Former ISI chief: Hiding Osama a victory

[Capt.Popeye]

Naya Pakistan lost - I'm just sayin...
Some of us are too used to playing "Heads I win and Tails you lose" - Hamid Gul now an idiot? and at the same time the goings on in Pakistan not the fault of RAW?? Hain ji?

As far as HG is concerned; he has had too much leverage (and still does) to be simply written off as an Idiot. So I will not use that characterisation.
Does Naya Pakistan exist; apart from in a political outfit's manifesto ? I believe it does, it always did. Maybe not in the form of a political sales-pitch. But it did even way back in 1947. In Jinnah's thoughts and in his expressions most notably where he held out his credo of a pluralistic Society in his Nation. Did that die? Or it got smothered; during so many attempts to bury it alive over the years? You would know the answer to that.
Not Hamid Gul. He has only sought the destiny of an Undertaker or the man whose sole vocation in life is to carry out burials.

 

[my2cents]

That is a completely different issue - Afridi had no right to spy for another country. Maybe India would appreciate Indians helping foreign intelligence agencies behind their back we certainly don't.

(Though the argument in Pakistan is whether he helped them or not in the first place)

For argument sake ....

Even if he was helping CIA in finding Osama, he was not revealing a state secret or document... unless the state was complicit in harboring a fugitive and a known terrorist. That is the message you guys are sending to the world by scapegoating a doctor.

 

[Bang Galore]

Total embarrassment,did gul the fool never once think of his country's reputation before making this comment?
Laughing stock stuff.

That would depend on with whom you want your reputation enhanced. Pakistanis have long stopped bothering about international opprobrium and people like Gul have different friends they want their reputations enhanced with, they couldn't care less about what their "enemies" thought about them. Also if you see how many Pakistanis have grown to think differently, you realise that the reality you see & the reality they see are simply not the same. The altered reality in such cases cannot be understood by methodologies devised to work with the reality that the rest of the world works on.

 

[Sedqal]

For argument sake ....

Even if he was helping CIA in finding Osama, he was not revealing a state secret or document... unless the state was complicit in harboring a fugitive and a known terrorist. That is the message you guys are sending to the world by scapegoating a doctor.

As a citizen he has absolutely no right to make that decision. That is pretty elementary, which nation in this world allows its citizens to spy for another country?

 

[Capt.Popeye]

For argument sake ....

Even if he was helping CIA in finding Osama, he was not revealing a state secret or document... unless the state was complicit in harboring a fugitive and a known terrorist. That is the message you guys are sending to the world by scapegoating a doctor.

That is an interesting POV. And one that the world subscribes to.
If the State (in this case, Pakistan) is (either in implicit or explicit fashion) involved in a 'less than legal act' then does that bind the Citizenry (of that State) to 'aid and abet' in any and all forms to initiate and perpetuate that act? The question then is: Did Pakistan declare OBL as a fugitive from justice? If it did, then it steps on to 'very thin ice' in acting against Dr.Afridi. Then again; the so-called grounds for treason seem to be specious. If at all; he can be indicted for aiding an act that may be illegal (the intrusive raid).

But that argument turns on its head if OBL was declared as a fugitive from justice (or in SA parlance: Proclaimed Offendor) by Pakistan. Does not seem to be an "open and shut" case against the Docor then. More like a "case of pique' or scapegoating as a reaction to the monumental embarrassment that Pakistan faced in the aftermath of the raid.

 

[Bang Galore]

One wonders what it would be like today if Nawaz was allowed to continue with Vajpai, Kashmir issue was likely to have been solved removing The main hurdle between Indo-Pak relationship.

While I think Indians should be very thankful to the PA for the Kargil conflict & its role in putting on the back burner the Kashmir issue, I believe Pakistanis should rue that opportunity. The situation in 1999 & any solution of Kashmir then would have been far more favourable to Pakistan than at any time after. Also, Vajpayee was probably the last leader who might have been actually able to give concessions to Pakistan and he did want to solve the Kashmir issue & leave a legacy.

 

[my2cents]

As a citizen he has absolutely no right to make that decision. That is pretty elementary, which nation in this world allows its citizens to spy for another country?

A citizen of your country identifies Osama and you call him a spy and put him in jail for 33 years. I think as a nation your priorities are all screwed up. In our country we would have given him a bravery award. I think I echo sentiments of most Indian on this forum.

 

[asad71]

1. HG was a very successful ISI Chief. During his tenure great things happened in this region. Afghans and Pakistanis would always remember him for his tireless work at a crucial time in history.

2. HG now writes and speaks in support of Pakistani masses, the Ummah and the defense of Islamic ideology. These topics are not popular in the WCC (Western Christian Civilization) which sees a resurgence of Islam as a threat to the hold of theocracy and capitalists over that Civilization..

 

[ranjeet]

So Hamid Gul wants to say that ... "even though USA slapped the living daylights out of us on the night of May 1st but hey lookie we grazed their hand with our beards" !!!!

 

[Bang Galore]

A citizen of your country identifies Osama and you call him a spy and put him in jail for 33 years. I think as a nation your priorities are all screwed up. In our country we would have given him a bravery award. I think I echo sentiments of most Indian on this forum.

The funny part is that he would have simply not known anything. The CIA isn't filled with idiots to let known that they were hunting for Bin Laden. He might have guessed they were looking for someone but very unlikely that Bin Laden would have crossed his mind, Unlikely even for him to know that he was working with the CIA. Most likely, he was just in it for the money.

 

[Capt.Popeye]

1. HG was a very successful ISI Chief. During his tenure great things happened in this region. Afghans and Pakistanis would always remember him for his tireless work at a crucial time in history.

..

Sure Hamida Gulbul was a great ISI chief. And during his tenure great things happened in his region (and command). Great Explosive things! Like the Great Explosion(s) at the Ojhri Arms Dump on the outskirts of the Capital. That was the "pinnacle" of HG's glory.

As for his nearly "non-existent constituency" of the Ummah; it as real as the State of Utopia!! Or the Man in the Moon.

The funny part is that he would have simply not known anything. The CIA isn't filled with idiots to let known that they were hunting for Bin Laden. He might have guessed they were looking for someone but very unlikely that Bin Laden would have crossed his mind, Unlikely even for him to know that he was working with the CIA. Most likely, he was just in it for the money.

That is simply the fact of the matter and even the Commission report points in that direction. The OP was planned with very stringent "need to know" principles. Why do you think that any and all Pakistani agencies were left out of the final executive Plan!

 

[Sedqal]

A citizen of your country identifies Osama and you call him a spy and put him in jail for 33 years. I think as a nation your priorities are all screwed up. In our country we would have given him a bravery award. I think I echo sentiments of most Indian on this forum.

Are you trolling? I wouldn't care if he caught the devil by its horns no individual can be allowed to work for another state. This is what every country practices - Afridi's case has nothing to do with Osama, he worked for a foreign spy agency and was caught.

 

[Bang Galore]

Are you trolling? I wouldn't care if he caught the devil by its horns no individual can be allowed to work for another state. This is what every country practices - Afridi's case has nothing to do with Osama, he worked for a foreign spy agency and was caught.

You are still making the assumption that he knew he was working for the CIA. That flies in the face of all logic.

 

[my2cents]

The funny part is that he would have simply not known anything. The CIA isn't filled with idiots to let known that they were hunting for Bin Laden. He might have guessed they were looking for someone but very unlikely that Bin Laden would have crossed his mind, Unlikely even for him to know that he was working with the CIA. Most likely, he was just in it for the money.

Another funny part is United States has cut 33 million of the aid money to Pakistan as a protest for this imprisonment of 33 years.

 

[Sedqal]

You are still making the assumption that he knew he was working for the CIA. That flies in the face of all logic.

"U.S. officials acknowledge that the CIA used Afridi, 48, to run a hepatitis vaccination program as a ruse, hoping to find a match for bin Laden’s DNA and thereby verify the al-Qaeda leaders’ presence in Abbottabad, the garrison town where he hid for six years.

The report says Afridi received about $61,000 for the operation in Abbottabad, as well as substantial sums for previous work that involved hepatitis-B vaccination campaigns in other areas."

Source: Pakistan recounts how doctor helped U.S. in bin Laden operation - The Washington Post

So he received 61,000 $ just for giggles? The episode of OBL has no bearing on Afridi's case he was working for a foriegn spy agency and got caught.