Terrorist Islamic Republic of Pakistan (TSP): May 30, 2011

[Altair]

Now that there is a train of thought that Pakistan is better off in broken pieces, we should be doubly careful that a similar is not attempted on India.

Such efforts are already underway since a long time.

Look at how the "nobel laureate" type of support was miraculously conjured out of thin air for binayak sen who was essentially unknown before the recent brouhaha.

Norhteast, Bengal, kashmir, lakshadeep ............ take your pick.

Now that US is beyond the operating safe margins with regard to Pakistan,they might attempt to break the safe margin barrier when dealing with India. The safe margin barrier when US talks to India is Kashmir. US understands the diplomatic niceties of not invoking Kashmir when dealing with India. They maintained that Kashmir is a issue between India and Pakistan even after repeated begging by Pakistan. It might change after the tectonic shifts in Pakistan in the recent weeks. I am suggesting caution. The earlier safe margin can be broken by America to get more leverage and attempt ==.

[shiv]

Yes, we need not feel obliged. It must be pointed out that these terrorists are creation of their policy and enabled by their support to TSP. I don't think US or any other country would fight India's war. It has to be fought by us only.

True we have to fight the war ourselves. But if our enemies are mysteriously removed by syphilis, earthquakes, bear attacks or drone strikes - we may get lucky and have no enemies or fewer enemies to fight.

[Shrinivasan]

True we have to fight the war ourselves. But if our enemies are mysteriously removed by syphilis, earthquakes, bear attacks or drone strikes - we may get lucky and have no enemies or fewer enemies to fight.

Or Floods... The recent floods in Pakistan has done far more damage to Pakistan than all wars, man made disasters and other natural disasters combined. thousands of Bridges, KMs of roads, ditches and bunds, canals etc which Pukes had built over decades are all gone. Not to mention the damage to their agriculture and animal husbandry.

[Johann]

Johann the Arabs who hated America technically had all of dar ul Islam to train for jihad. But the only place where they could receive top class training right under the noses of the Americans in a place where the US would not or could not touch them was in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The US saw Pakistan as an ally and Afghanistan as under Pakistani suzerainty. Anyone who receied traing under the supervision of "allty Pakistan would not be a threat to America. They fought the Soviets and hitting Inia was of no consequence to India. It was, in the American view, well with Pakistani rights to hit India. And it was well within Pakistani rights to receive American aid as an ally.

Pakistan operated on a kind of quid pro quo with the Arabs - if you support our jihad, we will support yours. The Arabs gave their money, not their lives for the jihad in Kashmir. Afghanistan was another story - they have generally been on the same page there.

The Pakistanis under a combination of Arab and American pressure pushed out the "Afghan Arabs" from Pakistan in 1993, and most of them followed Bin Laden and moved to Sudan.

Bin Laden moved back to region, specifically Eastern Afghanistan in 1996, and many Arabs followed.

The Americans certainly did want to want to 'touch him' - that is why they launched 66 cruise missiles in 1998, and why they developed the first armed predator in 2000-01

After the Soviets left these trained jihadis - both Arab and Pakistani had no job and were otherwise unemploayble. Pakistan used their services against India. Perhaps some of them migrated out - but for 11 years from 1989 to 2000 jihad in Kashmir was sponsored by Pakistan and a lot of the jihadis were "foreigners" and not just Pakistanis. During this phase Arabs came to Pakistan and got trained for jihad. Some were directed to hone their skills against India. It was the relative impossibility of fighting successful jihad in Kashmir (they were getting killed too soon) that left Pakistan with a surfeit of jihadis. At any given time there were several thousand men on the Pakistani side waiting to infiltrate. It was some of these men who eventually went out of Pakistan to do their jihad in the Phillipines, Chechnya, Europe and finally the US. Imagine if these thousands of men had managed to enter Kashmir - the jihad would have been in India. All thoe fighters would have been usefully employed right here as desired by Pakistan, the most favored non NATO ally of the US. And I am sure the US would have been quite comfortable seeing jihad in Kashmir as opposed to suffering 9-11.

Shiv, the vast majority of the foreigners killed in Kashmir were Pakistani Punjabis, Pakistani Pashtuns and Afghan Pashtuns from the Pakistani refugee camps, not Arabs. There used to detailed breakdowns of terrorist KIAs by ethnicity/nationality on SATP's website.

I can't find those exact figures any more, but there is an assessment of their involvement in Kashmir here; http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/ajaisahni/NATIV2002.htm

While you are familiar with the reasons why young men take to jihad in Pakistan, I don't know if you are as familiar with the story in the Arab world.

Many of those who came were Salafis inspired by the Salafi ideas Syed Qutb. They saw their societies at home as both spiritually and politically corrupt, and their first priority was an Islamic revolution at home that would cleanse their societies and restore them to 'true Islam'. It is their home states that were the 'near enemy'

These guys were already on the run from their own governments, which were happy to see them leave, and hoped to never see them again. That is the way it was for the Egyptians, the Algerians, the Libyans, the Syrians, Jordanians, etc. They already had an ideology, they already had organisation. The Egyptians, Syrians and Jordanians in particular already had a lot of military experience and training.

Defending Muslims against infidel invasions, especially Western invaders (Russia/Israel/Serbia/US/France) was an obligation yes, but one that prepared them for the war to take back home, and gave them somewhere to escape to. It also gave them a recruiting tool to bring young Arab men out from under home state surveillance, indoctrinate them as Salafis, and build up armies for the return.

These 'Arab Afghans' went home thrilled after defeating the Soviets and taking Kabul, and for the most part were crushed by their governments - Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Jordan, often with lots of Western help. Thousands were killed, and many thousands more imprisoned and tortured.

The survivors dispersed out again - Bosnia, Chechnya, Sudan, and then Eastern Afghanistan again.

Bin Laden's message in the late 1990s was that fighting the 'near enemy' was bad because it divided Muslim societies, but fighting the 'far enemy', America would awake and unite the Muslim world. Once America was driven from the Middle East, then its puppets would weaken, and their states and societies could be remade.

Unfortunately even the battle against the 'far enemy' turned in to a war against 'near enemies' in places like Iraq and Yemen, which has discredited them in the eyes of the Arab public.

[shravan]

Six killed, 11 injured in Peshawar blast

PESHAWAR: At least six people have been killed while 11 others sustained injuries in a blast that occurred in Matini Bazar of the city on Sunday morning.

=====


Three security men, two women shot dead in Peshawar


PESHAWAR: Five people, including three security personnel, were killed in separate gun attacks in less than one hour in Peshawar on Saturday night.

[ramana]

BBC:|

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13508864

New kind of attacker.

Mehran attack.

[Arjun]

Unfortunately even the battle against the 'far enemy' turned in to a war against 'near enemies' in places like Iraq and Yemen, which has discredited them in the eyes of the Arab public.

Johann, the insight regarding the motivations of the Arab jihadis is very useful. But would you disagree with the two points that I think Shiv is making-

1. 9/11 would not have happened if Pakistan had not been a failed, terrorism-supporting state.
2. The US has been hypocritical in the past where it has supported (or more charitably, turned a blind eye towards) terrorism directed against other states (specifically India), until 9/11 when it became a victim of the same forces?

[Patni]

Apology in advance if the news already discussed:

Am a little baffled and to me it comes out like GoI through its Minister of state for defense seem to give an impression that GoI is not going to find it easy to curb or least pretend that they are trying to keep a lid on rightful outrage and anger of general public against heinous killing of innocent Indians by Pakistan state through its uniformed / non-uniformed jehadis. So rather then being a plain warning to Pakistan that GoI will not put up with any more attacks it comes out sounding like oh GoI loves Pakis and we dont want to make trouble for Pakistan but what to do with our general public only they seem to get all worked up about such events and we feel pressured to react to it so please do not make it hard for us and be good!

And to top it after few hours the minister gives a clarification that he did not mean to warn Pakis at all! says that GoI is engaged extensively with pakis to avoid a repeat of 26/11.

So basically a GoI minister on foreign soil, whines about how hard it gets for GoI to
sell the show of "self-restraint" to its own people!

The original statement as it appeared in news:

Hard to justify 'self-restraint'-Pallam Raju

4 JUN, 2011, 06.58PM IST,PTI
SINGAPORE: India on Saturday said it would be hard to justify "self-restraint" in case of another 26/11 type attack on its territory.

"If the provocation is to happen again, I think it would be hard to justify to our people such a self-restraint," as has been exercised following the 26/11 Mumbai attack, Minster of State for Defence, M M Pallam Raju told an Asian security conference here.

But "I hope that it will not be repeated," the Minister said, pointing out that India had exercised great self-restraint and "dealt in a very mature manner with the government of Pakistan," following the 26/11 attack on Mumbai.

He said, India is engaged in extensive dialogues with Pakistan relating to the attack.

"The international community is aware of the damning evidence that has come out from David Headley's interrogation," he told the Shangri-La Dialogue where Defence Ministers from China, US, UK and top defence analysts were in attendance.

"We have had an extensive engagement in trying to bring the perpetrators to the book and have been continuing dialogue at government level (with Pakistan)," he said.

Raju said, it was not only India but Pakistan which had now become a victim to the machinations of the terrorists.

In his written speech, the Minister said, the spectrum of terrorist challenges to India ranged from suicide bombers to cyber hostility and New Delhi was developing capabilities to deal with these.

To grapple with this, the Minister said, there was a need for special equipment and special training and a doctrinal shift from the previous pre-occupation with conventional warfare alone

and here comes a clarification saying he did not give any warning to Pakistan at all.

Flutter over comment on India's ‘self-restraint'

India on Saturday said “self-restraint” would be difficult to sustain in the event of another terrorist attack like the 26/11 strike against Mumbai.

Issuing such a guarded warning to Islamabad, Minister of State for Defence M.M. Pallam Raju told the 10th Asia Security Summit here that India was still in dialogue with Pakistan to try and prevent a repeat attack.

'Public outrage'

Answering a question at a plenary session of the summit, being organised here by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, Mr. Raju said: “The 26/11 attack on Mumbai was definitely a public outrage. There was a lot of anger in India and, despite the public outrage, India had exercised great self-restraint and dealt in a very mature manner with the government of Pakistan. [We] have had an extensive engagement in trying to bring the perpetrators to book. We have been continuing the dialogue at the government level. While this is going on, the international community is aware of the damning evidence that has come out from David Headley during his interrogation. Against this light, if a provocation is to happen again, I think, it would be hard to justify to our people such a self-restraint. I hope that [such an attack] will not be repeated and that we will have a constructive dialogue with Pakistan in containing these terrorist elements which are causing strife not only in India but also within Pakistan.”

“Engagement continues”

With his comment causing more than a flutter that he warned Pakistan of retaliation for any future terrorist attack on India, Mr. Raju pointed out he had not said anything to that effect. Drawing attention to India's talks with Islamabad, he told The Hindu that “we are continuing to engage extensively with Pakistan to avoid a repeat of such an incident as 26/11.”

[CRamS]

The nutty nation berating Karzai on India’s Afghan adventure, neverthless likes what Uneven has to say

Afghanistan should pay heed to American scholar and area expert Stephen Cohen, who believes the Kashmir freedom struggle could last 100 years or even more.

[hulaku]

Blast kills 3 in Gujranwala

GUJRANWALA: An explosion killed three people and injured five others on Sheikhupura road near cardiology hospital in the wee hours of Sunday.

http://thenews.jang.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16575

[shiv]

Apology in advance if the news already discussed:

Am a little baffled and to me it comes out like GoI through its Minister of state for defense seem to give an impression that GoI is not going to find it easy to curb or least pretend that they are trying to keep a lid on rightful outrage and anger of general public against heinous killing of innocent Indians by Pakistan state through its uniformed / non-uniformed jehadis. So rather then being a plain warning to Pakistan that GoI will not put up with any more attacks it comes out sounding like oh GoI loves Pakis and we dont want to make trouble for Pakistan but what to do with our general public only they seem to get all worked up about such events and we feel pressured to react to it so please do not make it hard for us and be good!

And to top it after few hours the minister gives a clarification that he did not mean to warn Pakis at all! says that GoI is engaged extensively with pakis to avoid a repeat of 26/11.

Ahhh! Welcome to the club - you are doing just the sort of pisko hair splitting that I love to do

I see it as follows. You interpretation is perfectly correct if you take this as a two player India-Pakistan game.

But make it a three player game where Pakistan kicks India and the US advises the GoI restraint using a carrot and stick policy - where the stick may be helping Pakistan thwart an Indian attack.

Under the circumstances the thing to so would be to gnash one's teeth, bow to US blackmail and then fire a warning shot saying "We did it last time - but we are taking flak from our public as a result. Next time we will hit even if you blackmail us". In fact even US commentators have said that the India government would not be able top avoid public pressure to take action.

Naturally - Pakis who are on tenterhooks and imagine that India will fart even when India merely changes its position on its seat immediately read this as a warning. But more than a warning t Pakistan it is a signal that more such attacks will not necessarily be tolerated. In no way should this be seen as an intent to actually do anything. It is just a sort of handwave - which needs to be picked up by all "South Asia" watchers to reach their conclusions about how the next terror attack from Pakistan may elad to retaliation leading to nuclear war. That sounds like an indirect warning to everyone.

[svinayak]

Doing some research on the Zaid Hamid video.
Looks like his videos are being made for psy ops on India

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdt_2Rre4FY

They are collecting all the info from Indian media.
Looks like some Indians secretly are helping him to collect info.

There is a extensive part of insecurity within certain groups and they have become desparate.
After the bin laden era there is new fear of total disintegration

[Altair]

BBC:|

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13508864

New kind of attacker.

Mehran attack.

If we trust the news item, we must assume that they belong to the special branch responsible for the security of the Pakistani nuclear weapons. The tactics and skills match only those of highly trained commandos. A very valuable item has been destroyed or confiscated. If such highly trained people are after nuclear weapons, it is only a matter of time before they get one. This is really the worst nightmare.

[shiv]

This is really the worst nightmare.

Whose worst nightmare?

[Patni]

Ahhh! Welcome to the club - you are doing just the sort of pisko hair splitting that I love to do

I see it as follows. You interpretation is perfectly correct if you take this as a two player India-Pakistan game.

But make it a three player game where Pakistan kicks India and the US advises the GoI restraint using a carrot and stick policy - where the stick may be helping Pakistan thwart an Indian attack.

Under the circumstances the thing to so would be to gnash one's teeth, bow to US blackmail and then fire a warning shot saying "We did it last time - but we are taking flak from our public as a result. Next time we will hit even if you blackmail us". In fact even US commentators have said that the India government would not be able top avoid public pressure to take action.

Naturally - Pakis who are on tenterhooks and imagine that India will fart even when India merely changes its position on its seat immediately read this as a warning. But more than a warning t Pakistan it is a signal that more such attacks will not necessarily be tolerated. In no way should this be seen as an intent to actually do anything. It is just a sort of handwave - which needs to be picked up by all "South Asia" watchers to reach their conclusions about how the next terror attack from Pakistan may elad to retaliation leading to nuclear war. That sounds like an indirect warning to everyone.

Yes i agree with your 3 player game analysis for the same but then why issue a denial as done by the minister? now that defeats the whole purpose of "handwave" in fact the clarification puts emphasis on how we are being such good neighbors!

Also please note that only Hindu carried that clarification which seem that the correspondent specifically wanted to make sure that GoI is all goody goody with Pakistan and the rest of the world need not get alarmed about possible mushroom clouds being sighted!

[shiv]

Folks here is an example of how Pakis manage to lie and get away

The source for the data is linked at bottom

Pakistan literacy in 2003: 45.7%
Pakistan literacy in 2009: 49.9 %

So its all getting better isn't it?

No, because the population in 2003 was 159\0 million and was 176 million in 2009

So we have:
2003 - 81 million illiterate Pakis
2009 - 88 million illiterate Pakis

What this means is that although literacy percentages may go up, they are not going up as fast as the increase in population.

Sources
http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=pk&v=39
http://www.indexmundi.com/pakistan/population.html

[Mahendra]

Just being able to read Jihad, AoA, Kaffir and Raymond Davis doesn't necessarily make one literate. I will take the figures with a bucket full of captain cook iodised namak

If population increased from 160 to 180 million in 6 years all of those 20 million Jihadis will go into the illiterate pool, granted some of them will be now in Lower Kinder-garten Jihad madrassa and upper Kinder-garten Jihad madrassa.

A literacy rate of 49% for a country where 95% of the population lives on less than 45 Indian Rupees a day is way inflated. I think the 49% figure was pulled out by Shaukat Aziz when applying anusol to his haemorrhoids.

[Dilbu]

This is really the worst nightmare.

Whose worst nightmare?

May be unkil's. Indians are living 24x7 under this threat and there is nothing new here for us. We should state it crystal clear that we follow NFU policy but if ever a paki nook slips across our border, whether by eff-solaf, JDAM, or even if a crow eats uranium rich kebab left over from a mullah and drops radio active $hit in Indian territory, there will be a huge crater in place of erst while terrorist state of P. Indian WKKs can conduct annual yatras to do pushpa archana at the site, if they want to.

[shiv]

Just being able to read Jihad, AoA, Kaffir and Raymond Davis doesn't necessarily make one literate. I will take the figures with a bucket full of captain cook iodised namak

If population increased from 160 to 180 million in 6 years all of those 20 million Jihadis will go into the illiterate pool, granted some of them will be now in Lower Kinder-garten Jihad madrassa and upper Kinder-garten Jihad madrassa.

A literacy rate of 49% for a country where 95% of the population lives on less than 45 Indian Rupees a day is way inflated. I think the 49% figure was pulled out by Shaukat Aziz when applying anusol to his haemorrhoids.

True besides the buggers have not done a proper census since 1996. A few half hearted counts have been attempted since. but no census.

[Altair]

This is really the worst nightmare.

Whose worst nightmare?

For Unkil.The Pentagon allowed it. They were the one who allowed Pakistan to have them in the first place. If a nuclear weapon takes out a CBG in the Persian gulf using Pakistani naval assets US will be humiliated.No body has a scenario for a Pakistani Navy launching the Babur missile towards a Carrier armed with nuclear weapon. (babur was tested on Feb 17th this year) Chinese can integrate such a thing. These highly trained commando wing can execute this kind of operation.

I still do not understand what actually happened at Mehran, but I believe it is of high strategic importance.

I for one do not think that India would be their first target.May be I am too optimistic.

[Narad]

Six killed in Peshawar bomb blast: police

Three killed in gas pipeline blast in Gujranwala

AoA

[anandsgh]

I don't know if this news is for real but ..... SO much for the Ummah!!
http://tribune.com.pk/story/173758/kuwa ... countries/

[Kanishka]

Doing some research on the Zaid Hamid video.
Looks like his videos are being made for psy ops on India

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdt_2Rre4FY

They are collecting all the info from Indian media.
Looks like some Indians secretly are helping him to collect info.

There is a extensive part of insecurity within certain groups and they have become desparate.
After the bin laden era there is new fear of total disintegration

The Pakis are beginning to realize that this guy is a total nutcase!
As his popularity wanes, I see him appearing on a very few paki TV channels these days and hence the need for such propaganda videos.

Cannot deny his entertainment value though.
Never failed to cheer me up on a dull day. Priceless!

[Ambar]

Whatever the US perfidy maybe when it comes to India, they were right when they said "In a way we are indirectly fighting India's war". We couldn't do jack about Kashmiri and his like, droneacharya on the other hand has been busy handing the faithfools their ticket to 72. Next stop - Haqqanis !

If USA hurts some terrorist or terrorist group that only focuses on India and leaves Western and American targets alone, only and only then would USA be fighting India's war.

If some terrorist attacks Western and American interests, and Americans go for him, then it is simply America fighting America's wars! Period!

I agree, and that's what i meant when i said IK and his like invited the wrath of America when they crossed the "Lakshman Rekha" . I am a believer in "enemy of your enemy is your friend".Bhausaheb Maruti Talekar's family and families of those who lost their sons to barbarian Kashmiri can now take solace from the fact that he died a violent death at the hands of Americans. They did not do it for India or to avenge the losses of Indians, but i would certainly see a reason to be pleased that someone whacked my enemy.

It reminds me of a 'Tom and Jerry' cartoon that i once saw. The evil Tom chases Jerry around while a bullpit snores unconcerned.During this run around,Tom mistakenly steps on the dog's toes, the irate bullpit tears Tom apart to Jerry's glee. I cannot think of a better analogy although i am not implying India is a mouse and Pak a cat.

Whatever the US perfidy maybe when it comes to India, they were right when they said "In a way we are indirectly fighting India's war". We couldn't do jack about Kashmiri and his like, droneacharya on the other hand has been busy handing the faithfools their ticket to 72. Next stop - Haqqanis !

What do you think India should have done?

What should have India done ? Kill the mofo ofcourse! Instead we think handing over dossier after dossier to Pakis will somehow "enlighten" them and they'll round up the terrorists and hand them over to India tied in a satin bow! When you make sure those who live by violence are hunted with even bruter violence that's when hydra-heads slows resurfacing. When Ahmad Sadat masterminded Israeli tourism minister's assassination , Sadat was torn out of a Palestinian prison by IDF after a 8 hr,building to building gun battle. Israel made sure that he paid for his crimes in Israel. Forget about picking DI from his Karachi palace, i would settle for operations in PoK to eliminate the LeT/JeM camp runners. Until that happens, i have to cheer for those who are culling rabid dogs in my neighborhood,ofcourse, it is another matter that they culling them for their safety.

[Ambar]

I have believed that 9-11 occurred because jihadis could make no headway in India. They were right here - next door - but were being shaheedized as fast as they came in. But if you look at news reports of that era the western press were considering these terrorists deaths as deaths of Kashmiri freedom fighters. That was an era when these men, trained and armed by the Pakistani army were committing mayhem all over the world - culminating with 9-11.

We are helping Pakis self-aggrandize if we think Arabs even give 2 squirts of p1ss about Pakis. Sure, there were Chechen,Uzbek,Afghani ,fillipino ,Indonesian and some arabs during the heightened insurgency in the 90s, but they were mostly mercenaries and hardly a part of brainwashed canon-fodder by mullahs in their home nations . How often do we hear about arab mosques naming India among US/UK/Israel ? For an organization like AQ , Pakistan was/is an important tool to settle and expand but their ultimate agenda is to bleed the west. America is their prize plum and India hardly a consolation. 9/11 happened when OBL and AQ perfected their 1993 plan that couldn't do much. The people who executed 9/11 were educated well off bunch than the usual Kasab quality bunch who wield AKs and grenades and sneak into our border. If for AQ and global ummah had India as its primary target, wouldn't it have been a simpler task to execute such a operation in India ?

[shiv]

Well the world has really come a long way. Terrorism in India was not even recognized as terrorism

Here is the LA times talking of terrorism in 1998
http://articles.latimes.com/1999/may/01/news/mn-32944

Terrorist Attacks Down in 1998, but Record Number Killed
May 01, 1999| Associated Press

Although the number of attacks fell to the lowest level since 1971, terrorism took a record toll last year, with 741 people killed and 5,952 injured worldwide. Most of the casualties were the result of the bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa, the State Department said Friday in its annual report to Congress.

And here is Raman talking about the period 1988 to 1998
http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/%5Cpap ... per192.htm

In 1998 1442 people were killed in in terrorist acts in India alone and 741 (same figure as the LA times above) . India was not even counted in stats in those years - barely more than a decade ago. I mean BRFites in their mid twenties now may not even recall the pariah state that India was. Raman also notes that 776 terrorists were killed from Jan to Oct 1998.

[shiv]

We are helping Pakis self-aggrandize if we think Arabs even give 2 squirts of p1ss about Pakis. Sure, there were Chechen,Uzbek,Afghani ,fillipino ,Indonesian and some arabs during the heightened insurgency in the 90s, but they were mostly mercenaries and hardly a part of brainwashed canon-fodder by mullahs in their home nations . How often do we hear about arab mosques naming India among US/UK/Israel ? For an organization like AQ , Pakistan was/is an important tool to settle and expand but their ultimate agenda is to bleed the west. America is their prize plum and India hardly a consolation. 9/11 happened when OBL and AQ perfected their 1993 plan that couldn't do much. The people who executed 9/11 were educated well off bunch than the usual Kasab quality bunch who wield AKs and grenades and sneak into our border. If for AQ and global ummah had India as its primary target, wouldn't it have been a simpler task to execute such a operation in India ?

Ambarji look at the pre-2000 stats in Raman's page posted above. And the LA Times link. Terrorism in the whole world was nothing compared to that in India. All the training was in Pakistan. The facilities were in Pakistan. The infrastructure was in Pakistan, but no one was bothered about checking Pakistan while India bled. You are forgetting that and worrying about Paki "self aggrandizement". Pakistan was the source of all terror - but the US was ignoring it. If giving credit to Pakistan for terrorism is "self aggrandizement" I am all for it. They deserve the title.

[shiv]

9-11 done by Ay-rabs with no Pakistan connection is an American story. Heck with the American narrative dominating the world I suppose I need to philosophically accept that it will dominate minds on BRF as well.

It took the Americans 10 years after 9-11 and 10 years after occupying Afghanistan to find out that the problem was in Pakistan. Hopefully BRFites too will come to accept that in time rather than letting Pakistan off the hook the way the Americans have done.

My mind boggles..

[KLNMurthy]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/05/weeki ... .html?_r=1
Should (Could) America and Pakistan’s Bond Be Broken?
By MARK MAZZETTI

[changed from Prem's original quote from the article]Vali Nasr, who left the State Department in April after working for the late diplomat Richard Holbrooke, said that the “wheels have jammed” in the alliance: Because neither side trusts each other, the United States cannot exert any of the leverage it has with Pakistan.

As he sees it, the United States could help escape the pathologies of the alliance by convincing China, Saudi Arabia, and other nations like the United Arab Emirates that it would be truly ugly if Pakistan were to implode.

It’s a scare tactic, he admits. But, with a battle for Pakistan’s soul being waged among its Islamists, the security establishment, and a moderate middle class, Mr. Nasr says he believes that an unraveling in Pakistan is a clear possibility. At the least, he said, this approach might allow America to coordinate its efforts with countries that Pakistan is more eager to listen to.

He also wants to ensure that the alliance can survive in the future.

“We’re behaving as if killing Bin Laden was our last piece of business in Pakistan, and that’s incredibly dangerous,” he said.

After all, the United States beat a hasty exit from the region when the Soviets left Afghanistan, with chaotic results. This time around, the region is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons, and it could become far messier.

The agenda of this article is revealed in the conclusion: it is Vali "hug Pakistan" Nasr, chela of late Richard "squeeze India" Holbrooke speaking. Unlike other articles, there is no overt mention of squeezing India here, but that doesn't mean it isn't the thrust of the overall agenda. (Apparently he was pushed out after his boss died--Nasr probably talked himself into the job in the first place as the guy who will provide funda on mozlems to Holbrooke who was always a generalist negotiator, never a history-funda analyst--so that might mean the angry-at-Pakistan faction has the upper hand for now, but he is trying to come back, evidently.)

For the State Dept, and for US as a whole, the "hug Pak" option has only one strategic choice, and that is to squeeze India on J&K. Whether due to malintent or not, the US imagination doesn't extend beyond that at all.

The case being made is not entirely a crazy one, at least on the surface, if you persuade yourself that there are bigger things than India's survival at stake, or to be fair, if you don't see India's survival being at stake: faced with nuclear blackmail, and potential disastrous nuclear war, why not hand over J&K or more precisely the Valley to buy a respite and at least some chance that there will be a genuine change in Pak? And isn't it incredibly selfish and chauvinistic of India to stubbornly hang on to the Valley, merrily shooting youthful protestors, when so much is at stake? India should be "statesmanlike" and do the right thing, for the world and for itself and maybe it will get the status symbol called permanent membership of UNSC.

"Reasonable" and personable Pakis like Irfan Hussain, Hoodbhoy, Kamran Shafi, Najam Sethi, Marvi Sirmed's sari-bindi, et al as well as the bullying TFTA types like Hilaly et al beloved of Indian media are all making arguments that are in line with this thrust of this theme. True, there is an occasional article from Pakis moaning that nukes haven't bought us anything and we (pakis) should give up on the obsession with India, but they are, in effect, cover for the overall pressure on India, to give indignant Indians a straw to clutch; there is no serious movement at all to change the direction of Pak, nor are there any secondary signs that there will be such a movement. However, there is no reason why, in exchange for India giving up the Valley, TSPA can't be persuaded to observe a temporary truce in India, along with a longer one in the West, which will be presented as "peace" to the WKKs and to the relatively more hardheaded crowd as a window of strategic opportunity for achieving genuine reform in TSP through trade, building more crypto-madrasas, etc. The only big question here is whether TSPA and US can make the LeT cooperate.

I have seen no credible counterargument to this case being made, not in American circles that are indignant at Paki perfidy, like longwarjournal, and least of all in Indian circles. None of the angry articles in American media in this group have presented any strategic options (however flimsy or morally wrong in that they will reward blackmail) for managing the nuclear threat. (neither have we on brf or the Indian strategic community, other than, just saying we will call the bluff, which doesn't really make the threat go away). That means, when thinking of coherent next steps with Pak, the Vali Nasr school of thought is the only game in town right now, and it is being pushed hard as "statesmanship." The US will try to push India on standard pressure points of trade and growth, along with the carrot of US-India doing big sacrifices (i.e., Indian sacrifices) for greater good (i.e. Western good) in eternal strategic partnership. T

The next step of the game is the summer "intifada" in the Valley. The flavor of this year might include Fast Unto Death (FUD, also expands to Fear-Unceratinty-Doubt) though my gut tells me that is too SDRE for the enemy. But if we see an injection of FUD into the mix, that will indicate the beast has started to mutate.

(There does seem to be a parallel counter-strategy that involves Afghanistan in the lead--for the US it is the stick of India undermining Pak in Afghanistan; for India it is a bet that historical Afghan hatred and contempt for Pakjabis, along with a hopefully consolidated Afghan army, will do the needful in keeping Pak under pressure and off-balance on its western frontier. (US thinking has no clue about the role that Afghanistan could play independently in South Asia, it is locked up in a white missionary-exploitative MNC mindset).

The risk here is that this Indian game can be canceled at a stroke of the pen, Gujral-style by an Indian leader suffering r from a failure of nerve and / or intellect, or what is more likely, just operating from an institutional memory pattern of ad hoc and unprincipled negotiating approach combined with an inflated sense of personal vanity and generosity. That is where will see the price of having a counter-strategy without a counter-theory of what Pakistan is, and how it might be handled, including a realistic vision of how to manage the nuclear threat.

Having a strategy without a theory and principle can work, just due to India being sufficiently strong that it cannot be moved; but Qasim-Ghazni-Ghori worshipping Pakis--who are, collectively not dumb, they have all along been reinventing themselves to take over the mantle of QGG as Britain took over the mantle of Rome--know that this is not a sustainable way for Indians to defend India (and they are absolutely right, an unprincipled and passive defender will always lose to a principled, aggressive and persistent attacker).

[anupmisra]

What this means is that although literacy percentages may go up, they are not going up as fast as the increase in population.

Shiv, who else but BRFites should know this better than most when it comes to reading between the lines on statistical issues pertaining to the pakis (and to some extent, the Chinese). It's also known as periodically "shifting the goal posts" to "cooking the books". The pakis are adept in these exercises on matters pertaining to literacy numbers, economic data manupulation, growth figures, poverty alleviation, war on terror, invoicing the US, and defence spending/budgeting.

[shiv]

What this means is that although literacy percentages may go up, they are not going up as fast as the increase in population.

Shiv, who else but BRFites should know this better than most when it comes to reading between the lines on statistical issues pertaining to the pakis (and to some extent, the Chinese). It's also known as periodically "shifting the goal posts" to "cooking the books". The pakis are adept in these exercises on matters pertaining to literacy numbers, economic data manupulation, growth figures, poverty alleviation, war on terror, invoicing the US, and defence spending/budgeting.

Absolutely - but the post is for the lurkers and I have separately saved the post to retrieve and use at the appropriate time in some online reply or other

[A_Gupta]

98% chance Kashmiri is dead : Rehman Malik
http://www.dawn.com/2011/06/05/there-is ... malik.html

Between Pakistan's 400%s, 200%s and so on, who knows how much 98% actually is?

http://bit.ly/izuICH
E-Tribune - Mehran - "It had to be India", "Pakistan facing 4th generation warfare".

The military feels that non state violent actors (NSVAs) do exist on Pakistani soil and are being manipulated by enemy forces to achieve strategic goals. These enemy forces are neither individuals nor groups but ‘countries’ that are capitalising on internal conflict keeping alive the NSVAs. According to them strengthening security on military bases alone is not the solution. NSVAs will continue to be exploited until the political leadership takes the initiative to wipe out the enabling environment and external threat will continue to translate into internal threats that we see today......So how do we defeat these terrorists? The research paper highlights that ideology is the strongest element of 4G warriors’ power instead of military power, so their most powerful weapon of indoctrination can only be defeated through education and awareness in the region.

In the first place, who created the "enabling environment" and the "ideology" for these "4G warriors"? In the second place, how are Yindus able to exploit this ideology?

----
Fleeing Pakistan: Thailand releases 96 Qadiani asylum seekers from Pakistan who were in detention since December.
http://bit.ly/m6kSj2

----
Bruce Riedel thinks Ilyas Kashmiri's death removes one irritant in US-Pak relations.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and- ... relations/

[Rangudu]

Re: Ilyas Kashmiri, I'm wary of all those concurrent "confirmations" of his death, especially from TSPA sources. It is likely that they want to "disappear" him to stave of American pressure.

Also, the fact that Kashmiri's hiding place was with ISI's own Maulvi Nazir confirms that Kashmiri is part and parcel of the "S Branch" and still considered an asset by TSPA. Harkatul-Jihad-i-Islami is basically a subset of the ISI's S-branch.

[A_Gupta]

Folks here is an example of how Pakis manage to lie and get away

The source for the data is linked at bottom

Pakistan literacy in 2003: 45.7%
Pakistan literacy in 2009: 49.9 %

From a table available on the Pakistan Federal Bureau of Statistics:
http://www.statpak.gov.pk/fbs/content/details-tables
"Percentage Distribution of Population by Age, Sex, Litracy[sic] and Level of Education, 2008-09"
All Ages:
Illiterate 54.91%
Littertate [sic] 45.09%

10 Yrs & Over
Illiterate: 42.85%
Literate: 57.35%

5Yrs & Over
Illiterate: 48.1%
Literate: 51.9%

Not clear where the indexamundi figures came from.

[shyamd]

Star News: vid of Ilyas Kashmiri dead body released http://bit.ly/kYeAnL

Doesn't actually show the face to prove it is his body.

[shiv]

Re: Ilyas Kashmiri, I'm wary of all those concurrent "confirmations" of his death, especially from TSPA sources. It is likely that they want to "disappear" him to stave of American pressure.

Also, the fact that Kashmiri's hiding place was with ISI's own Maulvi Nazir confirms that Kashmiri is part and parcel of the "S Branch" and still considered an asset by TSPA. Harkatul-Jihad-i-Islami is basically a subset of the ISI's S-branch.

I trust the Indian agencies as well as R-man on this
http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-has ... 05963.aspx

India has no confirmation about Ilyas Kashmiri's killing
India has no confirmation that top al Qaeda linked militant, Ilyas Kashmiri, a key planner behind the Mumbai terror attack, was killed in a targeted US drone strike in Pakistan. Government sources said New Delhi has contacted several friendly countries asking about the authenticity of the reports which suggested that Kashmiri, a key conspirator in the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and wanted in India for his role in the terror acts, was killed.

"No one has confirmed his killing yet. Indian intelligence agencies also have not been able to corroborate the report," a source said.

Since Indian agencies are trying to verify the reports from different sources, a confirmation -- either way -- about Kashmiri's fate is expected within a day or two.

[rajanb]

Looks like someone will have to dig up his remnants after his burial? And do a DNA test.

Any noose on whether the Pakis gave up his co-ordinates? What with OBL gone, and the PNS fiasco, it would serve the Paki diabolical war machine's interest to have a personal threat out of the way?

Some posts had suggested that he was stopped by AQ from cooking the chief Gernail's goose?

[Gagan]

Now this is getting suspicious.

If Iliyas Kashmiri is dead, then show the phucking body along with the face onlee.

What is this beating about the bush showing the body and not the face hain ji?

Kashmiri is indeed an irritant for the US. But he is THE BIGGEST asset the the ISI could have had - even bigger than OBL himself!

Iliyas Kashmiri was extremely talented in the trade that the ISI has acute need for. And the ISI will go all out to protect him. I won't believe he is dead until I see a body with the face, and the POTUS or equivalent says he is dead.

[g.sarkar]

Star News: vid of Ilyas Kashmiri dead body released http://bit.ly/kYeAnL
Doesn't actually show the face to prove it is his body.

Sirji,
This clip just shows things wrapped in white sheets, could be anything in there. In the mean time every news paper shows the same file photo of IK with a huge beard covering much of his face and his eyes covered in dark glasses. He just may have shaved his beard and disappeared in to the great unwashed masses of people in Pukistan. But IK is such a talented man, if he is undead, we will hear from him again.
Gautam

[Gagan]

Now don't diss the US if it is trying to kill Kashmiri and the others.
Killing off the Al Qaida also solves the Arabs' problems to a huge extent.

For what ever reasons, if the US is doing things that benefit India, why should we be complaining about it?

The US has its own interests, India has its own.

I ask, why didn't our governments do something about these scumbag Jihadi leaders and their ISI handlers sitting next door in Pakistan? Why does it have to be the US who has to come saat samundar paar to take some of them out?

Our netas won't take out David Abraham because they are business partners with him, gawd knows why they don't want to take out the Jihadi leaders.