Wikileaks : Secret Afghanistan War logs

[EjazR]

gulfnews : US is no stranger to double-dealing

Following the revelation by WikiLeaks that there have been fresh allegations that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is secretly aiding the Taliban in Afghanistan, sections of the US media rushed to accuse Islamabad of supporting both sides of the decade-old conflict. A lengthy op-ed in the New York Times on Tuesday said that Pakistan had been involved in double-dealing for years. "Despite the billions of dollars the United States has sent in aid to Pakistan since September 11, [the revelation] offers powerful new evidence that crucial elements of Islamabad's power structure have been actively helping to direct and support the forces attacking the American-led military coalition", the New York Times said.

Critics of Pakistan tend to forget, however, that double-dealing is Washington's favourite foreign policy strategy. When weaker nations adopt the same method they are merely following in the footsteps of the master. Furthermore, if the ISI maintains strong ties with the Taliban, the US was the main sponsor and supporter of both the ISI and the Taliban.

In fact, since the early years of the Cold War, the US regarded Islam as a key foreign policy tool to achieve its strategic objectives in the Gulf and the Middle East. Washington believed that the best way to contain the Soviet Union in this region was by establishing a green belt that stretched from Pakistan in the east to Egypt in the west. Mohammad Hassanein Heikal, a well-known Egyptian commentator, claimed that this plan was revealed to him by General Alfred Armistead, who was in charge of US military aid to Third World countries. Heikal also claimed that this same point was mentioned again when he met former US secretary of state John Foster Dulles. Dulles told Heikal, "Your region was floating on two seas: oil and religion". During this period, the US relied on the support of what it considered moderate Islamic governments. These included Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Morocco, Indonesia, Turkey and Iran.

In 1979, with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the US was no longer in a position to rely solely on moderate Islamic governments to protect its interests in the region. It hence established a ‘Rapid Deployment Task Force' intended to intervene at short notice in the event of further Soviet advancement towards the Gulf. It also had other aims in mind.

In an interview with the French magazine Le Nouvel Observateur, former US national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski admitted that the US plan in Afghanistan was to force the Soviet Union to invade the country. By supporting Islamic elements against the Marxist regime in Kabul, the US intended to destabilise the predominantly Muslim parts of Soviet Central Asia and drag Moscow into the Afghan quicksand where a war of attrition could be started. Hence, Brzezinski devised a strategy that envisaged establishing an Islamic alliance against the Soviet invasion. Brzezinski believed that because of the ideological antipathy between Islam and Communism, Islamic states would serve as a bulwark against the Soviets. Subsequently, he flew to Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to sell the US plan. Brzezinski's tour was highly successful. Saudi Arabia agreed to provide financial support, Egypt weapons and Pakistan training and logistics. The Soviet Union was duly defeated in Afghanistan and ultimately collapsed.

Serious allegations

After the end of the Cold War, political Islam fell from grace. After 9/11 in particular, the US started accusing Saudi Arabia and Pakistan of creating a "monster". In a report on the September 11, 2001 attacks released after months of investigation by a joint panel of the US House and Senate intelligence committees, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were accused of having funnelled hundreds of millions of dollars to charitable groups and other organisations that were suspected of assisting the September 11 hijackers.

The Bush administration made most of the 900-page report public but, for "national security reasons", decided to classify 28 pages. The declassified part focused on the role played by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in financing and training Islamic activists in the 1980s and 1990s. In Afghanistan and Bosnia, the report accused Riyadh and Islamabad of supporting Arab Mujahideen fighting Soviet and Serb forces. Yet, the report failed to mention that successive Republican and Democratic administrations had also provided financial and logistical support for the Afghan Mujahideen and that the CIA had led a coordinated effort to expel the Soviet forces from Afghanistan. The report also ignored the fact that covert support for the Mujahideen received bipartisan backing in the 1980s and that under the Reagan administration Washington provided Islamic fighters with some of the most sophisticated weapons in its arsenal, including the Stinger anti-aircraft missile. As for Bosnia, the report failed to acknowledge that the Clinton administration had urged Saudi Arabia to pay for Iranian-made arms shipped to Bosnian Muslims through Turkey and that Arab Mujahideen were parachuted over Bosnia by US airplanes.

But apparently, all this does not amount to double-dealing in the eyes of some Americans.

Dr Marwan Al Kabalan is a lecturer in media and international relations at Damascus University's Faculty of Political Science and Media in Syria.

 

[muse]

Friends:

Below is an interview that teh CIA organ radio Liberty conducted with the founder of Wikileaks -- you are invited to critically review the interview - You will note that the in print, the interview does not deal with the atrocities committed by US and NATO, rather the interview begins with the reaction to the leaks in Pakistan - readers will also note the extent to which the interviewer develops the credibility of Wikileaks -- :

Interview: WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange

The Australian founder of the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, on July 26.
July 27, 2010
Julian Assange, the founder of the whistle-blower website WikiLeaks, says his work is based on the "ancient vision" of uncovering the truth. And he says sources would rather turn over their information to him than to traditional news outlets because he can protect them better. Assange spoke with RFE/RL's Ron Synovitz and Christopher Schwartz on July 27 by phone from London.

RFE/RL: What is your response to those in Pakistan who doubt the veracity of WikiLeaks' "Afghan War Diary?" In particular, Hamid Gul, the former chief of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency, has said he thinks the reports are fabrications.


Julian Assange: We need to look at these reports in a subtle way. A lot of material is included there. There are 91,000 reports from units in the field, from embassies in relation to Afghanistan, intelligence officers, and from informers. The informers make their reports for money. They are paid by the United States government for making serious allegations. They make reports to knock out a competitor -- a detested neighbor or family enemy -- and they make reports for legitimate reasons.


In looking at the ISI material by informers, we see that the U.S. military puts a sort of label on each informer as to how reliable they believe they are. If we just look [at these], we do see an extensive number of reports about the ISI. Now, any one of them may be incorrect, any two of them may be correct. It's really in the such large numbers and figures involving so many different circumstances and/or involving the ISI that we start to become very suspicious of the ISI [in Afghanistan].


RFE/RL: There's a rumor circulating in Pakistan -- one that's being encouraged by some Pakistani officials -- that this leak was actually orchestrated by the U.S. government to justify an increased military presence in, or even invasion of, Pakistan.


Assange: Well, it's simply not true, and people can read the individual reports and individual details and make connections about each one of those circumstances. Though we had a previous rumor that we were the CIA, [WikiLeaks] has put out information from the main manuals of Guantanamo Bay, [former U.S. vice-presidential candidate] Sarah Palin's e-mails, secret Chinese censorship briefs, official assassinations in Kenya and East Timor. It is clear that we are strictly impartial and we do take all comers from across the world who have material that is difficult for them to get out to the public.


RFE/RL: A lot of comparisons are being made between Wikileaks' "Afghan War Diary" and Daniel Ellsberg's leaking in 1971 of the U.S. Department of Defense's classified report on the Vietnam War, known as the "Pentagon Papers." Do you see a parallel?



Assange: We have great respect for Dan Ellsberg and the work that he has done and continues to do in promoting the importance of whistle-blowers and their role in society. As a comparison, this has been -- this is the Pentagon Papers -- it was the nearest analogy to what we were doing. and Dan Ellsberg says that he sees this being in the same way.


RFE/RL: Have you or WikiLeaks received any threats of violence or legal action, as Ellsberg did?


Assange: In relation to this particular event, we have received no court order or legal action, and as far as I'm aware, none of our legal partners have either.


You know, as a serious organization we sometimes take serious threats. In relation to this issue, there has been no physical threats. Now, there has been spying, some disturbing sounds coming out of the U.S. administration about a month ago in private. Those seem to have stopped, although it is too early to see what the reaction will be in relation to this publication.


RFE/RL: Why did you select "The New York Times," "The Guardian," and "Der Spiegel" as the media outlets to share the leak with?


Assange: We make a promise to our sources: one, that we will do everything in our power technically and legally to protect them; two, that we are going to maximize the impact of the submissions that they make to us, and we believe in this case that that was the way to maximize the impact.


RFE/RL: Why do you think so many important sources have chosen to give their information to WikiLeaks instead of traditional media outlets?

Assange: Because we are specialists. We specialize in protecting sources. We specialize in getting the full material out to the public. Now, mainstream media, through internal concentrations in countries where there's really only sort of one or two dominant media organizations in a town, has had a sort of perverse effect where sources are treated as something to be kept at bay rather than something to treasure. That has resulted in organizations such as "The [New York] Times" sitting on significant disclosures for a year, not releasing them, or only picking a few cherries from a whistle-blower's disclosure, instead of all the material that they submit in their documents.


Sources understand that we are the most reliable, from a safety point of view and from a publishing point of view, organization to deal with.


RFE/RL: How do you see WikiLeaks -- is it journalism, activism, or some new kind of intermediary between sources and journalists?


Assange: The vision behind it is really quite ancient: in order to make any sensible decision you need to know what's really going on, and in order to make any just decision you need to know and understand what abuses or plans for abuses are occurring. As technologists, we can see that big reforms come when the public and decision makers can see what's really going on.

 

[Solomon2]

America is furious about WikiLeaks’ revelations on the war in Afghanistan. But Pakistan also has much to worry about

GENERAL ASHFAQ KAYANI’S moment of pleasure was fleeting. Last week the Pakistani government granted him a second three-year term as army chief—something that no elected government in Pakistan had done before. But within days, thanks to a treasure-trove of 75,000 leaked American military reports, the Pakistani army was once again in the international spotlight for its suspected role in helping the Taliban in Afghanistan.

The files released by WikiLeaks, a whistle-blowing website, are mostly sparse field reports and intelligence assessments from 2004 to 2009. They detail the grim reality of the war: the hunt to kill insurgent leaders, the death of Afghan civilians by error or callousness, bomb and shooting attacks by insurgents, the unreliability of Afghan forces, the corruption of political leaders and much more.

At least 180 of the files contain accusations that Pakistan’s military intelligence service, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), had given arms, supplies and training to the insurgents. One reports that the ISI handed 1,000 motorcycles to the Haqqani network, thought responsible for most suicide bombings and spectacular attacks in Kabul. Another claims that insurgents were plotting to poison beer supplies for American forces.

Many of these reports may be unsubstantiated, originating from dubious Afghan informants. But the trouble for General Kayani, these days America’s favourite Pakistani general, is that he led the ISI from 2004 to 2007, before becoming army chief. America has denounced the leak as endangering soldiers’ lives, but played down the revelations. The White House said “there is no blank cheque” for Pakistan. But the cheque is nonetheless large. Washington has announced $500m of civilian-aid projects for Pakistan, part of a $7.5 billion, five-year package. Pakistan will also get about $2 billion a year in American military aid.

America is in a bind. It relies on Pakistan to help in the hunt for al-Qaeda figures in its tribal areas, and it in turn helps Pakistan fight its version of the Taliban. Yet America can do little to convince Pakistan to act against the Afghan Taliban. America’s policy is to embrace Pakistan, in the hope that the alliance will assuage its fears about India’s Afghan ambitions and convince it to “let go of the proxies”, as one senior American source says.

The chairman of America’s joint chiefs of staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, has invested heavily in his friendship with General Kayani, and accepts that the Pakistani army is stretched after operations against the Pakistani Taliban in the Swat valley and South Waziristan. The American source says: “Kayani has done everything he has promised to do, and he has not missed the deadlines by much.”

The Pentagon is thought to have lobbied Islamabad to renew General Kayani’s tenure. In most countries the extension would not be big news. In Pakistan, however, the prime minister made a sudden late-night address to announce that General Kayani would stay on because “military operations are at a critical stage” which required “continuation in military high command”.

Pakistan has spent most of its 63-year history under military rule—General Pervez Musharraf quit only in 2008. The army remains the country’s dominant force, and many believe General Kayani’s extension is a blow to a fragile democracy. “This strengthens the institution that should be subservient to civilian authority,” says Imtiaz Gul, an analyst and author of “The Most Dangerous Place”, a book about Pakistan’s tribal areas.

The laconic General Kayani has mostly kept out of domestic politics, but he has left no doubt who is in charge. The armed forces have kept a tight grip on two crucial areas: security policy and the sensitive bits of foreign policy, which means relations with Afghanistan, America and India. Extending the general’s term will entrench his position.

Despite its robust action against the Pakistani Taliban, there is scant evidence that the Pakistani army has fundamentally changed its policy towards Afghan insurgents. Most believe that it has little reason now to turn on the Taliban and the Haqqani networks, given that the Afghan war seems to be reaching an end-game which could give the insurgents some measure of power. And many ordinary Pakistanis much prefer the Taliban to Westerners. A survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project this week suggested that 65% of Pakistanis want American and NATO soldiers out of Afghanistan, and just 25% think it would be bad if the Taliban took over in Kabul.

President Hamid Karzai has moved closer to the idea of accommodating the Taliban. Some Pakistanis believe Washington will be willing to concede at least some of Pakistan’s aim to give the Taliban political representation within a broad-based government, in return for an end to the fighting. The senior American source, however, says: “Pakistan is not going to broker this deal. It has a view. It will have to be included. But we are not going to let Kayani drive this outcome.”

Pakistan contends that it can get the Taliban and the Haqqani network to join talks. It aims to promote groups that will ensure Afghanistan is friendly to Pakistan, and that Indian influence is kept at bay. Might General Kayani thus become a power behind the throne in Afghanistan too? The WikiLeaks disclosures, alleging Pakistani double-dealing, will not serve such dreams. This week David Cameron, the British prime minister, who was visiting India in an effort to improve relations, warned Pakistan that it could not look “both ways”, being a friend of the West yet “exporting terrorism”.

link

 

[Usama86]

The problem with western media is that they think that NATO forces are fighting the Taliban, i cannot understand that why they don't see that the Afghan people don't want NATO forces in their country and its a Afghan resistance that has build up against them and not just Taliban. It is not in Pakistani interest to help the west against these people and create a hostile neighbour after NATO departs.

 

[amit27]

The problem with western media is that they think that NATO forces are fighting the Taliban, i cannot understand that why they don't see that the Afghan people don't want NATO forces in their country and its a Afghan resistance that has build up against them and not just Taliban. It is not in Pakistani interest to help the west against these people and create a hostile neighbour after NATO departs.

All surveys have shown that afgani people want NATO to stay and not to go back to the taliban rule b4 9/11

 

[NWO]

Here's the former co-founder of Wikileaks saying that WikiLeaks is unreliable: Video - Breaking News Videos from CNN.com

 

[moha199]

there you go listen to him THE FOUNDER OF WIKILEAKS for some members who ask the source all the times hahah this guy himself is saying the intel was wrong and at times was falsely created for political gain! Islamabad Tonight | Nadeem Malik - July 29 2010 Talk Show @ Pakistan Herald

 

[Devil Soul]

WikiLeaks ‘Leaker’ Moved From Kuwait
WASHINGTON, July 30, (AFP): Under tight guard, a US soldier suspected of being at the center of a massive intelligence leak has been transferred from Kuwait to a cell at the Quantico Marine base to face tough questioning.

The Pentagon said 22-year-old Private First Class Bradley Manning arrived at the Virginia base Thursday night, after being transferred from Camp Arifjan, Kuwait.
Manning already faces four charges related to allegations he gave whistleblowers’ website WikiLeaks classified video showing a July 2007 US Apache helicopter strike in Baghdad that killed several people.
He is now also suspected of possible involvement in the bombshell leak to the same website of tens of thousands of classified documents related to the war in Afghanistan.
The Pentagon and the FBI have launched an investigation into the case, while US leaders and Afghan President Hamid Karzai have condemned the leak, citing fears that Afghan informants named in some of the documents could now be at risk.

Top military officer Admiral Mike Mullen on Thursday expressed outrage over the leak, saying the founder of the WikiLeaks website, Julian Assange, may have blood on his hands.
“Mr Assange can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing, but the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family,” he said.

Assange defended the release of the files in a statement broadcast on CNN Friday, and criticized Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates for condemning the document releases.
“This behavior is unacceptable. We will not be suppressed. We will continue to release this,” he said.
US officials have also said they fear the leaks could compromise their ability to collect intelligence in Afghanistan if informants believe their identities could eventually become public.
The controversial founder of the website has said he hoped the Afghanistan documents would spark debate about the war and that his site had checked for named informants before distributing the papers.
Assange has called Manning a “political prisoner” and alleged the United States kept him in detention in Kuwait to render him “incommunicado.”
The graphic video of the helicopter attack was posted on the Internet by WikiLeaks in April this year, prompting an international outcry and renewed demands for compensation from the victims’ families.

 

[mjnaushad]

If people here believe WIki leak then they should also believe that US is killing civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan.....And is doing war crimes....

But no one one will agree to that....

 

[mjnaushad]

All surveys have shown that afgani people want NATO to stay and not to go back to the taliban rule b4 9/11

Those surveys which happend in Karzais house......

 

[fawwaxs]

US worried more secret documents may be released

WASHINGTON: US officials are worried about what other secret US documents the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks may possess and have tried to contact the group without success to avoid their release, the State Department said on Friday.

The shadowy group publicly released more than 90,000 US Afghan war records spanning a six-year period on Sunday. The group also is thought to be in possession of tens of thousands of US diplomatic cables passed to it by an Army intelligence analyst, media reports have said.

“Do we have concerns about what might be out there? Yes, we do,” State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told a briefing, adding that US authorities have not specifically determined which documents may have been leaked to the organization.

He said the State Department could not confirm the longstanding reports that WikiLeaks is in possession of a large set of US diplomatic cables.

But the fact that the documents released on Sunday contained a handful of State Department cables suggests that other secret diplomatic messages may have been included in data transmitted to WikiLeaks, Crowley said.

“When we provide our analysis of situations in key countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan, we distribute these across the other agencies including to military addresses,” Crowley said. “So is the potential there that State Department documents have been compromised? Yes.”

Both Crowley and White House spokesman Robert Gibbs urged WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange, not to release further classified US government documents.

Gibbs, noting WikiLeaks claims to have at least 15,000 more secret Afghan documents, told NBC’s “Today” show there was little the government could do halt the release of the papers.

“We can do nothing but implore the person who has those classified top secret documents not to post any more,” Gibbs said. “I think it’s important that no more damage be done to our national security.”

“Blood On Their Hands”

Both Crowley and Gibbs expressed concern that the document dump might expose US intelligence-gathering methods and place in jeopardy people who had assisted the United States.

“You have Taliban spokesmen in the region today saying they’re combing through those documents to find people that are cooperating with American and international forces. They’re looking through those for names. They said they know how to punish those people,” Gibbs said.

Assange told the BBC World Service in an interview that Wikileaks had held back the remaining 15,000 papers to protect innocent people from harm, and was reviewing them at the rate of about 1,000 a day. He did not say if and when they would be published.

Assange hit back at comments from Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on Thursday, that Wikileaks “might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family.”

He accused Defense Secretary Robert Gates of attacking Wikileaks to “distract attention from the daily deaths of civilians and others in Afghanistan.”

“There is real blood in Afghanistan, and it has come about as a result of the policies of Mr Gates and the Obama administration and the general conflict in the region,” Assange said.

Crowley said the US government had tried to make contact with WikiLeaks but had not been successful in establishing a line of communication.

“We have passed messages to them,” he said. “I am not aware of any direct dialogue with WikiLeaks.”

Assange said Wikileaks had used the New York Times as an intermediary to request White House assistance in vetting the document trove prior to publication, but did not receive a response.

Crowley said: “Intelligence services all over the world will be looking over them and seeing what they can glean in terms of how we gain information.”

He added: “Behind these documents is a very important intelligence system that is vital to our national security and we are concerned ... that if WikiLeaks continues on its current path this will do damage to our national security.”

Gates and Mullen both said on Thursday the document leak had undermined trust in the United States.

Senator Carl Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, sent a letter asking Gates for an assessment of how badly the military’s sources and methods of gathering intelligence had been hurt.

“I am concerned about the nature and extent of the damage caused by the release of these documents,” he wrote in the July 28 letter, which was released by his office on Friday.

The Army investigation into the release of the documents is focusing on Army specialist Bradley Manning, who was already charged this month with leaking information previously published by WikiLeaks, US defense officials say.

Manning, who was moved from a detention facility in Kuwait to one at Quantico Marine Base in Virginia on Thursday ahead of his trial, is charged with leaking a classified video showing a 2007 helicopter attack that killed dozens. –Reuters

 

[Agnostic_Indian]

Mate, I am afraid to say this but you're choosing to keep your head buried in the sand despite the same thing being repeated again and again.

1)
The Intelligence in the report comes from Afghan intelligence. It is heavily influenced by the indians.

A lot of it is hearsey, i.e. this person told me that another person told that person that another person told that person that.. etc.

It is raw and unverified.

Most of all, intelligence reports by themselves is not proof.

2)

Your argument is that you're not the only one saying it. Implicitly, you're implying that since many people are saying the same thing, it is true. Now here's something I recommend you to check out: Argumentum ad populum - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

On top of that, the people who are saying your tone have interests in this. It suits their interests to blame Pakistan.

Note that neither you, nor them, have provided any proof.

They still have to provide proof to prove that Pakistan is doing what they say Pakistan is doing. Merely some westerners and Indians believing something to be true does not make it to be true nor will it be taken seriously by us if you don't show any proof.

3)

As far as Zardari is concerned. He is speaking about the past. I would like to talk more on his credibility but the fact that he's talking about the past should be enough.

Sorry for the late reply but I don’t think I am the one who got the head buried under the sand.

Some of the intelligence report may have come from Indian and afghan informers but not all of them.

I don’t argue that every body says that so it is true ‘what I say is every source confirm or indicate the same thing so it is more likely to be true.

Increased number of authorities with similar information increases the chances of it being true than false.

Neutrality of the authority also increases the chance. (US, UK, and Pakistan presidents)

Now the world doesn’t need to convince Pakistan that it plays double game. It is now Pakistan’s responsibility to prove that they are not. Look at UN’s position on Iran’s nuclear program. BANKI MOON said ‘I said clearly and directly that the burden of proof is on Iran to demonstrate that its nuclear program is for peaceful purpose ‘same can be applied to Pakistan. Even Pakistan’s new terror bill puts the burden of proof on accused.

Look at the amount of evidence against Pakistan. NATO chief’s revelation’s, CIA intelligence reports, headly’s revelations, kasab’s revelations, zardari’s and musharaf’s admissions about terror links of Pakistan, wikileaks. Those are elite people or agencies engaged in terror operations or captured terrorists and are in best position to know what they speak or make a claim. They are the authority.

It can be easily observed from all the revelation’s that in fact Pakistan is somehow involved in a double game and this opinion is likely to get some “ some ground for bias “ against Pakistan and it’s mere denial without any supporting information.


When several sources make same revelations (not just hear say or belief) Pakistan is the one who needs to convince the world that they are not supporting terrorists any more.

 

[Irfan Baloch]

When several sources make same revelations (not just hear say or belief) Pakistan is the one who needs to convince the world that they are not supporting terrorists any more.

naaa my simpleton friend Pakistan doesnt need to convince anyone

your so called "world" is the corrupted & failed Northern alliance on Afghanistan & your government
the current operations against the taliban are a proof enough
just because there are 100 people lying about something doesnt make it a truth
what is beyond doubt & proven is the deliberate & repeated killings of civilians & captives at the hands of Allied forces
the drug trade & corruption of Northern alliance leaders
& confused & paranoid Indian leadership who wont spare a chance to dish dirt at Pakistan

so there is nothing to convince my dearest
I assure you neither the army nor the foreign office of Pakistan will spend time or energy on trying to convince openly hostile people

what does matter is what the American General running the Operation in Afghanistan has to say
he has only praise for Pakistan Army & General Kayani & to add sault to your wounds he even calls him his friend

so dream on I cant care less what Zee tv or Fox news has to say or what the drug trafficking & corrupt Afghan officials have to say

 

[sparklingway]

Remember that Hanif takes very anti-establishment stances in his op-eds. Today, the mood is different.

In Pakistan, Echoes of American Betrayal​

By MOHAMMED HANIF
Published: July 31, 2010

PAKISTAN’S premier intelligence agency, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, has been accused of many bad things in its own country. It has been held responsible for rigging elections, sponsoring violent sectarian groups and running torture chambers for political dissidents. More recently, it has been accused of abducting Pakistanis and handing them over to the United States for cash.

But last week — after thousands of classified United States Army documents were released by WikiLeaks, and American and British officials and pundits accused the ISI of double-dealing in Afghanistan — the Pakistani news media were very vocal in their defense of their spies. On talk show after talk show, the ISI’s accusers in the West were criticized for short-sightedness and shifting the blame to Pakistan for their doomed campaign in Afghanistan.

Suddenly, the distinction between the state and the state within the state was blurred. It is our ISI that is being accused, we felt. How, we wondered, can the Americans have fallen for raw intelligence provided by paid informants and, in many cases, Afghan intelligence? And why shouldn’t Pakistan, asked the pundits, keep its options open for a post-American Afghanistan?

More generally, the WikiLeaks fallout brought back ugly memories, reminding Pakistanis what happens whenever we get involved with the Americans. In fact, one person at the center of the document dump is our primary object lesson for staying away from America’s foreign adventures.

Hamid Gul, now a retired general, led the ISI during the end years of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and together with his C.I.A. friends unwittingly in the 1990s spurred the mujahedeen to turn Kabul — the city they had set out to liberate — into rubble. According to the newly released documents, Mr. Gul met with Qaeda operatives in Pakistan in 2006 and told them to “make the snow warm in Kabul ... set Kabul aflame.”

This would seem highly sinister except that, today, Hamid Gul is nothing more than a glorified television evangelist and, as the columnist Nadir Hassan noted, “known only for being on half a dozen talk shows simultaneously.” He is also, for Pakistanis, a throwback to the lost years of our American-backed military dictatorships, a stark reminder of why we distrust the United States.

The ISI and the C.I.A. have colluded twice in the destruction of Afghanistan. Their complicity has brought war to Pakistan’s cities. After every round of cloak-and-dagger games, they behave like a squabbling couple who keep getting back together and telling the world that they are doing it for the children’s sake. But whenever these two reunite, a lot of children’s lives are wrecked.

In the West, the ISI is often described as ideologically allied to the Taliban. But Pakistan’s military-security establishment has only one ideology, and it’s not Islamism. It’s spelled I-N-D-I-A. It will do anybody’s bidding if it’s occasionally allowed to show India a bit of muscle.

Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the Pakistani Army chief, has just been given an unexpected three-year extension in his office, due in large part, it is said, to American pressure on Islamabad. Yet General Kayani headed the ISI during the period that the WikiLeaks documents cover. Since he became the head of the Pakistan Army — and a frequent host to Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — the number of drone attacks on Pakistani territory have increased substantially. It seems he has found a way to overcome his ISI past.

While he generally keeps a low profile, General Kayani in February gave an off-the-record presentation to Pakistani journalists. His point was clear: Pakistan’s military remains India-centric. His explanation was simple: we go by the enemy’s capacity, not its immediate intentions. This came in a year when Pakistan lost more civilians and soldiers than it has in any war with India.

Yet it has become very clear that an overwhelming majority of Pakistani people do not share the army’s India obsession or its yearning for “strategic depth” — that is, a continuing deadly muddle — in Afghanistan. They want a peaceful settlement with India over the disputed territory of Kashmir and a safer neighborhood. None of the leading parties in Parliament made a big deal about India, Afghanistan or jihad in their election campaigns. They were elected on promises of justice, transparency and reasonably priced electricity.

Lately, Americans seem to have woken up to the fact that there is something called a Parliament and a civil society in Pakistan. But even so, it seems that Americans are courting the same ruling class — the military elite’s civilian cousins — that has thrived on American aid and obviously wants an even closer relationship with Washington. A popular TV presenter who interviewed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her visit later jibed, “What kind of close relationship is this? I don’t even get invited to Chelsea’s wedding?”

Pakistan’s military and civil elite should take a good look around before they pitch another marquee and invite their American friends over for tea and war talk. There are a lot of hungry people looking in, and the strung lights are sucking up electricity that could run a small factory, or illuminate a village. Besides, they’re not likely to know what WikiLeaks is — they’ve been too busy cleaning up after their masters’ guests.

Mohammed Hanif, a correspondent for the BBC Urdu Service, is the author of the novel “A Case of Exploding Mangoes.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/opinion/01hanif.html

 

[Agnostic_Indian]

naaa my simpleton friend Pakistan doesnt need to convince anyone

your so called "wold" is the curropted & failed Nothern alliance on Afghanistan & your goverment
the current operations agains the taliban are a proof enough
just because there are 100 people lying about something doesnt make it a truth
what is beyond doubt & proven is the delibrate & repeated killings of cilvilans & captives at the hands of Allied forces
the drug trade & currpotion of Nothren alliance leaders
& confused & paranoid Indian leadership who wont spare a chance to dish dirt at Pakistan

so there is nothing to convince my dearest
I assure you neither the army nor the foreign office of Pakistan will spend time or energy on trying to convince openly hostile people

what does matter is what the American Genreral running the Operation in Afghanistan has to say
he has only praise for Pakistan Amry & General Kayani & to add sault to your wounds he even calls him his friend

so dream on I cant care less what Zee tv or Fox news has to say or what the drug trafficing & curropt Afghan officials have to say

it's no wonder that you like the US general and call all others as corrupted and liars only because what the larger majority reveals will not fit your arguements. And spending time and energy to convice the world is a must for pakistan or else they will be alone in the world with only one frined.And it is to be seen how far will china go to support pakistan. When chinese will get a taste of those terrorists they will also back off i guess.