Suicide Attack on Indian Embassy in Kabul

putnanja · Post by **putnanja** » 09 Jul 2008 03:18

Thanks Jaspreet. I had just posted one other article in the Nepal thread, and posted the above article there too. For some reason, thought I was in kabul bombing thread.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 03:29

The attackers were trying to get into the compound and attack the building itself. I thought that was evident from day one ..... the two Indian officials were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

However, what is really strange is the behaviour of US/UK politicians and/or strategic com. Their own intel have stated that Pakistan is behind these terrorists ........ and still they are daft enough to think otherwise ..... when the proof is black and white in front of them!!!!

India should alter this destiny. Take this as a Kargil "Far West".

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 09 Jul 2008 03:36

There are two important things going on now- one is the deal and the other is the climate change negotiations both could saddle India in the future. Once these are over there is some room for margin. Definitely there are short term and long term moves that India can take without prejudice from US.

Make haste slowly but delibrately.
-------
Alos for outsiders its easy to see its an attack on the embassy and not the officials. The GOI officials have to come out of the shock and plan for the aftermath.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 09 Jul 2008 04:02

From Telegraph, 9 july 2008

TRAGEDY IN KABUL
- A policy for the security of Indian diplomats abroad is needed
Diplomacy -K.P. Nayar

Vadapalli Venkateswara Rao made the highest sacrifice that any diplomat can make for his calling and for his country. Rao, 44, who died in the suicide bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul on Monday, is only the second diplomat in independent India that anyone can recall to fall victim to terrorism.

Twenty four years separate the kidnapping and murder of Ravindra Mhatre in Birmingham in 1984 and the terrorist bomb that took Rao’s life this week. Sadly, Rao will not be the last Indian diplomat to make the ultimate sacrifice for the country as India widens its national interests, adding economic and strategic clout to its geographic destiny.

It was in early 2003 that an agitated joint secretary in charge of South Block’s administration was in the outer office of the foreign secretary with the minutes of the foreign service board that decides the postings of Indian diplomats. The board had just decided on a long list of postings, and one of those was to send Rao as first secretary to the Indian embassy in Washington. She could not comprehend why Rao did not want to go to Washington.

He has just done three years of demanding political work in Kathmandu, the joint secretary attempted to rationalize with herself. Nepal had been in turmoil and Indian diplomats in Kathmandu did not have an easy time when the world’s only Hindu kingdom — then — was in ferment. In addition, the Nepalese government had hosted the summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, which meant a thankless additional workload for the Indian mission in Kathmandu. What is wrong with him, declining one of the most coveted postings in the Indian Foreign Service, the joint secretary kept asking in the hope that someone — even a visitor waiting in the outer office to see the foreign secretary — would give an answer that would satisfy her logic.

Eventually, Rao did go to Washington, where he was immediately thrown in at the deep end in the mission’s commerce wing. Economic work at the embassy in Washington is divided between a minister who is usually an Indian Administrative Service officer with experience in an economic ministry back home, and an IFS officer, also with the rank of minister, but who is on deputation to what is a post of the commerce ministry.

Around the time that Rao arrived in Washington, the IAS post had been vacant for some time. This meant that his boss, the minister for commerce, had to double as the economic minister as well. To make matters worse for Rao, the boss, V.S. Seshadri, a rare breed of applied mathematician who joined the IFS, was constantly being called to New Delhi and to trade policy meetings involving India, to advise the commerce minister on matters related to the World Trade Organisation. For a country of India’s size and economy, the government has experts — some say experts with intellectual honesty — on WTO matters who can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Seshadri is one of them, having worked earlier as joint secretary in the commerce ministry dealing with the WTO.

Rao made the easy transition from the sound and fury of Nepal’s politics to dealing with the corporate boardrooms in America. Because he died a victim of terrorism and as a ready volunteer in promoting India’s deeply entrenched, but challenging, interests in neighbouring Afghanistan, his role in promoting India’s economic interests in the United States of America is less likely to be remembered.

Told about the deaths at the Indian premises in Kabul on board his special flight to Japan on Monday, the prime minister, Manmohan Singh, was horrified by the tragedy. The name V.V. Rao, however, did not mean anything to him and the prime minister did not mention Rao by name. But as someone who covered Singh’s landmark visit to the White House in 2005, this columnist can attest that with Rao’s energy and perseverance at the embassy in Washington, the prime minister’s visit was fuller for its economic content, which Singh values much more than politics.

Rao was one of four backroom diplomats at the embassy in Washington without whom a prime ministerial visit on that scale would not have been glitch-free. Two of these diplomats had worked with different prime ministers in their office before being sent to the US. One of them had similarly run the office of the external affairs minister. And Rao had already dealt with most of India’s neighbourhood and that had made him street-smart in diplomatic terms. It was Rao’s commitment to serving in the neighbourhood that made him volunteer for Kabul. It was that commitment which puzzled the joint secretary to whom Rao said he did not want to go to Washington in 2003.

These diplomats are all in their mid-to-late 40s. Together, they represent a new brand in Indian diplomatic style and content. It is perhaps not a coincidence that their collective presence in Washington was also the most productive time ever in Indo-US relations.

In addition to the nitty-gritty of what Rao was entrusted with in terms of Singh’s visit, there was an avalanche of new economic initiatives which were coming to the desks of Seshadri and Rao at that time. The high-profile CEOs’ Forum which the prime minister set rolling jointly with the US president, George W. Bush, the reactivation and redefining of the Indo-US High Technology Cooperation Group that, in a way, eventually led to the nuclear deal, the Trade Policy Forum — the list goes on and on as the proof of the economic pudding that is now shared by India and the US.

Nearly two years after Rao’s departure from Washington, at a condolence meeting at the Indian embassy on Monday, Seshadri’s successor at the mission, Banashri Bose Harrison, acknowledged that her work had been made easier upon arrival in the US because of the detailed and comprehensive status report on key Indo-US commercial matters that Rao had left on each file.

When the IFS Association met in New Delhi on Monday to mourn Rao, there were not many among its members who had been friends of Mhatre, the diplomat who had been murdered in Birmingham. But there were several IFS officers who knew T.P. Sreenivasan, India’s former high commissioner in Nairobi, and who still deal with him in his retirement. Sreenivasan and his wife, Lekha, were brutally attacked in their official residence one night in 1995, an attack that was obviously meant not to kill, but to leave them alive to tell their story.

The official spin about the Nairobi attack was that it was a burglary, a spin that was designed to protect the Indian community in Kenya from any racial fallout of the incident. Sreenivasan now admits that Kenya’s domestic politics and his role as Indian envoy there had everything to do with the attack at his home.

In its dignity and wisdom, the IFS Association’s meeting on Monday made no references to previous attacks on Indian diplomats, obviously because it was called specifically to condole the loss of lives in Kabul, but the thread that runs through the three attacks is the same. That ought to make the government’s security establishment sit up and do some soul-searching about protecting Indian government personnel abroad before any more lives are lost.

Security at the Indian embassy in Kabul has been an issue since the time J.N. Dixit was ambassador to Afghanistan. But luck was on India’s side and that, more than anything else, prevented any incident on the scale of this week’s attack on the mission. That luck ran out with the suicide attack on Rao and others there.

It is urgent that a comprehensive, uniform approach to security at Indian installations abroad is worked out instead of the piece-meal localized measures that are now in effect. Because of the current approach, security at missions such as in Canada and the United Kingdom were virtually outsourced until recently to the local governments. Now is the time to change it before the country ceases to have the luxury of being relaxed about this issue.

John Snow · Post by **John Snow** » 09 Jul 2008 04:10

Ok all this post facto analysis points
1) ISI is behind this.
2) Taliban was instrumental in execution.
3) TSP wants to destabilize Afghanistan
4) India wants the good will of Afghanis and stabilize Afghanistan govt.
5) Indians have been killed in Indian Territory ( embassy is Indian property and is considered as extension of India)

So what now?
Two minute silence and grief
But no action of punitive nature.?

After IG all the PMs have had V notch only with Cd equal to zero, because there is no head!
Even periodically they can't perform ( their dharma)

I expect PM in action.

Sanjay M · Post by **Sanjay M** » 09 Jul 2008 04:51

Since the political system provides no accountability for our leadership, then our leadership won't feel particularly obliged to take any responsive action towards this terror act.

The state sponsor of this act will go unpunished, as they themselves already knew they would.

In the absence of a policy of accountability for our terror-sponsoring adversary, then our political leadership have to be held responsible in its place. That's the only fair and rightful response.

putnanja · Post by **putnanja** » 09 Jul 2008 06:47

Proxy Attack?

putnanja · Post by **putnanja** » 09 Jul 2008 07:04

Afghan Bombing Sends Stark Message to India: With Power Comes Risks

...

But the attack also set off a lively policy debate, first over whether India should complement its reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan with military boots on the ground, and then whether Pakistan, and its backers in Washington, would allow India to play a more robust military role.

Pakistan has long been nervous about India’s penetration into Afghanistan, including its five consular missions there, along with an air base in Tajikistan, across Afghanistan’s northern border.
...

The attack on the embassy in Kabul has also stirred a simmering debate about whether India, as a rising economic power in the world, ought to also flex its muscle in areas of strategic interest.

The United States, for instance, long ago leaned on India to send troops to Iraq and to use its influence on Myanmar to push for democracy. India refused both requests. Sri Lanka invited India to mediate in its long-running ethnic war, but India’s intervention there 20 years ago left the Indian military with a bloody nose, and it has since refused to meddle.

“I don’t know where is an example of India punching its weight,” said K. Subrahmanyam, a defense analyst. “It is India that is keeping a restrained posture. It goes back to how India became free and what kind of state India is.”
...

“As India’s influence grows it will become increasingly involved in the local politics of a foreign country,” said Rahul Roy-Chowdhury, a research fellow at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies. “It cannot afford to see itself as an innocent bystander anymore.”

Gurmeet Kanwal, head of the Center for Land Warfare Studies, said that Indian paramilitary troops were ill prepared to face the insurgents in Afghanistan, and that India’s development aid to that country needed to be secured by a military presence.

“I wouldn’t use the expression flex its muscles,” he said. “I would say the time has come to live up to our responsibility. If it involves military intervention, so be it.”

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 07:17

Ms Sengupta needs to get a life. India has faced THIS risk since partition!!! India has lost more lives than all countries combined have lost in A'stan.

Some of these articles create more problems for India than either solve them or provide any insight.

Karan Dixit · Post by **Karan Dixit** » 09 Jul 2008 07:37

My condolences to the family of victims.

Question for current administration - what are they doing to avenge the death of innocent brave men?

----------

Global community condemns Indian embassy blast

http://www.outlookindia.com/pti_news.asp?id=586980

-----------

India and Afghanistan both have enough integrity to call spade a spade:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 295422.ece

putnanja · Post by **putnanja** » 09 Jul 2008 07:56

Karan Dixit wrote:http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 295422.ece

From the above link...

...
The role of the ISI in supporting the Taliban insurgency is a highly sensitive issue, which Western officials decline to discuss openly. The British and US governments have both avoided directly accusing Pakistan of aiding insurgent groups. Britain in particular is reliant on the ISI for information connected to domestic terror plots planned in Pakistan.

However, privately there is acknowledgement that a level of complicity is a reality.

“There is an acceptance that elements of the ISI are engaged with the insurgents,” said one source serving in the International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) for Afghanistan yesterday. “The issue that remains unresolved is the degree of higher level acceptance of this, and how much they (the ISI) can actually be controlled.”

British officers confirmed to The Times an incident last summer in which a Taliban corpse found on the battlefield in Helmand turned out to be carrying papers identifying the body as that of a serving ISI colonel.

When British officials challenged the Islamabad government on the issue, they received an explanation that the man was ’on leave’ at the time of his death.

A US Department of Defence funded study undertaken by the RAND Corporation and published last month also stated that elements of the ISI were aiding the Taleban.

“Right now, the Taleban and other groups are getting help from individuals within Pakistan’s government, and until that ends, the region’s long-term security is in jeopardy,” concluded the report’s author Seth Jones.

He said support included medical care for wounded fighters, logistical and financial support. He also said ISI trainers were instructing insurgents in camps at Quetta, Mansehra, Shamshattu and Parachinar and other areas of Pakistan.
...
Dr Barnett Rubin, an Afghan expert in New York, told The Times: “People tend to depict Afghanistan as a fight between the United States and Islamic radicals, but it is also a theatre for other conflicts and one of those is between India and Pakistan.”

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 09 Jul 2008 08:57

One more
Familis grieve, refuse to crumble

Families grieve, refuse to crumble
- Diplomats weep for Venkat
ANANYA SENGUPTA
The families of Brigadier Ravi Dutt Mehta and (above) Vadapalli Venkateswara Rao in Delhi on Tuesday. Pictures by Ramakant Kushwaha

New Delhi, July 8: Hard-nosed diplomats broke down as they watched. The 12-year-old lighting his father’s pyres hardly did.

Aniket Rao stood firm at his post at Delhi’s Brar Cemetery, the military funeral ground, tearful but composed as he carried out the last rites before TV cameras, barely 24 hours after a terrorist’s bomb had thrown a shroud on his world.

Yards from him, a posse of foreign ministry mandarins wept unabashedly, or hid their eyes behind dark glasses, as they remembered the fun-loving and popular Vadapalli Venkateswara Rao, the counsellor killed in yesterday’s bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul.

Aniket kept gazing at the leaping flames but had to leave reluctantly since the public spotlight was becoming too much for mother Malathi. The Delhi schoolteacher, too, remained in control of her emotions as did daughter Amulya, 10, who kept crying softly holding her mother’s hand.

Each time Aniket’s façe suggested he was about to break down, Malathi kept reminding him: “You promised you won’t cry. We are all so proud of you.”

This was four hours after Sunita Mehta, clutching the cap and belt of her dead husband, Brigadier Ravi Dutt Mehta, watched his remains consigned to the flames at the same cemetery, her eyes dry.

“I am so proud of him. He was a very good man,” she said, running her hands affectionately over the cap again and again.

Brig. Mehta, India’s defence attache at the Kabul embassy, was in the same car with Rao that was blown up in the attack.

His son, Flight Lieutenant Udit Mehta, a fighter pilot with the Indian Air Force, was a picture of calm.

The 24-year-old tirelessly answered questions about his father while keeping a concerned eye over his mother.

He smiled each time he remembered his verbal duels with his 53-year-old father.

“I was sleeping when he left (for the embassy) yesterday. We had had dinner together on Sunday night. In fact, it was a ritual with us — dinners were a family affair,” the young officer said.

“I remember, we played squash for the first time together in Kabul and later we would come home and fight over who had cheated.”

Mehta’s family was with him, vacationing in Kabul. He was planning a trip to Delhi with his wife, son and daughter Bhavya, a final-year biotechnology student in Bangalore.

Army, navy and air force officers today thronged the funeral, attended by army chief Deepak Kapoor.

Mehta had been posted in Kabul in February while Rao was to have completed his tenure in August.

Rao, a month short of 45, was looking forward to a posting in Delhi, where his wife and children live, and had returned to Kabul after a vacation with them the day before he was killed.

“He was such a warm, fun-loving man. We have known the family for around 15 years and my husband and he had been together during two postings, in Colombo and Kathmandu,” remembered Jayanti Ramesh, wife of the cabinet secretary and a teacher at the same school as Malathi.

“He was a man who, after a day’s work, would call up friends and set up a meeting. His wife is just like him; they were both popular wherever they went.”

A journalist said what she found “the most endearing thing about Rao was his openly expressed affection and admiration for his beautiful wife”.

“I had joined them on a vacation two years ago. I remember an evening when she was dancing and he sat just in front of her, watching her in awe.”

I get the feeling that Sri Rao would have made an ideal BR member- young mid 40s, highly educated(Phd) yet not Westernised, loves his country and family. A very sad day when a core citizen is cut down.

Same with Brig. Mehta. He would have been a good Moderator once he retired.

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 09 Jul 2008 09:35

Bomb found on Afghan bus transporting Indians

* NATO soldier, four Afghan police killed in attacks
* US carrier moves from Gulf to back up Afghan operations

HERAT/ASADABAD/ WASHINGTON: A bomb was found on a bus transporting 12 Indian workers in Afghanistan on Tuesday, a governor said, a day after a suicide attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul killed 41 people.

The workers, including engineers, had noticed a "suspicious package" on the bus as they were travelling to work in the southwestern province of Nimroz, provincial governor Ghulam Dastagir Azad told AFP. They called the police who discovered it was a remote-controlled bomb, he said. The driver of the bus was arrested for questioning. "The bomb could have been fixed on his bus without him knowing but all this will be made clear after the investigation is over," he said.

Johann · Post by **Johann** » 09 Jul 2008 11:18

ramana wrote:One thing for experts to ponder is that the timing of the attack to coincide with the gates being opened to let the two officers into the embassy compound. Had the attacker made it into the compound the damage would have been more devastating based onthe reports of the sound of the explosion being felt all over Kabul which implies quite a lot of stuff was packed. In all probability the driver of the embassy car saved the embassy from greater damage by getting hit. The videos and eye witness reports (if there are any) could give better inofrmation if the driver took evasive action by blocking the attacker. If the attacker wanted to attack the car only couldnt he have done it in another area of Kabul? I submit it could be an attack on the embassy itself.

Ramana, of course the target was the embassy - the mode of the attack is identical to the Egyptian Islamic Jihad SVBIED attack on the Egyptian embassy in Islamabad in 1995, and all of the subsequent attacks patterned on that model.

Staggered concrete bollards are *essential* to preventing suicide vehicle bombers from having a straight high-speed run at a facillity gate. Israeli experience in Lebanon back in the 1980s where suicide car bomb technology and tactics were originally developed.

*BUT*

It could have been a lot worse!

Jihadi tactics in Saudi Arabia and Iraq since 2003 have focused on using *multiple* vehicles, often with gunmen following on. The first suicide vehicle (preferably a lorry/ambulance/cement mixer/fire engine/bus) breaches the gate. Subsequent vehicles detonate in the courtyard, as close to the main building as possible in order to bring about structural collapse in the best case scenario. Gunmen might also follow in additional vehicles - they will fight as fedayeen, willing to die, but also willing to escape if they can.

Other common jihadi tactics particularly in Iraq are a second round of IEDs to target first responders who rush in to assist victims of the first blast.

Sanjay M · Post by **Sanjay M** » 09 Jul 2008 12:09

I want to know how we can track down the killers. At this point, I'm willing to hold the Congress Party responsible, due to their stubborn willingness to turn a blind eye to Pakistani-sponsored terrorism.

Shivani · Post by **Shivani** » 09 Jul 2008 13:56

pradeepe wrote: 2. Karzai not pulling any punches when it comes to pinning the blame for the mess there

On this note, does the MEA have any plan ready to implement when Karzai is martyered? We may not be able to influence who will be his successor, and we should be prepared that new puppet might even be hostile to India.

Influence should be secured in the Afghan elite. Nothing should be taken for granted.

Shivani · Post by **Shivani** » 09 Jul 2008 14:07

NRao wrote:The attackers were trying to get into the compound and attack the building itself. I thought that was evident from day one ..... the two Indian officials were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It appears that the car acted as a barrier and prevented the terrorist from driving inside the compund.

Multi layered security should have been there from day one. Cars not belonging to embassy should be stopped a good 500 feet from the compund. Sure, the casualties might still be there, but at least embassy vehicles can be given quicker clearance to the secondary screening at main gate, thereby minimizing their exposure to risk. Safer for the embassy itself too.

This will be slightly more expensive, and perhaps inconvenience the non-hostile Afghans. Sadly, our adminstration seems to be penny wise pound foolish, and has wrong concept about how to win the hearts and mind game.

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 09 Jul 2008 14:10

We were warned,according to this report that an attack was imminent.If so there has been a catastrophic security failure,especially as there have been previous attacks against Indian citizens in the country.It as has been mentioned ,common practice in most countries is to install steel tripod fences with spikes,bollards,etc. to prevent an attacking vehicle from making a straight run into a road, entrance,gateway,etc. of a high value building/installation.Vehicles have to meander their way through after being checked before the barriers whic h are also placed some distance away from the main portal.This prevents a suicide bomber from damaging the building.From available pictures of theentrance to the embassy,these kind of defences were absent.Secondly,it is bad practice to have several cars entering at the same time,allowing for greater casualties.There was obvious monitoring of the movements of the diplomats,who appear not to have changed their routine commuting methods.A complete revamp of the security of our diplomatic missions and access procedures for our staff is needed.

There should also be a grading of missions according to their importance and threat perceptions.A mission in a less important country might have a higher risk factor than that of a major western state.I was once given a personal detailed tour around a most important foreign mission (prudence forbids me to mention the state and country) and specially shown virtually every important area,the ambassador and counsellors' suites,"pest free" conference rooms,including the most secret communications centre,and other classified areas like the vaults whose doors looked as if they could withstand a nuclear blast! Some of the defences,internal and external were also explained to me .I was amazed.All I can say that even if attackers could penetrate the inner compound of the mission with a vehicle,they would have to face further devices that would spring into action,impeding further progress,saving the building from a direct hit.The atttackers would then need a small army with exceptionally heavy weaponry,or the "Terminator" to successfully storm the building,sorry fortress,and once inside would be easily taken out by another set of defences!

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JG09Df02.html

Now it's war against India in Afghanistan
By Sudha Ramachandran

BANGALORE - The suicide bomber who crashed an explosive-laden car into the Indian Embassy in the Afghan capital Kabul on Monday not only killed 41 people and injured more than 140, he sent a powerful message to Delhi that its significant presence and growing influence in Afghanistan through its reconstruction projects are now in the firing line.

Among the dead were four Indians, including Defense Attache Brigadier R D Mehta, diplomat Venkateswara Rao and two guards at the embassy, who were personnel of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police - a paramilitary outfit. The attack is said to be among the deadliest in Kabul since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

The Indian Embassy stands near Afghanistan's Interior Ministry in
a busy part of Kabul. Intelligence sources had apparently warned of an attack on the mission this week and security had been upgraded. Yet the suicide bomber and his explosive-filled vehicle were able to reach the gates unhindered.

The attack comes within the context of spiraling violence in the country, including the capital. More US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization troops were killed in Afghanistan in June than in any other month since military operations began in 2001. Forty-five soldiers, including 27 American, 13 British, two Canadian, one Polish, one Romanian and one Hungarian, were killed during the month. Coalition fatalities in June in Afghanistan, for the first time, exceeded coalition fatalities in Iraq.

In April 27, militants opened fire on President Hamid Karzai at an annual military parade in Kabul, killing a legislator and two other Afghans. Last month, in a brazen attack, the Taliban stormed a jail in Kandahar, freeing hundreds of prisoners.

The Taliban issued a statement denying responsibility for Monday's attack. But few in India or Afghanistan are convinced. The Taliban generally claim responsibility for attacks against international or Afghan troops and deny their hand in attacks in which victims are mainly Afghan civilians. Most of the victims of Monday's blast were Afghan civilians; many had lined up for visas to travel to India.

Indian experts say that the needle of suspicion points to the Taliban and its backers in the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan's intelligence agency. This is the view in Kabul as well. While Afghanistan's Interior Ministry said the "attack was carried out in coordination and consultation with an active intelligence service in the region" - alluding to the ISI - Karzai said the bombing was the work of the "enemies of Afghanistan-India friendship", an implicit reference to Pakistan.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was quick to deny the allegations, saying that Pakistan "needed a stable Afghanistan".

India and Afghanistan enjoy a close relationship nowadays, a matter that irks their common neighbor and traditional foe, Pakistan.

India and Pakistan have vied for influence in Afghanistan for decades. In the 1990s, with the Pakistan-backed Taliban in power, Islamabad's influence peaked. Then in a reversal of fortune, India, which backed the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance during the years the Taliban were in power, saw its fortunes improve in Kabul, even as Islamabad's influence touched a nadir.

With its old friends in the Northern Alliance in power and an India-educated Karzai at the helm, India's influence has grown significantly in recent years.

It has pledged about US$750 million to Afghanistan's reconstruction since 2002 and is today the fifth-largest bilateral donor in Afghanistan after the United States, Britain, Japan and Germany. This places India among the big players in the country.

India is involved in an array of projects, ranging from providing food to children to improving infrastructure. It is constructing the 218-kilometer Zaranj-Delaram road, the Afghan parliament and a power transmission line from Pul-e-Khumri to Kabul and a substation in Kabul. It is repairing and reconstructing the Salma Dam in the western province of Herat at a cost of $109.3 million and building telephone exchanges linking 11 provinces to Kabul. It has supplied hundreds of buses and mini-buses. India is training bureaucrats and is providing over 3,000 Afghans with skills to earn a livelihood in carpentry, plumbing and masonry.

Hundreds of Afghans have been given scholarships to study in India. India is providing food assistance in the form of high-protein biscuits to 1.4 million school children daily.

"India's reconstruction strategy was designed to win over every sector of Afghan society, give India a high profile with Afghans, gain the maximum political advantage and, of course, undercut Pakistani influence," the BBC quoted analyst Ahmed Rashid as saying,

India's role in road construction is improving its access to Afghanistan and beyond to Central Asia. The Zaranj-Delaram project, for instance, will run from the Iranian border to Delaram, which lies on Afghanistan's Garland Highway. The Garland Highway connects several of the country's key cities. India can offload shiploads of goods at Iran's Chabahar port and then send the consignments overland through the Zaranj-Delaram highway and the Garland Highway to cities across Afghanistan.

Approximately 3,000-4,000 Indian nationals are working on reconstruction projects across Afghanistan.

Pakistan, which has denied India overland access to Afghanistan, is annoyed that the road construction will provide India with a land route to Afghanistan. India believes that the ISI has used the Taliban to strike at Indian activity in Afghanistan. India's road projects - Zaranj-Delaram in particular - have come under repeated Taliban fire, the most recent being a suicide attack in April that left seven people, including four Indians, dead.

India's engagement in Afghanistan has helped it exert its soft power in Afghanistan. It is seen as a country that is working at changing the daily lives of Afghans, committed to capacity-building of Afghans rather than engaged in winning contracts for Indian business. India is seen as contributing to the building of democracy in Afghanistan.

Then there is the popularity of Bollywood films and Indian television soaps in Afghanistan, which have won India many hearts in this country - and the Taliban's ire.

Pakistan has done its utmost to restrict Indian influence. It put its foot down on allowing Indian troops into the country, but contrary to Islamabad's expectations, this might have worked in India's favor.

India's engagement in Afghanistan has not been tainted by military operations gone awry. Unlike other powers in Afghanistan, whose reconstruction work has been sullied by indiscriminate bombing and killing of civilians, India is seen as working for the Afghan people.

So great is Pakistan's concern of India's presence in Afghanistan that it raised strong objections to India setting up consulates in Kandahar and Jalalabad. It has accused India of using these consulates, which border Pakistan, to support "terrorist activities" inside Pakistan. The Indian consulate at Jalalabad has been a target of at least a couple of grenade attacks, the most recent last December.

Monday's attack was the first time the Indian Embassy has been targeted since the fall of the Taliban. But the embassy building was in the crosshairs of the Taliban even in the 1990s. The building was a "favorite target of the Taliban" between 1996 and 2001, when it was in power.

"So intense were the rocket attacks on the embassy at a time when the Taliban were inching closer to Kabul waging bloody fights against the Northern Alliance forces led by legendary leader [Ahmad Shah] Massoud that [Indian] officials had decided to construct a heavily fortified bunker right inside the embassy premises. So specific was the targeting of the Indian Embassy that the officials used to leave their cars and other vehicles parked inside the Indonesian Embassy, which is next to the Indian Embassy, to keep them safe from the Taliban rockets," reports the Times of India.

The embassy was closed on September 26, 1996 - a few hours before the Taliban entered Kabul, to be reopened on December 22, 2001 - the day Karzai was sworn in as president.

Over the past few years, the ISI and its surrogates in the Taliban have sought to cut India's influence through intimidation and attacks on Indian engineers and construction workers. Now with the attack on the embassy, they have signaled that they are stepping up their battle against India. It marks a major escalation in terrorist attacks not only against India's presence in Afghanistan but against New Delhi's Afghan policy.

India has reiterated that the attacks will not weaken its mission to help in Afghanistan's reconstruction. In New Delhi, the Ministry of External Affairs commented, "Such acts of terror will not deter us from fulfilling our commitments to the government and people of Afghanistan."

And already there are calls in India for troops to be sent to Afghanistan. An editorial in the influential English daily, India Express, says, "After the Kabul bombing, India must come to terms with an important question that it has avoided debating so far. New Delhi cannot continue to expand its economic and diplomatic activity in Afghanistan, while avoiding a commensurate increase in its military presence there. For too long, New Delhi has deferred to Pakistani and American sensitivities about raising India's strategic profile in Afghanistan."

A military presence in Afghanistan might increase India's profile and add to its stature as a growing power in the region. But it will end up being bracketed with the Americans in Afghanistan, an image it would do well to avoid. It would work against the country's long-term interests in the region, jeopardizing the enormous goodwill it has earned to date.

Troops in Afghanistan would push India into the Afghan quagmire. This might be what the ISI was gunning for when they attacked the Indian embassy on Monday.

Sudha Ramachandran is an independent journalist/researcher based in Bangalore.

Dnirody · Post by **Dnirody** » 09 Jul 2008 17:00

The attack could potentially have happened at any time in the past few years; it did not. The Afghan authorities have gone out of their way to say that the Embassy had been specifically targeted. One may wonder how the attackers were able to get to their target, given the proximity of the Afghan Interior Ministry -- a plum target if ever there was one. So just what were Afghan security forces up to, not to mention their 'friends' and 'allies', while the vehicle was on its way in? It is an obvious demonstration of their failures , so ascribing the act to the ISI or to men from Mars is sheer irrelevance. HK must be cursing the day that he placed his confidence in NATO, one may wonder how many of its own incompetent soldiery were in the environs at the time. Too busy shopping, perhaps or visiting the new democratic watering holes. How about buying drugs and seeking out brothels?

Where may the NEXT attack take place. HK would be best advised checking and re-checking his own security. He may be next. But pity the poor fellow. When not begging alms abroad, defending corrupt warlords on his payroll, weeping over dead Afghan civilians or waving his finger in the general direction of Islamabad he must be worrying about re-election. Seriously, what reason is there to re-elect him?

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 17:38

Could more have been done - to protect - perhaps.

I was looking at Google Earth and from that there does not seem to be too much more that could have been done. The Embassy - looks like (correct me if I am wrong) - is located on a rather busy street, with not much depth to have vehicle weave around, etc.

Besides, reports suggest that one of the guards was in the process of lifting the barrier when the bomber blew the car up.

The street is a very busy street and I doubt anyone could have identified the bomb car very easily.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 18:05

AP Interview: Indian Embassy bomber hoped to destroy Kabul embassy, ambassador says

KABUL, Afghanistan: The suicide bomber who detonated his vehicle at the gates of the Indian Embassy in Kabul intended to destroy the embassy itself, the Indian ambassador to Afghanistan said Wednesday.

Ambassador Jayant Prasad also said the death toll from Monday's bombing had risen to 58, up from 41, after several people died of their wounds. Prasad said several school-age children who attend classes near the embassy were among the dead. The Education Ministry confirmed that eight school children died.

"It is our reconstruction of events that the intention of the attacker was to detonate the device within the premises of the embassy and destroy the embassy," Prasad told The Associated Press.

A review of the bomb scene showed that one of the embassy guards killed in the blast still had his hand on the closed gate. The guard likely hadn't opened it because he saw a suspicious car driving close behind an embassy vehicle, Prasad said.

"The suicide attacker then decided to explode his device outside rather than inside, so the maximum impact was taken by the (sand-filled blast) barriers," he said. "So the damage to the embassy wasn't structural."

The blast barriers were installed in the last several weeks, Prasad said, because "we were expecting trouble."

Prasad said the embassy was attacked because of projects India is carrying out in Afghanistan. India has spent $750 million in aid since 2001, Prasad said.

One of India's key projects is the building of a road in southwest Afghanistan that will give the country access to ports in Iran. The road will allow commerce to bypass seaports in southern Pakistan that Afghan trade must now use.

That road project is due to be completed next week.

"We were targeted because we are doing certain things in Afghanistan for the social and economic development of Afghanistan, and some elements, some people, don't want us to do what we are doing here," Prasad said without elaborating.

Barnett Rubin, an expert on Afghanistan at New York University, noted in a Web posting this week that there has been a pattern of attacks on Indian road construction teams in southwest Afghanistan.

"These teams are constructing a road linking Afghanistan to the Persian Gulf via the Iranian rail and road network, which would bypass both Karachi and Pakistan's new port in Gwadar," Rubin wrote. "This road also passes through the Baluch parts of Afghanistan and Iran, next to the Pakistani province of Baluchistan, where Pakistan charges India with supporting nationalist/separatist insurgents."

Another major Indian project is the building of electrical transmission lines and substations to bring electricity from Uzbekistan to Kabul.

The ambassador refused to speculate on who might have been behind the attack — the deadliest bombing in Kabul since the 2001 fall of the Taliban. But he said the embassy noted with interest the statements from President Hamid Karzai's office putting the blame on a regional intelligence agency, interpreted as a clear reference to Pakistan.

Early accounts "are pointing in one direction," Prasad said. "We are waiting for the further investigations to confirm or not to confirm that."

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 09 Jul 2008 18:18

Philip wrote:

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JG09Df02.html

Now it's war against India in Afghanistan
By Sudha Ramachandran

A military presence in Afghanistan might increase India's profile and add to its stature as a growing power in the region. But it will end up being bracketed with the Americans in Afghanistan, an image it would do well to avoid. It would work against the country's long-term interests in the region, jeopardizing the enormous goodwill it has earned to date.

Troops in Afghanistan would push India into the Afghan quagmire. This might be what the ISI was gunning for when they attacked the Indian embassy on Monday.

Sudha Ramachandran is an independent journalist/researcher based in Bangalore.

The author deliberately fails to mention that an air force base could be built for Indian air force in Afghanistan which could in future help in war against Pakistan. This should be the aim of the Indian govt and not just troops inside Afghanistan.
If really ISI was gunning for India to enter Afghanistan then may as well create another front in Afghanistan Pakistan border.

enqyoob · Post by **enqyoob** » 09 Jul 2008 18:24

a most important foreign mission (prudence forbids me to mention the state and country) and specially shown virtually every important area,the ambassador and counsellors' suites,"pest free" conference rooms,including the most secret communications centre,and other classified areas like the vaults whose doors looked as if they could withstand a nuclear blast!

The US Embassy in Moscow was built with all these. Unfortunately the Soviets just built the bugs right into the structure during construction.

The whole thing had to be torn down, IIRC. Probably the same was done to the Pakistani High Begging Commission in London, since it was probably built with 400% British aid.

Sending "boots on the ground" into Afghanistan would be even more stupid than sending troops into Iraq. But a few building-demolition exercises in downtown Islamabad using Su-30MKIs would be a very good "message".

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 18:48

Not much space between road and embassy

CRamS · Post by **CRamS** » 09 Jul 2008 19:06

Can anyone with a keen journalistic eye point out the differences, if any, between western, especially US media coverage of the latest attack on US embassy in Turkey and Paki attack on Indian embassy. And benefit of doubt given like 'rivals clashing over influence;, India alleges TSP denies kind of crap?

pradeepe · Post by **pradeepe** » 09 Jul 2008 19:17

^^ those pictures posted by NRao.

That must have been once heck of an explosion if it tore up concrete like that.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 19:32

CRS,

That mentality seems to exist within the Indian reporting system too!

Two things come to my mind:

1) I feel that Pakis have given India (another?) chance to act. Paki leaders claim they are not behind it. I think India should publicly accept that and state that India will quietly resolve this issue outside of the public eye. Whatever needs to be done to stop this will be done. Pakistan will be kept in the loop when and if needed ....... this is not a Pakistani issue - per their own leaders, so India does not need to tell them anything at all

2) A'stan needs to be temporarily divided - only for security reasons. Since the NATO commander has agreed that the TSP/A'stan border s too porous, that a new temp border need to be created at some point just north of Kandahar, running along the actual border, all the way to Iran. The "temp south" will be booted for a temp period of time and locals will have freedom, but not anyone else. Clamp down for a period of a year or so. and clean up the mess all the way across the actual border. Very controvertial - granted. During thsi period build out - specially roads. IF need be extend the time for another year - to accomodate for building more roads. And, of course, do not even listen to Pakistan.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 19:34

That must have been once heck of an explosion if it tore up concrete like that.

Certainly not meant to kill two very important Indian Embassy staff.

From that PoV, this is a failed attack.

Raju · Post by **Raju** » 09 Jul 2008 19:55

yeah, it was an attack on the embassy that failed. According to an interview with Indian Ambassador to Afghanistan the main person who was responisble for foiling this attack was the security guard posted at the embassy. Roop Singh was on duty when he saw a Toyota pickup behind VV Rao's and Brig Mehta's car which was waiting to enter the embassy.

Roop Singh immidiately closed the gate and did not allow Brig Mehta's and VV Rao's car to enter.

This forced the suicide bombers to set off the blasts outside the gate on the road itself in panic, and this prevented any further damage to the embassy.

Roop Singh's hands were still holding the gate when the remains of the gate were being removed.

Roop Singh's act prevented the embassy itself and all the people within including the ambassador from being blown away and killed.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 09 Jul 2008 20:00

NRao and Johann, My pointing out that it was an attack on the embassy and not just the two officials was due to Indian press reports of attacker ramming their car etc which amde it look like they were the targets. And forum mahashaye piped pulling a barkha mutt in speculating that these two were somehow intelligence connected thus rationalizing the attack. And my post was prior to the reports admitting that it was an attack on the embassy.

Others,
There have to be short term and long term moves to support a strategy. The strategy should be to not lose Afghanistan again even if US wishes it like the Taliban takeover.

Indian troops in Afghanistan have to be under independent command. And that was and is not palatable for US. That is why it didnt happen. So dont flaggellate yourselves on this count. It was not any NDA/UPA betrayal. Both asked for independent command and it was not offered.

Need to spread Indian influence beyond the Kabul, Northern Alliance and Herat regions. It has to be taken right into Pashtun land. The status of Durand Line is a pressing issue. Indian elite have not come to grips with this crucial issue. Should the Pashtuns have self determination rights or not? If Tibetians have then Pashtuns can too.

This might remake Afghanistan and TSP too.
------------------
The ITBP guard should be awarded the PVC and not the Ashok Chakra.

Shivani · Post by **Shivani** » 09 Jul 2008 20:18

NRao wrote:Not much space between road and embassy

As illogical as it may sound, in such cases the only solution is to work with local government and rent out all the properties on the said street out to some hundred feet. They may then be re-allocated to trusted businesses to recover some of the costs. Or, relocate the embassy somewhere else.

NRao wrote: From that PoV, this is a failed attack.

A failed attack that by pure luck was more successful than any jehadi could ever dream of.

Raju · Post by **Raju** » 09 Jul 2008 20:23

well this is the old location that the Indian embassy is still hanging on to.

Afghan Govt had allocated a new location for the embassy in the newly built diplomatic enclave which has been constructed recently and is far safer than the present one.

Probably for reasons of convenience they are still hanging on to the old location.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 09 Jul 2008 20:48

NRao wrote:
1) I feel that Pakis have given India (another?) chance to act. Paki leaders claim they are not behind it. I think India should publicly accept that and state that India will quietly resolve this issue outside of the public eye. Whatever needs to be done to stop this will be done. Pakistan will be kept in the loop when and if needed ....... this is not a Pakistani issue - per their own leaders, so India does not need to tell them anything at all

Good point NRao garu...

Perhaps, GOI should accept Pak Govt's position and point its finger to a specific India-centric-taliban-friendly-terrorist-entity and blow couple of their headquarters and training centers. I am sure GOI has details of their locations.. make sure that this attack happens when PA-ISI liasons are present in those compounds...

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 20:54

India caught in the Taliban myth

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 21:01

Indian troops in Afghanistan have to be under independent command. And that was and is not palatable for US. That is why it didnt happen. So dont flaggellate yourselves on this count. It was not any NDA/UPA betrayal. Both asked for independent command and it was not offered.

That does explain the result set that NATO has produced!! Obama's proposal of moving more troops to A'stan will not help either. The problem i snot more trrops, but the authority granted to them to operate in A'stan.

Need to spread Indian influence beyond the Kabul, Northern Alliance and Herat regions. It has to be taken right into Pashtun land. The status of Durand Line is a pressing issue. Indian elite have not come to grips with this crucial issue. Should the Pashtuns have self determination rights or not?

Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh ...... TSP of course, next parts of India itself....................

What is "Durand Line"?

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 09 Jul 2008 21:06

Delhi carries a small stick

I like this one:

Israel bombs the Osirak nuclear research facility in Iraq in 1981 after it alleges that Iraq is using the facility to develop a nuclear weapons program. China seizes and dismantles a United States EP-3 aircraft after it allegedly ventures into Chinese airspace in 2001. The US invades Afghanistan after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.

And then there is India. An attack on the Indian parliament in December 2001; hijacking of Indian Airlines 814 to Afghanistan in 1999, which was released only after the exchange of three terrorists, including one who was later responsible for the execution of US journalist Daniel Pearl; terrorist attacks in Jaipur in May 2008, Hyderabad in August 2007, Mumbai in July 2006, Varanasi in March 2006, Bangalore in December 2005, Delhi in October 2005 and Ayodhya in July 2005; a recent surge in infiltration across the Line of Control in Kashmir; and this week's attack on the Indian Embassy in the Afghan capital Kabul. India's reaction:

In one way India is growing very well. However, in many ways things are not keeping up ...... infrastructure as an example. FP is another.

kshirin · Post by **kshirin** » 09 Jul 2008 21:11

How come Ghishing chooses to become active now, Kashmir starts fermenting again, and now Kabul? Anything to do with the imminent finalisation of the N deal and China's blaming the disturbances in Tibet on the Dala Lama and us (because we gave refuge to the poor fuddy duddy Dalai Lama who is only taken seriously by his western flock, whom the Chinese forget was kicked out by them creating the problem for us in the first place) to everyone behind our backs? We know whose proxy the military establishment and ISI in Pak is, so is a connection too outlandish to suggest? We are living in a very dangerous neighbourhood. Sorry for stating the obvious.

(I guess I deserve the trainee tag, I meant to post this on this forum, how can I delete the new topic opened inadvertently and do i have to hit the quote button to stay in the forum every time?)

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 09 Jul 2008 21:12

Durand Line is the border setup between Afghanistan and NWFP by Sir Henry Durand and was singed in 1899 for one hundred years. Even the Taliban refused to ratify it with TSP. Durand drew a line that put NWFP in British India and in effect separated the Pahstuns between Afghans and Indians now Pakis. However it was Aurangazeb that created the sarkari Pashtuns some of whom live in NWFP.

NRao , The areas I mentioned are specific to Afghanistan. All reports mention that its the Pashtun areas that dont feel the love for India. Hence need to spread in those areas.

Will read the Bhadrakumar article and comment.

-
Its not that India doesnt carry a stick or carries small stick but that the elite dont like to use sticks. For a person with a hammer every problem is a nail.

India has a larger toolkit which includes sticks and hammers. Also mallets which dont leave hammer marks.

Raju · Post by **Raju** » 09 Jul 2008 21:13

NRao wrote:Delhi carries a small stick

ICMR studies have backed this conclusion.

kshirin · Post by **kshirin** » 09 Jul 2008 21:27

I forgot to add -...and the Communists pull the rug out from the Governemnt now? Not even a decent period for mourning? Some of their arguments about the dangers of enetring into a close incl military relationship with US as price for N deal made sense, but now I fear they have exposed where their inspiration comes from.