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Pakistan's ISI behind Pathankot Air Base Attack - former White House official.

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params7

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http://economictimes.indiatimes.com...white-house-official/articleshow/50464775.cms

WASHINGTON: Pakistan's powerful intelligence agency ISI is behind the attack on Pathankot air base in Punjab using a terrorist group it created 15 years ago, a former top White House official has said.

Bruce Riedel, who worked in the National Security Council of the White House and was among the few present at the Bill Clinton-Nawaz Sharif meeting in 1999 during Kargil war, said the attack is designed to prevent any detente between India and Pakistan after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's surprise Christmas Day visit to Pakistan.

In an article in the Daily Beast, Riedel said the attacks in Pathankot and on the Indian Consulate in Mazar-e Sharif in northern Afghanistan was the handiwork of Pakistani terror group Jaish-e-Muhammad which the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) created 15 years ago.

He quoted "well-informed press and other knowledgeable sources" for his assessment.

He said the ISI is under the generals' command and is composed of army officers, so the spies are controlled by the Pakistani army which justifies its large budget and nuclear weapons program by citing the Indian menace.

"Any diminution in tensions with India might risk the army's lock on its control of Pakistan's national security policy. The army continues to distinguish between 'good' terrorists like JEM and LET and 'bad' terrorists like the Pakistani Taliban, despite decades of lectures from American leaders," he said.

Riedel, a former CIA officer, said the Pakistani army has long distrusted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who has advocated a detente with India since the 1990s.

"An army coup in 1999 sent him into exile in Saudi Arabia for a decade. His warm embrace of Modi on Christmas Day in his home in Lahore undoubtedly angered the generals," he said.

He noted that the US put JeM on the terrorist sanctions list years ago -- but it continues to coddle the Pakistani army.

"Gen Raheel Sharif, the army's boss, got a warm embrace from the Pentagon last fall--despite the ISI support for the Afghan Taliban's offensive against the Kabul government and despite the Pakistani military's backing of terror groups like JeM," he said.


Just when things were looking better with Modi's visit to Pakistan, the attack happened and undid the goodwill fostered by the visit. If true - the implications are dangerous since it implies Pakistan's intelligence agency not being under the control of its Prime Minister but its military generals. The country seriously needs some introspection.
 

Zapages

Member
Some more food for thought about India blaming Pakistan for literally every problem that they have....


ISLAMABAD: Following Pathankot attack, the Indian media and government authorities have been referring to Mumbai attack as Pakistan’s work despite the fact that the Wikileaks had shown both the US and the British authorities trashing Indian so-called evidence against Pakistan.

Publicly both Washington and London have been shy to embarrass India and avoided rejecting her allegation against Pakistan but the Wikileaks showed the two trashing Indian claims about the involvement of either Pakistan’s prime intelligence agency- the ISI- or even senior leaders of a proscribed organisation.

Wikileaks, which contained secret State Department wires, had quoted former US ambassador to Pakistan Anne W Patterson as writing to the State Department that India had presented insufficient evidence against the senior leaders of now proscribed Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Anne W Patterson had mentioned in a wire to the Washington that Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and other investigators had insufficient evidence for prosecution against Lashkar-e-Taiba’s Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, Zarar Shah and Mazhar Iqbal Alqama.

Patterson had even said that FIA was forced, as a result of political pressure, to arrest and charge the three LeT leaders and that FIA was still without solid evidence to begin a formal trial.

Some of the wires generated by US embassy in India had also made the India’s case on Mumbai attacks doubtful. Charge Geoff Pyatt was quoted to have written to Washington: “Indian officials remain convinced that Pakistan is behind the July 11th Mumbai attacks, and worry that the US is setting the bar too high for “solid evidence” of Pakistani intelligence involvement.”

The leak had even quoted National Security Advisor MK Narayanan as admitting that there are some pieces of the puzzle still missing. “He (Narayanan) said he is hesitant to say the evidence is “clinching”, but it is pretty good. Narayanan used the opportunity to reinforce the popular perception here that Pakistan is to blame for the attacks, while answering criticism that the foreign secretary’s and Mumbai police’s statements about the investigation were not backed by solid proof…”

The wire, generated from New Delhi, had also shown the Indian politicians reminding the Americans that India had sided with US on the issue of 9/11 despite the absence of concrete evidence.

The wire said: “At dinner with CIA Deputy Director of Intelligence Carmen Medina on October 23rd, former National Security Advisor Brajesh Mishra raised the issue of the US response to the Mumbai blasts.

‘We backed you when you decided to take action in Afghanistan after September 11,’ he said. ‘Your evidence after 9/11 was no less circumstantial than our evidence after 7/11 in Mumbai.’

He went on to criticise the US “double standard”, arguing that we treat Hizbollah one way, and the Pakistan-based United Jihad Council very differently. The bottom line, Mishra said, is that there is a widespread perception that the US is doing nothing to help India fight terror.”

Another leak, a wire sent from US New Delhi embassy to Washington, reflects on British doubts about Indian’s evidence against Pakistan.

The leak said, “While Indian press continues to pin blame on Pakistan, observers and diplomats in Delhi are asking the same question: was the ISI behind the Mumbai attacks? While there are clear links between the attacks, perpetrators and the extremist group LeT, and likewise, there are links between LeT and the ISI, there is no clear evidence yet to suggest that ISI directed or facilitated the attacks, according to the British High Commission.”

Now yet again after Pathankot attack, Indians have started blaming Pakistan claiming that they have evidence of Pakistan's involvement.

Source: http://www.thenews.com.pk/print/890...nst-Pakistan-in-Mumbai-attacks-says-Wikileaks
 
This is definitely the plan to attack the thaw in Indo-Pak Relations. Modi will never visit Pakistan again with the backlash in the Indian government.
 

params7

Banned
Some more food for thought about India blaming Pakistan for literally every problem that they have....




Source: http://www.thenews.com.pk/print/890...nst-Pakistan-in-Mumbai-attacks-says-Wikileaks

That's interesting, if some Washington insiders believe ISI was not involved in the Mumbai attack. Pretty sure there was sufficient proof suggesting the terrorists received training in the military.

And yeah India will blame everything on ISI and Pakistan's government. That's why I quoted a Washington source.
 

Sayah

Member
Pakistan is at an existential crisis - and people in Pakistan generally tend to look up to/respect the military despite the shady past and present of the ISI. On the one side, there is India and the ongoing conflict with Kashmir. On the other side, there is Afghanistan and their desire to separate out a huge chunk of Pakistani territory to create a new nation of "Pashtunistan." And internally, Pakistan has its own fear of Balochistan's separation - and India I believe, at some point recently, also self-admitted their support of terrorist/separatist outfits.

After the bitter separation of East Pakistan, I think the Pakistani military will take whatever means necessary to ensure something like that doesn't happen again.

India also has its own struggles of maintaining internal cohesion - with movements like the Khalistan Liberation Force.

If Pakistan and India hadn't been involved in a security dilemma, both countries could have focused on development efforts instead of on military - and you possibly wouldn't see the gross levels of poverty you see in both countries today.

And while an all-inclusive India, incorporating Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Kashmir, has its appeal and a lot of conflict could have been avoided in this alternate reality, most Pakistanis are glad that didn't happen. Although the caste system in India is illegal, it still very much is pervasive and prevalent - and a Muslim's status in this caste system would have been zilch. Couple that with the fact that incidents like the Gujarat riots happened - and a party like the BJP is in power right now.

Just hoping the best for this region - especially since there is a lot of cultural and language similarity between India and Pakistan. These countries need to focus on serving their poor populations and thinking about climate change - and how that's going to impact their citizens. Floods and droughts already having a massive toll on these countries. Just wish everyone would move past the struggle to acquire more land and focus on the well-being of what they currently have instead of trying to get what they don't have.
 

Zapages

Member
Some more food for thought for here.

http://tribune.com.pk/story/1071787/raw-officer-arrested-in-balochistan/
http://www.thenews.com.pk/latest/107913-Arrest-of-RAW-agent-Pakistan-to-seek-Irans-help

Dawn: The most respected paper in Pakistan: http://www.dawn.com/news/1247665 and http://www.dawn.com/news/1247850/india-accepts-spy-as-former-navy-officer-denies-having-links


An ex Indian Naval officer has been arrested in Pakistan for helping training separatists in Balochistan and for training them on operations that would target the ports like Karachi (in Sindh)and Gwadar( in Balochistan).

If the same had occurred in India. It would have been across many newspapers and on Neogaf.... I am surprised no one is keeping up on this news. :\
 
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