Close to home in Pakistan

By Philip Mudd, May 7, 2010 Friday, May 7, 2010 - 9:44 AM Share

Years of working the al Qaeda problem in cities and tribal areas have taken their toll on Pakistani security services. Hundreds of Pakistani security personnel have been killed in recent years. Pakistan has now been involved in fighting militancy in a civil war for more than twice as long as the American civil war. It is difficult to fight and kill your own countrymen for that length of time. But this weekend's events in Times Square, if they lead to an actual link with the Pakistani Taliban, will lead to continuing questions about how we pursue not only the classic al Qaeda target -- typically Arabs and Central Asians who live in the tribal areas and are hosted by local tribal militants -- but also how we press forward a painful dialogue in Islamabad about groups that have been more closely associated with Pakistani security services. In the past year, we witnessed the arrest of a Chicago man linked to the Pakistan-based group Lashkar-e-Taiba and connected to the 2008 massacre in Mumbai. And now we have a man potentially connected with Taliban militants, who have a long history of relations with Pakistani services, dating back to the Afghan fight against the Soviets, who may also be linked with Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Jaish-e-Mohammed. Pakistan has lost a lot in this campaign, which we should respect. But Pakistan must now work with us to tackle groups that are closer to home, which once were proxies in the fight between India and Pakistan but who are now expanding their targeting horizons to include the United States. The stakes are growing.

Philip Mudd is a senior research fellow with the Counterterrorism Strategy Initiative at the New America Foundation and former deputy director of the CIA's Counterterrorist Center and the FBI's national security branch.

EXPLORE:AFPAK, AFPAK CHANNEL, PAKISTAN, TALIBAN, TERRORISM

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LAL QILA

3:23 PM ET

May 7, 2010

Philip Mudd, can you get India out of Kashmir?

Philip Mudd, can you get India out of Kashmir first; if so all can be solved; and there will be peace on Earth.

Till then, we have a difficult road ahead.

LAL QILA

9:32 PM ET

May 8, 2010

The language of Zionism now being applies by Hindoo Indians

“Colonialism is peace; anti-colonialism is war.” – The language of Zionism

Source: http://lalqila.wordpress.com/2010/05/08/colonialism-is-peace-anti-colonialism-is-war-the-language-of-zionism/

SURESH SHETH

4:18 PM ET

May 7, 2010

Pakistan was, is & always will be terror center of the world

The whitewash about the real culprits behind continuing terror threat from Pakistan in Western foreign policy establishment and news media continues.

Pakistani governments have been given an intentional free pass for their role in creating this global menace.

Nobody forced Pakistani government to facilitate relocation of Osama bin Laden from Sudan to Afghanistan in 1996. Democratic government of Pakistan chose to do so of its own free will.

Ex-CIA official Bruce Riedel said in an interview on 1/29/2009 that ''In Pakistan, the jihadist Frankenstein monster that was created by the Pakistani army and the Pakistani intelligence service, is now increasingly turning on its creators. It's trying to take over the laboratory.'' Pakistani Army and Intelligence Service (ISI) chose to create this ‘jihadist Frankenstein monster’ with full blessings and financing by Pakistan’s democratic governments in 1990s.

Sandy Berger, Bill Clinton’s national security advisor told 9/11 Commission in March, 2004 that ’Pakistani Army was the midwife of Taliban’.

Declassified DIA Washington D.C., "IIR (intelligence Information Report) Pakistan Involvement in Afghanistan," dated November 7, 1996 states how "Pakistan's ISI is heavily involved in Afghanistan," and also details different roles various ISI officers play in Afghanistan. Stating that Pakistan uses sizable numbers of its Pashtun-based Frontier Corps in Taliban-run operations in Afghanistan, the document clarifies that, "these Frontier Corps elements are utilized in command and control; training; and when necessary combat“.

Declassified U.S. Department of State, Cable "Pakistan Support for Taliban" from Islamabad dated Sept. 26, 2000 states that "while Pakistani support for the Taliban has been long-standing, the magnitude of recent support is unprecedented." In response Washington orders the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad to immediately confront Pakistani officials on the issue and to advise Islamabad that the U.S. has "seen reports that Pakistan is providing the Taliban with materiel, fuel, funding, technical assistance and military advisors. [The Department] also understand[s] that large numbers of Pakistani nationals have recently moved into Afghanistan to fight for the Taliban, apparently with the tacit acquiescence of the Pakistani government." Additional reports indicate that direct Pakistani involvement in Taliban military operations has increased.

For the American and other Western apologists who claim that ‘Pakistan is also the victim of terrorism’, following are some observations by UN report on Benazir Bhutto’s killing published on April 15, 2010:

- "The jihadi organizations are Sunni groups based largely in Punjab. Members of these groups aided the Taliban effort in Afghanistan at the behest of the ISI and later cultivated ties with Al-Qaida and Pakistani Taliban groups. A common characteristic of these jihadi groups was their adherence to the Deobandi Sunni sect of Islam, their strong anti-Shia bias, and their use by the Pakistani military and intelligence agencies in Afghanistan and Kashmir".

- "The PAKISTANI MILITARY ORGANIZED AND SUPPORTED THE TALIBAN TO TAKE CONTROL OF AFGHANISTAN IN 1996. These policies resulted in active linkages between elements of the military and the Establishment with radical Islamists, at the expense of national secular forces, and the entrenchment of religious extremist and other militant groups in the tribal areas and Punjab.

- “Elements within the Pakistani Establishment ……. retain links with radical Islamists, especially the militant jihadi and Taliban groups and are sympathetic to their cause or view them as strategic assets for asserting Pakistan’s role in the region. The ISI cultivated these relationships, initially in the context of the Cold War and the anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan in the 1980’s and later in support of Kashmiri insurgents. WHILE SEVERAL PAKISTANI CURRENT AND FORMER INTELLIGENCE OFFICIALS TOLD THE COMMISSION THAT THEIR AGENCIES NO LONGER HAD SUCH TIES IN 2007, VIRTUALLY ALL INDEPENDENT ANALYSTS PROVIDED INFORMATION TO THE CONTRARY AND AFFIRMED THE ONGOING NATURE OF MANY SUCH LINKS."

LAL QILA

4:39 PM ET

May 7, 2010

SURESH SHETH - Still cutting the same article

SURESH SHETH - Still cutting the same article again and again; I think its the 200th time I am seeing it.

Are you incapable of writing anything new? Must be poor quality rote-memorisation Hindoo Indian education.

ASHOK2718

8:00 PM ET

May 7, 2010

Look who is talking

People who begin their Sentence with the word KASHMIR. I just want to know how you can say something so hypocritical without any shame ?

Yes we use rote memorisation to learn useful things like scientific facts unlike you muslims who recite useless verses all day long. What will you get out of them ?