THE DEAD MEMO

Some facts are clear. There was a memo. It was written by an affluent Europe based US citizen of Pakistani origin whose self stated loyalties are to the US and not Pakistan. It was delivered to Admiral Mike Mullen when he was the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff in May 2011 by a retired four star general of the US Army on the request of the Pakistani American author. The author of the memo had been in extended contact with Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States and they had discussed the content and thrust of the memo as well as its destination. Almost five months later the memo was deliberately resurrected by public exposure in a newspaper article written by the author of the memo. After its publication the chief of Pakistan’s intelligence agency personally contacted and subsequently met the author of the memo as part of an investigation and later briefed Pakistan’s Army Chief on his findings. The Army Chief briefed the President and as a result Pakistan’s Ambassador to the US resigned and ‘memogate’, as it began to be called, became the subject of two separate investigations—one by a Parliamentary Committee ordered by the government and one by a judicial Commission set up by the Supreme Court of Pakistan in response to a petition filed by the opposition political party. These investigations are ongoing and are the subject of much speculation—mostly in a segment of the local Pakistani media.

There are some grey areas. Was the memo the brain child of the Pakistani Ambassador and did he use the Pakistani American to write the memo and have it delivered or was the memo the idea of its author who used the Ambassador to discuss his ideas thereby involving him inextricably? Did the Ambassador act on his own in his interaction with the Pakistani-American gentleman or did he get the matter approved from his superiors? Did the Ambassador provide input and give encouragement if the memo was not his own idea? These are the questions to which the investigative bodies have to get answers in order to reach a final conclusion. This is by no means an impossible task.

There is one important factor that overshadows everything else. The accusations being hurled at each other, the efforts to undermine credibility, the deliberate obfuscation of facts and the attempts to kill the memo all combine to hide the fact that there is a basic convergence in the long held and often stated views of the two main protagonists. Both have a pathological hatred of the Pakistan military and its intelligence agency. Others share this view because they see these two institutions as being the center of gravity in Pakistan that must be undermined— and it is these ‘’others” who are busy explaining the memo as a plan to undermine the democratically elected government by the military/intelligence establishment. There are many in Pakistan who, foolishly, are furthering such an agenda. This makes the result of the investigations most important—-the memo is dead, long live the memo.

By Ghalib Sultan

The Political Smokescreen

By: Ghalib Sultan
ZoneAsia-Pk

Pakistan’s inept and self-serving politicians are trying to up the ante in the federal political scene, ostensibly to make the people forget and ignore what happened on May 02

On May 02, 2011, the PPP-led federal government swore in two federal ministers, four state ministers and four other members from the PML-Q, the erstwhile murderers of Benazir Bhutto, the PPP chairperson who was assassinated in a terror attack on December 27, 2009. The President of Pakistan and widower of Benazir Bhutto, Asif Ali Zardari, administered the oath. His expressions upon signing the appointment letters were a treat if watched carefully; the President muttered under his breath as he approved the PML-Q legislators as government ministers. PM Gilani, the chief executive of the Pakistan government, sat quietly like the ornamental piece he usually is when his colleague and fellow Co-Chairman is present. And while President Zardari is not shy to repeat the notion that his party and family has suffered from terrorism, it seems highly unlikely that he himself knows what terrorism in Pakistan really is, courtesy the security protocol and box cordon he enjoys as President of Pakistan. Perhaps even the soul of Benazir Bhutto has stopped asking for justice and for the capture and trial of her killers, after it has become apparent that nobody in Pakistan is safe, that any foreign power can come in, strike, and leave as it pleases, and that Pakistan is a country which showers praise and blessings on killers instead of demonizing them and reiterating the call of justice – Mumtaz Qadri is a perfect example.

Pakistan’s ‘free’ media quickly jumped on the story a month before it actually happened – main news channels covered the PPP-PML-Q negotiations on a daily basis, and presented conjecture over the give-and-take of ministries, portfolios and powers. The biggest party to suffer from this alliance, the PML-N, also appeared rudderless because its Quaid, Nawaz Sharif, was recovering after a near-death surgical experience in the UK. Of course, Chaudhry Nisar, the Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly, continued his tirade against the ‘bandar-baant’ (literally meaning ‘distributing to monkeys’) of ministries and portfolios. His party members said that Zulfikar Bhutto and Zahoor Elahi – political enemies in their day – would be turning in their graves if they could see what their scions and successors are doing. Interestingly, Ch Nisar forgot all about ‘what the ISI was doing’ – as he was repeatedly ranting about it in the last few days of April – after May 02, when the whole world started asking that question – albeit under the ambit of a wholly different issue. But the PML-N is overly glad that if it had to face backlash from the Raymond Davis affair, it can heap blame on the PPP for the Abbottabad operation. Of course, it might have an axe to grind as well – reports suggest that Osama bin Laden was a financier of Nawaz Sharif’s 1997 electoral campaign, in which he incidentally won more than two-thirds of the National Assembly seats and acquired the ability to change the country’s constitution at will.

Pakistan’s political parties – and the inept and self-interested politicians who fill their ranks – are only concerned about their own lives and person. After a dastardly and secret attack on the country’s sovereignty, political parties and politicians continued to play according to a script where their own political games can progress, while the sanctity and respect of the nation went to the dogs.

The PPP defended the Armed Forces and the nation not in its capacity as a political party, but as a begrudging responsibility that it carries as the federal government. Gibran Peshimam accurately states that “it was painful watching our prime minister fumble through a policy statement following the killing of the world’s most wanted man on Pakistani soil”. The PML-Q remained quiet – it became part of the government after Operation Geronimo had already finished – and busied itself with accumulated power and commencing the exercise thereof. The PML-N asked for accountability and transparency in the Armed Forces’ operations, and wants ‘heads to roll’ – its ultimate design is to cash in on the government’s failure over the entire OBL fiasco, according to Irfan Ghauri. Maybe Shahbaz Sharif, Nawaz Sharif’s younger brother and Chief Minister of Punjab province, would do better if he increased the salaries of Pakistan’s young doctors – maybe then, Nawaz Sharif won’t have to go abroad for treatment.

The crucial question is why the Armed Forces – the Army, the ISI, the Air Force – were silent for a prolonged period after President Obama’s announcement. The answer is simple; they (wrongly) expected the civilian government – which claims that it is politically powerful and exercising oversight over the Armed Forces – to back them up and to defend the country against propaganda attacks and psychological warfare that would commence afterwards. However, Pakistan’s political parties themselves are experts in conducting psychological warfare against their own people – and the media is sometimes a willing participant in this pursuit. The Foreign Office of Pakistan, usually considered an ISI mouthpiece by the ‘liberal’ media, also tried to defend the Army, but made some statements that were later proven wrong (but still not retracted) like the issue of radar coverage, where the PAF denied that radars were jammed or switched off when US helicopters entered Pakistani airspace. On that day, Salman Bashir inadvertently allowed the media and security analysts to bash the FO as well as Pakistan, the Army, the Armed Forces in general, and the people of the country in general. Well, at least the FO tried to clear the air.

PM Gilani proceeded on a trip to France immediately after the dust settled from the Osama assassination – logic dictates that the PM should have cancelled all foreign trips after this shock. But it appears that nobody, not even the Prime Minister, would give up an opportunity to spend a few days outside the terror-infested, electricity-hungry, inflation-ridden country of Pakistan. Agreeing with this logic, President Zardari himself left for Kuwait on an official two-day visit.

Pretty soon, the MQM also joined the federal cabinet (again) after leaving it for the third time in this parliamentary tenure. The MQM’s national political policy seems to be similar to the social life of a ‘simple girl’ – immediately desisting, disengaging, and then running away whenever anyone gets ‘too close for comfort’. The PPP and the MQM need each other to run Sindh successfully and bring peace to Karachi. However, the MQM has a very acrimonious relationship with the ANP in Sindh – the ANP and PPP are also allies in the center, because the ANP carries the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. The PPP’s ineptitude at politics becomes more evident when the practices of its partners fulfill the following paradigm; that the friend of my friend is my enemy (even though both belong to the same country).

In all this tumult, the PTI is continuing its mass contact and social mobilization campaign; its drive against drone strikes and in pursuit of stopping NATO passage through Pakistan was only bolstered when the Osama operation happened, and Imran Khan has been quick to demand the President and Prime Minister’s resignation over the matter. Shah Mahmood Qureshi, the former Foreign Minister, senior party member of the PPP, and custodian of the shrines of Bahauddin Zikriya and Shah-Rukne-Alam, also demanded that the President and Prime Minister resign because they were unable to protect the sovereignty and integrity of Pakistan – which they were sworn to by sacred oath. But the Pakistani media and its pundits are quick to discredit both these politicians, and lump them together as pawns of the ISI. How Shah Mahmood Qureshi of the PPP, Imran Khan of the PTI, and the ISI of the Pakistan Army, can be connected together in a single sentence (let alone under a single political banner) is a subject of inquiry that would baffle many political scientists, but the Pakistani media (with its vested interests) and the Pakistani people (with their love for conspiracies) believe it as matter of fact, and readily gulp down such “truths” on mere face value as and when the media feeds it to them. Nobody sees how a Sufi saint from Multan and a cricketing hero from Mianwali could agree on this point – maybe everyone forgets that both of these individuals are Pakistani, in a country where many citizens are Pakistani just in name; just for the sake of an identity. Maybe if Pakistan had more Pakistanis than N-leaguers and jiyalas, the country would not have been in such a state. Putting party and politics before country has become standard operating procedure for these politicians who lie, cheat and steal to get to the top. They lie to the people’s face, via the media, and claim to be sensitive to their problems when they are not even aware what their constituents’ problems are. Shahbaz Sharif represents the constituency of Bhakkar in the Punjab Assembly, yet has only visited ‘his constituency’ only 4 times since he got elected. Bilawal Bhutto Zardari is going to inherit his grandfather’s electoral constituencies in Larkana, when he has barely spent more than 4-5 years of his entire life in Pakistan. So much for good governance and the rule of the people.

The religious parties in Pakistan redoubled their mass contact efforts against the US, and invested more vigor in their extremist campaign of turning Pakistan into a ‘devout and pious Islamic state’ where men will be defined by beards and women by the burka. Again, this is mere politicking – the religious parties know that if they stop haranguing the federal government and reminding the people about America, they will have no cards to play in the bluff game that is Pakistani politics. However, the shrewd Mubasher Lucman was successful in revealing the true face of these ‘America-hating’ religious parties: he showed that higher-level functionaries of these so-called anti-American religious parties were receiving funds from US donors (probably a state institution like USAID) to start up a children’s channel in Pakistan. Of course, when money comes in, religion can be bought and sold too. When the religious leaders of Pakistan have no qualms about declaring one person a Muslim and another an infidel (on the basis of questionable factors, if there are any factors to consider) it becomes more plausible to understand how illiteracy and absence of social safety nets pushes uneducated Muslim families closer to their imam’s and ulema’s, who can proceed to extort and manipulate them in the name of Allah, train their children to kill people and blow themselves up, and be free from prosecution and blame because they are ‘men of the beard’ (like priests are ‘men of the cloth’).

The fact remains that the people of Pakistan will suffer because of Osama’s death: while the government and Armed Forces remain insulated, it is the Pakistani people who will be called terrorists and extremists by the international community. The Pakistani people will be blamed for harbouring terrorists, and the Pakistani people will also continue to be killed by the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) and Al Qaeda for the ‘betrayal’ of Osama bin Laden.

Ammar Aziz is absolutely right when he says that “this assassination of Osama bin Laden is meaningless unless each one of us kills the Osama within. Otherwise they will keep killing you, me and all of us.” The same security paradigm is true for an effective political ethos; we as Pakistanis must stop blaming an ineffective government and stop depending on it; Pakistanis must resolve to take their problems head on, and resolve them collectively, otherwise other people (Pakistanis and foreigners) will continue to take advantage of the country’s problems and its people’s anger against the status quo.

Right now, the biggest existential threat that Pakistan faces does not come from within; it comes from itself.

Raymond Davis, an American “Tweetie Bird”

By: SYED ZAIDI

The Raymond Davis murders – American empire comes unhinged

FOR THE BENEFIT OF MY AMERICAN FRIENDS

About a year ago Gordon Duff and Jeff Gates, both associated with the Veterans Today website, and both well-connected with the Pentagon and the Pakistani military, visited the border area of Afghanistan and Pakistan in the company of top Pakistani army officers. They heard the complaints and saw the evidence that the US, Israel and India had secretly created and were arming and nurturing the so-called Pakistani Taliban (TTP – Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan) insurgency.

Duff and Gates noticed that a great many of the supposed aid projects that were claimed to be German were actually manned by Western and Israeli Jews. The Pakistanis couldn’t tell the difference, but these Americans obviously could. The private armies run by contractors such as Xe (the new name for Blackwater), it turns out, are under Zionist control. The effort to break up nuclear-armed Muslim Pakistan is most of all a Zionist project.

As Christopher Bollyn has pointed out, the main aim of the American war effort in Afghanistan, brought about by the Zionist-engineered 9/11 event, is for the benefit of ostensibly Israeli-owned (and ultimately Rothschild-et -al-controlled and -owned) gas, mineral and heroin interests in Central Asia.

The late Richard “Holbrooke” (hiding behind an olde Englishe name his father was not born to) turns out to have been a relative of the Rothschilds. And his replacement is one Mr Grossman, who will no doubt prove to link to the same networks. The Raymond Davis incident points to the unhinging of American, really Zionist, empire, in this zone as much as in the Arab world.

Since Obama and Hilary are, like 99% of American politicians, totally the creatures of Zionists, it comes as no surprise that they are going all out to try to keep a lid on this incident. Both have put their prestige on the line in support of the absurd claim that Davis must be given diplomatic immunity under the Vienna conventions. The State Department conveyed through an American TV channel a threat to expel the Pakistani ambassador. Now they are threatening to cut off US aid.

It’s not working.

America does have the support of Pakistani president Zardari – no wonder: they probably helped him murder his wife to make a claim for the presidency, and they helped get all the cases against him dropped so that the Swiss would release his massive accounts. Zardari has sacked – thus making a hero of – the foreign minister for opposing the release of Davis.

But there is not that much more within his power to do. If he did get close to getting Davis freed, the army would once more take over the country. Meanwhile, with or without the help of the latest American / Israeli torture technology, Davis is reported to be singing like Tweetie.

Word Games

By: Fatima Rizvi

The name of the game is doing everything and anything to gain an advantage. Blame others, cheat, scandalize, accuse, lie, fabricate-so long as you do in someone and get ahead. This is driving media debates, news, court cases, investigations and gossip. Ambassador Holbrooke, on his last visit commented on Musharaff by saying that ‘he had as much chance as Gorbachev of coming back’ and that ‘if he had done what he had promised to the US he would have been still around’. The sycophants who surround the former President swung into action – they said that this (Holbrooke’s statement) was proof that Musharraf had refused to do what the US wanted him to do and that he had put Pakistan’s interests first. Also that he had distanced himself from US when he found out that their policy was at odds with Pakistan’s.

No one believed any of this, but why pass up a chance to outwit someone – even if it is your benefactor!

Read Complete Article: http://www.zoneasia-pk.com/ZoneAsia-Pk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2639:word-games&catid=70:free-talk&Itemid=84

Pakistan heads down China road

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

ISLAMABAD – Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has visited China on several occasions since taking office in September 2008, but these visits have been more ceremonial than of substance, in part because his Washington-backed government had gravitated so close to the United States orbit that even the Chinese envoy in Islamabad publicly complained.

The Pakistani military establishment’s pro-China lobby, highly influenced by now retired General Tariq Majeed, frowned on this tilt towards the US, and was especially upset that the Americans were allowed to establsh a naval base in Ormara in Balochistan province, and that US defense contractors were given a free rein in the country. However, the post-Pervez Musharraf-era army was weak and didn’t have much choice except to turn a blind eye.

This situation continued until 2009, by which time the army had regained its influence in the corridors of power and had begun to prevail over the country’s decision-making process.

Hence, Zardari’s scheduled visit to China on November 11 takes on a special significance. Notably, he has not sought the counsel of his pro-US envoy in Washington, Husain Haqqani, who has consistently advised Zardari to keep his distance from Beijing. Instead, the president on Monday held a long meeting with Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani.

Zardari will attend the opening ceremony of the 16th Asian Games in Guangzhou, as well as meet with his counterpart Hu Jintao and senior officials.

On the surface, the leaders will discuss the Washington-opposed plan for a fifth Chinese-built nuclear reactor in Pakistan. However, the underlying emphasis will be on new moves on the grand chessboard of South Asia.

“This is a time of strategic uncertainty,” a senior Pakistani strategic expert told Asia Times Online on the condition of anonymity. “Although there is a strategic alliance between the US and Pakistan, the recent visit by United States President Barack Obama to India, which aimed to benefit the American economy, was revealing of how economic and strategic ties between India and American will be in the future: when push comes to shove, the Americans will stand with India, not with Pakistan.”

This does not mean that Pakistan, guided by the military, is instantly going to fall into China’s arms and abandon the US, but it is certainly considering adjusting its current alignments.

“While the US has provided all sorts of financial and economic assistance to Pakistan in return for its services in providing NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] a passage to Afghanistan and for fighting militancy in the tribal areas, America didn’t support Pakistan in regional conflicts with India,” the expert said.

“The US intervened to help resolve disputes between India and Pakistan, but in the end the formulas that emerged from Washington were aimed at creating a situation for dialogue and engagement – trade relations without any resolution of the Kashmir dispute.

“The only [US] goal was that Pakistan-India trade would resume and that would give the Americans a corridor from India into Afghanistan, and finally that dispensation would take India, geographically, into America’s strategic loop in South Asia and facilitate India’s role to work as an American strategic partner in Afghanistan and all the way up to Central Asia,” the expert said.

A changing world

From January to November 5 this year, there were 15 major militant attacks in Pakistan, a dramatic drop from 209 incidents in the same period of the previous year. According to the Canadian Press, the chronology of events shows that the first half of the year was marked by a visibly anti-state insurgency, as was the case in previous years. The frequency of attacks and the dynamics of conflict visibly changed after September [1].

Only two major attacks have occurred since then. These included suicide bomber strikes against a Sunni mosque in Darra Adam Khel in northwestern Pakistan on November 5, in which at least 67 people were killed during Friday prayers. There was also a Taliban suicide attack on a Shi’ite procession that killed 65 people in the southwestern city of Quetta on September 1, beside two other minor incidents against shrines in Karachi and Pakpattan.

This indicates that from September the violence become sectarian, or centered on tribal disputes. The attacks by the Taliban and al-Qaeda that played havoc in Pakistan in 2009 have virtually come to a halt.

Asia Times Online has documented the development of ceasefire initiatives between Pakistan and the militants (See Vultures are circling in Pakistan September 28, 2010). These were brokered with various main groups and at present only fringe groups like the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi are left to carry out attacks, and even these are sectarian in nature.

On the other hand, attacks against Afghanistan-bound NATO supply convoys in Pakistan have increased dramatically, to the extent that they have become almost daily.

The “understanding” between the security forces and militants has reached the stage where militants have pledged they will release all prominent prisoners without demanding a high price. These include former Inter-Services Intelligence official retired Colonel Ameer Sultan alias Imam (known as the “Father of the Taliban”) and Aamir Malik, the son-in-law of former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, retired General Tariq Majeed.

During Pakistan’s recent strategic dialogue with the US in Washington, Islamabad was directly urged to come out with a comprehensive action plan against the powerful Haqqani network in the North Waziristan tribal area. The network is a key player in the Taliban-led insurgency across the border in Afghanistan.

However, army chief Kiani is a fervent believer in dialogue with the network and sees it as a guarantee for peace in the future. The Americans have tried their level-best to reach out to the Haqqanis – Jalaluddin and his sons Sirajuddin and Naseeruddin – and the Taliban, but their talks to start talks have collapsed. This has been confirmed by Saudi and other officials involved in the process. Asia Times Online was the first publication to break the news of the failure, (See Taliban peace talks come to a halt October 30, 2010.)

Washington is still pressing Pakistan, though, to mount operations in North Waziristan, and is even prepared to use a stick if necessary. This could be done through international institutions in which the US has influence, such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the Asia Development Bank and the United States Agency for International Development.

The IMF’s assistant director for the Middle East and Central Asia Department, Adnan Mazarie, recently warned that if these bodies stopped their credit lines to Pakistan, it would go into default. The IMF is now warning that if Pakistan does not implement a “credible and irreversible plan to implement power sector reforms”, aid will be cut off.

China means business

Last Sunday, Pakistan’s Daily Dawn reported that Pakistan had set aside all competitive international bidding for the induction of power plants in the country and had decided to award a contract, without bidding, to a Chinese company for the construction of 1,100 megawatt hydropower project in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, at an estimated cost of US$2.2 billion.

Approximately 10,000 Chinese workers are engaged in 120 projects in Pakistan and total Chinese investment – which includes heavy engineering, power generation, mining and telecommunications – stood at $15 billion at the end of this year, up from $4 billion in 2007.

One of the most significant joint development projects of recent years is the major port complex at the naval base of Gwadar in Balochistan province. The complex, inaugurated in December 2008 and now fully operational, provides a deep-sea port, warehouses and industrial facilities for more than 20 countries.

China provided much of the technical assistance and 80% of the funds for the construction of the port. In return for providing most of the labor and capital, China gains strategic access to the Persian Gulf: the port is just 180 nautical miles from the Strait of Hormuz through which 40% of all globally traded oil is shipped.

This enables China to diversify and secure its crude oil import routes and provides the landlocked and oil- and natural gas-rich Xinjiang province with access to the Arabian Sea. With China formally in command of Gwadar port operations, it would, along with Pakistan, gain an important regional and strategic advantage.

Pakistan’s marriage of convenience with the US that began after September 11, 2001, with the US-led invasion of Afghanistan and the launch of the “war on terror”, has endured some rocky times.

Informed opinion in strategic quarters in Pakistan is that in the second half of next year, American aid packages, in the wake of the beginning of the US troop drawdown in Afghanistan, will be reduced or even stopped, and the US’s relations with India will bloom.

Pakistan wants to be ready for such a development, and is using China as a hedge.

Note

1. On August 23, three bomb attacks in northwest Pakistan kill at least 36. On July 9, a pair of suicide bombers kills 102 people and wounds 168 in the Mohmand tribal region. On July 2, twin suicide bombers attack Pakistan’s most revered Sufi shrine in Lahore, killing 47 people and wounding 180. On May 29, two teams of seven militants attack two mosques of the Ahmadi minority sect in Lahore, killing 97. On April 19, a suicide bomber apparently targeting police at a conservative Islamic party rally in Peshawar kills 23. On April 18, two burqa-clad suicide bombers attack refugees lined up to register for food in Kohat district in the northwest, killing 41. On April 5, a suicide bomber attacks a rally of an anti-Taliban political party in Lower Dir district, killing 45. On March 13, two suicide bombers targeting army vehicles in Lahore kill more than 55 and wound more than 100. On February 18, a bomb tears through a mosque in the Khyber tribal region, killing 29 people and wounding 50 more. On February 5, two bombs targeting the Shi’ite Muslim minority sect in Karachi kill 33 and wound 176 and on January 1 a suicide bomber drives a truckload of explosives into a volleyball field in Lakki Marwat district, killing at least 97 people.

US, Nato forces should eliminate terror bases in Afghanistan’

PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Information Mian Iftikhar Hussain on Tuesday linked regional peace to elimination of terrorism in Afghanistan, asking the Nato and US forces to uproot the bases of terrorists in the war-torn neighbouring country.

Speaking at a gathering at the Press Club here, the minister said the Awami National Party (ANP) had always advocated a political and peaceful solution to the ongoing crisis but there were certain foreign elements in Pakistan and Afghanistan that never responded positively to the peace initiatives in the region.

“Perpetual peace in the region is linked to complete tranquillity and harmony in Afghanistan,” he said, adding that a peaceful Afghanistan was a must for peaceful Pakistan, particularly for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the tribal belt.

Mian Iftikhar said that some opportunists were out to weaken the democratic government but they would not succeed in their bid in the presence of an independent judiciary, free media and strong parliament.

“Our government still has reservations over the distribution of the US aid for the flood-hit areas under Kerry-Lugar Bill,” he said, adding that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was already suffering from militancy when the floods hit the province.

Ayub Khan’s letter to Adm Radford (1955)

The US can blame Pakistan for double-dealing all it wants; but Pakistan knows that the US has been reneging on its official promises ever since Pakistan made the mistake of entering the Western orbit

This declassified letter from Gen. Ayub Khan shows how the United States has been double-dealing Pakistan more than FIFTY YEARS AGO!

Official Portrayal of War in Afghanistan

A six-year archive of classified military documents made public on Sunday offers an unvarnished, ground-level picture of the war in Afghanistan that is in many respects more grim than the official portrayal.

The secret documents, released on the Internet by an organization called WikiLeaks, are a daily diary of an American-led force often starved for resources and attention as it struggled against an insurgency that grew larger, better coordinated and more deadly each year.

The New York Times, the British newspaper The Guardian and the German magazine Der Spiegel were given access to the voluminous records several weeks ago on the condition that they not report on the material before Sunday.

The documents – some 92,000 reports spanning parts of two administrations from January 2004 through December 2009 – illustrate in mosaic detail why, after the United States has spent almost $300 billion on the war in Afghanistan, the Taliban are stronger than at any time since 2001.

As the new American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, tries to reverse the lagging war effort, the documents sketch a war hamstrung by an Afghan government, police force and army of questionable loyalty and competence, and by a Pakistani military that appears at best uncooperative and at worst to work from the shadows as an unspoken ally of the very insurgent forces the American-led coalition is trying to defeat.

The material comes to light as Congress and the public grow increasingly skeptical of the deepening involvement in Afghanistan and its chances for success as next year’s deadline to begin withdrawing troops looms.

The archive is a vivid reminder that the Afghan conflict until recently was a second-class war, with money, troops and attention lavished on Iraq while soldiers and Marines lamented that the Afghans they were training were not being paid.

The reports – usually spare summaries but sometimes detailed narratives – shed light on some elements of the war that have been largely hidden from the public eye:

• The Taliban have used portable heat-seeking missiles against allied aircraft, a fact that has not been publicly disclosed by the military. This type of weapon helped the Afghan mujahedeen defeat the Soviet occupation in the 1980s.

• Secret commando units like Task Force 373 – a classified group of Army and Navy special operatives – work from a “capture/kill list” of about 70 top insurgent commanders. These missions, which have been stepped up under the Obama administration, claim notable successes, but have sometimes gone wrong, killing civilians and stoking Afghan resentment.

• The military employs more and more drone aircraft to survey the battlefield and strike targets in Afghanistan, although their performance is less impressive than officially portrayed. Some crash or collide, forcing American troops to undertake risky retrieval missions before the Taliban can claim the drone’s weaponry.

• The Central Intelligence Agency has expanded paramilitary operations inside Afghanistan. The units launch ambushes, order airstrikes and conduct night raids. From 2001 to 2008, the C.I.A. paid the budget of Afghanistan’s spy agency and ran it as a virtual subsidiary.

Over all, the documents do not contradict official accounts of the war. But in some cases the documents show that the American military made misleading public statements – attributing the downing of a helicopter to conventional weapons instead of heat-seeking missiles or giving Afghans credit for missions carried out by Special Operations commandos.

White House officials vigorously denied that the Obama administration had presented a misleading portrait of the war in Afghanistan.

“On Dec. 1, 2009, President Obama announced a new strategy with a substantial increase in resources for Afghanistan, and increased focus on Al Qaeda and Taliban safe-havens in Pakistan, precisely because of the grave situation that had developed over several years,” said Gen. James L. Jones, White House national security adviser, in a statement released Sunday.

“We know that serious challenges lie ahead, but if Afghanistan is permitted to slide backwards, we will again face a threat from violent extremist groups like Al Qaeda who will have more space to plot and train,” the statement said.

General Jones also decried the decision by WikiLeaks to make the documents public, saying that the United States “strongly condemns the disclosure of classified information by individuals and organizations which could put the lives of Americans and our partners at risk, and threaten our national security.”"

“WikiLeaks made no effort to contact us about these documents – the United States government learned from news organizations that these documents would be posted,” General Jones said.

The archive is clearly an incomplete record of the war. It is missing many references to seminal events and does not include more highly classified information. The documents also do not cover events in 2010, when the influx of more troops into Afghanistan began and a new counterinsurgency strategy took hold.

They suggest that the military’s internal assessments of the prospects for winning over the Afghan public, especially in the early days, were often optimistic, even naïve.

There are fleeting – even taunting – reminders of how the war began in the occasional references to the elusive Osama bin Laden. In some reports he is said to be attending meetings in Quetta, Pakistan. His money man is said to be flying from Iran to North Korea to buy weapons. Mr. bin Laden has supposedly ordered a suicide attack against the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai. These reports all seem secondhand at best.

The reports portray a resilient, canny insurgency that has bled American forces through a war of small cuts. The insurgents set the war’s pace, usually fighting on ground of their own choosing and then slipping away.

Sabotage and trickery have been weapons every bit as potent as small arms, mortars or suicide bombers. So has Taliban intimidation of Afghan officials and civilians – applied with pinpoint pressure through threats, charm, violence, money, religious fervor and populist appeals.

FEB. 19, 2008 | ZABUL PROVINCE
Intelligence Summary: Officer Threatened

An Afghan National Army brigade commander working in southern Afghanistan received a phone call from a Taliban mullah named Ezat, one brief report said. “Mullah Ezat told the ANA CDR to surrender and offered him $100,000(US) to quit working for the Afghan Army,” the report said. “Ezat also stated that he knows where the ANA CDR is from and knows his family.”

MAY 9, 2009 | KUNAR PROVINCE
Intelligence Summary: Taliban Recruiter

A Taliban commander, Mullah Juma Khan, delivered a eulogy at the funeral of a slain insurgent. He played on the crowd’s emotions, according to the report: “Juma cried while telling the people an unnamed woman and her baby were killed while the woman was nursing the baby.” Finally he made his pitch: “Juma then told the people they needed to be angry at CF [Coalition Force] and ANSF [Afghan National Security Forces] for causing this tragedy” and “invited everyone who wants to fight to join the fighters who traveled with him.”

The insurgents use a network of spies, double agents, collaborators and informers – anything to undercut coalition forces and the effort to build a credible and effective Afghan government capable of delivering security and services.

The reports repeatedly describe instances when the insurgents have been seen wearing government uniforms, and other times when they have roamed the country or appeared for battle in the very Ford Ranger pickup trucks that the United States had provided the Afghan Army and police force.

NOV. 20, 2006 | KABUL
Incident Report:Insurgent Subterfuge

After capturing four pickup trucks from the Afghan National Army, the Taliban took them to Kabul to be used in suicide bombings. “They intend to use the pick-up trucks to target ANA compounds, ISAF and GOA convoys, as well as ranking GOA and ISAF officials,” said a report, referring to coalition forces and the government of Afghanistan. “The four trucks were also accompanied by an unknown quantity of ANA uniforms to facilitate carrying out the attacks.”

The Taliban’s use of heat-seeking missiles has not been publicly disclosed – indeed, the military has issued statements that these internal records contradict.

In the form known as a Stinger, such weapons were provided to a previous generation of Afghan insurgents by the United States, and helped drive out the Soviets. The reports suggest that the Taliban’s use of these missiles has been neither common nor especially effective; usually the missiles missed.

MAY 30, 2007 | HELMAND PROVINCE
Incident Report: Downed Helicopter

An American CH-47 transport helicopter was struck by what witnesses described as a portable heat-seeking surface-to-air missile after taking off from a landing zone.

The helicopter, the initial report said, “was engaged and struck with a Missile … shortly after crossing over the Helmand River. The missile struck the aircraft in the left engine. The impact of the missile projected the aft end of the aircraft up as it burst into flames followed immediately by a nose dive into the crash site with no survivors.”

The crash killed seven soldiers: five Americans, a Briton and a Canadian.

Multiple witnesses saw a smoke trail behind the missile as it rushed toward the helicopter. The smoke trail was an important indicator. Rocket-propelled grenades do not leave them. Heat-seeking missiles do. The crew of other helicopters reported the downing as a surface-to-air missile strike. But that was not what a NATO spokesman told Reuters.

“Clearly, there were enemy fighters in the area,” said the spokesman, Maj. John Thomas. “It’s not impossible for small-arms fire to bring down a helicopter.”

The reports paint a disheartening picture of the Afghan police and soldiers at the center of the American exit strategy.

The Pentagon is spending billions to train the Afghan forces to secure the country. But the police have proved to be an especially risky investment and are often described as distrusted, even loathed, by Afghan civilians. The reports recount episodes of police brutality, corruption petty and large, extortion and kidnapping. Some police officers defect to the Taliban. Others are accused of collaborating with insurgents, arms smugglers and highway bandits. Afghan police officers defect with trucks or weapons, items captured during successful ambushes or raids.

MARCH 10, 2008 | PAKTIA PROVINCE
Investigation Report: Extortion by the Police

This report captured the circular and frustrating effort by an American investigator to stop Afghan police officers at a checkpoint from extorting payments from motorists. After a line of drivers described how they were pressed to pay bribes, the American investigator and the local police detained the accused checkpoint police officers.

“While waiting,” the investigator wrote, “I asked the seven patrolmen we detained to sit and relax while we sorted through a problem without ever mentioning why they were being detained. Three of the patrolmen responded by saying that they had only taken money from the truck drivers to buy fuel for their generator.”

Two days later when the American followed up, he was told by police officers that the case had been dropped because the witness reports had all been lost.

One report documented the detention of a military base worker trying to leave the base with GPS units hidden under his clothes and taped to his leg. Another described the case of a police chief in Zurmat, in Paktia Province, who was accused of falsely reporting that his officers had been in a firefight so he could receive thousands of rounds of new ammunition, which he sold in a bazaar.

Coalition trainers report that episodes of cruelty by the Afghan police undermine the effort to build a credible security force to take over when the allies leave.

OCT. 11, 2009 | BALKH PROVINCE
Incident Report: Brutal Police Chief

This report began with an account of Afghan soldiers and police officers harassing and beating local civilians for refusing to cooperate in a search. It then related the story of a district police commander who forced himself on a 16-year-old girl. When a civilian complained, the report continued, “The district commander ordered his bodyguard to open fire on the AC [Afghan civilian]. The bodyguard refused, at which time the district commander shot [the bodyguard] in front of the AC.”

Rivalries and friction between the largest Afghan security services – the police and the army – are evident in a number of reports. Sometimes the tensions erupted in outright clashes, as was recorded in the following report from last December that was described as an “enemy action.” The “enemy” in this case was the Afghan National Security Force.

DEC. 4, 2009 | ORUZGAN PROVINCE
Incident Report: Police and Army Rivalry

A car accident turned deadly when an argument broke out between the police and the Afghan National Army. “The argument escalated and ANA & ANP started to shoot at each other,” a report said.

An Afghan soldier and three Afghan police officers were wounded in the shootout. One civilian was killed and six others were wounded by gunfire.

One sign of the weakness of the police is that in places they have been replaced by tribal warlords who are charged – informally but surely – with providing the security the government cannot. Often the warlords operate above the law.

NOV. 22, 2009 | KANDAHAR PROVINCE
Incident Report: Illegal Checkpoint

A private security convoy, ferrying fuel from Kandahar to Oruzgan, was stopped by what was thought to be 100 insurgents armed with assault rifles and PK machine guns, a report said.

It turned out the convoy had been halted by “the local Chief of Police,” who was “demanding $2000-$3000 per truck” as a kind of toll. The chief, said the report, from NATO headquarters in Southern Afghanistan, “states he needs the money to run his operation.”

The chief was not actually a police chief. He was Matiullah Khan, a warlord and an American-backed ally of President Karzai who was arguably Oruzgan’s most powerful man. He had a contract, the Ministry of Interior said, to protect the road so NATO’s supply convoys could drive on it, but he had apparently decided to extort money from the convoys himself.

Late in the day, Mr. Matiullah, after many interventions, changed his mind. The report said that friendly forces “report that the COMPASS convoy is moving again and did not pay the fee required.”

The documents show how the best intentions of Americans to help rebuild Afghanistan through provincial reconstruction teams ran up against a bewildering array of problems – from corruption to cultural misunderstandings – as they tried to win over the public by helping repair dams and bridges, build schools and train local authorities.

A series of reports from 2005 to 2008 chart the frustrations of one of the first such teams, assigned to Gardez, in Paktia Province.

NOV. 28, 2006 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Civil
Affairs Report: Orphanage Opens

An American civil affairs officer could barely contain her enthusiasm as she spoke at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new orphanage, built with money from the American military.

The officer said a friend had given her a leather jacket to present to “someone special,” the report noted. She chose the orphanage’s director. “The commander stated that she could think of no one more deserving then someone who cared for orphans,” it said.

The civil affairs team handed out blankets, coats, scarves and toys. The governor even gave money from his own pocket. “All speeches were very positive,” the report concluded.

DEC. 20, 2006 | PAKTIA PROVINCE
Civil Affairs Report: Not Many Orphans

The team dropped by to check on the orphanage. “We found very few orphans living there and could not find most of the HA [humanitarian assistance] we had given them,” the report noted.

The team raised the issue with the governor of Paktia, who said he was also concerned and suspected that the money he had donated had not reached the children. He visited the orphanage himself. Only 30 children were there; the director had claimed to have 102.

OCT. 16, 2007 | PAKTIA PROVINCE
Civil Affairs Report: An Empty Orphanage

Nearly a year after the opening of the orphanage, the Americans returned for a visit. “There are currently no orphans at the facility due to the Holiday. (Note: orphans are defined as having no father, but may still have mother and a family structure that will have them home for holidays.)”

FEB. 25, 2007 | PAKTIA PROVINCE
District Report: Lack of Resources

As the Taliban insurgency strengthened, the lack of a government presence in the more remote districts – and the government’s inability to provide security or resources even to its own officials – is evident in the reports.

An official from Dand Wa Patan, a small sliver of a district along the border with Pakistan, so urgently wanted to talk to the members of the American team that he traveled three and a half hours by taxi – he had no car – to meet them.

“He explained that the enemy had changed their tactics in the area and were no longer fighting from the mountains, no longer sending rockets toward his compound and other areas,” the report noted. “He stated that the enemy focus was on direct action and that his family was a primary target.”

Ten days earlier the Taliban crept up to the wall of his family compound and blew up one of the security towers, the report said. His son lost his legs in the explosion.

He pleaded for more police officers, weapons and ammunition. He also wanted a car so he could drive around the district he was supposed to oversee.

But the Americans’ situation was not much better. For months the reports show how a third – or even a half – of the team’s vehicles were out of service, awaiting spare parts.

NOV. 15, 2006 | PAKTIA PROVINCE
Civil Affairs Report: Local Corruption

For a while the civil affairs team worked closely with the provincial governor, described as “very charismatic.” Yet both he and the team are hampered by corrupt, negligent and antagonistic officials.

The provincial chief of police is described in one report as “the axel of corruption.”

“He makes every effort to openly and blatantly take money from the ANP troopers and the officers,” one sympathetic officer told the Americans.

Other officers are more clever. One forged rosters, to collect pay for imaginary police officers. A second set up illegal checkpoints to collects tolls around Gardez. Still another stole food and uniforms, leaving his soldiers underfed and ill equipped for the winter.

The governor, meanwhile, was all but trapped. Such animosity developed between him and a senior security official that the governor could not leave his office for weeks at a time, fearing for his life. Finally, the corrupt officials were replaced. But it took months.

SEPT. 24, 2007 | PAKTIA PROVINCE
Civil Affairs Report: The Cost of Corruption

Their meetings with Afghan district officials gave the American civil affairs officers unique insights into local opinions. Sometimes, the Afghan officials were brutally honest in their assessments.

In one case, provincial council officials visited the Americans at their base in Gardez to report threats – the Taliban had tossed a grenade into their office compound and were prowling the hills. Then the officials began a tirade.

“The people of Afghanistan keep loosing their trust in the government because of the high amount of corrupted government officials,” the report quoted them as saying. “The general view of the Afghans is that the current government is worst than the Taliban.”

“The corrupted government officials are a new concept brought to Afghanistan by the AMERICANS,” the oldest member of the group told the civil affairs team.

In conclusion, the civil affairs officer who wrote the report warned, “The people will support the Anti-Coalition forces and the security condition will degenerate.” He recommended a public information program to educate Afghans about democracy.

The reports also evoke the rivalries and tensions that swirl within the presidential palace between President Karzai’s circle and the warlords.

OCT. 16, 2006 | KABUL
Intelligence Summary: Political Intrigue

In a short but heated meeting at the presidential palace, the Kabul police chief, Brig. Gen. Mir Amanullah Gozar, angrily refuted accusations made publicly by Jamil Karzai that he was corrupt and lacked professional experience. The report of the meeting identified Jamil Karzai as the president’s brother; he is in fact a cousin.

General Gozar “said that if Jamil were not the president’s Brother he would kidnap, torture, and kill him,” the report said. He added that he was aware of plans by the American-led coalition to remove him from his post.

He threatened the president, saying that if he were replaced he would reveal “allegations about Karzai having been a drug trader and supporter of the Pakistan-led insurgency in Afghanistan,” presumably a reference to Mr. Karzai’s former links with the Taliban.

Incident by incident, the reports resemble a police blotter of the myriad ways Afghan civilians were killed – not just in airstrikes but in ones and twos – in shootings on the roads or in the villages, in misunderstandings or in a cross-fire, or in chaotic moments when Afghan drivers ventured too close to convoys and checkpoints.

The dead, the reports repeatedly indicate, were not suicide bombers or insurgents, and many of the cases were not reported to the public at the time. The toll of the war – reflected in mounting civilian casualties – left the Americans seeking cooperation and support from an Afghan population that grew steadily more exhausted, resentful, fearful and alienated.

From the war’s outset, airstrikes that killed civilians in large numbers seized international attention, including the aerial bombardment of a convoy on its way to attend President Karzai’s inauguration in 2001. An airstrike in Azizabad, in western Afghanistan, killed as many as 92 people in August 2008. In May 2009, another strike killed 147 Afghan civilians.

SEPT. 3, 2009 | KUNDUZ PROVINCE
Incident Report: Mistaken Airstrike

This report, filed about the activities of a Joint Terminal Attack Controller team, which is responsible for communication from the ground and guiding pilots during surveillance missions and airstrikes, offers a glimpse into one of the bloodiest mistakes in 2009.

It began with a report from the police command saying that “2X FUEL TRUCKS WERE STOLEN BY UNK NUMBER OF INS” and that the insurgents planned to cross the Kunduz River with their prizes. It was nighttime, and the river crossing was not illuminated. Soon, the report noted, the “JTAC OBSERVED KDZ RIVER AND REPORTED THAT IT DISCOVERED THE TRUCKS AS WELL AS UP TO 70 INS” at “THE FORD ON THE RIVER. THE TRUCKS WERE STUCK IN THE MUD.” How the JTAC team was observing the trucks was not clear, but many aircraft have infrared video cameras that can send a live feed to a computer monitor on the ground.

According to the report, a German commander of the provincial reconstruction team “LINKED UP WITH JTAC AND, AFTER ENSURING THAT NO CIVILIANS WERE IN THE VICINITY,” he “AUTHORIZED AN AIRSTRIKE.” An F-15 then dropped two 500-pound guided bombs. The initial report said that “56X INS KIA [insurgents killed in action] (CONFIRMED) AND 14X INS FLEEING IN NE DIRECTION. THE 2X FUEL TRUCKS WERE ALSO DESTROYED.”

The initial report was wrong. The trucks had been abandoned, and a crowd of civilians milled around them, removing fuel. How the commander and the JTAC had ensured “that no civilians were in the area,” as the report said, was not explained.

The first sign of the mistake documented in the initial report appeared the next day, when another report said that at “0900 hrs International Media reported that US airstrike had killed 60 civilians in Kunduz. The media are reporting that Taliban did steal the trucks and had invited civilians in the area to take fuel.”

The reports show that the smaller incidents were just as insidious and alienating, turning Afghans who had once welcomed Americans as liberators against the war.

MARCH 5, 2007 | GHAZNI PROVINCE
Incident Report: Checkpoint Danger

Afghan police officers shot a local driver who tried to speed through their checkpoint on a country road in Ghazni Province south of Kabul. The police had set up a temporary checkpoint on the highway just outside the main town in the district of Ab Band.

“A car approached the check point at a high rate of speed,” the report said. All the police officers fled the checkpoint except one. As the car passed the checkpoint it knocked down the lone policeman. He fired at the vehicle, apparently thinking that it was a suicide car bomber.

“The driver of the vehicle was killed,” the report said. “No IED [improvised explosive device] was found and vehicle was destroyed.”

The police officer was detained in the provincial capital, Ghazni, and questioned. He was then released. The American mentoring the police concluded in his assessment that the policeman’s use of force was appropriate. Rather than acknowledging the public hostility such episodes often engender, the report found a benefit: it suggested that the shooting would make Afghans take greater care at checkpoints in the future.

“Effects on the populace clearly identify the importance of stopping at checkpoints,” the report concluded.

MARCH 21, 2007 | PAKTIKA PROVINCE
Incident Report: A Deaf Man Is Shot

Members of a C.I.A. paramilitary unit moved into the village of Malekshay in Paktika Province close to the border with Pakistan when they saw an Afghan running away at the sight of their convoy, one report recounted. Members of the unit shot him in the ankle, and medics treated him at the scene. The unit had followed military procedure – first shouting at the man, then firing warning shots and only after that shooting to wound, the report said.

Yet elders in the village told the unit that the man, Shum Khan, was deaf and mute and that he had fled from the convoy out of nervousness. Mr. Khan was “unable to hear the warnings or warning shots. Ran out of fear and confusion,” the report concludes. The unit handed over supplies in compensation.

The reports reveal several instances of allied forces accidentally firing on one another or on Afghan forces in the fog of war, often with tragic consequences.

APRIL 6, 2006 | HELMAND PROVINCE
Incident Report: Friendly Fire

A British Army convoy driving at night in southern Afghanistan suddenly came under small-arms fire. One of the British trucks rolled over. The British troops split into two groups, pulled back from the clash and called in airstrikes from American A-10 attack planes. After several confusing minutes, commanders realized that the Afghan police had attacked the British troops, mistaking them for Taliban fighters. One Afghan police officer was killed and 12 others were wounded.

The shifting tactics of the Americans can be seen as well in the reports, as the war strategy veered from freely using force to trying to minimize civilian casualties. But as the documents make clear, each approach has its frustrations for the American effort.

Strict new rules of engagement, imposed in 2009, minimized the use of airstrikes after some had killed civilians and turned Afghans against the war. But the rules also prompted anger from American troops and their families. The troops felt that their lives were not sufficiently valued because they had to justify every request for air or artillery support, making it easier for the Taliban to fight.

OCT. 1, 2008 | KUNAR PROVINCE
Incident Report: Barrage

In the days when field commanders had a freer hand, an infantry company commander observed an Afghan with a two-way radio who was monitoring the company’s activities. Warning of “IMMINENT THREAT,” the commander said he would “destroy” the man and his equipment – in other words, kill him. A short while later, a 155-millimeter artillery piece at a forward operating base in the nearby Pech Valley began firing high-explosive rounds – 24 in all.

NOV. 13, 2009 | HELMAND PROVINCE
Incident Report: Escalation of Force

As the rules tightened, the reports picked up a tone that at times seemed lawyerly. Many make reference, even in pitched fights, to troops using weapons in accordance with “ROE Card A” – which guides actions of self-defense rather than attacks or offensive acts. This report described an Apache helicopter firing warning shots after coming under fire. Its reaction was described as “an escalation of force.”

The helicopter pilots reported that insurgents “engaged with SAF [surface-to-air fire]“and that “INTEL suggested they were going to be fired upon again during their extraction.”

The helicopters “fired 40x 30mm warning shots to deter any further engagement.”

The report included the information that now is common to incident reports in which Western forces fire. “The terrain was considered rurally open and there were no CIV PID IVO [civilians positively identified in the vicinity of ] the target within reasonable certainty. There was no damage to infrastructure. BDA [battle damage assessment] recording conducted by AH-64 Gun Tape. No follow up required. The next higher command was consulted. The enemy engaged presented, in the opinion of the ground forces, an imminent threat. Engagement is under ROE Card A. Higher HQ have been informed.”

The reports show in previously unknown detail the omnipresence of drones in Afghanistan, the Air Force’s missile-toting Predators and Reapers that hunt militants. The military’s use of drones in Afghanistan has rapidly expanded in the past few years; the United States Air Force now flies about 20 Predator and Reaper aircraft a day – nearly twice as many as a year ago – over vast stretches of hostile Afghan territory. Allies like Britain and Germany fly their own fleets.

The incident reports chronicle the wide variety of missions these aircraft carry out: taking photographs, scooping up electronic transmissions, relaying images of running battles to field headquarters, attacking militants with bombs and missiles. And they also reveal the extent that armed drones are being used to support American Special Operations missions.

Documents in the Afghan archive capture the strange nature of the drone war in Afghanistan: missile-firing robots killing shovel-wielding insurgents, a remote-controlled war against a low-tech but resilient insurgency.

DEC. 9, 2008 | KANDAHAR PROVINCE
Incident Report: Predator Attack

Early one winter evening in southern Afghanistan, an Air Force Predator drone spotted a group of insurgents suspected of planting roadside bombs along a roadway less than two miles from Forward Operating Base Hutal, an American outpost.

Unlike the drones the C.I.A. operated covertly across the border in Pakistan, this aircraft was one of nearly a dozen military drones patrolling vast stretches of hostile Afghan territory on any given day.

Within minutes after identifying the militants, the Predator unleashed a Hellfire missile, all but evaporating one of the figures digging in the dark.

When ground troops reached the crater caused by the missile, costing $60,000, all that was left was a shovel and a crowbar.

SEPT. 13, 2009 | BADAKHSHAN PROVINCE
Incident Report: A Lost Drone

Flying over southern Afghanistan on a combat mission, one of the Air Force’s premier armed drones, a Reaper, went rogue.

Equipped with advanced radar and sophisticated cameras, as well as Hellfire missiles and 500-pound bombs, the Reaper had lost its satellite link to a pilot who was remotely steering the drone from a base in the United States.

Again and again, the pilot struggled to regain control of the drone. Again and again, no response. The reports reveal that the military in Afghanistan lost many of the tiny five-pound surveillance drones with names like Raven and Desert Hawk that troops tossed out like model airplanes to peer around the next hill. But they had never before lost one of the Reapers, with its 66-foot wingspan.

As a last resort, commanders ordered an Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jet to shoot down the $13 million aircraft before it soared unguided into neighboring Tajikistan.

Ground controllers picked an unpopulated area over northern Afghanistan and the jet fired a Sidewinder missile, destroying the Reaper’s turbo-prop engine. Suddenly, the satellite link was restored, but it was too late to salvage the flight. At 5:30 a.m., controllers steered it into a remote mountainside for a final fiery landing.

As the Afghanistan war took priority under the Obama administration, more Special Operations forces were shifted from Iraq to conduct secret missions. The C.I.A.’s own paramilitary operations inside Afghanistan grew in tandem – as did the agency’s close collaboration with Afghanistan’s own spy agency.

Usually, such teams conducted night operations aimed at top Taliban commanders and militants on the “capture/kill” list. While individual commandos have displayed great courage, the missions can end in calamity as well as success. The expanding special operations have stoked particular resentment among Afghans – for their lack of coordination with local forces, the civilian casualties they frequently inflicted and the lack of accountability.

JUNE 17, 2007 | PAKTIKA PROVINCE
INCIDENT REPORT: Botched Night Raid

Shortly after five American rockets destroyed a compound in Paktika Province, helicopter-borne commandos from Task Force 373 – a classified Special Operations unit of Army Delta Force operatives and members of the Navy Seals – arrived to finish the job.

The mission was to capture or kill Abu Laith al-Libi, a top commander for Al Qaeda, who was believed to be hiding at the scene of the strike.

But Mr. Libi was not there. Instead, the Special Operations troops found a group of men suspected of being militants and their children. Seven of the children had been killed by the rocket attack.

Some of the men tried to flee the Americans, and six were quickly killed by encircling helicopters. After the rest were taken as detainees, the commandos found one child still alive in the rubble, and performed CPR for 20 minutes.

Word of the attack spread a wave of anger across the region, forcing the local governor to meet with village elders to defuse the situation.

American military officials drew up a list of “talking points” for the governor, pointing out that the target had been a senior Qaeda commander, that there had been no indications that women and children would be present and that a nearby mosque had not been damaged.

After the meeting, the governor reported that local residents were in shock, but that he had “pressed the Talking Points.” He even “added a few of his own that followed in line with our current story.”

The attack was caused by the “presence of hoodlums,” the governor told the people. It was a tragedy that children had been killed, he said, but “it could have been prevented had the people exposed the presence of insurgents in the area.”

He promised that the families would be compensated for their loss.

Mr. Libi was killed the following year by a C.I.A. drone strike.

APRIL 6, 2008 | NURISTAN PROVINCE
Incident Report: A Raging Firefight

As they scrambled up the rocks toward a cluster of mud compounds perched high over the remote Shok Valley, a small group of American Green Berets and Afghan troops, known as Task Force Bushmaster, were confronted with a hail of gunfire from inside the insurgent stronghold.

They were there to capture senior members of the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin militant group, part of a mission that the military had dubbed Operation Commando Wrath.

But what they soon discovered on that remote, snowy hilltop was that they were vastly outnumbered by a militant force of hundreds of fighters. Reinforcements were hours away.

A firefight raged for nearly seven hours, with sniper fire pinning down the Green Berets on a 60-foot rock ledge for much of that time.

Casualties mounted. By midmorning, nearly half of the Americans were wounded, but the militants directed their gunfire on the arriving medevac helicopters, preventing them from landing.

“TF Bushmaster reports they are combat ineffective and request reinforcement at this time.”

For a time, radio contact was lost.

Air Force jets arrived at the scene and began pummeling the compounds with 2,000-pound bombs, but the militants continued to advance down the mountain toward the pinned-down group.

The task force reported that there were ” 50-100 insurgents moving to reinforce against Bushmaster elements from the SW.”

Carrying wounded Americans shot in the pelvis, arm and legs – as well as two dead Afghans – the group made its way down toward the valley floor. Eventually, the helicopters were able to arrive to evacuate the dead and wounded.

Ten members of the Green Berets would receive Silver Stars for their actions during the battle, the highest number given to Special Forces soldiers for a single battle since the Vietnam War. By Army estimates, 150 to 200 militants were killed in the battle.

MARCH 8, 2008 | BAGRAM AIR BASE
Meeting Report: A Plea for Help

Toward the end of a long meeting with top American military commanders, during which he delivered a briefing about the security situation in eastern Afghanistan, corruption in the government and Pakistan’s fecklessness in hunting down militants, Afghanistan’s top spy laid out his problem.

Amrullah Saleh, then director of the National Directorate of Security, told the Americans that the C.I.A. would no longer be handling his spy service’s budget. For years, the C.I.A. had essentially run the N.D.S. as a subsidiary, but by 2009 the Afghan government was preparing to take charge of the agency’s budget.

Mr. Saleh estimated that with the C.I.A. no longer bankrolling the Afghan spies, he could be facing a budget cut of 30 percent.

So he made a request. With the budget squeeze coming, Mr. Saleh asked the Americans for any AK-47s and ammunition they could spare.

Courting Pakistan: Forging a Strategic Partnership

The United States and Pakistan is the world’s oddest couple, with an on-again, off-again friendship that has survived since the 1950s. Last week both sides completed a “strategic dialogue” in Washington amid fears that they were headed for another break-up. Those fears can only be countered if both the U.S. and Pakistan keep the larger goal in mind: the development of a stable, secure and prosperous Pakistan.

Last week’s dialogue reiterated common goals on some key issues, including energy, infrastructure, agriculture and trade. But the hard issues – the Afghan Taliban operating inside Pakistani space, the Pakistan-India conflict over Kashmir, and Islamabad’s wish for a civil nuclear deal similar to the one given to India – were politely avoided in public commentary.

Part of the problem is Pakistan’s wariness of U.S. intentions. As the late Pakistani dictator General Zial ul Haq once explained to his ambassador in Washington, Jamsheed Marker, “Being friends with the United States is like living on the banks of a great river. Every four years it changes course, and leaves you either flooded, or high and dry!” The U.S. showers aid and attention on Pakistan when it suits its strategic interests in the region and then leaves. Pakistan meanwhile seeks security against a larger and potentially hostile neighbor to the east: India. Each pretends to meet the other’s needs while papering over differences.

The U.S., on its part, sees a deceptive ally in Pakistan; one which seeks aid to use it for defense against India while pretending to meet U.S. regional aims. The Obama administration is attempting to craft a new, longer-term relationship with Pakistan, and American officials travel frequently to the country and return praising the relationship effusively. But it is hard to distinguish their attempts to proclaim success for their individual missions from the reality on the ground.

The passage of the Kerry-Lugar Bill that promises at least $7 billion of aid to Pakistan over five years should have been a good omen, but Pakistani military and public opposition to the bill has put a crimp in the relationship, adding to the public perception of the U.S. as an intrusive and overbearing friend. The army high command, confident after its recent successes against its internal militancy and buoyed by public approval of its actions, recently revived the dialogue with the U.S. on its terms. Army Chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani chose to focus on high visibility, high impact projects that would meet the country’s urgent energy and infrastructure needs, rather than dissipating its effect on a wide range of softer social sector projects with longer gestation periods.

To a large extent, Kayani’s actions appeared to be in accord with some of the targets set by Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke. However, the real test will be in Pakistan’s ability to set up an effective governance framework to implement the projects rapidly and without leakage of benefits to the traditional elites that suck up assistance for their own benefit. If most of the aid begins to reach average Pakistanis, then the U.S. and Pakistan could build on this new structure. If not, then the U.S. Congress likely will call in its auditors and cut off the flow.

One piece of good news has been the rapid provision of aid for key road-building projects in South Waziristan that have been undertaken via the FATA Development Authority by the Pakistan army’s Frontier Works Organization. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is reported to have helped push this aid through after her exchanges with Kayani, who came up with this idea. If this project model succeeds, much more could be done in the frontier areas by bringing the locals on board to help identify and implement necessary projects.

Kayani is clearly trying to build bridges with the U.S. as a necessary ally. But the officer corps still harbors residual mistrust. To remove it, Pakistan must improve its civil governance by taking ownership of its project plans, setting targets and achieving them. The U.S. must deliver what Pakistan needs rapidly, and without too much intrusive monitoring that many Pakistanis fear is secretly designed to identify the location of Pakistan’s strategic nuclear assets. The U.S. must also give the Pakistan military more usable weapons to fight its militancy. And it must use its influence on India to give Pakistan breathing room, so it can concentrate on the war within rather than stay ready for action on two fronts, one against India and the other on the Afghan border. Opening U.S. markets to Pakistani textiles and other goods will also help in the near term.

In the longer run, Pakistan needs help to move up the economic value chain and into manufacturing goods. With its growing population, it needs GDP growth of 6% or more each year to keep improving the lives of its 175 million inhabitants, half of whom are below 18 years of age. That growth depends on foreign investment, which is critically dependent on security and good governance, both of which have been in short supply in recent years. But Pakistan must also avoid becoming dependent on aid or ceding its sovereignty in the process of acquiring aid. As its first military dictator, Mohammad Ayub Khan, put it bluntly: Pakistan needs “friends not masters.” What happens after the strategic dialogue in Washington will help prove the truth of that statement.

Pentagon puts pressure on Hamid Karzai over corruption

By Adam Entous Adam Entous

KABUL: The Pentagon’s top military officer followed his commander-in-chief to Kabul on Monday to keep up pressure on President Hamid Karzai to tackle corruption, which he said could ruin the war’s new strategy.

President Barack Obama inspects a guard of honor with Afghan President Hamid Karzai at the Presidential …

Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, arrived less than a day after President Barack Obama made the first trip of his presidency there, bringing a stern message that Karzai needs to do more to fight graft.

Obama’s strategy, backed by 30,000 more troops this year, enters its most ambitious phase with a major offensive starting in June in the Taliban’s birthplace Kandahar, where the top provincial official is Karzai’s half brother, Ahmad Wali Karzai.

Mullen described Kandahar as Afghanistan’s “center of gravity” and the key to reversing the Taliban’s momentum.

But he said the whole strategy could fail if Karzai does not do more to fight corruption in his brother’s southern fiefdom.

“We will be unable to succeed in Kandahar if we cannot eliminate a vast majority of corruption there and set up a legitimate governance structure,” he told reporters.

“If we can’t do that there, then we will not be able to succeed. We can succeed militarily, but it’s not going to work. That’s just a fact.”

Asked if Ahmad Wali Karzai should be sidelined, Mullen said: “I think that’s something that President Karzai’s going to have to figure out … addressing the corruption and governance issues in Kandahar. It’s not for us to figure out.”

But a senior U.S. military official went further.

“I’d like him out of there,” the official said on condition of anonymity, talking of Ahmad Wali Karzai.

“We’d rather not have a guy like that down there because he’s so divisive. But there’s nothing that we can do unless we can link him to the insurgency, then we can put him on the (target list) and capture and kill him,” the official said.

KANDAHAR CAMPAIGN

As head of Kandahar’s provincial council Ahmad Wali Karzai wields considerable power in the south, but has been accused of amassing a vast fortune from the drugs trade, intimidating rivals and having links to the CIA; charges he strongly denies.

But there was no plan to target Ahmad Wali Karzai as yet. “We’re not going in that direction,” the senior official said. “The president of this country is the one that has to decide what to do with that guy.”

Ahmad Wali Karzai has taken on added importance for the United States ahead of an offensive to take control of Kandahar, Afghanistan’s second largest city, and the province around it.

Important elements of the Kandahar campaign, including outreach to tribal leaders, were already well under way, military officials said, and would intensify in the coming weeks with greater involvement by Karzai and other officials.

Pointing to a calendar, one of the officials indicated the month of June as the likely start of the offensive.

U.S. forces hope to take some areas in and around Kandahar without a fight by reaching agreements with local tribal leaders, but the operation is expected to include a main thrust of roughly 10,000 troops for areas to be “cleared” by force.

“The key thing is we’ve got to be done with that by Ramadan,” the second official said, referring to the Muslim holy month of fasting that begins in August.

The campaign would then shift from a “clearing” phase to a “secure and deliver government” phase, expected to last at least until mid-October, he said.

The timetable for the Kandahar campaign, the most detailed made public to date, highlights the limited window available to U.S. and NATO forces to turn the tide against the Taliban before a review of war strategy in late November or early December.

That review will assess whether the U.S.-led campaign and the training of the Afghan army and police have gained enough ground to allow a gradual U.S. withdrawal to begin in July 2011.

While U.S. and European leaders accept that a deal with the Taliban is the only way to end the war, Mullen played down the chances of a political agreement in the short term.

“I think it is premature. There’s no one that I’ve spoken to, at least on the American side, or actually, on the coalition side, that doesn’t think we need to proceed from a position of strength,” Mullen said. “In my judgment, we’re not there yet.”

Karzai this week held preliminary peace talks with Hezb-i-Islami, one of the smaller insurgent factions. Karzai is also holding a major peace conference in Kabul in early May.

SECURITY AND GOVERNANCE

In addition to cleaning up Afghan governance, Obama’s strategy hinges on building up the country’s army and police forces to take over security responsibility, a process that has been hamstrung by a shortage of international trainers.

The United States has struggled to convince its NATO allies in Afghanistan to fill the shortfall, and Mullen said one option might be to send more U.S. trainers to fill the gap.

“We’ve asked and pushed our other partners to provide as many as possible. That continues … We’ve come up short a few hundred,” Mullen said.

Aides to Mullen said the Pentagon did not currently envision a need to add trainers on top of the troop increase ordered by Obama in December.