Brian M Downing
I know it was you, Fredo.
That Osama bin Laden has been living comfortably in Abbottabad and evidently directing al Qaeda from there – all within earshot of a Pakistani military facility – has been a tremendous embarrassment to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), but it comes as no surprise to Indian or many other intelligence services, though realization in Washington has been too long in coming.
ISI has long been thought complicit in aiding al Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban, Lashkar-i-Taiba, Jaish-i-Mohammed, and a slew of other militant groups operating along the Af-Pak line and in Kashmir. Sipah-i-Sahaba was organized to intimidate and kill Shia and Christians inside Pakistan.
In the US, key members of congress are questioning the large subsidies given to Pakistan, including its military and intelligence services. Hostility toward Pakistan is building in the public. Congress is looking for further evidence of ISI links to al Qaeda; the public has seen enough. Other countries are also wary about ISI. China has critical economic and geopolitical plans that include Pakistan but it must now be rethinking its association with so artless an intelligence service.
ISI’s Ties With al Qaeda
Pakistani intelligence has had discernible ties with Osama bin Laden from his days with the mujahadin to his death last week. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan (1979) led to international support for the resistance. Inserting itself between donors and fighters, ISI controlled funds to various mujahadin groups, including the band of Arab volunteers which bin Laden led. ISI grew tremendously in size and power, becoming an army within the army and a benefactor to numerous militant groups.
After the war’s successful conclusion, ISI remained a hub connecting various militant groups, transnational brotherhoods, and generous donors. Soon enough, bin Laden founded a veteran network in Pakistan – al Qaeda. It maintained ties among the former mujahadin and sought new campaigns around the world. Events did not refuse them.
Al Qaeda was part of an array of ISI-supported militant groups that trained in Taliban-dominated Afghanistan for various theaters. The groups shared their deadly expertise and put it into practice in India-controlled Kashmir and alongside the Taliban as they battled the Northern Alliance for several years. The Pakistani army even sent troops to aid the latter effort.
As the Northern Alliance and the US drove the Taliban and their allies out of the country, the Pakistani army arranged to airlift its own and al Qaeda fighters out of harm’s way in Kunduz province to the north. To the south, US intelligence could only listen to radio intercepts as Pakistani officers directed al Qaeda and Taliban fighters to havens inside Pakistan. Leaders were brought to safe houses in Karachi, far away from the frontier and the US’s reach.
ISI, it is well known now, has only intermittently and selectively aided the US against the Taliban and al Qaeda. It has helped to capture only one high-ranking al Qaeda figure (Khalid Sheikh Mohammed), but few if any of the Taliban leaders known to be in Quetta, Peshawar, and Karachi.
US intelligence became increasingly loth to share intelligence with ISI as suspicion of its loyalties grew. The US built its own spy network inside Pakistan, which in the last few months led to deep strains with ISI, and in the last week to the raid on bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad.
Irrefutable evidence in the world of intelligence organizations and covert ops and militant groups is rare, even many years after events take place. India has been apprising intelligence services for years of the array of militant groups ISI has been nurturing along Af-Pak. The US is poring over the hard drives taken from 8for still more evidence, and ISI is bracing itself. It should.
Pakistan and the Two Powers
American officials are publicly expressing dismay and one can only imagine what words and glares are being exchanged in private. Only days after bin Laden’s death US Predators struck in North Waziristan a move calculated to hurl down the gauntlet to ISI. The US feels bolstered by the ire now directed on ISI within Pakistan and in a few capitals as well.
The US is seeking several objectives, perhaps most immediately the full cooperation of ISI in destroying al Qaeda along Af-Pak and in forcing the Taliban to accept a settlement by capturing or killing Mullah Omar and other key leaders residing in Pakistan.
The civilian government of Prime Minister Gilani and President Zardari are unlikely to have had foreknowledge of bin Laden’s whereabouts, as the military does not see fit to inform civilians of intelligence matters it deems outside Islamabad’s sphere. Gilani and Zardari know well that any inquiries would have led to their sorrow.
The US is seeking to bolster civilian government at the expense of ISI of course, but also at the expense of the rest of the military which enjoys key positions in economy and state. The US wishes to influence the Pakistani military away from politics, foreign and domestic, and help transform it into a professional army – a daunting project.
Rallies sympathetic to bin Laden were predictable and telegenic, but they do not express the range of opinion in the Pakistani public. Many young Pakistanis, like their peers in the Arab world, are angry over lack of opportunity and a corrupt polity, civilian or military, that has long misgoverned them. Washington will seek to channel their energies toward reforming the economy, government, and army, though US influence is limited and probably waning.
ISI, though on its back foot just now, is deeply imbued with a sense of honor alloyed with truculence and a sense of national mission without basis in military or political achievement. It will resist any inquiry or diminution of its power, and few people in or out of the country can think that assassination and coup are out of the question. ISI will look to Beijing for support.
Clearly, Pakistan has been moving closer to China in recent years as that emerging power seeks to expand its economic and military influence in Central and South Asia. China will play an important role in events inside Pakistan, probably a larger one than the US will play.
China of course has no admiration for democracy, neither at home nor abroad. China simply wants a stable, predictable partner in business and military matters. As unstable as civilian government in Islamabad is and as unappealing as democracy is to its hyper-capitalist politburo, China may not be willing to risk its objectives by tying itself to an overreaching intelligence clique that aids al Qaeda.
ISI’s militant network may bring costly trade sanctions that will affect China’s economy. China also risks peripheral engagement in endless frontier battles, which from the perspective of Beijing are quaint vestiges of the past that can only hinder the business at hand.
China’s brand name has already been marred by its North Korean subsidiary and as well by recent aggressive actions by its own military in East Asian waters. The more staid and corporate-minded elements of the Chinese state may have to decide whether its chief partner in Central and South Asia should be geared to professional expertise or clandestine intrigue.
©2011 Brian M Downing