December 15,2008:
The newly elected civilian government in Pakistan is trying to dismantle
the pro-Islamic radical elements in the ISI (a combination of military
intelligence and CIA). It's not certain that this effort will work, even though
it began several months ago, not in the wake of the recent Mumbai attack. Last
July, the U.S. accused the Pakistani ISI (Inter Service Intelligence agency) of
being directly involved in a recent terror bombing of the Indian embassy in
Afghanistan. The accusation not only involved CIA representatives going to
Pakistan to present intelligence information directly to Pakistani leaders, but
also leaking the event to the media. This was one of many instances where ISI
has supported Islamic terrorists, and this time Pakistan reacted by saying they
would root out "Taliban spies" in the ISI.
The problem
is that these Islamic radicals have been operating openly in the ISI for three
decades, and were put there by the government in the late 1970s, when it was
decided that Islamic conservatism was the solution for Pakistan's problems
(corruption and religious/ethnic conflicts.) These guys are not just
"Taliban spies," but Pakistani intelligence professionals that
believe in Islamic radicalism. The ISI itself was created in 1948 as a reaction
to the inability of the IB (Intelligence Bureau, which collected intelligence
on foreign countries in general) and MI (Military Intelligence, which collected
intel on military matters) to work together and provide useful information. The
ISI was supposed to take intel from IB and MI, analyze it and present it to
senior government officials. But in the 1950s, the government began to use the
ISI to collect intel on Pakistanis, especially those suspected of opposing the
current government. This backfired eventually, and in the 1970s, the ISI was
much reduced by a civilian government. But when another coup took place in
1977, and the new military government decided that religion was the cure for
what ailed the country.
Typically,
the Pakistani generals seized control of the government every decade or so,
when the corruption and incompetence of elected officials becomes too much for
the military men to tolerate. The generals never did much better, and
eventually there were elections, and the cycle continued. The latest iteration
began in 1999, when the army took over, and was only voted out of power last
year. Civilian governments tend to be hostile to the ISI, and apparently they
are going to make a real effort to clear out many of the Islamic radicals in
the ISI this time around. Then again, recent attempts by the government to take
control of the ISI backfired when the generals said they would not allow it.
Nothing is simple in Pakistan.
The ISI grew
particularly strong during the 1980s, when billions of dollars, most of it in
the form of military and economic aid, arrived from the oil-rich Arab governments
of the Persian Gulf. All this was to support the Afghans who were resisting a
Russian invasion (in support of Afghan communists who had taken control of the
government, and triggered a revolt of the tribes). The Afghan communists were
atheists, and this greatly offended Saudi Arabia, and other Arab countries, who
feared that Russia would encourage Arab
communists to rebel elsewhere. So the resistance to the Russians in Afghanistan
was declared a holy war which, after a fashion, it was. After about nine years
of fighting the tribes, the Russians got tired of their slow progress (and more
pressing problems back home, like the collapse of their economy from decades of
communist mismanagement) and went home.
The Russians
were gone by 1989 (and the Soviet Union collapsed two years later), but the
Afghans promptly fell upon each other and the civil war seemed never-ending.
This upset Pakistan, which wanted to send millions of Afghan refugees back
home. Few of the refugees were interested, as long as Afghans were still
fighting each other. So the ISI created its own faction, the Taliban, by
recruiting teachers and students from a network of religious schools that had
been established (with the help of Saudi Arabian religious charities) in the
1980s. The most eager recruits were young Afghans from the refugee camps. The
Taliban were fanatical, and most Afghans were willing to support them because
they brought peace and justice. But the Taliban never conquered all of
Afghanistan, especially in the north, where there were few Pushtun tribes (most
Taliban were Pushtuns, from tribes in southern Afghanistan). The Pushtuns were
about 40 percent of the population, and had always been the most prominent
faction in Afghanistan (the king of Afghanistan was traditionally a Pushtun.)
Although a
military junta was again running Pakistan when September 11, 2001 came along,
the president of the country, an army general (Pervez Musharraf), sided with
the United States, and turned against the Taliban. But many in the ISI
continued to support the Taliban, and the army was too dependent on the ISI
(for domestic intelligence, and to control Islamic militants that were
attacking India, especially in Kashmir) to crack down on the ISI.
Al Qaeda
took this betrayal badly, and declared war on the Pakistani government. The ISI
was used to seek out and kill or capture most of the hostile al Qaeda
operatives in Pakistan. But the ISI insured that Islamic terrorists who
remained neutral were generally left alone. The ISI thwarted government efforts
to have the army clear the al Qaeda out of the border areas (populated largely
by Pushtun tribes, there being more Pushtuns in Pakistan than in Afghanistan).
But now, in one sense, it's September 11, 2001 all over again. The U.S. has
told Pakistan that it is fed up with getting screwed around by the ISI, and if
Pakistan doesn't clean out the ISI, and shut down Islamic terrorists along the
Afghan border, NATO, U.S. and Afghan troops will cross the border and do it.
Pakistan
wants continued U.S. military aid to bolster its defenses against India. But if
it suddenly has a hostile U.S. in Afghanistan, and less (or no) military aid,
it's general military situation will be, well, not good. While Afghanistan, and
the foreign troops there, are dependent on Pakistani ports and trucking
companies for supplies, Pakistan is also dependent on the U.S. Navy for access
to the sea. Pakistan does not want to go to war with the United States in order
to defend Islamic terrorists it openly says it is at war with. Pakistan is being
forced to destroy the Islamic radical movement it has nurtured over the last
three decades, although it's still questionable if there's enough political
will in Pakistan to actually do the deed. The international condemnation of Pakistan based Islamic terrorists
responsible for the recent Mumbai massacre has put Pakistan in a difficult
position. If the Islamic radical groups in the country are not really shut
down, Pakistan risks be branded a terrorist state.