By Conn Hallinan - May 22, 2011
According to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
Director Leon Panetta, the U.S. never informed Pakistan about the operation to
assassinate al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Ladin because it thought the Pakistanis
could “jeopardize the mission” by tipping off the target.
Maybe, and maybe not. This is, after all, the ground over
which the 19th century “Great Game” was played, the essence of which
was obfuscation. What you thought you saw or knew was not necessarily what was.
The “official” story is that three CIA helicopters—one
for backup—took off from Jalalabad, Afghanistan and flew almost 200 miles
to Abbottabad, most of it through Pakistani airspace. Pakistan scrambled jets,
but the choppers still managed to land, spend 40 minutes on the ground, and get
away.
Is it possible the helicopters really did dodge Pakistani
radar? During the Cold War a West German pilot flew undetected through the
teeth of the Soviet air defense system and landed his plane in Red Square, so
yes. Choppers are slow, but these were stealth varieties and fairly quiet. But
at top speed, the Blackhawks would have needed about an hour each way, plus the
40 minutes on the ground. That is a long time to remain undetected,
particularly in a town hosting three regiments of the Pakistani Army, plus the
Kakul Military Academy, the country’s equivalent of West Point. Abbottabad is
also 35 miles from the capital, Islamabad, and the region is ringed with
anti-aircraft sites.
Still, it is possible, except there is an alternative
scenario that not only avoids magical thinking about what choppers can do, but
better fits the politics of the moment: that Pakistan’s Directorate of
Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) knew where Bin Ladin was and fingered him,
estimating that his death would accelerate negotiations with the Taliban. Why
now? Because for the first time in this long war, U.S. and Pakistani interests
coincide.
Gen. Hammad Gul, former head of the ISI, told the Financial Times on May 3 that the ISI
knew where he was, but regarded him as “inactive.” Writing in the May 5 Guardian (UK), author Tariq Ali says
that a “senior” ISI official told him back in 2006 that the spy organization
knew where bin Ladin was, but had no intention of arresting him because he was
“The goose that laid the golden egg.” In short, the hunt for the al-Qaeda
leader helped keep the U.S. aid spigot open.
Indeed, bin Ladin may have been under house arrest, which
would explain the absence of trained bodyguards. By not allowing the al-Qaeda
leader a private militia, the ISI forced him to rely on it for protection. And
if they then dropped a dime on him, they knew he would be an easy target. As to
why he was killed, not captured, neither the U.S. nor Pakistan wanted him
alive, the former because of the judicial nightmare his incarceration would
involve, the latter because dead men tell no tales.
As for the denials: the last thing the ISI wants is to be
associated with the hit, since it could end up making the organization a target
for Pakistan’s home-grown Taliban. If the ISI knew, so did the Army, though not
necessarily at all levels. Did the Army turn a blind eye to the U.S. choppers?
Who knows?
What we do know for certain is that there is a shift in
Pakistan and the U.S. with regards to the Afghan war.
On the U.S. side, the war is going badly, and American
military and intelligence agencies are openly warring with one another. In
December the U.S. intelligence community released a study indicating that
progress was minimal and that the 2009 surge of 30,000 troops had produced only
tactical successes: “There remains no clear path toward defeating the
insurgency.” The Pentagon
counter-attacked in late April with a report that the surge had been “a
strategic defeat for the Taliban,” and that the military was making “tangible
progress in some really key areas.”
It is not an analysis agreed with by our NATO allies, most
of which are desperate to get their troops out of what they view as a deepening
quagmire. A recent WikiLeak cable quotes Herman Van Rompuy, president of the
European Union, saying “No one believes in Afghanistan anymore. But we will
give it 2010 to see results.” He went on to say Europe was only going along
“out of deference to the United States.” Translation: NATO support is falling apart.
Recent shifts by the Administration seem to signal that the
White House is backing away from the surge and looking for ways to wind down
the war. The shift of Gen. David Petraeus to the CIA removes the major U.S.
booster of the current counterinsurgency strategy, and moving Panetta to the
Defense Department puts a savvy political infighter with strong Democratic
Party credentials into the heart of Pentagon. Democrats are overwhelmingly
opposed to the war but could never get a hearing from Secretary of Defense
Robert Gates, a Republican.
The last major civilian supporter of the war is Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton, but Gates, her main ally, will soon be gone, as will
Admiral Mike Mullen, head of the Joints Chiefs of Staff. The shuffle at the top
is hardly a “night of the long knives,” but the White House has essentially
eliminated or sidelined those in the administration who pushed for a robust war
and long-term occupation.
A surge of sanity? Well, at least some careful poll reading.
According to the Associated Press,
six in 10 Americans want out of the war. Among Democrats 73 percent want to be
out in a year, and a USA Today/Gallup
Poll found that 72 percent of Americans want Congress to address an
accelerated withdrawal. With the war now costing $8 billion a month, these
numbers are hardly a surprise.
Pakistan has long been frustrated with the U.S.’s reluctance
to talk to the Taliban, and, from Islamabad’s perspective, the war is largely
being carried out at their expense. Pakistan has suffered tens of thousands of
civilian and military casualties in what most Pakistanis see as an American
war, and the country is literally up in arms over the drone attacks.
The Pakistani Army has been deployed in Swat, South
Waziristan, and Bajaur, and the U.S. is pressing it to invade North Waziristan.
One Pakistani grumbled to the Guardian (UK), “What do they [the U.S.] want us to do? Declare war on our whole
country?” For the 30 million Pashtuns in the northwest regions, the Pakistani
Army is foreign in language and culture, and Islamabad knows that it will
eventually be seen as an outside occupier.
A poll by the New America Foundation and Terror Free
Tomorrow of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas in Pakistan’s
northwest—home and refuge to many of the insurgents fighting in
Afghanistan—found some 80 percent oppose the U.S. war on terror, almost
nine in every 10 people oppose U.S. attacks on the Taliban, and three quarters
oppose the drone attacks.
The bottom line is that Pakistan simply cannot afford to
continue the war, particularly as they are still trying to dig themselves out
from under last year’s massive floods.
In April, Pakistan’s top military, intelligence and
political leadership decamped to Kabul to meet with the government of Harmid
Karzai. The outcome of the talks is secret, but they appear to have emboldened
the parties to press the U.S. to start talking. According to Ahmed Rashid,
author of “Taliban” and “Descent into Chaos,” the White House is moving “the
fledgling peace process forward” and will “push to broker an end to the war.”
This includes dropping “its preconditions that the Taliban sever links with
al-Qaeda and accept the Afghan constitution before holding face-to-face talks.”
Given that in 2008 the Taliban agreed to not allow any
“outside” forces in the country and pledged not to pose a danger to any other
country, including those in the West, this demand has already been met. As for
the constitution, since it excluded the Taliban it will have to be
re-negotiated in any case.
While there appears to be a convergence of interests among
the major parties, negotiations promise to be a thorny business.
The Pentagon will resist a major troop drawdown. There is
also opposition in Afghanistan, where Tajik, Uzbek, and Hazara minorities are
deeply suspicious of the Taliban. The Karzai government also appears split on
the talks, although recent cabinet shuffles have removed some of the more
anti-Pakistan leaders.
Then there is the Taliban, which is hardly a centralized
organization, especially since U.S. drone attacks and night raids have
effectively removed more experienced Taliban leaders, leaving younger and more
radical fighters in charge. Can Taliban leader Mullah Omar deliver his troops?
That is not a given.
Both other insurgent groups—the Haqqani Group and
Hizb-i-Islami—have indicated they are open to negotiations, but the
Americans will have a hard time sitting down with the Haqqanis. The group has
been implicated in the deaths of numerous U.S. and coalition forces. To leave
the Haqqani Group out, however, will derail the whole process.
The U.S. would like to exclude Iran, but as Rashid points
out, “No peace process in Afghanistan can succeed without Iran’s full
participation.” And then there is India. Pakistan sees Indian involvement in
Afghanistan as part of New Delhi’s strategy to surround Pakistan, and India
accuses Pakistan of harboring terrorists who attack Indian-controlled Kashmir
and launched the horrendous 2008 attack on Mumbai that killed 166 people.
Murphy’s Law suggests that things are more likely to end in
chaos than reasoned diplomacy. But self-interest is a powerful motivator, and
all parties, including India, stands to gain something by ending the war. India
very much wants to see the 1,050-mile TAPI pipeline built, as it will carry gas
from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan and Pakistan, to Fazilka, India.
A lot is at stake, and if getting the peace process going
involved taking out Osama bin Ladin. Well, in the cynical world of the “Great
Game,” to make an omelet, you have to break eggs.
Back in the Victorian era the British Army marched off
singing a song:
“We don’t want to fight but by jingo if we do/
We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men, and we’ve got the money too”
But in the 21st century most our allies’ armies
don’t want to fight, ships are useless in Afghanistan, there aren’t enough men,
and everyone is broke.
For 33 years the people of Afghanistan have been bombed,
burned, shot, tortured and turned into refugees. For at least the moment the
pieces are aligned to bring this awful war to an end. It is time to close the
book on the “Great Game” and bring the troops home.
Read Conn Hallinan at dispatchesfromtheedgeblog.wordpress.com