A thought-provoking piece in the Post today, saturated with allegations by Hamid Gul (former head of the Pakistani ISI), exposes potential U.S. complicity in the leaking of U.S. intelligence data from the occupation of Afghanistan. The MSM angle on the leak is to excoriate Pakistan and (of course) Iran for allegedly aiding the Taliban/Al Qaeda/Haqquani bogeymen that frustrate the efforts of the U.S. in Afghanistan. As reported in the story, Gul does not disguise his opposition to the U.S. occupation, and does not deny his past existence as a tool of the CIA (along with bin Laden, Haqquani, and countless others) in its covert support of the mujhadeen's resistance of the Soviets. Without doubt, Gul knows the design of the great game in Afghanistan, so it's worthwhile to evaluate his opinion. Gul's opinion is that many of the intelligence reports disclosed in the data leak originated from Indian operatives who manufactured the reports for two reasons: (1) to implicate Pakistan and alienate it from the U.S., and (2) the most basic human need of greed, as Gul alleges that operatives are paid for each report they submit regardless of the quality of veracity of the intelligence reported. Contrary to Gul's assertions, I had surmised that many of these same intelligence reports had originated from operatives in the Afghanistan region who were reporting Pakistani and Iranian involvement as a means to give the U.S. a casus belli for planned action against Iran. Perhaps both assertions or true, and perhaps neither. In any event, Gul's statements are thought-provoking, and again reveal the many prisms through which a single event can be viewed.
The more important context overlaying the entire Afghanistan debate is: what the hell are we trying to doing there? What is victory? At best, victory in Afghanistan seems be that "we would be in minimalist possession of a fractious, ruined land, at war for three decades, and about as alien to, and far from, the United States as it’s possible to be on this planet. We would be in minimalist possession of the world’s fifth poorest country. We would be in minimal possession of the world’s second most corrupt country. We would be in minimal possession of the world’s foremost narco-state, the only country that essentially produces a drug monocrop, opium. In terms of the global war on terror, we would be in possession of a country that the director of the CIA now believes to hold 50 to 100 al-Qaeda operatives (“maybe less”) -- for whom parts of the country might still be a “safe haven.” And for this, and everything to come, we would be paying, at a minimum, $84 billion a year." Source for quote: http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175272/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_the_petraeus_syndrome/#more
Document leak part of U.S. plot, says Pakistani ex-general with ties to Taliban
By Karin Brulliard for the Washington PostWednesday, July 28, 2010; pg. A08
RAWALPINDI, PAKISTAN -- From the deluge of leaked military documents published Sunday, a former Pakistani spy chief emerged as a chilling personification of his nation's alleged duplicity in the Afghan war -- an erstwhile U.S. ally turned Taliban tutor.
Now planted squarely in the cross hairs, retired Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul seems little short of delighted.
In an interview Tuesday, Gul dismissed the accusations against him as "fiction" and described the documents' release as the start of a White House plot. It will end, he posited, with an early U.S. pullout from Afghanistan -- thus proving Gul, an unabashed advocate of the Afghan insurgency, right.
President Obama "is a very good chess player. . . . He says, 'I don't want to carry the historic blame of having orchestrated the defeat of America, their humiliation in Afghanistan,' " said Gul, 74, adding that the plot incorporates a troop surge that Obama knows will fail. "It doesn't sell to a professional man like me."
That sort of theory makes Gul an incarnation of some of the United States' greatest challenges in dealing with Pakistan, a U.S. ally. Here, prominent figures closely linked to the security establishment not only trumpet what they view as vast American scheming but also, U.S. officials and the leaked documents allege, provide support to Afghan rebels.
Gul did that in an official capacity as head of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency from 1987 to 1989, when he helped the CIA funnel Islamist fighters into Afghanistan to fight the Soviets. Eloquent and polished, he was viewed by his American partners as pro-Western and moderate, while his Saudi benefactors saw him as a pious, conservative Muslim.
After the Soviet withdrawal, the Saudis' characterization seemed to prevail. Gul continued to support the rebels in a semiofficial capacity, as did other elements of Pakistan's security forces that view the Taliban as a tool for influence in Afghanistan, U.S. officials say.
With the greatest detail yet made public, the leaked documents depict American views of Gul as a murderous terrorist agent. According to some of the documents, he possessed dozens of bombs for Taliban fighters to detonate in Kabul, instructed militants to kidnap United Nations workers, hatched a plan for a suicide bombing in Afghanistan to avenge an insurgent and assured fighters that Pakistan would provide them haven.
The reports are unconfirmed. But they are hardly surprising to those closely following the Afghan war, or to Gul himself. On Monday, he described himself as a "whipping boy" for the United States.
Current and former U.S. officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, variously described him as "very dirty" and a man with a "horrible reputation."
"There's no doubt where his sympathies lie," a U.S. official said, echoing the views of many Pakistani defense analysts. "Even though Gul may not be a card-carrying member of a terrorist group, he stays in touch with militants, offering his insights and advice on their activities."
Obama said Tuesday that the documents do not reveal any issues that weren't already part of the public debate on Afghanistan and that they "point to the same challenges that led me to conduct an extensive review of our policy last fall."
Gul, one of several former Pakistani military officials whom the United States accuses of fueling the Afghan insurgency, has deemed the war a "war against Muslims." He has acknowledged being a member of a militant organization banned by Pakistan.
Former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, who had fired Gul as ISI chief on suspicion that he wanted to overthrow her, fingered him as a threat shortly before her assassination in 2007. Gul has since publicly shared what he calls his "assessment" that the United States was behind Bhutto's slaying, an allegation U.S. officials vehemently deny.
Gul and a senior ISI official say he cut ties with the agency upon retiring two decades ago. But he remains a major figure in Pakistan, where he regularly airs his anti-American views on talk shows. Gul said talking to the media is one of his hobbies, as are horticulture and trying to lower his golf handicap of 18.
His support for the Taliban is purely "academic," he said.
"There is not physical input to it. I don't have the means. I don't have the will," Gul said, speaking in his living room in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. "I am not an enemy of America. I am against their policy, much as many very patriotic Americans are against the policies."
To that end, Gul said, he holds Taliban leader Mohammad Omar in high regard for his "resistance" to U.S. invaders, though he said he has never met the man. He readily acknowledged that he has maintained friendships with former mujaheddin such as Jalaluddin Haqqani, a onetime CIA-backed fighter whose network is now viewed as the coalition forces' most lethal foe.
"The Americans dropped him like a hot brick," Gul said. "Why should I discard him just because he is doing the same thing . . . that they did against the Soviet occupation? They are fighting for the liberation of their country."
A conversation with Gul is a journey into the dense web of suspicion in this region, where Americans detect Pakistani and Iranian involvement in attacks in Afghanistan, Afghans see the ISI under every rock, and Pakistanis sense nefarious Indian designs all around them.
In Gul's version, India is where the leaked documents implicating Pakistani aid to the Taliban originated. The reports, he said, were fed by Indians to Afghan intelligence agents and intelligence "contractors" who are paid for each report they file. The reports are meant to pressure Pakistan to toe the American line, he said, a view widely shared here.
Gul said he was singled out in the reports because of American fears that he will expose U.S. "cavities" -- corruption, poor planning and complicity in the opium trade -- in the Afghan conflict. Pakistan's cooperation with the United States, he said, has "ravaged" its economy and social fabric.
"My future generations are going to be proud when they read about their ancestors," Gul said. "What about the American children, when they read about this -- that a retired 74-year-old general brought about the defeat of America in Afghanistan? What were their generals doing?"
But Gul reserved praise for Obama, who, he said, was expertly playing this game of intrigue. The document leak was orchestrated to indict Bush-era war policy, and the troop surge to expose Pentagon follies; soon a massive antiwar movement will rise, Gul said.
"I am sitting here understanding your politics better," he said, almost giddily. "Obama has been given the peace prize, the Nobel Peace Prize, in anticipation of what he is going to do. Somebody has read his mind. And I have read his mind, too."
Staff writer Peter Finn in Washington contributed to this report.
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