There are times when big things happen and we do not recognize the magnitude of the sea change. We are the tree in the forest and shifting a few trees around doesn't seem a bother least of all a sea change.
Like Obama and his very real efforts to fundamentally change American society. Looked at in bits, they simply look like bits - golly gee, I just want to help everyone. It is often when we step back and consider the broader implications, or the macro, versus the micro, that we should be able to see more clearly this very real, change he wishes to impose on this country. His vision of what He believes we should believe.
This sea change can occur in other places also, and be as significant in different ways as Obama is to Marxism - but very little press in the US for the extension in the term of service for the ISI chief in Pakistan. We are much too busy with health care to worry about whether some Pakistani gets to keep a job or retire.
Perhaps we should care.
One of the lies of the left stems from a failure to understand anything about Pakistan and the Taliban - and then surprise, they are the ones conducting policy now with little to no reality check.
When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in December of 1979, the Mujahedeen stood up to them, and ultimately played a role in the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan. Listening to bin Laden et al, you would think they did it on their own. That these nomadic Arabs, travelled to Afghanistan, with no aid or support, stood unarmed against one of the mightiest armies on earth, and sent them packing in February of 1989.
Yep. Makes real sense to me. Pretty clear they did it on their own. Mounted on the horses, they scared away the Soviets. I would think it was their breath more than it was the horses. Oh, I suppose they found some old rifles and they shot down those Russian gunships. Yep. I believe in fairies and pixie dust as well. Apparently, bin Laden does also.
The United States played a lead role in aiding the renewers of the faith, who fought the Soviets. Ahmad Shah Massoud stood up and led Afghans against the Evil Empire and for it, was called the Lion. The US, UK, and Saudi Arabia played the more significant roles in the opposition to the Soviet invasion supplying arms, and funds to the beleaguered rag-tag gangs of Arabs. I am sure someone will mention China as having played a role - not interested and not entirely accurate so let us leave them out of it. Saudi Arabia paid for everything, while the US and UK supplied the arms, and eventually the training and construction. The Arabs did the fighting and dying, BUT without our weapons and assistance, they would have been eaten alive by the Soviet gunships and armored divisions, missile strikes, and bombs. Of course, someone will suggest I consider the fate of the Taliban with all the US bombs dropping now, and I again say - not interested, wrong story, no real connection. The Taliban of 1980 were not native to Afghanistan. They did not know the region, certainly did not have the bunkers constructed, and had limited skills in the caves and the mountains. The US and UK stepped in and gave them the necessary tools to stay alive and fight. How do I know? Maybe just because - which of course is not academic, nor is it properly cited.
How many citations do you think Obama can drum up for his very unorthodox approach to legislation? Citations and documentation on some issues, means little because it is almost entirely unverifiable. Think micro for a moment. The following is lite and fluffy. It avoids the complex and the details and provides enough I would think to indict the foolish left rabble and clear up the fog they have set upon the whole of Afghanistan.
1) In the CIA we had maybe 4 people who could speak Pashtu, or the farsi dialect in Afghanistan. Maybe 4. We may have had 10-12 Arabic speakers in the CIA secret agent business. At a desk, back in Langley, perhaps a few more, but none of them were field operatives. In the UK, they had maybe 1/2 as many as we did, and of all of these individuals, maybe 1-2 had ever been to Afghanistan.
2) We had no inside knowledge or inside sources - we had no insight on anything or anyone. We did not know who Massoud was. We did not know who any of them were. We did not know who was running anything.
3) So ... you are the Prime Minister of England or President of the United States - what do you think we should do first, before we deal with weapons and aid? And then, I would ask, how would you accomplish that goal? Who would those individuals see or talk to, how would that vision you have of this working, actually work - the mechanics of it. Explain.
What if I told you that you were more or less correct - we (US and UK) did send people there to learn the language and the culture, and at the same time, to ... make friends with up and coming (possibly) leaders. These people sent to this most miserable place on earth would take weapons, and in the process, begin the befriending of individuals.
I got ahead of myself a little. In the early 1970s, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in Pakistan was busy with a war with India, and very disorganized. Pakistan was manpower heavy but very limited on experience and materiale for war. Bodies only go so far. What Pakistan needed was money to build the infrastructure to develop a stable military that would then be able to stand against India or ... another enemy (mainly India). Where to get the money??? The answer arrived indirectly with some help from the Soviets. The US and the UK.
We had the money but no experience in Afghanistan. The ISI had the men and background to get to the renewers of the faith fighting the Soviets. After all, these Mujahedeen crossed the mountains into Pakistan each winter to rest and recuperate until spring. Often they would move into homes in Peshawar or other tribal regions. The big guys moved into Peshawar. Bin Laden had a house in Peshawar, so did Massoud, although they did not know each other as friends or even equals - bin laden was a johnny-come-lately-lazy-here-I-am-give-me-credit-type, while Massoud was the voice and the fist of the Mujahedeen.
So the US and UK had the money and the ISI could get them in to see Massoud and other Mujahedeen leaders (not bin Laden - he was a nobody - it would be like me saying my great-great grandfather won the civil war, when he fought in the war, and didn't quite make it through, but he did fight and that’s all that counts). The US and UK are introduced to the characters involved in the Mujahedeen, and deals are made. However, when Spring comes, the characters are off doing what they do - fighting, while the US and UK bring in supplies. So then now the question - how do we get the supplies to the Mujahedeen? Hmmm.
Easy enough - ISI will help, for a price. The price was a percentage of whatever - money and weapons. For every (my numbers only) $100 to the Mujahedeen, the ISI kept $40, for every 100 rifles to the Mujahedeen, the ISI kept 30. They were using the US and UK as a power station - they plugged into us and within a decade they were THE power in Pakistan. Not the President, not the Prime Minister - the ISI.
In time, our men from the US and UK began developing their own contacts, befriending the mujahedeen and people like Massoud. Maybe one of the befrienders told the story.
In any case - the point is not the details above, but how ISI came to be the power in Pakistan. Often the head of the ISI is at the top of the army chain of command, and in the case of Musharref, he was the head of ISI and the head of the army. There was no civilian control.
Pakistan will claim to have an 86% literacy rate. Brilliant, everyone can read. Compared to the US that is very good unless we winnow it down a bit. Boys who make it to 8th grade have proven they are sufficiently literate and may leave school and do some wonderful bit of service to the world, like join a madrassah. For girls, it is 5th grade. The majority of males are educated up to 8th grade. A very select few make it beyond. Want to guess where these males who make it to 8th grade end up getting much of their education from? Yep. Madrassahs that provide food, shelter, aid, and education in the finer points of life - like fundamentalist ideologies. Want to guess the one job for sure, open to these 8th grade graduates ? No. They join the military, and or, move into the ISI if they are the crème de la crème of the recruits. Where do the officers come from? Yes, they are the ones who take the O and A level exams and get into university.
We now have a conundrum. The working body of the military subscribe to the Taliban philosophy while the officer corps do not. The workers in the ISI are loyal to the Taliban while the officers are not.
How do you fight someone when the bureaucracy invested with the responsibility (ISI and army) to end the reign of the Taliban, is riddled with Taliban supporters?
You do know that the Taliban is like any decentralized organization - different branch officers, different managers, different theories on managing, some may be autocratic, others may be pedophiles. And it is a real possibility that 1-2 of the stronger factions opposed to several weaker groups who oppose them (this may well be evidenced in part by the events north of Kabul on March 6 - fighting between the Taliban and Taliban and Hizb-i-Islami), may well feed intelligence to the ISI, and army knowing it gets fed to NATO who will then bomb and blow up whoever is on the other end. If it kills innocents, oh well - they opposed someone that wanted them gone, and used NATO to remove them and at the same time made NATO look like murdering scum.
Considering the above, read below .........
ISI chief gets one-year service extension
By Iftikhar A. Khan
Wednesday, 10 Mar, 2010
Dawn.com
ISLAMABAD: The Chief of Army Staff, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, has given a one-year extension in service to Lt. General Ahmed Shuja Pasha to allow him to complete his tenure as three-star general and, more importantly, as head of the country’s premier spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).
Sources told Dawn a summary for Lt. Gen Pasha’s extension, initiated by the Defence Ministry, had been approved by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani.
The summary, they said, had reached the General Headquarters (GHQ) through the Defence Ministry.
The news of extension has become public only a day after the army chief met President Asif Zardari and officials here believe that the matter may have been discussed at the meeting.
Lt. Gen Pasha is the fourth Lt. General to be given extension in service by the present army chief.
Although service extension is always viewed with scepticism, in the case of Lt. Gen Pasha it was widely expected but many believe it meets the merit criterion.
They say that although he reaches the age of superannuation on March 18, more than a year remains in his tenure as a three-star general.
Besides, some senior security analysts said, Gen Pasha was directly involved in major missions, most important of them being the security establishment’s decision to systematically eradicate the militancy culture and jihadi organisations from the country.
Gen Pasha is one of the few chiefs of ISI who have remained in close touch with the administration and have briefed members of parliament on the ongoing military operations in Malakand and tribal agencies.
Regarded by most serving and retired military officials as an upright and dedicated intelligence official, Gen Pasha is also considered to be a close confidant of army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani. He served as Director-General Military Operations (DGMO) at the army headquarters and oversaw military engagements in Waziristan, Swat and other areas.
In October 2007, Gen Pasha was selected as military adviser to Secretary-General of United Nations, but due to his commitments as DGMO he did not join the UN.
Soon after coming into power, the present government tried to place the premier intelligence agency under the administrative, financial, and operational control of the Interior Ministry, but it failed to do so and had to shelve the controversial notification.
Lt. Gen Pasha was appointed as Director General ISI in September 2008, replacing Lt General Nadeem Taj, who had been appointed by Pervez Musharraf.
It may be mentioned that Nadeem Taj had been appointed ISI chief in place of the present army chief.
Pakistan
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