Taliban Military Chief Mullah Baradar captured by Pakistan

[Awesome]

Hey Asim and Taimi,
What is happening to the post ranking mechanism???

Just ignore it for now.

 

[Awesome]

finally some good news , now i hope both authorities can put this capture to good use for them selves and there progress in wot .

What would be interesting is if this time around they'd hand him over to the US. I believe a person of this level is more of an enemy of Pakistan (then Afghanistan and then the US) and should be interrogated, tried and sentenced within Pakistan.

Moreover the laws of Pakistan would probably allow for a more over the top torture (if required) than those in the US.

 

[Locked]

Well atleast now the people who keep accusing Pakistan of harboring the Afghani Talibs should Shut up as this news can put a stop to all of the crap.

It's the other way round dude. Now there is proof that there are terrorists in Cities liek Karachi, now "they" won't shut up for sure. Stop Dreaming!

 

[Awesome]

I'd be interested to find out if he was captured in around Sohrab Ghot, Super Highway, Scheme 33, etc.

 

[equiliz3r]

Good job..................one more murderer is behind bars

 

[Solomon2]

No one here can claim to know the complete truth so i would suggest that all stop speculating so as to call it intelligence failure.

This "peace" deal wasn't a failure of Pakistani intelligence; it was a failure of Pakistani governance. How poorly did the Pakistani government serve the people of Swat that so many were willing to give the Taliban a try, hoping it would be an improvement?

We're getting off-topic. For Afghanistan and the coalition, the arrest of the Taliban's top commander is very good news, of course. What has been the reaction on the streets of Pakistan to this?

 

[Ahmad]

According to CNN:

Another Afghan Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, also denied Baradar had been arrested. He told CNN the report is intended to demoralize the Afghan Taliban during the Marjah offensive.

 

[S-2]

" He told CNN the report is intended to demoralize the Afghan Taliban during the Marjah offensive."

Gee Unity, I'd think having to don Burkhas to slip out of Marjah would be more demoralizing than Barardar's arrest.

Thanks.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Here comes another fanboy low on knowledge and high on patriotism.

Is Gen Pasha ex ISI Chief or the serving one and this is what he said.



For any turnaround, the Pakistani state needs to initiate a radical course correction. The state cannot neutralize the insurgency in FATA or elsewhere within the existing ideological paradigms, articulated eloquently by ISI chief Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, who described Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud - the Pakistan Army's most relentless tormentor - as a "true patriot". Shuja Pasha also defended the Taliban in an interview with Der Spiegel, stating: "Shouldn't they be allowed to think and say what they please? They believe that jihad is their obligation. Isn't that freedom of opinion?"

The Pakistani Military Officer who called Baitullah 'a true patriot' did so on Baitullah's offer of putting aside differences with the GoP and assisting in fighting India - this occurred in the immediate aftermath of the Mumbai attacks when the statements from the Indian political and military leadership and media were full of warmongering hysteria.

Pasha did a pragmatic thing, by trying to take advantage of the opportunity to effect a ceasefire on the Western front so as to move forces to the Eastern Front to address a larger threat at the time.

I have no problem with this - at the end of the day the security establishment has to prioritize threats to country, and at that time the overriding threat was that of aggression from India.

As for his quote in Der Spiegel:

"Late on Wednesday evening, a spokesman for Pakistan’s Inter-Services Public Relations said: “Some of the important issues (raised by Pasha) have been reported out of context or have been incorrectly constructed as a result of mistranslation”.

The Der Speigel report said Pasha had “switched back and forth between English and surprisingly accent-free German” during the interview.

The spokesman said Pasha’s conversation with Der Spiegel had taken place on December 12, 2008, when the “environment was different from what it is today”.

He added: “Some of the things reported are either incongruous or have not been clearly stated.”

Wanted to go to India, says ISI chief, Pak Army says misquote

Without being able to look at the entire transcript to see what context those remarks were made in, they very well could have been taken out of context.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

This "peace" deal wasn't a failure of Pakistani intelligence; it was a failure of Pakistani governance. How poorly did the Pakistani government serve the people of Swat that so many were willing to give the Taliban a try, hoping it would be an improvement?

The government of Pakistan served the people of Pakistan very well in attempting negotiations and enacting a comprehensive negotiated settlement with the TTP-Swat, because that is exactly what the overwhelming majority of the people of Pakistan wanted, not realizing the true nature of the Taliban.

The events that unfolded after the peace deal was enacted ended up turning the tide of the war against the Taliban as public support swung the other way, in favor of the military eliminating the Taliban through force. All the major political parties came on board as well at that point.

Without that level of public and political support, I doubt the PA would be in as strong a position in its fight against the Taliban insurgency as it is now.

So while, in hindsight, the Swat peace deal was a flawed approach to calming the Taliban insurgency, it worked out brilliantly in shifting the tide of public and political opinion against the Taliban.

 

[S-2]

"What would be interesting is if this time around they'd hand him over to the US. I believe a person of this level is more of an enemy of Pakistan (then Afghanistan and then the US) and should be interrogated, tried and sentenced within Pakistan."

You've probably got a case to make holding and trying him in Pakistan but there's an Interpol warrant for him, IIRC, and he's likely committed most of his crimes relative to Afghanistan. OTOH, he's less likely to escape in Pakistan.

This is a powerful man. I doubt torture is the way to go. He's old school and fought with Omar in the Afghan-Soviet war. They retired back to Oruzgan together. He DROVE OMAR on a motorcycle out of Afghanistan. They're purportedly married to sisters.

HE'S THE MAN.

He controls the pursestrings to dope, donations, taxation, road tolls, and kidnappings. Hundreds of millions of dollars. He listens and negotiates with his commanders. Doesn't DICTATE to them "Thou shalt do this..." He is considered the MOST likely to negotiate. That is very interesting given the talk about reconciliation of the leadership.

He knows it all. We need very smart, very adept, very informed, very professional interrogators and I suspect the ISI and CIA are going to give him their best and take however long they need to get it done right.

Thanks.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

And the eight years of denials and dissemblance before this?

Unless you can conclusive show that the PA/ISI knew where these individuals were all that time, there is no dissemblance and denial.

Pakistani Taliban leaders and Baloch insurgent leaders are on Pakistan's hit list, would you not agree? So do we like the fact that they remain at large and continue to target civilians with terrorism, or is it actually possible that the vast uncontrolled and sparsely populated spaces of Balochistan and FATA have allowed them to go undetected?

And if the Baloch insurgents and TTP leaders can survive, despite being targeted with a large part of our resources (since they pose a direct threat to the state), then why not the Afghan Taliban leadership whom we are not actively hunting?

Additionally there were long stretches of time where we did not actively pursue either group, as the lack of political and popular support within Pakistan for military offensives in FATA, resulted in various flawed 'peace deals' being negotiated (with both Afghan focused and Pakistan focused Taliban - so no duplicity there either) as a means to end the conflict.

After '8 years' this arrest did not occur out of the blue with all else in stasis. The Pakistan Army and law enforcement have made significant advances in FATA, Swat and Peshawar. The space available to militants has been squeezed significantly, and much of the leadership has been argued to be 'on the run'. So I'd argue that the timing of the arrest has a lot more to do with the changing dynamics in Pakistan's North West, with the PA exerting control militarily on larger swathes of area, than any 'duplicity and dissemblance' over the past eight years.

Quetta Shura No Longer Poses A Threat: Ahmad Mukhtar-DAWN Dec. 11, 2009

After years of denial that the Quetta Shura didn't exist we awake one morning to read its been DESTROYED. Sure. Well at least it exists, correct?

Since this story I've been told at this board

1. Mukhtar was ill

2. Mukhtar was drunk

3. Mukhtar meant the TTP not the Quetta Shura (as though he doesn't know the difference in either nor where S. Waziristan versus Balochistan might be)

Now if a grand lie has been spun on this topic for eight years despite all that forty plus other nations in Afghanistan have insisted otherwise, what else might you have been lied about?

This is a more detailed quote of Ahmed Mukhtar's comments to that news
channel:

In an exclusive interview with a private TV channel, Federal Defence Minister Ahmad Mukhtar said the security forces have taken on the Quetta Shura and have damaged it to such an extent that it no longer poses any threat.

When asked about any arrest, he said: “I am sure the Pakistan army is on job and trying to locate those who are enemies of Pakistan.

We have finished them so that they don’t fight with us and create problem for us,” he said.

Responding to another question about allegation of US regarding existence of Taliban Shura in Quetta, he said:

“We have not any real reason not to believe that.”

Quetta Shura exists: Mukhtar | Pakistan | News | Newspaper | Daily | English | Online

Was that a double negative in the last line? You can beat this drum based on a one liner in Dawn all you want S-2, but as the above comments indicate (Mukhtar is stumbling over his words all over the place) , and as Prime Minister Gillani has since reiterated, the Quetta Shura does not exist.

The reference was more than likely to the the TTP, given that the interviewer asks him in that last question about the US allegation of the Quetta Shura, and I believe he was trying to say, 'we have no real reason to believe that' - hard to tell with that double negative.

Poor journalism by Dawn to not follow up the comment on such an important issue and clarify what he actually meant. Par for the course for Mukhtar, who is defence minister because of being a Zardari political lackey, and not any qualifications that make him suitable for the job.

 

[Solomon2]

Keep him in Pakistan! If he goes to the U.S. or Guantanamo the best we can hope for is that he shares a cell with Pineapple Face. No more intel, no propaganda value, nothing.

 

[All-Green]

This "peace" deal wasn't a failure of Pakistani intelligence; it was a failure of Pakistani governance. How poorly did the Pakistani government serve the people of Swat that so many were willing to give the Taliban a try, hoping it would be an improvement?

We're getting off-topic. For Afghanistan and the coalition, the arrest of the Taliban's top commander is very good news, of course. What has been the reaction on the streets of Pakistan to this?

Actually all the government did was guarantee shariah courts which actually was not akin to giving control to TTP and was constitutional.
It was the Judges of the Shariah courts really bombarded the TTP for their previous highhandedness and started giving bold decisions in favor of public against TTP.
This eventually irked the TTP and TNSM so much that they demanded their own people as judges, this is what started the rift.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

What would be interesting is if this time around they'd hand him over to the US. I believe a person of this level is more of an enemy of Pakistan (then Afghanistan and then the US) and should be interrogated, tried and sentenced within Pakistan.

Moreover the laws of Pakistan would probably allow for a more over the top torture (if required) than those in the US.

Some analysts in Pakistan have already said that if he is handed over to anyone it should be the Afghan government, and not the US.

That said, it will be interesting to see whether that occurs, since some of the reporting on him suggests he was one of the flexible Taliban leaders, and therefore might be used in 'reconciliation'.

I don't think there will be much of a chance for reconciliation once that evil little man Amrullah Saleh (Afghan intelligence chief) gets his hands on him. Quite a few reports of torture and prisoner abuse (some directly at his hands) floating around.