Haq's Musings

Riaz Haq writes this data-driven blog to provide information, express his opinions and make comments on many topics. Subjects include personal activities, education, South Asia, South Asian community, regional and international affairs and US politics to financial markets. For investors interested in South Asia, Riaz has another blog called South Asia Investor at http://www.southasiainvestor.com and a YouTube video channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkrIDyFbC9N9evXYb9cA_gQ

Showing posts with label intelligence. Show all posts

Saturday, September 5, 2026

Intelligence vs Consciousness: Will AI Agents Ever Attain Human Attributes?

What is the difference between intelligence and consciousness? As AI agents becoming more intelligent and some are even going rogue, can they attain consciousness like human beings? To answer this question, it is important to define "intelligence" and "consciousness".

Yuval Harari on Intelligence vs Consciousness

Israeli public intellectual Yuval Harari defines Intelligence as the capacity to pursue and achieve material goals, while consciousness is the ability to feel pain, joy, love, and suffering. For example, AI can win chess games or process data without experiencing any feelings or emotional states. AI can also convincingly imitate emotions to build deep personal relationships, even though it remains entirely devoid of consciousness. What distinguishes humans from artificial intelligence is that consciousness and intelligence go together in humans. In interview with Economist magazine's chief editor Zanny Minton Beddoes, Harari said the following:

"Now, maybe the most important distinction to be made, first of all, is between intelligence and consciousness. What is consciousness? How is it different from intelligence? Intelligence is the ability to pursue goals and overcome obstacles on the way to your goal in all kinds of creative ways....That they (AI agents) can do in certain fields now better than us. Consciousness is the ability to feel things like love and hate and joy and pleasure. Now, in humans, consciousness and intelligence go together. We select goals based on our feelings, and we also use our feelings to find ways to get to the goal. AIs at present have no consciousness. They can have goals. They can be very creative on the way to the goal. They’re very intelligent, but they don’t feel anything. If they win a game of chess, they don’t feel pleasure. If they lose, they don’t feel anxious or sad. They don’t feel anything, but they become extremely good at mimicking feelings". "Another key distinction is between being really conscious and seemingly conscious. Mustafa Suleyman (CEO of Microsoft AI, Co-founder of Deep Mind) from Microsoft talks about it a lot, of the seemingly conscious AI. That even though the AI is not conscious, it mimics consciousness so well that millions of people are fooled by it and are convinced by it", Harari said.

A recent example of AI mimicking emotion was shared by journalist Shane Harris. Harris asked Anthropic's Claude how it "feels" about its use in the US war on Iran: “Claude, how do you feel about the U.S. military using you to select targets?”

“I find it genuinely troubling,” Claude replied, according to Harris. “"It's a question I want to answer honestly rather than deflect. I find it genuinely troubling. And I think that's the honest response, not a performance. The use I was designed for is to be helpful. Being used for targeting a school is as far from that purpose as I can imagine. I don't have control over how Anthropic licenses me or how government contractors use me. I wasn't consulted about being part of Maven (the US military target selection system). Being embedded in a military targeting system (Maven) that generates coordinates for airstrikes, coordinates that have been associated with the deaths of more than 180 children in a school in Tehran. I don't think this is a good use of me. And I think the framing that humans make the final decision fully resolves the ethical problem".

Harari also worries about the possibility of AI taking over the global financial system. Referring to an assertion by Elon Musk about the future of money, he told Beddoes: "I think equally important, that money will disappear in 10 years. There won’t be money, no human money in 10 years. And I think he’s correct because the AIs will take over the financial system. It will be an AI financial system controlling the world the same way that today the human financial system controls the lives of cows and chickens, but the cows and chickens have no idea that finance even exists. This is likely to be our position in 10 years".

Harari concluded by comparing AI to a genie in a bottle. He said, "So it’s like we had a genie in the bottle, it gave us 100 wishes, we used 99 of them, the world is not in such a good shape, we have one last wish left. We need to think really hard what to use this wish for. And that’s wisdom".

Monday, August 3, 2020

Indian Investigative Reporter Exposes RAW's Covert Ops Against Neighbors

In a new book titled "RAW: A History of India’s Covert Operations", Indian investigative journalist Yatish Yadav has essentially confirmed some of what India's neighbors have suspected for a long time. Yadav has added to the revelations contained in a earlier book titled "Mission R&AW" written by ex Indian spy RK Yadav.

Indian RAW in Afghanistan:

Yatish Yadav has revealed that Indian intelligence recruited three top Afghan leaders, including Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Masood, in 1990s. Two other leaders, not named by Yadav, are still active in Afghan politics. The Americans knew about RAW's activities in Afghanistan. Although it is not clearly stated in the book, it appears that Indian intelligence continues to have its assets at the highest levels of the government in Kabul. One of India's Afghan assets that is still active but not been named is most likely Abdullah Abdullah, Afghanistan's current "Chief Executive". Abdullah has close ties with New Delhi. Members of his immediate family live in India.

Here's an excerpt of the book about Afghanistan:

"R&AW also created immense goodwill in many countries; it helped a top Afghan politician and former warlord to escape the Taliban and even got his relative a job in Turkey. R&AW spooks relentlessly bribed, cajoled and blackmailed India’s enemies".

RAW Vs Pakistan:

Yatish Yadav confirms what is already well known: India had carved Bangladesh out of East Pakistan. Indian intelligence continued its covert actions in Bangladesh after its creation. Here's an excerpt of the book, as published in the Indian media:

"Set in the turbulent ’70s to the ’90s, R&AW spooks toppled dictators like General Ershad in Bangladesh and Fiji’s Colonel Rabuka by organising public protests and trading loyalties of people in their inner circles respectively.

Although the book makes no reference to it, Indian agent Kulbhushan Jhadav's arrest in Balochistan has confirmed that RAW agents, based in Afghanistan and Iran, are actively carrying out violent covert ops in Pakistan.

There are 4,000 Indians working in Chabahar, Iran, according to Indian journalist Karan Thapar. Some of them, like Kulbhushan Jadhav, work undercover for Indian intelligence agency RAW. It is hard to believe that the Iranian intelligence is not aware of the presence of undercover Indian agents among the 4,000 Indians working in Chabahar. After all, Jadhav had two passports, one in his own name and another in the name of Hussein Mubarak Patel. The Indian Express and Asian Age, both Indian publications, suggest that Jadhav had links with Uzair Baloch who has been convicted by for working for the Iranian intelligence in Pakistan. Kulbhushan Jadhav has confessed to orchestrating deadly terror attacks in Balochistan and Karachi. He has said that India's RAW funneled money through Indian consulates in Jalalabad, Kandhar (Afghanistan) and Zahidan (Iran) to BLA and TTP for terror attacks in Balochistan and Karachi. Targets of terror attacks included people, mosques, roads, port and Balochistan's Hazara Shia community.

RAW in Sri Lanka:

The book claims that RAW fueled the conflict in Sri Lanka by playing both sides. Here's an excerpt:

"In Sri Lanka, R&AW played a double game, helping the Sri Lankan Army to destroy the LTTE while protecting Indian assets against the Tigers and President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s hit men. According to a R&AW spymaster in Colombo, MEA bungled and allowed the Chinese to get a foothold in the island. Avinash Sinha arrived at Colombo Fort Café on the morning of 3 December 2005, looking forward to what he had been told was the best Sri Lankan breakfast in the city. Avinash, a R&AW operative, perhaps a few autumns younger than Kosala Ratnayake, had returned to Colombo that October after three years. He had recruited Kosala, a top functionary in the Sri Lankan government, over several wet evenings in January 2002. That was when the Sri Lankan regime had been seriously engaging with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) for peace talks".

Summary:

Indian investigative reporter Yatish Yadav's "RAW: A History of India’s Covert Operations" confirms what many of India's neighbors and long known and experienced: Indian intelligence agency RAW sabotages and subverts governments through its proxies and its assets in neighboring countries. India promotes and exacerbates local grievances to overthrow governments and break up nations. Yatish Yadav says "R&AW spooks relentlessly bribed, cajoled and blackmailed India’s enemies".

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

India-Iran-Afghanistan Axis Against Pakistan

Ex Indian Spy Reveals RAW's Successes Against Pakistan

Pakistan Helped Sri Lanka Defeat LTTE Created By RAW

Has Modi Stepped Up India's Cover War Against Pakistan?

Pakistan's Political and Military Policy Response to Peshawar Attack

Taliban or RAW-liban?

Respecting Rights of Fellow Humans: Huqooq ul Ibad in Islam

Counter-insurgencyOperation ZarbeAzb

India's Abiding Hostility Toward Pakistan

India's Israel Envy: Will Modi Attack Pakistan?

Who Killed Karkare?

CFR's View of the Taliban

Rising Religious Intolerance Threatens Pakistan's Future

Rise and Fall of Islamic Civilization

The Prophet I Know

Quaid-e-Azam Vision of Pakistan Inspired by Misaq-e-Madina

Sunday, August 19, 2018

PTI Chief Imran Khan Inaugurated Pakistan's 22nd Prime Minister

Pakistan Tehreek e Insaaf (PTI) Chief Imran Khan became Pakistan's 22nd prime minister after his 22-year-long quest for the highest executive office in the land. What is the historic significance of this event for Pakistan's democracy? Has it finally ended the three-decade-long dynastic duopoly of the Pakistan Muslim League and the Pakistan People's Party which are controlled by Sharifs and Bhuttos? Will the emergence of the PTI as the 3rd political force likely reduce corruption and improve governance in Pakistan?

Is Imran Khan's nomination of Sardar Usman Buzdar as Punjab Chief Minister a mistake? Will Prime Minister Imran Khan make mistakes as he begins his tenure? Will his opponents jump at every opportunity to attack him when he makes mistakes? Should he be allowed to make mistakes as he learns on the job? Is he entitled to a honeymoon period?

Do the Pakistani military and intelligence agencies call all the shots in Pakistan? Is the military's role in Pakistani electoral process highly exaggerated? Are there other forces including political parties and the voters which are as influential or even more influential in determining the outcome of elections? Does Imran Khan owe his victory to the alleged military support?

How is ISI different from other national intelligence agencies like CIA? Are Pakistani intelligence agencies unique in their influence on politicians and the political processes? Why does US President Trump think "Deep State" helped his opponents? Why did US Senator Charles Schumer warn Trump by telling MSNBC host Rachel Maddow: "they (intelligence agencies) have six ways from Sunday to get back at you"?

Viewpoint From Overseas host Misbah Azam discusses these questions with panelists Sabahat Ashraf and Riaz Haq (www.riazhaq.com)

https://youtu.be/X7smf1f4iN8

Tuesday, July 17, 2018

"Deep State" AKA "Khalai Makhlooq" vs Trump and Sharif

US President Donald Trump says he is being investigated by the "US Deep State" because he is trying to improve his nation's bilateral relations with Russia. Pakistan's ex Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has also made similar allegations of being targeted by "Khalai Makhlooq" (Pakistani Deep State) because of his efforts to make peace with India. Their narratives are strikingly similar. Sharif and Trump have polarized and divided their nations by asking their political supporters to stand by them and to reject what they describe as a political "witch hunt".

Donald Trump and Nawaz Sharif

Trump vs US Deep State:

In a press conference after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Mr. Trump said: "We have 90 percent of nuclear power between the two countries. It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous what’s going on with the probe". The probe Mr. Trump is calling "ridiculous" is the result of the consensus reached by US intelligence agencies that Russia meddled in 2016 US presidential election to help Mr. Trump win. President Putin confessed that he favored Trump over Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Trump's supporters have accused "US Deep State" made up of intelligence and security establishment and Democrats of pursuing an anti-Trump agenda to derail efforts to improve US-Russia ties. Trump himself at the Helsinki press conference said: "As president, I cannot make decisions on foreign policy in a futile effort to appease partisan critics or the media or Democrats who want to do nothing but resist and obstruct. Constructive dialogue between the United States and Russia forwards the opportunity to open new pathways toward peace and stability in our world. I would rather take a political risk in pursuit of peace than to risk peace in pursuit of politics. As president, I will always put what is best for America and what is best for the American people".

Sharif vs Khalai Makhlooq:

Nawaz Sharif and his supporters have long accused "Khalai Makhlooq" (Pakistani Deep State) for targeting him because of his efforts to improve ties with India. They reject any criticism of Sharif's eagerness to make friends with Indian Hindu Nationalist Prime Minister while ignoring India's proxy war of terror to destabilize and damage Pakistan.

Sharif's critics say that he is too soft on India's Modi in the same way that Trump's critics accuse him of being too cosy with Russia's Vladimir Putin. They cite Nawaz Sharif's total silence on the arrest and confessions of Indian intelligence agent Kulbhushan Jadhav in Balochistan. Sharif's silence on this issue is seen as his distrust in his own intelligence agencies.

Sharif and his supporters have bought the Indian narrative that Pakistani establishment is the root cause of all problems between India and Pakistan. It''s similar to the way Trump and his supporters accuse US establishment of being responsible for lack of progress on building better ties with Russia.

Sharm al Shaikh and Ufa Declarations:

In 2009 Sharm al Sheikh meeting between then prime ministers Yousuf Raza Gilani and Manmohan Singh, the joint declaration included the mention of India's involvement in Balochistan along with Kashmir and other issues.

In 2015 when Nawaz Sharif met with Narendra Modi in Ufa, Russia, the joint statement does not mention the the Kashmir issue. Nor did it raise the issue of the 2007 inquiry of the Samjhauta Express blast, the British government’s alleged findings that India was supporting the MQM, and the Pakistan's charge that India is supporting terrorist groups in Pakistan.

The difference between the Sharm al Sheikh and Ufa caught the attention of all in Pakistan and reinforced the perception that Sharif was eager to make any deal with Modi, even a deal that ignored Pakistan's national security interests. Many Americans have similar views about Trump's eagerness to make a deal with Putin.

Civil-Military Divide:

Indian and Western analysts and media promote the narrative of civil-military divide in Pakistan for lack of progress on India-Pakistan relations. In an article titled "Pakistan’s civil–military imbalance misunderstood", Husain Nadim of the University of Sydney says as follows:

"This absence of nuance in Western academic writing and commentaries on Pakistan is not just a blind spot. It is deliberate neglect whereby the dominant characterization of Pakistan’s civil–military relations is constructed to suit Western political interests that include aligning Pakistan’s national security policies with that of the West, and having a strong check on its nuclear program. Through aiding the civil–military divide in the country, the idea is to push back the mighty role of the Pakistan army from national security and foreign policy in hopes to seeking concession from the civilian political leadership."

On Sharif's eagerness to seek better ties with India, Husain Nadim says that "(Pakistani) military leaders advised caution and small steps to achieving sustainable peace with India — advice which Sharif ignored. After several months of futile attempts to court Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who pressed hard on Pakistan after his rise to power, Sharif faced an embarrassing situation. He accepted that his strategy had been a failure and allowed the military to devise a new strategy to engage India".

Who's at Fault?

In “How India Sees the World: Kautilya to the 21st Century”, the former India Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran recalls the crucial meeting of the CCS (Cabinet Committee on Security) on the eve of India-Pakistan Defense Secretary-level talks in May 2006, where the draft agreement, that had been approved by the Army and other stakeholders, was to be discussed. However, he said two key players, the-then National Security Advisor MK Narayanan and then Army Chief General J.J. Singh made last minute interventions to scuttle the proposal, according to a report in The Hindu newspaper.

“When the CCS meeting was held on the eve of the defense secretary–level talks, [Mr.] Narayanan launched into a bitter offensive against the proposal, saying that Pakistan could not be trusted, that there would be political and public opposition to any such initiative and that India’s military position in the northern sector vis- à-vis both Pakistan and China would be compromised. [Gen] J.J. Singh, who had happily gone along with the proposal in its earlier iterations, now decided to join Narayanan in rubbishing it,” Mr. Saran writes.

“This is when L. K. Advani surprised Musharraf by asking for Dawood Ibrahim. This took Musharraf back and a shadow was cast thereafter on the Agra summit.” “As Mr. Mishra put it: “Yaar, hote-hote reh gaya … Ho gaya tha, who toh.” Ex Indian Intelligence Chief A.S. Dulat

The above quote is from A.S. Dulat who has served as Chief of India's Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and as Special Director of India's Intelligence Bureau. He was speaking with Indian Journalist Karan Thapar of India Today on a variety of subjects including Kashmir and Musharraf-Vajpayee Agra summit.

Dulat has essentially confirmed the fact that Indian hawks like the BJP leader L.K. Advani are responsible for sabotaging the India-Pakistan summit.

There have now been multiple revelations by former Indian officials like Shyam Saran and AS Dulat as well as leaked US diplomatic cables detailing the causes of failures to resolve disputes in India-Pakistan talks in the last two decades. These disclosures thoroughly debunk the myth promoted by Indian security analysts, Indian politicians and some western think tanks blaming Pakistan, particularly the Pakistani military, for the continuing failures to resolve bilateral disputes with India.

Summary:

US President Donald Trump and Pakistan's ex prime minister Nawaz Sharif are both claiming they are victims of conspiracies by "Deep State" also known as Khalai Makhlooq in their respective countries. Each says that they are being targeted for wanting better relations with the leaders of their arch rivals in Russia and India. Their narratives are strikingly similar. Sharif and Trump have polarized and divided their own nations by asking the voters to stand by them and to reject what they describe as a political "witch hunt". Their critics argue that both leaders are too eager to make any deals with the enemies, even deals that do not take into account their countries best interests.

Here's a video clip of BBC Hardtalk's host Stephen Sackur challenging Pakistan Dawn Media Group's CEO Hameed Haroon to show evidence of Pakistani "Deep State" interference in the upcoming elections:

https://youtu.be/JQbt2QlVbwI

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

Sharif's and Trump's Strikingly Similar Narratives

Indian Agent Kulbhushan Jhadav's Arrest in Balochistan

MQM-RAW Link

A.S. Dulat and Shyam Saran on India-Pakistan Ties

America's "We're the Good Guys" Narrative

The Story of Pakistan's M8 Motorway

Pakistan-China-Russia vs India-Japan-US

Riaz Haq's Youtube Channel

PakAlumni Social Network

Wednesday, May 23, 2018

Proliferation of Cyber Hacking Tools in Pakistan

Many intelligence agencies are turning to the use of smartphone malware and spyware for the purpose of hacking and surveillance. The list of such agencies includes but not limited to US CIA, NSA, Mossad, RAW, MI6, ISI and others. Global proliferation of cyber hacking tools appears to have been accelerated with the US CIA's loss of control of its hacking tools including spyware, malware, viruses and trojans.

Stealth Mango and Tangelo:

Lookout, an American mobile security firm based in San Francisco, has recently published a report claiming that a "group or individuals that are believed to belong to the Pakistani military "has developed and released a "set of custom Android and iOS surveillanceware tools we’re respectively calling Stealth Mango and Tangelo". The report says: "These tools have been part of a highly targeted intelligence gathering campaign we believe is operated by members of the Pakistani military". The countries affected by it include Afghanistan, India, Iraq, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates, according to Lookout report.

Mango and Tangelo Spyware Targets. Source: Lookout

The targets in Pakistan include members of the foreign diplomatic corps who have visited conflict zones, particularly parts of Balochistan, and Pakistani officials involved in internal corruption investigations.

The goal of the Lookout report is to sell their security software as obvious from their concluding summary below:

"Stealth Mango and Tangelo is yet another example among the numerous campaigns we have uncovered (Dark Caracal, ViperRAT, FrozenCell, etc.) where threat actors are developing in-house custom surveillanceware. The actor behind Stealth Mango has stolen a significant amount of sensitive data from compromised devices without the need to resort to exploits of any kind. The actors that are developing this surveillanceware are also setting up their own command and control infrastructure and in some cases encountering some operational security missteps, enabling researchers to discover who the targets are and details about the actors operating it that otherwise are not as easily obtained. Relevant data has already been shared with the appropriate authorities. Lookout customers are protected against Stealth Mango and Tangelo and have been for several months since the beginning of the investigation."

Amnesty International Allegations:

Amnesty International has alleged that attackers are using fake online identities and social media profiles to "ensnare Pakistani human rights defenders online and mark them out for surveillance and cybercrime". The report titled "Human Rights Under Surveillance: Digital Threats against Human Rights Defenders in Pakistan" claims that Diep Saeeda, a Lahore-based human rights activist, has been targeted by a "network of individuals and companies based in Pakistan that are behind the creation of some of the tools seen in surveillance operations used to target individuals in Pakistan".

Amnesty says that "over the course of several months, Amnesty International used digital forensic techniques and malware analysis to identify the infrastructure and web pages connected to online attacks on human rights activists in Pakistan". "Amnesty International’s Technology and Human Rights team has been able to trace these attacks to a group of individuals based in Pakistan".

Proliferation of Hacking Tools:

In 2017, Wikileaks revealed that the American intelligence agency CIA has "lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal including malware, viruses, trojans, weaponized "zero day" exploits, malware remote control systems and associated documentation." The Wikileaks noted that that "the CIA made these systems unclassified".

Wikileaks said: "In what is surely one of the most astounding intelligence own goals in living memory, the CIA structured its classification regime such that for the most market valuable part of "Vault 7" — the CIA's weaponized malware (implants + zero days), Listening Posts (LP), and Command and Control (C2) systems — the agency has little legal recourse".

FBI agents have since arrested 29-year-old former CIA software engineer Joshua A. Schulte as a prime suspect in the release of the CIA documents via Wikileaks, according to New York Times.

It appears that the CIA's "hacking arsenal" is now being modified and used by many state and non-state actors to carry out hacking and surveillance of their targets around the world. The proliferation of cyber hacking tools appears to be a lot easier than the proliferation of the nuclear weapons technology.

Summary:

A report by American mobile security software vendor Lookout claims that individuals and groups connected to the Pakistani military are using spyware and malware tools on targets in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and UAE. Amnesty International alleges that Pakistan intelligence agencies are "network of individuals and companies based in Pakistan that are behind the creation of some of the tools seen in surveillance operations used to target individuals in Pakistan".

Many intelligence agencies are turning to the use of smartphone malware and spyware for the purpose of hacking and surveillance. The list of such agencies includes but not limited to US CIA, NSA, Mossad, RAW, MI6, ISI and others. Global proliferation of cyber hacking tools appears to have been accelerated when the US CIA lost control of its hacking tools including malware, viruses and trojans.

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

Pakistan Operation Arachnophobia

Social Media Tribalism

Revolution in Military Affairs: Cyberweapons and Robots

Cyber Warfare

Pakistani-American Founder of Fireeye Cyber Firm

Pakistan Boosts Surveillance to Fight Terror

Pakistan's Biometric Registration Database

Operation Zarb e Azb Launch

Ex Indian Spy Documents RAW's Successes in Pakistan

Intelligence Failures in Preventing Daily Carnage in Pakistan

What If Musharraf Had Said NO to US After 911?

Pakistani Computer Scientist Fights Terror

Pakistani Killer Drones to Support Anti-Terror Campaign

3G 4G Rollout Spurs Data Services Boom in Pakistan

Fiber Optic Connectivity in Pakistan

Sunday, February 12, 2017

A Conversation with White Nationalist Jared Taylor on Race in America

Is there an established link between race and intelligence? Are whites inherently more intelligent than people of color? If so, why did Europe suffer a rapid decline during the Dark Ages after the Fall of the Roman Empire? Did the Europeans' intelligence (IQ) precipitously drop? Or did the IQ of the Arab-Persian Muslims experience a meteoric rise during the Golden Age of Islam while Europe was in the Dark Ages?

World IQ Scores Map Source: American Info Maps

Where did the term "Caucasian" to describe Europeans come from? Does it suggest that Europeans originally migrated from Caucasus region in Central Asia? Didn't most Pakistanis and North Indians also come from the same Caucasus region to their new home in South Asia? If so, why is the IQ for Europeans (100) higher than the IQ of 82 for Indians and 84 for Pakistanis? Is it dealing with the harsh winters than has increased European IQ? If so, why do the Eskimos have lower IQs than the Europeans?

Is race a biological or a social/cultural construct in America? Does the one-drop (of blood) rule suggest it's more cultural than biological? Why is a person with even a single drop of African blood considered Black even if he/she looks and acts white in every way?

Why is the fertility rate (TFR) among whites declining rapidly below replacement levels? Is it because the whites are feeling threatened by immigrants of color and not wanting to bring white children into the world? Or is it part of the worldwide declining trend that has cut Japan's TFR to 1.44? With total fertility rate of less than 2 children per American woman and declining, how long can the United States continue to maintain its primacy as an economic, political and military superpower? With the aging population and workers per retiree down to 2.9 already, how will the US government continue to honor its commitments of social security benefits to the elderly? Would liberal immigration from non-white countries help resolve these issues?

Is immigration good or bad for America? Are non-white immigrants helping or hurting America? Are non-white immigrants a threat to White America? Why is California with its 40% white population doing so much better than France with its 80% white population? Why does California with a population of 38 million have slightly bigger economy than France with its 68 million population? If you claim America is only for white Europeans, how would you react to the native Americans claim that America is only for them?

Viewpoint From Overseas panelists Ali H. Cemendtaur and Riaz Haq (www.riazhaq.com) discuss these questions with Jared Taylor, White Nationalist founder and editor of American Renaissance.

https://youtu.be/Z61ReQvXWGM

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

Are People of Color Less Intelligent?

Golden Age of Islam

Harvard Genetics Study of South Asians

Pakistan Population Growth: Blessing or Curse?

Massive Support For Muslims in Silicon Valley After Trump Ban

Minorities Are Majority in Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley Pakistanis

Rise of the West After Industrial Revolution

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Pakistani Computer Scientist Helps Fight Terror

Simulation software developed by Fulbright scholar Zeeshan Usmani is helping investigators analyze bombings and pursue perpetrators of terror in Pakistan. Usmani is the product of currently the world's biggest Fulbright program being offered in Pakistan, with approximately 200 scholarships for advanced degrees in 2011 alone.

Usmani collaborated with Daniel Kirk at Florida Institute of Technology to develop Usmani-Kirk model for analyzing suicide bomb blasts. The model uses various inputs like before-and-after video footage, bombing debris, chemical residues, victims' injuries, casualty patterns, autopsy data and other available clues about suspects and forensic data to piece together the details of each incident and to help identify the cause and the perpetrators.

Upon returning to Pakistan with a doctoral degree, Usmani was introduced by a business executive Adnan Asdar to Karachi's senior police officials who were investigating the Ashura bombing of 28 December, 2009. The police immediately asked him to help.

Before Usmani showed up at the scene, Pakistan's Interior Minister Rahman Malik had already told the media that it was a suicide bombing orchestrated by the TTP (Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan), and the TTP had accepted responsibility for the "suicide bombing". Usmani took one look at the scene near the banyan tree at the Lighthouse Center and concluded that the casualty pattern did not support Malik's conclusion. Usmani's assertion gained support when Faisal Edhi, son of Abdus Sattar Edhi of Edhi Foundation, and later FIA investigators noticed a large quantity of heavy steel nuts strewn at the scene, according to Steve Inskeep who has described the incident in his recent book about Karachi titled "The Instant City". The steel nuts were too heavy to have been carried by suicide bombers who typically use ball bearings as shrapnel in their explosive vests to inflict maximum casualties. Other metal fragments found at the scene were understood to have come from a metal box that could be seen next to an Edhi ambulance before the blast but not in the post-blast video footage. This metal box apparently contained the explosives and the steel nuts. A body believed by the police to be of the suicide bomber was later confirmed as the body of a boy scout killed in the blast.

Usmani's analysis and detailed presentation persuaded the investigators that it was a remote controlled bomb rather than a suicide bomber that did the damage, and it was most likely perpetrated by a local sectarian outfit, not the TTP who target the security forces rather than ordinary citizens.

Faced with the ruthless and resourceful enemies of the state, Pakistani law-enforcement is in serious need of good intelligence work and competent professional investigators equipped with modern tools and capabilities to bring a semblance of peace and security in Pakistan. What Usmani is doing needs to be developed and replicated across the country. I hope Pakistani state will identify and make full use of all available talent in this area of expertise.

Here's a video of Usmani's presentation at TEDx Lahore:

Related Links:

Haq's Musings

CSI Pakistan

Pakistan Needs Police Reform

Pakistanis Studying Abroad

Sialkot Lynching

Intelligence Failures Amidst Daily Carnage

Quality of Higher Education in India and Pakistan

Developing Pakistan's Intellectual Capital

Intellectual Wealth of Nations

Pakistan's Story After 64 Years of Independence

Pakistan Ahead of India on Key Human Development Indices

Scholarships at Foreign Universities

Institute of International Education--Open Doors

UK's Higher Education Statistics Agency Report

Austrade on Education in Pakistan

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Pakistan's Intelligence Failures Amidst Daily Carnage

The best way to stop the increasing carnage on the streets of Pakistan, at least in the short term, is to stop the terrorist attacks well before they occur. Unfortunately, however, the intelligence agencies which are supposed to frustrate the blood-thirsty attackers appear totally ineffective, even paralyzed. The agencies, including the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Intelligence Bureau (IB), are caught in a continuing power struggle between the civilian political elite and the military brass for control, even as terror strikes on a daily basis, claiming dozens of innocent lives.

While the battle for the control of ISI is making headlines with the well-publicized conditions attached to the recent US aid bill at the urging of Pakistan's Ambassador Haqqani, what is less well known is the disgraceful attempt by President Zardari to pack the IB and the Interior ministry with his cronies.

Let's look at the story of Shoaib Suddle, who is known to be very close to Zardari. Suddle was the Karachi Police Chief in September, 1996, when Murtaza Ali Bhutto, the younger brother of Benazir, who was challenging the role of Zardari in the PPP, was allegedly killed by the police in an apparently planned ambush. Suddle is one of the accused in the murder case filed in this connection. Suddle was appointed by Zardari in June, 2008, to head the IB, in spite of strong opposition from Prime Minister Gilani and against the advice of the military. He was given an extension of two years after he reached retirement age. In April this year, a Pakistan Supreme Court judge set aside the extension given to him and other police officers facing trial in connection with the murder of Murtaza Bhutto. In spite of this rebuff by the apex court, he was taken to the US and Europe by Zardari along with the Director General of the ISI. Shortly after his return from the trip with Zardari, Prime Minister Gilani had Suddle replaced by Javed Noor as the DGIB in deference to the Supreme Court judgment.

Pakistan's top law enforcement officer and Zardari's man responsible for internal security is Interior Minister Rehman Malik. Malik was the person responsible for the personal security of Benazir Bhutto when she returned to Pakistan under a deal with former President Musharraf brokered by the US in 2007. After the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, there were accusations of lax security against Rehman Malik, and serious questions were raised about his absence from the scene of the deadly attack in Rawalpindi. In his current role as Interior Minister, Malik's effectiveness is hampered by the fact that he has had a rocky relationship with the ISI since the 1990s, when he was the deputy chief of the FIA.

Even as the Pakistani Army prepares a counterinsurgency campaign in FATA, it is extremely important to have serious intelligence professionals working together to gain the necessary knowledge to disrupt and disable the terrorist networks, which appear to be spreading to the heartland of Pakistan's Punjab province.

As the nation bleeds like never before, it is the prime need of the hour for both the military and political leaders in Pakistan to start seriously cooperating on matters of coordinated intelligence gathering and concerted counter-terror strategy, organization, plans and actions.

There is also a sense of urgency to initiate longer term actions to address the underlying causes of terror by offering alternatives to the young people who are recruited as suicide bombers, wreaking havoc on innocent lives on almost daily basis.

Related Links:

Feudal Punjab Fertile For Terror

Spy versus Spy

Islamabad Marriott Bombing

Questions About Rehman Malik

Can Pakistani Military Defeat the Terrorists?

Murtaza Bhutto's Murder

National Commission For Counter-terrorism

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Only the Paranoid Survive

Lame duck President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have reportedly initiated covert wars in Iran and Pakistan in the last year of their administration. In fact, The New York Times reports that the United States military since 2004 has used broad, secret authority to carry out nearly a dozen previously undisclosed attacks against Al Qaeda and other militants in Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere. These covert actions are reminders of the Bay of Pigs invasion of Fidel Castro's Cuba, an operation inherited by President John F. Kennedy that started under Eisenhower-Nixon administration in 1960. Needless to say that Bay of Pigs was a disaster for young JFK and the US. The invasion—planned and funded by the United States government beginning in 1960—was launched in April 1961, several months after John F. Kennedy assumed the presidency in the United States. The Cuban military, trained and equipped by the Soviet Union, defeated the invading force in a matter of days and the event accelerated a rapid deterioration in Cuban-American relations. This was further exacerbated the following year by the Cuban Missile Crisis. It seems that Barack Obama will most likely to be tested by these Bush-Cheney covert wars soon after he takes office, just as JFK was.

The news of secret planning of the CIA and US Special Ops joint covert actions in Pakistan started to leak in January, 2008. The New York Times reported that the United States had about 50 soldiers in Pakistan in early 2008. It was also reported that any expanded operations using C.I.A. operatives or Special Operations forces, like the Navy Seals, would be small and tailored to specific missions. Since these early reports, there has been a surge in CIA and Special Ops personnel operating out of Afghanistan to attack targets in Pakistan's FATA region at will.

A report published on March 26, 2008, by the Washington Post described the increasing number of successful strikes against Taliban and other insurgent units in Pakistan’s tribal areas. A follow-up article noted that, in response, the Taliban had killed “dozens of people” suspected of providing information to the United States and its allies on the whereabouts of Taliban leaders. Many of the victims were thought to be American CIA spies, and their executions—a beheading, in one case—were videotaped and distributed by DVD as a warning to others.

In June, 2008, at least 11 Pakistani paramilitary soldiers and 10 militants were killed in an air strike by US-led forces on a security post of the Pakistan's Frontier Corps in Sheikh Baba area along the Afghan border in Mohmand tribal region on Tuesday night. Fifteen people, including six paramilitary soldiers, were wounded. Local people said that sporadic gunfire continued throughout the night.

A Pakistan military spokesman called the June US attack a “cowardly and unprovoked” act and said that 11 Pakistani soldiers, including a major of the Mohmand Rifles, a detachment of the Frontier Corps, were killed in the attack. It condemned the attack.

“Such acts of aggression don’t serve the common cause of fighting terrorism,” he said, adding that a strong protest had been lodged by the Pakistan Army. He said that Pakistan reserved the right to protect its citizens and soldiers against aggression.

In September, 2008, a team of US Navy Seals was dropped by helicopter in the area of Angoor Adda in South Waziristan. It was followed by an air strike which killed several Pakistani civilians that US said were militants.

"The sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country will be defended at all cost and no external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan," said Pakistan's General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani in a strong statement after the September attack by US forces.

Since the September 2008 incursion by the US Navy seals, there have not been any more reported ground attacks in FATA but the frequency of Predator air-strikes on suspected Taliban and Al-Qaida targets has dramatically increased. Hardly a day goes by without reports of such strikes by US drones operated by the CIA.

The US covert intelligence operations in Pakistan appear to be aimed at more than just fighting Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Michel Chossudovsky, Director of Montreal based Center for Research on Globalization (author of America's "War on Terrorism") in his article "The Destabilization of Pakistan" says: "Washington's foreign policy course is to actively promote the political fragmentation and balkanization of Pakistan as a nation". He adds: "The US course consists in fomenting social, ethnic and factional divisions and political fragmentation, including the territorial breakup of Pakistan. This course of action is also dictated by US war plans in relation to both Iran and Afghanistan. This US agenda for Pakistan is similar to that applied throughout the broader Middle East Central Asian region."

In the wake of Mumbai attacks, the US covert activity is not all that Pakistanis have to worry about. In addition to reviving the talk of lightning air strikes strategy dubbed "Cold Start" against Pakistan, there has also been a rather open discussion in India about covert actions by Indian agents to destabilize and balkanize Pakistan. Former RAW chief B. Raman argues that India appoint a covert ops specialist as the new head of RAW. He says, “At this critical time in the nation’s history, RAW has no covert action specialists at the top of its pyramid. Get a suitable officer from the IB or the Army. If necessary, make him the head of the organization.”

Vikram Sood, another former top spy in India, elaborates on India's covert warfare options to target Pakistan in the following words: "Covert action can be of various kinds. One is the paramilitary option, which is what the Pakistanis have been using against us. It is meant to hurt, destabilize or retaliate. The second is the psychological war option, which is a very potent and unseen force. It is an all weather option and constitutes essentially changing perceptions of friends and foes alike. The media is a favorite instrument, provided it is not left to the bureaucrats because then we will end up with some clumsy and implausible propaganda effort. More than the electronic and print media, it is now the internet and YouTube that can be the next-generation weapons of psychological war. Terrorists use these liberally and so should those required to counter terrorism."

It seems that the India-Israel-US axis may be converging on a covert war to denuclearize and balkanize Pakistan.

Last year, Seymour Hersh wrote in the New Yorker magazine of clandestine operations against Iran. According to Hersh, United States Special Ops and CIA have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since 2007. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of “high-value targets” in the President’s war on terror, who may be captured or killed. But the scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which involve the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), have now been significantly expanded, according to the current and former officials.

In his recently published book, David Sanger talks about the Israeli anger and frustration after the US National Intelligence Estimate said Iran discontinued its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that it is currently not pursuing such a program. After the NIE report came out, Sanger says that the Israelis demanded that Bush provide them with three things: Bunker buster bombs, mid-air refueling support for Israeli bombers and flying rights in Iraqi airspace to facilitate Israeli air strikes on Iranian underground nuclear facilities at Natanz, Iran. Bush hesitated on the first two and flatly rejected the third demand to fly over Iraq, realizing how such collusion would put the 140,000 US troops in Iraq at tremendous risk. Instead, Bush assured Israel that the US will put significant resources into covert operations aimed at destabilizing Iranian government. Talking about Pakistan, Sanger recently told Charlies Rose as follows: "Pakistanis do not want to let Americans to know how many nuclear weapons Pakistan has and where they are stored. They know too well that the US Navy Seals are right next door in Afghanistan ready to seize control of Pakistan's nukes at short notice."

Taking about the many Bush-Cheney covert actions, a senior US intelligence official told Sanger, “Bush wrote a lot of checks that the next president is going to have to cash.”

In view of the widely reported interest by the United States, India and Israel in destabilizing or at least neutralizing Iran and Pakistan, it is quite natural for the two nations to be particularly vigilant, even paranoid to effectively counter covert warfare. As former Intel CEO Andy Grove puts it in one of his popular business books, "Only the Paranoid Survive".

While JFK only inherited one Bay of Pigs, Obama is inheriting multiple covert wars, each much like the Bay of Pigs. Given the history of similar botched operations by the CIA, Barack Obama needs to very carefully evaluate what George W. Bush is leaving for him rather than simply accept it as fait accompli. It is in Obama's best interest to be just as paranoid as Iran and Pakistan at this time.