"Assassination is the most extreme form
of censorship" George Bernard
Shaw, in The Limits to Tolerance
To call the killing of Syed Saleem Shahzad
a grave injustice would itself do grave injustice
to all that he stood for. In a country
characterized by all forms of corruption, from the
mundane economic crimes of politicians to the
self-serving institutions of the military (the
Inter-Services Intelligence - ISI - being a state
within a state) and worst of all the selfish
corruption of the country's population (the silent
majority is never as quiet), Saleem, Asia Times
Online's Pakistan bureau chief, stood out as
that rarest of commodities -
a person who believed in what he did, and more
importantly, did what he believed in.
His
was the most unique form of courage - that of a
lonely man surrounded by cowardly or corrupt
people. It is a different breed of courage than
what the likes of al-Qaeda muster, when they get
impressionable young men to join a large mob that
targets weak and innocent people.
Saleem's
killing raises the question - why? What was the
need to kidnap, torture and kill the man? His
recent articles have increasingly exposed the
connections between al-Qaeda and the ISI, and more
importantly those between al-Qaeda and the
Pakistan navy. Specifically, he stumbled upon the
casus belli for last month's attacks on
Karachi naval installations by al-Qaeda, namely
the arrests of various navy personnel due to their
proximity to al-Qaeda.
Massoud may
offer clues Two days before the September
11, 2001, attacks on the United States, al-Qaeda
carried out the assassination of Ahmad Shah
Massoud, the Lion of Panjshir and leader of the
anti-Taliban Northern Alliance. The killing was
widely reported as a putative gift by al-Qaeda to
the Taliban that had been entrenched in a
long-term warfare with Massoud and his men for
control of Kabul and the northern provinces of
Afghanistan. The two assassins posed as
journalists, who went for an interview with the
Lion. At the time, and since then, the hand of the
ISI was widely suspected in the killing of
Massoud.
Since then, a number of instances
of such gifts made in the blood of innocents have
occurred that have been followed by acts of
terrorism. The killing of former Pakistani premier
Benazir Bhutto in December 2007 springs to mind as
the act of the Taliban to keep itself in the good
books of the ISI and the Pakistan military - or a
blood gift for all assistance previously rendered
by these organizations that faced awkward
questions if she had been elected back to power.
The question uppermost in my mind is whether the
shadow of Massoud lurks over the killing of Saleem
as well.
Let us look at the evidence - we
know that Saleem was focused on the links between
al-Qaeda and the Pakistan navy. (See Al-Qaeda
had warned of Pakistan strike Asia Times
Online, May 27.) We also know that an offshoot of
the Lashkar e-Taiba (LeT) attacked the Indian city
of Mumbai in November 2008 to much "acclaim" in
the Pakistani terror establishment. Saleem had
interviewed Ilyas Kashmiri previously for Asia
Times Online - and Kashmiri's 313 Brigade has been
identified as the operational group behind the
Karachi attacks in May.
So what if the
Pakistan navy and Ilyas Kashmiri were in cahoots
and a journalist found out? The current head of
the Pakistan military, Ashfaq Parvez Kiani, was
previously the head of the ISI - the organization
that is accused of sheltering Osama bin Laden in
Abbotabad. Therefore, the existence of links
between the two (al-Qaeda and navy) wouldn't come
as a surprise to anyone.
Unless, if the
revelations were "inconvenient" to anyone on an
operational basis. Massoud was an inconvenience to
the Taliban in their ability to give shelter to
al-Qaeda (which Bin Laden shrewdly realized would
be needed after attacking the US); he was hence
removed. Similarly, it may well be that Saleem was
removed because his revelations were complicating
certain operations.
What could those
operations be? Firstly, it could involve an
al-Qaeda operation against India. While
traditionally the forces of al-Qaeda have kept
away from India and subcontracted such "low" work
to Pakistani terrorists, the apparent elevation of
Ilyas Kashmiri within al-Qaeda may have changed
that equation so that al-Qaeda would be focused on
attacking India.
This theory though
doesn't quite hold water because a lesser
organization like LeT had already attacked India
in November 2008. The objective of terror
organizations is to do something "new and
improved" like the ads for soaps. Hence, it is
highly unlikely that whatever Saleem was in danger
of stumbling on had anything to do with India.
If you remove the obvious alternatives,
whatever remains must be the logical option. That
would involve Israel - in other words, elements of
the Pakistan navy may have been cooperating with
al-Qaeda over a possible attack on Israel. The
modus operandi would be similar to the
attacks on India in November 2008 - sea-based,
which is actively ignored by the Pakistan navy.
However, a commando-type operation like
the one on India wouldn't be practical in the case
of Israel. Secondly, there are a number of other
navies between the shores of Pakistan and Israel,
not the least of which would be the Americans.
Thus, the plan is likely to have focused on what
al-Qaeda wanted to remove from Pakistan that could
be used later against Israel.
Remember,
though, that the attacks on the Karachi naval
installations were focused on the P3 Orion
aircraft - exactly the technology that the navy
would be using to monitor the movements of large
craft of the type that is used to
load/unload/transport large objects.
Adding up the different permutations, it
is difficult to ignore the probability that the
idea involves using weapons of mass destruction
(WMD) that had been spirited away by al-Qaeda with
the active connivance of elements in the ISI.
America and other countries have been focusing on
the worst-case scenario of al-Qaeda getting WMDs,
but haven't spent enough time considering that the
organization may already have done so.
Pakistan has been on a bit of a
bomb-building spree recently - again a suspicious
activity because the stockpile of nuclear weapons
meant to target India was widely considered
sufficient as recently as 2008. So the building of
new bombs had to have something to do with other
applications - or other enemies than India. It is
also more plausible to hide the creation of a
rogue nuclear weapon when a hundred ones are being
built as against when the stockpile is stable.
If you were the ISI person responsible for
this project, a mere journalist like Saleem would
be quite an inconvenience for your partners.
Tragic as the killing of Saleem is, it may well
have been initiated as part of a blueprint for a
WMD to be used on Israel by al-Qaeda. An attack on
India using such WMD is also plausible, albeit
less likely due to the immediate retaliation that
would cause.
On a personal
note My association with Saleem has
been tangential to say the least for the past five
years or so that I have been writing for Asia
Times Online. We have intersected on many stories,
him as the intrepid investigative reporter and me
as the fat armchair columnist sitting a million
miles away.
Even so, we had common fears
about the evolution of Pakistan. He was the man on
the ground watching his beloved country shred
itself at the altar of Arab nationalism and I the
person who viewed the dangers posed by Pakistan to
its neighbors and all else.
As with my
relationship towards former Asia Times editor
Allen Quicke, there were many occasions where I
disagreed with Saleem's assessment of a situation,
but there was never a situation where I doubted
his integrity or his methods.
In the end,
it appears that the powers that be saw him as
incorruptible; a person who couldn't be bought or
swayed to believe what his brain didn't teach him
to be correct.
So they killed him.
Thus, in the worst possible fashion, the
military-political-religious establishment in
Pakistan has paid Saleem the biggest compliment
possible.
My suggestion to the editors of
Asia Times Online that they start a fund/trust for
the benefit of Saleem's wife Anita and his three
children has been accepted and I have made a
binding commitment for an opening donation along
with David Goldman (Spengler to the readers of
Asia Times Online). The mere fact that two people
like David and I who don't agree on much have
agreed to do this may not mean much to readers -
however, I do appeal that you find it in your
hearts and your wallets to endorse Saleem's
memory.
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