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I personally find it unbelievable that such a vast, massive, and effective conspiracy of silence could exist in Pakistan without a single voice of dissent. In other societies, for example the UK and the USA, even as the government was dedicated to convincing the people and world that they needed to invade Iraq, there were many individuals in intelligence agencies and government who either spoke to the press off the record to say the evidence was weak, or who resigned and then spoke openly to the press.
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Whereas you reasoning is sound, I don't think a conspiracy on the level of individual attacks, nor foreign forces (foe or friendly alike) being able to buy key figures to collude and push certain agendas, is far removed from the realm of the possible. What would be insane is a blanket conspiracy by the entire establishment, but that would be a particularly paranoid argument. The truth always comes in shades of gray, and the fact is we'll never know it.
As for chatter before the conspiracy...there was none to speak of before Kargil either. And I do count that as a rather grand conspiracy on the part of the Pakistani establishment, wholesale.