The Battle for Bajaur - PA seizes control

[air marshal]

Congratulations! Well done Pakistan Army Jawans.

 

[air marshal]

 

[Awesome]

Merged the two popular threads for sake record keeping and chronology.

 

[air marshal]

History created at Damadola
Mohammad Jamil

Pakistan’s armed forces created history by wresting control of Damadola in Bajaur Agency once a no-go area and thought to be insurmountable, the entire Bajaur agency stands cleared of militants within a short time. The area was convenient route for supply of explosives and ammunition from terrorists’ backers to FATA and other settled areas of Pakistan.

A large quantity of explosives, weapons and currency notes were found in the caves. According to Major General Tariq, “Pakistani flag has been raised in the region for the first time since independence”. The capture of key Taliban complex has proved that Pakistan army is capable of fighting against militants having expertise in unconventional (guerrilla) warfare. Pak army’s professionalism and prowess were already proved during operation in Swat and Malakand Division and South Waziristran, but Damadola was indeed a bigger challenge than any of those areas. If an honest appraisal is made it will not be difficult to reach the conclusion that Pakistan army’s military is second to none to the best of armies in the world.

Pakistan’s armed forces indeed deserve all the superlatives. The ruling and the opposition should place on record their appreciation and acknowledgement and stop maligning the army for the deeds of the military adventurers of the past, because they are now part of history. Military strategists wonder as to how Pakistan’s armed forces could rout the militants who were well-trained in guerilla fighting over decades rather centuries. It has to be mentioned that mlitants had all the ingredients for successful guerilla warfare -difficult mountainous remote area, scanty and thinly populated area with porous border, and at east 150 caves in which they were well-entrenched; and last but not the least they had forced the local population to support them. Anyhow it was an arduous and very difficult task.

However, Pakistan army tactfully made inroads in the local population and convinced the residents of the area that Pak army personnel are there to protect them from the barbarians. On this assurance, they came out in droves and told the reporters that militants had made their lives miserable before the military offensive and had subjected them to the worst kind of atrocities.

Journalists were later taken to Bajaur, where locals were reported to have raised a 10,000-strong lashkar. About 2,000 armed men were seen brandishing guns, dancing and chanting slogans in favour of Pakistan. Pakistan army and intelligence agencies had to face enormous difficulties due to Indian RAW’s support to the Taliban. They used their clout to send Afghans to penetrate in Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan who received funds and arms through Afghanistan. Credible reports reveal that Maliks of Pakistani tribes are persuaded through middlemen and taken to Kabul for meetings with high ranking RAW officials. Million of dollars are paid to the tribal Maliks to purchase their loyalties, besides valuable gifts and all paid visits to India are some of the ways the Indians bribe the tribal. These tribal elders, unaware of Indians designs, remain available to them and serve their interest. FATA and other settled areas like Swat and Malakand remained violent in the past due to heavy investment by RAW with the collaboration of Afghan intelligence. Weapons, ammunition and other combat equipment were made available to militant to fight Pakistan Army. To make things worse, the US and NATO commanders did not trust Pakistan army and its agencies. After successful operation in Swat and Malakand Division, the trust deficit has decreased and America is cooperating with Pakistan.

It has to be admitted that successes of Pakistan armed forces are due to their professionalism, courage, conviction and determination. However, American cooperation has also helped in apprehending the Al Qaeda and the Taliban leaders. When the terrorists attacked Pakistan’s General Headquarters, the US and the West tried to convey an impression that Pakistan’s army is incapable of securing the nukes and the terrorists have the ability to attack wherever they want. They had unfounded fears that the terrorists could one day take over the country, and with it the nukes’ control.

It was a flawed perception because there have been militants’ attacks on the best of the armies’ camps and barracks in the world. On 18th April 1983, a suicide bomber exploded an explosives-truck near the US military barracks at Beirut Airport killing 241 marines. Minutes later, second bomb killed 58 French paratroopers at West Beirut. On June 25, 1996, in Saudi Arabia a truck bomb exploded outside Khobar Towers’ military complex killing 19 American servicemen and injuring hundreds of others. In Iraq, terrorists had penetrated in Iraq’s greenbelt and other military camps causing colossal loss of army personnel.

On 11th September 2001, Al Qaeda operatives had crashed planes in World Trade Centre; thus exposing the weakness of the sole super power and its agencies that were considered as the best in the world. After a recent incident of Nigerian citizen who was successful in taking explosives on an American plane, President Obama said: “The buck stops with me, as I am responsible for the protection of the American people. We are at war against Al Qaeda, a far-reaching network of violence and hatred that attacked us on 9/11, that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people, and that is plotting to strike us again. And we will do whatever it takes to defeat them.” On 1st September 2004, the Beslan school hostage crisis began when a group of armed terrorists, demanding an end to the Second Chechen War, took more than 1,100 people hostage at School Number One (SNO) in the town of Beslan, North Ossetia-Alania, an autonomous republic in the North Caucasus region of the Russian Federation. During the commando operation, at least 334 hostages were killed, including 186 children. Hundreds more were wounded or reported missing.

Anyhow, Pakistan army was earlier successful in Swat, Buner, Dir and South Waziristan, and one of the reasons was that the army could build up trust by helping in rehabilitation of the displaced persons. Of course, accommodating such a large number of IDPs was a challenge for the government, and people had faced difficulties, but they were full of hope that their coming generations would live without trepidation and fear and would play their role for the security, progress and prosperity of the country. To destroy the internal enemies was not difficult for the Pakistan armed forces, but because of divided opinion of political and some religious parties earlier, the action was somewhat delayed. Defence experts and analysts say that difficult terrain, porous border and friendly population that provide safe hideouts to the militants are the ingredients for the success of guerilla warfare. And TTP operatives have had all of these advantages. On the top of that the TTP leadership was using religion to motivate and indoctrinate the people. Now, the terrorists stand exposed, and it is hoped that the civil administration would put in place a mechanism to sustain the gains of Pakistan’s armed forces.

Source: Pakistan Observer

 

[Creder]

130 houses of militants torched in Bajaur

130 houses of militants torched in Bajaur

KHAR: Armed Lashkar of the Salarzai tribe backed by political administration and the Bajaur Levies on Monday torched the houses of 130 militants.

The elders of the tribe announced to continue their activities against the militants till their complete elimination from the area. Assistant Political Agent of Khar Muhammad Iqbal Khattak on the occasion said that nobody would be allowed to challenge the writ of the government in their respective areas.

Thousands of armed volunteers took part in the grand operation against militants. Tehsildar Salarzai, Abdul Kabeer Khan and elders of Salarzai Lashkar including Malik Muhammad Younas, Malik Munasib Khan, Malik Abdul Nasir and others were also present on the occasion. Armed volunteers and political administration torched 130 houses of the militants in Banda area in Salarzai.

Chak do phattay

 

[ajpirzada]

Hustle and bustle in Khar as peace returns to Bajaur



38 militants surrender to security forces

Wednesday, March 17, 2010
By our correspondent

KHAR: There was a state of euphoria in most of Bajaur Agency as all the educational institutions, government departments, bazaars and markets opened here on Tuesday.

A hustle and bustle could be seen here and other big and small towns of the agency. All main and link roads were opened to facilitate the returnees to their hometowns, while cellular services and the World Food Programme centres also started functioning after a long time.

Reports said tribesmen, dislocated due to clashes between security forces and militants, started returning to their homes. Joy could be seen on the faces of tribesmen who were seen exchanging greetings over restoration of peace in Bajaur. Those coming to their native villages hoisted national flags on their vehicles and were chanting slogans ‘long live Pakistan’ and ‘salute to the Pakistan Army.’

Meanwhile, 38 militants, including a commander, surrendered to security forces here. Sources said the militants belonging to the Mamond subdivision surrendered to security forces in the presence of a tribal Jirga. Commander Khalifa was also among them.

The militants promised neither to indulge in militant activities, nor allow others to carry out subversive acts in Bajaur Agency. Meanwhile, security forces carried out a search and clean-up operation in Sewai, Shinkot, Damadola and adjoining areas and recovered weapons.

Hustle and bustle in Khar as peace returns to Bajaur

 

[Windjammer]

 

[SSGPA1]

Pakistan Tribes Plan Anti-Taliban Strategy at Biggest Gathering
March 19, 2010, 3:37 AM EDT

Business Exchange By Anwar Shakir

March 19 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistan’s tribal leaders will discuss a strategy tomorrow to end support for militants, their biggest gathering since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001 and removed the Taliban from power.

At least 3,000 elders representing the 20 largest tribes in North West Frontier Province and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas will hold a meeting known as a ‘jirga’ in the provincial capital of Peshawar, Naeem Gul, one of the organizers, said in an interview.

Tribal support is crucial to efforts by Pakistan’s army to prevent insurgents from regrouping after an offensive in the region, focused on Swat Valley and South Waziristan, against groups blamed for 80 percent of nationwide terror attacks. Elders failed to stop the rise of militancy after the Taliban fled Afghanistan and thousands of tribesmen joined their ranks, killing scores of pro-government leaders.

“We plan to reach a consensus and form a panel of 40 tribal elders from all the various parts of the region,” said Syed Alam Khan Mehsud, leader of the Amn Tehrik, or Peace Movement, which is organizing the gathering. “They will then be responsible for mobilizing people against the militants.”

Jirgas are the traditional way of solving disputes among the ethnic Pashtun tribes of Afghanistan and northern Pakistan. The men typically sit in a circle on the ground and the meeting ends with a prayer by the most senior tribal elder. The government will not be represented at tomorrow’s gathering.

“This struggle for peace through jirgas is good but this time, military operations are the only solution for ending militancy and terrorism,” said Basheer Bilour, a senior provincial minister in the NWFP. “The army has spent just one year in Swat Valley and South Waziristan. It will take a long time to defeat the terrorists.”

Transferring Responsibility

In January, Pakistan’s government agreed to transfer responsibility for maintaining order in the longtime Taliban stronghold of South Waziristan to local leaders. More than 500 elders from the dominant Mehsud tribe endorsed the government proposal at a jirga.

Under the 1901 Frontier Crimes Regulation, which governs the seven districts of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, tribes are collectively responsible for any criminal acts in territory under their control.

Pakistan is pushing for cooperation from the tribes to help quell violence that has claimed more than 900 lives in nationwide suicide bombings and gun battles since 28,000 troops launched an offensive in South Waziristan in October. At least 3,000 tribal leaders have been killed by the Taliban since 2004, according to Peshawar-based Amn Tehrik.

The Taliban’s capability to wage nationwide terror strikes from South Waziristan has been minimized, Army Spokesman Athar Abbas said in a Feb. 23 interview. The military drove Taliban militants from the Swat Valley in a 10-week campaign that started in May.

--Editors: Naween A. Mangi, Bill Austin

To contact the reporter on this story: Anwar Shakir in Peshawar, Pakistan at ashakir@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Foxwell at sfoxwell@bloomberg.net.

Pakistan Tribes Plan Anti-Taliban Strategy at Biggest Gathering - BusinessWeek

 

[air marshal]

At least 10 militants were reported killed and several others were injured in air raids at Arghanjo, Dago and Shadla areas of upper Orakzai Agency. AFP

 

[ameer219]

28 Taliban surrender in Bajaur
KHAR: As many as 28 Taliban belonging to various areas of Mamoond tehsil in Bajaur Agency laid down their arms and surrendered to the security forces on Sunday. The militants also announced full support for the government and vowed to remain loyal to the state. The security forces also seized a huge cache of arms and ammunition during search operations in various areas of Mamoond tehsil. staff report

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan

 

[fatman17]

Pakistan Security Brief - April 15, 2010
Pakistan Security Brief – April 15, 2010

Security forces kill at least six militants in Orakzai, ICRC comments on IDPs; US drone hits militant vehicle in North Waziristan; LI asks to hold talks with government; four militants arrested in Kurram; Pakistan calls on US to do more in Bajaur;

FATA

At least six militants have been killed in clashes with security forces in the Shireen Dara and Goeen areas of Lower Orakzai as part of the military’s continuing operations there. In addition, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Wednesday that the Pakistan Red Crescent Society (PRCS) is making concerted efforts to help IDPs who have fled the fighting in Orakzai and Kurram Agencies.[1] (For detailed daily updates on Pakistani military operations in Orakzai, CLICK HERE).

Two missiles fired from a US drone struck a vehicle in the Amboor Shaga area of North Waziristan on Wednesday, killing 3-4 militants. Although one report suggests that those killed in the strike may have been foreign militants, the victims’ identities have not yet been confirmed.[2]

Lashkar-e-Islam (LI) spokesman Zarr Khan has appealed to the government to hold talks with LI and has also asked that the military stop its operations in Khyber Agency’s Bara sub-district. In his statement, Khan also added that LI is not involved in ‘anti-state activities’ and has not engaged in clashes with security forces.[3]

Security forces arrested four Afghan militants in Kurram Agency on Wednesday. Lieutenant Colonel Akbar Butt said that the militants were plotting to target a passenger convoy travelling to Parachinar but were apprehended before they could carry out the attack.[4]

Colonel Nauman Saeed, the commander overseeing military operations in Bajaur Agency, has criticized the US of not doing enough to fight militants in the area, saying that US forces failed to stop more than 700 militants who had fled Bajaur into the Kunar province of Afghanistan.[5]

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

The secret war – and the hidden lair of the Taliban​

Patrick Cockburn investigates the insurgents' mountain hideaway – and a little-known conflict that has killed thousands

Friday, 16 April 2010

The Pakistani army has fought successfully to control mountainous frontier areas once ruled by the Pakistani Taliban, but it remains reluctant to attack the cross-border safe havens of the Afghan Taliban despite American pressure.

Pakistani soldiers in Bajaur district on the Afghan frontier are eager to demonstrate what they have already achieved, showing off captured tunnels dug into the hillside by the local Taliban to protect their fighters against air and artillery attack. On display are some rockets and shells and a broken sign put up outside a building serving as a court house in the last days of Taliban rule reading: "Don't bring any more cases."

In Bajaur, a heavily populated area of mountains and well-watered terraces and valleys, the Pakistani army is once more very much in charge. Col Nauman Saeed, commander of the 3,500-strong Bajaur Scouts, said: "I want to end the misconception that our frontier areas are the most ungovernable in the world."
Related articles

Even so the Pakistani army is taking no chances. I travelled by helicopter from Islamabad to Khar, the small town which is the district capital, to avoid a 10-hour road trip through at least three mountain ranges. As we drove half a dozen miles along the dusty road from Col Saeed's headquarters, with its neat lawns and beds of roses, to the tunnels and caves where the local Taliban formerly had their headquarters, there was a soldier on guard every few hundred yards. The soldiers did not look as if they expected to be shot at, and the fields around Khar are green with young crops, but there is little traffic on the road and half the shops look closed.

Bajaur may be pacified, but at least a third of Pakistan's half-million strong army is now deployed in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of which it is part. Urged on by the US, the Pakistani military have taken back areas once held by the Pakistani Taliban all along the border, but it is reluctant to enter those like North Waziristan which the Americans see as a crucial base of the Afghan Taliban.

The Pakistani army's campaign in FATA has been largely successful so far. The price has been high in terms of refugees, ruined villages and casualties. In Bajaur the army lost 150 dead and 637 wounded, while several thousand insurgents are claimed dead.

There was little sign of battle damage on Khar, but Col Saeed said that 12 villages totally destroyed in fighting over the last two years have not been rebuilt. Some 70,000 people out of a population of 1.2 million in Bajaur are still refugees, along with a million others from the rest of Pakistan's North West Frontier province.

Many people have died and are still dying in this vicious and little-reported war where it is difficult to get details even when there are many dead. For instance last Saturday some 75 villagers were killed in an air strike by Pakistani jets in the Khyber district of FATA. The army at first said they were Islamic militants, but later admitted that there had been a blunder and victims were being compensated.

Two days after this attack Pakistani officials said that four people had been killed by an American drone hitting a vehicle in North Waziristan. A local resident claimed that in reality 13 civilians, including two children, had died in the explosion.

It may be that local inhabitants are glad to see the back of the Taliban. Officers point out a dry river bed near Khar where people were assembled to watch public executions. But at the same time the area remains very much under military occupation, with frequent checkpoints and fortified outposts. The Bajaur Scouts are recruited from local tribes, but there is also an army brigade in the district.

It is hazardous to draw too many conclusions from an official tour such as the one I was on in Bajaur. There is so much one does not see. But it is impossible for foreign journalists to visit the area without official permission and protection.

Just how necessary this protection is was demonstrated a few hours after I had left Khar when gunmen burst into the house of a local journalist called Imran and shot and badly wounded him and his sister. A press report recalled that Imran's father had been murdered when covering insurgent activities in an earlier incident.

Officially Pakistan decries the use of the American drones, but a senior security official confirmed that the drones rely on information supplied by local agents of Pakistan's ISI intelligence service. Without such intelligence the US officers directing the drones, which are launched from inside Pakistan, would not know who or what to target. Some 73 ISI agents have been killed setting up these intelligence networks. Several of them have been seen on video being ritually beheaded by the Taliban.

The Pakistan army's public denunciation of and private collaboration with the drone attacks is one example of its ambivalent relationship with the US. In American eyes it is reluctant to act against Afghan Taliban safe havens along the border in the same way as it did against their Pakistani equivalents. To many Pakistani soldiers this would be a very different type of war.

Col Saeed says he calls the local Islamic militants "miscreants" who have no aim other than to win power and do not deserve the name of Taliban. He has a much higher opinion of the Taliban fighters in Afghanistan and has his own explanation as to why the US forces in Kunar, the Afghan province across the border from Bajaur, have so little success. "They don't have the legitimacy we do," he says.

He believes that the Afghan Taliban become insurgents and are motivated because they are members of the Pashtun community which has been marginalised. His analysis is confirmed by many American officials on the ground. The strength of the Pakistan Taliban was probably always exaggerated in the West. They were never more than a powerful irritant rather than a real threat to the Pakistani state even when they took over the Swat Valley. Their open bloodthirstiness, demonstrated on videos of the public lashing of women, isolated them politically.

Peace has not returned to FATA. Local papers carry stories down-column of suspected Islamic militants' houses being burned, refugees in flight or returning, a girls' school destroyed by insurgents and many killed by American drone attacks. The army is in control, but it is not clear what would happen if it left. It may find it more difficult to get out of FATA than it was to get in.

Frontier area in numbers

70,000 people Out of population of 1.2 million in Bajaur are refugees.

150 pakistan soldiers killed by insurgents in Bajaur.

75 civilians killed in Pakistan air strike in Khyber last Saturday.

The secret war – and the hidden lair of the Taliban - Asia, World - The Independent

 

[air marshal]

 

[ajpirzada]

In Bajaur, Pakistan Army faults U.S. strategy

Sandeep Dikshit
KHAAR (BAJAUR): After a bloody campaign that lasted six months, the Pakistan Army has restored control over this tribal agency that nearly fell last year to a rampaging Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). As the Army helicopter swept down towards the fort, it was clear that the Army and the paramilitary Bajaur Scouts were putting their best foot forward to showcase an area that had gone out of state control to militias aligned with Behtullah Mehsud's TTP.

Rosy-cheeked children, girls and boys, stream out of schools, the older ones taking home provisions of sugar and flour, the younger ones stopping to wave at the hurrying convoy. People are clustered around a pack of shops crammed with medicines near one of the biggest hospitals in the region. And the few general-purpose shops open have multi-coloured sweets.

Three of the area's top TTP leaders are on the run. A meticulously dug cave near the village of Damadola was assaulted and captured, and operations are on in the higher mountain reaches that enclose the wide valley of Khaar town and its adjoining villages.

In the fort, senior Army officials detached themselves from inspecting a captured wheeled contraption — used by militants to quickly shift mortar guns from one firing location to another — to meet Indian journalists ferried from Islamabad. The gutted armoured vehicles and mini-trucks Pakistani journalists saw months earlier have been removed, and bombarded shops and houses where militants made their last stand are the only aberration to a partly enforced scene of normalcy.

But the danger is present and serenity brittle. A short distance from the briefing room, two artillery guns are dug into the soft soil, their barrels facing the mountains, misty in the upper reaches and divided into canopies of green and smouldering boulders. The guns are part of the heavy weaponry that the Pakistan Army flooded the frontier agencies with to plaster militants mercilessly after ordering the evacuation of the entire population.

The Army is still not taking any chances. A large group of men in Pathan suits, spotted hurrying away when the helicopter landed, could be the same ones who lined the bazaar when the media convoy passed by. Most shops are shuttered and traffic on either side has been stopped. Soldiers with their backs to us dot the entire route to a laboriously dug TTP hideout aimed at riding out air attacks. The Army overran it while they were still adding cisterns and doorframes.

An army captain suddenly materialises when the last vehicle in the convoy stalls, gets into the driver's seat and shows the right way to disengage the gears. This is near the village of Damadola, where a U.S. airstrike killed 83. It is also the birthplace of the TTP's predecessor organisation. Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Omar were sighted here after the U.S. bombing in 2001, using the same high ridges they roamed during the anti-Soviet jehad.

But soldiers cramming the back of the SUVs are relaxed, one confessing that he just “missed” becoming a shaheed when his platoon was encircled. He and his mates escaped getting slaughtered after fighter jets and helicopter gunships arrived to pound militant positions.

The Pakistan Army is still taking casualties — it has already lost 1,000 men and officers, with 9,000 injured — and the militants retain the wherewithal to issue press statements and dispatch suicide bombers.

This is the 22nd delegation of foreign journalists being brought to the Bajaur tribal agency, bordering Afghanistan's Kunar province, which has the same stock of Pathan tribals. But this is the first time the Pakistan Army has brought Indian journalists. And they were wholehearted about fulfilling their part of the bargain.

Twice the choppers were ready, but cloud cover made crossing the mountains and valleys on the way to this northernmost of the seven Pakistani tribal agencies treacherous. The promise was to take us to the scenic Swat Valley as well, but it had to be aborted as the weather cleared only on the last day of our stay in Islamabad.

But this would probably be the first batch of journalists that was sympathetic to their narrative of why militants overran the tribal agencies, bringing in their wake deadly ambushes, pitiless killing of civilians suspected of collaborating with the government, checkpoints on roads, closure of music and barber shops, and revenue collection in the name of donations.

All senior Pakistan Army officials make the same point: the faulty U.S. strategy in Afghanistan pushed militants here and nearly led to the takeover of the tribal agencies and Swat. There is no coordination between the two forces on U.S. drone attacks, which “ignite” public opinion as they also kill children and women. Instead, western reports prefer to describe the terrain that has hosted proxy warriors for three decades and the fact that outsiders rarely get access to the region where the distrust of strangers borders on xenophobia, but a guest will be sheltered against all odds. Where there is no application of conventional law, but tribes have self-governance systems. Force and allurement are two sides of the coin to ensure the state's writ is more or less maintained.

The Army has taken a huge gamble by hosting Indian journalists and baring their innermost thoughts to them. The common thread of the briefings was acute displeasure with U.S. political and military tactics.

The U.S. was trying to rectify its political mistake of ignoring Pashtuns in the Afghan governance structure through military strategy, said an officer. Another found fault in the military strategy: “While they pushed from the north, they did not block the rear.”

Either way, in these rugged frontier regions, Pakistan has been left fighting a Holy War that has ricocheted.

The Hindu : Front Page : In Bajaur, Pakistan Army faults U.S. strategy

 

[Javed3]

AgNoStIc MuSliM:

""but at least a third of Pakistan's half-million strong army is now deployed in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of which it is part"".

1/3rd of the Army deployed on our own soil, while the nation is groaning under extreme poverty and 16-hours of load shedding; and you call that a "successful" strategy? Being a US "ally" or sorts should have been the key to attaining the prosperity level of Taiwan and Korea. Instead we are sliding down the bottomless pit of misery.
NA KHUDA HI MILA NA WISAL-E-SANAM


""In Bajaur, Pakistan Army faults U.S. strategy""

This is absolutely comic!. Our brilliant Military commanders have been reading too much into the Hammer and Anvil operations!. They really believed they are some sort of "Hammer".