Why The ISI Won't Help In War Against Terror

The Intelligence Bureau (IB) of undivided India, which was created by theBritish colonial rulers, to collect domestic political intelligence was largelya police organization. It had no responsibility for the collection of foreignintelligence. 

At the time of the partition of India in 1947, its personnel, assets and recordswere divided between India and Pakistan. Most of the Muslim police officersserving in the IB of undivided India chose to join the IB of Pakistan. Othersstayed behind in the IB of India. 

The government of independent India placed its IB under the control of theMinistry of Home Affairs and expanded its charter to make it responsible for thecollection of internal as well as foreign intelligence. This position continuedtill September 21,1968, when the government of India bifurcated the IB andconverted its foreign intelligence division into an independent organizationcalled the Research & Analysis Wing (R&AW). The R&AW was placeddirectly under the Prime Minister and was made part of the Cabinet Secretariat,which functions under the Prime Minister. 

Like the IB, the R&AW too was initially a largely police organization with asmall number of military officers taken on deputation to handle militaryintelligence. Since then, the predominance of police officers has been reducedand more officers unconnected with the police have been inducted into theR&AW. It is a largely civilian organization with a small number of militaryofficers. 

The evolution in Pakistan took a different path. The IB of Pakistan, which ispart of the Ministry of the Interior, was initially a largely policeorganization and was given the responsibility for the collection of internal andexternal intelligence. However, following complaints from the Army about thepoor performance of the IB and its police officers during the firstIndo-Pakistan war of 1947-48 over Kashmir, the government of Pakistan created anew organization called the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate andmade it responsible for the collection of foreign intelligence. 

The ISI was placed under the control of the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and itspersonnel were taken from the three wings of the armed forces. It became amilitary-dominated intelligence agency. 

Initially, the ISI had no responsibility for the collection of internalintelligence, which continued to be collected by the police officers of the IB.This position started changing after the Army started meddling in politics inthe late 1950s. Field Marshal Ayub Khan ( President during 1958-69), whodistrusted the police officers of the IB, made the ISI responsible for thecollection of internal intelligence too having a bearing on national security.He also created in the ISI a Covert Action Division to provide assistance to thetribal insurgents in India’s North-East. 

The internal intelligence role of the ISI was further strengthened under thelate Zulfiquar Ali Bhutto (1971-77) and then under the late Gen.Zia ul Haq(1977-88), who overthrew Bhutto and seized power in 1977. Both Bhutto and Ziaused the Political Division of the ISI for the collection of intelligence abouttheir political opponents and the ethnic and linguistic minorities. While thepolice officers of the IB continued to perform their internal intelligencecollection role, the reports of the ISI were given greater credence than thoseof the IB. 

Under Z.A.Bhutto and Zia, the role of the Covert Action Division of the ISI wasexpanded and strengthened in order to enable it to assist Sikh and Kashmiriseparatists in India and radical elements in the Indian Muslim community. Theassistance was in the form of funds, training and supply of arms, ammunition andexplosives. 

Z.A.Bhutto also ordered the creation of a new Division in the ISI to assist thePakistan Atomic Energy Commission in the clandestine procurement of nucleartechnology and equipment from abroad. This Division played an active role inhelping Pakistan acquire a military nuclear capability. 

Thus, when Zia overthrew Bhutto and seized power in 1977, the ISI had threeimportant roles---collection of internal and external intelligence, covertaction in India and clandestine procurement of nuclear technology and equipment. 

The internal political intelligence Division of the ISI came under considerablecriticism after the death of Zia in a plane crash in August,1988. The PakistanPeople’s Party (PPP) of Mrs.Benazir Bhutto won the elections held thereafter.The ISI, then headed by Lt.Gen.Hamid Gul, strongly opposed her taking over asthe Prime Minister. It alleged that she was in touch with India when she wasliving in political exile in the UK and hence projected her as a security risk. 

Under US pressure, the Army and the ISI agreed to her becoming the PrimeMinister on condition that she would not have anything to do with the nuclearprogramme. Even after she had assumed office, the ISI kept disseminating reportsalleging that she was an Indian agent. The ISI’s animosity to her increasedwhen she abolished the internal political intelligence Division and ordered theCovert Action Division to stop supporting the Sikh separatists of India.However, she gave it a free hand in J&K. 

The ISI’s animosity to her resulted in her dismissal by the then PresidentGhulam Ishaq Khan in August,1990, and fresh elections. During the elections, theISI, with money allegedly donated by a private bank, assisted the PakistanMuslim League (PML) of Mr.Nawaz Sharif and the Jamaat-e-Islami (JEI) in theirelection campaign and worked against the candidates of the PPP. 

The PML and the JEI won the majority of seats. After taking over as the PrimeMinister, Nawaz ordered the re-establishment of the internal politicalintelligence Division of the ISI. He also made Brig.Imtiaz, who used to head thePolitical Division of the ISI before 1988, the Director of the IB. Thus startedthe process of the militarization of the IB. This has continued since then andacquired momentum under President Pervez Musharraf. 

Since 1990, there have been allegations that the Political Division of the ISIhas been interfering in the conduct of the general elections in order to getcandidates critical of the Army defeated through rigging and other means. Theseallegations gained force under Musharraf. In 2002, he was accused of misusingthe ISI for ensuring the victory of the Pakistan Muslim League faction headed byMr.Shujjat Hussain, which supported him. In the run-up to the elections onFebruary 18,2008, there were similar allegations of the misuse of the ISI by himto influence the results. 

De jure, the ISI is supposed to report to the Prime Minister, but de facto itgenerally reports to the Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) and keeps the PrimeMinister in the dark about its activities. There were, however, three instanceswhen the heads of the ISI were more loyal to the Prime Minister than to the COASand this created tensions in the relations between the Prime Minister and theCOAS. 

The first instance was during the first tenure of Mrs.Benazir Bhutto as PrimeMinister (1988 to 1990). To reduce the powers of the ISI, to re-organise theintelligence community and to enhance the powers of the police officers in theIB, she discontinued the practice of appointing a serving Lt.Gen, recommended bythe COAS, as the DG, ISI, and, instead appointed Maj.Gen. (retd) Shamsur RahmanKallue, a retired officer close to her father, as the DG in replacement ofLt.Gen.Hamid Gul in 1989 and entrusted him with the task of winding up theinternal intelligence collection role of the ISI and civilianising the IB andthe ISI. 

Writing in the Nation of July 31,1997, Brig.A.R.Siddiqui, who had servedas the Press Relations Officer in the army headquarters in the 1970s, said thatthis action of hers marked the beginning of her trouble with Gen.Mirza AslamBeg, the then COAS, which ultimately led to her dismissal in August,1990.Gen.Beg stopped inviting Kallue to the Corps Commanders conferences andtransferred the responsibility for covert action in India from the ISI to theArmy intelligence directorate working under the Chief of the General Staff (CGS). 

The second instance was during the first tenure of Nawaz Sharif (1990-93) as thePrime Minister. He appointed as the DG,ISI, Lt.Gen.Javed Nasir, a fundamentalistKashmiri officer, though he was not recommended by Gen.Asif Nawaz Janjua, thethen COAS, for the post. This created friction in the relations between NawazSharif and his COAS, who excluded the ISI chief from all important Armyconferences. 

The third instance was during the second tenure of Nawaz Sharif (1997-99) whenhis action in appointing Lt.Gen. Ziauddin, an engineer, as the DG,ISI,over-riding the objection of Musharraf led to friction between the two. Theseinstances would show that whenever an elected leadership was in power, the COASsaw to it that the elected Prime Minister did not have effective control overthe ISI and that the ISI was marginalised if its head showed any loyalty to theelected Prime Minister. 

In the 1990s, there was a controversy in Pakistan as to who really controlledthe ISI and when was its internal Political Division set up. Air Marshal (retd)Asghar Khan, former chief of the Pakistan Air Force, filed a petition in theSupreme Court challenging the legality of the ISI's Political Division acceptinga donation of Rs.140 million from a bank for use against PPP candidates duringthe 1990 elections. Testifying before the Supreme Court on June 16,1997, Gen. (retd)Mirza Aslam Beg claimed that though the ISI was manned by serving militaryofficers and was part of the Ministry of Defence, it reported to the PrimeMinister and not to the COAS and that its internal Political Division wasactually set up by the late Z.A.Bhutto in 1975. 

Many Pakistani analysts challenged this and said that the ISI, though de jureunder the Prime Minister, had always been controlled de facto by the COAS andthat its internal Political Division had been in existence at least since thedays of Ayub Khan, if not earlier. 

After the elections of 2002, Musharraf kept the ISI directly under his controland did not allow the elected Prime Minister to have any responsibility forsupervising its work. 

During the 1980s, the Covert Action Division of the ISI was used by the CentralIntelligence Agency (CIA) of the US for recruiting, training and arming not onlyAfghan Mujahideen, but also fundamentalist elements of Pakistan for fightingagainst the Soviet troops in Afghanistan. The Saudi intelligence agencyrecruited over 6,000 Arabs in West Asia and North Africa and sent them to theISI for being trained, armed and infiltrated into Afghanistan. All the funds andarms and ammunition from the CIA and all the funds from the Saudi intelligencefor use against the Soviet troops were channelled through the ISI. Among theArabs brought in and trained were Osama bin Laden and his supporters. TheISI’s links with bin Laden and his operatives thus started from the 1980s withthe knowledge and approval of the CIA. 

The withdrawal of the Soviet troops from Afghanistan in 1988-89, which was dueto the jihad waged by the Afghan Mujahideen, Pakistani jihadis and the Arabsunder bin Laden, strengthened the reputation of the ISI. During the same period,the ISI helped DR.A.Q.Khan, the Pakistani nuclear scientist, in the clandestineprocurement and transport of nuclear equipment for the Kahuta Uranium Enrichmentplant, which enabled Pakistan to acquire a military nuclear capability with thetechnology given by China and the equipment procured by the ISI. The US closedits eyes to the nuclear procurement activities of the ISI because of the CIA’sdependence on it for the jihad against the Soviet troops. 

Differences started appearing between the CIA and the ISI in 1990. These weredue to the CIA’s unhappiness over the non-co-operation of the ISI in itsefforts to buy back from the Afghan Mujahideen the unused shoulder-fired Stingermissiles supplied to them for use against Soviet aircraft. The CIA’s concernsover the ISI were enhanced by reports of Pakistani assistance to Iran in thenuclear field starting from 1988 and Pakistani contacts with China and NorthKorea in the nuclear and missile fields. 

In 1993, the Clinton Administration forced Nawaz Sharif, the then PrimeMinister, to remove from the ISI Lt.Gen. Javed Nasir, the then Director-General,and some of his officers because they were seen as non-cooperative in itsefforts to buy back the Stingers. Nasir was a Deobandi fundamentalist, whobelonged to the Tablighi Jamaat, a Pakistani organization to preach Islam, whichwas assisting the jihadi organizations in their recruitment drive in Pakistanand abroad. 

In 1994, during the second tenure of Benazir as the Prime Minister, the ISI andMaj.Gen.Naseerullah Babar, her Interior Minister, acted jointly in encouragingthe formation of the Taliban in order to restore law and order in Afghanistan,which had collapsed after the Afghan Mujahideen came to power in April,1992. BySeptember,1996, the Taliban, with the ISI’s help, succeeded in capturing powerin Kabul and extending its control over all the Pashtun areas. 

Initially, the CIA closed its eyes to it because UNOCAL , the US oil company,was interested in the construction of a gas pipeline from Turkmenistan toPakistan through Afghanistan and was facing difficulty in going ahead with thisproject due to the break-down of law and order. The US interest in seeking theassistance of the Taliban for the UNOCAL project disappeared after the UNOCALitself abandoned it as not feasible. In 1996, Osama bin Laden and his advisersshifted from the Sudan to Afghanistan when the Taliban had not yet capturedpower in Kabul. 

After capturing power in Kabul, the Taliban welcomed the presence of bin Ladenand encouraged him to shift from Jalalabad to Kandahar. He was permitted tostart his training infrastructure in Afghan territory. Alarm bells startedringing in the US over the developing nexus between the Taliban and Al Qaeda,the role played by the ISI in training the Taliban and reports of the resumptionof the contacts of bin Laden with his old friends in Pakistan in the ISI as wellas in Pakistani fundamentalist organizations. 

The US concerns over these developments increased after bin Laden formed in 1998his International Islamic Front (IIF) For Jihad Against the Crusaders and theJewish People and Al Qaeda organized explosions near the US Embassies in Nairobiand Dar-es-Salaam on August 7,1998. The US Cruise missile attacks on AlQaeda’s training camps in Afghan territory on August 20,1998, were noteffective. 

From then on, there was increasing pressure by the US on the government of NawazSharif to either pressure the Taliban to hand over bin Laden to the CIA or topermit the US Special Forces to mount a special operation from Pakistaniterritory to kill or capture bin Laden. Nawaz did not do either as he was afraidof the repercussions in Pakistan if he collaborated with the US against theTaliban and Al Qaeda. 

After overthrowing Nawaz Sharif and seizing power in October, 1999, Musharrafappointed Lt.Gen.Mahmood Ahmed, a close friend of his, as the DG of the ISI. TheUS was unhappy over what it viewed as non-cooperation by the ISI in its effortsto have bin Laden killed or captured. Before it started its military strikes onthe Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghan territory on October 7,2001, it pressuredMusharraf to replace Lt.Gen.Ahmed as the DG of the ISI. Musharraf appointedLt.Gen.Ehsan-ul-Haq as the DG. He was succeeded by Lt.Gen.Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani,who has since taken over as the COAS from Musharraf. The present DG isLt.Gen.Nadeem Taj. 

Kiyani tried to keep the ISI out of political controversies. In recent months,it is the IB which is becoming increasingly controversial after Musharrafappointed Brig (retd) Ijaz Shah, a close personal friend of his, as its Directorand inducted a number of retired army officers into it. He also placed the IBunder the control of Shaukat Aziz, his confidante, who was the then PrimeMinister. Before her assassination, Benazir used to complain that the threat toher security mainly came from Ijaz Shah, Lt.Gen.(retd) Hamid Gul and ChaudhuryPervez Elahi, former Chief Minister of Punjab, all the three of them Zialoyalists. She did not make any complaint against the ISI. However, since herassassination, there have been allegations by her party members that juniorofficials of the ISI might have also been involved in her assassination inaddition to those named by her when she was alive. Ijaz Shah resigned after theelections. 

The ISI has always had three operational priorities. Firstly, the annexation ofKashmir through covert action; secondly, acquiring a strategic depth inAfghanistan through a government which would be favourable to Pakistaniinterests; and thirdly, to help the government in its clandestine nuclear andmissile procurement efforts. 

These priorities have not changed. That is why it has refrained from takingaction against the Pakistani jihadi organizations, which are active in India andagainst the Neo Taliban of Afghanistan, which is operating against the US-ledNATO forces in Afghanistan from sanctuaries in Balochistan and theFederally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). 

While pretending to extend unconditional co-operation to the US in its so-calledwar against terrorism, Musharraf kept the co-operation confined to actionagainst Al Qaeda operatives based in Pakistani territory. Even the co-operationagainst Al Qaeda is restricted to action against Al Qaeda sleeper cellsoperating from non-tribal areas. He did not take any effective action against AlQaeda sanctuaries in the FATA or against the leadership of the Neo Taliban,headed by Mulla Mohammad Omar, its Amir, operating from the tribal areas ofPakistan. Nor did he act against the terrorist infrastructure directed againstIndia. 

In December,2003, Musharraf escaped two attempts to assassinate him atRawalpindi allegedly mounted by Al Qaeda and pro-Al Qaeda elements with thecomplicity of some junior officers of the Army and the Air Force.