). Kiyani and Musharraf are too different kettle of fish.

U.S. Considers New Covert Push Within Pakistan
By STEVEN LEE MYERS, DAVID E. SANGER and ERIC SCHMITT
Published: January 6, 2008
This article is by Steven Lee Myers, David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt.

WASHINGTON — President Bush’s senior national security advisers are debating whether to expand the authority of the Central Intelligence Agency and the military to conduct far more aggressive covert operations in the tribal areas of Pakistan.

The debate is a response to intelligence reports that Al Qaeda and the Taliban are intensifying efforts there to destabilize the Pakistani government, several senior administration officials said.
Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and a number of President Bush’s top national security advisers met Friday at the White House to discuss the proposal, which is part of a broad reassessment of American strategy after the assassination 10 days ago of the Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. There was also talk of how to handle the period from now to the Feb. 18 elections, and the aftermath of those elections.
Several of the participants in the meeting argued that the threat to the government of President Pervez Musharraf was now so grave that both Mr. Musharraf and Pakistan’s new military leadership were likely to give the United States more latitude, officials said. But no decisions were made, said the officials, who declined to speak for attribution because of the highly delicate nature of the discussions.
Many of the specific options under discussion are unclear and highly classified. Officials said that the options would probably involve the C.I.A. working with the military’s Special Operations forces.
The Bush administration has not formally presented any new proposals to Mr. Musharraf, who gave up his military role last month, or to his successor as the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who the White House thinks will be more sympathetic to the American position than Mr. Musharraf. Early in his career, General Kayani was an aide to Ms. Bhutto while she was prime minister and later led the Pakistani intelligence service.

But at the White House and the Pentagon, officials see an opportunity in the changing power structure for the Americans to advocate for the expanded authority in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country. “After years of focusing on Afghanistan, we think the extremists now see a chance for the big prize — creating chaos in Pakistan itself,” one senior official said.

The new options for expanded covert operations include loosening restrictions on the C.I.A. to strike selected targets in Pakistan, in some cases using intelligence provided by Pakistani sources, officials said. Most counterterrorism operations in Pakistan have been conducted by the C.I.A.; in Afghanistan, where military operations are under way, including some with NATO forces, the military can take the lead.
The legal status would not change if the administration decided to act more aggressively. However, if the C.I.A. were given broader authority, it could call for help from the military or deputize some forces of the Special Operations Command to act under the authority of the agency.
The United States now has about 50 soldiers in Pakistan. Any expanded operations using C.I.A. operatives or Special Operations forces, like the Navy Seals, would be small and tailored to specific missions, military officials said.
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who was on vacation last week and did not attend the White House meeting, said in late December that “Al Qaeda right now seems to have turned its face toward Pakistan and attacks on the Pakistani government and Pakistani people.”

In the past, the administration has largely stayed out of the tribal areas, in part for fear that exposure of any American-led operations there would so embarrass the Musharraf government that it could further empower his critics, who have declared he was too close to Washington.

Even now, officials say, some American diplomats and military officials, as well as outside experts, argue that American-led military operations on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan could result in a tremendous backlash and ultimately do more harm than good. That is particularly true, they say, if Americans were captured or killed in the territory.

In part, the White House discussions may be driven by a desire for another effort to capture or kill Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri. Currently, C.I.A. operatives and Special Operations forces have limited authority to conduct counterterrorism missions in Pakistan based on specific intelligence about the whereabouts of those two men, who have eluded the Bush administration for more than six years, or of other members of their terrorist organization, Al Qaeda, hiding in or near the tribal areas.
The C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in the tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success. Intelligence officials said they believed that in January 2006 an airstrike narrowly missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who had attended a dinner in Damadola, a Pakistani village. But that apparently was the last real evidence American officials had about the whereabouts of their chief targets.
Critics said more direct American military action would be ineffective, anger the Pakistani Army and increase support for the militants. “I’m not arguing that you leave Al Qaeda and the Taliban unmolested, but I’d be very, very cautious about approaches that could play into hands of enemies and be counterproductive,” said Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University. Some American diplomats and military officials have also issued strong warnings against expanded direct American action, officials said.

Hasan Askari Rizvi, a leading Pakistani military and political analyst, said raids by American troops would prompt a powerful popular backlash against Mr. Musharraf and the United States.

In the wake of the American invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, many Pakistanis suspect that the United States is trying to dominate Pakistan as well, Mr. Rizvi said. Mr. Musharraf — who is already widely unpopular — would lose even more popular support.

“At the moment when Musharraf is extremely unpopular, he will face more crisis,” Mr. Rizvi said. “This will weaken Musharraf in a Pakistani context.” He said such raids would be seen as an overall vote of no confidence in the Pakistani military, including General Kayani.
The meeting on Friday, which was not publicly announced, included Stephen J. Hadley, Mr. Bush’s national security adviser; Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and top intelligence officials.
Spokesmen for the White House, the C.I.A. and the Pentagon declined to discuss the meeting, citing a policy against doing so. But the session reflected an urgent concern that a new Qaeda haven was solidifying in parts of Pakistan and needed to be countered, one official said.
Although some officials and experts have criticized Mr. Musharraf and questioned his ability to take on extremists, Mr. Bush has remained steadfast in his support, and it is unlikely any new measures, including direct American military action inside Pakistan, will be approved without Mr. Musharraf’s consent.
“He understands clearly the risks of dealing with extremists and terrorists,” Mr. Bush said in an interview with Reuters on Thursday. “After all, they’ve tried to kill him.”
The Pakistan government has identified a militant leader with links to Al Qaeda, Baitullah Mehsud, who holds sway in tribal areas near the Afghanistan border, as the chief suspect behind the attack on Ms. Bhutto. American officials are not certain about Mr. Mehsud’s complicity but say the threat he and other militants pose is a new focus. He is considered, they said, an “Al Qaeda associate.”
In an interview with foreign journalists on Thursday, Mr. Musharraf warned of the risk any counterterrorism forces — American or Pakistani — faced in confronting Mr. Mehsud in his native tribal areas.
“He is in South Waziristan agency, and let me tell you, getting him in that place means battling against thousands of people, hundreds of people who are his followers, the Mehsud tribe, if you get to him, and it will mean collateral damage,” Mr. Musharraf said.
The weeks before parliamentary elections — which were originally scheduled for Tuesday — are seen as critical because of threats by extremists to disrupt the vote. But it seemed unlikely that any additional American effort would be approved and put in place in that time frame.
Administration aides said that Pakistani and American officials shared the concern about a resurgent Qaeda, and that American diplomats and senior military officers had been working closely with their Pakistani counterparts to help bolster Pakistan’s counterterrorism operations.
Shortly after Ms. Bhutto’s assassination, Adm. William J. Fallon, who oversees American military operations in Southwest Asia, telephoned his Pakistani counterparts to ensure that counterterrorism and logistics operations remained on track.
In early December, Adm. Eric T. Olson, the new leader of the Special Operations Command, paid his second visit to Pakistan in three months to meet with senior Pakistani officers, including Lt. Gen. Muhammad Masood Aslam, commander of the military and paramilitary troops in northwest Pakistan. Admiral Olson also visited the headquarters of the Frontier Corps, a paramilitary force of about 85,000 members recruited from border tribes that the United States is planning to help train and equip.
But the Pakistanis are still years away from fielding an effective counterinsurgency force. And some American officials, including Defense Secretary Gates, have said the United States may have to take direct action against militants in the tribal areas.
American officials said the crisis surrounding Ms. Bhutto’s assassination had not diminished the Pakistani counterterrorism operations, and there were no signs that Mr. Musharraf had pulled out any of his 100,000 forces in the tribal areas and brought them to the cities to help control the urban unrest.

Carlotta Gall contributed reporting from Islamabad, and David Rohde from New York.

US Seeks 'Plan B' in Pakistan

Posted Nov 15, 07 4:08 AM CST

As Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf continues to crack down on opponents, the US is losing faith in his ability to survive, the New York Times reports. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte will meet with Musharraf tomorrow in an effort to help calm the situation, but administration officials are already looking for a Plan B. That could mean another general or a fragile alliance between former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and the military.

The White House fears the political crisis is distracting Pakistan's army from fighting the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in the rugged mountains bordering Afghanistan. “They don’t want to encourage another military coup, but they are also beginning to understand that Musharraf has become part of the problem,” said one former US official.

U.S. Is Looking Past Musharraf in Case He Falls
By HELENE COOPER, MARK MAZZETTI and DAVID ROHDE
Published: November 15, 2007

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 — Almost two weeks into Pakistan’s political crisis, Bush administration officials are losing faith that the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, can survive in office and have begun discussing what might come next, according to senior administration officials.


In meetings on Wednesday, officials at the White House, State Department and the Pentagon huddled to decide what message Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte would deliver to General Musharraf — and perhaps more important, to Pakistan’s generals — when he arrives in Islamabad on Friday.
Administration officials say they still hope that Mr. Negroponte can salvage the fractured arranged marriage between General Musharraf and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. But in Pakistan, foreign diplomats and aides to both leaders said the chances of a deal between the leaders were evaporating 11 days after General Musharraf declared de facto martial law.

Several senior administration officials said that with each day that passed, more administration officials were coming around to the belief that General Musharraf’s days in power were numbered and that the United States should begin considering contingency plans, including reaching out to Pakistan’s generals.

More than a dozen officials in Washington and Islamabad from a number of countries spoke on condition of anonymity because of the fragility of Pakistan’s current political situation. The doubts that American officials voiced about whether General Musharraf could survive were more pointed than any public statements by the administration, and signaled declining American patience in advance of Mr. Negroponte’s trip.

Officials involved in the discussions in Washington said the Bush administration remained wary of the perception that the United States was cutting back-room deals to install the next leader of Pakistan. “They don’t want to encourage another military coup, but they are also beginning to understand that Musharraf has become part of the problem,” said one former official with knowledge of the debates inside the Bush administration.

That shift in perception is significant because for six years General Musharraf has sought to portray himself, for his own purposes, as the West’s best alternative to a possible takeover in Pakistan by radical Islamists.
While remote areas in northwestern Pakistan remain a haven for Al Qaeda and other Islamic militants, senior officials at the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon now say they recognize that the Pakistani Army remains a powerful force for stability in Pakistan, and that there is little prospect of an Islamic takeover if General Musharraf should fall.

If General Musharraf is forced from power, they say, it would most likely be in a gentle push by fellow officers, who would try to install a civilian president and push for parliamentary elections to produce the next prime minister, perhaps even Ms. Bhutto, despite past strains between her and the military.

Many Western diplomats in Islamabad said they believed that even a flawed arrangement like that one was ultimately better than an oppressive and unpopular military dictatorship under General Musharraf.

Such a scenario would be a return to the diffuse and sometimes unwieldy democracy that Pakistan had in the 1990s before General Musharraf seized power in a bloodless coup.
But the diplomats also warned that removing the general might not be that easy. Army generals are unlikely to move against General Musharraf unless certain “red lines” are crossed, such as countrywide political protests or a real threat of a cutoff of American military aid to Pakistan.

Since he invoked emergency powers on Nov. 3, General Musharraf has successfully used a huge security crackdown to block large-scale protests. Virtually all major opposition politicians have been detained, as well as 2,500 party workers, lawyers and human rights activists, and on Wednesday, a close aide to General Musharraf said the Pakistani leader remained convinced that emergency rule should continue.
Pakistan’s cadre of elite generals, called the corps commanders, have long been kingmakers inside the country. At the top of that cadre is Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, General Musharraf’s designated successor as army chief. General Kayani is a moderate, pro-American infantry commander who is widely seen as commanding respect within the army and, within Western circles, as a potential alternative to General Musharraf.
General Kayani and other military leaders are widely believed to be eager to pull the army out of politics and focus its attention purely on securing the country.

My Dear, fatman17, sir

I , would like to beg, pardon sir, i willbe glad if you can bring some light on the above posted post.
i will be very thank full to you sir, like always.
thanks

 

[pkpatriotic]

U.S.-Pakistani Brainstorming on Border Violence
By ERIC SCHMITT

Military officials from both countries declined to say whether commanders had reached any new agreement to allow American Special Operations forces greater access to Pakistan’s tribal areas to conduct missions to kill or capture top leaders of Al Qaeda who have found sanctuary there.

Please try to find classified from above unclassified diplomatic statment on the basis of the following reservations (mostly proved created & supported by US, like B.Mehsud etc; ) staged as serious concerns to keep pressure up on Pakistan to get maximum direct and free access/control in Pakistani areas of Fata, in the name of friendly support. as poet says "Rind key rind rahey , haat sey janat bhi na gayee".

Surprisingly, as i have mentioned in one of my another post, NATO even not able to control its occupied land n Afghanistan as yet, and the world's news papers and magazines are full of critics & analysis of world familer strategists & experts, who pointed out the failure of NATO in Afghanistan, while they keep on chanting and blamed Pakistan to not only cover their weaknesses in front of global community but their main intention is to workout their specific tasks: Promote instablity and anarchy in Pakistan with the supporters and ultimately to reach and control on its Nukes.

“They were military-to-military discussions focusing on what more the Pakistanis could do and what more we could offer to help,” the American military official said.
The official said that Tuesday’s meeting had allowed Admiral Mullen to “better understand a complex problem in a critical part of the world, and try to do that through the eyes of the leadership who live and work and fight there.”

American commanders in Pakistan and Afghanistan have sounded alarms about the growing militancy in both countries.

Maj. Gen. Jeffrey J. Schloesser, the top American commander in eastern Afghanistan, said in a telephone interview last week that American and allied forces continued to see a growing number of foreign fighters flowing into Afghanistan from Pakistan. These foreign fighters — Arabs, Uzbeks and Chechens — were carrying out ever more sophisticated strikes, he said.

A meaningfull agreement have been done that may effect long last. Visible changes may be appearing not in months but in days, including the strategical & political senerio of Baluchistan too.

GOD BLESS PAKISTAN

 

[Munir]

The problem mainly is the failing reason for this war. One cannot bomb a nation beack to the stone age, humiliate ordinary people and pay thieves and warlords to rule. With every killed person they add another family that may add soldiers to fight. And though the fight looks like clean killing of Taleban/Al Qaida the reality is that it is not a clean war. And by trying to manipulate a neighbouring country will not make this war more logical. Neither will it solve anything. The solving wills start as soon as both sides accept eachother as equal and not as one sides sees the other as canonfodder and fanatic crazy morons...

 

[fatman17]

[BMy Dear, fatman17, sir

I , would like to beg, pardon sir, i willbe glad if you can bring some light on the above posted post.
i will be very thank full to you sir, like always.
thanks

these are views which are speculated upon by newspaper wallas. we should not ignore them. it gives us an idea of what the US is thinking at this time. i am quite confident that our military leaders (with clearence from the civilian govt) will be able to convince the US on how to go about dealing with the current situation.

remember, the US military knows and respects the CoAS otherwise all hell would have broken loose already!

 

[batmannow]

these are views which are speculated upon by newspaper wallas. we should not ignore them. it gives us an idea of what the US is thinking at this time. i am quite confident that our military leaders (with clearence from the civilian govt) will be able to convince the US on how to go about dealing with the current situation.

remember, the US military knows and respects the CoAS otherwise all hell would have broken loose already!

Dear fatman17 sir,
Thanks a lot for your wise and kind veiws, i guss the war crazy morans dont have any respect of our COAS, but its RUSSIAN SHOW DOWN in GEORGIA.
It is the situation, which made USA admin and its WAR cazy militry officials including CIA , in serious distress which was a direct result of RUSSIAs shochking entry to the EROUPEAN war theater.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, is worried about a possible confrontation with the Russian navy.
"Certainly there is potential there because physically the Russian navy is operating in the Black Sea, so is the United States navy, and so are other navies, quite frankly, that live in that part of the world," he said.

August 29, 2008
Australian Broadcasting Corporation



Acorrding to GEO TV.s programe eak din kammran khan kee sath, its said that COAS GEN.KIYANI made it clear to USA & its militry intelligensia, that they had to think about the issues which pakistan is facing now & also USA had to help pakistan in its fight against terror inside pakistan. USA had to accept its failure in afghanistan of its forces ad thier way of handilling the war, & they cant put thier blame to pakistan! they had to stop thier DO MORE, DO MORE policy.

Afghans Say US Raid Based on Bad Tip

August 29, 2008
Associated Press

KABUL, Afghanistan - Afghan officials said Aug. 28 that a deadly U.S.-led special forces raid on a remote western village last week was based on misleading information provided by a rival clan.

It was the latest twist in a tangled debate over what happened. U.N. officials say the raid killed up to 90 civilians, most of them children. A NATO official said U.S. and Afghan troops were fired on first, touching off a battle of several hours that killed 25 militants and five civilians.



I certnly, hope that GEN.KIYANI can expolite the situation in pakistans favour & i certnly wish him best of luck from the bottom of my heart......

 

[Logic note]

Raman's strategic analysis: US-PAKISTAN TOP SECRET MILITARY TALKS

US-PAKISTAN TOP SECRET MILITARY TALKS
B.RAMAN

The "New York Times" reported as follows on August 28,2008: "Top US and Pakistani army commanders had a highly unusual secret meeting on board an American aircraft carrier in the Indian Ocean to discuss how to combat the escalating violence along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The leading actors in the day long conference were Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani.The meeting had been convened on Tuesday (August 26) by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. While officials of the two allies offered few details on Wednesday about what was decided or even discussed at the meeting - including any new strategies, tactics, weapons or troop deployment- the star-studded list of participants and an extreme secrecy surrounding the talks underscored how gravely the two nations regarded the growing militant threat.".

2.The top secrecy surrounding the talks between Admiral Mullen and Gen.Kayani brings to mind a similar top secret meeting between Gen.Jehangir Karamat, the then Pakistani Chief of the Army Staff (COAS), and Gen.Anthony Zinni, the then chief of the US Central Command, on the tarmac of a Pakistani airport before the US launched Cruise missile strikes against Osama bin Laden and the training camps of Al Qaeda in Afghan territory in August,1998, in retaliation for the Al Qaeda-organised explosions outside the US Embassies in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam.

3.The US had fixed the Cruise missile strikes on a day (August 20,1998) when bin Laden was expected to visit a training camp to meet a group of Al Qaeda volunteers, who had completed the training. Nawaz Sharif was then the Prime Minister of Pakistan. The US did not want his Government to know in advance about the planned Cruise missile attacks lest the information leak to Al Qaeda. At the same time, it was worried that if the Pakistani Army detected the incoming Cruise missiles, it might mistake them for missiles launched by India and this could lead to a war between India and Pakistan.

4.Just before the launch of the missiles, Gen.Zinni landed in a Pakistani airport secretly. Only Karamat was informed in advance about his landing. Zinni had requested him to meet him secretly for a discussion on the tarmac of the airport. He also asked Karamat to come alone to the airport without being accompanied by any of his officers. As the two took a stroll on the tarmac, Zinni told Karamat about the impending missile strikes and asked him not to tell Nawaz or anybody else about the strikes. Immediately thereafter, Zinni took off. Shortly thereafter, the missiles were launched from US naval ships.

5.The missiles destroyed only some training camps of the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) of Pakistan in Afghan territory. Al Qaeda camps had been evacuated from the area targeted by the Cruise missiles. Bin Laden had cancelled his visit to one of the camps. He and his camps escaped the strike.

6.Till today, it has been a mystery as to how bin Laden and his Al Qaeda came to know of the date and time of the strike. Did they get their information from their own sources? Or did Karamat inform his officers and Nawaz in violation of the assurance given by him to Zinni and did any of them leak out? No answer is available to any of these questions.

7.Recently, US military officers have been complaining in their testimonies to the Congressional committees as well as in their briefings of the media that the collusion between Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Taliban has reached such an extent that the Taliban and Al Qaeda had come to know in advance in some cases about planned strikes by US Predator aircraft on the hide-outs of these organizations in Pakistan. While some Predator strikes were successful, many others were not.

8.It is learnt from reliable Afghan sources that the NATO officials based in Afghanistan suspect that the leakages had been taking place not only from the ISI and some sections of the Pakistan Army, but also from some members of the Pakistan Government headed by Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani. The US suspicions are particularly focussed on the Awami National Party of Afsandyar Wali Khan, and the Jamiat-ul-Islam Pakistan of Maulana Fazlur Rahman It is understood that this matter of leakages of information was raised by President George Bush with Gilani when the latter visited Washington DC in the last week of July,2008.

9.It is likely that one of the purposes of the top secret meeting between Mullen and Kayani on board a US aircraft-carrier was to discuss how to prevent such leakages.(29-8-08)

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Posted by B.RAMAN at 3:48 AM

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

"It is learnt from reliable Afghan sources"

Is there such a thing as a 'reliable source' on Pakistan in a GoA whose members are reported to be heavily involved in the drugs and weapons trade and whose links to the Northern Alliance indicate a severe bias against Pakistan?

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

The US suspicions are particularly focussed on the Awami National Party of Afsandyar Wali Khan, and the Jamiat-ul-Islam Pakistan of Maulana Fazlur Rahman It is understood that this matter of leakages of information was raised by President George Bush with Gilani when the latter visited Washington DC in the last week of July,2008.

This is just laughably wrong - The ANP shares nothing ideologically with the JUI, or with the Taliban. Its leadership enjoys a strong friendship with Karzai, and was always strongly opposed to Pakistan's Taliban policy after the Soviet withdrawal, and even now criticizes that policy for the ills in FATA and Swat.

 

[dr.umer]

Raman's strategic analysis: US-PAKISTAN TOP SECRET MILITARY TALKS

Find some reliable source when you quote a story. Blogspot stuff are mostly news mixed with personal opinions.

Here is the original version.

Top U.S., Pakistani brass have secret strategy session

Chicago Tribune
August 29, 2008

WASHINGTON — In a meeting cloaked in secrecy, an unusually high-level roster of U.S. military officials huddled with senior Pakistani military officers this week aboard an aircraft carrier in the Indian Ocean to discuss the increasing violence along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

The U.S. commanders—including Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen and Army Gen. David Petraeus—met with Pakistan's army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln on Tuesday in the first meeting of senior U.S. and Pakistani military leaders since former Gen. Pervez Musharraf stepped down as Pakistan's president last week.

The meeting also occurred amid concerns about the increasingly deadly Taliban-led insurgency in Afghanistan and lingering questions about the effort of Pakistan's military and new government to help contain it.

Petraeus is winding down his tour as the top commander in Iraq and will soon take over as the head of U.S. Central Command, which helps oversee the war in Afghanistan.

Mullen, who was meeting with Kayani for the fifth time since the general took control of Pakistan's army last year, spoke at a Pentagon news conference Thursday about the meeting but declined to delve into details about any strategies discussed.

"I can tell you that I came away from the meeting very encouraged that the focus is where it needs to be and … that the military-to-military relationship we're building with Pakistan is getting stronger every day," Mullen said.

The Pakistanis also revealed little about the meeting, saying in a statement that security matters were talked about and that the "discussion was held in an open and cordial manner."

The secrecy surrounding the event—at least initially—was unusual because the Pentagon typically publicizes meetings that U.S. military brass hold with foreign officials.

The timing of the meeting and the high rank of the U.S. commanders involved underscore the Pentagon's desire to strengthen ties to Pakistan's military leaders during a tumultuous period on Pakistan's political scene.

Musharraf was widely considered the Pentagon's and Bush administration's closest ally in Pakistan, and it remains uncertain whether Pakistan's new government will continue to cooperate as closely with the U.S. in its efforts to take on militants who allegedly travel easily across the Afghan-Pakistani border.

Presidential elections are to be held on Sept. 6, but it is unclear whether any of the candidates—the front-runner is former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari—would have the political will or authority to take on the growing militant problem.

Mullen said he was encouraged that Kayani has taken action to improve the security situation along the border areas but said more needs to be done.

"There are areas that we can do better," Mullen said. "There are areas that the Pakistan military can do better. We understand that. … But it is not going to be something that gets solved overnight."

amadhani@tribune.com

Also NewYork Times Version of the story

WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff secretly convened a highly unusual meeting of senior American and Pakistani commanders on an aircraft carrier in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday to discuss how to combat the escalating violence along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

While officials from the two allies offered few details on Wednesday about what was decided or even discussed at the meeting — including any new strategies, tactics, weapons or troop deployments — the star-studded list of participants and the extreme secrecy surrounding the talks underscored how gravely both nations regard the growing militant threat.

The leading actors in the daylong conference were Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, chief of staff of the Pakistani Army.

Joining them aboard the carrier Abraham Lincoln were Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, who will soon become the senior officer in the Middle East; Gen. David D. McKiernan, NATO’s top officer in Afghanistan; Adm. Eric T. Olson, head of the Special Operations Command; Lt. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, acting commander of American forces in the Middle East; and Rear Adm. Michael A. LeFever, the senior American military liaison to Pakistan. General Kayani was accompanied by ranking officers from Pakistan.

The meeting was prompted by a series of ominous developments: continuing political turmoil in Pakistan, increasingly deadly attacks against Afghan and Western targets in Afghanistan and American complaints that the Pakistani military has been ineffective in stemming the flow of militants who launch attacks in Afghanistan from Pakistani havens.

American officials pointed to two major Taliban attacks in Afghanistan last week — a coordinated assault by at least 10 suicide bombers against one of the largest American military bases and another by about 100 insurgents who ambushed and killed 10 elite French paratroopers.

“The meeting was mainly to continue to discuss ongoing operations against extremists in the border region and to work together to find better ways to solve those problems,” said one American military official who was briefed on the talks.

Admiral Mullen met with General Kayani just a month ago in Islamabad, Pakistan. It was then that this week’s meeting was scheduled, the military official said. In Islamabad, he said, Admiral Mullen had bluntly warned General Kayani that Pakistan had to do more to combat militants in the restive tribal areas.

The gathering aboard the Abraham Lincoln was less confrontational in tone, aides said. “It was one of those meetings to help clear up the situation, get an understanding of the issues, and look for a way forward,” said a senior Pakistani officer briefed on the discussions.

Military officials from both countries declined to say whether commanders had reached any new agreement to allow American Special Operations forces greater access to Pakistan’s tribal areas to conduct missions to kill or capture top leaders of Al Qaeda who have found sanctuary there.

Ted Gistaro, the American government’s senior terrorism analyst, said this month that Al Qaeda’s success in developing closer ties to Pakistani militants had given it an increasingly safe base in the mountainous tribal areas, where he said its leaders had recruited and trained “dozens” of militants capable of blending into Western society and carrying out attacks.

“They were military-to-military discussions focusing on what more the Pakistanis could do and what more we could offer to help,” the American military official said.

The official said that Tuesday’s meeting had allowed Admiral Mullen to “better understand a complex problem in a critical part of the world, and try to do that through the eyes of the leadership who live and work and fight there.”

American commanders in Pakistan and Afghanistan have sounded alarms about the growing militancy in both countries.

Maj. Gen. Jeffrey J. Schloesser, the top American commander in eastern Afghanistan, said in a telephone interview last week that American and allied forces continued to see a growing number of foreign fighters flowing into Afghanistan from Pakistan. These foreign fighters — Arabs, Uzbeks and Chechens — were carrying out ever more sophisticated strikes, he said.

General Schloesser said that recent Pakistani military operations in Bajaur and other border areas had had no impact thus far on the influx of foreign fighters. “We’ve yet to see a lessening of the movement,” he said.

Now from where this one came

8. It is learnt from reliable Afghan sources that the NATO officials based in Afghanistan suspect that the leakages had been taking place not only from the ISI and some sections of the Pakistan Army, but also from some members of the Pakistan Government headed by Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani. The US suspicions are particularly focussed on the Awami National Party of Afsandyar Wali Khan, and the Jamiat-ul-Islam Pakistan of Maulana Fazlur Rahman It is understood that this matter of leakages of information was raised by President George Bush with Gilani when the latter visited Washington DC in the last week of July,2008.

Cheap mentality of indian writer. Logic note, try to come logically next time.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Members can read the entire transcript of Admiral Mullen's press briefing here:

DefenseLink News Transcript: DoD News Briefing with Adm. Mullen from the Pentagon

Overall, the impression seems to be that both sides feel a lot more comfortable with each other, though its not where they would like the relationship and cooperation to be.

Adm. Mullen seems to acknowledge that all sides must do more, and that Pakistan has been doing more (though reports of the GoP accepting a ceasefire from the Taliban are disappointing - though this decision could be linked to Ramazan coming up, and how that might have a huge negative impact from the refugee standpoint).