The Pakistan Update

by Sen. Carl Levin and Senator Diane Feinstein

The revelation that Osama bin Laden was comfortably hiding out for years in a city popular with Pakistan’s military elite raises disturbing questions that Islamabad needs to answer.

Pakistan will hopefully hold a high-level, civilian investigation — by respected and qualified people — to discover whether any Pakistani officials knew this and to share those answers with the Pakistani people and the international community.

Some basic questions: How was the land bought? How were permits acquired? How could a conspicuous structure be built without Pakistani officials being aware or investigating?

But even before the bin Laden discovery, Pakistan’s actions over the past few years convinced us that an honest look at the relationship between Washington and Islamabad — including our financial aid to Pakistan — is warranted. We need to examine our mutual strategic interests to determine how they align.

The record has been mixed.

Pakistan’s contributions to countering international terrorism need a clear-eyed review. Islamabad has arrested key senior terrorist leaders, including Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. It has suffered greatly at the hands of terrorists — tens of thousands of Pakistani citizens have been killed in terrorist attacks over the past decade. Yet bin Laden’s hiding in plain sight for years suggests either complicity or incompetence on the part of Pakistani officials.

Most disturbing, though, are Pakistan’s continuing ties to extremist militant groups — particularly the Haqqani group in North Waziristan and the Afghan Taliban shura in and around Quetta. Pakistan provides safe harbor to the Haqqani insurgent group responsible for attacks against U.S. and coalition forces across the border in Afghanistan. Regardless of what Pakistan knew about bin Laden’s whereabouts, the Haqqani sanctuaries are well-known.

Similarly, Pakistan continues to provide safe haven for the Afghan Taliban leadership. It is an open secret that the area around Quetta is home to senior Afghan Taliban leaders, including Mullah Omar. This is unacceptable.

Pakistan is also alleged to support the terrorist group Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, known as LT. This organization devised the 2008 Mumbai, India, attack — which killed six Americans. India has requested extradition of the LT leaders, but Pakistan has refused.

U.S.-Pakistan intelligence cooperation has become badly frayed in the past six months. Pakistani media, with the likely assistance of security forces, have twice published names of alleged CIA chiefs of station in Islamabad, posing a safety threat to U.S. citizens in the country.

We also need to review Pakistan’s conduct on nonproliferation. It continues building a significant nuclear arsenal. The Pakistan nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan provided nuclear technology to the world’s most anti-U.S. regimes — including Iran, North Korea and Libya.

In addition, we need to revisit Pakistan’s role in regional stability. Given its population, economy and democratic institutions, Pakistan is inevitably a key player. Yet recent reports that Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, urging him to weaken ties with Washington and instead strengthen relations with China are disconcerting. During an address to parliament on Monday, Gilani called China “Pakistan’s all-weather friend.”

The U.S.-Pakistan relationship is at a pivotal moment. The return of the tail of the downed helicopter from the bin Laden raid could serve as a useful first step in repairing our ties. But it is essential that Pakistan cut its relations with the Haqqani group and the Afghan Taliban and prevent them from using Pakistan as a safe haven from which to launch attacks in Afghanistan.

Many Pakistanis, including those in the military, believe Washington undervalues the losses they have suffered from terrorist attacks. We understand that feeling — and we believe that should unite us in the fight against those who use Pakistani territory as a base for attacks against the U.S. and its allies. Pakistan should end the impunity, if not tacit approval, that those terrorists receive from Pakistan. As long as that situation exists, it will be difficult to maintain political support in the U.S. for our partnership.

There is still an opportunity to put our countries back on the path of partnership and defeat the terrorists who kill innocent men, women and children — including innocent Pakistanis. But that is likely to require not only answers to the legitimate questions about bin Laden’s presence but strong follow-through on Pakistan’s commitment to act against terrorists openly operating there against us and our allies in Afghanistan.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) is chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) is chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

Tags: 9/11, A.Q. Khan, Afghan Taliban, Afghanistan, carl levin, china, CIA, diane feinstein, Featured, Hamid Karzai, haqqani network, Iran, khalid sheikh mohammed, Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, libya, Mullah Omar, non-proliferation, north korea, North Waziristan, nuclear weapons, Osama Bin Laden, Pakistan, Pakistan Army, Pakistan Media, pakistan nuclear weapons, US Pak relations, Yousaf Raza Gilani

Posted in Afghanistan, Blog, News | 1,578 Comments »

by Wajid Ali Syed

You can’t fool all of the people all of the time. At some point reality catches up to you.

Just like it did in Pakistan over the past week.

During the six years that Osama bin Laden was “hiding” in his compound in Pakistan, experts compiled research, wrote reports and articles and convened panels at think tanks to convince the United States that the ISI — Pakistan’s infamous intelligence agency — has been playing a double game. But the ISI and the Pakistan army continued to benefit from the largesse of American aid and official gratitude for their assistance in the war on terror.

In an old interview, Pervez Musharraf, who was the Chief of the Army and head of the state from 1999 to 2008, said he wanted bin Laden captured anywhere in the world but Pakistan. At around the same time Benizar Bhutto accused Musharraf of hiding terrorists and said that bin Laden could be in the basement of the President’s house in Islamabad. As the world now knows, the world’s most wanted terrorist was a block away from the army garrison. The swaggering confidence of his hosts had to turn into unfathomable embarrassment.

This incident is not the first time the Pakistan Army has made claims that strained credulity. When A.Q. Khan was caught operating a nuclear bazaar that trafficked information to the world’s most notorious regimes, the official Army line was that it had no knowledge of his activities.

Because of arrogance, or overconfidence, the Army chose to overlook the fact that the US had been after bin Laden with force and determination years before 9/11. In mid-August of 1998, the then-Pakistan Army Chief General Jahangir Karamat met his American counterpart, General Joseph Ralston. At the dinner table, General Ralston informed General Karamat that in few minutes some sixty Tomahawk cruise missiles would be entering Pakistan’s airspace to hit a location in Afghanistan where bin Laden was believed to be operating training camps. Obviously, General Karamat was shocked.

The next time the US infiltrated Pakistani air space, it was General Kayani’s turn to be shocked. Only now the destination was different and the mission was a success.

But killing bin Laden does not mean that al Qaeda has been destroyed. It’s not solely a terrorist organization. It facilitates and funds other terrorist groups. According to American journalist and author Mary Ann Weaver, al Qaeda is like a clearinghouse from which other groups obtain funds, training, and logistical support. These other groups exist from Egypt to Algeria, from Yemen to Somalia, from Saudi Arabia to the Philippines and, of course, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Probably for this reason al Qaeda does not face a leadership crisis, as such. Interestingly enough, the next two frontrunners to take charge of al Qaeda could be residing deep in Pakistan.

Evidence shows that before settling in Abbottabad, bin Laden was seen in North Waziristan in the Tirah valley, then in Balochistan for a short time (probably meeting with the Quetta shura). Months after, he was spotted near Meran Shah with none other than Ayman al Zawahari. Later, al Zawahari was seen with Jalaluddin Haqqani, the head of the Taliban in North Waziristan.

Balochistan’s Quetta Shura and North Waziristan still stand out as al Qaeda and Taliban hideouts. Now that the US has embarrassed the Pakistan Army and its intelligence network for being unaware of the presence of the world’s most wanted terrorist in their own backyard, American officials should keep up the pressure and demand the capture of all terrorist group members and especially their leaders. In a grim yet darkly amusing example of the militants’ ability to survive and thrive, in 2002 Taliban leader Mullah Omar escaped the US Army on a motorbike.

The official Pakistani response to bin Laden’s presence in Pakistan doesn’t hold water. But even if we give the Pakistan Army the benefit of the doubt for not knowing where bin Laden was, it has been an open secret that Jalaluddin Haqqani and Mullah Omar reside somewhere deep in Pakistan. The army does know about Mullah Omar and Haqqani, and the US has been asking it to take action.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Senator John Kerry are still on board, claiming that the US needs access to the Afghanistan supply routes via Pakistan. This official excuse to continue sending aid is that the ISI has been an invaluable ally in helping the US root out terrorists. Now the Pakistan Army should make a grand gesture if it wants to be taken seriously as a partner.

Meanwhile, the US should attach some strings to the aid it lavishes on Pakistan. The Pakistan Army has always been a powerbroker in the country, not answerable to anyone. It’s been said that Pakistan is not a country with an army, but an army with a country.

The US was treated to a dose of the Army’s determination to keep a grip on foreign cash during fuss kicked up over the Kerry Lugar bill, a measure that would provide $7.5 billion in non-military aid over a five year period to help the civilian government provide essential services to the population. The Urdu press went berserk, turning the proposal into a dark conspiracy aimed at undermining Pakistani sovereignty. The army exploited the outrage, carving out a good chunk out of the funds. Apart from foreign military aid, the army gets a lion’s share from the national budget without any accountability, funds that could otherwise be used to pay for education and infrastructure.

So, now that the Pakistan Army has been caught red handed eagerly accepting money to fight terrorism while claiming not to know that the world’s most notorious terrorist was living within a stone’s throw of that same army’s training academy, perhaps it’s time for the US to focus on supporting the country’s fragile political government and demand better results and more candor from the military.

This article originally appeared in the Huffington Post

Tags: 9/11, A.Q. Khan, Abbottabad, Afghanistan, Al Qaeda, algeria, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Balochistan, Benazir Bhutto, double game, Egypt, Featured, General Ashfaq Kayani, General Joseph Ralston, Hillary Clinton, ISI, Jahangir Karamat, Jalaluddin Haqqani, John Kerry, Kerry Lugar Bill, Mullah Omar, North Waziristan, Osama Bin Laden, Pakistan, Pakistan Army, Pervez Musharraf, philippines, Quetta Shura, Saudi Arabia, somalia, urdu media, yemen

Posted in Blog, News | 2,064 Comments »

by Bruce Reidel

Osama bin Laden’s death is a severe blow to al Qaeda–but not its end. His death answers some key questions about the terror cell and Pakistan, but leaves some even more perplexing ones still open.

First, congratulations to President Obama and the CIA. From the very start of his administration he ordered an intense focus on al Qaeda and its leader. The trail had long gone cold due largely to the diversion of critical resources to Iraq back in 2002 and 2003. Obama rightly promised to focus on Pakistan, the center of the global jihad and the most dangerous country in the world, and his efforts have now paid off.

Many had questioned whether bin Laden was still alive almost ten years after 9/11. But there was never really any doubt. By eluding justice after his first attacks on America in 1998, bin Laden created a mystique of invulnerability. He remained not just a symbol of al Qaeda’s continuing threat but a real leader, issuing strategic direction and propaganda.

His death weakens al Qaeda’s cohesion and its image of being beyond the reach of America. It comes after two years of intense pressure on the group and its allies in Pakistan and Afghanistan from American drones in the skies as well as NATO boots on the ground in Afghanistan. Key lieutenants like his operational commander in Afghanistan, a fellow Saudi named Abdul Ghani, have been tracked down and killed just this spring. The pressure was designed to weaken al Qaeda’s operational tempo, disrupting its routines. The strategy has worked. Presumably his hideout deep in Pakistan also contained clues and data that will help further dismantle al Qaeda’s core.

But the terror cell has always known bin Laden was at risk and it has devolved much authority to his deputy, the Egyptian Ayman Zawahiri, and to others. Zawahiri has been the public face of al Qaeda for years. Just this year he has released five audio messages focused on the Arab spring (he put out only four in all of last year). Bin Laden in contrast was silent about the wave of revolutions in Arabia. The New Mexico born Yemeni Anwar Awlaki has emerged as another operational and propaganda hub with his on line English language magazine Inspire and his al Qaeda Yemen cell has tried to attack Detroit and Chicago already. We can expect effusive memorials from them to their fallen “martyr.”

And we should expect the threat of more al Qaeda attacks to remain real. This weekend, several terrorists linked to al Qaeda were arrested for plotting an attack in Germany. Last week, the group’s Maghreb affiliate struck in Morocco, killing Western tourists.

Obama was right to call his Pakistani counterpart, Asif Ali Zardari, to thank him for help in the chase. Zardari’s wife Benazir Bhutto was murdered by al Qaeda in 2007; the death of the country’s most popular and capable leader was perhaps the group’s biggest triumph since 9/11. Pakistan has yet to recover from her demise. Al Qaeda has been focused like a laser beam on Pakistan for the last decade. It rightly judges Pakistan to be both uniquely vulnerable in the Islamic world to jihadism and equipped with the ultimate strategic prize, the fastest growing nuclear arsenal in the world. With allies like the Taliban and Lashkar-e-Taiba, al Qaeda will remain a threat to Pakistan’s nascent democracy and to peace in the Indian subcontinent.

Obama should schedule an early Zardari visit to Washington and his own visit later this year to Pakistan to signal our support for democratic forces there. We also now know what many long suspected: that Bin Laden was not hiding in Pakistan’s tribal wastelands, but rather in its heartland. He was killed in Abbotabad, the home town of Pakistan’s first military dictator, Ayub Khan, just thirty miles from the capital Islamabad. This raises the question: who helped him all these years hide in-country? He was not alone in al Qaeda in hiding out in Pakistan’s towns and cities. Khalid Shaykh Muhammad and Abu Zubayda, two key al Qaeda operatives, were caught in Pakistan’s urban centers. Mullah Omar, bin Laden’s Afghan Taliban partner (and the man he swore loyalty to even in the last few years) has long been thought to be hiding in Pakistan’s mega- port of Karachi. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has often publicly said she suspected some in the Pakistani establishment knew where to find bin Laden. She raised the right question. It remains a good one.

Al Qaeda long ago became more than a terror group. It is an idea, the concept of global jihad against America. It has an elaborate narrative to justify murder. But Bin Laden was caught off guard by the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions this winter and the wave of turmoil that has followed them. These popular uprisings challenged his whole worldview that terror and jihad were the only way to free Islam of its dictators and of what he called “Crusader-Zionist oppression.” The triumph of freedom in Tahrir Square was a blow to al Qaeda—a sign that aside from in Pakistan and Yemen, the group seemed increasingly marginalized. NATO is now fighting to free Libya, not to occupy it. Whether al Qaeda can adapt to the new Arab renaissance is an open question. Bin Laden won’t be able to answer it. Can his heirs?

Bruce Riedel, a former longtime CIA officer, is a senior fellow in the Saban Center at the Brookings Institution. At Obama’s request, he chaired the strategic review of policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2009.

Tags: 9/11, Abbotabad, Abdul Ghani, Abu Zubayda, Al Qaeda, Anwar Awlaki, Ayman Zawahiri, Ayub Khan, Benazir assassination, Benazir Bhutto, CIA, drones, Featured, Hillary Clinton, Islamabad, Jihad, karachi, Khalid Shaykh Muhammad, Lashkar e Taiba, Mullah Omar, NATO, Obama, Pakistan, President Asif Ali Zardari, Taliban

Posted in Afghanistan, Blog, News | 1,021 Comments »

Just another school day in late December.  Students at Karachi University gathered to discuss the latest news – class schedules, assignments, politics.  They were solid students from middle-class homes, proud to be enrolled at the university and looking forward to life post-graduation. It was lunchtime, so small groups gathered to unwrap their meals, perhaps share their food.  Across the lawn, a Shiite student’s group gathered to pray.  Suddenly, a blast shattered the quiet.  Four of the students from the prayer group were rushed to the hospital. Police arrested three students who were affiliated with an Islamic organization whose members are non-Shiite.
During the investigation, Ali Wasif, 23, a Shiite student leader who witnessed the bombing, said he attributed it to “Zionist” and other non-Muslim “elements.”

But that’s not new. Following the 9/11 attacks, a rumor spread around the world that some 4,000 Jews employed by companies housed in the World Trade Center stayed home from work, warned in advance of the impending attack (in some reports, the word “Jews” was replaced by “Israelis”).  

When CBS News reporter Lara Logan was brutally assaulted in Tahir Square following the fall of Hosni Mubarak, the crowd of men reportedly shouted “Jew, Jew” as they were attacking her.

The question of why anti-Semitic rumors, thoughts and conspiracy theories are so prevalent in the Muslim world are a source of beffudlement in many quarters. Tarek Fatah, in a scholarly and powerful new book “The Jew Is Not My Enemy: Unveiling the Myths That Fuel Anti-Semitism,” goes in-depth to explain the root causes of why the Muslim world is so suspicious of Jews.

To illustrate how pervasive anti-Semitic thought has become in Pakistan, Fatah shares an anecdote about a conversation he had with a group of Pakistan’s elite in 2006:

“My host and his friends were among the wealthy and well-educated elites of the land. The home where Muslim marginalization was being discussed boasted half a dozen cars in the driveway, a retinue of servants, and a front lawn that was larger than several back yards put together…

I laughed off what in the Islamic world is the ultimate insult to a Muslim – an allegation of being a Jewish lackey. I asked my friends if they were aware that Jews had come to the United States as poor immigrants escaping persecution in Europe in the nineteenth century, yet were able to assimilate and, through hard work, make incredible contributions to American life. I urged them to consider the fact that even though Jews make up just 2 percent of the US population, they form 21 percent of the Ivy League student body. I pointed out that this 2 percent of the American population accounts for 38 percent of Business Week’s list of leading philanthropists, 51 percent of the Pulitzer Prize winners for non-fiction, and 37 percent of Academy Award directors. But they saw in the same statistics the evidence of conspiracy theories: ‘That just proves that the Jews control the USA.’ I was speechless.”  

A large portion of blame can be laid at the feet of the propaganda spread by media organizations in the Muslim world, many of which are tightly controlled by dictators who use inflammatory material to control restless, disgruntled and often illiterate masses.  The tactic serves as an effective tool to change the subject from local misery and lack of political freedom and free speech to sympathizing with a rallying cause, usually that of the Palestinians, whose fate will ultimately have little to no impact on quality of life in the countries who populations agitate for their statehood.  Indeed, as Fatah points out, even if the Palestinians were to be given their own homeland and the state of Israel ceased to exist, there is little chance that the anti-Semitism that has taken root in the Muslim world would cease to exist or even dissipate.

Fatah is no apologist for Israel. While supporting Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, he writes that Israel must end its “illegal” and “immoral” occupation of Palestinian territory and push for a Palestinian state alongside Israel.  

How and when in history did anti-Semitism became so deeply rooted in the Muslim world? To answer that question, he turns to Bernard Lewis, one of the foremost scholars of Islamic history. As Lewis explains,

The origins can be traced back to Europe, where for centuries Jews had been persecuted first by the Catholic Church, then afterwards by Protestant Christians as well, leading to expulsions, pogroms, the containment of Jews to filthy ghettoes and the Inquisition. Lewis posits that the anti-Semitism of Europe first entered the Muslim world because of Islam’s conquest of Europe, which resulted in many Christians converting to Islam. Later, when Europe hit back and colonized the Middle East, its anti-Jewish ideas infiltrated the Muslim world. Greek Orthodox Christians living under Ottoman rule are said to have introduced the notion of the blood libel – the accusation that Jews murder children to use their blood in certain aspects of their religious rituals and holidays – into the Middle East.

A pivotal moment in Jewish-Muslim relations was Turkey’s implementation of the Reform Act in 1856, which gave equal status to all Ottoman subjects irrespective of religious background, and forbade discrimination against non-Muslims. Suddenly, Jewish citizens were deemed equal to their Muslim counterparts, much to the resentment of the Muslim clergy and the privileged classes. Rumors of a Jewish conspiracy began to circulate. And a powerful prejudice took root, then spread like a virus across the Muslim world.

One of the book’s most interesting aspects is the chapters that deal with Muhammad’s slaughter of the Banu Qurayza. Fatah denounces the story as invented by influential scholar Ibn Ishaq nearly 100 years after the Prophet’s death. No archeological evidence supports it. No Jewish text corroborates it. Yet the story forms part of Islam’s Hadith literature and the Sira, the biography of the Prophet, and has come to be regarded as divine truth.  Indeed, Fatah criticizes Islam’s lack of tradition of questioning religious texts.

This work will be a hard pill to swallow for many readers, particularly in Pakistan, where conspiracy theories and paranoia have risen to such absurd levels that the author reports of a banner in a Karachi street reading “Bird Flu Is a Jewish Conspiracy.”  For Pakistan and the rest of the Muslim world to advance, the media must take a more responsible role and cease spreading rumor as fact.  The population needs to address grievances and Muslim-on-Muslim violence and repression of religious minorities rather than throw up their hands and continue to blame a Jewish conspiracy for their ills.  

Even more sobering than the actual content of this bracing book is that Fatah has been praised as brave for writing it.

Tags: 9/11, anti-Semitism, bernard lewis, jews, karachi, Lara Logan, Muslims, Ottoman Empire, Pakistan, Pakistan Media, Tarek Fatah, The Jew is Not My Enemy

Posted in Around, Blog, News | 1,147 Comments »

by Bilal Qureshi

There we go again. Earlier today, law enforcement authorities arrested yet another terrorist in the making – a naturalized American of Pakistani origin, Farooque Ahmed, for trying to help coordinate bombing of Washington’s Metro System, also known as the subway system. Once again, fortunately, this nut’s plot was never a serious threat, but for his part, Farooque Ahmed did everything in his power to hurt, harm and devastate whatever he could.

Shame on him and shame on everyone who knowingly supported his sickening plot to target innocent civilians. Really, shame on them.

Given what Muslims in general, but in this case, Pakistanis in particular have tried to do to attack America to date; it truly is amazing that so far, the Americans have been superbly generous, amazingly tolerant and insanely forgiving towards Muslims within the United States. But can this relaxed attitude towards Muslims continue, given repeated attempts to harm America? Only time will tell, but common sense points towards justified anger emerging within this country in the very near future, if Muslims, and Pakistanis (not all Pakistanis) don’t give up their violent and wicked dreams of attacking America.

I personally have had the misfortune to come across people who didn’t believe that Al-Qaeeda existed, or worse, that Osama and his cronies are behind any effort, including the horrific tragedy of 9/11, to harm America, but naively, I dismissed them as loonies. However, it seems that it is a mistake, in fact, a horrible blunder to not take anyone seriously who speaks of Osama admiringly and who believes that every foiled terrorist attack is actually a ‘conspiracy concocted by the CIA’.

I suspect that this misguided man Farooque Ahmed will too justify his behavior by complaining that Muslims are being attacked for their religion, and that there is a conspiracy against Islam. And, even though he was living in America, he still got plenty of material not only on the Internet, but also in the mosques that he and his family visited. And, it makes me really sad, because Farooque had every opportunity to study in detail that Muslims are hurting because of their own failures and their misfortunes have nothing to do with America, honestly. Worse yet, he could have helped his Muslim brother and sisters by dispelling this notion of ‘Muslims are being attacked for being Muslims’ but instead, he opted to go down the wrong path, and now, thankfully, he is in custody, and fortunately, his vicious dreams will never materialize.

However, for me, his arrest is not the end of the struggle to beat hate mongers, because for me, it represents just one chapter that came to light and I believe that there are many more people within the United State who think and agree with the ideology that inspired Farooque Ahmed to engage in terrorist activities.

I believe that it is time for Muslims, and of course, Pakistanis in American to seriously entertain the notion that political Islam is not the way to move forward. Muslims and Pakistanis must decide whether they are loyal to America or not and if not, believe me, nobody wants to keep them in the United States forcefully. These people, whether it is Faisal Shazad and Farooque Ahmed and numerous others like them to move to another country that welcomes their ideology of hate.

In America, we reject this appalling idea of carrying out revolting attacks in the name of religious fight.

Thankfully, in America, there is no room for religious hate and we all, regardless of our background, support the efforts to defeat nihilists.

Tags: 9/11, america, CIA, conspiracy, dc, Faisal Shahzad, Farooque Ahmed, metro, Muslims, Osama Bin Laden, pakistanis, subway, Terrorism, terrorist

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By Dr Manzur Ejaz

The rise of the right wing conservative religious forces in Pakistan was due to a combination of factors. A changing economy, military adventures and backward state institutions played a main role in giving rise to jihadism, etc. It was not dictator Zia or other military rulers who were the only players in such an outcome. The evolution of Pakistan has to be reviewed in a broad historical perspective.

The 1965 war had done irreparable damage to Ayub Khan’s regime; the economy started sagging, food shortages became common and prices of necessities saw a steep rise. In such a depressing environment, Ayub Khan and his son’s corruption scandals became the diet of daily political discussions. In a shrinking job market and increasing population, the post-partition born educated work force was seeking jobs with no success. Later on, Zulifqar Ali Bhutto’s breaking away and his exploitation of the Tashkent Agreement further undermined the Ayub regime.

Around 1965-66, on the surface, Ayub Khan was very strong because there was no credible opposition to his rule except in East Pakistan. (more…)

Tags: 9/11, Af-Pak, Afghan War, Afghanistan, Al Qaeda, Ayub Khan, Extremism, Featured, Fundamentalism, Military dictatorship, Religious Extremism, Soviet Union, Taliban, US Pakistan relations, Yahya Khan, ZA Bhutto, Ziaul Haq

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By Irfan Husain – Dawn Pakistan

Is there — can there ever be — such a thing as accurate, objective history? If history is a true record of the past, how do we know we can trust the record-keepers? And years later, as historians sift through the past, can they be depended on not to let their own biases creep in?

As a student of history, I have long been fascinated with the problem of ascertaining which set of facts about the past to accept, and which to discard. Indeed, how can we even tell what has been handed to us over the years has not been deliberately or accidentally distorted?

This is not just idle speculation. Just as the present shapes the future, so too does the past determine the present. In a sense, we are all prisoners of history, and time has us by the jugular. This is not to say we have no control over our future: each choice we make determines which road we will take. Thus, I do not believe our future is predetermined. We all have the freedom to decide which path we take. Individuals can decide for themselves, and suffer or prosper from the choices they have made. (more…)

Tags: 1971 War, 9/11, Afghanistan, Fundamentalism, History, Media, Pak-India Relations, Pakistan, Pakistan Army

Posted in Blog | 801 Comments »

This post carries an offer for the right wingers. Those who consider themselves good Christians, the ones who talk incessantly about family values and the importance of virginity. The ones who go to Church every Sunday and incorporate Jesus into every nonsensical thought that comes out of their mouths. The wholesome, flag-waving American-born Christians.

For all you believers, Afghanistan has a proposition for you. The Taliban leaders had a grand Jirga and suggested that each riteous Christian should be offered a sum of money, a couple of grand, to change their hearts.

Now, we know not all good Christians are sell outs…but look when you take gas prices, utility bills, unemployment, health, inflation, and the kids’ education into account, is it that hard to imagine that more than a few people would consider the Taliban’s offer?

Good Christians might secretly visit Church even after agreeing to the deal. But what’s going to happen once the money is gone? Good Christians will return to their faith, or will scheme to keep the money coming their way.

Does this sound ridiculous enough?

Well, that’s what Afghanistan’s puppet President Hamid Karzai proposed at the London Conference. The United States backed the idea, and has decided to raise one billion dollars to buy off Taliban or Taliban sympathizers. The specific amount of money each member of the Taliban would receive has not yet been worked out, but given the high corruption level in Afghanistan, my shot in the dark is that they won’t get enough money to keep their loyalties to one party.

Over the next 5 years, as proposed by the Afghan government, this money would be used to establish a trust to finance the reintegration program that would persuade the militants to lay down their weapons.

The U.N. Security Counsel  also removed the names of five Taliban leaders from the “black list” of 144 dangerous terrorists figuring in the sanctions regime under Resolution 1267 dating back to the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. This shows that we are back to square one. As the UN envoy to Afghanistan put it, “If you want results, then you have to talk to the relevant person in authority.”

Paying the bribe to purchase a change of heart is a bogus idea. But some argue that Taliban supporters have failed to realize why international forces are in their country. Interestingly, this idea is supported by the argument that it can’t be worse than the previous efforts.

Well, then the previous efforts were wrong, as this one. Bottom line is, you can not correct a historical blunder with such idiotic tactics. This is what the West never understood and still refuses to.

–

Picture Credit: AP

Tags: 9/11, Afghanistan, Al Qaeda, Christianity, Current Affairs, Featured, Hamid Karzai, Jihadists, London Conference, National Security, Religion, Richard Halbrooke, Taliban, Terrorism, United Nations, UNSC

Posted in Blog | 93 Comments »