WASHINGTON POST
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan Embarrassed by the Osama bin Laden raid and by a series of insurgent attacks on high-security sites, top Pakistani military officials are increasingly concerned that their ranks are penetrated by Islamists who are aiding militants in a campaign against the state.
Those worries have grown especially acute since the killing of bin Laden less than a mile from a prestigious military academy. This weeks naval base infiltration by heavily armed insurgents in Karachi an attack widely believed to have required inside help has only deepened fears, military officials said.
Pakistans army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, who like the civilian government has publicly expressed anger over the secret U.S. raid, was so shaken by the discovery of bin Laden that he told U.S. officials in a recent meeting that his first priority was bringing our house in order, according to a senior Pakistani intelligence official, citing personal conversations with Kayani.
We are under attack, and the attackers are getting highly confidential information about their targets, said the official, who, like others, would speak only on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.
Pakistans top military brass claimed to have purged the ranks of Islamists shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Since then, the nations top officials have made repeated public assurances that the armed forces are committed to the fight against extremists and that Pakistans extensive nuclear arsenal is in safe hands.
But U.S. officials have remained unconvinced, and they have repeatedly pressed for a more rigorous campaign by Pakistan to remove elements of the military and intelligence services that are believed to cooperate with militant groups.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, on a previously unannounced visit to Islamabad on Friday, emphasized U.S. demands for greater cooperation in the war against al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other violent Islamist organizations that have taken root in Pakistan. Standing beside Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Clinton said the United States would be looking to the government of Pakistan to take decisive steps in the days ahead.
It is unclear how authentically committed Kayani and other top military leaders are to cleansing their ranks. U.S. officials and Pakistani analysts say support by the nations top military spy agency for insurgent groups, particularly those that attack in India and Afghanistan, is de facto security policy in Pakistan, not a matter of a few rogue elements.
But Kayani is under profound pressure, both from a domestic population fed up with the constant insurgent attacks and from critics in the U.S. government, who view the bin Laden hideout as the strongest evidence yet that Pakistan is playing a double game.