Predators for Peace

There has been a substantial increase in cross border US drone attacks inside Pakistani territory since the new Obama administration took charge. Which indicates clear American commitment and intentions to continue and take the war on terror further inside Pakistan.

As for President Obama, we know that American policies are merely influenced by the president of the country. Real force behind the policy making is those think tanks, powerful groups and strong lobbies, that exist in USA.

Commenting on unmanned aerial strikes in Pak Afghan border region, CIA Director Leon Panetta said in February: “I don’t think we can stop just at the effort to try to disrupt them. I think it has to be a continuing effort, because they aren’t going to stop.”

Recent efforts to review the American policy for Afghanistan and Pakistan by President Obama and Richard Holbrooke’s visit to the region also carries another aspect to it. To get reassurances from Pakistanis in war against terror.

“We have two goals,” a senior administration official said. One is to receive their input for the Obama administration’s ongoing strategy review on Afghanistan and Pakistan, he said. “But it’s also to hear commitments — the Pakistanis on taking on terrorists themselves, and the Afghans on cleaning up their government.”

“There are not too many brand-new ideas,” the official said. “But our expectations of what they have to do are not just based on what we want them to do, but what they say they’re going to do. It gives us a different basis for going back to them in the future.”

But this brings us to another question, what has been the role of Pakistani politicians and new Pakistani government in “War against Terror”, and in stopping the cross border attacks and convincing USA that hitting inside Pakistan won’t serve their purpose?

The photographs, obtained from Google Earth by The Times of London and taken three years apart, depict the Shamsi airbase in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Baluchistan, 30 miles from the border of Afghanistan. In the first photograph from 2006, three comparatively small craft are parked on the tarmac. Military aviation experts shown the image said that the aircraft appeared to be MQ1 Predator UAVs — the model used by the CIA to observe and strike militants on the Afghan border. The MQ1 Predator carries two laser-guided Hellfire missiles, and can fly for up to 454 miles, at speeds of up to 135 mph, and at altitudes of up to 25,000 feet, according to the US Air Force. In the second photograph, a brand-new airplane hangar that could easily fit the three aircraft is situated right off the runway, and perimeter defenses have also been established.

Over the past few months, new Pakistani administration has been the key  player in communicating to the world about the threats caused by the Taliban and islamic extremists  in the country. They have shown their concerns even about talibanization of Pakistani nuclear weapons. And in return demand the coperation of US government to fight insurgency in the country.

The difference between the Obama and Bush administrations, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said, is that “the present administration is willing to listen. They are very frank. They’re saying, ‘We do not have a magic formula. . . . Let Pakistan, let the U.S., let Afghanistan — let’s all stick together and find a solution,” Qureshi told CNN.

In a series of interviews last month, Qureshi said that Pakistan objected to the Predator strikes and that he had asked the United States to supply his country with drones to carry out its own missile attacks against extremists. Pakistan had also requested other sophisticated weaponry, including Cobra attack helicopters, communications and night-vision equipment. Although the drones were unlikely — and both U.S. and Pakistani officials say they were privately in agreement on continuation of the CIA strikes — the administration and Congress were likely to approve more military assistance along with a multi billion dollar aid package.

So, the dollars are coming in and our administration is ready to continue its commitment to War on Terror (in Afghanistan and may be in Pakistan as well). But are they ready to face the growing public pressure against the increased drone attacks in the country?

Aftereffects to these attacks can be catastrophic for Pakistan and cause destabilization in the country. If militants face heavy casualties in the border areas through drones and military action, they will move further inside Pakistan, setting up their bases and strong holds in much quite and largely populated cities  creating anarchy and establishing supply channels to reach border. Pakistani police is not professionally trained and capable of handling those militants and so army will have to intervene to enforce law and order again. But this time, fight will be much inside the country and will simply not be termed as border insurgent clashes.

Fact is largely being established about possible American defeat in Afghanistan . General view is that they are trying to find a safe exit, both from Iraq and Afghanistan to save themselves from humiliation. American and NATO generals have failed to curb Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan, increasing mass murders, opeum trade, weapons trade, and are pointing their fingers towards Pakistan, asking to do more and more.

In Pakistan, general public view about War on Terror is that we are fighting an american war. Why should we not let them fight it alone? Why should we bleed our soldiers and countrymen for them? What assurances we have from Americans that our best interests will be served and India will be kept away from entering into our country through Afghanistan? What can Americans commit about keeping Israelies dressed in US Army uniform away from our soil? What improvements in economy we have seen in return of our long shown fortified commitment to War on terror?

We will see in near future if predators and guns together can bring peace in the region or the fire will ignite and spread all across till USA itself.

Long March towards a New Pakistan

Monday March 16. 2009. A beautiful morning it was. Nation woke up to a day that would be marked historically. A day that would be remembered for the struggle of Pakistani people against the dictatorship and jungle rule. Prime Minister Gillani announced the reinstatement of deposed Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Chaudhry, at 6 Am, as promised by Benazir Bhutto shaheed.

Full credit to lawyers movement and Nawaz Sharif. They lead the nation and it followed them faithfully. Long march for restoration of CJ may be over. He will take office on 21st.  Some speculate that it was because of the army. Some say it was because of America, may be because of any deal between Sharif brothers and government and Iftikhar Chaudhry. Doesn’t matter. Movement for restoration of rule of law is not over yet. Restoration of CJ is merely first step towards a long march to democracy.

Restoration of CJ has brought good news for the terror hit country and its already suffering people. I asked some the question today. That CJ was restored but what benefit it would give them personally? Answer was more or less the same. Our lives will remain unchanged. We have spent our lives in the dark age. But our children will grow in a land governed by rules and law. Dictators will fear the people now. They will know how hard it gets to impose their wishful thinking and unlawful decisions.

Many of them believe that restoration of CJ will take Pakistan closer to become the kind of state that Muhammad Ali Jinnah and his followers dreamt of.

So to speak, job is far from finished. Challenges are yet to appear. CJ has greater responsibility over his shoulders now. He had taken stand against a dictator in the past and people remembered him for his tough judgments. So they took to streets for him and now have high hopes and expectations from him. Chief Justice of Pakistan owes them equal and fair justice.

Finally, our nation has started a long march towards a new Pakistan in the wake of this reinstatement.

God speed our nation !

Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry to be restored as Chief Justice of Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: In a golden moment in Pakistan’s history, the government has decided to restore the deposed Chief Justice of Pakistan, Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

The Opposition Leader in the National Assembly, Chaudhry Nisar told Geo news about the decision of Justice Iftikhar’s reinstatement. He told Geo news senior Analyst Kamran Khan that Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani had personally told him about Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry’s reinstatement.

——————-

Congratulations Pakistan. Rule of law will prevail finally.

I am Sorry Mr. President, But You are Wrong…

In political theory, democracy describes a small number of related forms of government and also a political philosophy. Even though there is no universally accepted definition of ‘democracy’, there are two principles that any definition of democracy includes. The first principle is that all members of the society (citizens) have equal access to power and the second that all members (citizens) enjoy universally recognized freedoms and liberties.

Today, the roads of Pakistani cities give us a clear impression of uprising, revolt and mistrust of the people of the country in its government. Lawyers are in the streets. Media is showing past interviews and false commitments of leaders in the government.  Masses of journalists have gathered in the local press clubs to raise voice against unwise and unjust acts of the government against the media. Shopkeepers, businessmen, transporters, cable operators, even a few policemen have joined the movement. Every single common Pakistani is playing his role to show his equal access to freedom and liberty seized by their uncommitted president.

According to latest media reports, Nawaz Sharif is leading the march towards Islamabad among thousands of protestors.  Shahbaz Sharif has reached Islamabad despite all the obstacles that come across.

Concerns and fears among common people are rising related to security of Nawaz Sharif. Rehman Malik has repeatedly talked about this in his press conferences. Benazir Bhutto was executed in a public address and her murderers have not been known thus far. Scenario is building up for a very open and public presence of Nawaz Sharif for a considerably long time. It exposes him to multiple foreign threats at the same time. Let us hope that government agencies are aware of this security situation and do their best to protect Nawaz Sharif.

Loss of Benazir Bhutto has been unrecoverable for this nation so far and will remain like so for a much long time to come. It is due to her absence that we have seen these issues being handled in such an irresponsible manner, that has compromised the national security situation. But there is day after night. Unfortunate absence of Benazir Bhutto from the national political scene has allowed Nawaz Sharif to emerge as a public leader and he has proven well upto the task. He has lead the common people and lawyers to move in favor of restoration of judiciary and eliminate dictatorship and foreign influence from the country. We cannot bear the loss of this only public leader present at this stage of time. May Allah be his protector for rest of his journey.

There is an increasing sense of conflict inside the government over its strategy to handle the “Long March”. Ms. Shireen Rehman, Minister for Information resigned yesterday due to her difference of opinion upon the handling of media (particularly GEO) by President Zardari. DCO Lahore, Deputy Attorney General of Pakistan have also resigned. Prime Minister seems to be taking the lead in reconciliation efforts alongwith the army chief. Both of them are infact advising President Zardari to avoid head on collision with rest of the nation and put offer for legitimate table talks and introduce an acceptable package deal.

But, the person living in the president house has lost his credibility. Imagine, how bad it feels to be ruled by a person who lies, does not fulfill his promises, does not abide by the agreements by merely saying ‘I simply signed on it. I did not read it’. He is accompanied by his de facto advisor to interior Rehman Malik in Islamabad and controversial Salman Taseer, governor of Punjab. A lot of people know a lot about Salman Taseer. But just for some of you, who do not know about him, his intellectual wisdom and love for his people can be judged by his rediculous decision about Basant (Kite flying in Lahore accompanied by girls and wine that kills and injures many each year). Few thousand will celebrate Basant this year and enjoy their night with girls and alcohol. But a few hundred thousand will not be able to move on their motorcycles as punjab government has imposed ban on bike driving for 2 days in Lahore, just for the sake of pleasure of a few elite. How rediculous!!

We need change. This change will not come on the table. Whole system needs to be changed. We need to get rid of foreign influence and slavery finally. We do not need leaders who can sell their consciousness for a few thousand dollars. We do not need leaders who are labeled as Mr. or Ms. 10%. We do not need leaders who lie. We do not need leaders who are afraid to face the truth and justice. We do not need leaders who are taking benefit of their positions and pushing up their bank balances and acting as commission agents. We do not need leaders who are foreign spies. We do not need leaders who stay quite on the bloodshed in their country. We do not need leaders who cannot find the murderers of our Benazir Bhutto since more then 1 year has past now.

I am sorry Mr. President, but you are wrong. Your services are dragging this state in harms way, and hence, are no longer required. Thank You.

Double Impact: Global Crisis & Instable Pakistani Politics

I understand that we, in Pakistan, have not felt the sheer jolts of global financial crisis yet, primarily because of the existing credit controls applied by the financial institutions and regulatory compliance of prudential regulations introduced by the SBP (State Bank of Pakistan). But, just to think, we already have the major proportion of the population living below the poverty line. Even the middle salaried class segment does not have easy access to money from the banks. Established businesses are already taking up their margins and profits. New small businesses are being setup through private capital. And above all, mortgages are not pegged to banking portfolios.

In USA, it all started from mortgages. Ron Paul is of the view that FED is the culprit and Dollar Reserve System introduced in 1971 has effectively failed. Many are predicting the collapse of United States just like the mighty USSR. The question though, for us is that when and how it will show its ugly face in Pakistan? And what will be the result?

Today, Pakistan stands in the middle of the worst political crisis ever in the history of the country since 1971. As of this writing, lawyers are rallying for “Long March” towards Islamabad from Baluchistan and Sindh provinces. Sharif brothers are awaiting their arrival in Lahore and re-evaluating their strategy for long march. Government machinery is heavily involved in capturing opposition leaders. Many of the blunt and vocal political activists have gone underground to save themselves from being arrested.

Before we can answer when the global financial crisis will be visible in Pakistan, and what will be the results? we have to see what has already gone wrong in the country.

An inevitable and unusual clash between opposition and the government is expected on the roads of the country. Which will invite increased security threat to the common people and their properties. In some swere cases, injuries and deaths will rise amid clashes between activists and law enforcement agencies. Which, in turn, will fuel the crisis. Businesses in those areas will remain closed for indefinite period.

Government is trying to stop the “Long March” by force and by using extra police and military/para-military units in the country. Secret agencies, which were once used to protect Pakistan from foreign threats, are now being used for private surveillance and to observe political enemies. Which offguards the country to some extent, from external threats. We must not forget the threat to the country from insurgent movements in FATA and Baluchistan. Different media reports have confirmed the heavy involvement of Indian RAW in those movements. Suspicions have already been raised on recent attacks on Sri Lankan team in Lahore. American drones are already flying in our air space.  While Mr. Altaf Hussain of MQM occasionally raising the slogans of “Sindh Motherland”, Punjab must not be used as the battleground this time. A weak federal government cannot sustain the pressures of such many nuisances in the country.

An economically weak and pressurized USA is trying to find a new war to divert the focus of its people. A weak federal Pakistani government will give an impression of unguarded Pakistani nuclear weapons ready to fall in the hands of Taliban, motivating the zionist driven USA to hop around it like jack rabbits, backed ofcourse by India and Israel. Which, in turn, will break the country, as desired by its enemies.

While political destabilization in the country is quite visible, economic downturn in US and Europe will show its ugly face in the country very soon. Decrease in imports to those countries will decrease our foreign reserves. An already unfavorable balance of payments will be more visible. As KIBOR (Karachi Interbank Offer Rate) sets LIBOR (London Interbank Offer Rate) as its benchmark. SBP will force to increase controls and flow of money in the economy. Which will prove fatal for manufacturing industry accompanied by already anticipated shortage of power.  Manufacturing will hit all time lows, cutting down jobs and business associated with it, and in turn, will cause the country to be dependent upon agriculture sector solely. Which also, depends upon manufacturing to flourish. Cattle and crops will not be able to take economy on their shoulders alone. Lack of money in developed economies will cut the amount of aid, funding and loaning that we are getting, shrinking development projects, effecting NGOs, and other miscellaneous activities, forcing the unrest in the country and again, a weak federal government.

I assume that conscious of a man cannot encourage him to run after his rule of the land, pride on his treasure,  greed for more and forget about the rights of his fellow human beings, forever. Even Pharaoh accepted his defeat when the waves surrounded him from both sides while Moses was crossing the river . But it was too late then.

Perhaps, it is the hardest times of all on nations when the men leading and ruling on them are unjust, unfaithful and untrustworthy. But, these are those times when nations emerge as united and rise above all. A great responsibility lies with the leaders in Pakistani government to fulfill the promises they made with the nation and make justice to the cause for which people voted for them and allowed them to sit in the big sacred halls of the democratic system. Results are going to be catastrophic otherwise.

They promised to restore the judges, eliminate 17th amendment in the constitution, abolish 58-2-B – a present from a dictator. Failing to do so will expose them to a double impact: A global crisis and a country internally destabilized. That, any nation loving pakistani does not want to see and face ever.

Benazir Bhutto once said: “It’s true that General Musharraf opposes my return, seeing me as a symbol of democracy in the country. He is comfortable with dictatorship. I hope better sense prevails.”

I hope that the better sense prevails…

The CIA’s Anti-communist Jihad – A History Lesson to Remember

by Phil Gasper

President Jimmy Carter immediately declared that the Soviet invasion on Afghanistan jeopardized vital U.S. interests, because the Persian Gulf area was “now threatened by Soviet troops in Afghanistan. But the Carter administration’s public outrage at Russian intervention in Afghanistan was doubly duplicitous. Not only was it used as an excuse for a program of increased military expenditure that had in fact already begun, but the U.S. had in fact been aiding the mujahideen for at least the previous six months, with precisely the hope of provoking a Soviet response. Former CIA director Robert Gates later admitted in his memoirs that aid to the rebels began in June 1979. In a candid 1998 interview, Zbigniew Brezinski, Carter’s national security adviser, confirmed that U.S. aid to the rebels began before the invasion:

According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the mujahideen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan [in] December 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise: indeed, it was July 3, 1979, that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention…. We didn’t push the Russians to intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would….

That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap…. The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter: We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam War.”
The Carter administration was well aware that in backing the mujahideen it was supporting forces with reactionary social goals, but this was outweighed by its own geopolitical interests. In August 1979, a classified State Department report bluntly asserted that “the United States’ larger interest…would be served by the demise of the Taraki-Amin regime, despite whatever setbacks this might mean for future social and economic reforms in Afghanistan.” That same month, in a stunning display of hypocrisy, State Department spokesperson Hodding Carter piously announced that the U.S. “expect[s] the principle of nonintervention to be respected by all parties in the area, including the Soviet Union.”

The Russian invasion in December was the signal for U.S. support to the Afghan rebels to increase dramatically.

Three weeks after Soviet tanks rolled into Kabul, Carter’s secretary of defense, Harold Brown, was in Beijing arranging for a weapons transfer from the Chinese to the ClA-backed Afghani troops mustered in Pakistan. The Chinese, who were generously compensated for the deal, agreed and even consented to send military advisers. Brown worked out a similar arrangement with Egypt to buy $15 million worth of weapons. “The U.S. contacted me,” [then-Egyptian president] Anwar Sadat recalled shortly before his assassination [in 1981]. “They told me, ‘Please open your stores for us so that we can give the Afghans the armaments they need to fight.’ And I gave them the armaments. The transport of arms to the Afghans started from Cairo on U.S. planes.”

By February 1980, the Washington Post reported that the mujahideen was receiving arms coming from the U.S. government.

The objective of the intervention, as spelled out by Brezinski, was to trap the Soviets in a long and costly war designed to drain their resources, just as Vietnam had bled the United States. The high level of civilian casualties that this would certainly entail was considered but set aside. According to one senior official, “The question here was whether it was morally acceptable that, in order to keep the Soviets off balance, which was the reason for the operation, it was permissible to use other lives for our geopolitical interests.” Carter’s CIA director Stansfield Turner answered the question: “I decided I could live with that.” According to Representative Charles Wilson, a Texas Democrat.

There were 58,000 dead in Vietnam and we owe the Russians one…. I have a slight obsession with it, because of Vietnam. I thought the Soviets ought to get a dose of it…. I’ve been of the opinion that this money was better spent to hurt our adversaries than other money in the Defense Department budget.

The mujahideen consisted of at least seven factions, who often fought amongst themselves in their battle for territory and control of the opium trade. To hurt the Russians, the U.S. deliberately chose to give the most support to the most extreme groups. A disproportionate share of U.S. arms went to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, “a particularly fanatical fundamentalist and woman-hater.”‘ According to journalist Tim Weiner, ” [Hekmatyar's] followers first gained attention by throwing acid in the faces of women who refused to wear the veil.

CIA and State Department officials I have spoken with call him ‘scary,’ ‘vicious,’ ‘a fascist,’ ‘definite dictatorship material.”

There was, though, a kind of method in the madness: Brezinski hoped not just to drive the Russians out of Afghanistan, but to ferment unrest within the Soviet Union itself. His plan, says author Dilip Hiro, was “to export a composite ideology of nationalism and Islam to the Muslim-majority Central Asian states and Soviet Republics with a view to destroying the Soviet order.” Looking back in 1998, Brezinski had no regrets. “What was more important in the world view of history?… A few stirred-up Muslims or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the Cold War”.

With the support of Pakistan’s military dictator, General Zia-ul-Haq, the U.S. began recruiting and training both mujahideen fighters from the 3 million Afghan refugees in Pakistan and large numbers of mercenaries from other Islamic countries. Estimates of how much money the U.S. government channeled to the Afghan rebels over the next decade vary, but most sources put the figure between $3 billion and $6 billion, or more. Whatever the exact amount, this was “the largest covert action program since World War II” – much bigger, for example, than Washington’s intervention in Central America at the same time, which received considerably more publicity. According to one report:

The CIA became the grand coordinator: purchasing or arranging the manufacture of Soviet-style weapons from Egypt, China, Poland, Israel and elsewhere, or supplying their own; arranging for military training by Americans, Egyptians, Chinese and Iranians; hitting up Middle-Eastern countries for donations, notably Saudi Arabia which gave many hundreds of millions of dollars in aid each year, totaling probably more than a billion; pressuring and bribing Pakistan-with whom recent American relations had been very poor-to rent out its country as a military staging area and sanctuary; putting the Pakistani Director of Military Operations, Brigadier Mian Mohammad Afzal, onto the CIA payroll to ensure Pakistani cooperation.
When Ronald Reagan became president in 1981, he found the Democratic-controlled Congress eager to increase spending on the Afghan war. A congressional staffer told a reporter, “It was a windfall [for the new administration]. They’d faced so much opposition to covert action in Central America and here comes the Congress helping and throwing money at them, putting money their way and they say, ‘Who are we to say no?”
Aid to the mujahideen, who Reagan praised as “freedom fighters,” increased, but initially Afghanistan was not a priority:
In the first years after the Reagan administration inherited the Carter program, the covert Afghan war “tended to be handled out of [CIA director William] Casey’s back pocket,” recalled Ronald Spiers, a former U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, the base of the Afghan rebels. Mainly from China’s government, the CIA purchased assault rifles, grenade launchers, mines and SA-7 light antiaircraft weapons, and then arranged for shipment to Pakistan…. The amounts were significant-10,000 tons of arms and ammunition in 1983, according to [Pakistani General Mohammed] Yousaf-but a fraction of what they would be in just a few years.

In March 1985, the Reagan administration issued National Security Decision Directive 166,29 a secret plan to escalate covert action in Afghanistan dramatically:

Abandoning a policy of simple harassment of Soviet occupiers, the Reagan team decided secretly to let loose on the Afghan battlefield an array of U.S. high technology and military expertise in an effort to hit and demoralize Soviet commanders and soldiers….
Beginning in 1985, the CIA supplied mujahideen rebels with extensive satellite reconnaissance data of Soviet targets on the Afghan battlefield, plans for military operations based on the satellite intelligence, intercepts of Soviet communications, secret communications networks for the rebels, delayed timing devices for tons of C-4 plastic explosives for urban sabotage, and sophisticated guerrilla attacks, long-range sniper rifles, a targeting device for mortars that was linked to a U.S. Navy satellite, wire-guided anti-tank missiles, and other equipment.

Between 1986 and 1989, the mujahideen were also provided with more than 1,000 state-of-the-art, shoulder-fired Stinger antiaircraft missiles.
By 1987, the annual supply of arms had reached 65,000 tons, and a “ceaseless stream” of CIA and Pentagon officials were
visiting Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) headquarters in Rawalpindi and helping to plan mujahideen operations:

At any one time during the Afghan fighting season, as many as 11 ISI teams trained and supplied by the CIA accompanied mujahideen across the border to supervise attacks, according to Yousaf and Western sources. The teams attacked airports, railroads, fuel depots, electricity pylons, bridges and roads….

CIA operations officers helped Pakistani trainers establish schools for the mujahideen in secure communications, guerrilla warfare, urban sabotage and heavy weapons.

Although the CIA claimed that the purpose was to attack military targets, mujahideen trained in these techniques, and using chemical and electronic-delay bomb timers supplied by the U.S., carried out numerous car bombings and assassination attacks in Kabul itself.

Musharraf sees conspiracy against Pakistan

Pervez Musharraf said that attempts were being made to malign the armed forces. He said that the allegations being levelled against the armed forces and ISI by foreign journalists and authors would lead to the defeat in war on terror. “If Pakistan’s army or the ISI were weakened due to certain conspiracies, the international community would lose the war on terror,” he noted.

Read full report here

————-
1) Its not our war.
2) Its nice that our intelligent ex-president foresees a conspiracy hatching against Pakistan. Perhaps, he also realizes the damage his administration has brought to the country.