Experiments With Terror

Late in June, theLashkar-e-Toiba’s (LeT) top commander for north Kashmir emerged from theforests above the small mountain hamlet of Sumlar, and ordered its residents togather in the local mosque. 

"I don’t want to see younggirls and boys roaming around with mobile phones, for it will lead to immoralityand vice," said the imposing 6-foot 6-inch Pakistani national, who is, so far,known only by the multiple aliases ‘Bilal,’ ‘Salahuddin and ‘Haider’.Three terrified teenage girls found in possession of the offending instrumentswere dragged into the centre of the mosque and tonsured in full public view.

Bilal’s concerns in fact hadlittle to do with morals, for text messaging allows Indian informants to reportBilal’s rare movements out of the dense forests that run north from themountains above Bandipora to the Line of Control (LoC). His forest fortress isat the centre of new Lashkar strategies designed to demonstrate its reach andpower in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), despite the degradation of its cadrestrength and war resources.

Where Taliban-linked terrorgroups in Afghanistan or Islamist insurgents in Iraq have, in recent months,demonstrated quasi-conventional military abilities, the Lashkar in J&K seemsto be going down the opposite route. It seeks to use untrained, expendable cadreto execute strikes of little military value, hoping that these will act as aninstrument through which the dialogue process in J&K may be subverted.

The J&K Police, last week,identified Bilal – who helped organise the October 29, 2005, serial bombingsat New Delhi as well as an abortive 2004 attempt on the life of Prime MinisterManmohan Singh – as the architect of the recent terror offensive which hasrocked J&K’s summer capital, Srinagar. Director-General of Police GopalSharma has now announced a INR 500,000 reward for information on the Lashkar‘commander’.

Sharma made the declaration ata press conference organised to announce the arrest of twelve alleged Lashkaroperatives who helped execute the fidayeen (suicide squad cadre) attack,which targeted a Congress rally in Srinagar on the eve of the Prime Minister’sRound Table Conference on Jammu and Kashmir on May 24-25, 2006. Five people werekilled in the attack and twenty-one, including Inspector-General of Police K.Rajendra, were seriously injured.

Along with his key lieutenant,a north Kashmir resident identified as Mudasir Gojri, Bilal also directed twelveseparate grenade attacks on civilian and military targets – seven of whichtook place simultaneously on April 14 – as well a series of assassinations.Members of the cell assassinated two policemen on May 11, and murdered MohammadRiyaz, a Sopore resident whom the Lashkar had earlier attempted to kill for the‘crime’ of gambling.

Investigators have found thatthe two fidayeen who attacked the Congress rally had been dispatched by‘Bilal’ to Srinagar on May 20, accompanied by two still-unidentified women. Gojri, according to the police, separately arranged for a Srinagar-based Lashkaroperative, Mohammad Yusuf Dagga, to ship the weapons and explosives used in theattack from a cache in the Bandipora mountains. Both the fidayeen-squadmembers and the weapons were hidden overnight at a hotel that is beingconstructed near Regal Chowk, a prominent Srinagar landmark.  The nextmorning, Gojri, Dagga and a third terrorist, Wasim Zargar, provided the two fidayeenwith the fake police uniforms which helped them penetrate the security aroundthe rally.

While the use of Bandipora asa base to funnel fidayeen into major cities across India isn’t news,the profile of the twelve arrested Lashkar operatives demonstrates changingtactics and intentions. For long a magnet for ideology-driven Islamists withcomputer and engineering skills, the LeT has now started to fish for recruitsamongst Srinagar’s urban underclass, using cash as bait.

Notably, not one of themembers of the cell had received weapons or explosives training at theLashkar’s camps in Pakistan, or been given pre- or post-recruitmentideological indoctrination at seminaries. Instead, the Lashkar drew its newcadre from the ranks of Srinagar’s ill-educated and low-skilled artisans andvendors, offering cash in return for their participation in terrorist strikes,including grenade attacks.

Mohammad Yusuf Dagga, theprincipal organiser of the Lashkar cell, was perhaps the only terrorist handwith operational experience – and even this was negligible. Dagga was pulledout of school after his sixth grade by his father and put to work sellingvegetables on the streets.  Bored and frustrated, he began to act as acourier for Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM)weapons and explosives at the age of just twelve. Dagga’s parents promptlyhanded him over to the Border Security Force (BSF) – and, after a brief stintunder detention, he resumed work selling vegetables.  However, the streetbusiness just didn’t yield the kind of income or excitement Dagga craved. InJanuary, Javed Sofi, an old associate from his HM days, approached Dagga with asimple offer: INR 1,000 – roughly US$ 22 – for each grenade thrown at Indianforces. 

Wasim Zargar, who, after Daggaand Sofi, was perhaps the most important member of the cell, also dropped out ofschool in 1999. He succeeded in passing his eight-grade examinations at the ageof sixteen. Zargar then worked as an apprentice shawl weaver until 2001, when heagreed to start supplying cellphone SIM cards to a Srinagar-based Lashkaroperative, Ijaz Ahmad Kital.  Part of the profits Zargar made from thisenterprise went into setting up his own cosmetics store.  More cash waspromised when he was recruited by Dagga to execute grenade strikes and shootoutsin Srinagar. Like Dagga himself, though, Zargar was paid only small sums for hisactions. Most of the dozen-odd grenade strikes and shootouts he participated inbetween January and May this year brought in just INR 1,000 each.

Others, like Bilal Ahmad Mir,seem to have been driven by personal frustration. The eldest of five sons of aNational Conference-affiliated municipal politician, Mir dropped out of schoolafter the fifth grade. He apprenticed with a local tailor from 1989, but provedunable to make a living.  Moreover, Mir’s three younger brotherscontinued their studies with some success – a fact which further eroded hisself-esteem. Like Mir, Mohammad Yaqoob Sheikh was the least successful of hisfour brothers. A copper-work artisan, Mir dropped out of school after the thirdgrade to learn his trade. However, the long-standing decline in demand forhand-made utensils meant that his brothers, all of whom worked as truck drivers,made a far better living. Desperate for cash, Sheikh agreed to throw a grenadeat a bus carrying tourists on May 25, 2006.

For the Lashkar, which hassuffered a series of command-level losses in Indian counter-terroristoperations, such tactics make eminent sense. While conserving its leadership andcrack fidayeen-squad personnel for high-profile operations of particularsignificance, the Lashkar’s outsourcing of terrorist acts helps theorganisation execute enough attacks to demonstrate its presence and resolve.

Consider the facts: thenumbers of violent incidents in J&K since 2001 have declined markedly, but fidayeenattacks, bombings and grenade attacks in the first six months of 2006, havealmost doubled compared with the same period in 2005. And, while Indian SecurityForce fatalities have also fallen, killings of policemen – the principalsecurity actors in cities – have also increased this year.

For Indian strategists, thishold holds out two challenges. The first is clearing the Bandipora forests andother mountain regions used as secure bases by terrorist groups, such as theYaripora-Shopian-Tral belt in south Kashmir or Harwan near Srinagar. Ever since1999-2000, the Lashkar started developing well-hidden and fortified hideouts inthese areas, defended by an elaborate system of lookouts. Now, though, mattershave begun to come to a head. Sources indicate that, at a June 20 briefingorganised for United Progressive Alliance chairperson, Sonia Gandhi, theNorthern Army Commander, Lieutenant-General Deepak Kapoor, argued that the realproblem was lack of will among the 31,000 men of the J&K Police and CentralReserve Police Force committed to protecting the State capital. At a subsequentmeeting with National Security Advisor M.K. Narayanan, though, police andintelligence personnel hit back. Officials argued that it was impossible tosecure Srinagar unless the Lashkar’s mountain bases were destroyed. Localoperatives working for the Lashkar had repeatedly been arrested since 2002,Narayanan was told, but their commanders in Bandipora continued to operate withrelative impunity.

What can be done? Since2000-2001, military strategists have discussed a division-strength operationinvolving pushing troops south from the Bod Kol river near Gurez, along the LoC,and north through Patwan and Chatarnar, above Bandipora town. However, suchaction has been deterred by the prospects that many of the estimated 50-75Pakistani terrorists in the Bandipora forests will, most likely, evade such anoperation. Military planners also fear that that an offensive push againstwell-defended positions could result in casualties not commensurate with thepotential dividends: a public-relations disaster. Keeping the forests free ofterrorists, once cleared, will also require additional troops – a tall orderin the midst of a détente process where several actors are demanding areduction in force levels.

A second option is to simplywait for attrition to take its course. Indian intelligence estimates suggestthat 189 terrorists had succeeded in crossing the LoC between January and May2006.  Before snow closes the mountain passes in November, overallinfiltration for 2006 is likely to be somewhat lower than the 2005 figure of597. Several factors, including improved electronic surveillance, appear to havedriven the decline. Although a precise determination of successful infiltrationis nigh-impossible, official estimates suggest it has been in steady declinesince 2001, when an estimated 2,417 terrorists crossed the LoC. The figure fellto 1,504 in 2002, 1,373 in 2003, and 537 in 2004, rising somewhat in 2005because of the degradation of India’s forward defences and LoC fencing afterthe great Kashmir earthquake of October 8, 2005.

Despite the Army’ssuccesses, though, terrorists appear to have been able to part-replenish thematerials needed for their ongoing campaign. On June 20, two weeks after a largeinfiltration attempt was interdicted in the Macchal sector, troops recovered amulti-tonne cache of arms, equipment and explosives, including 338 hand-grenades– the weapon of choice in recent urban terrorist strikes. Large stocks ofexplosives and communication equipment were also found.

Terrorists have also improvedtheir fencing-penetration skills. Days before a June 29 infiltration attempt inwhich eight terrorists were killed, another large Lashkar unit had succeeded incutting the fencing without activating sensors. While the fencing has improvedinterdiction considerably, an estimated 30 to 40 per cent of the defensive linealong the LoC has been destroyed by snowfall, leaving gaps which may take up tosix months to repair.

Under other circumstances,current infiltration and violence levels would not be a matter for alarm. Indeed, Indian security planners could take heart from the Lashkar’s changingstrategies and read them as a sign that terror groups are under very realpressure. However, continuing violence imposes significant costs on India’spolitical establishment, limiting its ability to push forward with the peaceprocess.

Two areas of impasse are nowkey. With its northern Army reserve depleted by counter-insurgency operations inthe North West Frontier Province and Balochistan, Pakistan has becomeincreasingly worried about the integrity of its posture along the LoC, and thisis the concern underlying President Pervez Musharaf’s frequent and stridentdemands for Force reduction on the Indian side. India, however, has rejectedPakistan’s calls for a reduction of troops in the region, pointing tocontinued cross-border infiltration and terrorism in J&K.

Second, and perhaps moreimportant, terrorism restricts India’s ability to move forward on building upa broad-based dialogue with a wide spectrum of political opinion within J&Kitself.  Marketing political concessions on J&K to an electorate thatperceives itself to be under terrorist siege is no easy task, as Prime MinisterSingh and his advisors are discovering.

As things stand, the peaceprocess resembles nothing so much as an arch without its keystone – in thiscase, an end to killing. Now as before, though, the keystone is stored inIslamabad, not New Delhi or Srinagar. Beset as he is with multiple internalcrises, few believe that General Musharraf will be able to find the energy tohaul it across the LoC any time soon.

Praveen Swami is Deputy Editorand Chief of Bureau, Frontline magazine, New Delhi. Courtesy, the SouthAsia Intelligence Review of the South Asia Terrorism Portal