Terrorist Pearl Harbour

The USA has a well-oiled security management system with an efficient crisismanagement capability.

In the wake of the unprecedented terrorist attacks by air in New York andWashington and possibly also near Pittsburgh on September 11, the crisismanagement, the preventive and the investigative mechanisms would haveimmediately gone into action.

The objectives of the crisis management system would be to save the lives ofthose still trapped in the debris, organise medical attention for those injuredand ensure that normal activity, governmental and non-governmental, is resumedas quickly as possible.

The preventive system would focus on the identification and arrest of theaccomplices of the responsible terrorist groups still present in the US beforethey escape or commit more terrorist acts, protection of American lives andinterests abroad in terrorism-vulnerable areas and evacuation of any foreignhumanitarian voluntary workers still working in Afghanistan. Protection ofAmerican lives and interests in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Bangladeshwould be a matter of priority in view of the activities of the jehadis in thisregion. Similar priority would be given to protective measures in the WestAsian and the Gulf countries.

Another priority for the preventive mechanism would be to reinforce physicaland aerial security measures at and around nuclear establishments in the US,particularly reactors and power stations, and large oil storage facilities.

The investigative mechanism would look into all possibilities without rulingout any, however remote it may seem initially. The questions to whichanswers would be sought are:

Which group might have been responsible? Initial focus would be on the International Islamic Front For Jehad against the US and Israel led by the Kandahar-based Osama bin Laden; the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM ) of Pakistan, which is a member of bin Laden's Front and which was declared by the US as an international terrorist organisation in October, 1997; the Jamaat-ul-Fuqra, another Pakistan-based extremist organisation with a known presence in the US, but with no previously-known links with bin Laden; the various Palestinian groups; and individual, indigenous copy cat elements similar to Timothy McVeigh, who was recently executed for his responsibility for the Oklahoma bombing of 1995.
What circumstantial evidence is available presently? Pointing the needle of suspicion at bin Laden's Front is its anti-US motivation, its demonstrated capability of the past for the orchestration of widespread attacks, its wide network extending to even North America and the fact that the final judgement in the trial involving bin Laden's supporters for their role in the bombing outside the US Embassy in Nairobi in August,1998, was reportedly due on September 12 and that the Federal court, which was to pronounce the judgement, was near the World Trade Centre. Pointing the suspicion at the HUM would be its membership of bin Laden's Front and its known past presence in the US. Suspicion against Timothy-type irrational elements would be due to the fact that the New York World Trade Centre, apart from being a commercial complex, also housed a large number of New York branches of the Federal Government. If the attacks are viewed as directed not against US national power vis-à-vis the rest of the world, but against the US Federal bureaucracy, Timothy-like copy cats would attract attention. However, ruling out such elements would be the fact that they generally do not undertake suicide attacks. There is presently very little circumstantial evidence implicating the Fuqra.
Where did the terrorist pilots/navigators come from? No commercial pilot would let himself be intimidated into crashing his aircraft against buildings. If he was forced by the terrorists to crash, he would have crashed into the sea. Hence, it seems likely that pilots/navigators with experience of flying wide-bodied planes had been used for the suicide crashes. None of the Islamic terrorist groups was previously known to have pilots with such expertise. There must have been a minimum of eight terrorists employed for these attacks--- a pilot and a navigator each for each aircraft. Where did they recruit the pilots and navigators from? In the US or elsewhere?
The terrorists seem to have deactivated the alert mechanism in the aircraft, which automatically alerts ground control immediately after a plane is hijacked. How did they do it? When an unidentified plane approaches sensitive buildings in Washington DC, the US Air Force is immediately alerted and its aircraft scramble. How this did not happen? In the past too, there was an instance in which a small plane managed to reach the White House vicinity without the Air Force alert detecting it.

If the investigations rule out the involvement of indigenous groups orindividuals and point the finger of suspicion strongly, even if notconclusively, at Afghanistan/Pakistan/West Asia based groups, public andCongressional opinion in the US would force the Government to act much morestrongly than in the past against those elements and wipe them out. TheBush Administration had repeatedly warned the Taliban that if bin Laden strikesagainst US interests again, the USA's retaliatory attacks would be directedagainst him as well as the Taliban leadership.

Despite open pronouncements in favour of international co-operation againstterrorism, there was always an ambivalence in such co-operation in the past dueto political factors. Both the HUM and the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) are associatedwith bin Laden. While the US acted against the HUM because it threatenedAmerican lives, it was reluctant to act against the LET, which did not. Pakistan acted against terrorists in Pakistani territory threatening Americanlives, but supported those threatening Indian lives. It was not preparedto co-operate with the US against the Taliban and bin Laden.

Unless terrorists are treated as terrorists, whatever be their cause, andunless State-sponsors of terrorism such as Pakistan and the Taliban Governmentare treated as such and not shown any forbearance for political reasons, theworld community would not be able to effectively end this menace.

A paper of the Heritage Foundation of Washington DC prepared last year hadstrongly argued for declaring Pakistan a State-sponsor of internationalterrorism for not co-operating with the US against bin Laden and the Taliban. The possibility of such a declaration would be strengthened now.

The Pakistan-Afghanistan based supporters of bin Laden view the US, Israeland India as the principal enemies of Islam. The Government of India isreported to have already strengthened security for US Govt establishments inIndia and its own establishments in New Delhi. The security of our nuclearestablishments and oil facilities such as Mumbai High should also bestrengthened.

Attached are extracts from our previous papers which might be of interest:

INTERNATIONAL ISLAMISM(EXTRACTS)---27-11-00

Practically all the Islamic extremist and terrorist movements of today,whether they be in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, the Central Asian Republics (CARs),the Chechnya and Dagestan areas of Russia, the Xinjiang area of China, theJ&K State of India and in Southern Philippines were born out of ideasconceived in the battle-fields of Afghanistan of the 1980s and spread from themosques and madrasas of Pakistan subsequently.

These movements could not have maintained the intensity and the ruthlessnessof their activities without the support, instigation and encouragement receivedby them from the soil of Pakistan and Afghanistan. And such support,instigation and encouragement from Pakistani soil would not have been possiblewithout the active involvement of the Pakistani military-intelligenceestablishment in the case of the terrorist movements directed against India andwithout its complicity or acquiescence in the case of terrorism directed againstother countries.

While one is not surprised by its active involvement in the terroristmovements directed against India, the tolerance by the Pakistanimilitary-intelligence establishment of the operations of the movements directedagainst the other countries---and particularly against Saudi Arabia and China--defies logic and understanding.

The tolerance is partly a quid pro quo for their role in assisting thePakistani military-intelligence establishment in its efforts to keep the Indiansecurity forces bleeding at no cost to Pakistan's Armed Forces and partly out offear that any strong action against their activities directed against othercountries might make them turn against the military-intelligence establishment.

It is mistaken to think that the terrorist movements directed against othercountries could be attributed to the Taliban only. Today, Afghanistan isnothing but a veritable colony of Pakistan and the Taliban, despite itsretrogade concepts in matters such as women's rights much to the embarrassmentof the Pakistani military-intelligence establishment, is nothing but anappendage of Pakistan.

The idea for the creation of the Taliban to use it to achieve Pakistan'sstrategic objectives in Afghanistan was the brainwave of Maj.Gen. (retd)Nasirullah Baber, the Interior Minister in the Cabinet of Mrs. Benazir Bhutto,Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who was the Director-General of Military Operations (DGMO)under her, and Lt.Gen. Mohammad Aziz, now one of the two Corps Commanders inLahore, who was then the Deputy Director-General of the Inter-ServicesIntelligence (ISI) and in charge of the ISI's operations in India andAfghanistan.

It suits the present military regime in Islamabad that the internationalcommunity blames the Taliban and not Pakistan for what is happening in countriesother than India. It should not be allowed to get away with this. The international community should hold Islamabad squarely responsible for whathas been happening elsewhere too.

The Taliban's militia is officered, trained and guided by Pakistaniex-servicemen. The Administration in the Taliban-controlled areas islargely run by retired Pakistani bureaucrats. The budget of the TalibanGovernment, which has no source of revenue except heroin, is heavily subsidisedby the Pakistani exchequer.

The solidarity of the extremists and terrorists of International Islamism hasnot been matched by a solidarity of the victim-States in confronting themeffectively. There has been a mushrooming of intelligence-sharingmechanisms in the form of Joint Working Groups, the Shanghai Five etc. But, the ineffectiveness of the victim-States in dealing with this menace cannotbe blamed only on inadequate intelligence.

A more important factor has been a lack of lucid analysis of the dimensionsof the menace and the absence of a political will to strike at the source of themenace through individual and joint operations.

MUSHARRAF & BIN LADEN(EXTRACTS)

Independent reports from Islamabad and Peshawar suggest that:

bin Laden, who suffers from renal deficiency, has been periodically undergoing dialysis in a Peshawar military hospital with the knowledge and approval of the Inter-Services Intelligence, (ISI) if not of Gen.Pervez Musharraf himself.
The recent circulation of copies of bin Laden's video cassette showing him and his followers undergoing training in Afghan territory and the interview of Bakr Atyani, a correspondent of the Middle East Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) with bin Laden and his aides Abu Hafas al-Masri and Ayman al-Zawahiri, leader of Egypt's outlawed Jihad group, were organised by Pakistani military and ISI officers manning the Taliban's newly-created intelligence agency, which has replaced the Khad, the intelligence agency of the Najibullah regime. In this interview, during which bin Laden was present but did not speak, his two aides warned that "the coming weeks will hold important surprises that will target American and Israeli interests in the world." The interview was reportedly recorded by a camera supplied by the ISI officers of the Taliban's intelligence agency since the correspondent was not allowed to carry any recording equipment when he transited Peshawar on his way to Kandahar to interview bin Laden and his aides.
In view of the ban on all flights from and to Afghanistan under the UN sanctions, the only way of travelling to and from Kandahar to meet bin Laden is by flying from the Gulf or elsewhere to Peshawar and from there to travel by road. The ISI and the Pakistan Army have been facilitating this mode of travel by the foreign-based cadres of the Al Qaeda and other constituents of the International Islamic Front For Jihad Against the US And Israel.
In the past, bin Laden used to contact his cadres abroad by satellite telephone from Kandahar. After the US bombing of his training camps in Afghan territory in October,1998, he has stopped telephoning from Afghan territory lest US Cruise missiles zero in on the frequency of his telephone. Since then, all his instructions to his cadres abroad are conveyed from Peshawar by one of his aides, generally al-Zawahiri.

However, the Taliban has questioned the authenticity of the video cassetteand the claims of the journalist to have interviewed bin Laden's aides……….

It is likely that whatever be the outcome of the forthcoming summit (atAgra), Pakistan will continue its proxy war against India through its jihadisurrogates even while denying any links with or control over them. Any optimismof a reduction in violence and cross-border terrorism as a result of the summitwould be misplaced. Musharraf will continue to play his doublegame---overtly friendly, warm and seemingly accommodating and covertlycontinuing to make our security forces bleed. To expect anything differentfrom him and to lower our guard against him could be suicidal. India willcontinue to pay a heavy price for its failure to evolve and implementconsistently an effective counter proxy war policy. The policy of "kabinaram, kabi garam" (sometimes soft, sometimes hard) doesn't pay againstPakistan. It will only confirm Musharraf in his perception that India is asoft State, which lends itself to easy manipulation.