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A formidable intelligence machine is fighting to douse the fires of revolt, says Mark Adkin
http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2001/09/23/stiusausa03012.html
The spies who could save Pakistan
The loyalty of the Pakistan army is under extreme strain
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Suddenly, it’s back to the old days. For any operations inside Afghanistan, the Americans need their old allies: Pakistan’s feared intelligence agency, the Inter- Services Intelligence, or ISI.
Once they were so close that their agents trekked across the Hindu Kush together on reconnaissance missions (or to mingle with mujaheddin, as the Americans put it). It was the time of the Soviet war on Afghanistan, and the CIA was utterly dependent on the ISI to pass on arms and training to the guerrillas in their struggle against the Russians.
** The ISI has the reputation of being the most effective intelligence organisation in the Third World. ** It is headed by a director-general, now Lieutenant-General Mahmood Ahmed, who has direct, daily access to the president. He is almost certainly the most powerful man in the military, responsible for all political, military, internal, external and counter-intelligence operations in Pakistan.
Until very recently the Afghan bureau of the ISI has been something of a command post in supporting the Taliban. As part of a policy of “Islamic debts”, a campaign to buttress its defences against India, Pakistan has used the Taliban’s support to project power north.
The Afghan opposition claims that Pakistani pilots often carry out air raids on behalf of Taliban forces; independent sources also say that Pakistani special forces take part in military operations inside Afghanistan. It is said that around 30% of Pakistani military remain sympathetic to the Taliban cause: something General Musharraf, the president of Pakistan, and President Bush will be painfully aware of.
A vast organisation, divided into several bureaux, the ISI is based in a heavily guarded headquarters in Islamabad. The main operational department is the Afghan bureau, but of almost equal importance will be the bureau for Kashmir, the region over which Pakistan and India remain in bitter dispute.
The CIA’s collaboration with the ISI began in 1984. Brigadier Mohammed Yousaf was the head of the Afghan bureau during that time. “From 1984 to 1987 over 80,000 mujaheddin went through our training camps,” he says. “Hundreds of thousands of tons of weapons and ammunition were distributed, and active operations were planned and carried out in all of Afghanistan’s 29 provinces.”
These weapons were supplied covertly by the CIA, and the training sanctioned by them too. Why? In 1985 the American congressman Charles Wilson said: “There were 58,000 [American] dead in Vietnam and we owe the Russians one . . . I thought the Soviets ought to get a dose of it.”
This stance is essential to understanding why America supported the mujaheddin against the Soviet Union. But it could not do it alone - just like today, without the full backing of the ISI the US would blunder into Afghanistan blind. Then, as now, the CIA had no agents on the ground, had no Pushtu-speaking personnel and would rely on what their satellite cameras told them. Cameras may not lie, but they seldom give answers to the critical questions of who, when, why and how.
With its superior knowledge, the ISI told the CIA what weapons and ammunition were required, then distributed these along with food and clothing to the various guerrilla groups. Yousaf and his staff were in daily contact with the mujaheddin and developed good relationships. They trained them in tactics, in the use of weapons, explosives and radio communications.
Mujaheddin commanders would be selected, brought into Pakistan, briefed on the target they should attack and then trained for the mission. They then went back into Afghanistan, sometimes accompanied by Pakistan army advisers, to carry it out.
The ISI also planned operations, briefing commanders on specific tasks, such as destroying an oil pipeline or ambushing a convoy. But it was a cardinal rule that no American ever became involved with the distribution of funds or weapons once they were in Pakistan. No Americans ever trained, or had direct contact with, the mujaheddin. It was galling to the Americans that they paid the piper but could not call the tune.
To assist the mujaheddin, Pakistan operated inside Afghanistan in up to 11 groups. They provided vital intelligence, not only on enemy activities but also on the competence or otherwise of mujaheddin commanders.
The ISI has been doing exactly the same with the Taliban forces ever since, and the information it has will now be essential to any troops in Afghanistan.
The CIA, meanwhile, was based discreetly at the embassy in Islamabad. The ISI’s relations with the CIA were sometimes polite, but more often strained. This was because CIA officials continually wanted to become involved in details of arms purchases and what targets should be attacked. According to Yousaf, the relationship was often problematic: “Invariably the CIA failed to meet our needs. I am sure these bureaucratic snarl-ups would not have been accepted had it been American troops in the firing line.”
After the Soviet Union pulled out, America rapidly lost interest in Afghanistan and funds dried up. The ISI, as a result, became intensely disillusioned with America - it felt badly let down.
Just as the guerrillas were on the verge of victory in the field, the Americans abandoned them. They cut off the money supply and thus the flow of weapons just at the time that the Soviet Union, although no longer present in Afghanistan, poured in a huge supply of tanks, guns and other equipment to keep its Afghan army fighting. A stalemate developed. The mujaheddin’s feuding became more important than their fighting.
“The more I look back, the more convinced I am that it was the deliberate policy of the American government that we should never achieve a military victory in Afghanistan,” says Yousaf now. “Once the Soviet Union was out, the Americans had avenged Vietnam; she then only concerned herself with bringing about a stalemate . . . I feel the only winners in the war in Afghanistan are the Americans . . . the losers are most certainly the people of Afghanistan.”
Into the vacuum came the Taliban, came Bin Laden. In 1990 America strained relations with Pakistan even further. Fearful that Pakistan was too close to making an atomic bomb, it cut off all military contact.
Now, if America is to find Bin Laden, track his movements and use Pakistani facilities, it will once again have to cultivate the ISI, and in particular its Afghan bureau.
Mark Adkin is the author of Brigadier Yousaf’s biography
Columns - Andrew Sullivan: America drops the little issues to face the real world
[This message has been edited by Abdali (edited September 24, 2001).]