Act 1: March 2002.
Abu Zubaidah, a Palestinian member of al-Qaeda, was
arrested in Faislabad in Pakistani Punjab by the
Pakistani authorities and handed over to the US's
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was the
operational chief of al-Qaeda; his arrest was a major
breakthrough, we were told. This is hardly supported by
the report of the 9-11 Commission.
Act
2: September 2002. Ramzi Binalshibh was arrested
in Karachi and handed over to the FBI. He was the man,
we were told. Not Abu Zubaidah. A real
breakthrough, it was claimed. He figures frequently in
the commission's report, but one does not get the
impression that he was as great a cat's whiskers as made
out to be.
Act 3: March 2003.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammad (KSM) was arrested in Rawalpindi
and handed over to the FBI. What a breakthrough, it was
said. The real mastermind of September 11. The evil
genius of al-Qaeda. Of all the jihadi terrorists, he
figures the most frequently in the report. Almost as
frequently as Pakistan's President General Pervez
Musharraf. The report does give the impression that KSM
was the brain who conceived of the plans for September
11, and orchestrated their execution. He is a Pakistani
from Balochistan, who grew up in Kuwait. The plans,
which led to the destruction of the two towers of the
World Trade Center in New York and to the attack on the
Pentagon and which caused the deaths of 3,500 innocent
men, women and children, were conceived not by the brain
of Osama bin Laden or a Muslim of any other nationality.
They were conceived and executed by the mind of
a Pakistani. If KSM was the mastermind and he was the
real evil genius, how about those in Pakistan who
sheltered and protected him in Karachi from 1998 until
September 2002, when he ran away to Quetta when the FBI
came to know of his presence in Karachi? How about those
who sheltered him in Quetta? How about those in
Pakistan's Jamaat-e-Islami (JEI) and army who sheltered
him in Rawalpindi, right under the nose of Musharraf,
when he fled there from Quetta, when the FBI established
his presence in Quetta? Are they any the less evil? The
commission, which goes into great detail on his
activities from Karachi before September 11, is
strangely silent on his activities there between
September 11 and March, 2003. An American journalist of
Indian sub-continental origin, who is a good personal
friend of Marianne Pearl, the widow of Daniel Pearl, the
US journalist kidnapped and beheaded in Karachi in
February, 2002, mentioned in an article in the online
journal Salon in October last year that the US
intelligence had informed Marianne that it was KSM who
had her husband killed. That means, KSM is a good friend
of Omar Sheikh, who organized the trap for Daniel. That
means, Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI),
which was operating Omar Sheikh as a source, must have
known of this friendship. That means, the ISI must have
known of KSM's presence in Karachi even in 2002, if not
before. Why did it not act against him?
The
biggest deficiency in the 9-11 Commission's report is
that it has restricted its enquiries to what happened
before September 11. It has not gone into what happened
after September 11 - the kidnapping and beheading of
Pearl, the grenade attack in an Islamabad church in
March 2002 which killed the wife and daughter of an
American diplomat, the attack on French submarine
engineers in Karachi thereafter and the car bomb
explosion outside the US consulate in Karachi in June
2002. Without going into them, how can one assess what
is the threat today and what will be the threat
tomorrow?
The reason why the commission did not
go into post-September 11 happenings is not difficult to
understand. The US intelligence did not want it to. From
the sanitized summaries of the interrogation reports
shared with the commission, the Central Intelligence
Agency (CIA) and the FBI excluded all references to
post-September 11 developments. If they had shared them
too, US public opinion would have been wiser about the
continued collusion of the Pakistani intelligence, or at
least sections of it, with Omar Sheikh, KSM and others
after September 11 too. And if it had become wiser, it
might have questioned the wisdom of the trust placed in
Musharraf, widely known in Pakistan army circles as
Tricky Mush, by the Bush administration. KSM also
mentioned one Issa al-Brittani, whom he had sent to the
US before September 11 at bin Laden's instance to case
possible economic and Jewish targets in the US. The
commission did not know anything about the identity of
this al-Brittani. At least did the CIA and the FBI know
about it?
Act 4: April, 2003. A
man projected as a principal suspect in the case
relating to the attack on the USS Cole, the US naval
ship, at Aden in October, 2002, was arrested in Karachi.
His name was initially given as Khalid bin Attash. It
was subsequently changed to Walid bin Attash. It hardly
matters whether you call him Khalid or Walid. You will
be none the wiser. The choice is yours. A great catch,
we were told. Musharraf got another pat in the back.
From the commission's report, he does not appear to have
been such a great catch. Another person was arrested
along with bin Attash. A nephew of KSM, we were told.
Handed over to the Americans. Disappeared from press
headlines. Nobody knows whether he was identified and
what happened to him.
Act 5:
October 2003. Musharraf sent his troops into South
Waziristan, much to the applause of the Americans. To
smoke out bin Laden and other dregs of al-Qaeda. For the
first time since Pakistan's creation in 1947, its army
had ventured into this God forsaken area, we were told.
Pakistan television reported the exploits of the army
day after day, hour after hour. Al-Qaeda's camps
destroyed. Dozens killed and arrested. So we were told.
The only confirmed killing so far is that of Hassan
Mahsun, an Uighur terrorist. What happened to those
arrested? Innocent Pakistani tribals or Arabs? Al-Qaeda
or something else? When you are watching a striptease
show, you should not ask questions. Just watch.
Act 6: February-March, 2004. The
Pakistan army ventured back into South Waziristan. A
high-value target surrounded, we were told. Ayman
al-Zawahiri, the Egyptian No 2 to bin Laden, Musharraf
told the US officials and media, which lap up whatever
he says just as they lapped up everything Ahmed Chalabi
told them about Iraq. It turned out to be an Uzbek.
Tohir Yuldeshev, leader of the Islamic Movement of
Uzbekistan. There would have been some saving grace at
least if he had been caught. No. He managed to just
drive through a Pakistani army cordon and escape to
fight another day. Doesn't matter, said Sheikh Rashid
Ahmed, Pakistan's Information Minister. The army had
caught or killed dozens of other al-Qaeda dregs, he
claimed.
Act 7: June. Within a few
days of an abortive attempt to kill the Corps Commander
of Karachi, Faisal Saleh Hyat, Pakistan's Interior
Minister, proudly announced the case had been solved and
those responsible arrested. They belonged to an
organization called Jundullah (Army of Allah), he said.
A new organization, of which the ISI was not aware till
then, we were told. Trained in South Waziristan by
al-Qaeda, we were further told. South Waziristan had
been swarming with Pakistani troops, helicopter gunships
and 007s of the US since October, 2003. How come
al-Qaeda managed to run training camps right under the
nose of the Pakistan army and American 007s just as KSM
had managed to live right under the nose of Musharraf in
Rawalpindi? Don't ask inconvenient questions. Just watch
the show. You have no idea what more is to come. Along
with the Jundullah members, one more guy was arrested. A
nephew of KSM, we were told. How many nephews does KSM
have? As many as the bras that a striptease dancer has.
A woman of Karachi filed a habeas corpus in a
Karachi court that the man arrested was her husband and
not a nephew of KSM. In Pakistan, such fine distinctions
are irrelevant. What matters is what Musharraf says. If
he says he is a nephew of KSM, so he is.
Act 8: July 25. After an encounter
lasting over 12 hours during which no one was killed and
not many bullet marks were left anywhere, the ISI
announced the arrest of a group of al-Qaeda members at
Gujrat in Pakistani Punjab. The leader was a Kenyan
national, we were told.
Act 9:
July 29. Sorry. He was actually a Tanzanian.
That, too, a famous Tanzanian. None other than Ahmed
Khalfan Ghailani wanted by the US for his involvement in
the explosions outside the US embassies in Kenya and
Tanzania in 1998. When was his identity established and
announced? Three hours before Senator John Kerry was to
make his acceptance speech at the Democratic
presidential convention. Investigation revealed that
Ghailani had been living at Gujrat for some months. Many
local police officers were suspended for not detecting
his presence. It is learnt that in their explanations
they admitted they were aware of his presence in Gujrat,
but said that they had not acted against him because the
ISI had brought and kept him there. Ghailani had escaped
to Pakistan immediately after the explosions of 1998.
How come the ISI was not aware of this all these years
and became aware of it only just before the Democratic
Party's convention?
Act 10:
August. Tom Ridge, the US homeland secretary,
announced with great fanfare that US intelligence had
come to know of plans of al-Qaeda to blow up US and
international economic targets in New York, New Jersey
and Washington DC. It had cased those buildings. Heavily
armed US security forces personnel took up positions
around all these buildings. Barricades were put up. All
staff and visitors were checked. Obliging TV channel
crews beamed visuals of these all over the world. Many
watched it. Including bin Laden, presuming he is still
alive, and his boys. They now know the buildings which
were not guarded. Someone in the US intelligence tipped
off the press that the information was three years old.
Sheepishly Ridge and his officers admitted that this was
so. They said that this does not mean the danger is any
the less. Al-Qaeda plans its operations years in
advance. Nobody drew the attention of Ridge to the fact
that KSM had reported about the casing of the economic
targets by al-Brittani in his interrogation report. Why
was the US public not informed of it at that time and
why were no security precautions taken? Was it because
no Republican Party presidential convention was due last
year? Don't ask stupid questions. Watch the show.
Act 11: August. Faced with
increasing skepticism, US officials leaked to the media
that the information was from a so-called computer
wizard of al-Qaeda, a Pakistani by the name of Mohammad
Naeem Noor Khan, arrested in Lahore. The Pakistanis hit
the ceiling. They accused the US of blowing a sensitive
ongoing operation by revealing the identity of a
collaborating detainee. They admitted such an arrest now
that the US had blown his cover. It was he who led them
to Ghailani, they claimed.
Act 12:
August. The British got into the act. They
arrested 12 persons - Dhiren Bharot alias Bilal, a Hindu
convert to Islam, and 11 others, seven of them of
Pakistani origin. Hey presto. Dhiren is none other than
al-Brittani. Or, rather, al-Brittani was none other than
Dhiren. A key al-Qaeda operative, said some. In fact,
the leader of the local al-Qaeda cell, said others. The
information came from the Pakistanis, admitted the
British, but they had been keeping a watch on Dhiren
even earlier. Dhiren and others were planning a
terrorist strike against Heathrow airport, said the
Pakistanis. No such information, said the British. Bin
Laden and his al-Qaeda are very security conscious. How
come they trusted Dhiren, a Hindu convert to Islam?
Dhiren was known to KSM as al-Brittani and to Noor Khan
as al-Hindi. Was he known to anyone else as al-Pakistani
or al-Kenyan? His family had migrated to the United
Kingdom from Kenya in 1973.
Act 13:
August. The so-called nephew of KSM arrested in
June back in the headlines. It was he who led the
Pakistanis to Noor Khan and it was Noor Khan who led
them to Ghailani, we were told.
Act 14:
August. Like a magician taking rabbits out of
his hat, as the Republican presidential convention and
his visit to New York during which he is to meet Bush
for another pat in the back approached, Musharraf
started finding al-Qaeda dregs all over Pakistan -
Arabs, Uzbeks, South Africans and Pakistanis. A plot for
simultaneous attacks on Musharraf's palace and the US
Embassy in Islamabad, general headquarters in Rawalpindi
and other places discovered and foiled. Many more dregs
arrested. Al-Qaeda penetrated. The days of its dregs
numbered. Claims galore from the interior and
information ministers. Pakistani backers of al-Qaeda
identified and under watch. Do you know who is the
principal backer, according to these ministers?
Musharraf? No. Lieutenant-General Ehsanul-Haq, director
general of the ISI? No. He is none other than Javed
Ibrahim Paracha , a close associate of Nawaz Sharif and
a member of Nawaz's faction of the Pakistan Muslim
League. Yes sir. You now know how al-Qaeda had remained
undetected all these years in Pakistan. Because of the
support from Nawaz's Muslim League.
Should one
laugh or cry? Don't do either. Keep watching the show.
There are more striptease acts to come as the US
presidential elections and the deadline for Musharraf to
resign as the chief of the army staff (COAS) approaches.
Bush and Tricky Mush need each other. And they both need
bin Laden. Bush for winning re-election. Mush for
getting US support for his planned violation of the
Pakistani constitution in order to be able to continue
as the COAS after December 31.
There is another
striptease going on in Iraq.
Another show,
another day.
B Raman is Additional
Secretary (retired), Cabinet Secretariat, Government of
India, New Delhi, and, presently, director, Institute
For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Distinguished Fellow
and Convenor, Observer Research Foundation (ORF),
Chennai Chapter. Email: corde@vsnl.com
Abu Zubaidah. A real
breakthrough, it was claimed. He figures frequently in
the commission's report, but one does not get the
impression that he was as great a cat's whiskers as made
out to be. 
