Headley: ISI had no links to 26/11

[S.M.R]

How Do We Know Pakistan Terror Witness Is Telling the Truth?

Is David Coleman Headley telling the truth?

Till yesterday = YES
After that = NO

 

[twoplustwoisfour]

Till yesterday = YES
After that = NO

3 easy steps on making an acceptable argument:

1. read on the subject
2. present your logical reasoning
3. arrive at a conclusion.

Where's step 2 in your post?

 

[Major Ram]

Sincerely, india was in a desperate need of anything similar to 9/11 to rant on, so came up with 26/11.

Stop following footmarks of US, this will make your life happier and easier.

If you could kindly turn your 'Conspiracy Theory Mode' off then the discussion will have some meaning. thanks.

 

[pmukherjee]

Pakistan ISI had no role in Mumbai plot: court

(AFP)

31 May 2011, 8:29 PM The leadership of Pakistan’s ISI agency was not involved in planning the deadly 2008 Mumbai attacks, self-confessed plotter David Coleman Headley testified Tuesday.
Headley, who has pleaded guilty to 12 terror charges arising out of the attacks on India’s financial capital, said during the Chicago trial of his childhood friend, Tahawwur Hussain Rana, that no more than a handful of ISI agents were involved in the plot.

“The colonel might have known and someone in the group might have known,” Headley testified.

But when asked by Rana’s defense attorney if he meant that neither the head of the ISI nor its senior leadership were involved Headley testified “Yes.”

The Mumbai attacks, in which 166 people were killed, stalled a fragile four-year peace process between India and Pakistan, two South Asian neighbors and nuclear-armed rivals, which was only resumed in February.

Pakistan’s powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency has long been suspected of involvement and three ISI agents were named as co-conspirators by US prosecutors.

However, Headley’s testimony supports Pakistan’s assertion that the ISI’s involvement was limited to a handful of rogue agents.

Rana is accused of providing Headley with a cover and acting as a messenger, with prosecutors alleging he played a behind-the-scenes logistical role in both the Mumbai attacks and another abortive plan to strike Copenhagen.

Rana, a Canadian-Pakistani and Chicago businessman, has denied all charges, and his defense attorneys argue that he was duped by his friend, whom he had met in military school.

The Mumbai attacks also left more than 300 people wounded after coordinated strikes on high-profile targets

Sorry, it does not work that way. The ISI is made up of 100% Army. No civilians, no bureaucrats, no police personnel. Only Army. In this way the ISI is different from the RAW or CIA or Mossad or most other Intelligence agencies which are open to multiple intake sources. The Army is a very homogeneous and coherent organisation. The thought processes and the attitudes are similar throughout the Army. It is easier for an organisation like the CIA or the RAW to have different interest groups within with different ideologies and interests . But for an organisation which has the Army as its only catchment area, not so easy.

So we come to the point of rogue elements within ISI. Again not convincing. How do rogue elements gain access to so much resources to pull off Mumbai? Without sanction of higher echelons? That too in an organisation where every one is from Army or ex Army? Same culture, same ethos, only the Regiments differ. Yes rogue elements are possible, but they will never gain access to the resources that make an operation like Mumbai possible.

This guy's statement is something that only the total layman or the naive can believe. Not that it really matters though.

 

[S.M.R]

3 easy steps on making an acceptable argument:

1. read on the subject
2. present your logical reasoning
3. arrive at a conclusion.

Where's step 2 in your post?

2. What logical reasoning do you expect for people who were airing statements of the person whose past is known to everyone. Till the date his statement gave u-turn to the case, he was considered to be telling truth. Whenever we used to ask for the evidences for ISI's involvement in 26/11, we in return told to watch the headly/rana trial. Now the same people are calling him smuggler etc and saying he is a liar? Why? Just bcaz he gave statement contrary to their mindset?
3. We simply dont care and watch the headly/rana trial as it will die its own death. Our stance from the day one is same 'that headly is not trust worthy'.

 

[S.M.R]

Sorry, it does not work that way. The ISI is made up of 100% Army. No civilians, no bureaucrats, no police personnel. Only Army. In this way the ISI is different from the RAW or CIA or Mossad or most other Intelligence agencies which are open to multiple intake sources. The Army is a very homogeneous and coherent organisation. The thought processes and the attitudes are similar throughout the Army. It is easier for an organisation like the CIA or the RAW to have different interest groups within with different ideologies and interests . But for an organisation which has the Army as its only catchment area, not so easy.

So we come to the point of rogue elements within ISI. Again not convincing. How do rogue elements gain access to so much resources to pull off Mumbai? Without sanction of higher echelons? That too in an organisation where every one is from Army or ex Army? Same culture, same ethos, only the Regiments differ. Yes rogue elements are possible, but they will never gain access to the resources that make an operation like Mumbai possible.

This guy's statement is something that only the total layman or the naive can believe. Not that it really matters though.

You are entirely mistaken that ISI is made up of 100% army. If you believe so, then your knowlwdge needs overhauling. So your first para is based on an assumption.

Well the possiblity of rogue element, you not willing to accept that just
bcaz you doubt about their access to the resources required for 26/11. It is quiet possible that RAW provided them those resources as you are hell bent to exclude 'rogue' element from the plot to which the pakistani establishment itself says there is 'possibility'. So going with your logics, it is done by people having no association with ISI.

We know headly's statements do not matter.

 

[pmukherjee]

Rogue Element.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

The only contradictions Sir, are in your replies. You can either accept or not Headley's testimony in toto. You cannot selectively choose parts of it in a silly attempt to buttress your failing case.

You are having comprehension problems. I have made to different points with regards to Headley's comments, and those were explained two or three posts ago. Please go back and read the post again and be a bit more specific about what exactly you find 'contradictory' in my explanation.

In any case I have already pointed out that there was no way Headley could have known about the ISI's top brass being involved or not. Can only be guesswork while his testimony about the involvement of the ISI officers is derived from direct experience.

Headley does not even know 'Major Iqbal's' true identity, as he himself said, so there is no way Headley could argue that he was 'dealing with ISI agents' either. You cannot have it both ways sir.

Surely you understand the difference. An institution like the ISI would deliberately compartmentalise its operations as a matter of course. whether the officers in question operated with or without sanction from the top brass is irrelevant. The ISI as a whole bears responsibility for their actions. The fact that American prosecutors are using Headley's testimony to prosecute a terror case indicates their confidence in the veracity of the evidence provided by him.

Again, if Headley himself was not certain of the true identity of the individuals he was dealing with, then how can he claim they were ISI, active, former, rogue or under institutional instructions?

We will have to wait and see what case American prosecutors make to establish the identity of 'Major Iqbal' and others before even accepting the 'rogue agent' theory.

You have also been quoting a wikileaks cable of 2009 suggesting that insufficient evidence was given to Pakistan on the Mumbai case.Again, you are being selective - either you will accept all wikileaks cables or you won't. Picking & choosing is not acceptable. In any case the cables actually mention that both India & the U.S.had sufficient evidence but that the FBI was waiting for Indian permission to release the same to Pakistan.

What is selective about the cable I provided? I presents an opinion about the nature of the evidence provided by India, and what exactly was stopping India from having the FBI release evidence to Pakistan? I would have thought India would have had no qualms about such a release. The cable you refer to, of the FBI waiting on India, only further establishes the argument that the evidence provided by India was insufficient, and that India did not facilitate a prompt sharing of intelligence and evidence to assist Pakistani authorities in cracking down on the people alleged to have perpetrated the Mumbai attacks.

In any case after the Headley revelations of 2010, there remains little doubt, not just in Indian minds but also in that of the Americans that the LeT along with some members of the ISI were directly culpable in the attacks.

The Headley testimony has exposed Indian lies and propaganda for what they are - months of fabricated 'Headley Confessions to Indian investigators int the US' have been exposed as lies. I fail to see how you could argue that his testimony has done anything to suubstantiate the argument of institutional ISI invovlement. Heck, even the 'rogue ISI agent' argument is in doubt given Headley's own admission that he does not know the real identity of those he dealt with.

 

[Peshwa]

Headley does not even know 'Major Iqbal's' true identity, as he himself said, so there is no way Headley could argue that he was 'dealing with ISI agents' either. You cannot have it both ways sir..

You're accusing Indians of speculating.....but you're doing exactly the same by giving ISI a clean chit based on Headley's statement that he could not be certain whether "Major Iqbal" was the real name of the agent he was working with....
You dont expect the ISI conducting a covert terrorist operation to use their real names do you? But this isnt a surprise to us as you make it sound since we obviously dont expect the ISI to drive an axe through their foot by using real names....

Yet Headley seems convinced enough to call them ISI agents....

The question that has not been answered here is "What makes Headley believe that Major Iqbal was a serving ISI agent?", why is he so convinced of the same?
The question hasnt been asked yet, nor has the information been released....

So unless this is answered and verified, I would suggest you to hold off on popping that bubbly....especially since it may very well backfire...

I think you're way ahead of yourself to think that ISI's role in this operation has been discredited based on the extremely scarce information you're privy to

 

[Bang Galore]

Headley does not even know 'Major Iqbal's' true identity, as he himself said, so there is no way Headley could argue that he was 'dealing with ISI agents' either. You cannot have it both ways sir.


Again, if Headley himself was not certain of the true identity of the individuals he was dealing with, then how can he claim they were ISI, active, former, rogue or under institutional instructions?

We will have to wait and see what case American prosecutors make to establish the identity of 'Major Iqbal' and others before even accepting the 'rogue agent' theory.

What is selective about the cable I provided? I presents an opinion about the nature of the evidence provided by India, and what exactly was stopping India from having the FBI release evidence to Pakistan? I would have thought India would have had no qualms about such a release. The cable you refer to, of the FBI waiting on India, only further establishes the argument that the evidence provided by India was insufficient, and that India did not facilitate a prompt sharing of intelligence and evidence to assist Pakistani authorities in cracking down on the people alleged to have perpetrated the Mumbai attacks.

The Headley testimony has exposed Indian lies and propaganda for what they are - months of fabricated 'Headley Confessions to Indian investigators int the US' have been exposed as lies. I fail to see how you could argue that his testimony has done anything to suubstantiate the argument of institutional ISI invovlement. Heck, even the 'rogue ISI agent' argument is in doubt given Headley's own admission that he does not know the real identity of those he dealt with.

According to you, since Headley didn't even know the names of the ISI agents he couldn't be sure he was dealing with the ISI. Surely follows that he certainly would not then be able to exonerate anyone either and therefore your position on the case should not change, no matter what Headley said in his testimony.

There however is a point here that is important and that is how Headley first came into contact with the ISI. According to his testimony, he was arrested/detained in Pakistan and was let off after he told an "ISI agent" about his links to LeT. That makes a persuasive case for the official concerned to be someone with the powers to order the release of a detained person. Surely civilians & retired folk are not hanging around official institutions having powers of letting off would be terrorists ? His claim that the person was from the ISI therefore has some substance. As Peshwa made clear in a post a little while back, Headley answer in the court to a question only indicated his personal knowledge about who was involved. The fact that Headley did not know about any senior officer being involved does not mean they were not. Doesn't mean they were but doesn't mean they were not either!

When the FBI arrested Headley in 2009, investigators were stunned by his insider’s knowledge of the Mumbai plot, which killed 166 people, including six Americans. They worried, however, that his talent for deception could result in disaster in court, so they worked to confirm as much of his account as they could.

They scoured his computer for information. They analyzed his phone, travel and credit card records. They pored over the intelligence haul gathered while shadowing him and monitoring his communications for at least two months before his arrest. They compared his story to the results of investigations in India, Pakistan, Denmark, Britain and elsewhere.

As a result, the case unfolding in Chicago consists of far more than Headley’s word./

.....Pakistani officials have denied that the ISI played any role in the Mumbai attacks and that Iqbal was a serving intelligence officer. Some question whether Iqbal really exists.

But U.S. prosecutors are so convinced that Iqbal is real that they took the diplomatically explosive step of indicting him last month. They have done their best to bring him to life in the courtroom, displaying his e-mail exchanges with Headley and Rana. According to intercepted phone calls and other evidence Headley spent months talking with associates about Iqbal and other ISI officers
http://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...ial-in-chicago/2011/05/31/AG70aeFH_story.html

As for the wikileaks cable, I was pointing out specifically to the date of the cable. A lot of water has flown down the Indus since then & plenty more evidence is now in the hands of the Pakistani authorities. However the situation of the case has remained pretty much the same strongly indicating an reluctance on the part of the Pakistani authorities to take the matter to its logical conclusion.

Btw, I have never argued that the evidence suggests that the ISI chief ordered the attack , my point has always been that the ISI cannot escape culpability if any official(s) within it planned & conducted the attack in Mumbai. The use of the term "rogue" is meaningless unless the ISI showed demonstratively that it would deal with ruthlessness anyone indulging in such activities. On the contrary every action of the Pakistani government is meant to try & cover up the issue & protect men like Hafeez Saeed. One can only then conclude that the ISI has made a choice to be involved in the "rogue" plot as willing participants.

 

[S.M.R]

The United States may provide access to Pakistani American David Headley after the ongoing trial of his long time friend, Pakistan-born Canadian Tahawwur Rana, for helping in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. Rana is under trial in a Chicago Federal court for allegedly providing support to Pakistan based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) for the attacks by giving Headley cover of his immigration business to scout targets in Mumbai.

"Moving forward, I think we would look for or consider further access," State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters on Thursday when asked about Homeland such an assurance by Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to India.

"Just that, as Secretary Napolitano said (during her visit to India) last week, we can't get into too much detail about the ongoing case in Chicago," he said.

"But in the past we've given India full access to Headley, and I think that when a case is in litigation it's impossible to do that. But moving forward, I think we would look for or consider further access," Toner said

The spokesman declined to confirm if US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, during her recent visit to Islamabad, had handed a list of terrorists to Pakistan or if Ilyas Kashmiri, commander of the Pakistani-based terrorist organisation Harakat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (HUJI) was on such a list.

"I think I'd just say that the Secretary had very constructive meetings while she was in Pakistan, and there was broad agreement that our counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan has yielded results in the past and that it's in both our interests to work even more diligently in the future," he said.

"I don't know what list you're referring to," he said when asked if Kashmiri was on the list. "I'm not going to confirm there's some list, no."

India may get access to Headley again - Hindustan Times

 

[hembo]

Chicago court begins deliberations on fate of Tahawwur Rana
PTI | Jun 9, 2011, 02.01am IST

CHICAGO: The 12-member jury of a federal court here on Wednesday held close-door deliberations against Tahawwur Rana, who is charged with involvement in the Mumbai terror attacks and providing material support to Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba.

After two-hours of intensive confabulations, the jury posed two questions to the defence and prosecution. It asked whether Pasha ( Abdur Rahman, a retired Pakistani Army major), was involved with LeT or ISI.

It also wanted to know whether al-Qaida terrorist Ilyas Kashmiri was associated with LeT.

After consultations, judge Harry D Leinenweber told the jury that they have to rely on "collective memory", which means that they have to depend on material that is available in public domain.

If convicted on the three counts - helping 26/11 attackers, giving material support to LeT and planning a terror strike in Denmark - 50-year-old Rana, a Pakistani Canadian, faces a possible life sentence.

 

[muse]

How Do We Know Pakistan Terror Witness Is Telling the Truth?

lets get real -- Now Mr. Headley, alleges that he was dealing with agents of the ISI -- and yet these agents used their real names?? ISI are clowns, but gimme a break guys --

Mr. Headley is doing what is required of him to do, which is to essentially, smear -- the important part of all of this is to create a legal impediment or obstacle for the future -- and from my perspective, I wish them God speed.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

After two-hours of intensive confabulations, the jury posed two questions to the defence and prosecution. It asked whether Pasha ( Abdur Rahman, a retired Pakistani Army major), was involved with LeT or ISI.

After all the arguments made by the defence and the prosecution, the Jury was still not sure about whether XYZ was involved with the ISI or LeT or whatever?

What does that say about the nature of the evidence brought about to illustrate an 'ISI connection'?

 

[khurasaan1]

Yes! the headly has to deny ISI involvement...cuz then CIA was getting caught red handed in their game....