PAKISTAN ARMY MAY TOPPLE TERRORIST SANCTUARY

Will Pakistan be able to defeat its homegrown terrorist threat? (Comments allowed).
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     We all witnessed on TV the suicide attack on a historic church in northwestern Pakistan. It was no fun seeing the blood and carnage as ambulances took 78 dead Christians away.

Aftermath of Pakistani Church Attack

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     Pakistanis grieved over the coffins of their relatives who attended the service or who were simply strolling past the church when the suicide bomb attack occurred in Peshawar. It was estimated that over 600 people had attended the service and were leaving to receive free food being distributed on the lawn outside when two explosions ripped through the crowd. 

     I think Pakistan is ready to more aggressively go after its homegrown terrorists. Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said that 78 people had been killed, including 34 women and 37 children. “Such an attack on women and children is against humanity,” he said. The dead included two Muslim police officers who had been posted outside the church.

     I think Pakistan is preparing to fight back against their  homegrown terrorist threat. To find out, I inspected an excellent report on Pakistan's commitment to fighting terrorism. It's called The Creation and Development of Pakistan's Anti-terrorism Regime, 1997-2002. 

 

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I also wanted to determine if Pakistan's security forces have recently killed and jailed more of their homegrown terrorists, then they have in the past. So, I obtained information from the South Asian Intelligence Portal and their South Asian Intelligence Review (SAIR) report. The SAIR report studied the following sources- Daily Times, Dawn, The News, Tribune,Central Asia Online, The Nation, The Frontier Post and the Pakistan Observer. I found out anti-terrorist events in Pakistan from December 4-10, 2012. Here's what I found:

December 9: There were 14 militants and seven security forces among 22 persons killed during the week in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). I've always considered the FATA regions to be terrorist breeding grounds. A US drone attack killed four militants, including a senior al Qaeda 'commander' Muhammad Ahmed Almansoor, in Tappi village in the North Waziristan Agency (NWA) of the FATA. According to The Express Tribune newspaper, he was the second militant leader to be killed by drone attacks in three days. The attack also killed three others in a village close to Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan, near the Afghan border. The three other people killed were Almansoor’s family members.

     The drone fired missiles at a house with Almansoor inside, destroying two rooms and a car. Four drones were seen flying over the area during the attack, residents and government officials said. The local sources added that Almansoor had been living in North Waziristan for a long time and used to wear the local dress. A foreigner was also reportedly killed in the attack, but his name and identity could not be ascertained as yet.
     A similar attack on Thursday in North Waziristan had killed another senior al Qaeda commander, Abu Zaid, who replaced Abu Yahya al-Libi as one of the militant Islamist group’s most powerful figures. A US drone attack also killed Libi in June. I feel that the deadly U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan are necessary and effective.
December 9: Three soldiers were killed and 20 others sustained injuries in a suicide blast near the Ziari Noor Camp on the Angoor Adda Road in South Waziristan Agency.
December 9: Overall, 28 civilians and four SFs among 33 persons killed during the week in Sindh: Five persons were killed in separate incidents of violence in Karachi, the provincial capital of Sindh.
December 8: Three persons, including two Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) activists, were killed in incidents of target killing in Karachi. Let's talk a bit about MQM! It stands for United National Movement and is a liberal political party in Pakistan that holds strong mobilizing potential throughout the Karachi region. It is the second largest party in Sindh and the traditionally the third largest in the country, however it currently holds fourth highest number of seats in the National Assembly while maintaining its second position in the Sindh Assembly. MQM has several chapters across the world in the United States, Canada, South Africa, several European countries, and Japan.
December 7: Seven persons were killed and at least four others injured in Karachi.
December 6: Two MQM activists and a Police Constable were among five persons killed in separate incidents of violence in different parts of Karachi.

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December 6: Four suspected militants were killed when a US drone fired two missiles at a house in Mir Ali tehsil (revenue unit) of NWA.
December 5: At least six militants were killed and eight others sustained bullet injuries when Lashkar-e-Islam (LI) militants attacked pro-government lashkar (militia), Tauheedul Islam (TI), post in Bukar area of Zakhakhel in Khyber Agency.
December 4: At least four persons, including two MQM activists and a Pakistan Sunni Tehreek (PST) cadre, were killed in separate acts of violence in Karachi.
December 3: At least nine persons, including four activists of the MQM and a Policeman, were killed in separate incidents of target killing in Karachi.

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A Connection to the 2008 Mumbai Terrorist attack- an 
update : According to a article in The Hindu (12/09/12), the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) showed LeT terror camps’ photos evidence to the Rawalpindi Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) hearing 26/11 case. The ATC was created in Pakistan, under Nawaz Sharif's government, to deal with terrorism cases. The FIA on December 8 presented the photographs of Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) training camps in Sindh and motorboats used by the 10 terrorists who attacked Mumbai on November 26, 2008 (26/11) to an anti-terrorism court conducting the trial of seven Pakistanis charged with involvement in the strikes. The motorboats and other items, currently in the custody of the FIA, were recovered in January 2009.

TTP even set up a Facebook site to recruit 'enthusiasts'. I wrote before about how this Taliban umbrella group hates the U.S. The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has set up a page on Facebook to recruit 'enthusiasts' to write for a quarterly magazine and to edit video, spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan confirmed on December 7. The Umar Media TTP page, which has more than 270 likes, appears to have been created in September and have just a handful of messages written in English. "Umar Media is proud to announce online jobs opportunities (sic)," says the first post on the networking website, written on October 25. Source: Daily Times (December 8, 2012). I also found an excellent collegiate research article on the TTP. Click HERE to view it. 

 

     I feel the Pakistan government has no choice but to end its homegrown terrorist problem, for it has grown to become a major and highly destructive phenomenon in recent years. The annual death toll from terrorist attacks has risen from 164 in 2003 to 3318 in 2009, with a total of 35,000 Pakistanis killed between 9/11/2001 and May 2011. The economic costs from 2000-2010 total $68 billion. 
     Interestingly, President Asif Ali Zardari and former President ex-Pakistan Army leader Pervez Mushaffaf have admitted that terrorist outfits were "deliberately created and nurtured" by past governments "as a policy to achieve some short-term tactical objectives".
     In essence, they admitted that their country's homegrown terrorist problem is because they were embedded within the government itself. It began with Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq's  policy of "Islamization" in the 1980s, under which conflicts were started against soviet involvement in Afghanistan. Zia's tenure as president saw Pakistan's involvement in the Soviet-Afghan War and led to the migration of ideologically driven Muslims, the mujahideen, into the tribal areas along with  increased availability of guns such as the AK-47 and drugs from the Golden Crescent.  
     I get the feeling that Pakistan's acceptance of these terrorist groups has waned and they are becoming  unwelcomed  "guests". I see more U.S. drone strikes inside the FATA regions, especially as our massive Afghanistan troop levels shrink into a more vulnerable "advisory" army of only a few thousand. And, I see the Pakistan government ignore the drone attacks against the terrorists inside the FATA region while their own security forces more aggressively pursue them on the ground. I also envision U.S. drone surveillance planes assisting and protecting Pakistan's security forces while they do so. Yes, in that manner, the Pakistan government may welcome drones flying overhead inside their country's heartland...we shall see.    

Learn about Pakistan's defense forces:

 

Robert Morton, M.Ed., Ed.S. is a member of the Association Of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO) and writes the online spy series "Corey Pearson- CIA Spymaster in the Caribbean". Contact him on the Secure Contact Form

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PRESIDENT OBAMA- PLEASE GIVE CONDITIONAL PARDON TO CIA HERO

President Barack Obama

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW

Washington, DC 20500

 Dear Mr. President:

As a staunch supporter of yours, I urge you to reconsider the case of CIA agent John Kiriakou who is serving a 30 month sentence as part of a plea deal in which he admitted violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act by e-mailing the name of a covert C.I.A. officer to a freelance reporter, who did not publish it. True, he made a mistake and his blunder is not acceptable or excusable. But, I feel it is forgivable for three reasons. First, this law was passed in 1982 and targeted radical publications that deliberately sought to out undercover agents, exposing their secret work and endangering their lives and the spies they recruited. However, John Kiriakou never associated with "radical publications". 

 

Second, he is a CIA hero and would not willfully turn on his country as the government charged. I only wish that the pardoned Scooter Libby was dealt a more severe penalty than Kiriakou for participating in the outing of another CIA hero- Valerie (Plame) Wilson. Libby's pardon left Americans confounded about the role Karl Rove and Dick Cheney played in the outing of Plame. Few would be confused if Kiriakou was pardoned, for he has fulfilled his debt to society. As a CIA operative, he spent 8 years as a Middle East analyst, specializing on Iraq. He held a Top Secret Case Sensitive security clearance, learned to speak Arabic, and from 1994-96 served as an economic officer at the American Embassy in Manama, Bahrain before returning to Washington, D.C. to focus on his specialty- Iraq.

Then, he transferred to the CIA’s Directorate of Operations in 1998 and studied counterterrorism and went to Athens, Greece, working on Euro-communist terrorism matters. He returned back to CIA Headquarters in 2000, then after the 9/11 attacks, was named Chief of Counterterrorist Operations in Pakistan. He was noted in this position to have led a series of raids on al-Qaeda safe houses, which resulted in the capture of dozens of al-Qaeda warriors.
 
The third reason stems from this invaluable experience and his heretofore impeccable service to country. Why not grant him a conditional pardon, instead of an absolute "Scooter Libbey-type" pardon? An absolute pardon would completely release Kiriakou from punishment, but with his experience as a Middle East CIA operative and Chief of counterterrorism operations in Pakistan, I feel a conditional pardon would benefit America because of the immense benefits he could bestow upon the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC).

For example, Mr. President, you could require him to serve out his sentence by working in the CIA's Office of Near Eastern and South Asian Analysis (NESA). His knowledge of Middle Eastern and North African countries, his expertise about South Asian nations such as Pakistan, and his analytical and fluent language skills would be a great help for the analysts currently working in NESA.

Or, you could require that he teach undergraduate degree coursework that involves language training and familiarization of the Middle Eastern countries in The Sherman Kent School for Intelligence Analysis. With his eight years experience as a Middle East analyst, he could teach foreign languages and regional issues to the DI students and officers who will eventually be assigned to the Middle East.



Mr. President, I urge you to consider a conditional pardon for this CIA hero who, on March 28, 2002, led a raid in which Abu Zubaydah, al-Qaeda’s 3rd ranking official, was captured in Faisalabad, Pakistan. It would be a defensible Presidential Conditional Pardon, in light of his taking home 10 Exceptional Performance Awards, a Sustained Superior performance Award, the Counterterrorism Service Medal, and the State Department’s Meritorious Honor Award...all well-deserved. 

Sincerely,

Robert Morton

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WHAT MAKES AL QAEDA SUICIDE BOMBERS TICK?

According to "The Times of Israel" newspaper, al Qaeda is posting want ads for suicide bombers. The job offer appeared on a closed Internet forum and sought applicants who were utterly committed to completing their mission. I guess so! 

Apparently, al Qaeda is low on bombers, so they're running a (short-term) employment advertisement on its Shumukh al-Islam Internet forum. Under the heading “Area of activity: The planet Earth,” the ad seeks jihadists to carry out suicide attacks.

The Hebrew Daily reported that these ads state "Applicants must be Muslim, mentally mature, dedicated, able to listen, and utterly committed to completing their mission". 

  

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Several email addresses are provided for applicants. While their real names are not required, candidates are asked to send details of their nickname or handle, along with their age, marital status, languages spoken and a list of passports in their possession.

The ad on the forum, which is accessible only to al Qaeda members, specifies the targets of the terror attacks that applicants will be expected to carry out, including “People who fight Islam and Muslims” and enemy “financial, military and media targets.” The ad indicates that the anticipated attacks will be solo operations: “Only one person will be in charge. He will gather all of the intelligence, he will prepare the operation — and he will complete the attack.” A "military panel” will oversee the bomber’s training and select the target. The job description promises only a “very slight chance of being caught.”

The ad elicited several positive responses, the Yedioth article claimed. One forum participant requested that Germany, Denmark and Sweden be specified as potential targets. The same participant warned the forum to be very careful about what it publishes, for fear that the enemy may see what the group is planning. 

To win the war on terror, the U.S. must analyze and understand the nature of al Qaeda and its penchant for suicide bombings. We must know why they employ this effective tactic to better counter it. Policymakers, first responders, and students of homeland security must fully understand and deal with the growing threat of suicide terror by analyzing such attacks and pinpointing our vulnerabilities and foresee high-risk scenarios for future attacks. 

I believe that America is due for suicide attacks in its heartland and we must continue preparing and implementing an effective and quick response to minimize casualties and losses when they occur. 

Studying Israel’s experience with suicide bombings, the internationalism of suicide terrorism, high-risk scenarios, methods to confront suicide terror and medical management of suicide terrorism should be incorporated into our educational system in intelligence studies.

By getting into the hearts and minds of suicide bombers, our intelligence community can better confront these very effective and dangerous threats. It would be beneficial to have in-depth studies of successful, and dead, suicide bombers, such as Ignacy Hryniewiecki, Mohammad Sidique Khan, Dilawar Singh Babbar, Abdallah Al-Ajmi, Axel Freiherr Von Dem Bussche-Streithorst, Niser Bin Muhammad Nasr Nawar, and Abdullah Hassan Al Aseery. 

By conducting what psychologists term "suicidal autopsies", we can learn how they were raised, the "formal" education they had, what mosques they attended, who they admired, the kinds of enticements they fell for, what their traumatic and enjoyable childhood experiences were, etc. Such data can be obtained from interviews and gathering open source intelligence, and would enable our Intelligence Community to counteract the formation and recruitment of future suicide bombers.

As the first edition of this article was written, multiple suicide bombings occurred in southwestern Afghanistan that killed 27 and wounded 110 people in the city of Zaranj. 

According to police, at least three of the attackers' suicide vests exploded but several more bombers were involved. Authorities killed two of them and captured three more after killing several others in the afternoon before they could detonate their explosives.

In Israel, suicide bombings are commonplace:

Total Israel suicide bombings from 2000-2005	159
Total victims killed	514
Suicide Bomber Demographics
17 years old	5 %
17 – 24 years old	76 %
25 – 34 years old	17 %
35 + years old	2 %
Percent women	5 %

I believe the U.S. Intelligence Community should have a specially-trained team of psychologists and psychiatrists flown to Afghanistan, Israel...anywhere in the world where these events occur. We need to develop a scientific base through extensive interviews with these surviving suicidal subjects or with the people who knew them well... beyond the obvious, we must learn what makes them tick...so to speak!

Robert Morton, Ed., Ed.S. is a member of the Association Of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO) and writes the spy novel series "Corey Pearson- CIA Spymaster in the Caribbean, Bahamas, Florida Keys and Key West".  The views expressed on this site do not represent those of any organization he is a member of. Contact him on the Secure Contact Form

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U.S.- RUSSIAN SYRIAN CONFRONTATION LOOMING

Analytic Guidance: "The Crisis in Syria"

     In the wake of President Barack Obama's change of tack from a strike on Syria, the threat of war has not dissolved. It has, however, been pushed off beyond this round of negotiations. 

     The president's minimalist claims are in place, but they are under serious debate. There is no chance of an attack on chemical weapons stockpiles. Therefore, the attack, if any, will be on command and control and political targets. Obama has options on the table and there will be force in place for any contingency he selects. Nothing is locked in despite public statements and rhetoric in Washington, London, Paris or Moscow.

     Remember that all public statements now are meant to obscure real plans and intentions. They are intended to shape the environment. Read them, but do not look at them as anything more than tactics.
     The issue has morphed into a U.S.-Russian confrontation. Russia's goal is to be seen as an equal of the United States. It wins if it can be seen as a protagonist of the United States. If it can appear that Washington has refrained from an attack because of Russian maneuvers, Moscow's weight increases dramatically. This is particularly the case along Russia's periphery, where doubts of American power abound and concern over Russian power abides.
     This is not merely appearance. After all that has been said, if the United States buys into some Russian framework, it will not be seen as a triumph of diplomacy; it will be seen as the United States lacking the will to act and being pushed away out of concern for the Russians. The Russian ploy on weapons controls was followed by the brilliant move of abandoning strike options. Obama's speech the night of Sept. 10 was addressed to the U.S. public and Obama's highly fractured base; some of his support base opposes and some -- a particular audience -- demands action.
     He cannot let Syria become the focus of his presidency, and he must be careful that the Russians do not lay a trap for him. He is not sure what that trap might look like, and that's what is unnerving him as it would any president. 
 

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     Consequently, he has bought time, using the current American distaste for military action in the Middle East. But he is aware that this week's dislike of war can turn into next week's contempt on charges of weakness. Obama is an outstanding politician and he knows he is in quicksand.
     The Russians have now launched a diplomatic offensive that emphasizes to both the Arabs in the Persian Gulf opposing Bashar al Assad and the Iranians supporting him that a solution is available through them. It requires only that they ask the Americans to abandon plans for action. The message is that Russia will solve the chemical weapons problem, and implicitly, collaborate with them to negotiate a settlement.
     Obama's speech on Sept. 10, constrained by domestic opinion, came across as unwilling to confront the Russians or al Assad. The Russians are hoping this has unnerved al Assad's opponents sufficiently to cause them to use the Russians as their interlocutors. If this fails the Russians have lost nothing. They can say they were statesmen. If it succeeds, they can actually nudge the regional balance of power.
     The weakness of the Russian position is that it has no real weight. The limit on American military action is purely domestic politics. If the United States chooses to hit Syria, Russia can do nothing about it and will be made to look weak, the tables thus turned on them.
     At this point, all signs indicate that the domestic considerations dominate U.S. decision-making. If the Russian initiative begins to work, however, Obama will be forced to consider the consequences and will likely act. The Arabs suspect this and therefore will encourage the Russians, hoping to force the U.S. into action.
     The idea that this imbroglio will somehow disappear is certainly one that Obama is considering. But the Russians will not want that to happen. They do not want to let Obama off the hook and their view is that he will not act. Against this backdrop, they can appear to be the nemesis of the United States, its equal in power and its superior in cunning and diplomacy.
     This is the game to watch. It is not ending but still very much evolving.
 

"Analytic Guidance: The Syria Crisis is republished with permission of Stratfor."

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SOUTH KOREAN NAVY GROWS LETHAL

The South Korean Navy has taken delivery of its 10th domestically built guided-missile destroyer on Tuesday, which will join patrol missions to defend the nation's shoreline and harbor waters, the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said Tuesday.

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STX Offshore and Shipbuilding Co. delivered the newest PKG-class (Patrol Killer, Guided Missile) patrol ship to the Navy command, located in Jinhae, some 410 kilometers south of Seoul.

The 450-ton high-speed ship can sail at a top speed of 40 knots and is equipped with anti-ship missiles that have a range of 140 kilometers.

It is also fitted with 76mm and 40mm guns and can accommodate 40 crew. The ship will join Navy patrol missions after two-months of deployment, the DAPA said.