Time to Re-Think the Drone Wars?

Time to Re-Think the Drone Wars?
by Ali Chishti

Karachi. It's no secret that drone strikes have become a hot-button issue in Pakistan. The Pakistani security establishment has publically distanced itself from the CIA drone program while allegedly supporting it quietly. Pakistani military officials have called the drone attacks in its federally administered area “against humanity” at the same time they openly ask the United States for joint control of drone operations and a transfer of drone technology.

According to Wikileaks there have been a total of 233 drone strikes since 2004 that have resulted in 228 deaths in this "drone war." Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani appreciates the security value of the CIA drone program but spoke against it in the parliament. Only recently a top commander of the Pakistani Army stationed at forward lines fighting the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) and al-Qaeda told local journalists that he supported the drone program. For its part, the (TTP) -- which has forged a close alliance with al-Qaeda and is emerging as the biggest national security threat to the United States -- publically acknowledged sending out a Jordanian suicide bomber who killed 14 members of CIA working at a drone command and control station in Afghanistan?

There's no denying drone attacks have had an effect. In June 2004 the first drone attack killed Nek Muhammad Wazir in Wana, South Waziristan. The next attack came almost a year later, in May 2005, killing Haitham al-Yemeni -a top al-Qaeda member in North Waziristan. Since that time drones have killed bad guys from Baitullah Mesud -- Pakistan's public enemy number one -- to Atiyah Abd al-Rahman. Drones have killed more enemies of both the United States and Pakistan than ground offensives or any other strategy attempted since 9-11. And one former general in the Pakistani army estimates that "thousands" of casualties would have resulted had forces tried to get the same result fighting on the ground.

So what do the Pakistanis really want?

Direct US military aid to Pakistan has been approximately $4 billion from fiscal years 2002 to 2010 while security assistance support had been $462 million in FY2008, $884 million in FY 2009 and $1,114 million in fiscal year 2010. (This doesn't include CSF reimbursements since coalition support program is not technically an aide program. CSF reimbursements to Pakistan from the United States have been approximately $8.88 billion since 2001.

The counter-argument on drone attacks is that they fuel more terrorism than they prevent. Understandably there's a backlash as a result of drone attacks in Pakistan but the fault for that lies with Pakistan as much as any other country. The government's ill-conceived policies that provided safe havens to mercenaries around the world in the 80s and 90s along with the deals carried forward from the regime of General Pervez Mushraff have created a very divided country.

Pakistan needs a clear policy on drone attacks along with an above-board counter terrorism policy that doesn't pick between the good terrorists and bad ones. For its part the United States needs to realize that any policy on drones needs to be carefully worked out with Pakistan before any more strikes happen. As it appears right now, the U.S. seems to be settling for short-term disruptions at the expense of long term solutions. And that acceptance won't eliminate the terror threat to either country.

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Ali K. Chishti is an investigative journalist and a counterterrorism expert based in Karachi, Pakistan. His book, Jehadi Godzilla and Pakistani Establishment will be released early next year.

The War Continues...Outside of Kandahar

Current Ops outside of Kandahar; an Army unit's fight to control their area:
The war hasn't let up much for the Wolfpack this winter. They've taken three casualties the last couple weeks. A platoon commander, a 19-year old single father,
and a PFC from another company. Spc Adam been out on two air assault missions
in CH-47s and a whole bunch of village sweeps lately.

Two weeks ago, they swept a village. After clearing it, they left via an open field, with Adam covering the rear with his SAW. Suddenly they started taking fire from the village they'd just left.

Adam hit the dirt and was the first to return fire. He laid down suppressing fire while the rest of his squad ran to a ditch on the far side of the field. AK and MG fire landed all around him, so close, he said later, that it kicked dirt into his ears. More than a dozen RPGs fired at or over him. When his squad reached the ditch, they covered him to run the gauntlet to join them. They then outflanked the village and drove the Talibs away. Of course, the Talibs had managed to booby-trap the village again, but knowing that they would, the squad carefully swept it again. In all, Spc Adam squeezed off some 600 rounds in this short, nasty firefight.

A few nights later, his squad was QRF when a drone's night-vision saw four Talibs planting IEDs about six clicks away from the COP. Off they marched, and nabbed the suckers, who were brought back for detainment and given to the ANA/ANP for processing.

A replacement unit is due in soon, but the RTB date to return to KAF keeps getting pushed back. It's been delayed 3 weeks now, and the incoming commander wants the Wolfpack to take his boys out in the field and do some side-by-sides and teach the incoming soldiers how to fight.
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The intelligence and agencies of Pakistan

The intelligence and agencies of Pakistan (Part I)

By Ali K Chishti
Daily Times

Karachi: There are visible signs. What is, however, not so visible and will not be is the role that has been played by the intelligence agencies in shaping and running of the political process in Pakistan. There are more than a dozen or so intelligence agencies working in Pakistan which is commonly referred to as “agencies”. The primary objective of these intelligence agencies is to collect intelligence and pre-empt terrorist’s attacks. While an average citizen has serious doubts and apprehensions about the working style of the intelligence agencies in Pakistan - from the assassination of the country’s first prime minister, whose assassin was once on the premier intelligence agency Intelligence Bureau’s payroll to destabilise a democratically elected government with operations like Midnight Jackal to the only recent “missing persons case” – where intelligence agencies kidnap and kill fellow Pakistanis without trial.

While there are numerous smaller intelligence and investigating agencies, like Rangers Intelligence, Air Force Intelligence, Naval Intelligence, Special Branch, CID, FIA, etc –the big three, Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), Military Intelligence (MI) and Intelligence Bureau (IB), are at the forefront as far as “intel operations” are concerned in Pakistan and aboard. The job description of the big three intelligence organisations are pretty clear where the ISI in principle looks after the foreign threats; MI looks after the military related affairs and the IB looks after the internal affairs – but these three intelligence agencies seems to be out of control and “often cross the lines and even step on each other’s toes”, a former top intelligence official confirmed to Daily Times. In fact, according to Brigadier (r) Shaukat Qadir, former vice president and founder of the Islamabad Policy Research Institute (IPRI), “the ISI, at least under Gen Mehmood in 2000-2001, completely went out of control until he was sacked. It was more of an ego problem, where Gen Mehmood, the ISI director general, considered himself unaccountable.” A trend which shows that it’s not the institution but often its personnel which goes freelance for which various intelligence agencies have made there “counter-intelligence” units more stronger for better vigilance of their own operatives.

The civilian-military distrust could also be witnessed in the intelligence community where it is part of the book by the uniformed intelligence agencies, the Military Intelligence and the ISI to seals off the K-Block or the IB’s Headquarters as a routine whenever there’s a coup which shows a thread of animosity and mistrust between the civilian and military institutions. The politicisation of the intelligence agencies could be judged with the fact that at least 4,000-5,000 sacked Intelligence Bureau officials, who were previously profiled to be “unfit for service” due to political connections, were reinstated by the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) government with back pays and benefits only recently. The IB often accuses other intelligence agencies of interfering in its affairs – remember only in recent years more IB operatives have gone down than anyone else. So, how do our intelligence agencies work? They send out a daily report to the president and the prime minister via COAS, titled “eyes only” mostly “googled stuff” and constantly plays up threat levels apart from nagging for more funds. While the three big intelligence agencies have received all the latest tech and surveillance equipment from the United States, including serious investments in a new field, quantum computing to break terrorist codes, it is the human intelligence which the Pakistani intelligence agencies normally rely upon but lacks training in. “They work like sub-inspectors and mostly tap phones and chase people,” confirmed a former intelligence operative. The incompetence of our intelligence agencies could be judged from the fact that they have completely failed to stop or pre-empt at least 87 percent of terrorist related crimes despite millions of dollars of funding and investment by the GoP and other allies in Pakistani intelligence network. The CIA’s former operative Jonathan Hugh confirmed to Daily Times that the CIA had only recently secured around $500 million under a covert programme to give out “carrots” to the ISI for catching top wanted terrorists. The funding, part of the intelligence agencies, is also dubious and deliberately kept murky, one example of which is how General (r) Pervez Musharraf gave out a record allocation of Rs 2.2 billion and Rs 140 million to a premier intelligence agency from the Finance Ministry funds in November 10, 2007 in an effort to manipulate the elections which were to be held in 2008. Mostly a “secret fund” is also abused for funding various operations with no records available.

There’s also a psychological warfare unit and press-handlers operated by various intelligence agencies through which they unleash targeted propaganda and plant stories through journalists on agencies’ payroll. Certain top journalists had only recently received plots and houses via the new Younas Habib of the intelligence agencies, a notorious builder and developer from Islamabad known to be close to all politicians. Only recently, news planted by an intelligence agency made sure that Qari Saifullah backed by another intelligence agency was victimised and re-arrested on the basis of the story filed. Intelligence coordination is an area which Pakistan lacks and is regarded as the prime reason why our intelligence agencies had failed. As of now, there is no practical mechanism to actually exchange information between various intelligence agencies and although the government had set up the National Counter Terrorism Authority (NCTA), now headed by Zafarullah Khan, has “fallen to the dogs” according to the sources and is practically non-functional. A top intelligence chief confirmed to Daily Times that “we need an effective and efficient institution for collection of data, assets and monitoring of activities of all national, defence and domestic intelligence organisations – right now it’s not working out well for us.”
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Marine Success in Helmand Recognized

Marines Fighting Back in Helmand Province

ISW Scholar Jeffrey A. Dressler examines the heated fight for the Taliban’s financial hub, Helmand province, finding the insurgency has been driven out en masse

Washington, D.C: Helmand is Afghanistan’s largest province and the central node of the Taliban’s narcotics empire, generating substantial funds to finance a brutal insurgency. In short, success in Afghanistan requires success in Helmand province.

“Helmand province was formally the economic life-blood of the insurgency, but U.S. Marines and coalition forces have made remarkable gains there by taking back key terrain that was previously controlled by the Taliban,” explained ISW Afghanistan Scholar, Jeff Dressler. “The enemy network is fractured and it proves counterinsurgency can work in southern Afghanistan, while noting that sustainable progress is still elusive.”

Key findings and recommendations:

Helmand is the first province in Afghanistan to receive sufficient force to engage in comprehensive, population-centric counterinsurgency operations. Requisite troop numbers did not arrive in Helmand until the summer of 2009, a full three years after the U.K. arrived in 2006.

The insurgency in Helmand has been significantly degraded over the past eighteen months. Coalition and Afghan forces have removed nearly all insurgent safe havens and are killing, capturing, and denying insurgent’s access to key terrain and population centers in and around the Helmand River Valley.

According to recent polling by the Washington Post, ABC and the BBC, the number of people in Helmand describing their security as "good" increased from 14 percent in December 2009 poll to 67 percent as of December 2010.

Although there have been tremendous strides made in provincial and district governance over the past several years, some critical challenges remain, including identifying and attracting capable civil servants.

In Helmand, insurgent weapons caches and bomb making materials are seized alongside narcotics, highlighting the increasingly cooperative relationship between the insurgency and the drug trade.

Letter from Karachi

Letter from Karachi
By Taimur Khan
Foreign Affairs

"An influx of working poor into Pakistan's cities is leading to violent competition over land and political loyalties -- not to mention changing the very social fabric of the country. Will Karachi, and Pakistan as a whole, be able to adapt?"

Read in on Foreign Affairs: http://www.foreignaffairs.com/node/67173

Funding Pakistan's Jihad Against the West

Funding Pakistan’s Jihad

By Ali K Chishti

Karachi. While it may be true that over the years the militants have developed a vast and effective network for raising funds by taking as much as a rupee from a poor man to millions from the rich, donations are pouring in for jihad from every segment of society

All the commitment and fanaticism notwithstanding, terrorist operations cannot be run without funds. Funds for jihad are required for procuring weapons, financing training camps, providing logistical support, compensating the families of jihadis, paying instructors and also the wide networks of agents and running recruitment offices.

During the Afghan war, western governments were a major source of funding and weapons for the groups engaged in taking on the Soviet occupation army in Afghanistan. Much of these funds came from covert accounts of the states funding the Afghans. Islamic countries also poured in billions of dollars into the coffers of the jihadi groups. While the role of Saudi Arabia has been limited to the provision of funds to the Islamist and jihadi organisations, the Kingdom, to this day, is the biggest source of official and private funding to Islamist and jihadist organisations in Pakistan, and it is to their credit that certain Deobandi and Ahle-Hadith extremist organisations became so powerful with the growth in their size.

One also has to see the Saudi financial support to Deobandi organisations in the context of the rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran post the Iranian revolution where both these countries had supported militant sectarian organisations to organise attacks and counter-attacks on each other’s sects and fought a proxy war inside Pakistan.

So open was Saudi support to Sipah-e-Sahaba (now the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Jundullah) that the Saudi government, in 2000, gave out Rs 17 million to fund hardcore militant madrassas in Jhang alone. Another Saudi charity, called the International Islamic Relief Organisation (IIRO), is an affiliate of the Saudi welfare organisation, Rabita Alam-e-Islami, which in turn helped to set up the Rabita Trust in Pakistan that was banned after 9/11 because of a strong bin Laden connection. The most interesting aspect of the Trust was that its chairman was none other than General Pervez Musharraf, the chief of army staff. To save embarrassment to a close ally, a state department official said, “We do not think the prominent people who have their names on it were aware of the infiltration.”

In fact, so murky is the source of funds coming from Saudi Arabia that the leader of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, Maulana Fazlur Rahman Khalil said, “The US had instructed, through Rabita Alam-e-Islami that we should initiate jihad in the Chinese province of Xinjiang, to which I replied that we have grown up now. We do not do jihad at your bidding.”

Lashkar-e-Tayyaba’s (LeT’s) parent organisation, the Dawat wal Irshad, initially also attracted the sympathy of certain Arab donors interested in purifying Islam in the subcontinent, which is considered to have been tainted by the influence of Hinduism. In fact, one such Saudi donor, Abu Abdul Aziz, who invested millions of dollars on LeT, LeJ and various jihadi organisations, even donated Rs 10 million to make a mosque at Markaz-e-Dawa’s headquarters.

And while it may be true that over the years the militants have developed a vast and effective network for raising funds by taking as much as a rupee from a poor man to millions from the rich, donations are pouring in for jihad from every segment of society. And while many jihadi organisations collect sacrificial hides to raise funds, many have started raising their capital from publishing magazines to even the property business, and now, as a jihadi told me sheepishly, “the national disaster business”. In a report published by the Aga Khan Development Network in 1998, approximately 50 percent of Pakistanis gave an estimated amount of Rs 770 billion in money, goods and time, of which 90 percent of the surveyed donors cited religious faith as the motivation for giving.

If all this foreign and local funding were not enough, the Pakistani government gives out an estimated Rs 20-35 billion in grants to madrassas and jihadi movements indirectly from government resources like zakat or iqra funds. Another funding source after the crackdown on Saudi sources and tighter monetary controls is the Afghan Transit Trade, which is a cash cow for jihadis and certain rogue establishment actors who exploit the trade for procuring weapons and narcotics smuggling, earning millions of dollars to be funnelled into proxy wars from Afghanistan to Pakistan. There was a reason why the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) offered $ 10 million to replace American aid. The hundi trade is another source that is ‘welcomed’ by the State Bank of Pakistan, as it has, over the years, been buying billions of dollars to shore up its balance of payment positions. The hundi trade helps launder money for jihadis but in the land of the pure, jihad is used as a weapon to further our so-called strategic plans.

Even after 9/11, much of what is happening inside the tribal belt is a bit of a charade. In fact, what earlier used to be taking place openly has now been pushed behind the curtain, otherwise it is business as usual. Every time the Americans start getting impatient, the Pakistanis make a show of launching an operation in the tribal belt. There are arrests of Afghan and Arab jihadis or the killings of certain individuals until everything returns to normal. One big reason why our own Pakistani government will never really close the funding source and cut the roots of jihadis is because doing so would have a direct impact on the various jihads it is involved with to suit certain foreign policy goals. Moreover, by shutting down these rackets, the Pakistani state will lose an important leverage over deciding affairs inside Afghanistan. Often, the Pakistani state has used smuggling as a carrot for the various Afghan warlords and agents, and in return has managed to get them to do Pakistan’s bidding inside Afghanistan. This currency of power will be lost if Pakistan were to curb the illegal rackets. But, in the process of taking action on this trade, what will happen is that the Pakistani state will try to regain total and complete control over this trade, something it was gradually losing out on with the increasing privatisation of jihad.

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The writer is a political analyst. He can be reached at akchishti@hotmail.com

"Brigade 313" prepares plan to attack Commonwealth Games

"Brigade 313" prepares plan to attack Commonwealth Games

By Ali K Chishti

Daily Times: http://tinyurl.com/32yd4se
Karachi, Sept 30, 2010

It can be confirmed that al Qaeda and a group based in North Waziristan calling itself “Brigade 313”, which is made up of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and allied extremist group members, including Lashkar-e-Tayyaba and Karachi-based Jandullah, has prepared a plan to attack the 19th Commonwealth Games, which are due to be held in News Delhi from October 3 to October 14, Daily Times has learnt.

Previously, those who have been described as “stateless actors” by the government, attacked various targets in India’s financial hub, Mumbai, which strained the relations between India and Pakistan and brought them on the brink of war.

The intelligence has originated from Kabul where a western military source confirmed that, “We intercepted certain conversations that gave us the impression that the attack on an important sporting event is due in India.”

It has also been confirmed that some of the information originated from a German national named, Ahmed Siddiqui, 36, who has been caught in Kabul under suspicion of carrying out a terrorist plot in the West. The intelligence about such an attack had also been passed on to the Indians.

Daily Times has been told that Ilyas Kashmiri, who heads al Qaeda’s Brigade 313 and who is a former rogue SSG commando, will be heading the whole operation to carry out this terrorist plot in New Delhi. Kashmiri had been linked to have actually orchestrated the Mumbai attacks and to have links with the Dylands-Posten plot to carry out the assassination of General Alvi, who commanded the Pakistan Army’s elite Special Services Group (SSG). Kashmiri is now based in North Waziristan and heads what is now called the Punjabi Taliban.

The Interior Ministry, along with various security establishments in Pakistan, after the news that there could have been another terrorist plot originating from Pakistan are in a ‘state of panic’, where according to one senior ministry member, “We are seriously investigating and taking all precautions that we could and have been extra-vigilant. Surely another 26/11 or a high-profile terrorist incident now in India would definitely be a major blow, something that none of us wants.”

A New Delhi based security analyst, Bharat Swami, told Daily Times, “Another attack from Pakistan would leave India no other option but to target militant camps inside Pakistan and could end all diplomatic relations with Pakistan.”

The Pakistani Foreign Office’s spokesman declined to comment on the story, but termed it ‘baseless’. Western diplomat in close contact with security officials told Daily Times that, “This is what we fear the most… we all have our fingers crossed on this one, but if such an incident does take place, we will be packing our bags.”

India only recently raised the level of security for the 19th Commonwealth Games and deputed more than 100,000 security officials, including elite commandoes, for providing security to the participants.

US-PK-Talib peace talks? "Special" from Karachi's Daily Times

Diplomatic Efforts for Afghanistan
By Ali K Chishti
DAILY TIMES, Karachi
18 Sept 2010

Daily Times has learned of a massive diplomatic effort by the United States, Pakistan and certain Arab Governments to ‘find a solution for Afghanistan’. A western diplomat who has been at the forefront as a fixer told Daily Times that, “that, the idea is to have broad based government that includes Talibans in Afghanistan.”

Hamid Karzai the president of Afghanistan who is dubbed as ‘the mayor of Kabul’ and is criticized as enormously corrupt and incompetent by the Americans is on board to talk to the Talibans too.

Earlier as part of the diplomatic flurry, United States special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke visited Pakistan, followed by Karzai and Gen.Petraeus and met, Gen.Keyani and DG, ISI Gen.Pasha who according to a top foreign ministry’s source described, ‘came to sought Pakistan’s help to broke a deal with the Talibans and give some sort of legitimacy and power to Hamid Karzai to deal with the them (Talibans). The Americans practically accepts Pakistan’s stance that the Talibans are a reality in Afghanistan.”

Daily Times could confirm that Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Muqrin bin Abdul Aziz who has the confidence of both the Americans and Hamid Karzai is next in line to visit Pakistan where he will meet high-level Taliban leadership at various safe-houses.

The sources confirmed Daily Times that the Saudi intelligence chief will try to convince the Talibans to break a deal with Hamid Karzai. The UAE’s special envoy to Pakistan Ali Mohammad al-Shamsi who had previously led the negotiations will also be present in talks and would offer major concessions to the Talibans.

A Taliban spokesman while talking to Daily Times denied that negotiations are actually taking place and said, ‘that Ameer Ul Momineen Mulla Omer and Talibans will only negotiate when the US and coalition forces leave Afghanistan."

Profiling Pakistani Jihadists

ANALYSIS: Profiling Pakistani Jihadists

By Ali K Chishti

Karaci: One major draw for jihadis in Pakistan is the clout a religious militant enjoys with the law-enforcement agencies. The militant organisation gives otherwise powerless men a strong sense of identity in an increasingly fragmented social structure

What kind of people are rushing to join jihadi organisations? Where are they coming from? What is their family and educational background? And most importantly, what motivates them to put their lives on the line for missions that really have nothing material to do with them? What really prompts a Punjabi, Sindhi, Baloch or Pashtun to become a member of a suicide squad? Or, for that matter, what makes these people participate in far off conflicts that have no bearing on their lives, except maybe emotional attachment? What is behind their fanaticism and their commitment? How are they recruited?

All such profiling conducted by various think-tanks gives us a small hint of the demonic mindset that we are dealing with in the fight against radical Islamic terror groups. Another frightening reality that emerges from a close study of jihadis is that they do not come from any one particular education stream, family background, region or even economic background. The spirit of jihad transcends these boundaries and stereotypes. In other words, jihadis are now coming from every social, economic and cultural strata of Pakistani society. This means that our country itself has become one big Jihad Inc. The role of mullahs in motivating and recruiting young men for jihad clearly comes out when profiling jihadis but equally important is the fact that economic factors and a breakdown in traditional social structures too are motivating many people to take to jihad.

Jihad in this part of the world is seen as lending a sense of purpose to the lives of many people who otherwise would be pushovers in society. One major draw for jihadis in Pakistan is the clout a religious militant enjoys with the law enforcement agencies. A black tinted four-by-four and a suspicious number plate with occupants sporting militia-style clothing, long hair and beards is bound to arouse suspicion and get the vehicle pulled over at any check post. If you are a religious militant, however, you are simply waved through with a level of ‘respect’ unthinkable for most Pakistanis. Obviously, being above the law holds great appeal for the jobless. The militant organisation gives otherwise powerless men a strong sense of identity in an increasingly fragmented social structure.

Only recently a research paper published on the very subject reveals that a vast number of recruits come from formal schools and lack any real religious knowledge or motivation. The primary cause behind militancy, it is argued, is unemployment and poverty. There are the middle class jihadis like Shehzad Tanvir or Sheikh Omar, who has been convicted of murdering Daniel Pearl. There is a popular misconception that young Pakistani men who volunteer for jihad invariably do so out of a lack of viable economic options. This is particularly untrue in Karachi where most budding jihadis hail from middle, upper middle or even upper class families. A similar trend prevails in other large cities that, in turn, explodes another myth that Pakistan’s ‘non-state actors’ are largely confined to the country’s tribal and northern areas.

“I am proud of my son although the only regret I have is that I do not have another son to send for this noble cause,” says a middle-aged man whose only son is believed dead somewhere in Afghanistan. Another jihadi now turned tableeghi, Mehmood, who in his late 20s managed to come back to Karachi in one piece, maintains that misconceptions abound concerning the current reality in Afghanistan. He says, “Some people accuse the Taliban of retreating without informing the Pakistani and Arab mujaheedin, a move that allegedly resulted in their slaughter by the Northern Alliance. That is totally incorrect.” While pulling back, the Taliban asked all their foreign allies to withdraw with them. The Pakistani and Arab mujahideen, however, decided to keep on fighting even though they knew that they would get killed. Most of them preferred to die as they had already burnt their bridges.

One would imagine that most of those planning to take part in the holy war would be from the militant cadres of jihadi organisations. However, it has become patently obvious that this modern version of the David and Goliath fable has an emotive appeal across the spectrum of Pakistani society too. Many, even those who do not agree with the Taliban’s obscurantist version of Islam, have found inspiration in the obdurate refusal of one of the world’s poorest Muslim countries to give in to the demands of the only global superpower.

Finally, there is the myth and misconception that jihadis are only Pashtuns and Punjabis. The records provided by different jihadi organisations and research material available show that the number of martyrs from Sindh has already touched 500 in the FATA region alone. In the early 2000s, when our proxies were primarily targeted towards the east, 85 of the Jaish-e-Mohammad, 175 of Hizbul Mujahideen and 51 of Lashkar-e-Islam were Sindhi-speaking jihadis. In the case of Balochistan, the list of casualties published by various jihadi organisations shows that from 1999 to March 2002, there were 112 so-called martyrs from Balochistan, most of whom died in Afghanistan, indicating that the jihad phenomenon in Pakistan has gone viral in almost every segment of our society.

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The writer is a political analyst. He can be reached at akchishti@hotmail.com

"Building on Faith" By the Imam of the proposed NYC mosque

Building on Faith

By FEISAL ABDUL RAUF

AS my flight approached America last weekend, my mind circled back to the furor that has broken out over plans to build Cordoba House, a community center in Lower Manhattan.I have been away from home for two months, speaking abroad about cooperation among people from different religions. Every day, including the past two weeks spent representing my country on a State Department tour in the Middle East, I have been struck by how the controversy has riveted the attention of Americans, as well as nearly everyone I met in my travels.

We have all been awed by how inflamed and emotional the issue of the proposed community center has become. The level of attention reflects the degree to which people care about the very American values under debate: recognition of the rights of others, tolerance and freedom of worship.

Many people wondered why I did not speak out more, and sooner, about this project. I felt that it would not be right to comment from abroad. It would be better if I addressed these issues once I returned home to America, and after I could confer with leaders of other faiths who have been deliberating with us over this project. My life’s work has been focused on building bridges between religious groups and never has that been as important as it is now.

We are proceeding with the community center, Cordoba House. More important, we are doing so with the support of the downtown community, government at all levels and leaders from across the religious spectrum, who will be our partners. I am convinced that it is the right thing to do for many reasons.

Above all, the project will amplify the multifaith approach that the Cordoba Initiative has deployed in concrete ways for years. Our name, Cordoba, was inspired by the city in Spain where Muslims, Christians and Jews co-existed in the Middle Ages during a period of great cultural enrichment created by Muslims. Our initiative is intended to cultivate understanding among all religions and cultures.

Our broader mission — to strengthen relations between the Western and Muslim worlds and to help counter radical ideology — lies not in skirting the margins of issues that have polarized relations within the Muslim world and between non-Muslims and Muslims. It lies in confronting them as a joint multifaith, multinational effort.

From the political conflicts between Israelis and Palestinians to the building of a community center in Lower Manhattan, Muslims and members of all faiths must work together if we are ever going to succeed in fostering understanding and peace.

At Cordoba House, we envision shared space for community activities, like a swimming pool, classrooms and a play space for children. There will be separate prayer spaces for Muslims, Christians, Jews and men and women of other faiths. The center will also include a multifaith memorial dedicated to victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.

I am very sensitive to the feelings of the families of victims of 9/11, as are my fellow leaders of many faiths. We will accordingly seek the support of those families, and the support of our vibrant neighborhood, as we consider the ultimate plans for the community center. Our objective has always been to make this a center for unification and healing.

Cordoba House will be built on the two fundamental commandments common to Judaism, Christianity and Islam: to love the Lord our creator with all of our hearts, minds, souls and strength; and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. We want to foster a culture of worship authentic to each religious tradition, and also a culture of forging personal bonds across religious traditions.

I do not underestimate the challenges that will be involved in bringing our work to completion. (Construction has not even begun yet.) I know there will be interest in our financing, and so we will clearly identify all of our financial backers.

Lost amid the commotion is the good that has come out of the recent discussion. I want to draw attention, specifically, to the open, law-based and tolerant actions that have taken place, and that are particularly striking for Muslims.

President Obama and Mayor Michael Bloomberg both spoke out in support of our project. As I traveled overseas, I saw firsthand how their words and actions made a tremendous impact on the Muslim street and on Muslim leaders. It was striking: a Christian president and a Jewish mayor of New York supporting the rights of Muslims. Their statements sent a powerful message about what America stands for, and will be remembered as a milestone in improving American-Muslim relations.

The wonderful outpouring of support for our right to build this community center from across the social, religious and political spectrum seriously undermines the ability of anti-American radicals to recruit young, impressionable Muslims by falsely claiming that America persecutes Muslims for their faith. These efforts by radicals at distortion endanger our national security and the personal security of Americans worldwide. This is why Americans must not back away from completion of this project. If we do, we cede the discourse and, essentially, our future to radicals on both sides. The paradigm of a clash between the West and the Muslim world will continue, as it has in recent decades at terrible cost. It is a paradigm we must shift.

From those who recognize our rights, from grassroots organizers to heads of state, I sense a global desire to build on this positive momentum and to be part of a global movement to heal relations and bring peace. This is an opportunity we must grasp.

I therefore call upon all Americans to rise to this challenge. Let us commemorate the anniversary of 9/11 by pausing to reflect and meditate and tone down the vitriol and rhetoric that serves only to strengthen the radicals and weaken our friends’ belief in our values.

The very word “islam” comes from a word cognate to shalom, which means peace in Hebrew. The Koran declares in its 36th chapter, regarded by the Prophet Muhammad as the heart of the Koran, in a verse deemed the heart of this chapter, “Peace is a word spoken from a merciful Lord.”

How better to commemorate 9/11 than to urge our fellow Muslims, fellow Christians and fellow Jews to follow the fundamental common impulse of our great faith traditions?
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Feisal Abdul Rauf is the chairman of the Cordoba Initiative and the imam of the Farah mosque in Lower Manhattan.

We Owe the Troops an Exit

We Owe the Troops an Exit
By BOB HERBERT
New York Times
31 Aug 2010

At least 14 American soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan over the past few days.

We learned on Saturday that our so-called partner in this forlorn war, Hamid Karzai, fired a top prosecutor who had insisted on, gasp, fighting the corruption that runs like a crippling disease through his country.

Time magazine tells us that stressed-out, depressed and despondent soldiers are seeking help for their mental difficulties at a rate that is overwhelming the capacity of available professionals. What we are doing to these troops who have been serving tour after tour in Afghanistan and Iraq is unconscionable.

Time described the mental-health issue as “the U.S. Army’s third front,” with the reporter, Mark Thompson, writing: “While its combat troops fight two wars, its mental-health professionals are waging a battle to save soldiers’ sanity when they come back, one that will cost billions long after combat ends in Baghdad and Kabul.”

In addition to the terrible physical toll, the ultimate economic costs of these two wars, as the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz and his colleague Linda Bilmes have pointed out, will run to more than $3 trillion.

I get a headache when I hear supporters of this endless warfare complaining about the federal budget deficits. They’re like arsonists complaining about the smell of smoke in the neighborhood.

There is no silver lining to this nearly decade-old war in Afghanistan. Poll after poll has shown that it no longer has the support of most Americans. And yet we fight on, feeding troops into the meat-grinder year after tragic year — to what end?

“Clearly, the final chapters of this particular endeavor are very much yet to be written,” said Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan, during a BBC interview over the weekend. He sounded as if those chapters would not be written any time soon.

In a reference to President Obama’s assertion that U.S. troops would begin to withdraw from Afghanistan next July, General Petraeus told the interviewer: “That’s a date when a process begins, nothing more, nothing less. It’s not the date when the American forces begin an exodus and look for the exit and the light to turn off on the way out of the room.”

A lot of Americans who had listened to the president thought it was, in fact, a date when the American forces would begin an exodus. The general seems to have heard something quite different.

In truth, it’s not at all clear how President Obama really feels about the awesome responsibilities involved in waging war, and that’s a problem. The Times’s Peter Baker wrote a compelling and in many ways troubling article recently about the steep learning curve that Mr. Obama, with no previous military background, has had to negotiate as a wartime commander in chief.

Quoting an unnamed adviser to the president, Mr. Baker wrote that Mr. Obama sees the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as “problems that need managing” while he pursues his mission of transforming the nation. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, speaking on the record, said, “He’s got a very full plate of very big issues, and I think he does not want to create the impression that he’s so preoccupied with these two wars that he’s not addressing the domestic issues that are uppermost in people’s minds.”

Wars are not problems that need managing, which suggests that they will always be with us. They are catastrophes that need to be brought to an end as quickly as possible. Wars consume lives by the thousands (in Iraq, by the scores of thousands) and sometimes, as in World War II, by the millions. The goal when fighting any war should be peace, not a permanent simmer of nonstop maiming and killing. Wars are meant to be won — if they have to be fought at all — not endlessly looked after.

One of the reasons we’re in this state of nonstop warfare is the fact that so few Americans have had any personal stake in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There is no draft and no direct financial hardship resulting from the wars. So we keep shipping other people’s children off to combat as if they were some sort of commodity, like coal or wheat, with no real regard for the terrible price so many have to pay, physically and psychologically.

Not only is this tragic, it is profoundly disrespectful. These are real men and women, courageous and mostly uncomplaining human beings, that we are sending into the war zones, and we owe them our most careful attention. Above all, we owe them an end to two wars that have gone on much too long.

COIN - How Not To vs. How To

The photo above shows why the war in Afghanistan is not going well for the United States.

It came from Laura King’s LATimes.com article of 17 Aug “'Three cups of tea' a byword for U.S. effort to win Afghan hearts and minds.” As Ms. King so aptly explains, the phrase “three cups of tea” has been adapted from the Greg Mortenson best-seller of the same name by the American military as the basis of how to conduct a counterinsurgency campaign.

The concept is a good one: win the trust of the people and they’ll tell you who are the bad guys, as well as what’s needed in their village to make it a semi-viable place to live – building local governments that can minister to its own people is incredibly important in a country whose central government is known worldwide for corruption and incompetence. “Counterinsurgency is easy,” Col Dale Alford (USMC) said at the National Press Club "COIN Symposium", “you want to make the locals choose us.” It worked with the Marines and Sunni’s in Ramadi and Anbar; it should work in Afghanistan where the choices are either us or the Taliban.

But any plan is only as good as it’s implementation…and that bring us back to the photograph : two soldiers sitting at their desk in an office looking down at Afghans who are sitting on the floor on the other side of the room. This is hardly how Gen James Mattis (USMC) and Gen David Petraeus (Army), co-authors of the 2006 Army-Marine Counterinsurgency Manual, envisioned building relations with the locals.

Mattis knew how to deal with a wary population. “Take off your sunglasses,” he ordered his Marines back in 2003 Iraq, “and let them get to know you. Play soccer with the kids, and don’t worry if you lose. Shake a lot of hands and chat them up.” Sound, effective advice until Paul Bremer’s ill-planned CPA took charge and Iraq exploded with I.E.D.’s.

What the Army fails to understand is that it’s not how many cups of tea one drinks that’s important, but that the act of drinking tea or sharing a melon is how strangers sit down peacefully and begin to know one another. Afghanistan is an incredibly poor country; perhaps the 5th poorest in the world, and sharing food is the ultimate in hospitality. It’s also worth noting that relationships are not built in a day, neither here, or in Afghanistan. Similar to most courting rituals worldwide, it takes more than one cup of tea and more than one meeting to build a relationship sufficiently deep to talk honestly about schooling, IED’s, and Taliban presence.

Bureaucracy and counterinsurgency are incompatible. Living on a FOB and patrolling by vehicle ensures you meet no locals. Eating at the DFAC means you’re not eating with the locals, and it’s worth noting that ten months after President Obama ordered more troops into Afghanistan, the Army has yet to deploy their final thousands of troops. Air conditioned bunks, Playstations and Wii, fast-food joints, an MWR shop…while such creature comforts are certainly attractive, they also keep the soldiers tied to their FOB’s.

In comparison, the Marine forces in Helmand and Nimroz Provinces live in, or in close proximity to the towns. They have limited internet access, very little a/c, and no Wii. In Musa Qual’ah, they live in the village center. In Marjah, they live on some ten different little patrol bases. In Nawa and Garmsir, considered the success stories of COIN in Afghanistan, they live in-and -around the towns. Relationships and trust are built by constant exposure to each other, and the Marines patrol 3x daily 7 days/ week. Yet Ms. King’s article quotes the ranking elder of a village as mentioning that American soldiers visited him ‘last month’, and how he doubted that “an occasional visit by the American forces could keep the insurgents at bay.”

It’s been written that the Marines out-patrol the Army by a factor of perhaps 20-1; hot, tiring work in a country jaded by nine years of broken Western promises. Yet done properly, as Mortenson’s book and Marine efforts in Helmand Province evidence, personal relationships can bring two disparate cultures together for mutual success. With American assistance, they’ll build enough functioning local governments that will enable our troops to come home.

But to “choose us” the locals need to get to know us, and to “know us” we need to get off the FOB’s and drink chai daily with that village elder.

Insurgents Attack 2 Bases - wearing US Army uniforms

Afghan Insurgents Attack 2 Bases
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 10:35 a.m. ET

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- Insurgents wearing U.S. Army uniforms launched pre-dawn attacks Saturday on a major NATO base in eastern Afghanistan and a nearby camp where seven CIA employees were killed last year in a suicide bombing. NATO said there were no coalition casualties and the attacks were repelled.

NATO said at least 21 insurgents were killed -- including four who were wearing suicide vests -- and five captured in Saturday's coordinated attacks.

Afghanistan's Interior Ministry put the insurgent death toll in the attacks at 24, with five captured and no casualties on the police side. The Defense Ministry said two Afghan soldiers were killed and three wounded in the fighting.

The assaults on the sprawling Forward Operating Base Salerno in Khost province and nearby Camp Chapman came around 3 a.m., just as area residents were rising for early morning prayers.

The area, about 60 miles southeast of Kabul near the border with Pakistan, is a hotbed of activity by the Taliban and other insurgent groups, including the December attack on Chapman that killed four CIA officers and three contracted security guards.

In recent months similar attacks have been launched against U.S. bases at Bagram, Jalalabad and Kandahar.

Afghan police said about 50 insurgents attacked using rifles, heavy machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and other weapons, but had been repelled.

After being driven away from the bases, the insurgents approached the nearby offices of the governor and provincial police headquarters but were driven off, said Khost provincial police Chief Abdul Hakim Ishaqzai.

"Given the size of the enemy's force, this could have been a major catastrophe for Khost. Luckily we prevented it" he said.

Small arms fire continued through the morning, while NATO helicopters patrolled overhead.

NATO said two insurgents had managed to breach Salerno's perimeter, but were observed cutting the fence and killed immediately.

Dead insurgents were seen wearing camouflage jackets and pants seemingly identical to those warn by U.S. Army soldiers.

Police captured a pickup truck laden with ammunition along with a light truck packed with explosives that had become stuck in deep mud, according to Maj. Wazir Pacha of the provincial police headquarters. Bomb specialists later destroyed the truck and its cargo, according to the Interior Ministry.

NATO said the dead insurgents were members of the Haqqani Network, a Taliban-affiliated group with deep ties to al-Qaida that is accused of launching frequent raids across the border from neighboring Pakistan.

TAPS Program - Support for families of fallen soldiers

Mentors support families of fallen soldiersBy Renee Chou
WRAL.com
August 21, 2010

Coping with a soldier's death can be a lonesome and difficult journey. But survivors of fallen soldiers don't have to go through it alone.

The Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS) offers peer mentor training to help survivors grieving a military loss.

Randy and Betsy Beard learned about TAPS after their 22-year-old son was killed in 2004 in Ramadi, Iraq.“He took shrapnel in the head and died about three hours later,” Randy Beard said.

Brad Beard was an Army mechanic who worked on howitzers. He was stationed in Korea for two years and volunteered to go to Iraq when he heard the Army needed mechanics.
“When someone really close to you dies, it just shatters your whole world,” Betsy Beard said.

“My heart was ripped apart,” Randy Beard said. “You are helpless. You can't help your wife. You can't help your family. There is nothing you can do to make it better.”

Overwhelmed with grief, the Beards contacted TAPS for help. A program mentor reached out to Betsy Beard by telephone.“She was a mom like me who lost a son in the military. She lived in Vermont,” Betsy Beard said. “I knew if she could survive, I could survive as well.”

The Beards are taking part this weekend in a TAPS camp in Pinehurst where about 150 people are learning how to survive military loss.“We are here to reach out our hand to those walking behind us,” Randy Beard said. “What that does for grief is that it helps us feel not so isolated,” Betsy Beard said.

The support is crucial because the Beards say they have learned that time does not heal the pain.“Time just moves on. What we do with our time can help or hinder us I think,” Randy Beard said.

The Beards, who live in Louisburg, travel to Fort Hood, Fort Campbell and Fort Lewis to provide peer mentoring. They also run a monthly support group for military families dealing with loss in Raleigh.

Somalia resembling Afghanistan under Taliban

Somalia resembling Afghanistan under Taliban
Some experts say the similarities are no accident

Associated Press

By JASON STRAZIUSO, MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN
updated 8/22/2010 12:00:09 AM

MOGADISHU, Somalia — Men are forced to grow beards. Women can't leave home without a male relative. Music, movies and watching sports on TV are banned. Limbs are chopped off as punishment, and executions by stoning have become a public spectacle.

Somalia is looking more and more like Afghanistan under the Taliban — two rugged countries 2,000 miles apart, each lacking a central government, each with a hard-line Islamist militia that cows the public into submission.

Al-Shabab in Somalia and the Taliban in Afghanistan — their tactics increasingly mirror each other. Those tactics worked for the Taliban until the U.S. invasion overthrew it in 2001, and now they are making a comeback. Meanwhile, al-Shabab has gained control over large swaths of this arid Horn of Africa country.

In the latest adoption of tactics long used by the Afghan militants, al-Shabab is ordering households in southern Somalia to contribute a boy to the militants' ranks. Childless families have to pay al-Shabab $50 a month. That's Somalia's per capita income.

An al-Shabab commander attributed the shared tactics and ideology to the fact that both groups follow a strict form of Islam.

"One more thing we deeply share is the hatred of infidels," the commander, Abu Dayib, told The Associated Press.

Some experts say the similarities are no accident.

"Al-Shabab is copying exactly whatever the Taliban was doing in the late 1990s, because they think the strategies the Taliban employed in Afghanistan were successful," said Vahid Mujdeh, the Afghan author of a book on the Taliban. "There is no doubt that the Taliban are like heroes for al-Shabab."

U.S. and other security officials worry about another common thread: Both the Taliban and al-Shabab have links to al-Qaida.

'Unrelenting oppression'
Until their overthrow, the Taliban gave Osama bin Laden and his group safe haven in Afghanistan. Many analysts believe al-Shabab is now controlled by al-Qaida-linked foreign fighters who honed their skills in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Last month Al-Shabab claimed its first international attack — twin bombings in Uganda that killed 76 people watching the World Cup final on TV. Uganda said at least one of the confessed participants belonged to al-Qaida. Simultaneous attacks are an al-Qaida hallmark.

Both the Taliban and al-Shabab moved into a power vacuum left by inconclusive civil war, and were initially welcomed by publics desperate for some form of law and order. What they got was an extremely harsh penal code.

Now the Taliban is gaining ground despite NATO forces' efforts to push them back, and brazenly advertised its clout this month by stoning a young couple stoned to death in front of a crowd, allegedly for committing adultery.

In Somalia, two months ago, al-Shabab accused Ahmed Ali Shuke, a 27-year-old laborer, of being a government spy and slashed his tongue.

"Both groups derive support from followers of their strict interpretations of Shariah (Muslim law). Both groups also derive support by terrorizing the population," said Letta Tayler, a counterterrorism specialist at Human Rights Watch. "The people of Somalia, as in Afghanistan, have learned the hard way that if they speak out against these groups' practices, they will get killed."

Both the Taliban and al-Shabab win some sympathy by positioning themselves as defenders against invading infidels. Foreign forces — African Union troops in Somalia, U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan — feed into that narrative when they kill civilians during raids, Tayler said.

"Even many Somalis who don't like the Shabab's ideology are immensely thankful for the drop in crime in many areas under the group's control. Their daughters are not raped. Their crops are not stolen en route to market," she said.

But Human Rights Watch said in an April report that the stability was achieved by "unrelenting repression and brutality."

Several women told Human Rights Watch that they had been flogged or jailed for selling tea to support their families because the work brought them into contact with men.

Losing the hearts and minds'
Somalia has had no functioning government since 1991, and militants with guns have been filling the void ever since. Al-Shabab, which the U.S. branded a terror group in 2008, is believed to have several thousand members.

Hundreds of its fighters have died in battle, forcing al-Shabab to increase recruiting among young men and boys, said Ali Mohammed, a retired Somali colonel.

They are "losing the hearts and minds of the ordinary people," he said.

In turn, families in militant-controlled areas of Somalia who can afford it to send their sons away, several parents told the AP.

"I have lost one of my sons in a battle he was forced to join in central Somalia three months ago. He was only 15," said Asha Mohamed Amin, who lives in a rebel-controlled area of Mogadishu, the capital. "Again they say contribute the other son to a senseless death. Is that acceptable?"

Amin said she sent her other son to Hargeisa in northern Somalia to live with friends.

Innocent victims
A 26-year-old woman named Ubah felt al-Shabab's brutality firsthand.

She was visiting a moneychanger in the southern town of Kismayo with a male cousin when two young militants accused them of engaging in an illicit relationship after they couldn't show proof they were related. Hours later the militants whipped Ubah and her cousin — 80 lashes for the man and 50 for Ubah.

"I was crying and I thought they would never release me," Ubah told AP, asking that her last name not be used for fear of militant reprisals. "I couldn't move because there were men with guns."

She said the militants warned that if the two were seen together again they would be stoned to death.

===========
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

The Media - GTMO - The Pentagon

Did the Pentagon 'Cave' On Four Banned Reporters at Gitmo Trial?
By J.D. Gordon
FoxNews.com
August 09, 2010

Four previously banned reporters will attend the military commission trial at Gitmo on Tuesday. Did the Pentagon do the right thing?

Tomorrow, on Tuesday, August 10, the first military commission trial under the Obama administration will begin at Guantanamo.

Omar Khadr, a Canadian citizen charged with the death of Army Sergeant First Class Christopher Speer in Afghanistan by tossing a hand grenade in a July 2002 fire fight, has been controversial since his capture. That's due in part to his age at the time, nationality, and also because his infamous father Ahmed Said Khadr was a top aide to Usama bin Laden.

Though Khadr was first brought before a military commission hearing five years ago, complex legal hurdles have delayed his trial countless times.

Since he was 15 years old at the time of the attack (he's now 23), NGOs and many in the press have made him the poster child for everything they see wrong with Guantanamo.

The drama is sure to continue during the trial as four reporters who were banned by the Pentagon several months ago for offenses in covering his pre-trial hearings will be in attendance.

In a move that evokes memories of Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s ouster following his ill-advised Rolling Stone exposé last month, the Pentagon has suffered yet another defeat by the media through the forced re-instatement of these four reporters. In this case, Obama political appointees overruled career civilian and military officials who had issued the ban.

This was despite the Pentagon’s charge that the reporters – The Miami Herald’s Carol Rosenberg and 3 Canadians… The Toronto Star’s Michelle Shephard, The Globe & Mail’s Paul Koring, and CanWest News Service’s Steven Edwards defied a military court order by revealing the name of a protected witness at hearing on May 5.

Still in a state of shock after lawyers affiliated with the John Adams Project who were representing detainees allegedly stalked and photographed CIA operatives last year -- then showed their pictures to 9/11 co-defendants in an attempt to build a torture lawsuit -- the Pentagon could not tolerate another breach of protected identity disclosure.

The witness in the Khadr case, a former Army Sergeant who served as an interrogator in Afghanistan and was later court-martialed and sentenced to 5 months in prison for detainee abuse, only agreed to testify in court if his identity would be protected. Judges typically grant protection requests to witnesses who are at high risk from those seeking retribution… in this case, from Al Qaeda.

Ignoring the judge’s written order and verbal reminder, the four reporters revealed his name anyway, arguing that since he had given one “on-the-record” interview last year (coincidentally with Ms. Shephard), the judge had no authority to protect his identity. The handful of other reporters also in attendance at Guantanamo stuck by the rules simply labeling the protected witness “Interrogator #1,” in their reports. Yet, as a result, they were scooped by their competition.

Miami Herald Executive Editor Anders Gyllenhaal chalked it all up to a “misunderstanding,” noting the witness's name was already in the public domain and in any case, the newspaper published it before the judge’s reminder in court on the afternoon of May 5.

The Pentagon disputes that claim, noting the four media outlets continued to publish the name between the evening of May 5 and into May 6, well after the judge’s admonishment instructing all courtroom observers to follow the written protective order. The four reporters were promptly banned on May 6.

Meanwhile, one of the reporters who was banned is no stranger to controversy, including a previous experience with banishment from the military while covering the 1st Marine Division during Gulf War I. The Miami Herald's Ms. Rosenberg has been notorious for clashes. In fact, as the Pentagon spokesman for the Western Hemisphere including Guantanamo from 2005-2009, I personally filed two complaints with The Miami Herald executive leadership in an attempt to stop her outrageous comments and use of profanity that would make even Helen Thomas blush.

Pentagon officials simply became weary of such a prolonged, contentious relationship with one reporter, and decided the ground rule violation was the last straw before enacting a ban.

In seeking to overturn the Pentagon’s decision, lawyers representing The Miami Herald and Canadian media found powerful allies, and according to Mr. Gyllenhaal “naturally” joined forces with legal teams from The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and the Associated Press.

Though these 3 media giants were not involved in the banning episode, they all shared long-standing -- and often legitimate concerns -- over the difficulties associated with news reporting on Guantanamo. This included numerous lawsuits over the lack of access to detainee case files, combined with a letter to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates regarding chronic instances of photo deletions and even video seizure by overzealous security minders exercising absolute authority over imagery release.

Ironically, most media and NGOs now complain that Guantanamo is actually less transparent under the Obama administration than it was under President Bush.

Once the “big media” were brought in to the legal picture on the banning issue, it was all but over for the Pentagon.

In retrospect, since this administration includes nine attorneys who represented Al Qaeda-linked detainees, it is amazing that the ban lasted this long.

While no consolation to the former Army Sergeant and his family who are now at higher risk of reprisal from Al Qaeda, it should be no surprise that the Obama administration lacked the will for a prolonged legal fight in the Pentagon’s name. Looks like they simply said, "nah, it's easier to quit…" just like their other hollow Guantanamo promises.

================================

J.D Gordon, a Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Policy, is a retired Navy Commander who served in the Office of the Secretary of Defense from 2005-2009 as the Pentagon spokesman for the Western Hemisphere.

Pakistan Passport Fraud Promotes Terror

Fake Passports
By Ali K Chisti
10 Aug 2010
DAILY TIMES (Karachi)

Imagine if al Qaeda and the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) train a team of suicide bombers in FATA and send them to the US and all the European capitals to carry out a series of suicide bombings and 26/11-style fidai attacks?

A logical question countering the argument would be: who will provide the logistics and visas? Well, there is no need for one, now: thanks to dozens of fake and stolen European passports readily available in Pakistan.

A European passport not only insures you visa free entry to the EU countries but a visa on arrival for the US and Canada – countries which are at the forefront of the war against terrorism.

And there had been precedents. In 1993 a top al Qaeda member later turned FBI informant, Ali Muhammad helped al Qaeda’s number two, Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri enter the United States with a “fake passport” and tour San Francisco Bay area mosques to raise money to fund al Qaeda. Later, Sheikh Muhammad Atta of Al Qaeda’s Hamburg Cell and one of the hijackers who carried out 9/11: flied to Karachi, Pakistan some time between 1999-2001 on a fraudulent Belgian passport to eventually move to Kabul, and just before 9/11 two al Qaeda assassins posing as French journalists with stolen French passports exploded themselves and killed Ahmed Shah Masood – the leader of the Northern Alliance.

The Daily Times could now confirm that fake passports are widely available in Pakistan, which could be used by terrorists and money launderers to carry out terrorist activity flying out of country from Pakistan. A foreign diplomatic who was shown these passports claimed that, “they are the best, I have seen” adding that, “another Kasab or Faisal Shahzad from Pakistan result in diplomatic ties with Pakistan”. The counterfeits are cheap, realistic and available if you know the right people. We only got to know about the availability of such passports via someone who has recently applied for political asylum from Pakistan in the UK (thanks to the lax asylum system of Britain which allows a foreign national to apply for political asylum on the port of entry). The hub of such counterfeit and stolen passports apparently is none other than Bangkok from where Eastern European and Pakistani gangs operate. During our investigation; we approached one of the agents named Mehmood in Karachi who assured us that he would provide us a European passport and would ensure that we go through the Pakistani immigration and take a flight to any European destination.

On enquiry Mehmood (the agent) assured that if you are caught in Europe there’s always a way to “apply for political asylum”. “Would this get me on board to the US?” “You can try – it has worked before...,” comes the reply.

These passports costing from Rs 1,50,000 to Rs 350,000 ($1,765-$4,117) are available in Pakistani markets but “there’s a difference” one of the agents told us. One is a “forged” one and another, a “stolen” one. A stolen EU passport costs somewhere around Rs 500,000 to 700,000 in Pakistan and is mainly used by human smugglers although there are precedents that such passports had been used by high-profile al Qaeda and Taliban operatives to conceal their identity and travel abroad.

There is another way an agent told us. “You can go to Dubai on a regular Pakistani passports and from there you can use these passports to go to any of the European cities.”

Upon enquiry with the Dubai authorities and with the Ministry of the Interior, Abu Dhabi, they confirmed such incidents occur and that, only recently, a Mossad hit-squad in Dubai used similar European passports. The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) whose primary responsibility is to put a cap on such forgery mission statement is, “to achieve excellence in FIA by promoting culture of merit, providing continuous professional training, ensuring effective internal accountability, encouraging use of technology and having a meaningful mechanism”.

As it turn out from our investigation that, not a single such case had been detected at any of the major airports recently although, the FIA is aware of such passports. When asked as to the detection mechanism used by Immigration authorities and law enforcement authorities at ports? The answer we get is, “from experience and human intelligence” - apparently, there is no database of stolen passports, no Interpol records nor any coordination from foreign embassies and vice versa whatsoever. A security analyst who had been on the top slot at the FIA confirmed, “that there are black sheep around” but, “with Rehman Malik as the interior minister, serious funds had come to FIA and the level of professionalism has increased”.

During the course of investigations, Daily Times could confirm that, these passports do go through to the scanners and machines without a “red-flag” being raised at least two airports in Pakistan: Quaid-e-Azam International Airport in Karachi and Benazir Bhutto International Airport in Islamabad, while Alama Iqbal Airport turned out to be easiest where officials would take bribes to get people on board.

Remember, as per Civil Aviation and country laws which varies if an illegal passenger boards an airplane and is caught, the airline in our case, the PIA, is fined hundreds of thousands of dollars. On contacting PIA – an official from PIA confirmed that, due to illegal passengers only last year – PIA had been fined over one hundred thousand dollars.

The British Home Office and Border Controls gave out an official statement on our story. “Everyone entering and leaving the UK is required to produce a valid document, establishing their identity, nationality and citizenship.” All documents are checked against the UK and Interpol watch lists and a Border Force officer will also undertake checks to establish that the document is valid and belongs to the rightful holder” while, “As well as electronic checks, the UK Border Agency has specially trained forgery officers, whose role is to check documents and provide advice to colleagues.”

In response to our claim that stolen and forged UK passports can be bought - An Identity and Passport Service spokesperson said: “We remain confident that through its combination of physical and electronic security features the British passport remains a highly secure document, meeting rigorous international standards. “The Identity and Passport Service utilise encryption technology that ensures the encoded data on the chip contained within the British passport cannot be changed or modified. If an attempt is made to alter the data in the passport, through its combination of physical and electronic security features, this will be picked up at Border Control.

“Any passport which has been reported as lost of stolen is cancelled by IPS and rendered invalid for travel.” The good officer, Mr Carlos Vázquez, Counsellor of Interior, Embassy of Spain, Islamabad, when contacted gave out a statement that, “investigations are currently on”. The whole point of this story is not to undermine Pakistan’s security or enforcement forces as the fake passports are widely available from the United Kingdom to Spain to the US, but to blow a whistle and point out that such documents could be used by none other than the TTP or any other terrorist organisation to carry out terrorist activity inside the United States or any European country, the last thing we want is another, Ajmal Kasab or Shehzad Tanweer.

Doctors Murdered by the Taliban

Monday, August 9, 2010

Three Seasoned Professionals Senselessly Murdered
By Kanani Fong
www.TheKitchenDisptach.com

"Let him grieve undistracted, without having to worry about how he looked in mine or anyone else’s eyes. Death is a strange and complete entity. In plain sight of death we contemplate our own mortality and that sensation of loss that is so fucking unfair." --The late British surgeon Karen Woo, writing on her blog about her fiance's need to grieve after losing two friends in a plane crash in Afghanistan. Now, he grieves for her.

Still reeling over the bad news of the volunteer medical team of ten doctors, nurses and other workers who were executed point blank in the Kuran Wa Munjan district of Badakhshan. In a conversation with a friend on the ground after it happened, many think this wasn't exclusively a Taliban hit, rather the work of Jihadi tourists, who come over with no ties to these remote regions to kill infidels. In the Irish Times, Michael Semple gives us a clearer picture, a veritable definition of lawlessness:

"Outsiders have no brothers or cousins to act as a deterrent against violence.
Killers of outsiders, even if they are really bandits, can claim moral
authority and enhance their reputation as purveyors of violence. Political
groups with limited control on the ground can claim responsibility for such
extreme acts of violence as a way of trying to project themselves beyond
their real limits of influence."

While many have jumped to the conclusion that this was a Christian group carrying bibles translated into Dari, it's been rebuffed by a variety of sources that humanitarian aid groups like this use their faith not to proselytize as has been accused, but as a source of inner strength to carry out good works. Faith in the broadest sense pulls everyone through tough times. Furthermore, groups like the International Assistance Mission accept help from a variety of health care professionals, and they don't make anyone take a Jesus test before signing on.

Killers do not distinguish between non-Christian or Christian groups. In 2004, five workers with Doctors Without Borders were ambushed and killed. This lead to the withdrawal of services from the organization in Afghanistan until 2009.

Those killed weren't novices when it came to the area. Tom Little, an eye surgeon, had given much of his professional career to one of the world's poorest regions. He oversaw three 40-bed hospitals in three larger cities, as well as three 10-bed clinics in remote outposts, under the NOOR (National Organization For Opthmalic Rehabilitation), a project of the International Assistance Mission (IAM). Little's wife also worked with him, however was back in upstate NY at the time of the murders. Their daughter was in a different region of Afghanistan, carrying out humanitarian work as well.

In addition, another of the murdered was Dan Terry. Terry had also given his entire life's work to the region. As the son of the man who founded the International Assistance Mission, Terry lived in the area for 30 years, raising his children there. He was described by Tim Lynch as:

"The Godfather of Free Range International – the man who pioneered the techniques, tactics and procedures we use to travel in remote districts was executed last week in Badakhshan Province. Dan Terry was a good man. He was humble, self-effacing, and competent. He lived in Afghanistan with his family and spoke fluent Dari and Pashto."
Another of those murdered was Dr. Karen Woo, a British physician who had forsaken her practice in the UK to bring medicine to Afghanistan. She was running services for women and children --urgently needed since women there never go to a male physician.

One can't help but be captivated by her voice. She was spirited, soulful, intelligent, a humanitarian, a seasoned surgeon, and fun. She has what we call the "X-Factor" times ten. She was capable funny and irreverent. This is from her last post, where she also does a hilarious knock down of politicians:

"Most of the time I listen to politicians on the TV with an autistic head on, you know the kind of head where you can instantly tell when someone is lying through their teeth or is simply delivering a foil of bullshit, liberally peppered with terms designed to disguise that there is absolutely nothing inside the hot air that they are spouting."

The politicians are sickening, as unlike the three people described here, they do very little in terms of hands-on work. They are given too much time and consideration.

I wish I had known all of them. Karen Woo was to have been married in two weeks time. Her gown was being made. Her fiancee, also in Afghanistan, had the terrible burden of having to identify his beloved's remains.

In all of this, the biggest losers are the Afghan people. As it was with those murdered at Ft. Hood, health care professionals willing to carry out their work in these kinds of condition are a rare breed. It is estimated that 250,000 Afghans were helped by the efforts of Dr. Tom Little. Now, another 250,000 will have to go without.

"In Memoriam
(From the IAM site)

Name Nationality Status

Mahram Ali Afghan Confirmed dead
Cheryl Beckett USA Confirmed dead
Daniela Beyer German Confirmed dead
Brian Carderelli USA Confirmed dead
Jawed Afghan Confirmed dead
Dr Tom Grams USA Confirmed dead
Glen Lapp USA Confirmed dead
Dr Tom Little USA Confirmed dead
Dan Terry USA Confirmed dead
Dr Karen Woo UK Confirmed dead


Thankfully, two of our Afghan eye camp team members survived, Mr. Said Yasin and Safiullah."

Mischief in Manhattan - The NY Mosque

Mischief in Manhattan
We Muslims know the Ground Zero mosque is meant to be a deliberate provocation. It's an act of "fitna"Raheel Raza and Tarek Fatah
The Ottawa Citizen
August 7, 2010


Last week, a journalist who writes for the North Country Times, a small newspaper in Southern California, sent us an e-mail titled "Help." He couldn't understand why an Islamic Centre in an area where Adam Gadahn, Osama bin Laden's American spokesman came from, and that was home to three of the 911 terrorists, was looking to expand.

The man has a very valid point, which leads to the ongoing debate about building a Mosque at Ground Zero in New York. When we try to understand the reasoning behind building a mosque at the epicentre of the worst-ever attack on the U.S., we wonder why its proponents don't build a monument to those who died in the attack?

New York currently boasts at least 30 mosques so it's not as if there is pressing need to find space for worshippers. The fact is we Muslims know the idea behind the Ground Zero mosque is meant to be a deliberate provocation to thumb our noses at the "infidel." The proposal has been made in bad faith and in Islamic parlance, such an act is referred to as "Fitna," meaning "mischief-making" that is clearly forbidden in the Koran.

The Koran commands Muslims to, "Be considerate when you debate with the People of the Book" -- i.e., Jews and Christians. Building an exclusive place of worship for Muslims at the place where Muslims killed thousands of New Yorkers is not being considerate or sensitive, it is undoubtedly an act of "fitna"

So what gives Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf of the "Cordoba Initiative" and his cohorts the misplaced idea that they will increase tolerance for Muslims by brazenly displaying their own intolerance in this case?

Do they not understand that building a mosque at Ground Zero is equivalent to permitting a Serbian Orthodox church near the killing fields of Srebrenica where 8,000 Muslim men and boys were slaughtered?

There are many questions that we would like to ask. Questions about where the funding is coming from? If this mosque is being funded by Saudi sources, then it is an even bigger slap in the face of Americans, as nine of the jihadis in the Twin Tower calamity were Saudis.

If Rauf is serious about building bridges, then he could have dedicated space in this so-called community centre to a church and synagogue, but he did not. We passed on this message to him through a mutual Saudi friend, but received no answer. He could have proposed a memorial to the 9/11 dead with a denouncement of the doctrine of armed jihad, but he chose not to.

It's a repugnant thought that $100 million would be brought into the United States rather than be directed at dying and needy Muslims in Darfur or Pakistan.

Let's not forget that a mosque is an exclusive place of worship for Muslims and not an inviting community centre. Most Americans are wary of mosques due to the hard core rhetoric that is used in pulpits. And rightly so. As Muslims we are dismayed that our co-religionists have such little consideration for their fellow citizens and wish to rub salt in their wounds and pretend they are applying a balm to sooth the pain.

The Koran implores Muslims to speak the truth, even if it hurts the one who utters the truth. Today we speak the truth, knowing very well Muslims have forgotten this crucial injunction from Allah.

If this mosque does get built, it will forever be a lightning rod for those who have little room for Muslims or Islam in the U.S. We simply cannot understand why on Earth the traditional leadership of America's Muslims would not realize their folly and back out in an act of goodwill.



As for those teary-eyed, bleeding-heart liberals such as New York mayor Michael Bloomberg and much of the media, who are blind to the Islamist agenda in North America, we understand their goodwill.

Unfortunately for us, their stand is based on ignorance and guilt, and they will never in their lives have to face the tyranny of Islamism that targets, kills and maims Muslims worldwide, and is using liberalism itself to destroy liberal secular democratic societies from within.
---------------
Raheel Raza is author of Their Jihad ... Not my Jihad, and Tarek Fatah is author of The Jew is Not My Enemy (McClelland & Stewart), to be launched in October. Both sit on the board of the Muslim Canadian Congress.

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

Brit Op in Nad Ali

30 July 2010 Last updated at 08:06 ET
UK troops launch Operation Tor Shezada in Afghanistan

By Ian Pannell

BBC News, Helmand Military chiefs said Operation Tor Shezada got off to a "successful" start. Hundreds of British soldiers have launched an operation against Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan.

Operation Tor Shezada began early on Friday morning in Helmand province in the south of the country.

Soldiers from the 1st Battalion The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment are trying to clear the Taliban from an important stronghold in the Nad Ali district. The Brigade Reconnaissance Force (BRF) was among the first wave of troops.

UK troops in Afghanistan
Under cover of darkness, this small elite unit launched an airborne assault deep into insurgent-held territory.

Operation Tor Shezada, which means black prince, is a mission to seize a Taliban-controlled town in central Helmand and try to restore government rule.

Hundreds of British and Afghan forces are moving by land and air towards the town of Saidabad. It is one of the areas that UK forces were unable to clear during Operation Moshtarak earlier this year. As many as 180 insurgents are believed to use the town as a base; it is where bombs are made, attacks are planned and injured fighters are treated.

The area is seeded with IEDs, the home-made bombs that have killed and maimed so many soldiers and civilians. When troops have entered the area in the past they have encountered stiff resistance.

In the words of the commanding officer, Lt Col Fraser Lawrence, they will try to "steal" Saidabad but are "prepared to fight for it".

The BBC's Ian Pannell examines the aims of Operation Tor Shezada

Maj Marcus Mudd, the commander of the BRF, said his troops would be dropping in behind enemy lines.

In an eve-of-battle address, he urged his men to move quickly to win over the local population with the message that the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) would be here to stay.

Radio broadcasts have been used to warn people that this operation is taking place, although it is unclear how many will have been able to hear the message.

Frank Gardner BBC security correspondent --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There are two ways of viewing Operation Tor Shezada.
On the positive side, the area now being 'cleared' of Taliban is said to be the last remaining centre of population in the Nad Ali area not yet under Afghan government control. This is a joint operation with the Afghan army, a continuation of the largely successful process of British troops mentoring and partnering their Afghan allies.

But on the negative side one might well ask why, if Nad Ali has been officially such a success, do hundreds of British and Afghan soldiers need to risk their lives going in to clear an area (Saidabad) that we had never heard of but is apparently a hotbed of Taliban insurgents?

The truth is that clearing central Helmand of insurgents, then bringing in elements of government that the local population can actually trust, is taking rather longer than commanders had hoped.

The Taliban have certainly lost a safe haven there this year, but they have not gone away. They are lurking in the background, intimidating locals not to co-operate with Nato and the Afghan government, and waiting for the day when foreign forces pull out. And they believe they can sweep aside government forces and reassert control.
Operation Tor Shehzade may well achieve short-term tactical success. The challenge will be to see if it delivers lasting security.

It is a mark of how controversial the issue of civilian casualties is that Maj Mudd cautioned his men to show restraint, telling them "if we fail to protect the population, we will fail in our mission".

Until a few years ago, Nad Ali was a relatively peaceful district in the central Helmand river valley.

But the combination of a corrupt and brutal police force and an abusive local government, together with an aggressive poppy eradication programme, turned it into a virulent insurgent stronghold.

Local farmers, with encouragement and support from the Taliban, took up arms, creating additional strain on Britain's already overstretched troops.

Operation Black Prince is just the latest in a series of missions over the last year-and-a-half that have attempted to "clear" the insurgents from the district.

There has been progress.
Most of the towns and villages here are no longer under the complete control of the Taliban. The media and politicians are regularly flown in to witness what the military see as a success story.

But the veneer of normality is dangerously thin. The Taliban have always been able to exert influence far beyond their numerical strength.

It is true that intimidation is the weapon of choice when it comes to coercing the local population, but there is also genuine support for insurgents who are largely drawn from the area.

Shopkeepers in the district centre complain that security is not good.

They insist that the Taliban still operate just 2km away and they fear being caught up in the fighting. Motorcycle mechanic Sultan Mohammed wants the government to talk to the Taliban.

"You cannot bring peace by fighting - war is not the answer," he told me.

A large crowd gathered to listen in, nodding in agreement.

When asked whom they would like to see in charge in Nad Ali - the government, army, foreign forces or the insurgents - they all agreed that they wanted the Taliban.

In a rare insight into the insurgency they insisted that people do not join the Taliban for the money.

This contradicts ISAF's categorisation of the bulk of fighters as "$10 Taliban", who are susceptible to inducements to switch to the government side.

Instead, the men told me that the Taliban are people motivated by religion, anger at corrupt police and local officials and affront at the presence of foreign, non-Muslim soldiers in their midst.

Yet the military insists Nad Ali is a model of progress.

Lt Col Fraser Lawrence says Operation Moshtarak, which took place here and in neighbouring Marjah earlier this year, was "a huge success".

But attacks and casualties have continued to mount in both areas. The US Marine Corps to the South West of here is struggling with a resurgent Taliban.

A combination of influence and intimidation means that progress has been far slower than first predicted by military commanders.

Sultan Mohammed wants the government to open dialogue with the Taliban
Operation Tor Shezada is only possible because extra British forces have been brought in to Afghanistan.

The transfer of other troops from areas like Sangin will also increase their ability to tackle the insurgency later this year.

But the challenge in Helmand is, and always has been, to win over the local population. As British troops embark on another bloody summer in Afghanistan, it is a battle they have yet to win.