Pervez Hoodbhoy on Mumbai

"LeT (Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, accused of Mumbai attacks) is based around Lahore, which is on the Pakistan-India border, in a town called Muridke. This has a huge militant training and charity complex. LeT’s membership is mostly Punjabi, which makes it linguistically and culturally quite unsuited for fighting in Afghanistan. You could say that LeT is an India-specific, Kashmir-specific group. Indeed, over the years it has had many military successes in Kashmir against Indian forces. But LeT, like other militant groups in Pakistan, sees a nexus between Indians, Americans, and Israelis. Hence they are all seen as enemies and fair game", says Pakistan's Peace Activist Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy.

Cristina Otten of German E-zine Focus Online interviewed Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy, Chairman of Physics Dept at Islamabad's Quaid-e-Azam University, following the Mumbai attacks. Here is the English translation of the text of the interview published in German.

Cristina Otten: Tensions between Pakistan and India have been growing after the Mumbai attacks. Are we close to a military escalation?

Pervez Hoodbhoy: In spite of vociferous demands by the Indian public, Manmohan Singh’s government has withstood the pressure to conduct crossborder strikes into Pakistan. Correspondingly, in spite of the bitter criticism by Islamic parties, Pakistan’s government has taken some action against the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT), the jihadist organization that is quite probably behind the attacks. For now, the tension has eased somewhat but another attack could push India over the fence.

CO: What makes the LeT so different from other militant groups? Is Pakistan really moving against it?

PH: LeT, one of the largest militant groups in Pakistan, was established over 15 years ago. It had the full support of the Pakistani military and Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) for over a decade because it focussed upon fighting Indian rule in Muslim Kashmir. Today it is one of the very few extremist groups left that does not attack the Pakistani arm and state; in contrast almost all others have turned into mortal enemies. We now hear that a few members of LeT, who were named by India, have been arrested. Time will tell whether this was a serious move, or if this was a ruse to ease the enormous pressure against Pakistan. If serious, then the Army and ISI will have earned the bitter enmity of yet another former ally. They are afraid of a repeat of their experience with Jaish-e-Muhammad, a formerly supported Islamic militant group that now is responsible for extreme brutalities, including torture and decapitations, of Pakistani soldiers captured in FATA. It’s a nightmarish situation for the Pakistan Army.

CO: How have Pakistanis reacted to the Mumbai massacre?

PH: The initial reaction was of sympathy. I did not see any celebrations, contrary to those I saw after 911. But then, as the Indian TV channels started accusing Pakistan and demanding that it be bombed in retaliation, the reaction turned to that of anger and then flat denial. Pakistanis did not want to accept that this attack was done by Pakistanis or had been launched from Pakistani soil. Subsequently one saw amazing mental calisthenics. Popular TV anchors, and their guests, invoked far-out conspiracy theories. Years ago, some of the same anchors had confidently (but wrongly) claimed that Kathmandu-Delhi Indian Airlines Flight 814 (IC814) had been hijacked by RAW to malign Pakistan. They had also ridiculed the notion that Pakistan was involved in the Kargil invasion. Now, pointing to the RSS hand in the Samjhota Express bombing, they are alternately ascribing the Mumbai attacks to radical Hindus, and to Jews and Americans. It is sad to see intelligent persons losing their marbles.

CO: Pakistan has always stressed that it will deliver the first nuclear strike if it feels threatened by India? Do you see any signs on the Pakistani sign to carry out its threat?

PH: About a week before the Mumbai massacre, President Asif Ali Zardari had given the assurance that Pakistan would not use nuclear weapons first. India had announced a no first use policy almost ten years ago. But Zardari is not taken seriously by the Pakistani generals who actually control the Bomb, and the Indian NFU declaration is frankly of no consequence. Cross-border raids by India could well ignite a conventional war. If that happens, all bets are off and it could escalate without warning into a nuclear conflict. For many years US defense strategists, belonging to various think tanks and war colleges, have been simulating conflicts between Pakistan and India. They say that a conventional war will almost certainly lead to a nuclear conclusion. Fear of nuclear weapons has made deterrence work. More accurately, deterrence has worked only thus far. No guarantees can be given for
the future.

CO: Why did the assassins choose India instead of committing attacks against Western allies in Afghanistan?

PH: LeT is based around Lahore, which is on the Pakistan-India border, in a town called Muridke. This has a huge militant training and charity complex. LeT’s membership is mostly Punjabi, which makes it linguistically and culturally quite unsuited for fighting in Afghanistan. You could say that LeT is an India-specific, Kashmir-specific group. Indeed, over the years it has had many military successes in Kashmir against Indian forces. But LeT, like other militant groups in Pakistan, sees a nexus between Indians, Americans, and Israelis. Hence they are all seen as enemies and fair game.

CO: What did the Mumbai terrorists want?

PH: No demands were made and all hostages were killed. So the purpose of the attack was never formally declared. On the other hand, the stated goals of LeT and similar organizations based in Pakistan leave little doubt. The attack clearly sought to hurt India’s economy and its newly acquired reputation as an economic powerhouse, and to create a climate of war between India and Pakistan. If Pakistan moves its
troops towards the eastern border the pressure on the Taliban in FATA, which is close to the western border, would be lessened. Still another reason would be to encourage pogroms against Muslims in India. This would swell the ranks of the extremists, and also have the added benefit of destabilizing both the Pakistani and Indian states. Finally, the attack was a means of releasing hatred against non-
Muslims.

CO: What differences and parallels do you see between the Mumbai attacks and the attack in the in Marriott Hotel in Islamabad?

PH: They were quite dissimilar in how they were executed. The Mumbai attacks were extremely intricate, used GPS and voice-over-internet protocols for communication purposes, involved extensive militar training, and probably required planning over a period of a year. The goal was to kill foreigners, particularly Jews and Americans, although Muslims were also collateral casualties. On the other hand, the Marriot bombing in Islamabad was a relatively simple affair involving a single dump-truck with a suicide bomber, and its victims were principally Muslims. The basic purpose, however, was similar – to destabilize the Pakistani state, take revenge on the US (2 of the 58 killed were US marines), and raise the cost of war in Afghanistan and FATA.

CO: In the West experts talk about a new dimension of terror in India. Do you also see tight connections between Lashkar-e- Taiba and al-Qaida?

PH: One is naturally tempted to guess a nexus between LeT and Al-Qaida. Of course, they do share similar goals. But in the world that extremist inhabit, mere similarity is insufficient – it has to be much closer than that and small ideological differences are amplified out of proportion. As yet there is no proof of joint operations or cooperation. So presently this is no more than a plausible hypothesis.

CO: What role does Kashmir play in the current conflict?

PH: Since 1987, Kashmir has been in a state of upheaval. Fraudulent elections conducted by India led to widespread resentment, followed by a horrifically bloody crackdown by Indian security forces. Pakistan’s army saw opportunity in this, and waged a covert war in Kashmir using jihadists to “bleed India with a thousand cuts”. The United Jihad Council, which oversees the activities of an estimated 22 Pakistan-based organizations, acts outside of the domain of the Pakistani state but it has had active support from the country’s army and intelligence agencies. The Kargil conflict in 1999 brought matters to a head when General Musharraf initiated a war with the assistance of jihadist forces. This inflicted severe damage on Indian forces but Pakistan was ultimately forced to withdraw. Jihadists subsequently celebrated General Musharraf as a hero, and vilified Nawaz Sharif for a cowardly
surrender.

CO: In January 2002, General Musharraf had declared that no groups on Pakistani territory would be permitted to launch cross-border attacks. Was this promise fulfilled?

PH: Subsequently there indeed was a decline in cross-border infiltrations, and some lessening of the covert support given by Pakistani agencies. But this was far from zero and they maintained a strong presence. On a personal note: soon after the terrible October 8, 2005 earthquake, I had gone to various areas of Azad Kashmir for relief work. There I found the Lashkar-i-Tayyaba, Jaish-e-Muhammad, Sipah-i-Sahaba,
and other banned jihadist organizations operating openly and freely using military-style six-wheeled vehicles, as well as displaying their weapons. Their relief efforts were far better organized than that of the Pakistan army and, in fact, they were pulling injured soldiers out of the rubble. When I mentioned this fact to General Musharraf a few months later at a Kashmir peace conference, he was very angry at me for discussing a tabooed subject. On the one hand, we have radical extremists in Pakistan who want to bring strict Islamic law into force and demonize the West. On the other hand, however, the government presents itself as a friend and ally of the United States.

CO: Could you please describe this antagonism and explain where it originates from?
What does this tell us about the growth of extremism in Pakistan?

PH: Radical extremism is the illegitimate offspring of a union between the United States under Ronald Reagan, and Pakistan under General Zia ul-Haq. Twenty five years ago, the two countries had joined up to harness Islamic fighters for expelling the Soviets from Afghanistan. The US was quite happy to see radical Islam spreading because it served its goal at the time. Simultaneously, Pakistan saw a major
social transformation under General Zia. Prayers in government departments were deemed compulsory, floggings were carried out publicly, punishments were meted out to those who did not fast in Ramadan, selection for university academic posts required that the candidate demonstrate knowledge of Islamic teachings, and jihad was
declared essential for every Muslim. But today the government is in open conflict with the radicals. It has to deal with a spontaneous groundswell of Islamic zeal. The notion of an Islamic state – as yet in some amorphous and diffuse form – is more popular today than ever before as people look desperately for miracles to rescue a failing state. Even though the government and military in Pakistan are allied formally to the US, the people are strongly against the US.

CO: What parts of the Pakistani society support al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden?

PH: Baluchistan and Sind are far less supportive than Punjab or the NWFP. The amazing fact is that parts of Pakistan’s upper class – which is very Westernized but also very anti-Western – also support the Islamists. I find it tragic that there is no uproar in the country when Taliban suicide bombers target mosques, funerals, hospitals, girls schools, and slaughter policemen and soldiers. People have become so anti-American that it has blinded them to these atrocities. Even the
Pakistani left is thoroughly confused and mistakes the Taliban as anti-imperialist
fighters.

CO: And where do you stand on this matter? Do you see anything that the Islamists have to offer?

PH: The people of Pakistan need and deserve everything that people everywhere else want. This means food, jobs, houses to live in, a system of justice and governance, and protection of life and property. Equally, people need freedom of worship and thought, education for both males and females, and protection of their freedom as
summarized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These are everybody’s primary needs. After this – a distinct second – come matters that deal with national sovereignty, foreign policy, various global issues, etc. Frankly, I cannot see Pakistan’s Islamists offering anything positive. They are against population planning, educating females, tolerating other sects or religions, etc. They neither know the outside world, nor want to know it. All they know – and know well – is
how to make war. Fortunately, as their rout in the recent elections showed, most Pakistanis do not want to live under their narrow doctrines and belief system.

CO: President Asif Ali Zardari promised to hunt terrorists and to destroy terror camps in Pakistan? But his affirmations seem to be halfhearted. Can’t he do more or doesn’t he want do more?

PH: It is not up to him to do more. The real power lies with the Pakistan Army, which is still undecided as to who the real enemy is. The Army has lost nearly two thousand soldiers in battles with extremists. But it still cannot convince itself that they constitute an existentialist threat to Pakistan. One can understand this reluctance. Over the years, officers and soldiers were recruited into the Army on the basis that they were defenders of Islam and would always fight India. Instead they now have to fight forces that claim to be even better defenders of Islam. Worse, they are no longer being called upon to fight India, which is what they were trained for. So there is confusion and demoralization, and practically zero public understanding or support. Therefore, Pakistani soldiers are not fighting well at all in FATA. Many have surrendered without a fight. This is the first time in my life that I feel the Army should be supported, but only to the extent that it fights the extremists without killing innocents. Unfortunately, the Army’s current tactic is to flatten villages suspected of harbouring terrorists. The collateral damage is huge and completely unacceptable. Pakistan has armed and financed the Taliban after the US invasion of Afghanistan. The CIA pays Pakistan to arrest al-Qaeda operatives, but Pakistan uses the money to fund the Taliban resurgence in northwest Pakistan.

CO: Any changes under the new president?

PH: It will take time – and perhaps still more suffering – to kick an old habit. Even though the Army is being literally slaughtered by the Taliban, it continues to make a distinction between the “good” and “bad” Taliban. The good ones are, by definition, those who attack only US/Nato or Indian interests in Afghanistan, but do not attack the Pakistan Army. The good ones are seen as essential for having a
friendly Afghanistan when, as will surely happen some day, the Americans withdraw. Among the good Taliban are jihadist leaders such as Jalaludin Haqqani. On the other hand, Baitullah Mehsud or Maulana Fazlullah, are considered bad Taliban because they attack the Army and the state. Interestingly, Army inspired propaganda paints the bad
Taliban as Indian agents – which is quite ridiculous. This false differentiation is the real reason for the Army’s ambivalence and inability to deal effectively with the Taliban menace.

CO: Pakistan is a nuclear state. Should we fear that one day the Taliban or al-Qaida could get access to the nuclear arsenal?

PH: I am more worried about extremists having access to nuclear materials, particularly highly enriched uranium, rather than completed weapon. Because of secrecy requirements, it is very difficult for outsiders to monitor the output of uranium enrichment or plutonium reprocessing plants. Interestingly, we are seeing a shift away from nuclear weapons in the West. The unusability of nuclear weapons by national states is being recognized even by mainstream politicians in the US and Europe because they no longer guarantee the monopoly of power. This makes possible the ultimate de-legitimization of nuclear weapons, and hence winding down of fissile material production globally. This may be our best long-term hope of countering the nuclear terrorist threat, whether by Al-Qaida or other terrorist groups. Meanwhile, in the short term, great care must be given to watching over suspicious nuclear activities.

CO: What should India do and what is your forecast for the region?

PH: India should not attack Pakistan. This would be counter-productive in every possible way. Even if it wins a war, it will be a pyrrhic victory. On the other hand, a small attack can be no more than a pin-prick. This would do more harm than good because it will unite the army and the jihadists who, at this juncture in history, are in serious confrontation with each other. Worse, even a small attack could lead to large response, and then escalate out of control. Nuclear armed
countries simply cannot afford skirmishes. I think India’s demand for action against jihadist groups is entirely legitimate, but this must be done by Pakistan, which is susceptible to international pressure. To get rid of militants and extremists – whether Muslim or Hindu – is in the best interests of both Pakistan and India.

CO: Will Pakistani extremists win or can the West still bring about a rebound?

PH: It’s a grim situation but not irreversible. The invasion of Iraq, and US imperial policies over the last decades, created a hatred for Americans that ultimately translated into support for all who fight them. Most Pakistanis do not approve of the Taliban’s fundamental and primitivist social agenda. But, by virtue of fighting the Americans, popular sentiment is still with them. So, reducing anti-Americanism is the key. One hopes that Barack Obama will be able to undo some of the harm his country did to Pakistan. Let’s see. But basically it is for Pakistanis – not Indians or anybody else – to fight it out. We Pakistanis have to realize that this is a war for our very existence as a civilized nation. Western support for Pakistan must be very judicious and not too overt. Similarly, isolating Pakistan, or inflicting harsh punitive measures, could easily backfire. The Taliban and allied extremists have a real chance of winning in Pakistan. The state is already crumbling in places and it could disintegrate quite rapidly, leaving the fanatics in charge.

Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy is chairman of the physics department at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, a frequent commentator on nuclear and security matters, and a member of the Permanent Monitoring Panel on Terrorism of the World Federation of Scientists.

Here is a comprehensive video on the origins of Kashmir dispute and the positions of various parties as presented by Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy:



Related Links:

Mastermind of Mumbai Massacre

Pakistan, US Act in Mumbai's Aftermath

Can India "Do A Lebanon" in Pakistan?

ISI Rogues

Hoodbhoy on India

Anti-Corruption Day, Blagojevich and Zardari

When Barack Obama was elected president, Governor Blagojevich of Illinois saw opportunity in the vacancy created in the U.S. Senate. "I've got this thing and it's f------ golden, and uh, uh, I'm just not giving it up for f------ nothing," he allegedly said, according to U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago. Fitzgerald has the governor's recorded conversations demanding $500,000 to a million dollars to sell the senate seat.

How ironic! The governor of a major American state that is sending its senator to the White House as president got charged with massive corruption on Dec 9, 2008, the day designated as International Anti-Corruption Day by the United Nations.

This latest corruption scandal in the United States confirms that corruption exists in all parts of the world to varying degrees, including the industrialized world. However, this report also illustrates that, unlike Pakistan and many other less developed countries, there is greater accountability in the West for the people in power. Official corruption is almost universal but the extent of corruption and the strength of anti-corruption enforcement measures vary widely. It is not the constitution or the laws on the books that make a difference; it's the independence of the career civil servants and the judiciary that differentiates the US system from what is observed in Pakistan and other developing nations. The US attorneys, for example, pursue investigations and prosecutions independently of the politicians who appoint them. The judges are appointed for life and they do not take dictation from politicians and their appointees either.

At the time of the recent India-US nuclear deal approval, members of India's parliament, including convicts released on parole, were offered all kinds of incentives to vote in a certain way. Both the government and the opposition tried desperately to entice them with promises of largess, influence and plum jobs in return for their vote. The BJP opposition, however, could not match the resources of the governing Congress party and the deal was approved.

There have been significant bribery allegations involving Indian politicians and officials and corporations such as Bofors, Enron and Xerox. The Swedish firm Bofors AB allegedly paid Rs.640 million ($13 million) in bribes to middlemen to get the contracts for the deal signed in 1986. Nearly a decade later, Enron India spent US$ 20 million in "educating" Indian bureaucrats about the role of private companies in power generation, an euphemism for bribes. Two telecommunications companies, Essar and Swisscom, were alleged to have paid a former minister, Sukh Ram, a hefty amount during early 1996 to help change the original license conditions, which it had signed with the Department of Telecommunications. Except Bofors, none have been prosecuted to any extent. Meanwhile, India's spending on defense procurement and infrastructure spending involving foreign companies has increased several fold without much scrutiny of how the deals are made.

Not only is there lack of accountability in the developing nations, it seems that corrupt politicians such as Pakistan's President Zardari, widely known as Mr. Ten Percent, get rewarded with high offices by the illiterate electorate living in a feudal society, with the assistance of amnesties arranged by the United States. It is what President Bush often describes as "soft bigotry of low expectations" when the West pushes for the pardon of corrupt politicians in countries such as Pakistan, in clear violation of the UN Conventions against Corruption. What is worse, such policies of condoning corruption are pursued in the name of promoting democracy in the third world.

The behavior of condoning corruption in the third world extends to the private sector as well, with American and European companies routinely engaging in bribery in Africa, Middle East and Asia. For example, Forbes reported last year on Siemens involvement in bribery in the developing world as follows: "The World Bank is looking at an electrical power plant project in Pakistan concluded in the mid-1990s, which was built and later partially maintained by Siemens and financed by the World Bank. The World Bank is concerned that Siemens' costs for the project may have been overpriced.Siemens is currently engulfed in a slush-fund scandal, in which prosecutors allege that managers siphoned off hundreds of millions of euros in company money to obtain foreign contracts.Siemens' own internal investigation uncovered 420 mln euros in suspicious payments going back to 1999 which may have been made to obtain telecommunications equipment contracts in a range of foreign countries. The Bavarian State Prosecutors office has said the sum is estimated in the triple-digit millions of euros." Subsequent to these reports, Daniel Noa, Siemens' top anti-corruption chief, stepped down after only six months at the company, with little explanation given.

There have also been reports from Munich about Siemens pleading guilty to bribing politicians and officials in Nigeria, Russia and Libya. Last month, Siemens said it would take a charge of about 1 billion euros ($1.29 billion) this fiscal year as part of a settlement of bribery investigations by authorities in Germany and the United States.I believe such reports represent only the tip of the iceberg of corruption involving Western multi-nationals and politicians and officials in developing nations.

There are definitely laws on the books in the West such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) in the United States. Almost all ethics classes taught in the Western management schools and company training courses cover this topic. However, the question is whether these laws are really enforced and how often are the companies held accountable? Or do they simply rely on the foreign governments to report misbehavior? It would be a fantasy to expect the officials and politicians on the receiving end to report incidents of bribery as they are the main beneficiaries. But I think the German, French, US, British and other governments of developed nations who claim higher moral positions should be cracking down on these reprehensible practices just to enforce their own laws and live up to their own higher standards. While it may be argued and it is like putting the shoe on the wrong foot, I see it as the only hope we have of containing such widespread corruption in developing nations that is robbing their people blind.

Here's a video clip on global corruption by US corporations:



Related Links:

Bhutto Convicted in Switzerland

Corruption in Pakistan

Transparency International Survey 2007

Is Siemens Guilty?

Zardari Corruption Probe

Dawood Ibrahim--the Mastermind of Mumbai Massacre?

Yoichi Shimatsu, former editor of The Japan Times, believes that the Mumbai attack was "a made-in-Mumbai production much like the Bollywood crime movies about D-Company’s many bloody gang wars". According to Shimatsu, a Hindu breakaway gang, in concert with Hindutva politicians and police officers, revived the turf wars in 2007 with a spike in shootings and arrests, along with gaining Pakistani approval for Dawood’s deportation. Then D-Company (Dawood's gang), with a few lowly recruits from Pakistan, stuck back.

Dawood Ibrahim's name shows up on top of the list of most wanted men Indian Government wants Pakistan to extradite to India. Did he do it? Is he in Pakistan? Is he in Dubai? Where is he? Is he dead? Shimatsu explains Dawood's whereabouts as follows: Washington and London both agreed with India's legal claim and removed the longstanding "official protection" accorded for his past services to Western intelligence agencies. U.S. diplomats, however, could never allow Dawood's return. He simply knows too much about America's darker secrets in South Asia and the Gulf, disclosure of which could scuttle U.S.-India relations. Dawood was whisked away in late June to a safe house in Quetta, near the tribal area of Waziristan, and then he disappeared, probably back to the Middle East.

The full text of Yoichi Shimatsu's article published by New American Media website is as follows:

The coordinated nighttime assault against seven major targets in Mumbai is reminiscent of the 1993 bombings that devastated the Bombay Stock Exchange. The recent attack bears the fingerprints of the same criminal mastermind – meticulous preparation, ruthless execution and the absence of claims or demands.

The eerie silence that accompanied the blasts are the very signature of Ibrahim Dawood, now a multi-millionaire owner of a construction company in Karachi, Pakistan. His is hardly a household name around the world like Osama bin Laden. Across South Asia, however, Dawood is held in awe and, in a twist on morals, admired for his belated conversion from crime boss to self-styled avenger.

His rise to the highest rungs of India's underworld began from the most unlikely position as the diligent son of a police constable in the populous commercial capital then known as Bombay.

His childhood familiarity with police routine and inner workings of the justice system gave the ambitious teenager an unmatched ability to outwit the authorities with evermore clever criminal designs. Among the unschooled ranks of Bombay gangland, Ibrahim emerged as the coherent leader of a multi-religious mafia, not just due to his ability to organize extortion campaigns and meet payrolls, but also because of his merciless extermination of rivals.

Dawood, always the professional problem-solver, gained the friendship of aspiring officers in India's intelligence service known as Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). He soon attracted the attention of American secret agents, then supporting the Islamic mujahideen in their battle against the Soviet occupiers of Afghanistan. Dawood personally assisted many a U.S. deep-cover operation funneling money to Afghan rebels via American-operated casinos in Kathmandu, Nepal.

Eager to please all comers, Dawood occasionally got his wires crossed, providing travel documents and other amenities to Islamist airplane hijackers. In response, Washington spymasters tried to unofficially "impound" his investment in the Nepalese casinos. Dawood's fury is legendary among locals. An honorable businessman, he held to the strict belief that a deal is a deal and there can be no reneging for any reason.

As Bombay moved into the league of Asia's premier cities – hotel rates and apartment rentals are the highest in the region – Dawood could have led a comfortable life as top dog. Instead he suffered a spasm of conscience, a newfound moral outrage, when rightwing Hindu nationalists destroyed a mosque in northern India in 1992, slaying 2000 Muslim worshippers, mostly women and children.

One day in the following May, his henchmen set off bombs across Bombay, killing more than 300 people. His personal convictions had – uncharacteristically - overcome his dispassionate business ethics. Reeling in shock, his top lieutenant, a Hindu, attempted to assassinate Dawood. A bloody intra-gang war followed, but as always Dawood triumphed, even while away in exile in Dubai and Karachi.

In the ensuing decade, at the height of violence in Kashmir, Dawood sent his heavily armed young trainees by boat from Karachi on covert landings onto Indian beaches. This same method was used in the Mumbai assault with more boats, seven craft according to initial navy reports.

Why the timing of this raid, on the dawn of Thanksgiving in America? The leader of India's opposition and former deputy Prime Minister L. K. Advani had long sought Dawood's extradition from Pakistan, a move opposed by the then military government in Islamabad. With the restoration of civilian rule, the new Pakistani prime minister (Gillani) consented to New Delhi's deportation request.

Washington and London both agreed with the India's legal claim and removed the longstanding "official protection" accorded for his past services to Western intelligence agencies. U.S. diplomats, however, could never allow Dawood's return. He simply knows too much about America's darker secrets in South Asia and the Gulf, disclosure of which could scuttle U.S.-India relations. Dawood was whisked away in late June to a safe house in Quetta, near the tribal area of Waziristan, and then he disappeared, probably back to the Middle East.

As in the case of America's Afghan war protégé Osama bin Laden, the blowback to U.S. covert policy came suddenly, this time with spectacular effects in Mumbai. The assault on the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel will probably go down as the first lethal blow to the incoming Obama administration. The assailants, who spoke Punjabi and not the Deccan dialect, went to a lot of trouble to torch the prestigious hotel, which is owned by the Tata Group. This industrial giant is the largest business supporter of the U.S.-India nuclear cooperation agreement, and Tata is now planning to become a nuclear power supplier. The Clintons, as emissaries of Enron, were the first to suggest the nuclear deal with New Delhi, so Obama inherits the Mumbai catastrophe even before he takes office.

Dawood, ranks fourth on Forbes' list of the world's 10 most wanted fugitives from the law. After the new round of attacks that killed more than 100 people and laid waste top five-star hotels, Dawood can now contend for the No.1 spot in the coming months and years. In contrast to the fanatic and often ineffective bin Laden, Dawood is professional on all counts and therefore a far more formidable adversary. Yet some in Pakistan's military intelligence agency say that Dawood is dead, killed in July. This version of events is much the same as a variation of the bin Laden story. If true, then his underlings are carrying on the mission of an outlaw transfigured into a legend.

Yoichi Shimatsu. Former editor of The Japan Times in Tokyo and journalism lecturer at Tsinghua University in Beijing. Shimatsu has covered the Kashmir crisis and Afghan War.

Related Links:

Dawood Provided Logistics to Mumbai Attackers

Dawood Ibrahim Behind Mumbai Attacks

Solving Mumbai Puzzle

No One Knows Mumbai Better

Pakistan, US Act in Mumbai's Aftermath

A series of actions are being taken by Pakistan and the US in the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attacks. Pakistan is cracking down on LeT militants and the US is pursuing sanctions on former ISI and Pakistani military officers. Here's a snapshot of what's happening as reported in the media:

Excerpt from President Zardari's OpEd in NY Times today:

India is a mature nation and a stable democracy. Pakistanis appreciate India’s democratic contributions. But as rage fueled by the Mumbai attacks catches on, Indians must pause and take a breath. India and Pakistan — and the rest of the world — must work together to track down the terrorists who caused mayhem in Mumbai, attacked New York, London and Madrid in the past, and destroyed the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad in September. The terrorists who killed my wife are connected by ideology to these enemies of civilization.

These militants did not arise from whole cloth. Pakistan was an ally of the West throughout the cold war. The world worked to exploit religion against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan by empowering the most fanatic extremists as an instrument of destruction of a superpower. The strategy worked, but its legacy was the creation of an extremist militia with its own dynamic.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting on Pakistani crackdown on militants as follows:

Pakistan intensified its crackdown on the terror outfit alleged to have orchestrated November's three-day siege of Mumbai, arresting about 40 people Tuesday in raids on militant camps and offices across northwestern and central parts of the country. But a senior Pakistani official made it clear that no suspect arrested by Pakistan would be handed over to India.

A report in Wall Street Journal says US is seeking UN sanctions against Pakistani individuals it believes support terror. Here's an excerpt from the report:

The Bush administration wants the United Nations to put several prominent Pakistanis ( including General Hamid Gul) on a financial blacklist for their alleged support of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the militant group blamed by India for last month's Mumbai terror attacks, according to diplomats familiar with the matter.

The diplomats wouldn't identify the names of the Pakistani individuals being targeted by the U.S., but they are expected to include some former leaders of Pakistan's powerful spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI.

A U.S.-led action by the U.N. against ISI officers, either retired or current, would mark a break from past U.S. policy towards the Pakistani spy agency, said South Asia experts.

Meanwhile, doubts also continue to be expressed about the causes and the culprits of the attacks. It appears that the Indian investigators of Mumbai are operating with only a few pieces of a much larger and more complex puzzle of the tragic terror attacks in Mumbai. What is needed is a broader, more independent, high-level investigation that also looks into the role of Indian intelligence agencies before, during and after Mumbai attacks. Just based on the few reported pieces of this large and complex puzzle, it seems that Pakistan is at least partially culpable, but India must also share responsibility for the horrible treatment of its Muslim minority and the role its security officials and intelligence agencies have played in their dealings with unsavory characters and gangs involved in domestic and international terror.

Former editor of Japan Times Yoichi Shimatsu believes that blaming LeT is a "convenient solution" for the politicians who are trying to cement an Indo-American civilian nuclear pact. Shimatsu writes in an article published by New American Media as follows:

Conservative politicians in New Delhi have seized on the brutal Mumbai attack to discredit the nationalist revolt in Kashmir and undermine the five U.N. Security Council resolutions (1948-1965) that call for a plebiscite on the status of the once-independent country. By linking Lashkar to Mumbai, the Indian right hope to deter President-elect Barack Obama from his oft-stated policy of bringing the Kashmir issue to the fore.

These same politicians hope to repeat their successful handling of Bill Clinton, who reversed the American policy of sanctions for India’s nuclear bomb tests in 1998 within two short years by proposing nuclear cooperation with New Delhi. The Enron gas-fired electricity plant outside Mumbai played a major role in that about-face.


Yoichi Shimatsu believes that the recent Mumbai attack was "a made-in-Mumbai production much like the Bollywood crime movies about D-Company’s many bloody gang wars". According to Shimatsu, a Hindu breakaway gang, in concert with Hindutva politicians and police officers, revived the turf wars in 2007 with a spike in shootings and arrests, along with gaining Pakistani approval for Dawood’s deportation. Then D-Company (Dawood Ibrahim's gang), with a few lowly recruits from Pakistan, stuck back.

Solving the Mumbai Attacks Puzzle

It appears that the Indian investigators of Mumbai are operating with only a few pieces of a much larger and more complex puzzle of the tragic terror attacks in Mumbai. What is needed is a broader, more independent, high-level investigation that also looks into the role of Indian intelligence agencies before, during and after Mumbai attacks. Just based on the few reported pieces of this large and complex puzzle, it seems that Pakistan is at least partially culpable, but India must also share responsibility for the horrible treatment of its Muslim minority and the role its security officials and intelligence agencies have played in their dealings with unsavory characters involved in domestic and international terror.

Former editor of Japan Times Yoichi Shimatsu believes that blaming LeT is a "convenient solution" for the politicians who are trying to cement an Indo-American civilian nuclear pact. Here is a piece by Shimatsu published by New American Media website.


On India’s “most-wanted” list of 20 suspects believed to have planned the recent Mumbai attacks is the name of fugitive crime boss Dawood Ibrahim, who ordered an earlier wave of bombings 15 years ago. Among those chief suspects, only Dawood has sufficient local knowledge, an entrenched organization -- known as D-Company -- and the deep pockets for such a complex operation in a world city.

The bold raid by young gunmen, who apparently came by sea, was preceded by extensive preparations by city insiders – mapping and targeting were specific and explosives were stocked inside hotel rooms rented before the attack. Most telling was an early police report that indicated one of Dawood’s lieutenants inside the Mumbai Customs House organized the transfer of guns and ammunition from warehouses on Sassoon Dock onto the speedboats used in the landing.

The assault was a made-in-Mumbai production much like the Bollywood crime movies about D-Company’s many bloody gang wars. A Hindu breakaway gang, in concert with conservative politicians and police officers, revived the turf wars in 2007 with a spike in shootings and arrests, along with gaining Pakistani approval for Dawood’s deportation. Then D-Company, with a few lowly recruits from Pakistan, stuck back.

Why then is New Delhi and Washington insisting that Islamic militants in Pakistan are primarily responsible for the attack while downplaying Dawood’s larger role?

Lashkar-e-Taiba is the convenient solution for the politicians who are trying to cement an Indo-American “civilian” nuclear pact and military allinace, and every such arranged marriage demands a common enemy.

Blaming the Lahore-based Lashkar is all-too easy since the outfit was once the West Point of the Kashmir insurgency. The Army of the Righteous, as it is known in English, was a paramilitary force par excellence that routinely mauled the Indian Army along the Himalayan ridge that forms the Line of Control of divided Kashmir. In an attack on the strategic town of Kargil in late spring 1999, Lashkar broke through India’s alpine defense line and came close to forcing New Delhi to the negotiating table.

Along the sawtooth LoC, Lashkar is respected by professional soldiers on both side. A Pakistani hero who fought on the Baltistan heights, Corporal Ahmed, told me of his admiration for the stoicism of these jihadis, who wore sandals to battle in the snow. At a checkpoint in Indian-controlled Kargil, an army captain wearing a Sikh turban said frankly that nobody in the Indian Army could fight man-to-man against Lashkar.

Lashkar earned its reputation in clean-fought mountain warfare, pitting lightly armed guerrillas against Indian armor and superior firepower.

In its finest hours, these fighters would never consider the dirty tactics used against civilians in Mumbai, for example, the gangland-style executions using a shot to the back of a kneeling captive’s head. That is more typical of the Mumbai underworld.

Like many of the misguided decisions in the war on terror, the banning of Lashkar by Pakistan in 2002 did more harm than good. Without central discipline and a unifying cause, splinter groups broke off and many a cadet went solo. During his residency in Karachi, Dawood is known to have sent his young recruits for training by former Lashkar instructors. The moralistic cause had degenerated into a school for hitmen.

Conservative politicians in New Delhi have seized on the brutal Mumbai attack to discredit the nationalist revolt in Kashmir and undermine the five U.N. Security Council resolutions (1948-1965) that call for a plebiscite on the status of the once-independent country. By linking Lashkar to Mumbai, the Indian right hope to deter President-elect Barack Obama from his oft-stated policy of bringing the Kashmir issue to the fore.

These same politicians hope to repeat their successful handling of Bill Clinton, who reversed the American policy of sanctions for India’s nuclear bomb tests in 1998 within two short years by proposing nuclear cooperation with New Delhi. The Enron gas-fired electricity plant outside Mumbai played a major role in that about-face.

So did the Battle of Kargil. A greater international leader would have seen that the Islamic tactical victory was the key for dislodging New Delhi’s institutional inertia against Kashmir talks. Clinton intervened in the Kargil battle by pressuing Pakistani President Nawaz Sharif to order a pullback, and the Indian artillery in violation of the truce opened fire on the retreating guerrillas.

The Kashmiris again lost their right of self-determination, the U.N. resolution remained unresolved, and America got nothing out of the deal. Worse yet, this policy failure shattered any lingering hopes among Islamic militants for American evenhandedness. The inevitable consequence of the Kargil betrayal was 911, and the rise not of Laskar-e-Taiba but of Al Qaeda.

President-elect Obama should not submit to the hysteria being whipped up over the Mumbai atrocities. Mumbai was a criminal event that India’s elite cannot face up to, for Dawood’s D-Company was and still is their procurer of starlets, smuggled gold, drugs, loans for gambling debts and urban land for their new hotels and office blocks. Don’t mix up the healthy oranges for the rotten apples Kashmir is a historic judgment awaiting the verdict of a popular referendum.



Yoichi Shimatsu. Former editor of The Japan Times in Tokyo and journalism lecturer at Tsinghua University in Beijing. Shimatsu has covered the Kashmir crisis and Afghan War.

Mumbai's Puzzle Points to Indian Culpability

Mumbai attacks plot is thickening by the day. Several names and details are emerging that seem to implicate Pakistanis, Indians, Kashmiris, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and India's Intelligence Bureau.
For example, Calcutta police arrested Mukhtar Ahmed, an Indian Muslim, for procuring SIM cards for the Mumbai terror group without knowing that he was an undercover operative, according to a BBC report. He was on a long-term mission with police in Indian-administered Kashmir. Senior intelligence sources say a "high-value asset" has been blown and his family put at risk.

Police arrested four Indian Muslims for alleged involvement in a planned attack on Mumbai as early as February, a senior police officer who handled the case told The Times Friday.

One of them, Faheem Ahmed Ansari, was carrying a fake Pakistani passport and a list and maps of nine targets in southern Mumbai, including the Taj Mahal hotel and other sites attacked last week, the officer said. Ansari was born in a slum in Mumbai and was recruited by LeT when he took a job as a mechanic at a printing press in Dubai in December 2005, according to reports. He was taken by boat to the Pakistani port of Karachi a year later and then on to an LeT training camp in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.

The revelation appears to undermine India’s assertion that the attack on Mumbai last week, in which 171 people were killed, was planned and executed only by Pakistani members of the Kasmiri militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), which has had links to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency.

The Times further reports that security officials and experts have told the Indian Government that it faces a growing threat from home-grown Islamic militants recruited from the country’s 150 million-strong Muslim population.

According to a report produced by a committee led by a former Indian chief justice, Rajender Sachar, Muslims are now worse off than the Dalit caste, or those called untouchables. Some 52% of Muslim men are unemployed, compared with 47% of Dalit men. Among Muslim women, 91% are unemployed, compared with 77% of Dalit women. Almost half of Muslims over the age of 46 are illiterate. While making up 11% of the population, Muslims account for 40% of India’s prison population. Meanwhile, they hold less than 5% of government jobs.

As the world focuses on the ISI and its possible role in support of LeT, it's important to also recognize India's intelligence agencies' involvement in promoting trouble in South Asian region. India's RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) involvement in Bangladesh, supporting both secular forces and the area's Hindu minority has been mentioned by Federation of American scientists (FAS). The involvement of RAW in East Pakistan is said to date from the 1960s, when RAW supported Mujibur Rahman, leading up to his general election victory in 1970. RAW also provided training and arms to the Bangladeshi freedom fighters known as Mukti Bahini. RAW's aid was instrumental in Bangladesh's gaining independence from Pakistan in 1971.

RAW has had a significant role in the creation of Sri Lankan terror outfits. During the course of its investigation the Jain Commission received testimony on the official Indian support to the various Sri Lankan Tamil armed groups in Tamil Nadu. From 1981, RAW and the Intelligence Bureau established a network of as many as 30 terrorist training camps for these groups in India. Centers were also established at the high-security military installation of Chakrata, near Dehra Dun, and in the Ramakrishna Puram area of New Delhi. This clandestine support to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), some of whom were on the payroll of RAW, was later suspended. Starting in late 1986 the Research and Analysis Wing focused surveillance on the LTTE which was expanding ties with Tamil Nadu separatist groups. Rajiv Gandhi sought to establish good relations with the LTTE, even after the Indian Peace Keeping Force [IPKF] experience in Sri Lanka. But the Indian intelligence community failed to accurately assess the character of the LTTE and its orientation in India and its political leaders. The LTTE assassination of Rajiv Gandhi was apparently motivated by fears of a possible re-induction of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) in Sri Lanka and a crackdown on the LTTE network in Tamil Nadu, according to FAS.

An FAS report says Pakistan has accused RAW of sponsoring sabotage in its Punjab province, where it has been supporting the Seraiki movement, "providing financial support to promote its activities in Pakistan and organizing an International Seraiki Conference in Delhi in November December 1993". It adds: "RAW has an extensive network of agents and anti-government elements within Pakistan, including dissident elements from various sectarian and ethnic groups of Sindh and Punjab." There are also reports of RAW involvement in Baluchistan and Afghanistan to attack Pakistani interests. Throughout the Afghan war, FAS report says “the RAW was responsible for the planning and execution of terrorist activities in Pakistan” to deter Pakistan from supporting the Afghan liberation movement against India’s ally, the Soviet Union. The assistance provided to the RAW by the KGB enabled it to “arrange terrorist attacks in Pakistani cities throughout the Afghan war.”

It appears that the Indian investigators of Mumbai are operating with only a few pieces of a much larger and more complex puzzle of the tragic terror attacks in Mumbai. What is needed is a broader, more independent, high-level investigation that also looks into the role of Indian intelligence agencies before, during and after Mumbai attacks. Just based on the few reported pieces of this large and complex puzzle, it seems that Pakistan is at least partially culpable, but India must also share responsibility for the horrible treatment of its Muslim minority and the role its security officials and intelligence agencies have played in their dealings with unsavory characters and gangs involved in domestic and international terror.

America's Afghan War Effort Relies on Pakistan

Pakistan's significance in the US "global war on terror" was highlighted again yesterday as the media reported yet another major attack on US supply lines through Pakistan. In this attack, 96 flat trucks and six containers were destroyed, including a 40-foot container, armored jeeps, trucks and fire engines, according to Reuters.

Pakistani truckers say that more than 350 trucks carry an average of 7,000 tons of supplies over the Khyber Pass to Kabul every day. Almost 75% of all supplies for NATO forces in Afghanistan come through Pakistan, including 40 percent of the fuel sent to troops, the majority through Peshawar. Last month, militants looted a convoy of 12 trucks carrying Humvees and food supplies as they traveled through the Khyber Pass.

Following US strikes in Pakistan in November this year, Pakistan's decision to temporarily bar some trucks from a key passageway to Afghanistan threatened a critical supply route for U.S. and NATO troops and raised more fears about deteriorating security situation in the border region.

The U.S. military has been looking at alternate routes to send supplies to troops in Afghanistan in case Pakistan makes current supply lines unavailable, the Pentagon said last year. There have been reports of US contemplating longer but safer overland supply routes to Afghanistan through Europe. Apparently not much has changed in a year, indicating lack of success of the US efforts.

"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 against US military incursion in FATA. General Kayani, named by Time magazine among the 100 most influential people of the world, was commenting on a cross-border raid allegedly by US-led coalition troops based in neighboring Afghanistan in which 15 Pakistanis were killed. "Such reckless actions only help the militants and further fuel the militancy in the area," he was quoted as saying.

The U.S. is "running out of time" to win the war in Afghanistan, and sending in more troops will not guarantee victory, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Michael Mullen, warned Congress recently. Mullen said he is convinced the Afghanistan war can be won but said the U.S. urgently needs to improve its nation-building initiatives and its cross-border strategy with Pakistan, according to CNN.

It is clear that there is growing resentment and impatience on both the US and Pakistani sides. Military leaders Kayani and Mullen seem to be indicating that the US and Pakistan are heading toward an unnecessary military confrontation. But is it inevitable?

To understand the Pakistani position, let me refer the readers to what Gary Leupp, a history professor at Tufts University has to say. According to him, Pakistan has provided more assistance to the United States than any other nation as it pursues its goals in southwest Asia. No country has been more dramatically destabilized as the price of its cooperation.

“But not only does the U.S. political class take this disastrous compliance for granted, it wants to further emphasize Islamabad’s irrelevance by attacking the border area at will,” he writes.

The US dilemma is captured well in what Admiral Mullen told Congress today. Mullen stressed that Afghanistan can't be referenced without "speaking of Pakistan," where, he said, the militant groups collaborate and communicate better, launch more sophisticated attacks, employ foreign fighters and use civilians as human shields.

"In my view, these two nations are inextricably linked in a common insurgency that crosses the border between them," he said, adding that he plans "to commission a new, more comprehensive strategy for the region, one that covers both sides of the border.

"I have pressed hard on my counterparts in Pakistan to do more against extremists and to let us do more to help them," he said.

There is a constant refrain from US and NATO urging Pakistan to "do more" while undermining its sovereignty by humiliating its government and military to make them both look weak and irrelevant. Such treatment meted out to its "ally" is not winning the US any friends or positively influencing people in Pakistan to support the US war on terror. On the contrary, it is reinforcing the terrorists and radicalizing Pakistanis to oppose the US presence in region.

Recently, the American officials and media completely ignored the fact that the growing admiration of Israel and the urge to emulate Israel often find expression in the Indian media. Those who argue for "doing a Lebanon" in Pakistan have once again found growing support in India with the government and the media joining the chorus of accusations of Pakistan's complicity in Mumbai attacks. Saber rattling has also started with India's Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee not ruling out military strikes in Pakistan. President-elect Obama has come out in support of India's right "to protect themselves". Asked if India had the right to “take out” high-value targets inside Pakistan with or without the permission of Islamabad, as he espousing in regard to the U.S. under his presidency, he said: “I think that sovereign nations, obviously, have a right to protect themselves". This is the same kind of language that President Bush has often used in support of Israel's attacks on Palestinians and Lebanese.

In the context of Pakistan's anti-American public opinion, the country's ongoing crises, and the growing US demands on Pakistan, the future of US-Pakistan relations and the chances of success in the "war on terror" do not look particularly bright. The only solution to this darkening mood in both nations is a serious and sincere effort by each to improve their bilateral relationship based on a recognition of mutual interests and genuine needs. The incoming Obama administration has an opportunity to change the US tone with Pakistan in January 2009 to make the friendship genuine and useful to both partners in the war on terror. Barack Obama's oft-repeated position that Kashmir and India-Pakistan relations can not be isolated from the "war on terror" in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere in the world offers a good starting point for discussion.

As long as the Kashmir issue remains unresolved, Pakistan, India and the US can not win the "war on terror" and bring peace and stability to the South Asian region. Recent Mumbai attacks and the ostensible Kashmir link have confirmed that yet again. India's opposition to Mr. Obama's desire to mediate will test the Obama administration's resolve in seriously pursuing resolution of Kashmir.

Social Media Bring Happiness, Pose Risks

Of the two recent studies making headlines this week, one brings good news and the other warns of grave risks.

The good news first: New research shows that in a social network, happiness spreads among people up to three degrees removed from one another. That means when you feel happy, a friend of a friend of a friend has a slightly higher likelihood of feeling happy too. And the more connected you are to happy people, the happier you feel.

"We get this chain reaction in happiness that I think increases the stakes in terms of us trying to shape our own moods to make sure we have a positive impact on people we know and love," explains Professor James Fowler, co-author of the study and professor of political science at the University of California in San Diego.

"We've known for some time that social relationships are the best predictor of human happiness, and this (latest study) shows that the effect is much more powerful than anyone realized," Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology at Harvard told CNN. "It is sometimes said that you can't be happier than your least happy child. It is truly amazing to discover that when you replace the word 'child' with 'best friend's neighbor's uncle,' the sentence is still true."

Earlier this year, President-elect Barack Obama's campaign rewrote the rules of successful presidential election campaigning as it embraced social networking and Web 2.0 technologies to reach out to young American voters across the nation. The dramatic success of the Obama campaign in fundraising and energizing young, affluent voters and on college campuses has been quite phenomenal. Obama significantly outraised funds by at least two to one, to the tune of $750m in small contributions, and defeated the powerful Clinton Democratic machine as well as his Republican opponent John McCain.

While almost no one questions the power of social networking in transforming the lives of under-30 Americans, there are concerns being raised about the risks of social networking. As the membership of social networks and the users of social media applications such as Facebook, MySpace, and Orkut grow dramatically to hundreds of millions in the US, Europe, Asia and Latin America, it seems that this phenomenon is still in very early infancy in Pakistan. As of now, there are about 200,000 Pakistanis on Facebook, about 100,000 on Orkut, and a few thousand on MySpace. There are smaller social networks such as Naseeb.com that have a few thousand Pakistani members as well. While Naseeb.com bills itself as a Muslim social network, it seems primarily focused on match-making. Recently Naseeb has started a Pakistani job-search site as well. Pakistan's middle class is estimated to be about 25m people, larger than the population of several European countries and Australia. With such a large middle class population, only a small fraction is participating in the social networking phenomenon. The reasons cited for this minuscule participation include the lack of access to the PC and the Internet, lack of familiarity, and shyness standing in the way of appropriate public self-expression. While I acknowledge that these might be contributing factors, I believe the main factor is the lack of a socially and culturally appropriate content and welcoming environment that suits the Pakistani sensibility and taste. It is something hard to describe but it is something you know when you see it. A new social network called PakAlumni Worldwide has recently been launched to serve this exact need and to encourage Pakistanis to participate in larger numbers. It is still in its early days with about 800 members but growing rapidly. The membership includes a large number of Pakistanis living in the United States, Europe, the Middle East and various parts of Asia. The social connections made via PakAlumni can easily turn into business connections and help build support for important social causes. PakAlumni can also help bring the Pakistani diaspora together to grow closer and more prosperous and help Pakistan achieve greatness in the process while improving its civil society and image.


As to the risks involved in social media participation, a recent hoax on MySpace led to the suicide of a 13-year old girl in Missouri. Megan Meier thought she had made a new friend in cyberspace when a cute teenage boy named Josh contacted her on MySpace and began exchanging messages with her. Megan, who suffered from depression and attention deficit disorder, corresponded with Josh for more than a month before he abruptly ended their friendship, telling her he had heard she was cruel and told her "the world would be a better place without you".

Lately, IT executives in large corporations have expressed fears that employees using social networking sites may download viruses that wind up on their employer's computers or reveal information about themselves on the networking sites that compromises their employer's business secrets. To prevent such problems, some companies, including Intel, ban their workers' access to social networking sites. Not only do employees put their companies at risk, they also expose themselves to identity fraud. McAfee's list of top 12 Christmas scams this year warns that people on some social-networking sites have been receiving messages that say "You've got a new friend." When clicked, the messages downloads software that steals their financial information.

Social networks and social media applications are like any other powerful tools at our disposal. They can be extremely useful in connecting us to the world and increase our wealth and happiness, but they can also bring serious harm to the lives of young people who tend to be more open to sharing personal information with strangers or clicking on malicious links.

Can India "Do a Lebanon" in Pakistan?

Gung-ho members of India's middle class clamor for Israeli-style retaliation against jihadi training camps in Pakistan. But India can "do a Lebanon" only by risking nuclear war with its neighbor; and Indian intelligence agencies are too inept to imitate Mossad's policy of targeted killings, which have reaped for Israel an endless supply of dedicated and resourceful enemies.

The preceding words were written by Pankaj Mishra and published in the Guardian newspaper just a few months ago. Mishra is the author of Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan and Beyond

Writing for the Guardian newspaper, Mr. Mishra further added, "In an article I wrote for the New York Times in 2003 I underlined the likely perils if the depressed and alienated minority of Muslims were to abandon their much-tested faith in the Indian political and legal system. Predictably Hindu nationalists, most of them resident in the UK and US, inundated my email inbox, accusing me of showing India in a bad light."

The growing admiration of the Jewish state and the urge to emulate Israel often find expression in the Indian media. Those who argue for "doing a Lebanon" in Pakistan have once again found growing support in India with the government and the media joining the chorus of accusations of Pakistan's complicity in Mumbai attacks. Saber rattling has also started with India's Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee not ruling out military strikes in Pakistan. President-elect Obama has come out in support of India's right "to protect themselves". Asked if India had the right to “take out” high-value targets inside Pakistan with or without the permission of Islamabad, as he espousing in regard to the U.S. under his presidency, he said: “I think that sovereign nations, obviously, have a right to protect themselves". This is the same kind of language that President Bush has often used in support of Israel's attacks on Palestinians and Lebanese.

Given the angry and vengeful public mood in India, the apparent green-light from Obama, and the elections only a few months away, would the Indian government be tempted to "do a Lebanon"? To examine such an Indian fantasy, let us look at South Asian reality.


Even though Pakistan's military is dwarfed in size by the Indian military, it is still a very large, well-equipped, well-trained and effective professional fighting force that has never hesitated in taking on India's conventionally superior might. Contrary to the Indian folklore of "defeating Pakistan" in several wars, India has not been able to score any decisive victories over Pakistani military except in Bangladesh war where Pakistanis, cut off from the Western wing of the country and surrounded by India, found themselves trapped by a ferocious Bengali insurgency supported by Indian government. Counter-insurgency is where most conventional armies of the world, including Pakistan's, are not very effective.

Pakistani military is definitely much larger in size and strength than the Lebanese military. In fact, it is the fourth or fifth largest military force in the world. On the other hand, Lebanon has never been a conventional military power. Lebanese military has never taken on the Israelis, leaving it to Hizbullah to do the the asymmetrical resistance using guerrilla tactics and outdated Katyusha rockets. Needless to say, the Israelis have failed to achieve their objectives in Lebanon in spite of the use of US-supplied high-tech weaponry and overwhelming force. Israelis have failed to gain the release of their dead and captured soldiers nor have they been able to stop Hizbullah or Hamas from carrying out attacks against Israelis.

If Indian leadership does decide to emulate the Israelis in Lebanon, they may be able to make some short-term tactical gains, getting the satisfaction of killing a few suspected "terrorists" along with many innocent civilians, and occupying a small chunk of Pakistani territory temporarily. But in the long run, they run the risk of a spectacular strategic failure leading to more and bigger terrorist attacks and possibly a nuclear conflagration in the South Asian region. Any reckless adventure by India will almost certainly relieve pressure on Al Qaeda and the Taleban in Pakistan's FATA region, strengthen support for Pakistan's military, weaken Pakistan's democracy and help in the emergence of a new, powerful, popularly supported Hizbullah style resistance group in South Asia.

Even if any credible evidence is found implicating Pakistanis in the Mumbai attacks, the Indian fantasy of "doing a Lebanon" is completely futile and misguided. Instead of military confrontation against each other, India and Pakistan must be persuaded to collaborate and together confront the terrorists who indiscriminately inflict pain and suffering on Indians, Pakistanis, Americans, Europeans and the rest of the world.

Early Eyewitness Accounts from Mumbai

On the 20th floor (of Hotel Oberoi), the gunmen shoved the group out of the stairwell. They lined up the 13 men and three women and lifted their weapons. "Why are you doing this to us?" a man called out. "We haven't done anything to you."

"Remember Babri Masjid?" one of the gunmen shouted, referring to a 16th-century mosque built by India's first Mughal Muslim emperor and destroyed by Hindu radicals in 1992.

"Remember Godhra?" the second attacker asked, a reference to the town in the Indian state of Gujarat where religious rioting that evolved into an anti-Muslim pogrom began in 2002.

"We are Turkish. We are Muslim," someone in the group screamed. One of the gunmen motioned for two Turks in the group to step aside.

Then they pointed their weapons at the rest and squeezed the triggers.


The preceding excerpts are part of the eyewitness accounts of Mumbai pieced together by YAROSLAV TROFIMOV, GEETA ANAND, PETER WONACOTT and MATTHEW ROSENBERG of the Wall Street Journal. These excerpts illustrate how radicals on both sides of the divide draw strength from each other to justify their unjustifiable acts of murder and mayhem of innocent people. Here is the full story:

MUMBAI -- As waiters started setting dinner buffets in Mumbai's luxurious hotels, the killings that would ravage this Indian metropolis began out of sight, in the muddy waters of the Arabian Sea.

In the dusk hours of Wednesday, fisherman Chandrakant Tare was sailing his boat about 100 yards from a fishing trawler when he spotted young men killing a sailor on board. He says he saw them toss the body into the engine room. Assuming he had stumbled upon pirates, Mr. Tare says, he sped away.

Hours later, at least 10 terrorists, having arrived by small craft on the shores of Mumbai, began to sow death and destruction at will across India's financial capital.

Pieced together from interviews with dozens of witnesses and officials, this account of the three days of the battle for Mumbai shows just how a small but ruthless group of skilled militants, attacking multiple targets in quick succession, managed to bring one of the world's largest cities to its knees. The human toll -- currently at 174 fatalities, including nine terrorists -- was exacerbated by the Indian authorities' lack of preparedness for such a major attack. But the chain of events also points to just how vulnerable any major city can be to this type of urban warfare.

Authorities are still questioning the one captured terrorist, a 21-year-old Pakistani named Ajmal Qasab, who they say has confessed to training with outlawed Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba. The investigation remains in its very early stages, and the identities of the killed militants remain unclear.

Around 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, one dinghy with half a dozen young men landed at a trash-strewn fishing harbor near the southern tip of the Mumbai peninsula, witnesses say; a second arrived nearby shortly after. Mostly in their early- to mid-20s, the men came ashore wearing dark clothes and hauling heavy bags and backpacks, according to fisherman Ajay Mestry, who saw one of the landings. The group he saw split up and raced toward the shimmering city.

Arriving by boat, a small team of terrorists spread out across Mumbai, instilling terror in India's largest city for three days.

When one young man with a bulging bag jogged up from the beach, Anita Rajendra Udayaar, the keeper of a roadside stall full of recycled plastic bottles, asked where he was heading. "Mind your own business!" he shouted back, she recalls.

Mumbai's attention that night was focused on one of the country's favorite sports: cricket. India was playing against England, and beating its old colonial master. In the open-air Cafe Leopold, a popular people-watching spot near the landing site, customers -- many of them foreign backpackers -- were watching the match.

At about 9:30 p.m., two gunmen with assault rifles appeared on the sidewalk, witnesses said. One stood at the entrance, the second to his left. Then they started firing.

Minutes later, they walked away, leaving more than a dozen casualties behind amid upturned, bloodied tables.

At about the same time, two other gunmen arrived at a Bharat Petroleum gas station at the corner of a small alley that leads to Chabad House, also known as Nariman House, the local headquarters of the Brooklyn-based Chabad-Lubavitch Jewish movement.

With its small, faded sign, the five-story Chabad House -- which served as a guesthouse and source of kosher food for the many Israeli backpackers who travel through India -- is so hard to find that most visitors ask for directions at the gas station. But the militants knew their way, a station attendant says: Without stopping, they threw a hand grenade into the gas station, and walked into the alley.

Alarmed by the explosion, Chabad House's rabbi, Gavriel Holtzberg, called the Israeli consulate. The two gunmen burst into his building, taking a number of Israelis, a young Mexican Jewish woman, and the rabbi and his family hostage. It appears that they quickly shot dead one of the guests, an Israeli kosher ritual inspector, whose body would be found badly decomposed at the end of the siege.

The explosion and gunfire attracted the attention of neighbors. Some young men started throwing stones toward the building. Manush Goheil, a 25-year-old tailor, stepped outside the family's shop to get a better view. His brother Harish watched from the shop as a gunman shot him dead with a well-aimed bullet fired from the Chabad House's top floor.

Around the same time about one mile north at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, Mumbai's monumental colonial-era train station, two gunmen in dark T-shirts and hauling heavy backpacks walked down Platform 13, which opens into a large hall fringed by Re-Fresh Food Plaza, a fast-food outlet.

Throwing a hand grenade into the crowd of travelers, they unloaded volleys of gunfire. Bullets flew through the window where the station's manager, D.P. Chaudhari, observed the hall; he ducked down and survived. A colleague, S.K. Sharma, was cut down as he crossed the concourse. One bullet lodged in the stomach of Re-Fresh Plaza manager Mukesh Aggarwal. The gunmen peppered a bookstand at the back of the hall with bullets, shattering the glass next to a copy of "Complete Wellbeing" magazine, according to vendor Sarman Lal, who quivered on the floor saying his last prayers.

The two gunmen moved along two separate paths toward the station's main entrance, firing as they walked. They met virtually no resistance, even though several dozen police officers are usually deployed at the station. "They were killing the public, and the police just ran away," says Ram Vir, a coffee vendor whose stand is near Platform 8.

B.S. Sidhu, head of the Railway Protection Force for the Mumbai region, says that while some officers tried to fight back, there was little his force could do. Most police officers at the station -- as they are throughout India -- were unarmed or carried only bamboo sticks known as lathis. More than 40 people, including three police officers, were killed in just a few minutes, authorities said. The wounded survivors screamed for help amid acrid smoke, piles of slumped, bloodied bodies and spilling suitcases.

By then, shooting had begun in two other spots: Mumbai's most luxurious hotels, symbols of the city's prosperity that were packed with tourists, visiting executives, and the local elite out for dinner. The historic Taj Mahal Palace & Tower and a complex housing both the Oberoi and Trident hotels rise high above the sea on opposite sides of the southern tip of Mumbai.
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In the aftermath of bloody attacks, Mumbai residents raised questions about how they could have occurred and how a handful of terrorists could hold off waves of Indian commandos.

At about 9:45 p.m., two gunmen, slender and in their mid-20s, ran up the circular driveway at the entrance to the Trident. They shot the security guard and two bellhops. The hotel had metal detectors, but none of its security personnel carried weapons because of the difficulties in obtaining gun permits from the Indian government, according to the hotel company's chairman, P.R.S. Oberoi. The gunmen raced through the marble-floored lobby, past the grand piano into the adjoining Verandah restaurant, firing at the guests and shattering the windows.

At the end of the lobby, they burst into a bar called the Opium Den, shooting dead a hotel staff member. Then they ran after a group of guests who tried to escape through a rear service area. They killed them, too.

The gunmen returned to the Verandah, climbed a staircase, dashed down a corridor lined with jewelry and clothes shops, and stopped in front of the glass doors of Tiffin Restaurant, a swanky restaurant with a sushi bar in the Oberoi hotel.

They killed four of six friends who live in south Mumbai and had just settled down at a table near the front door. One member of the group, a mother of two, threw herself to the ground and shut her eyes, pretending to be dead. The men circled the restaurant, firing at point blank range into anyone who moved before rushing upstairs to an Indian restaurant called Kandahar.

Restaurant workers there ushered guests closest to the kitchen inside. The assailants jumped in front of another group that tried to run out the door. "Stop," they shouted in Hindi. They corralled 16 diners and led them up to the 20th floor. One man in the group dialed his wife in London and told her he'd been taken hostage but was OK. "Everybody drop your phones," one of the assailants shouted, apparently overhearing. Phones clattered to the floor as the three women and 13 men dug through their purses and pockets and obeyed.

On the 20th floor, the gunmen shoved the group out of the stairwell. They lined up the 13 men and three women and lifted their weapons. "Why are you doing this to us?" a man called out. "We haven't done anything to you."

"Remember Babri Masjid?" one of the gunmen shouted, referring to a 16th-century mosque built by India's first Mughal Muslim emperor and destroyed by Hindu radicals in 1992.

"Remember Godhra?" the second attacker asked, a reference to the town in the Indian state of Gujarat where religious rioting that evolved into an anti-Muslim pogrom began in 2002.

"We are Turkish. We are Muslim," someone in the group screamed. One of the gunmen motioned for two Turks in the group to step aside.

Then they pointed their weapons at the rest and squeezed the triggers.

A few minutes later they walked upstairs to the terrace. Unbeknownst to the terrorists, four of the men were still alive; one of the survivors later provided the account of the shooting to The Wall Street Journal.

At the vaunted Taj hotel across the peninsula, two terrorists arrived from their attack on Cafe Leopold by about 9:45 p.m., broke down a side door and entered the building, according to a police officer investigating the attacks.

Two others entered the hotel's modern lobby, opened fire and threw grenades. As guests dashed for cover, the two pairs united. They would keep Indian police and commandos at bay for another 60 hours as they rampaged through the building.

Uptown, the two gunmen who had attacked the train station -- recorded by the station's surveillance cameras -- reached the nearby Cama Hospital for women and children, authorities said, shooting dead two unarmed guards at the entrance and racing up the stairs. By then, news of the attacks had spread in the neighborhood. A number of policemen ran into the hospital as nurses herded expectant mothers into one room and locked themselves inside, a duty doctor says.

On the top floor, the terrorists and the police traded fire near a poster that reads "Mother's Milk is Best for Babies." The policemen were badly outgunned. The gunmen killed one officer and escaped down the stairs, into a narrow alley that separates Cama Hospital from another hospital called GT.

In the alley, the state of Maharashtra's antiterrorism chief, Hemant Karkare, sat in a police SUV packed with fellow officers, trying to coordinate a response to the mayhem engulfing the city. Creeping up, the two militants sprayed the vehicle with gunfire.

The officers appear to have died before any of them had a chance to fire back. The wall and metal blinds behind the van's spot are riddled with bullets. Not a single bullet mark could be seen by a reporter in the area from which the terrorists fired.

Dumping three of the officers' bodies on the ground and taking the others with them, the two militants jumped into the SUV and sped towards the Metro Big Cinemas multiplex. As they passed a crowd of journalists and onlookers, the SUV slowed down, a gun barrel emerged from the window, and bullets started to fly. Then, the vehicle sped on, with another police vehicle in hot pursuit. At one point, the gunmen ditched the SUV and hijacked a Skoda, police said, cruising through southern Mumbai -- possibly looking for an escape route. Two hours later, they ran into a large police roadblock erected on a key road leading out of south Mumbai, at Chowpatty Beach.

Skidding to a halt 30 feet away from the roadblock, the Skoda's driver blinded the police with high beams and, flipping wipers, began spraying fluid on the windshield so that officers couldn't see into the car, said sub-inspector Bhaskar Kadam, one of the officers manning the roadblock.

The three policemen armed with guns drew them. The nine others waved their bamboo sticks. Revving the engine, the car tried to U-turn but got stuck on the median. The man in the passenger seat rolled out and started shooting, killing one officer and wounding another. The surviving baton-wielding officers jumped on him, knocking him unconscious. Policemen with guns shot the driver dead.

This pair's killing spree was over. Police later identified the gunman taken alive as Mr. Qasab, from the Punjab region of Pakistan, who they say is providing details of the plot.

Back at the Taj Mahal Palace, staff members had been calling room after room, advising hundreds of guests to lock the doors, switch off all the lights, and hide, guests and staff said.

At about 11 p.m., K.R. Ramamoorthy, the 69-year-old nonexecutive chairman of ING Visya Bank, heard men in the corridor knock on his sixth-floor room, he says. "Room service," one of them called out in English.

Silence.

"Shoe polish," the same voice called out.

Mr. Ramamoorthy moved to the bathroom, accidentally banging the door. The two gunmen blasted the room door's lock open and entered. They tied Mr. Ramamoorthy's hands and feet, he says, using his long Indian top known as a kurta, and his pajama bottoms. Then they ordered him to kneel on the ground. "I'm 69 years old. I have high-blood pressure. Please let me go," he recalls begging.

"We'll leave you, we'll let you go," one of the men replied, he says. They turned him over so he lay face down on the floor.

Over the next hour or two, the two men spoke on their mobile phones in his room, seeming relaxed and happy, Mr. Ramamoorthy says. He couldn't tell much of what they said but made out the word "grenade" several times, he says. They ate some snacks from the minibar. Then, two more gunmen showed up in the room, dragging four other hostages -- all uniformed hotel staff.

"What are your names and occupations?" the men asked the five hostages.

"I am Ramamoorthy from Bangalore," Mr. Ramamoorthy says he replied.

"What is your work?" one of the assailants asked in Hindi.

"I am a teacher," he replied.

"No way can a teacher afford to stay here," shouted the gunman, he recalls. "You better tell us the truth."

"I work for a bank," Mr. Ramamoorthy admitted.

The assailants were distracted by calls on their mobile phones. Minutes later, pushing the five hostages in front of them, the gunmen descended the staircase to a fifth-floor room. They shoved the hostages inside, laid them face down on the floor, and left.

Mr. Ramamoorthy says he managed to free his hands and untied the others. By now, a fire possibly started by a grenade explosion was spreading through the sixth floor of the Taj hotel. As the choking smoke from the blazing fire enveloped the room, one of the four hotel staffers ripped off curtains and bedsheets, creating an improvised rope. The staffers used the rope to shimmy down the balcony outside to the third-floor ledge.

Certain he didn't have the physical strength to follow suit, Mr. Ramamoorthy backtracked and descended via the smoke-filled staircase to the third floor. Some time later, he noticed the glare of searchlights. He opened the window and waved and shouted. Firefighters saw him and lifted a ladder to the window. "You are safe," he says they told him. He looked at his watch. It was 6 a.m. Thursday.

As the fires set by the militants burned through the hotel during the night, the general manager, Karimbir Kang, was busy shepherding hotel residents like Mr. Ramamoorthy to safety. Mr. Kang didn't manage to rescue his own wife, Neeti, and two young children: They died in the blaze.

In the other hotel complex taken over by the militants, the Oberoi-Trident, gunmen returned to the 20th floor at around 6 a.m. Thursday. They pulled out their mobile phones and filmed the sprawled bodies of executed diners. The four injured men who survived the firing line there -- one squashed under two bodies -- were still playing dead, trying not to move.

"We'll booby-trap the bodies with bombs," one of the gunmen said into the phone. As soon as the two terrorists left, the four injured men crept out to a terrace and hid behind a cooling tower, says one of the men. For more than 24 hours, they didn't move from their hiding place, drinking small amounts of red liquid inside the cooling system to soothe their thirst, the man says.

Authorities had asked the Mumbai-based Marine Commandos to help at the Taj in the first hours after the takeover of the hotels. But the so-called MarCos struggled to figure out the entrances and exits in the hotel and found it hard to match the gunmen who moved with ease through the building and seemed to know the structure inside out. The gunmen also were accustomed to operating in darkness, a commander on the force said.

At 6.30 a.m. Thursday, commandos from India's National Security Guard finally arrived -- after they first waited for hours while authorities located a plane to pick them up at New Delhi, then waited for transportation from Mumbai's airport to the hotels under attack. The NSG commandos had proper equipment and training. They surrounded both the Taj and the Oberoi complex and a prolonged siege began.

The terrorists moved frequently through both buildings to confuse their pursuers and create the impression of greater numbers. Still, two of them found time on Thursday to call a local TV station to rant about India's mistreatment of Muslims.

As the fighting went on, new fires broke out at both the Taj and the Oberoi in the evening, sending plumes of smoke into the sky. "Every time the terrorists were in a corner and under stress...they set fire to the curtains," said J.K. Dutt, director general of the NSG.

By Friday morning, the NSG began to achieve real progress. At roughly 9 a.m. that day, Bill Bakshi heard a knock on his 19th-floor room in the annex section of the Taj. A diabetic who was running low on insulin, he peeked through the eyehole in hope of rescue and saw three uniformed men with assault rifles, he says. "They wouldn't say who they were," says Mr. Bakshi, a 63-year-old who owns a textile company. "They were scared, too -- they didn't know who was inside, either."

Mr. Bakshi opened the door. The next thing he knew, he says, he had three gun barrels thrust in his face. It took a couple minutes to convince the NSG men that he was not a terrorist, he says.

By late Friday morning, the NSG cleared out the annex section of the Taj, freeing hostages there. It also succeeded in storming the Oberoi, killing one gunman in a corridor and another in a bedroom. As they combed the hotel room by room, bringing out to safety the four injured men hiding behind the cooling system, the commandos found 32 other bodies inside.

At the Taj and the besieged Chabad House, the fighting continued. Two militants holed up inside the Jewish center had blown off the doors of the elevator on every floor, and used the shaft to hide whenever NSG commandos fired back.

It appears that they executed their hostages one by one as the commandos closed in. Two young women guests, their wrists tied with white plastic rope, lay on the same bed, bullet holes in their heads, according to a photograph taken later at the scene. The terrorists shot Rabbi Holtzberg and his wife, who fell next to each other. As darkness fell, NSG commandos blasted a wall with explosives and finally penetrated the building. They killed the gunmen.

At the Taj, the battle raged into Friday night, with one of the gunmen opening fire from a window and shooting at the hundreds of journalists who gathered to cover the siege on the plaza outside. None were hit.

By Saturday morning, however, the commandos had taken over most of the building. They set a fire to smoke out three surviving terrorists, cornered in a restaurant called Wasabi, up a spiral staircase from the lobby. Two of the gunmen were shot dead. The third was hit with bullets as he tumbled backwards out of a window and onto the plaza outside. "After that," said Mr. Dutt, the NSG chief, "There was no more shooting."
—Niraj Sheth in Mumbai and Krishna Pokharel in New Delhi contributed to this article.

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