Book claims drone attacks began after ISI-Taliban coordination confirmed

[qsaark]

Monday, February 16, 2009: Daily The News

Book claims drone attacks began after ISI-Taliban coordination confirmed

By Rauf Klasra

ISLAMABAD: A new book by a New York Times journalist has levelled serious allegations against Pakistan and its Army claiming the telephones of all senior officers, including the COAS General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani were bugged by Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and National Security Agency (NSA), the main eavesdropping US agencies around the world.

The book written by David E Sanger, which has hit the stands a few days back, claims that the American intelligence agencies were intercepting telephonic conversations of Army officers and the decision to attack Pakistan through drones was taken after one such high level conversation was intercepted claiming the Taliban as a “strategic asset” for Pakistan.

The book, titled “The Inheritance: The World Obama Confronts and the challenges to American power” claims the decision to invade Pakistani territories was taken after the CIA reached a conclusion that the ISI was absolutely in complete coordination with the Taliban.

The NSA intercepted messages indicating that ISI officers were helping the Taliban in planning a big bombing attack in Afghanistan although the target was unclear. After some days, the Kandahar Jail was attacked by the Taliban and hundreds of Taliban were freed, it says.

General Kayani would be the second army chief of Pakistan whose conversations have been bugged by the Americans, if the allegations in the book are true. Earlier the FBI had intercepted the telephone conversation between President Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto when Musharraf had threatened her that her safety within Pakistan depended upon her nature of relationship with him (Musharraf). The Indians had also recorded a telephone conversation between General Musharraf and General Aziz when Musharraf was in Beijing during the Kargil war days.

The author who seemed to have been given direct access to the secret record of several meetings held at the White House before George Bush left the presidency on January 20, has made several revelations in his book.

The book has also disclosed that NSA was already picking up interceptions, as the units of Pakistan army were getting ready to hit a school in the tribal areas. Someone was giving advance warning of what was coming. The book said they must have dialed 1-800-HAQQANI, said one person who was familiar with the intercepted conversation.

According to another para, the account of the warning sent to the school was almost comical. “It was something like that “Hey, we are going to hit your place in a few days, so if anyone important is there, you might want to tell them to scream”.

The book also establishes that the Americans were in full knowledge of the facts on the ground and they started attacking territories inside Pakistan as they thought the Pakistan army and intelligence agencies were no more interested in fighting the Taliban.

In chapter 8 of the book on Pakistan “Crossing the Line”, the author has also revealed that how an angry two star army officer of Pakistan army had actually unfolded the whole secret plan of Pakistan army deliberately before a US spy master McConell.

The book said, the US intelligence agencies knew very well that Musharraf was playing a double game with them as on the one hand he was assuring the Americans that only he could fight against the Taliban and on the other, he was backing the militancy and the militants. “Musharraf’s record of duplicity was well known.

The author has written this chapter on Pakistan on basis of some secret trips of America’s twwo top spy chiefs-McConnel an Haden-nicknamed as “two Mikes” who had held several meetings with the top military army officers including General Pervez Musharraf.

The author records that in late May 2008, McConnel made a secret trip to Pakistan, his fourth or fifth since becoming the director of national intelligence, trips that seemed to blur together in his head.

But this one was dramatically different from the rest- and ended up driving the push in the last days of the Bush administration to greatly step up covert action across the border into Pakistan.

The book says, packing quickly through his usual rounds of meetings with Musharraf and a raft of intelligence officials in Islamabad, McConnel and his small entourage found themselves in a conference room with several military officers, including a two star Pakistan general.

No officer was talking to other participants in the meeting as if the American intelligence chief, the visiting dignitary for the day, wasn’t in the room. Not surprisingly, he was being pressed about Pakistan strategy in the tribal areas, and he was “reluctant to start” one of the participants in the conversation recalled.

“But once he got into it, he could not contain himself”. The two-star general began making the case that the real problem was the tribal areas and in Afghanistan was not al-Qaeda or the Taliban, or even the militants who were trying to topple the Pakistani government. The real problem was Pakistan’s rival of more than sixty years which he said was secretly manipulating events in an effort to crush Pakistan and undo the 1947 partition that sought to separate the Islamic and Hindu states.

“The overwhelming enemy is India”, the Pakistani officer told the General. “We have to watch them at every moment. We have had wars with India, he said as everyone in the room needed reminding.”

The Pakistani two-star general described President Karzai’s cozy relationship with India, seeking investment and aid. With alarm, he talked about how the Indians were opening consulates around the country and building roads. What the rest of the world saw as a desperately needed nation-building programme, Pakistan saw as a threat. He was not alone in that view, conspiracy theories about Indian activities in Afghanistan are a daily staple in the Pakistani media.

As the officer talked, he became more and more animated. The Indians will surround us and annihilate us, he said, knowing McConnel was hearing every word. “And the Indians in their surrounding strategy, have gone to Afghanistan.” Those newly built roads were future invasion routes, he seemed to suggest, without quite saying so.

The consulates were dens of Indian spies. The real purpose of the humanitarian aid to Afghanistan was to run “operations out of Afghanistan to target Pakistan”.

The conspiracy theory deepened. “In the long run, America will not have the stomach to bear the burden of staying in Afghanistan,” the officer continued, still seeming to ignore the presence of the American intelligence chief. “And when the Americans pull out, India will reign. Therefore, the Pakistanis will have to sustain the contacts with the opposition to the Afghanistan government meaning the Taliban so when the Americans pull out, it’s a friendly government to Pakistan. “Therefore,” the officer concluded with a flourish, “we must support the Taliban”, two-star general announced in the meeting in the presence of US spymaster.

The last statement of the two star general stunned McConnel. For six years, the Americans had paid upward $10 billion to the Pakistan army to support its operations against al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Bush and his aides knew — though they never admitted that much of the money had been diverted to buying equipment for the Pakistan military to bulk up against the Indian. Now a Pakistani officer in his fury and frustration, was openly admitting that the Pakistani government had officially denied that it was playing both sides of the war—-the Americans side and Taliban side.

In return for the Americans billions, Pakistani forces or intelligence agencies operatives occasionally picked off a few al-Qaeda leaders (though even that had slowed to a trickle). But they were actively supporting the Taliban and even some militants in the tribal region. It was almost as if the American taxpayers were making monthly deposits in the Taliban bank accounts. Some in the Pentagon objected but were overruled.

None of this was really a surprise-except to the American people who were regularly told by President Bush that Pakistan and its leadership were a strong ally against terror. Even some of the Bush aides cringed when he uttered those words “it was like hearing him say, victory in Iraq”, one told me after leaving the muddled complexity of it all was some kind of admission of defeat.

Even some inside the While House, admitted to me (author) that “reimbursements” to the Pakistani military were just this side of fraud. They had been paid out when Musharraf had announced he was pulling back from tribal areas because of a “truce” with the tribal leaders. When Congress threatened to link the reimbursement to the Pakistan military performance, one American general summarized this reaction this way: “It’s about goddamn time”.

Bush knew the truth. Intelligence reports written over the past five years have all documented the ISI support for Taliban-something Bush had admitted to me (author) and other reporters. He knew of course that even Musharraf had little interest in sending his army into tribal areas. Every military professional who returned from Islamabad came back with the same report. Seven years after 9/11, 80 per cent of Pakistan military was arrayed against India.

McConnel himself returning from one of his trips noted that there is only one army that has more artillery tubes per unit, everything from old cannons to rocket launchers and mortars. It’s North Koreas’, he said. It was a telling statistic. Artillery tubes weigh tonnes and are useful only in holding back Indian hordes as they come across the plains. They are useless against terrorists enclaves.

Overhearing the two-star’s rant about India was not the only rude surprise McConnel experienced on this trip. He had brought with him the chart he used in the White House situation room tracking the number of attacks inside Pakistan over the past two and a half years.

One of the charts showed that about 13,000 Pakistanis had been killed in 2007 chiefly by suicide bombers, about double the numbers in 2006.

He told Musharraf and General Kayani, the former DG ISI, that the casualty numbers on the track to double again in 2008. Then he described the interviews that Osama Bin laden and his deputies had given, declaring their intention to topple the Pakistan government.

“You are aware of these casualty numbers and what Osama said of course”, McConnel asked. He got blank stares. They told him they had heard about Bin Laden statements.

“It was news”, McConnel reported to his colleagues later. “I talked to the highest level of the Pakistani government and it was news. They just were not tracking it”. It astounded him that the officials in Washington and at the American embassy in Islamabad might be keeping more careful tabs on the rising number of attacks than were Musahrraf or Pakistani crop of democratically elected leaders. Were they ignoring the obvious or were they just denying they knew about it, part of the deception within the deceptions as they supported both sides in the terror fight.

When McConnel returned to Washington in late 2008, he ordered up a full assessment so that he could match what he had heard from the single angry officer with the intelligence that had poured in over the years. His question was a basic one. Is there what McConnel called an officially sanctioned “dual policy” in Pakistan?” That was a polite way of asking whether the leadership of the country including Musahrraf had been playing both sides of the war all along.

It did not take long for McConnel’s staff to produce the answer. McConnel took the formal assessment to the White House, concluding that the Pakistani government regularly gave the Taliban and some of the militant groups “weapons and supporters to go into Afghanistan to attack Afghan and coalition forces”.

This was not news to many in the administration but McConnel wanted to have it down on paper. The assessment was circulated to the entire national security leadership and to Bush who was still giving public speeches praising Musharraf as a great ally.

“It was news to him,” said one of the officials who briefed Bush and watched his reaction to McConnel’s assessment. “And he always says the same thing, so what do you do about it?

By the summer, Bush answered his own question. For the first time in a presidency filled with secret unilateral actions, he authorized the American military to invade an ally-Pakistan.

Editor’s Note: The ISPR has been requested for a detailed response and whenever available it would be given equal and similar space.

 

[muse]

This should make interesting reading for those who want to make sovereignty arguments.


And then there is this:


Islamabad’s heavy cross
Ejaz Haider



United States Senator Dianne Feinstein, chairperson of the Senate Intelligence Committee, has added to Islamabad’s pain at a time when the government could do with a bit of reprieve.

The details are mostly known by now but just a quick recap.

During testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee by US Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, Feinstein reportedly expressed surprise over Islamabad’s protestations on Predator strikes, saying “As I understand it, these are flown out of a Pakistani base”.

Translated, it means she asked Blair why Islamabad was raging over these strikes when the government had allowed the stationing and operation of Predators from Pakistani territory.

Of course, her disclosure in the form of an “innocent” question did not help Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi who, on his part, was assuring us the same day that “Pakistan and the US are soon going to discuss a new strategy regarding drone attacks because these attacks are not acceptable to us”.

Blair, we are told, did not respond directly to the remark, but said that Pakistan is “sorting out” its cooperation with the United States. Some “sorting out” it is going to be. That’s for sure. TV channels have already pounced on the news and will, as is their wont, go over the top with “informed” analyses.

The CIA has officially declined to comment on Feinstein’s statement, which begs the question of why, if the senator was out of line, did the Agency not refute her. Former CIA officials, less squeamish for that reason, have, in the meantime, confirmed as correct Feinstein’s account.

Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University, says: “If accurate, what this says is that Pakistani involvement, or at least acquiescence, has been much more extensive than has previously been known.” Can’t quibble with that. Hoffman further said that “It puts the Pakistani government in a far more difficult position [in terms of] its credibility with its own people”. Islamabad would surely describe this as understatement of the year so far.

Defence Minister Ahmed Mukhtar has meanwhile managed a feeble “I do not know on what she based all this”. Well sir, she happens to sit atop the committee that is supposed to monitor such things and so it would be safe to assume that knowing this falls within her purview.

But precisely for that reason, one needs to ask the obvious question: why would she say what she said? If the policy is in place and if she knows about it, as she must, then she should also know why it is important for Islamabad to play the charade it is playing?

It defies credulity that while she knows the details about where the drones are flying from, she is in the dark about the overall game.

One is constrained to say that she knew what she was saying but said it because she was put up to it. The only other explanation, incredible, can be that she lost her head at that particular moment and made a Freudian slip.

Accepting the credible means her disclosure, cloaked in the form of surprise, was deliberate.

But why would the US want to spill the beans on this cooperation? Could it be that the new administration thinks the disconnect between the covert and the overt is increasing; that Pakistan cannot continue to cooperate on the sly, away from public glare, and then go around making enraged statements about these attacks?

Let us not forget that these attacks have been presented by the government as a major area of friction between the US and Pakistan.

Going by this logic, it may be that President Barack Obama wants to settle this issue by getting Pakistan to take the pain of this disclosure, grapple with its fallout, and shut up. This also means that the US has found its policy of drone attacks very useful and plans to continue with it.

There can be another reason too, and not exclusive of the first — i.e., the Obama administration thinks it better to get other actors to do what they must, and as the necessary price for the move away from Bush’s unilateralism to Obama’s multilateralism.

This is how Richard N Hass put it in an op-ed captioned The Obama Surprise (Daily Times, January 21):

“The rest of the world was often unhappy with George W Bush, for both the content and style of his foreign policy. Now others will find that the alternative to America going it alone or withdrawing from the global scene is real multilateralism, which requires their willingness and ability to commit resources to deal with pressing challenges. Obama is likely to be more diplomatic than his predecessor, but he is also likely to be more demanding.”

On the issue of drone strikes, I have previously written that I do not believe the government is not in on them. A case can also be made, as indeed I have tried to, that it is eminently sensible at the operational level to try and take out the Taliban-Al Qaeda leadership to demoralise the movement. And if it can be done from the air, given increasing precision-strikes capability, it is better and neater than using ground troops for raids and extraction operations (Ejaz Haider, “Droning about drones”, Daily Times, January 31).

In fact, this is the reason. Taking out the Taliban-Al Qaeda leadership neatly is as much in the interest of Pakistan as it is in the US interest.

Also, there is credible information that the US has not made these strikes unilaterally, though the fact that these UCAVs may be flying out of a Pakistani base does indeed come as a surprise; besides, it puts a whole new construct on the extent of cooperation.

I have also argued with responsible people within the government, questioning the policy of denial and describing it as “implausible deniability” (Ejaz Haider, Daily Times, November 21, 2008). The government’s view has been that it would be politically more costly and wrenching to own up to them. Hence the need to continue to cooperate covertly while protesting the strikes overtly.

As events have shown, the policy of denial was unsustainable in the longer run. These things cannot be kept secret for long and when information descends from the Western governments and/or the press, it becomes damning.

Feinstein’s statement has not only effectively buried the policy of denial, it has also left Islamabad to bear this cross. Given the credibility problem for this government, it is going to be a heavy one. Also, if this disclosure has been deliberate, someone in Washington didn’t think hard enough about its consequences.

The old policy was flawed; but having pursued it now for so long and written the story-board, to go for a disclosure at this stage is pure idiocy.

Punjabi has a saying for it: Naani nain khasam keeta burra keeta; kar kay chhadya, hore burra keeta (It was bad enough for granny to have married; but having done that to divorce the husband now is worse).

Ejaz Haider is Op-Ed Editor of Daily Times and Consulting Editor of The Friday Times. He can be reached at sapper@dailytimes.com.pk

 

[S-2]

Personally, I find the confluence of Feinstein's comments with Sanger's revelations to be the salient matters.

My conclusion from all this is that President Obama is well aware of the conclusions drawn by the Bush administration and the supporting intelligence. He may have access to new information but everything we read lately suggest that the Quetta shura, Haqqani, and Hekmatyar all remain "beyond reach".

Sanger's information is a damning indictment of your government's duplicity. I can think of only one mitigating factor- your transportation routes. Were it not for that need I don't know how my government could view your nation's actions as anything but war.

Not that war would be the immediate reaction but I rather doubt ROZs and aid bills, etc. would be high on the agenda either. It would be, sadly, a waste of money under the present circumstances.

Obama's delay until April of our policy commitment suggests big changes may be forthcoming. Maybe we already know why.

 

[qsaark]

Updated at: 2020 PST, Monday, February 16, 2009. Daily The News.

Armed forces being maligned under conspiracy: Musharraf

ISLAMABAD: Former president Pervez Musharraf Monday clarified that he never said that security of Ms. Benazir Bhutto was dependent on her relations with him.

“I never told Ms. Benazir Bhutto that her security was dependent on her relations with me,” he clarified while talking to media here. I can never utter such cheap words, he added.

He referred to a book authored by a foreign writer ‘David E Sanger’, saying: “ I don’t know what the writer was trying to prove but what he has written is far from the fact and completely distorted”. “May be he was trying to create sensation.”

Pervez Musharraf pointing to the author said: “You must show some character.”

“The allegations being leveled against the armed forces and intelligence agencies of the country will lead to the defeat in war on terror,” he feared.

The former president said attempts are being made under a conspiracy to malign the armed forces.

He said no deal was made with the Taliban during his rule. He said Pakistan remained committed to fighting the war on terror for eight years and asked as to why nobody took notice of such an allegation during that time.

Pervez Musharraf said names of those Pakistanis who are involved in terrorist activities should not be concealed.

He said the maximum number of people who were martyred in war against terrorism is that of army men.

“A strict eye must be kept on institutions that are undermining others,” he said.

To a question regarding Swat accord, Pervez Musharraf said the government is doing what it deems fit.

 

[pama]

It does not surprise me.

 

[asaad-ul-islam]

David E Sanger a Pakistani-hating journalist, working for the Pakistani-hating New York Times. This article is just a bunch of bullsh. even if the army was double-dealing with the americans, everything is done with national interests in mind. there's no such thing as right or wrong.

 

[Patriot]

This is pure bullshit.So American Generals knew Pakistan was double dealing and still could not do anything and then Senator says that Predator is being launched from Pakistan then how exactly are we double dealing and Steve if our Generals think India is destabilizing Pakistan from Afghanistan and there must be some truth behind it.ISI is not exactly sleeping...

 

[Awesome]

Did anyone catch Musharraf's press conference about this guy? He was pissed off and said he couldn't sit by while some guy just got up and started to make crap up.

 

[PakistanMyPride]

About Musharaf: This is not a surprise. A ruler who doesn't respect the wishes of majority of his people, always face such situation.

About Pakistan Army and ISI: This is an attempt to malign ISI and Pak Army. Americans are publishing contradictory statements/reports. on one side, they say, they are using PAF bases for drone attacks and on other side, they say PA is playing double game and are not sincere with them. How strange!!! Pak Army has given lots of sacrifices, even Americans sacrifices are lesser than PA. PA's personals and other belongings have been the victims the of suicide attacks. The current situation of Pakistan is also the result of WOT. No doubt, Americans are unthankful! It's easy to blame Pakistan for their failures in Afghanistan but why are they failed in Iraq?

The amazing fact is, common Pakistani People don't trust Americans. Whenever, Americans blame on a Pakistani person/institution, they used to like that person/institution. Pakistanis understand, there is something fishy in that! This is just because of Americans previous records.

The material in this book, would increase the support for PA and ISI. When 160 million people are behind their Army, nobody can dare to harm that Army. The only thing, PA should do, is to stop drone attacks as these attacks are annoying Pakistanis.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

I'll wait till I read the relevant sections of the book before coming to a final conclusion on this, but just from the excerpts, there seems a serious lack of actual facts as a basis for Sangers conclusions, and indeed a lack of facts and objective analysis behind the opinions of officials whose views he claims to articulate.

One example from this excerpt is this reported exchange:

One of the charts showed that about 13,000 Pakistanis had been killed in 2007 chiefly by suicide bombers, about double the numbers in 2006.

He told Musharraf and General Kayani, the former DG ISI, that the casualty numbers on the track to double again in 2008. Then he described the interviews that Osama Bin laden and his deputies had given, declaring their intention to topple the Pakistan government.

“You are aware of these casualty numbers and what Osama said of course”, McConnel asked. He got blank stares. They told him they had heard about Bin Laden statements.

“It was news”, McConnel reported to his colleagues later. “I talked to the highest level of the Pakistani government and it was news. They just were not tracking it”. It astounded him that the officials in Washington and at the American embassy in Islamabad might be keeping more careful tabs on the rising number of attacks than were Musahrraf or Pakistani crop of democratically elected leaders. Were they ignoring the obvious or were they just denying they knew about it, part of the deception within the deceptions as they supported both sides in the terror fight.

First off, I do not know if this is a typo by Rauf Klasra, but the numbers being presented here are out right exaggerations. 13,000 Pakistani casualties?

This SATP assessment indicates about 3500 Pakistani deaths, including militants and Security Forces, which at first glance seems largely in line with the media reports on terrorist attacks that I can recall.
Pakistan Assessment 2009

Secondly, are we really to believe that US intel chiefs are coming to conclusions based on facial expressions? This is pretty absurd. Again, I'll reserve my final opinion until I read his book, but so far all we seem to have ais a lot of sensationalism.

Kaplan's review in the NYT sums it up in these lines IMO:

"Too often, Sanger’s analysis shades into cliché — credibility lost, opportunity squandered. Observations like these may go down smoothly with a brandy and C-Span, but they do not advance our understanding."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/books/review/Kaplan-t.html?em

 

[qsaark]

Tuesday, February 17, 2009. Daily The News.

News Desk

RAWALPINDI: The views expressed by Gen (Retd) Pervez Musharraf are tantamount to rubbing salt into the wounds of the nation because it is dictatorship that pushed Pakistan towards a political and constitutional anarchy.

Commenting on the press conference of Gen Musharraf, MNA Ahsan Iqbal, information secretary of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), said on Geo TV’s ‘Aaj Kamran Khan Ke Sath’: “Pakistan had received 80 billion dollars since 2002 but no project was executed for development in the country but the money has vanished,” he said.

The PML-N leader said that the Army has a chief and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) also has a director-general so if any conspiracy is being hatched against these institutions, they have the right to speak. So why is Musharraf pleading the case of the two institutions? “He (Musharraf) pitched the Army against the people, which led to confrontation between the people and the military. The ISI has been used to gain political objectives during his regime. He (Musharraf) harmed the Army and the ISI to such an extent that no enemy is needed after him. Musharraf must be tried for his actions,” he said.

Ahsan Iqbal said that if allegations are being levelled against Musharraf, he should file a suit against the author of the book in a US court. He said that Musharraf pleased the US because he did not enjoy support locally and had come into power with American blessings.

Commenting on the press conference of Musharraf, Professor Ghafoor Ahmed of the Jamaat-e-Islami said it is unfortunate that Musharraf maligned the Army and sensitive institutions more than anybody else. He said that Musharraf used the Army according to US dictates. He recalled that when Musharraf held two offices, he used to say that he issues orders and the military obeys him. He said that Musharraf used the ISI against the politicians and created a party by picking up people from other parties.

“Musharraf is the first person who used the Army in Balochistan and the tribal areas and we are facing its consequences today. It is an irony of fate that Musharraf abrogated the Constitution twice but no action has been taken against him whereas Article 6 of the Constitution describes it as high treason. He should be tried in a court of law. He handed over Pakistanis to the US and admitted this fact in his book. The US paid for it but the funds did not reach the national exchequer but went into the pockets of Musharraf. These are the crimes for which he should be tried,” the Jamaat-e-Islami leader said.

In his comments, former ISI chief Lt Gen (Retd) Hamid Gul said that the ISI and Army has always been a target because these are the defence lines of the country. He said the friends of Musharraf are after Pakistan and what he did with the country with the help of his friends is no secret. He said Musharraf is enjoying the life of a free citizen after retirement because he still enjoys US blessings. But, he added, now Musharraf is afraid of losing US blessings. He said if Musharraf has some reservations over the book of an American author, he should sue him.

“The image of the Army and the ISI was tarnished during the Musharraf regime. This person (Musharraf) created a gulf between the Pakistani people and Army and it will take a long time to be bridged He (Musharraf) infused the fear of the US and India into the nation. A conspiracy is being hatched against the country and the Army and Musharraf not only knew it but knowingly or unknowing remained part of the conspiracy. Now he is facing difficulties in his personal capacity,” he said.

Explaining the conspiracy against Pakistan and the Army, Lt Gen (Retd) Gul said that in the reports submitted to US President Barack Obama it has been stated that all roads of terrorism meet in Pakistan and this clearly shows the intentions of the US. He said the US could not attack Pakistan from outside so the Americans are destabilising Pakistan internally.

Commenting on reports about recording of the army officers’ telephone calls, Javed Ashraf Qazi, another former ISI chief, said that recording the calls controlled by the military is extremely difficult but if civil communication system or a satellite is used, then calls could be recorded. He said if Musharraf’s conversation in China was recorded, it would have been made through the civil system but in the system used by the Army calls could not be taped.

About the statement of Musharraf regarding maligning of the Army and the ISI, Javed Ashraf Qazi said those who wanted to destabilise Pakistan would weaken the ISI, which is the frontline of the country’s defence. He said that some western and other countries have been trying to do so. He said if the Army were criticised instead of supported, this action too would weaken the Army so the military needs the complete support of masses. He said he believed that the Army and the ISI are following the government’s policies and could not pursue any other policy.

“Musharraf has tried to transfer his burden to Army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani because he was the ISI chief when Musharraf was heading the Army. What has been stated in the book pertains to the double standards during the Musharraf regime and he has refuted it but the book contains proof,” said senior journalist Imtiaz Alam. “As for Musharraf’s claim that his conversation could not be recorded, the reality is altogether different. Musharraf’s conversation was also recorded during the Kargil conflict and the Indians had provided that tape to Nawaz Sharif,” he said.

Imtiaz Alam said Musharraf’s stance that there were no double standards is wrong because duplicity was rampant throughout his regime. He recalled that the Kargil issue was the creation of Musharraf and then he assured India of peace in 2004. On the one hand, the Army soldiers were being martyred in the tribal areas but on the other the elements backed by Musharraf were arming the Taliban, he said.

Another senior columnist, Nazir Naji pointed out that Musharraf’s conversation in question is with Benazir Bhutto, who at that time was not in the country so it was a private call that was recorded. He said Musharraf’s record of speaking the truth is not so magnificent that one could believe in his latest utterances. He recalled that Musharraf had given an interview to an American news agency but later disowned it and when it was posted on the internet he kept silent. He said Musharraf launched the Kargil operation and later claimed that he did so in consultation with the prime minister. He said now Musharraf is saving himself from allegations using the Army as a shield. He said the Pakistan Army produced very brilliant generals but also produced those who are a black spot on its face. He said the army and the ISI are facing the consequences of what Musharraf did. He said had Musharraf kept the prestige of the Army in view, he would not have talked in this way and would have taken the Army into confidence. He said Musharraf piled up lies and pushed the Army towards destruction and it is because of his actions that now soldiers are not being respected despite embracing martyrdom.

Senior journalist and analyst Irfan Siddiqui said the talk of Musharraf did not demonstrate in any way that he is ashamed of his deeds. “We may have numerous difference with the incumbent government but whatever is happening now has been inherited by them. The happenings after February 18 are result of his policies. Musharraf will have to answer for the decision he took on a single call from abroad. How Pakistani sovereignty was put on stake and the US was allowed to use the Pakistani soil. How army was moved into the tribal areas. Nobody brought as much disrepute to the army as brought by Musharraf,” he said.

Irfan Siddiqui said that Musharraf used the Army and his uniform for prolonging his rule and trampling the courts. He said the press conference of Musharraf was an arranged one. He should tender an apology to the nation. He said that Musharraf himself disengaged the ISI from the tribal areas and provided bases to the CIA and the FBI. He said if Musharraf has no courage to accept his blunders before the Army, he should keep mum and avoid rubbing salt into wounds of the nation.

Mujib-ur-Rehman Shami, another senior journalist, said the Pakistani nation believes that Musharraf served the US very honestly and sincerely and gave the Americans much more than he got from them. He said Musharraf’s colleagues have already told the nation that he has been taking decisions without consulting the corps commanders and also did not take parliament into confidence. He said the time has come that all these matters are investigated. He said Musharraf settled matters with the US against the aspirations of the Pakistani people and put the national institutions in trouble.

Senior analyst Haroon-ur-Rashid said that Musharraf is not defending the Army and ISI but he is seeking help from the two institutions. He said it is a nature of Musharraf to confuse the masses. He said Musharraf damaged the country and served the US. He said that Musharraf should be tried in a court of law. He said that the US is saving Musharraf and Zardari is doing so on the US’s demand. He said the Army and ISI did not play double game but killing their own brothers is not their duty. He said although the Army is performing its duty but it is unhappy with it. He said that basically Musharraf is a fraudster and no bigger cheat than him could be found in the world.

 

[Awesome]

I can see the anti-Musharraf machinery is at work just as soon as he gave very positive, brave and much need comments about the entire issue. He not only rubbished the David Sanger report he pointed out that a deliberate attempt is being made against the ISI and the Army. Now its Musharraf, its not some conspiracy nut. He's not even in power today, but he gave us a warning for our own benefit.

All this talk about salt on wounds, Musharraf started this bla bla bla... What has that got to do with realizing that some foreigners and our leaders alike are trying to F-up our nations defenders? This is just brilliant, someone comes and tells you, you're going to be royally screwed and you're busy griping about Musharraf... Does that change the fact that its still going to happen if we allow it?

I can just see the entire machinery at work, the guy gave a clear cut warning, he didn't have to, he won't benefit from it, but in a processed way they are annihilating his words of caution.

"This is totally rubbish!"

 

[Patriot]

Politicians as always playing dirty politics instead of working for country National Interest...oh and check this statement
Commenting on the press conference of Gen Musharraf, MNA Ahsan Iqbal, information secretary of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), said on Geo TV’s ‘Aaj Kamran Khan Ke Sath’: “Pakistan had received 80 billion dollars since 2002 but no project was executed for development in the country but the money has vanished,” he said.
Who the **** gave us 80 Billion Dollars?

 

[SurvivoR]

Why CIA Is Engaged In Motivated Campaigns Against Pakistan’s ISI, Military?

The American CIA almost killed Musharraf. The ISI is familiar with terrorism inside Pakistan by the spy agencies of many countries. Even Libya’s Gaddafi once ordered a couple of bombings here after the execution of his friend Mr. Bhutto. But this is the first time that the CIA is found directly involved in working against Pakistani interests. The U.S. spy organization is sponsoring the multibillion dollar Afghan drug trade, helped by the Indians. CIA’s latest trash is a statement by a U.S. congresswoman and a book by a third-rate American journalist both aimed at discrediting the ISI in the eyes of its own people. The million dollar question is this: Why is CIA sponsoring the campaign to tarnish Pakistani image worldwide, from the nuclear scare to the breakup scare to the ‘terrorist’ scare? The answer is astonishing.

By SANDRA JOHNSON in Washington DC
CHRISTINA PALMER in New Delhi
JAMAL AFGHANI in Kabul
MAKHDOOM BABAR in Islamabad
Tuesday, 17 February 2009.
Ahmed Quraishi-Pakistan/Middle East politics, Iraq war, lebanon war, India Pakistan relations

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—Coffee and aspirin, aspirin and coffee. This is what the Chief of Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency, the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) Lt. General Ehsan-ul-Haque was repeating after he went through the news on the website of a U.S. newspaper in which a news report filed by a U.S. news agency claimed quoting “U.S. intelligence sources” that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf survived the bomb attack on his motorcade because the President’s limousine was equipped with state-of-the-art jamming devices.

The news appeared on Dec. 18, 2003, shortly after former President Musharraf’s motorcade was attacked through a remote controlled device connected to a cell phone on a bridge in Rawalpindi.

“What the hell is this, we discussed this jamming device thing with them just a day before and they have leaked it to the media straight away? What are they up to? Are they helping us or al-Qaeda by telling them that President’s car cannot be bombed through a remote device? Are they trying to guide these killers so that they go for a suicide attack next time?” Gen. Ehsan asked his aides, sitting there to discuss the issue.

And true to his prediction, after a gap some 15 to 20 days, Musharraf’s motorcade was subjected to a high profile suicide attack on the same road a just a few yards away from the previous incident. However the Pakistani President survived again.

This has been the biggest dilemma of Pakistan’s ISI ever since Islamabad decided to be an ally in America’s global war on terror. Right from day one, Pakistan’s Foreign Office and the ISI sleuths have been complaining about the constant leaking in the U.S. media by ‘U.S. intelligence sources’ of intelligence reports and highly classified. The former President of the Islamic Republic, Pervez Musharraf, who was also the head of the country’s army, conveyed these reservations about intelligence leakages many times to U.S. officials and made it very clear to the former U.S. President George W. Bush that Pakistan and particularly the ISI were not comfortable at all with such a state of affairs.

The U.S. was told in clear terms that this menace of constant leakages of classified material to the U.S. media had become a very big hardship for the continuation of anti-terror operations.

Terrorism is nothing new to Pakistan, neither is its top security agency, the ISI, an alien to the operations of foreign intelligence services against Pakistan. Starting from 1960s, when neighboring India’s counterpart of ISI, the Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW), commonly know as RAW, started small- scale sabotage activities in border towns like Sialkot, Shakar Garh and parts of Balochistan, the ISI and other security agencies of Pakistan have been through a lot of encounters to prevent and counter anti-Pakistan sabotage activities by India’s R&AW, former Soviet Union’s KGB, former communist Afghanistan’s Khaad, Iran’s former Savak, Israel’s Mosaad and even the Libyan MIF that carried out some sabotage operations after the hanging of the former Prime Minister of the country, Mr. Z. A. Bhutto, who was a very special friend of Libya’s Gaddafi.

In sharp contrast, the ISI or the country’s other security agencies never had a problem with the American CIA and in fact developed an amazing level of understanding and professional collaboration during the USSR’s invasion of neighboring Afghanistan. It appears that suddenly, after the demise of the Taliban government in Afghanistan and with the growing influence of India’s R&AW in Afghanistan, the CIA preferred to become hand in glove with R&AW in Afghanistan. Both R&AW and CIA are banking on the three trillion U.S. Dollars worth of drug money every year that is generated through heroin production and its subsequent sale across the world.

According to The Daily Mail’s investigations, certain wings of both the R&AW and CIA generate millions of dollars by providing or arranging safe passages for drug traffickers of Afghanistan and India at many points across the world. They generate these funds to carry out certain unapproved operations. It was the Pakistani Army and ISI that unfolded some proofs of the same in this direction after which the CIA got extremely annoyed and finally opted to launch motivated campaigns against Pakistan’s ISI and Pakistani Army with the generous collaboration of India’s R&AW.

A former official of the UN office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) says that despite the fact that the cultivation of poppy crop across Afghanistan has risen dramatically after the Taliban era and dozens of heroin production factories have been established across the country, the CIA never showed any interest in recommending to the U.S. government to launch a crackdown on heroin factories across Afghanistan that feed and finance militants and warlords. The annoyance of CIA with Pakistani ISI and Army, according to some reports, peaked when an Indian defense official posted at the Indian Embassy in Kabul, who was a lynchpin between the Indian and Afghan drug operations, was killed in a suicide attack last year. The said Indian official was killed in an attack carried out, according to our investigations, by Afghan President’s brother and the world’s biggest heroin producer Izzat Ullah Wasifi after he developed doubts that the Indian officer was betraying him to America’s DEA (Drugs Enforcement Agency). And despite leads in this direction, R&AW convinced the CIA that the Indian officer was killed by attackers sent by ISI.

The recent blitzkrieg on Pakistan Army and the ISI are clear gifts of CIA. In the first attack, the Chairperson of the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Intelligence Diane Feinstein came up with a very ridiculous and rather childish ‘disclosure’ that U.S. Drones, named Predators, were flying from certain ISI air bases within Pakistan and that the USAF or U.S. Army had nothing to do with this activity. “Even a child knows that these Predators fly from the U.S. base in Bagram in Afghanistan and there are no air bases owned by the ISI as ISI is an intelligence agency that relies on Pakistan Air Force and its bases for any air space or avionic support. Coming out with such a ridiculous statement and that too, publicly, by the head of the U.S. Senate Intelligence committee is very surprising”, commented a senior defense analyst when contacted by The Daily Mail. He said this was nothing but a bid to generate feelings of hatred among Pakistanis against their own premier intelligence service, when the ISI is busy protecting the interests of the Pakistanis people.

In a second example, an ordinary U.S. journalist, working for the CIA-blessed U.S. daily The New York Times; named David E. Sanger, has come out with a book that can be described as nothing but a perfect piece of trash and a very mediocre work on intelligence. In the book, titled The Inheritance, Sanger claims, attributing to some highly classified files of the CIA and NSA that former Pakistani President Musharraf was playing a double game and making a double deal, on one side with America and on other side with the Taliban. This is not the start of the great Sanger-CIA trash but he claims a little down the road that the CIA had been bugging or tapping the telephones of top Pakistani Army Generals including the Chief of the Army Staff and head of the top spy agency, the ISI, and that during these tapped calls, it was revealed to the CIA and the National Security Agency (NSA) that top Generals of Pakistan were protecting the [Afghan] Taliban.

“This Sanger trash is nothing but a double bullshit with a cherry on top. First of all in the Pakistan Army establishment, the Generals and Commanders do not use the ordinary telephone lines or the cellular or satellite phones. The Armed forces have their own, secured and dedicated phone lines and most of the time, dedicated for person to person conversation and no one from the outside can, through any means, tape or bug these highly secured and sophisticated phone lines. Secondly, I must tell you that conversations of such a highly sensitive nature are never made on telephone lines anywhere in the world, a fact that makes this Sanger stuff a complete piece of trash and bullshit,” said a former Chief of ISI, adding that in no intelligence set up across the world, such advanced warnings are issued to any ally, the way Sanger has narrated in his book while mentioning an advance warning by some ISI officials to Taliban before launching an attack on a school in tribal areas of the country, where Pakistani Army and the ISI are battling militants.

According to certain Western intelligence observers and media commentators, if for a minute it is assumed that Sanger’s book was based on facts, this would raise alarming questions about the state of security and secrecy within CIA and NSA where a journalist like Sanger can lay his hands on information that supposedly cost the two organizations millions of dollars to attain and secure.

“In that case, the ISI’s complaints and Islamabad’s protests over the constant leakages of classified information to the media by U.S. intelligence authorities are one hundred percent accurate,” says David Smith, a senior journalist at a Washington-based news organization. Diplomatic analysts and intelligence observers say that it was surprising to see how that whenever it has something against Pakistan, the first thing the CIA does is to reach out straight away to the journalists of New York Times, Washington Post or CNN. How come the reporters of these media organizations get easy access to highly classified CIA reports in no time?

Taking exceptional note of the Sanger trash, former President Pervez Musharraf, for the first time after he left the Presidency, appeared before the media and brushed aside all the accusations made in the Sanger-CIA trash. He clearly stated that if the Pakistan Army and the ISI were not sincere in the global anti terror war, then it was a big intelligence lapse on part the U.S. spymasters who could not detect this alleged duplicity earlier. He also snubbed Sanger for his baseless accusations but said he would not press charges against the American journalist because the said journalist was that important and such mischief is not unusual. But Musharraf was clear about one thing: That there is a motivated campaign against Pakistan Army and ISI by U.S. quarters. He said the military and the ISI are custodians of Pakistan’s security and solidarity. He urged the Pakistani media to expose the hands behind this anti-ISI and anti-Pak Army campaign.

The Daily Mail is based in Islamabad and Beijing. Makhdoom Babar Sultan can be reached at macbaburAThotmail.com

Ahmed Quraishi.com

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

One more excerpt from the above 'excerpt' that leaves one wondering what exactly the author was trying to do in this book except 'rant' against Pakistan:

McConnel himself returning from one of his trips noted that there is only one army that has more artillery tubes per unit, everything from old cannons to rocket launchers and mortars. It’s North Koreas’, he said. It was a telling statistic. Artillery tubes weigh tonnes and are useful only in holding back Indian hordes as they come across the plains. They are useless against terrorists enclaves.

Anyone have a big enough "DUH" to say here.

What did McConell think the Army had been geared towards before the Taliban became an issue in FATA?

Oh right, warding of a hostile country we have had three wars with. So what exactl;y was the point of this observation? Sanger insidiously inserts this little tidbit of information implying McConnells displeasure, no doubt to link this to the argument of 'beefing up its deterrent against India instead of fighting COIN'.

This book, or at least the section on Pakistan, is quite obviously nothing better than pseudo journalism based on distortions and even outright lies (the story of how many people were killed). Either that, or everythign he narrated is true, but since his sources are US officials, it gives us an insight into how incompetent US officials are.