B.RAMAN
China’s concerns over developments in the Gulf of Aden area, which could affect the movement of oil to China from West Asia and Africa, are increasingly evident. These concerns have been triggered off by three developments.
2.The first was the seajacking of a Chinese ship transporting coal to China by a group of Somali pirates in October,2009, off Seychelles. The pirates managed to take the ship to the waters off Somalia and made demands for ransom. After concluding that their anti-piracy naval patrol in the area would not be in a position to intervene to have the ship and its 25-member Chinese crew rescued from the pirates, the company owning the ship made a deal with the pirates, allegedly paid the ransom and got the ship and its crew back on December 28,2009.
3.The second was the escalation in the activities of pro-Al Qaeda elements in Somalia. The Chinese recognize that the US is the only country in a position to deal with Al Qaeda in Somalia and media comments in China expressed their disappointment and concern that the US, in its preoccupation with countering the activities of Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the Af-Pak region, was not paying adequate attention to the increasing activities of Al Qaeda in Somalia.
4.In the Chinese perception, Al Qaeda activities in Somalia, if not controlled, could ultimately affect sealane security and jeopardize the movement of oil supplies to China. The sustained activities of the Somali pirates despite the deployment of anti-piracy patrols by the navies of many countries including those of the NATO, India, China and Japan show that while these patrols might have been tactically successful in dealing with certain individual incidents, they have not been strategically effective in dealing with the problem of piracy in an Al Qaeda infested region.
5.The third is the emergence of Al Qaeda in Yemen as a second major source of threat to peace and security after Al Qaeda of Osama bin Laden based in North Waziristan in Pakistan. While there is a broad convergence of views among counter-terrorism analysts and experts of different countries on the need for a more comprehensive strategy to deal with the escalation in the activities of Al Qaeda, the trigger for action is not the same. In the case of the US, the trigger is Washington’s concerns over threats to the security of the US Homeland from the mushrooming Al Qaedas. In the case of Beijing, the trigger is its concerns over possible future threats to sealane security from the Al Qaedas of the region, which would directly impact on the Chinese economy.
6.There is a tacit recognition among Chinese experts that the Chinese Navy by itself will not be in a position to deal with the looming threat to maritime security from a mix of escalating piracy and escalating activities of Al Qaeda. The inability of the Chinese anti-piracy patrols to go to the rescue of the seajacked ship brought out the capacity limitations of the Chinese Navy. This gave rise to a debate on the need for a Chinese naval base in the region to give a greater thrust to the anti-piracy patrols and give them a longer staying power.
7.The debate was triggered off by surprisingly outspoken comments by retired Admiral Yin Zhuo, who is now stated to be a senior researcher at the Navy’s Equipment Research Centre, in an interview on December 29, 2009, a day after the Chinese company allegedly paid the ransom to the Somali pirates and got its ship back. He was quoted as saying in his interview:: “Setting up a base would bolster China's long-term participation in the operations. We are not saying we need our navy everywhere in order to fulfill our international commitments. We are saying to fulfill our international commitments, we need to strengthen our supply capacity. China has sent four flotillas to the region since the end of last year, with the first escort fleet spending 124 days at sea without docking, a length of time that added to the challenges of the operation. Since then, Chinese vessels have docked at a French naval base for supplies. The United States, the European Union and Japan have supply bases in the region. If China establishes a similar long-term supply base, I believe that the nations in the region and the other countries involved with the (anti-pirate) escorts would understand."
8.The sensation caused by his remarks led to an attempt by Beijing to play down the significance of what he said and remove the impression that his advocacy of an overseas naval base had the support of the party and the Government. In comments quoted by the "China Daily" on January 1,2010,a Chinese Defence Ministry spokesman said: "China will stick to its current supply regime to support anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden. Some countries have set up overseas supply bases (but) the Chinese fleet is currently supplied at sea and through regular docking (in the Gulf of Aden region)."
9. Interestingly, side by side with the denial of the Defence Ministry, the "China Daily" carried the comments of some experts, which were not categorical in ruling out the option of an overseas naval base. Some of these comments are given below:
(a). Jin Canrong, an international relations expert at the Renmin University: Beijing has yet to seriously consider setting up a permanent overseas supply base. It's unnecessary to "play up the personal view of Yin, a retired admiral". However, the possibility of setting up such a base should not be ruled out. "China's national interests have extended beyond its border, so it's necessary to have strong ability to protect them."
(b).Li Jie, a senior colonel and researcher with the Chinese Navy's Military Academy: Beijing should consider setting up an overseas supply base "in the long run". "For many other countries, it's a common way of ensuring naval supplies." Such a base, "not a military one", would not only ease supply but also provide a venue for naval personnel to take a break. But an overseas base could only be set up "within the UN framework and concurrence of surrounding countries".
10. The possibility of linkages eventually developing between the mushrooming Al Qaedas and the Somali pirates----if such linkages do not already exist--- has also been reflected in recent comments of Chinese non-Governmental analysts.
11. The perception that the US focus in the "war" against Al Qaedas tends to be Homeland security related and that the protection of sealane security from the new generations of Al Qaedas and pirate gangs has not been receiving adequate attention has much validity. Possible future threats to sealane security from developments in the Somalia-Yemen region should be a matter of common concern to India, China and Japan, whose economies largely depend on energy supplies coming from or transiting this region.
12. Last year, I had proposed an India-China-Japan trialogue on maritime security issues. The need for such a trialogue has assumed greater importance and urgency in the light of the recent developments. India should take the initiative in the matter. (13-1-2010)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute for Topical Studies, Chennai. He is also associated with the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Monday, January 11, 2010
CIA: AFTER THE KHOST TRAGEDY
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR---PAPER NO.608
B.RAMAN
The US has kept up its Drone strikes in the two Waziristans of Pakistan. While this is a continuation of the policy initiated under George Bush in August,2008, the stepped-up strikes since the beginning of the New Year are meant to convey a message of renewed resolve to go after Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists operating from Pakistani territory unshaken by the claimed success of the Pakistani Taliban in killing seven officers of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and one of the Jordanian intelligence in the Khost area of Afghanistan on December 30,2009, through a Jordanian agent of the Jordanian intelligence, who betrayed the two intelligence agencies. The stepped-up Drone strikes are meant to show that the tragedy suffered by the CIA has not affected its determination to go after the terrorists. Any wrong message that the CIA's morale has suffered would have been counter-productive.
2. The Drone strikes depend partly on human intelligence and partly on technical intelligence. Since August,2008, there was a considerable improvement in the flow of HUMINT as could be seen from the increasing successes of the strikes. The success of a Drone strike in killing Baitullah Mehsud, the then Amir of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), in August , 2009, was made possible by precise TECHINT pinpointing the house of Baitullah's father-in-law in South Waziristan and equally precise HUMINT indicating that Baitullah had come to his father-in-law's house for medical assistance.
3. While the flow of TECHINT will not be affected by the Khost tragedy, the flow of HUMINT can be in the short-term. This is because the CIA has lost some experienced field operatives with considerable knowledge of the area across the Af-Pak border. It is also because the CIA is likely to be more cautious in its operations in future and more careful in assessing the dependability of its sources. Extra or over caution tends to slow down HUMINT operations affecting the flow of HUMINT.
4. In the short-term till the CIA is able to find alternate ways of keeping up the HUMINT flow without exposing its field operatives to physical dangers due to excessive risk-taking as one saw at Khost, the TEHINT agencies will have to step up their coverage in order to make up for the difficulties that could be faced by the CIA in its HUMINT coverage.
5.The US will not be able to depend on Pakistan's intelligence agencies to fill the gap in HUMINT. While there is no evidence of any institutional collusion between Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the TTP, there is definite collusion between the ISI and the Afghan Taliban operating from the Quetta area of Balochistan and between the ISI and the Haqqani network operating in the Khost and adjoining areas of Afghanistan from North Waziristan. The question of the CIA depending on the ISI for HUMINT collection would not, therefore, arise.
6. The Afghan and Uzbeck intelligence agencies could be useful to the CIA in its efforts to fill the HUMINT gap. The fact that a joint operation with the Jordanian intelligence proved catastrophic should not inhibit the CIA from exploring the possibilities of joint operations with the intelligence agencies of Afghanistan and Uzbekistan. There would always be the risk of double agents betraying the CIA, but the risk has to be faced.
7. There is no intelligence without risk-taking. The tragedy struck the CIA on December 30,2009, not because it took risks, but because the risk was not combined with adequate caution. It has been reported in the US media that the CIA did subject the Jordanian suicide bomber to frisking, but he triggered the improvised explosive device in his suicide vest just as the frisking was about to start. This is what has been happening in Pakistan repeatedly----TTP suicide bombers set off the IED just as the frisking is about to start. This has resulted in the death of a number of policemen in Pakistan who died while trying to frisk TTP suspects.
8. Unfortunately, no new technology has been devised so far which could enable the neutralization of the triggering device of an IED carried by a person from a distance without subjecting him to physical frisking. This problem poses a serious dilemma without a solution. One idea that could be tried is frisking of suspects through robots before they are brought inside a camp for a more detailed search.
9. The CIA would now go after Hakimullah Mehsud, the Amir of the TTP, and Hussain Mehsud, its trainer of suicide bombers, with greater determination than before now that the video released by the TTP has established that the TTP had motivated and trained the Jordanian suicide bomber. Baitullah suffered from health problems. His movements were, therefore, confined to the South Waziristan area. It was comparatively easier to hunt him and run him down, but even then, it took two years. Hakimullah and Hussain move around in a much larger area in the Pakistani tribal belt. Running them down is going to be even more difficult. That should not deter the CIA from going after them. ( 11-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
B.RAMAN
The US has kept up its Drone strikes in the two Waziristans of Pakistan. While this is a continuation of the policy initiated under George Bush in August,2008, the stepped-up strikes since the beginning of the New Year are meant to convey a message of renewed resolve to go after Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists operating from Pakistani territory unshaken by the claimed success of the Pakistani Taliban in killing seven officers of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and one of the Jordanian intelligence in the Khost area of Afghanistan on December 30,2009, through a Jordanian agent of the Jordanian intelligence, who betrayed the two intelligence agencies. The stepped-up Drone strikes are meant to show that the tragedy suffered by the CIA has not affected its determination to go after the terrorists. Any wrong message that the CIA's morale has suffered would have been counter-productive.
2. The Drone strikes depend partly on human intelligence and partly on technical intelligence. Since August,2008, there was a considerable improvement in the flow of HUMINT as could be seen from the increasing successes of the strikes. The success of a Drone strike in killing Baitullah Mehsud, the then Amir of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), in August , 2009, was made possible by precise TECHINT pinpointing the house of Baitullah's father-in-law in South Waziristan and equally precise HUMINT indicating that Baitullah had come to his father-in-law's house for medical assistance.
3. While the flow of TECHINT will not be affected by the Khost tragedy, the flow of HUMINT can be in the short-term. This is because the CIA has lost some experienced field operatives with considerable knowledge of the area across the Af-Pak border. It is also because the CIA is likely to be more cautious in its operations in future and more careful in assessing the dependability of its sources. Extra or over caution tends to slow down HUMINT operations affecting the flow of HUMINT.
4. In the short-term till the CIA is able to find alternate ways of keeping up the HUMINT flow without exposing its field operatives to physical dangers due to excessive risk-taking as one saw at Khost, the TEHINT agencies will have to step up their coverage in order to make up for the difficulties that could be faced by the CIA in its HUMINT coverage.
5.The US will not be able to depend on Pakistan's intelligence agencies to fill the gap in HUMINT. While there is no evidence of any institutional collusion between Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the TTP, there is definite collusion between the ISI and the Afghan Taliban operating from the Quetta area of Balochistan and between the ISI and the Haqqani network operating in the Khost and adjoining areas of Afghanistan from North Waziristan. The question of the CIA depending on the ISI for HUMINT collection would not, therefore, arise.
6. The Afghan and Uzbeck intelligence agencies could be useful to the CIA in its efforts to fill the HUMINT gap. The fact that a joint operation with the Jordanian intelligence proved catastrophic should not inhibit the CIA from exploring the possibilities of joint operations with the intelligence agencies of Afghanistan and Uzbekistan. There would always be the risk of double agents betraying the CIA, but the risk has to be faced.
7. There is no intelligence without risk-taking. The tragedy struck the CIA on December 30,2009, not because it took risks, but because the risk was not combined with adequate caution. It has been reported in the US media that the CIA did subject the Jordanian suicide bomber to frisking, but he triggered the improvised explosive device in his suicide vest just as the frisking was about to start. This is what has been happening in Pakistan repeatedly----TTP suicide bombers set off the IED just as the frisking is about to start. This has resulted in the death of a number of policemen in Pakistan who died while trying to frisk TTP suspects.
8. Unfortunately, no new technology has been devised so far which could enable the neutralization of the triggering device of an IED carried by a person from a distance without subjecting him to physical frisking. This problem poses a serious dilemma without a solution. One idea that could be tried is frisking of suspects through robots before they are brought inside a camp for a more detailed search.
9. The CIA would now go after Hakimullah Mehsud, the Amir of the TTP, and Hussain Mehsud, its trainer of suicide bombers, with greater determination than before now that the video released by the TTP has established that the TTP had motivated and trained the Jordanian suicide bomber. Baitullah suffered from health problems. His movements were, therefore, confined to the South Waziristan area. It was comparatively easier to hunt him and run him down, but even then, it took two years. Hakimullah and Hussain move around in a much larger area in the Pakistani tribal belt. Running them down is going to be even more difficult. That should not deter the CIA from going after them. ( 11-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Sunday, January 10, 2010
INDIA & PAKISTAN: MOVING FORWARD BY MOVING BACKWARD
B.RAMAN
(The following comments have been sent by me at the request of "The Times of India")
Any improvement in Indo-Pakistan relations is not going to come as a result of two newspaper groups of the two countries taking the initiative in drawing attention to their common heritage and providing additional channels for increased people-to-people contacts.
2.It will come as a result of policy-making circles in the two countries realizing that the policies followed hitherto have reached a dead-end and, hence, there is a need for fresh-thinking. There is a need for greater interactions----formal and informal--- between the policy-makers of the two countries to pick each other’s brains and explore new options for the future. Such interactions should not be confined to the narrow framework of a formal dialogue, which has been in a state of suspension since 26/11 of 2008.
3.Regular interactions at policy-making ---civilian and military--- levels to understand each other’s perceptions and to remove misperceptions have been absent for nearly two decades. These interactions have to be resumed and expanded. Periodic exchanges of visits by political leaders, military officers, security officials and other civilian functionaries help them in knowing of each other in flesh and blood instead of only through media and often uncorroborated source reports.
4.Had there been the practice of senior Army officers of the two countries exchanging periodic visits, some of the recent comments of our Army chief, which have been criticized in Pakistan, could have been discussed and clarified behind the glare of publicity.
5.We have such interactions with China, but not with Pakistan. This absence of inter-personal interactions at leadership and policy-making levels between India and Pakistan has largely contributed to the failure of the two countries to make any forward movement on any issue.
6.Sitting in their respective offices in New Delhi and Islamabad, the policy-makers have become bereft of any new ideas as to how to get out of the present rut. The initiative for restoring and expanding inter-personal interactions at leadership and policy-making levels has to come from governmental circles in the two countries.
7.The role of non-governmental facilitators in such an exercise would be in educating public opinion on the need for such interactions so that the leadership does not have to fear any adverse public fall-out of the exercise.
8.The media has an important and serious role to play in encouraging new thinking and policy changes. If the TOI group had done it independently on its own, its efforts would have carried greater credibility and its motives might not have been questioned.
9.The TOI’s action in joining hands with a controversial and highly politicized media group of Pakistan, which was in the forefront of a high-profile campaign to drive out President Asif Ali Zardari from power, has robbed it of much-needed credibility. (11-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi)
(The following comments have been sent by me at the request of "The Times of India")
Any improvement in Indo-Pakistan relations is not going to come as a result of two newspaper groups of the two countries taking the initiative in drawing attention to their common heritage and providing additional channels for increased people-to-people contacts.
2.It will come as a result of policy-making circles in the two countries realizing that the policies followed hitherto have reached a dead-end and, hence, there is a need for fresh-thinking. There is a need for greater interactions----formal and informal--- between the policy-makers of the two countries to pick each other’s brains and explore new options for the future. Such interactions should not be confined to the narrow framework of a formal dialogue, which has been in a state of suspension since 26/11 of 2008.
3.Regular interactions at policy-making ---civilian and military--- levels to understand each other’s perceptions and to remove misperceptions have been absent for nearly two decades. These interactions have to be resumed and expanded. Periodic exchanges of visits by political leaders, military officers, security officials and other civilian functionaries help them in knowing of each other in flesh and blood instead of only through media and often uncorroborated source reports.
4.Had there been the practice of senior Army officers of the two countries exchanging periodic visits, some of the recent comments of our Army chief, which have been criticized in Pakistan, could have been discussed and clarified behind the glare of publicity.
5.We have such interactions with China, but not with Pakistan. This absence of inter-personal interactions at leadership and policy-making levels between India and Pakistan has largely contributed to the failure of the two countries to make any forward movement on any issue.
6.Sitting in their respective offices in New Delhi and Islamabad, the policy-makers have become bereft of any new ideas as to how to get out of the present rut. The initiative for restoring and expanding inter-personal interactions at leadership and policy-making levels has to come from governmental circles in the two countries.
7.The role of non-governmental facilitators in such an exercise would be in educating public opinion on the need for such interactions so that the leadership does not have to fear any adverse public fall-out of the exercise.
8.The media has an important and serious role to play in encouraging new thinking and policy changes. If the TOI group had done it independently on its own, its efforts would have carried greater credibility and its motives might not have been questioned.
9.The TOI’s action in joining hands with a controversial and highly politicized media group of Pakistan, which was in the forefront of a high-profile campaign to drive out President Asif Ali Zardari from power, has robbed it of much-needed credibility. (11-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi)
INDIA & US: HAUNTING PAST & BECKONING FUTURE
B.RAMAN
(Written at the request of an Italian journal, which is bringing out a special issue on the US later this month)
The US will continue to be a pre-eminent power of the world. Despite its growing economic and military strength, China will not be able to challenge the pre-eminence of the US. The pre-eminence of a nation is not derived only from its GDP growth rate, foreign trade and military modernization. It is also derived from its intellectual, technological, moral and cultural strength and its ability to constantly innovate and evolve. China is nowhere near the US in respect of these factors. It is unlikely to be in the short and medium terms.
2. The biggest asset of the US is not its armed forces. It is its educational system---its schools, colleges and universities of excellence. It is its democratic system, its multi-cultural ambiance and its ability to harmonise and profit from cultural influences from different parts of the world. China is yet to build for itself a comparable educational system. Its one-party State is not conducive to a robust intellectual debate without which the intellectual prowess of a State and civil society will remain stunted.
3. Stalin and his successors built up the USSR into what they thought was the equal of the US as a super power. Large parts of the world looked upon the USSR as the equal of the US. Nikita Khrushchev even talked of the USSR overtaking the US and “burying the US capitalist system.” Look at what happened to the USSR and who was buried. The US had the last laugh.
4. India is the only country in Asia, which can evolve into a power comparable to the USA. Its democratic and educational systems, its pluralistic civil society and its pervasive cultural influence are strong foundations for its emergence as a power to be reckoned with not only economically and militarily, but also intellectually and culturally. India’s growing hard power as measured by its economic and military strength still lags behind that of China, but its soft power from which arises the ability to influence the hearts and minds of people is far ahead of that of China.
5. China is a distrusted power. Even its perceived allies do not feel quite comfortable in its embrace. There is hardly any distrust of India across the world--- except in Pakistan.
6.Whether one likes it or not, the US influence will continue to count in the years to come. Its economy will recover faster than one imagines. Its military strength and stamina will remain intact whatever be the outcome of its “war” against the Taliban and Al Qaeda in the Af-Pak region. There can be no meaningful challenge to its political influence. The stamp of its political influence will be found in all major developments of the world, whatever be the region. To talk of a world without US influence or even with a reduced US influence will be illusory.
7. India has two options---- either continue to be inhibited in its policies towards the US because of the negative experiences of the past or get out of the stranglehold of these negative memories and work for a new relationship with the US, which will be mutually beneficial. The negative experiences and memories are still strong and many. One can mention as examples the US attempt to initimidate India during the Indo-Pakistan war of 1971, its building-up the military strength of Pakistan, its closing its eyes to Pakistan’s misuse of this military strength given for fighting communism for fighting India and to Pakistan’s use of terrorism as a weapon against India, its encouragement of the Pakistani machinations on Kashmir , its refusal to sell modern technologies to India, its placing India for nearly three decades in a nuclear dog house after the Indian nuclear test of 1974 etc etc .
8.An attempt to get out of these negative experiences was made by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India and Barack Obama’s predecessor George Bush. The credit for visualizing India’s potential as an emerging power of Asia capable of considerable benign influence across Asia should go to Bush and his Secretary of State Condolleezza Rice. They were impressed by the strength of India’s pluralism which had kept Al Qaeda out of its Muslim community, the second largest in the world after that of Indonesia. They were equally impressed by the strength of India’s democracy and its soft power. They wanted India to emerge as a pole of attraction for the rest of Asia to counter the influence of China.
9. The foundations for a new strategic relationship between India and the US were laid even during the presidency of Bill Clinton. During his visit to India in 2000, Clinton and Atal Behari Vajpayee, the then Indian Prime Minister, agreed on a new vision document to govern bilateral relations. The first six years of the Clinton Presidency (1993 to 1999) were wasted years so far as Indo-US relations were concerned. India’s nuclear tests of May 1998, and the strong US reactions to them and its joining hands with China during Clinton’s visit to China shortly after the tests in opposing India’s legitimate nuclear aspirations added to India’s negative vibrations towards the US. The Clinton Administration’s support to India during India’s Kargil conflict with Pakistan in 1999 saw a turning point in the US policy-formulation towards India. Clinton’s successful visit to India in 2000 gave a further momentum to the attempted move of the relations in a positive direction, but in the few months left before he completed his term of office, Clinton could not give concrete shape to the new vision.
10. The first four years of the Bush Presidency too were wasted years in Indo-US relations. The preoccupation of the Bush Administration with the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the Af-Pak region and with the war in Iraq and its dependence on the regime of Gen.Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan came in the way of any vigorous thinking on the US relations towards India. The first signs of a new thinking in Washington DC on the importance of encouraging and helping India to take up its place as a pre-eminent power of Asia, on par with China, came during the visit of Rice to India in March 2005 and the subsequent visit of Manmohan Singh to the US in July 2005.
11. The Indo-US agreement on civilian nuclear co-operation signed during Manmohan Singh’s visit to the US in July 2005 marked the beginning of the process of discarding the past and moving to the future which was beckoning the two countries. India was taken out of the nuclear dog house. The promises made by the Clinton Administration to transfer dual-use technologies to India on a case-by-case basis, which had remained unfulfilled, were taken up once again with greater seriousness of purpose. Indian policy-makers were in a mood to consider weapon purchases from the US, ridding themselves of past fears that the US would be an undependable supplier of spare parts which could be stopped for political reasons. Fears of US undependability remained strong, but there was a realization that these fears should not be allowed to come in the way for considering new options for the future. For the first time in two decades, an attempt was made by the Bush Administration in its second term to reduce the trust deficit between India and the US and increase the mutual comfort level.
12. The one year of Barack Obama as the President has unfortunately not been a totally positive experience for India. There were hopes and dupes. What was seen as the Obama Administration’s courting of China resulted in a diminution of the importance of India as a counter to China. US economic difficulties partly accounted for this courting. There were other reasons too. The Obama Administration did not see China as a likely threat to the US influences in Asia in the same manner as the Bush Administration did. There was a feeling that the US and China could live and let live in Asia without stepping on each other’s toes.
13. The unmistakable anxiety of the Obama Administration to be attentive to China’s concerns and sensitivities resulted in the discarding of the Bush Administration’s ideas such as a democracy quadrilateral involving the US, India, Japan and Australia and the five-power naval exercises in the waters of South-East Asia involving the Navies of the US, India, Singapore, Japan and Australia.
14.India was no longer seen as a power, which should be encouraged and helped to reach an equality of status with China. The tacit US decision to recognize China’s pre-eminence in Asia was evident in the decision of Obama to legitimize a Chinese role as a benign influence in South Asia during his visit to China in November,2009. This action of the Obama Administration, more than anything else, surprised India and was strongly criticized by many Indian analysts.
15.The failure of Manmohan Singh’s talks with Obama during his State visit to Washington later in November,2009, to give a push forward to the implementation of the civilian nuclear deal added to India’s disappointments. The delay in the implementation has been attributed to the Obama Administration’s reluctance to transfer to India uranium enrichment and reprocessing technologies. Despite the flurry of spins by the advisers of Manmohan Singh it is obvious that the no-changers in the US in respect of nuclear co-operation, who are believed in India to be close to Obama, are once again influencing policy and Obama is disinclined to overrule them.
16. On Pakistan too, the past is back to haunt India. India’s hopes that Obama will take a strong line towards Pakistan and will stop the past pampering of Pakistan by different Administrations have been belied. India has been noting with unease the repeated comments from Obama and others about the need for a regional approach----whether in relation to the restoration of normalcy in Afghanistan or the fight against jihadi terrorism emanating from the Pakistani territory.
17.Pakistani analysts such as Ahmed Rashid have been able to sell the idea to the advisers of Obama that a regional approach would have to address the concerns of the Pakistani military-intelligence establishment over what they view as the increasing Indian presence in Afghanistan. This presence is viewed by the military-intelligence establishment as detrimental to Pakistan's historic interests in Afghanistan and its internal security, particularly in Balochistan. Till 2004, the Bush Administration was attentive to Pakistani concerns and sought to discourage an increase in the Indian presence in Afghanistan. Its policy changed thereafter due to the belief that greater interactions between India and Afghanistan could contribute to the strengthening of democracy and governance in Afghanistan.
18. Similarly, analysts such as Ahmed Rashid have been trying to convince Obama and his advisers that without a more active role by the US in facilitating a search for a solution to the Kashmir issue, there will be no incentive for Pakistan to act sincerely and effectively against the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistani territory. The Bush Administration was disinclined to follow an activist policy on Kashmir and accepted India's stand that it was a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan in which others should have no role. Obama and his advisers seem prepared to revisit this policy, if not immediately, at least at a later date.
19. The revived drag of the past has fortunately not reversed the move towards the future. The credit for this should largely go to Manmohan Singh, who seems convinced more than any other Indian leader that periodic disappointments and misperceptions, which are inevitable in the relations between the two biggest democracies and pluralist societies of the world, should not be allowed to damage their joint vision for the future. They should keep moving forward despite such disappointments and misperceptions. That is what India has been doing.
20. All major political formations in India barring the communists and large sections of its people want closer relations with the US and the forward momentum to be maintained. The large community of Indian origin in the US, which has been in the forefront of the intellectual and managerial class of the US, are an important driving force in this regard. So too, their relatives in India. Young Indians continue to look upon the US with fascination. They have no memories of the past. They have no time and patience for the political and politicized arguments of the no-changers in India. They welcomed the changes brought about by Manmohan Singh in our perceptions of the US and want these changes to continue.
21. The forward movement, therefore, continues----with varying velocity. And it will continue. But disappointments will continue to take place too. Such disappointments will be as much due to India as they would be due to the US. No thinking has ever been done in India as to what it expects out of a long-term strategic relationship with the US. It is often the US which decides what it will give to India and it is New Delhi which accepts. India's expectations from the US in the past were limited to US pressure on Pakistan to stop using terrorism against India, removal of restrictions on the supply of modern dual-use technologies to India and US support for India's permanent membership of the UN Security Council. They remain the same. Any strategic relationship has to be a quid pro quo relationship. Since the US has hardly any dependence on India in any matter, there is no scope for any quid pro quo.
22.India visualises itself as an Asian power on par with China. Beijing does not see it this way. China views India as a sub-regional Asian power and wants to keep its influence restricted to its immediate neighbourhood. Obama's visit to China has uncomfortably brought out to India that there is a convergence of perceptions between China and the Obama Administration on the limited regional role of India. China's pre-eminence has been recognised by Obama. He has re-hyphenated India-Pakistan relations and quietly relegated India to the role of a sub-regional power whose aspirations of having a status on par with China are unrealistic.
23.In geopolitical matters, there is no futuristic thinking in India. The quality of Indian thinking and analysis----strategic and tactical----is poor. What passes for analysis in India is often wishful-thinking. Nobody in India has realised and brought out that for the first time the US, Japan and Australia have a leadership which does not rate highly India's potential as an emerging power. There is less and less talk of Chindia.
24. Someone once said that power and influence are not given. They are taken. China has shown how to take it. India does not have the political will and courage to fight for it and take it. It is hoping that the US will give it. Bush and Condolleezza Rice seemed inclined to bestow on India the status of an Asian power on par with China. The Obama Administration does not seem to be so inclined.
25. Policy changes in India are rarely preceded by a debate in depth on the implications of the contemplated changes. The change of policy towards the US was brought about by Manmohan Singh without a national debate in public or in the Parliament on the wisdom of the change. Whatever debate was there in the Parliament with reference to the nuclear deal tended to be more an exchange of rhetoric than an analysis of facts and figures. There is hardly any effort to bring about a national consensus on foreign policy. When changes are driven by a determined individual and not by a national debate and consensus, there is a danger of the policy being jettisoned if the disappointments continue.
26. Can that happen to the Indo-US strategic relationship? Unlikely. The large public and particularly youth support for a forward-moving Indo-US relationship is a guarantee that the forward movement will continue. (10-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India , New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. He is also associated with the Chennai Centre for China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
(Written at the request of an Italian journal, which is bringing out a special issue on the US later this month)
The US will continue to be a pre-eminent power of the world. Despite its growing economic and military strength, China will not be able to challenge the pre-eminence of the US. The pre-eminence of a nation is not derived only from its GDP growth rate, foreign trade and military modernization. It is also derived from its intellectual, technological, moral and cultural strength and its ability to constantly innovate and evolve. China is nowhere near the US in respect of these factors. It is unlikely to be in the short and medium terms.
2. The biggest asset of the US is not its armed forces. It is its educational system---its schools, colleges and universities of excellence. It is its democratic system, its multi-cultural ambiance and its ability to harmonise and profit from cultural influences from different parts of the world. China is yet to build for itself a comparable educational system. Its one-party State is not conducive to a robust intellectual debate without which the intellectual prowess of a State and civil society will remain stunted.
3. Stalin and his successors built up the USSR into what they thought was the equal of the US as a super power. Large parts of the world looked upon the USSR as the equal of the US. Nikita Khrushchev even talked of the USSR overtaking the US and “burying the US capitalist system.” Look at what happened to the USSR and who was buried. The US had the last laugh.
4. India is the only country in Asia, which can evolve into a power comparable to the USA. Its democratic and educational systems, its pluralistic civil society and its pervasive cultural influence are strong foundations for its emergence as a power to be reckoned with not only economically and militarily, but also intellectually and culturally. India’s growing hard power as measured by its economic and military strength still lags behind that of China, but its soft power from which arises the ability to influence the hearts and minds of people is far ahead of that of China.
5. China is a distrusted power. Even its perceived allies do not feel quite comfortable in its embrace. There is hardly any distrust of India across the world--- except in Pakistan.
6.Whether one likes it or not, the US influence will continue to count in the years to come. Its economy will recover faster than one imagines. Its military strength and stamina will remain intact whatever be the outcome of its “war” against the Taliban and Al Qaeda in the Af-Pak region. There can be no meaningful challenge to its political influence. The stamp of its political influence will be found in all major developments of the world, whatever be the region. To talk of a world without US influence or even with a reduced US influence will be illusory.
7. India has two options---- either continue to be inhibited in its policies towards the US because of the negative experiences of the past or get out of the stranglehold of these negative memories and work for a new relationship with the US, which will be mutually beneficial. The negative experiences and memories are still strong and many. One can mention as examples the US attempt to initimidate India during the Indo-Pakistan war of 1971, its building-up the military strength of Pakistan, its closing its eyes to Pakistan’s misuse of this military strength given for fighting communism for fighting India and to Pakistan’s use of terrorism as a weapon against India, its encouragement of the Pakistani machinations on Kashmir , its refusal to sell modern technologies to India, its placing India for nearly three decades in a nuclear dog house after the Indian nuclear test of 1974 etc etc .
8.An attempt to get out of these negative experiences was made by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India and Barack Obama’s predecessor George Bush. The credit for visualizing India’s potential as an emerging power of Asia capable of considerable benign influence across Asia should go to Bush and his Secretary of State Condolleezza Rice. They were impressed by the strength of India’s pluralism which had kept Al Qaeda out of its Muslim community, the second largest in the world after that of Indonesia. They were equally impressed by the strength of India’s democracy and its soft power. They wanted India to emerge as a pole of attraction for the rest of Asia to counter the influence of China.
9. The foundations for a new strategic relationship between India and the US were laid even during the presidency of Bill Clinton. During his visit to India in 2000, Clinton and Atal Behari Vajpayee, the then Indian Prime Minister, agreed on a new vision document to govern bilateral relations. The first six years of the Clinton Presidency (1993 to 1999) were wasted years so far as Indo-US relations were concerned. India’s nuclear tests of May 1998, and the strong US reactions to them and its joining hands with China during Clinton’s visit to China shortly after the tests in opposing India’s legitimate nuclear aspirations added to India’s negative vibrations towards the US. The Clinton Administration’s support to India during India’s Kargil conflict with Pakistan in 1999 saw a turning point in the US policy-formulation towards India. Clinton’s successful visit to India in 2000 gave a further momentum to the attempted move of the relations in a positive direction, but in the few months left before he completed his term of office, Clinton could not give concrete shape to the new vision.
10. The first four years of the Bush Presidency too were wasted years in Indo-US relations. The preoccupation of the Bush Administration with the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the Af-Pak region and with the war in Iraq and its dependence on the regime of Gen.Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan came in the way of any vigorous thinking on the US relations towards India. The first signs of a new thinking in Washington DC on the importance of encouraging and helping India to take up its place as a pre-eminent power of Asia, on par with China, came during the visit of Rice to India in March 2005 and the subsequent visit of Manmohan Singh to the US in July 2005.
11. The Indo-US agreement on civilian nuclear co-operation signed during Manmohan Singh’s visit to the US in July 2005 marked the beginning of the process of discarding the past and moving to the future which was beckoning the two countries. India was taken out of the nuclear dog house. The promises made by the Clinton Administration to transfer dual-use technologies to India on a case-by-case basis, which had remained unfulfilled, were taken up once again with greater seriousness of purpose. Indian policy-makers were in a mood to consider weapon purchases from the US, ridding themselves of past fears that the US would be an undependable supplier of spare parts which could be stopped for political reasons. Fears of US undependability remained strong, but there was a realization that these fears should not be allowed to come in the way for considering new options for the future. For the first time in two decades, an attempt was made by the Bush Administration in its second term to reduce the trust deficit between India and the US and increase the mutual comfort level.
12. The one year of Barack Obama as the President has unfortunately not been a totally positive experience for India. There were hopes and dupes. What was seen as the Obama Administration’s courting of China resulted in a diminution of the importance of India as a counter to China. US economic difficulties partly accounted for this courting. There were other reasons too. The Obama Administration did not see China as a likely threat to the US influences in Asia in the same manner as the Bush Administration did. There was a feeling that the US and China could live and let live in Asia without stepping on each other’s toes.
13. The unmistakable anxiety of the Obama Administration to be attentive to China’s concerns and sensitivities resulted in the discarding of the Bush Administration’s ideas such as a democracy quadrilateral involving the US, India, Japan and Australia and the five-power naval exercises in the waters of South-East Asia involving the Navies of the US, India, Singapore, Japan and Australia.
14.India was no longer seen as a power, which should be encouraged and helped to reach an equality of status with China. The tacit US decision to recognize China’s pre-eminence in Asia was evident in the decision of Obama to legitimize a Chinese role as a benign influence in South Asia during his visit to China in November,2009. This action of the Obama Administration, more than anything else, surprised India and was strongly criticized by many Indian analysts.
15.The failure of Manmohan Singh’s talks with Obama during his State visit to Washington later in November,2009, to give a push forward to the implementation of the civilian nuclear deal added to India’s disappointments. The delay in the implementation has been attributed to the Obama Administration’s reluctance to transfer to India uranium enrichment and reprocessing technologies. Despite the flurry of spins by the advisers of Manmohan Singh it is obvious that the no-changers in the US in respect of nuclear co-operation, who are believed in India to be close to Obama, are once again influencing policy and Obama is disinclined to overrule them.
16. On Pakistan too, the past is back to haunt India. India’s hopes that Obama will take a strong line towards Pakistan and will stop the past pampering of Pakistan by different Administrations have been belied. India has been noting with unease the repeated comments from Obama and others about the need for a regional approach----whether in relation to the restoration of normalcy in Afghanistan or the fight against jihadi terrorism emanating from the Pakistani territory.
17.Pakistani analysts such as Ahmed Rashid have been able to sell the idea to the advisers of Obama that a regional approach would have to address the concerns of the Pakistani military-intelligence establishment over what they view as the increasing Indian presence in Afghanistan. This presence is viewed by the military-intelligence establishment as detrimental to Pakistan's historic interests in Afghanistan and its internal security, particularly in Balochistan. Till 2004, the Bush Administration was attentive to Pakistani concerns and sought to discourage an increase in the Indian presence in Afghanistan. Its policy changed thereafter due to the belief that greater interactions between India and Afghanistan could contribute to the strengthening of democracy and governance in Afghanistan.
18. Similarly, analysts such as Ahmed Rashid have been trying to convince Obama and his advisers that without a more active role by the US in facilitating a search for a solution to the Kashmir issue, there will be no incentive for Pakistan to act sincerely and effectively against the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistani territory. The Bush Administration was disinclined to follow an activist policy on Kashmir and accepted India's stand that it was a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan in which others should have no role. Obama and his advisers seem prepared to revisit this policy, if not immediately, at least at a later date.
19. The revived drag of the past has fortunately not reversed the move towards the future. The credit for this should largely go to Manmohan Singh, who seems convinced more than any other Indian leader that periodic disappointments and misperceptions, which are inevitable in the relations between the two biggest democracies and pluralist societies of the world, should not be allowed to damage their joint vision for the future. They should keep moving forward despite such disappointments and misperceptions. That is what India has been doing.
20. All major political formations in India barring the communists and large sections of its people want closer relations with the US and the forward momentum to be maintained. The large community of Indian origin in the US, which has been in the forefront of the intellectual and managerial class of the US, are an important driving force in this regard. So too, their relatives in India. Young Indians continue to look upon the US with fascination. They have no memories of the past. They have no time and patience for the political and politicized arguments of the no-changers in India. They welcomed the changes brought about by Manmohan Singh in our perceptions of the US and want these changes to continue.
21. The forward movement, therefore, continues----with varying velocity. And it will continue. But disappointments will continue to take place too. Such disappointments will be as much due to India as they would be due to the US. No thinking has ever been done in India as to what it expects out of a long-term strategic relationship with the US. It is often the US which decides what it will give to India and it is New Delhi which accepts. India's expectations from the US in the past were limited to US pressure on Pakistan to stop using terrorism against India, removal of restrictions on the supply of modern dual-use technologies to India and US support for India's permanent membership of the UN Security Council. They remain the same. Any strategic relationship has to be a quid pro quo relationship. Since the US has hardly any dependence on India in any matter, there is no scope for any quid pro quo.
22.India visualises itself as an Asian power on par with China. Beijing does not see it this way. China views India as a sub-regional Asian power and wants to keep its influence restricted to its immediate neighbourhood. Obama's visit to China has uncomfortably brought out to India that there is a convergence of perceptions between China and the Obama Administration on the limited regional role of India. China's pre-eminence has been recognised by Obama. He has re-hyphenated India-Pakistan relations and quietly relegated India to the role of a sub-regional power whose aspirations of having a status on par with China are unrealistic.
23.In geopolitical matters, there is no futuristic thinking in India. The quality of Indian thinking and analysis----strategic and tactical----is poor. What passes for analysis in India is often wishful-thinking. Nobody in India has realised and brought out that for the first time the US, Japan and Australia have a leadership which does not rate highly India's potential as an emerging power. There is less and less talk of Chindia.
24. Someone once said that power and influence are not given. They are taken. China has shown how to take it. India does not have the political will and courage to fight for it and take it. It is hoping that the US will give it. Bush and Condolleezza Rice seemed inclined to bestow on India the status of an Asian power on par with China. The Obama Administration does not seem to be so inclined.
25. Policy changes in India are rarely preceded by a debate in depth on the implications of the contemplated changes. The change of policy towards the US was brought about by Manmohan Singh without a national debate in public or in the Parliament on the wisdom of the change. Whatever debate was there in the Parliament with reference to the nuclear deal tended to be more an exchange of rhetoric than an analysis of facts and figures. There is hardly any effort to bring about a national consensus on foreign policy. When changes are driven by a determined individual and not by a national debate and consensus, there is a danger of the policy being jettisoned if the disappointments continue.
26. Can that happen to the Indo-US strategic relationship? Unlikely. The large public and particularly youth support for a forward-moving Indo-US relationship is a guarantee that the forward movement will continue. (10-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India , New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. He is also associated with the Chennai Centre for China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Friday, January 8, 2010
WHY DID AL QAEDA TARGET A FLIGHT TO DETROIT?
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR-- PAPER NO.607
B.RAMAN
In my earlier writings on the attempt by a Nigerian student trained by Al Qaeda in Yemen to blow up a North-West Airlines aircraft flying from Amsterdam to Detroit on December 25,2009, as it was coming in to land at Detroit, I had posed the question as to why Al Qaeda targeted this particular flight to Detroit? Did Detroit have any special significance for Al Qaeda? I had said that I was not in a position to answer this question.
2, Now, I think I can tentatively , after reading President Barack Obama's address to his people ( Annexure I) on the results of the in-house review (Annexure II ) of why the US counter-terrorism community reorganised in 2004 failed to prevent this attack. My answer is: While the Schiphol airport in Amsterdam had at some gates the required equipment with technology capable of detecting explosives concealed inside an underwear, the gate from which the North-West Airlines flight to Detroit took off did not have this equipment and technology.
3. This admission has not been made by Obama in such categorical terms as I have used, but it is obvious between the lines in the following sentence in his address to his people: "But a metal detector can't detect the kind of explosives that were sewn into his clothes. As Secretary Napolitano will explain, the screening technologies that might have detected these explosives are in use at the Amsterdam airport but not at the specific checkpoints that he passed through."
4.Were the North-West Airlines flights to Detroit taking off from the same gate every day which does not have the equipment with the technology to detect explosives concealed inside one's underwear? Or did only the flight on December 25 take off from that gate? If they were taking off from that gate every day, there is a strong likelihood that Al Qaeda knew about it in advance either through the observation of its sources transiting Schiphol or through moles and that was why it directed him to take this particular flight.
5. Al Qaeda chose the Nigerian for the attempted attack because it knew he had a valid US visa. The US Government failed to thwart the attempt because it did not know that the Nigerian student about whom his own father had cautioned the US Embassy in Nigeria held a valid visa for travel to the US. This was because the US Embassy in Nigeria in its report to the State Department on the father's warning had spelt the student's name differently from the spelling in his passport on which the visa was issued by the US Embassy in London in June,2008.Neither the human analysts in the US counter-terrorism agencies in Washington DC nor their computers connected the name as it had figured in the report of the US Ambassador in Nigeria and as it had figured in the list of persons for whom a visa was issued by the US Embassy in London.
6.An important lesson coming out of the enquiry: Data bases are important in counter-terrorism. Easy access to the databases to those dealing with counter-terrorism is equally important. Both these requirements were met in the case of the Nigerian student, but no action was taken to thwart the attempt because those having access to the databases did not make proper use of them. The information about the student conveyed by the Ambassador in Nigeria was not sufficient to warrant his black-listing and being included in the no-fly list, but there was other adverse information about him available in other databases. The bits and pieces of adverse information about him available in different databases were not brought together in an integrated manner on a single piece of paper. Had this been done, immediate action might have been taken to cancel his visa and prevent him from boarding the plane.
7. Obama's address and the in-house review do not call for any change in the counter-terrorism structure as it was set up in 2004. They have called for modifications and improvements in the way the human and technical elements in this structure operate.
8. The BBC's correspondent in North America has come out with an interesting comment on the brave attempt made by Obama to prevent any serious damage to his administration and to his own reputation as a result of the Christmas Day failure, which he has compared to the Bay of Pigs failure of John F.Kennedy. It can be seen in Annexure III. ( 7-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
ANNEXURE I
TEXT OF PRESIDENT OBAMA'S ADDRESS TO HIS PEOPLE ON THE ATTEMPTED TERRORIST STRIKE OF DECEMBER 25,2009.
Obama: Good afternoon, everybody.
The immediate reviews that I ordered after the failed Christmas terrorist attack are now complete. I was just briefed on the findings and recommendations for reform, and I believe it's important that the American people understand the new steps that we're taking to prevent attacks and keep our country safe.
This afternoon my counterterrorism and homeland security adviser, John Brennan, will discuss his review into our terrorist watch list system, how our government failed to connect the dots in a way that would have prevented a known terrorist from boarding a plane for America, and the steps we're going to take to prevent that from happening again.
Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano will discuss her review of aviation screening, technology and procedures, how that terrorist boarded a plane with explosives that could have killed nearly 300 innocent people, and how we'll strengthen aviation security going forward.
So today I want to just briefly summarize their conclusions and the steps that I've ordered to address them.
In our ever-changing world, America's first line of defense is timely, accurate intelligence that is shared, integrated, analyzed and acted upon quickly and effectively. That's what the intelligence reforms after the 9/11 attacks largely achieved. That's what our intelligence community does every day.
But, unfortunately, that's not what happened in the lead-up to Christmas Day. It's now clear that shortcomings occurred in three broad and compounding ways.
First, although our intelligence community had learned a great deal about the al Qaeda affiliate in Yemen, called al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, that we knew that they sought to strike the United States and that they were recruiting operatives to do so, the intelligence community did not aggressively follow up on and prioritize particular streams of intelligence related to a possible attack against the homeland.
Second, this contributed to a larger failure of analysis, a failure to connect the dots of intelligence that existed across our intelligence community and which together could have revealed that [Umar Farouk] AbdulMutallab was planning an attack.
Third, this in turn fed into shortcomings in the watch-listing system which resulted in this person not being placed on the no-fly list, thereby allowing him to board that plane in Amsterdam for Detroit.
In sum, the U.S. government had the information scattered throughout the system to potentially uncover this plot and disrupt the attack. Rather than a failure to collect or share intelligence, this was a failure to connect and understand the intelligence that we already had.
Now, that's why we took swift action in the immediate days following Christmas, including reviewing and updating the terrorist watch list system and adding more individuals to the no-fly list, and directing our embassies and consulates to include current visa information in their warnings of individuals with terrorist or suspected terrorist ties.
Today, I'm directing a series of additional corrective steps across multiple agencies. Broadly speaking, they fall into four areas.
First, I'm directing that our intelligence community immediately begin assigning specific responsibility for investigating all leads on high-priority threats so that these leads are pursued and acted upon aggressively not just most of the time, but all of the time.
We must follow the leads that we get, and we must pursue them until plots are disrupted. And that means assigning clear lines of responsibility.
Second, I'm directing that intelligence reports, especially those involving potential threats to the United States, be distributed more rapidly and more widely. We can't sit on information that could protect the American people.
Third, I'm directing that we strengthen the analytical process, how our analysis -- how our analysts process and integrate the intelligence that they receive.
My director of national intelligence, Denny Blair, will take the lead in improving our day-to-day efforts. My Intelligence Advisory Board will examine the longer term challenge of sifting through vast universes of -- of intelligence and data in our information age.
And, finally, I'm ordering an immediate effort to strengthen the criteria used to add individuals to our terrorist watch lists, especially the no-fly list. We must do better in keeping dangerous people off airplanes, while still facilitating air travel.
So taken together, these reforms will improve the intelligence community's ability to collect, share, integrate, analyze and act on intelligence swiftly and effectively.
In short, they will help our intelligence community do its job even better and protect American lives.
But even the best intelligence can't identify in advance every individual who would do us harm.
So we need the security at our airports, ports, and borders and through our partnerships with other nations to prevent terrorists from entering America.
At the Amsterdam airport, AbdulMutallab was subjected to the same screening as other passengers. He was required to show his documents, including a valid U.S. visa. His carry-on bag was X-rayed. He passed through a metal detector.
But a metal detector can't detect the kind of explosives that were sewn into his clothes. As Secretary Napolitano will explain, the screening technologies that might have detected these explosives are in use at the Amsterdam airport but not at the specific checkpoints that he passed through.
Indeed, most airports in the world and in the United States do not yet have these technologies.
Now, there's no silver bullet to securing the thousands of flights into America each day, domestic and international. It will require significant investments in many areas. And that's why, even before the Christmas attack, we increased investments in homeland security and aviation security.
This includes an additional $1 billion in new systems and technologies that we need to protect our airports, more baggage screening, more passenger screening, and more advanced explosive detection capabilities, including those that can improve our ability to detect the kind of explosive used on Christmas.
These are major investments, and they'll make our skies safer and more secure.
Now, as I announced this week, we've taken a whole range of steps to improve aviation screening and security since Christmas, including new rules for how we handle visas within the government and enhanced screening for passengers flying from or through certain countries.
And today, I am directing that the Department of Homeland Security take additional steps, including strengthening our international partnerships to improve aviation screening and security around the world, greater use of the advanced explosive detection technologies that we already have, including imaging technology, and working aggressively in cooperation with the Department of Energy and our national labs to develop and deploy the next generation of screening technologies.
Now, there is, of course, no foolproof solution. As we develop new screening technologies and procedures, our adversaries will seek new ways to evade them, as was shown by the Christmas attack. In the never-ending race to protect our country, we have to stay one step ahead of a nimble adversary. That's what these steps are designed to do, and we will continue to work with Congress to ensure that our intelligence, homeland security, and law enforcement communities have the resources they need to keep the American people safe.
I ordered these two immediate reviews so that we could take immediate action to secure our country. But in the weeks and months ahead, we will continue a sustained and intensive effort of analysis and assessment so we leave no stone unturned in seeking better ways to protect the American people.
I have repeatedly made it clear in public with the American people and in private with my national security team that I will hold my staff, our agencies and the people in them accountable when they fail to perform their responsibilities at the highest levels.
Now, at this stage in the review process it appears that this incident was not the fault of a single individual or organization, but rather a systemic failure across organizations and agencies.
That's why, in addition to the corrective efforts that I've ordered, I've directed agency heads to establish internal accountability reviews and directed my national security staff to monitor their efforts.
We will measure progress, and John Brennan will report back to me within 30 days and on a regular basis after that.
All of these agencies and their leaders are responsible for implementing these reforms, and all will be held accountable if they don't.
Moreover, I am less interested in passing out blame than I am in learning from and correcting these mistakes to make us safer, for ultimately the buck stops with me. As president, I have a solemn responsibility to protect our nation and our people, and when the system fails, it is my responsibility.
Over the past two weeks, we've been reminded again of the challenge we face in protecting our country against a foe that is bent on our destruction. And while passions and politics can often obscure the hard work before us, let's be clear about what this moment demands.
We are at war. We are at war against al Qaeda, a far-reaching network of violence and hatred that attacked us on 9/11, that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people, and that is plotting to strike us again. And we will do whatever it takes to defeat them.
And we've made progress. Al Qaeda's leadership is hunkered down. We have worked closely with partners, including Yemen, to inflict major blows against al Qaeda leaders. And we have disrupted plots at home and abroad and saved American lives.
And we know that the vast majority of Muslims reject al Qaeda. But it is clear that al Qaeda increasingly seeks to recruit individuals without known terrorist affiliations, not just in the Middle East but in Africa and other places, to do their bidding.
That's why I've directed my national security team to develop a strategy that addresses the unique challenges posed by lone recruits. And that's why we must communicate clearly to Muslims around the world that al Qaeda offers nothing except a bankrupt vision of misery and death, including the murder of fellow Muslims, while the United States stands with those who seek justice and progress.
To advance that progress we've sought new beginnings with Muslim communities around the world, one in which we engage on the basis of mutual interest and mutual respect and work together to fulfill the aspirations that all people share -- to get an education, to work with dignity, to live in peace and security.
That's what America believes in. That's the vision that is far more powerful than the hatred of these violent extremists.
Here at home, we will strengthen our defenses, but we will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans, because great and proud nations don't hunker down and hide behind walls of suspicion and mistrust. That is exactly what our adversaries want. And so long as I am president, we will never hand them that victory.
We will define the character of our country, not some band of small men intent on killing innocent men, women and children.
And in this cause, every one of us -- every American, every elected official -- can do our part. Instead of giving in to cynicism and division, let's move forward with the confidence and optimism and unity that defines us as a people, for now is not a time for partisanship, it's a time for citizenship, a time to come together and work together with the seriousness of purpose that our national security demands.
That's what it means to be strong in the face of violent extremism. That's how we will prevail in this fight. And that's how we will protect our country and pass it, safer and stronger, to the next generation.
Thanks very much.
ANNEXURE II
WHITE HOUSE SUMMARY OF THE IN-HOUSE REVIEW OF THE ATTEMPTED TERRORIST ATTACK ON DECEMBER 25,2009
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release January 07, 2010
White House Review Summary Regarding 12/25/2009 Attempted Terrorist Attack
SUBECT: Summary of the White House Review of the December 25,2009 Attempted Terrorist Attack 1
On December 25,2009 a Nigerian national, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempted to detonate an explosive device while onboard flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit. The device did not explode, but instead ignited, injuring Mr. Abdulmutallab and two other passengers. The flight crew restrained Mr. Abdulmutallab and the plane safely landed. Mr. Abdulmutallab was taken into custody by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and later was questioned by the Federal Bureau ofInvestigation (FBI). Mr. Abdulmutallab was not on the U.S. Government's (USG) terrorist watchlist, but was known to the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC).
BACKGROUND
Following the December 25, 2009 attempt to bring down the flight by detonating an explosive device onboard flight 253, the President directed that Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism John Brennan conduct a complete review of the terrorist watchlisting system and directed that key departments and agencies provide input to this review. What follows is a summary of this preliminary report.
First, it should be noted that the work by America's counterterrorism (CT) community has had many successes since 9111 that should be applauded. Our ability to protect the U.S. Homeland against terrorist attacks is only as good as the information and analysis that drives and facilitates disruption efforts. The thorough analysis of large volumes of information has enabled a variety of departments and agencies to take action to prevent attacks. On a great number of occasions since 9111, many of which the American people will never know about, the tremendous, hardworking corps of analysts across the CT community did just that, working day and night to track terrorist threats and run down possible leads in order to keep their fellow Americans safe. Yet, as the amount of information continues to grow, the challenge to bring disparate pieces of information - about individuals, groups, and vague plots - together to form a clear picture about the intentions of our adversaries grows as well.
These actions, informed by the excellent analytic work of the very same individuals and structure that is under review, have saved lives. Unfortunately, despite several opportunities that might have allowed the CT community to put these pieces together in this case, and despite the tireless effort and best intentions of individuals at every level of the CT community, that was not done. As a result, the recent events highlight our need to look for ways to constantly improve and assist our CT analysts, who are at the forefront of providing warning of terrorist attacks and keeping Americans safe.
1 This report reflects preliminary findings to facilitate immediate corrective action. Neither the report nor its findings obviate the need for continued review and analysis to ensure that we have the fullest possible understanding of the systemic problems that led to the attempted terrorist attack on December 25,2009. Note further that sensitive intelligence data was removed from this public report to protect sources and methods.
FINDINGS
The preliminary White House review of the events that led to the attempted December 25 attack highlights human errors and a series of systematic breakdowns failed to stop Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab before he was able to detonate an explosive device onboard flight 253. The most significant failures and shortcomings that led to the attempted terror attack fall into three broad categories:
A failure of intelligence analysis, whereby the CT community failed before December 25 to identify, correlate, and fuse into a coherent story all of the discrete pieces of intelligence held by the u.s. Government related to an emerging terrorist plot against the U.S. Homeland organized by al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and to Mr. Abdulmutallab, the individual terrorist;
A failure within the CT community, starting with established rules and protocols, to assign responsibility and accountability for follow up of high priority threat streams, run down all leads, and track them through to completion; and
Shortcomings of the watchlisting system, whereby the CT community failed to identify intelligence within u.S. government holdings that would have allowed Mr. Abdulmutallab to be watchlisted, and potentially prevented from boarding an aircraft bound for the United States.
The most significant findings of our preliminary review are:
The U.S. Government had sufficient information prior to the attempted December 25 attack to have potentially disrupted the AQAP plot-i.e., by identifying Mr. Abdulmutallab as a likely operative of AQAP and potentially preventing him from boarding flight 253.
The Intelligence Community leadership did not increase analytic resources working on the full AQAP threat.
The watchlisting system is not broken but needs to be strengthened and improved, as evidenced by the failure to add Mr. Abdulmutallab to the No Fly watchlist.
A reorganization of the intelligence or broader counterterrorism community is not required to address problems that surfaced in the review, a fact made clear by countless other successful efforts to thwart ongoing plots.
FAILURE TO "CONNECT THE DOTS"
It is important to note that the fundamental problems identified in this preliminary review are different from those identified in the wake of the 9111 attacks. Previously, there were formidable barriers to information sharing among departments and agencies--tied to firmly entrenched patterns of bureaucratic behavior as well as the absence of a single component that fuses expertise, information technology (IT) networks, and datasets-that have now, 8 years later, largely been overcome.
An understanding of the responsibilities of different analytic components of the CT community is critical to identifying what went wrong and how best to fix it. The National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) was created by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (IRTPA) to be "the primary organization in the U.S. government for analyzing and integrating all intelligence possessed or acquired by the U.S. government pertaining to terrorism and counterterrorism 2." Intelligence Community guidance in 2006 further defined counterterrorism analytic responsibilities and tasked NCTC with the primary role within the Intelligence Community for bringing together and assessing all-source intelligence to enable a full understanding of and proper response to particular terrorist threat streams. Additionally, the Director of NCTC is in charge of the DNI Homeland Threat Task Force, whose mission is to examine threats to the U.S. Homeland from al-Qa'ida, its allies, and homegrown violent extremists.
Notwithstanding NCTC's central role in producing terrorism analysis, CIA maintains the responsibility and resource capability to "correlate and evaluate intelligence related to national security and provide appropriate dissemination of such intelligence. ,,3 CIA's responsibility for conducting all-source analysis in the area of counterterrorism is focused on supporting its operations overseas, as well as informing its leadership of terrorist threats and terrorist targets overseas. Therefore, both agencies - NCTC and CIA - have a role to play in conducting (and a responsibility to carry out) all-source analysis to identify operatives and uncover specific plots like the attempted December 25 attack.
The information available to the CT community over the last several months - which included pieces of information about Mr. Abdulmutallab, information about AQAP and its plans, and information about an individual now believed to be Mr. Abdulmutallab and his association with AQAP and its attack planning - was obtained by several agencies. Though all of that information was available to all-source analysts at the CIA and the NCTC prior to the attempted attack, the dots were never connected, and as a result, the problem appears to be more about a component failure to "connect the dots," rather than a lack of information sharing. The information that was available to analysts, as is usually the case, was fragmentary and embedded in a large volume of other data.
Though the consumer base and operational capabilities of CIA and NCTC are somewhat different, the intentional redundancy in the system should have added an additional layer of protection in uncovering a plot like the failed attack on December 25. However, in both cases, the mission to "connect the dots" did not produce the result that, in hindsight, it could have - connecting identifying information about Mr. Abdulmutallab with fragments of information about his association with AQAP and the group's intention of attacking the U.S.
The majority of these discreet pieces of intelligence were gathered between mid-October and late December 2009.
For example, on November 18, Mr. Abdulmutallab's father met with U.S. Embassy officers in Abuja, Nigeria, to discuss his concerns that his son may have come under the influence of unidentified extremists, and had planned to travel to Yemen. Though this information alone could not predict Mr. Abdulmutallab's eventual involvement in the attempted 25 December attack, it provided an opportunity to link information on him with earlier intelligence reports that contained fragmentary information.
Analytic focus during December was on the imminent AQAP attacks on Americans and American interests in Yemen, and on supporting CT efforts in Yemen.
Despite these opportunities and multiple intelligence products that noted the threat AQAP could pose to the Homeland, the different pieces of the puzzle were never brought together in this case the dots were never connected, and, as a result, steps to disrupt the plot involving Mr. Abdulmutallab were not taken prior to his boarding of the airplane with an explosive device and attempting to detonate it in-flight.
BREAKDOWN OF ACCOUNTABILITY FOR THREAT WARNING & RESPONSE
Intelligence is not an end to itself, nor are analytic products-they are designed to provide senior government leaders with the necessary information to make key decisions, but also to trigger action, including further collection, operational steps, and investigative adjustments. As noted above, NCTC and CIA have the primary and overlapping responsibility to conduct all-source analysis on terrorism. As with this intentional analytic redundancy, the CT community also has multiple and overlapping warning systems to ensure that departments and agencies are kept fully aware of ongoing threat streams.
NCTC is the primary organization that provides situational awareness to the CT community of ongoing terrorist threats and events, including through several daily written products that summarize current threat reporting for a broad audience, as well as meetings and video teleconferences that provide the opportunity for the CT community to engage in a real-time manner on this information. While the threat warning system involves analysis, it also extends to other elements within the CT community that should be responsible for following up and acting on leads as a particular threat situation develops.
In this context, the preliminary review suggests that the overlapping layers of protection within the CT community failed to track this threat in a manner sufficient to ensure all leads were followed and acted upon to conclusion. In addition, the White House and the National Security Staff failed to identify this gap ahead of time. No single component of the CT community assumed responsibility for the threat reporting and followed it through by ensuring that all necessary steps were taken to disrupt the threat. This argues that a process is needed to track terrorist threat reporting to ensure that departments and agencies are held accountable for running down all leads associated with high visibility and high priority plotting efforts, in particular against the U.S. Homeland.
FAILURE TO WATCHLIST
Although Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was included in the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE), the failure to include Mr. Abdulmutallab in a watchlist is part of the overall systemic failure. Pursuant to the IRTPA, NCTC serves "as the central and shared knowledge bank on known and suspected terrorists and international terror groups.,,4 As such, NCTC consolidates all information on known and suspected international terrorists in the Terrorist Identities Datarnart Environment. NCTC then makes this data available to the FBI-led Terrorist Screening Center (TSC), which reviews nominations for inclusion in the master watchlist called the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB). The TSC provides relevant extracts to each organization with a screening mission.
Hindsight suggests that the evaluation by watchlisting personnel of the information contained in the State cable nominating Mr. Abdulmutallab did not meet the minimum derogatory standard to watchlist. Watchlisting would have required all of the available information to be fused so that the derogatory information would have been sufficient to support nomination to be watchlisted in the Terrorist Screening Database. Watchlist personnel had access to additional derogatory information in databases that could have been connected to Mr. Abdulmutallab, but that access did not result in them uncovering the biographic information that would have been necessary for placement on the watchlist. Ultimately, placement on the No FIy List would have been required to keep Mr. Abdulmutallab off the plane inbound for the U.S. Homeland.
VISA ISSUE
Mr. Abdulmutallab possessed a U.S. visa, but this fact was not correlated with the concerns of Mr. Abdulmutallab's father about Mr. Abdulmutallab's potential radicalization. A misspelling of Mr. Abdulmutallab's name initially resulted in the State Department believing he did not have a valid U.S. visa. A determination to revoke his visa, however, would have only occurred if there had been a successful integration of intelligence by the CT community, resulting in his being watchlisted.
KEY FINDINGS EMERGING FROM PRELIMINARY INQUIRY & REVIEW
The U.S. government had sufficient information to have uncovered and potentially disrupted the December 25 attack-including by placing Mr. Abdulmutallab on the No Fly list -- but analysts within the CT community failed to connect the dots that could have identified and warned of the specific threat. The preponderance of the intelligence related to this plot was available broadly to the Intelligence Community.
NCTC and CIA are empowered to collate and assess all-source intelligence on the CT threat, but all-source analysts highlighted largely the evolving "strategic threat" AQAP posed to the West, and the U.S. Homeland specifically, in finished intelligence products. In addition, some of the improvised explosive device tactics AQAP might use against U.S. interests were highlighted in finished intelligence products.
The CT community failed to follow-up further on this "strategic warning" by moving aggressively to further identify and correlate critical indicators of AQAP's threat to the U.S. Homeland with the full range of analytic tools and expertise that it uses in tracking other plots aimed at the U.S. Homeland.
NCTC and CIA personnel who are responsible for watchlisting did not search all available databases to uncover additional derogatory information that could have been correlated with Mr. Abdulmutallab.
A series of human errors occurred----delayed dissemination of a finished intelligence report and what appears to be incomplete/faulty database searches on Mr. Abdulmutallab's name and identifying information.
"Information sharing" does not appear to have contributed to this intelligence failure; relevant all-source analysts as well as watchlisting personnel who needed this information were not prevented from accessing it.
Information technology within the CT community did not sufficiently enable the correlation of data that would have enabled analysts to highlight the relevant threat information.
There was not a comprehensive or functioning process for tracking terrorist threat reporting and actions taken such that departments and agencies are held accountable for running down all leads associated with high visibility and high priority plotting efforts undertaken by alQa'ida and its allies, in particular against the U.S. Homeland.
Finally, we must review and determine the ongoing suitability of legacy standards and protocols in effect across the CT community, including criteria for watch lists, protocols for secondary screening, visa suspension and revocation criteria, and business processes across the government.
ANNEXURE III
( Comments of Mark Mardell, the BBC Correspondent for North America )
Obama rounds on critics
Friday, 8 January 2010
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste," the Obama administration said in the midst of economic meltdown and the same must go for the attempted bombing of a transatlantic jet as it flew into Detroit on Christmas Day.
Borrowing that sign from Harry Truman's desk - "the buck stops here" - is a bit of a hostage to fortune. But his advisors must hope that taking personal responsibility will go down well with the American people. Apparently, it worked for JFK. He said the same thing after the Bay of Pigs debacle. His approval ratings shot up. Only later did he fire the head of the CIA. By the way, Mr Obama is only following a tradition - all US presidents since Kennedy have used the phrase at least once.
More importantly, Mr Obama has rounded on his Republican critics. They attack him for not using the term "war on terror". This is not surprising - it is an article of liberal faith that you cannot wage war on abstract nouns. But he sounded a note of battle, not for the first time.
"We are at war. We are at war against al-Qaeda, a far-reaching network of violence and hatred that attacked us on 9/11, that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people, and that is plotting to strike us again. And we will do whatever it takes to defeat them," he said.
But the nub of the criticism of Mr Obama is that by trying to close Guantanamo Bay, and by treating militants as criminals not enemies of the state, he is weak.
There is little doubt al-Qaeda scored a major victory over Detroit, even though no-one was badly hurt. After all, the core aim of al-Qaeda militants is not simply to kill people but to terrorise them, and so effect political change. The US is very jittery at the moment.
The criticism of some, immediately after the Christmas Day plot, was that Mr Obama was too cool, not emotional enough - in fact, insufficiently terrified. There is at least an argument that the most potent allies of the militants, the unwitting foot solders of al-Qaeda's cause, are all those columnists and bloggers who want to raise the status of the enemy from mere common criminal to warrior, and who worry that the US is not being sufficiently hysterical. The president seems aware that there is more ways than one for a militant group to win.
"We will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans, because great and proud nations don't hunker down and hide behind walls of suspicion and mistrust. That is exactly what our adversaries want, and so long as I am president, we will never hand them that victory. We will define the character of our country, not some band of small men intent on killing innocent men, women and children," he said on Thursday.
A poke in the eye for former Vice-President Dick Cheney at the end of that, followed up by a plea for unity, confidence and optimism, continuing: "That's what it means to be strong in the face of violent extremism."
Mr Obama is suggesting that it is his critics who have shown weakness and fear by abandoning American values. It is a bold attempt to turn this shambles into a statement that he is the really tough one, just tough in his own way.
B.RAMAN
In my earlier writings on the attempt by a Nigerian student trained by Al Qaeda in Yemen to blow up a North-West Airlines aircraft flying from Amsterdam to Detroit on December 25,2009, as it was coming in to land at Detroit, I had posed the question as to why Al Qaeda targeted this particular flight to Detroit? Did Detroit have any special significance for Al Qaeda? I had said that I was not in a position to answer this question.
2, Now, I think I can tentatively , after reading President Barack Obama's address to his people ( Annexure I) on the results of the in-house review (Annexure II ) of why the US counter-terrorism community reorganised in 2004 failed to prevent this attack. My answer is: While the Schiphol airport in Amsterdam had at some gates the required equipment with technology capable of detecting explosives concealed inside an underwear, the gate from which the North-West Airlines flight to Detroit took off did not have this equipment and technology.
3. This admission has not been made by Obama in such categorical terms as I have used, but it is obvious between the lines in the following sentence in his address to his people: "But a metal detector can't detect the kind of explosives that were sewn into his clothes. As Secretary Napolitano will explain, the screening technologies that might have detected these explosives are in use at the Amsterdam airport but not at the specific checkpoints that he passed through."
4.Were the North-West Airlines flights to Detroit taking off from the same gate every day which does not have the equipment with the technology to detect explosives concealed inside one's underwear? Or did only the flight on December 25 take off from that gate? If they were taking off from that gate every day, there is a strong likelihood that Al Qaeda knew about it in advance either through the observation of its sources transiting Schiphol or through moles and that was why it directed him to take this particular flight.
5. Al Qaeda chose the Nigerian for the attempted attack because it knew he had a valid US visa. The US Government failed to thwart the attempt because it did not know that the Nigerian student about whom his own father had cautioned the US Embassy in Nigeria held a valid visa for travel to the US. This was because the US Embassy in Nigeria in its report to the State Department on the father's warning had spelt the student's name differently from the spelling in his passport on which the visa was issued by the US Embassy in London in June,2008.Neither the human analysts in the US counter-terrorism agencies in Washington DC nor their computers connected the name as it had figured in the report of the US Ambassador in Nigeria and as it had figured in the list of persons for whom a visa was issued by the US Embassy in London.
6.An important lesson coming out of the enquiry: Data bases are important in counter-terrorism. Easy access to the databases to those dealing with counter-terrorism is equally important. Both these requirements were met in the case of the Nigerian student, but no action was taken to thwart the attempt because those having access to the databases did not make proper use of them. The information about the student conveyed by the Ambassador in Nigeria was not sufficient to warrant his black-listing and being included in the no-fly list, but there was other adverse information about him available in other databases. The bits and pieces of adverse information about him available in different databases were not brought together in an integrated manner on a single piece of paper. Had this been done, immediate action might have been taken to cancel his visa and prevent him from boarding the plane.
7. Obama's address and the in-house review do not call for any change in the counter-terrorism structure as it was set up in 2004. They have called for modifications and improvements in the way the human and technical elements in this structure operate.
8. The BBC's correspondent in North America has come out with an interesting comment on the brave attempt made by Obama to prevent any serious damage to his administration and to his own reputation as a result of the Christmas Day failure, which he has compared to the Bay of Pigs failure of John F.Kennedy. It can be seen in Annexure III. ( 7-1-10)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
ANNEXURE I
TEXT OF PRESIDENT OBAMA'S ADDRESS TO HIS PEOPLE ON THE ATTEMPTED TERRORIST STRIKE OF DECEMBER 25,2009.
Obama: Good afternoon, everybody.
The immediate reviews that I ordered after the failed Christmas terrorist attack are now complete. I was just briefed on the findings and recommendations for reform, and I believe it's important that the American people understand the new steps that we're taking to prevent attacks and keep our country safe.
This afternoon my counterterrorism and homeland security adviser, John Brennan, will discuss his review into our terrorist watch list system, how our government failed to connect the dots in a way that would have prevented a known terrorist from boarding a plane for America, and the steps we're going to take to prevent that from happening again.
Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano will discuss her review of aviation screening, technology and procedures, how that terrorist boarded a plane with explosives that could have killed nearly 300 innocent people, and how we'll strengthen aviation security going forward.
So today I want to just briefly summarize their conclusions and the steps that I've ordered to address them.
In our ever-changing world, America's first line of defense is timely, accurate intelligence that is shared, integrated, analyzed and acted upon quickly and effectively. That's what the intelligence reforms after the 9/11 attacks largely achieved. That's what our intelligence community does every day.
But, unfortunately, that's not what happened in the lead-up to Christmas Day. It's now clear that shortcomings occurred in three broad and compounding ways.
First, although our intelligence community had learned a great deal about the al Qaeda affiliate in Yemen, called al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, that we knew that they sought to strike the United States and that they were recruiting operatives to do so, the intelligence community did not aggressively follow up on and prioritize particular streams of intelligence related to a possible attack against the homeland.
Second, this contributed to a larger failure of analysis, a failure to connect the dots of intelligence that existed across our intelligence community and which together could have revealed that [Umar Farouk] AbdulMutallab was planning an attack.
Third, this in turn fed into shortcomings in the watch-listing system which resulted in this person not being placed on the no-fly list, thereby allowing him to board that plane in Amsterdam for Detroit.
In sum, the U.S. government had the information scattered throughout the system to potentially uncover this plot and disrupt the attack. Rather than a failure to collect or share intelligence, this was a failure to connect and understand the intelligence that we already had.
Now, that's why we took swift action in the immediate days following Christmas, including reviewing and updating the terrorist watch list system and adding more individuals to the no-fly list, and directing our embassies and consulates to include current visa information in their warnings of individuals with terrorist or suspected terrorist ties.
Today, I'm directing a series of additional corrective steps across multiple agencies. Broadly speaking, they fall into four areas.
First, I'm directing that our intelligence community immediately begin assigning specific responsibility for investigating all leads on high-priority threats so that these leads are pursued and acted upon aggressively not just most of the time, but all of the time.
We must follow the leads that we get, and we must pursue them until plots are disrupted. And that means assigning clear lines of responsibility.
Second, I'm directing that intelligence reports, especially those involving potential threats to the United States, be distributed more rapidly and more widely. We can't sit on information that could protect the American people.
Third, I'm directing that we strengthen the analytical process, how our analysis -- how our analysts process and integrate the intelligence that they receive.
My director of national intelligence, Denny Blair, will take the lead in improving our day-to-day efforts. My Intelligence Advisory Board will examine the longer term challenge of sifting through vast universes of -- of intelligence and data in our information age.
And, finally, I'm ordering an immediate effort to strengthen the criteria used to add individuals to our terrorist watch lists, especially the no-fly list. We must do better in keeping dangerous people off airplanes, while still facilitating air travel.
So taken together, these reforms will improve the intelligence community's ability to collect, share, integrate, analyze and act on intelligence swiftly and effectively.
In short, they will help our intelligence community do its job even better and protect American lives.
But even the best intelligence can't identify in advance every individual who would do us harm.
So we need the security at our airports, ports, and borders and through our partnerships with other nations to prevent terrorists from entering America.
At the Amsterdam airport, AbdulMutallab was subjected to the same screening as other passengers. He was required to show his documents, including a valid U.S. visa. His carry-on bag was X-rayed. He passed through a metal detector.
But a metal detector can't detect the kind of explosives that were sewn into his clothes. As Secretary Napolitano will explain, the screening technologies that might have detected these explosives are in use at the Amsterdam airport but not at the specific checkpoints that he passed through.
Indeed, most airports in the world and in the United States do not yet have these technologies.
Now, there's no silver bullet to securing the thousands of flights into America each day, domestic and international. It will require significant investments in many areas. And that's why, even before the Christmas attack, we increased investments in homeland security and aviation security.
This includes an additional $1 billion in new systems and technologies that we need to protect our airports, more baggage screening, more passenger screening, and more advanced explosive detection capabilities, including those that can improve our ability to detect the kind of explosive used on Christmas.
These are major investments, and they'll make our skies safer and more secure.
Now, as I announced this week, we've taken a whole range of steps to improve aviation screening and security since Christmas, including new rules for how we handle visas within the government and enhanced screening for passengers flying from or through certain countries.
And today, I am directing that the Department of Homeland Security take additional steps, including strengthening our international partnerships to improve aviation screening and security around the world, greater use of the advanced explosive detection technologies that we already have, including imaging technology, and working aggressively in cooperation with the Department of Energy and our national labs to develop and deploy the next generation of screening technologies.
Now, there is, of course, no foolproof solution. As we develop new screening technologies and procedures, our adversaries will seek new ways to evade them, as was shown by the Christmas attack. In the never-ending race to protect our country, we have to stay one step ahead of a nimble adversary. That's what these steps are designed to do, and we will continue to work with Congress to ensure that our intelligence, homeland security, and law enforcement communities have the resources they need to keep the American people safe.
I ordered these two immediate reviews so that we could take immediate action to secure our country. But in the weeks and months ahead, we will continue a sustained and intensive effort of analysis and assessment so we leave no stone unturned in seeking better ways to protect the American people.
I have repeatedly made it clear in public with the American people and in private with my national security team that I will hold my staff, our agencies and the people in them accountable when they fail to perform their responsibilities at the highest levels.
Now, at this stage in the review process it appears that this incident was not the fault of a single individual or organization, but rather a systemic failure across organizations and agencies.
That's why, in addition to the corrective efforts that I've ordered, I've directed agency heads to establish internal accountability reviews and directed my national security staff to monitor their efforts.
We will measure progress, and John Brennan will report back to me within 30 days and on a regular basis after that.
All of these agencies and their leaders are responsible for implementing these reforms, and all will be held accountable if they don't.
Moreover, I am less interested in passing out blame than I am in learning from and correcting these mistakes to make us safer, for ultimately the buck stops with me. As president, I have a solemn responsibility to protect our nation and our people, and when the system fails, it is my responsibility.
Over the past two weeks, we've been reminded again of the challenge we face in protecting our country against a foe that is bent on our destruction. And while passions and politics can often obscure the hard work before us, let's be clear about what this moment demands.
We are at war. We are at war against al Qaeda, a far-reaching network of violence and hatred that attacked us on 9/11, that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people, and that is plotting to strike us again. And we will do whatever it takes to defeat them.
And we've made progress. Al Qaeda's leadership is hunkered down. We have worked closely with partners, including Yemen, to inflict major blows against al Qaeda leaders. And we have disrupted plots at home and abroad and saved American lives.
And we know that the vast majority of Muslims reject al Qaeda. But it is clear that al Qaeda increasingly seeks to recruit individuals without known terrorist affiliations, not just in the Middle East but in Africa and other places, to do their bidding.
That's why I've directed my national security team to develop a strategy that addresses the unique challenges posed by lone recruits. And that's why we must communicate clearly to Muslims around the world that al Qaeda offers nothing except a bankrupt vision of misery and death, including the murder of fellow Muslims, while the United States stands with those who seek justice and progress.
To advance that progress we've sought new beginnings with Muslim communities around the world, one in which we engage on the basis of mutual interest and mutual respect and work together to fulfill the aspirations that all people share -- to get an education, to work with dignity, to live in peace and security.
That's what America believes in. That's the vision that is far more powerful than the hatred of these violent extremists.
Here at home, we will strengthen our defenses, but we will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans, because great and proud nations don't hunker down and hide behind walls of suspicion and mistrust. That is exactly what our adversaries want. And so long as I am president, we will never hand them that victory.
We will define the character of our country, not some band of small men intent on killing innocent men, women and children.
And in this cause, every one of us -- every American, every elected official -- can do our part. Instead of giving in to cynicism and division, let's move forward with the confidence and optimism and unity that defines us as a people, for now is not a time for partisanship, it's a time for citizenship, a time to come together and work together with the seriousness of purpose that our national security demands.
That's what it means to be strong in the face of violent extremism. That's how we will prevail in this fight. And that's how we will protect our country and pass it, safer and stronger, to the next generation.
Thanks very much.
ANNEXURE II
WHITE HOUSE SUMMARY OF THE IN-HOUSE REVIEW OF THE ATTEMPTED TERRORIST ATTACK ON DECEMBER 25,2009
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release January 07, 2010
White House Review Summary Regarding 12/25/2009 Attempted Terrorist Attack
SUBECT: Summary of the White House Review of the December 25,2009 Attempted Terrorist Attack 1
On December 25,2009 a Nigerian national, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempted to detonate an explosive device while onboard flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit. The device did not explode, but instead ignited, injuring Mr. Abdulmutallab and two other passengers. The flight crew restrained Mr. Abdulmutallab and the plane safely landed. Mr. Abdulmutallab was taken into custody by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and later was questioned by the Federal Bureau ofInvestigation (FBI). Mr. Abdulmutallab was not on the U.S. Government's (USG) terrorist watchlist, but was known to the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC).
BACKGROUND
Following the December 25, 2009 attempt to bring down the flight by detonating an explosive device onboard flight 253, the President directed that Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism John Brennan conduct a complete review of the terrorist watchlisting system and directed that key departments and agencies provide input to this review. What follows is a summary of this preliminary report.
First, it should be noted that the work by America's counterterrorism (CT) community has had many successes since 9111 that should be applauded. Our ability to protect the U.S. Homeland against terrorist attacks is only as good as the information and analysis that drives and facilitates disruption efforts. The thorough analysis of large volumes of information has enabled a variety of departments and agencies to take action to prevent attacks. On a great number of occasions since 9111, many of which the American people will never know about, the tremendous, hardworking corps of analysts across the CT community did just that, working day and night to track terrorist threats and run down possible leads in order to keep their fellow Americans safe. Yet, as the amount of information continues to grow, the challenge to bring disparate pieces of information - about individuals, groups, and vague plots - together to form a clear picture about the intentions of our adversaries grows as well.
These actions, informed by the excellent analytic work of the very same individuals and structure that is under review, have saved lives. Unfortunately, despite several opportunities that might have allowed the CT community to put these pieces together in this case, and despite the tireless effort and best intentions of individuals at every level of the CT community, that was not done. As a result, the recent events highlight our need to look for ways to constantly improve and assist our CT analysts, who are at the forefront of providing warning of terrorist attacks and keeping Americans safe.
1 This report reflects preliminary findings to facilitate immediate corrective action. Neither the report nor its findings obviate the need for continued review and analysis to ensure that we have the fullest possible understanding of the systemic problems that led to the attempted terrorist attack on December 25,2009. Note further that sensitive intelligence data was removed from this public report to protect sources and methods.
FINDINGS
The preliminary White House review of the events that led to the attempted December 25 attack highlights human errors and a series of systematic breakdowns failed to stop Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab before he was able to detonate an explosive device onboard flight 253. The most significant failures and shortcomings that led to the attempted terror attack fall into three broad categories:
A failure of intelligence analysis, whereby the CT community failed before December 25 to identify, correlate, and fuse into a coherent story all of the discrete pieces of intelligence held by the u.s. Government related to an emerging terrorist plot against the U.S. Homeland organized by al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and to Mr. Abdulmutallab, the individual terrorist;
A failure within the CT community, starting with established rules and protocols, to assign responsibility and accountability for follow up of high priority threat streams, run down all leads, and track them through to completion; and
Shortcomings of the watchlisting system, whereby the CT community failed to identify intelligence within u.S. government holdings that would have allowed Mr. Abdulmutallab to be watchlisted, and potentially prevented from boarding an aircraft bound for the United States.
The most significant findings of our preliminary review are:
The U.S. Government had sufficient information prior to the attempted December 25 attack to have potentially disrupted the AQAP plot-i.e., by identifying Mr. Abdulmutallab as a likely operative of AQAP and potentially preventing him from boarding flight 253.
The Intelligence Community leadership did not increase analytic resources working on the full AQAP threat.
The watchlisting system is not broken but needs to be strengthened and improved, as evidenced by the failure to add Mr. Abdulmutallab to the No Fly watchlist.
A reorganization of the intelligence or broader counterterrorism community is not required to address problems that surfaced in the review, a fact made clear by countless other successful efforts to thwart ongoing plots.
FAILURE TO "CONNECT THE DOTS"
It is important to note that the fundamental problems identified in this preliminary review are different from those identified in the wake of the 9111 attacks. Previously, there were formidable barriers to information sharing among departments and agencies--tied to firmly entrenched patterns of bureaucratic behavior as well as the absence of a single component that fuses expertise, information technology (IT) networks, and datasets-that have now, 8 years later, largely been overcome.
An understanding of the responsibilities of different analytic components of the CT community is critical to identifying what went wrong and how best to fix it. The National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) was created by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (IRTPA) to be "the primary organization in the U.S. government for analyzing and integrating all intelligence possessed or acquired by the U.S. government pertaining to terrorism and counterterrorism 2." Intelligence Community guidance in 2006 further defined counterterrorism analytic responsibilities and tasked NCTC with the primary role within the Intelligence Community for bringing together and assessing all-source intelligence to enable a full understanding of and proper response to particular terrorist threat streams. Additionally, the Director of NCTC is in charge of the DNI Homeland Threat Task Force, whose mission is to examine threats to the U.S. Homeland from al-Qa'ida, its allies, and homegrown violent extremists.
Notwithstanding NCTC's central role in producing terrorism analysis, CIA maintains the responsibility and resource capability to "correlate and evaluate intelligence related to national security and provide appropriate dissemination of such intelligence. ,,3 CIA's responsibility for conducting all-source analysis in the area of counterterrorism is focused on supporting its operations overseas, as well as informing its leadership of terrorist threats and terrorist targets overseas. Therefore, both agencies - NCTC and CIA - have a role to play in conducting (and a responsibility to carry out) all-source analysis to identify operatives and uncover specific plots like the attempted December 25 attack.
The information available to the CT community over the last several months - which included pieces of information about Mr. Abdulmutallab, information about AQAP and its plans, and information about an individual now believed to be Mr. Abdulmutallab and his association with AQAP and its attack planning - was obtained by several agencies. Though all of that information was available to all-source analysts at the CIA and the NCTC prior to the attempted attack, the dots were never connected, and as a result, the problem appears to be more about a component failure to "connect the dots," rather than a lack of information sharing. The information that was available to analysts, as is usually the case, was fragmentary and embedded in a large volume of other data.
Though the consumer base and operational capabilities of CIA and NCTC are somewhat different, the intentional redundancy in the system should have added an additional layer of protection in uncovering a plot like the failed attack on December 25. However, in both cases, the mission to "connect the dots" did not produce the result that, in hindsight, it could have - connecting identifying information about Mr. Abdulmutallab with fragments of information about his association with AQAP and the group's intention of attacking the U.S.
The majority of these discreet pieces of intelligence were gathered between mid-October and late December 2009.
For example, on November 18, Mr. Abdulmutallab's father met with U.S. Embassy officers in Abuja, Nigeria, to discuss his concerns that his son may have come under the influence of unidentified extremists, and had planned to travel to Yemen. Though this information alone could not predict Mr. Abdulmutallab's eventual involvement in the attempted 25 December attack, it provided an opportunity to link information on him with earlier intelligence reports that contained fragmentary information.
Analytic focus during December was on the imminent AQAP attacks on Americans and American interests in Yemen, and on supporting CT efforts in Yemen.
Despite these opportunities and multiple intelligence products that noted the threat AQAP could pose to the Homeland, the different pieces of the puzzle were never brought together in this case the dots were never connected, and, as a result, steps to disrupt the plot involving Mr. Abdulmutallab were not taken prior to his boarding of the airplane with an explosive device and attempting to detonate it in-flight.
BREAKDOWN OF ACCOUNTABILITY FOR THREAT WARNING & RESPONSE
Intelligence is not an end to itself, nor are analytic products-they are designed to provide senior government leaders with the necessary information to make key decisions, but also to trigger action, including further collection, operational steps, and investigative adjustments. As noted above, NCTC and CIA have the primary and overlapping responsibility to conduct all-source analysis on terrorism. As with this intentional analytic redundancy, the CT community also has multiple and overlapping warning systems to ensure that departments and agencies are kept fully aware of ongoing threat streams.
NCTC is the primary organization that provides situational awareness to the CT community of ongoing terrorist threats and events, including through several daily written products that summarize current threat reporting for a broad audience, as well as meetings and video teleconferences that provide the opportunity for the CT community to engage in a real-time manner on this information. While the threat warning system involves analysis, it also extends to other elements within the CT community that should be responsible for following up and acting on leads as a particular threat situation develops.
In this context, the preliminary review suggests that the overlapping layers of protection within the CT community failed to track this threat in a manner sufficient to ensure all leads were followed and acted upon to conclusion. In addition, the White House and the National Security Staff failed to identify this gap ahead of time. No single component of the CT community assumed responsibility for the threat reporting and followed it through by ensuring that all necessary steps were taken to disrupt the threat. This argues that a process is needed to track terrorist threat reporting to ensure that departments and agencies are held accountable for running down all leads associated with high visibility and high priority plotting efforts, in particular against the U.S. Homeland.
FAILURE TO WATCHLIST
Although Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was included in the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE), the failure to include Mr. Abdulmutallab in a watchlist is part of the overall systemic failure. Pursuant to the IRTPA, NCTC serves "as the central and shared knowledge bank on known and suspected terrorists and international terror groups.,,4 As such, NCTC consolidates all information on known and suspected international terrorists in the Terrorist Identities Datarnart Environment. NCTC then makes this data available to the FBI-led Terrorist Screening Center (TSC), which reviews nominations for inclusion in the master watchlist called the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB). The TSC provides relevant extracts to each organization with a screening mission.
Hindsight suggests that the evaluation by watchlisting personnel of the information contained in the State cable nominating Mr. Abdulmutallab did not meet the minimum derogatory standard to watchlist. Watchlisting would have required all of the available information to be fused so that the derogatory information would have been sufficient to support nomination to be watchlisted in the Terrorist Screening Database. Watchlist personnel had access to additional derogatory information in databases that could have been connected to Mr. Abdulmutallab, but that access did not result in them uncovering the biographic information that would have been necessary for placement on the watchlist. Ultimately, placement on the No FIy List would have been required to keep Mr. Abdulmutallab off the plane inbound for the U.S. Homeland.
VISA ISSUE
Mr. Abdulmutallab possessed a U.S. visa, but this fact was not correlated with the concerns of Mr. Abdulmutallab's father about Mr. Abdulmutallab's potential radicalization. A misspelling of Mr. Abdulmutallab's name initially resulted in the State Department believing he did not have a valid U.S. visa. A determination to revoke his visa, however, would have only occurred if there had been a successful integration of intelligence by the CT community, resulting in his being watchlisted.
KEY FINDINGS EMERGING FROM PRELIMINARY INQUIRY & REVIEW
The U.S. government had sufficient information to have uncovered and potentially disrupted the December 25 attack-including by placing Mr. Abdulmutallab on the No Fly list -- but analysts within the CT community failed to connect the dots that could have identified and warned of the specific threat. The preponderance of the intelligence related to this plot was available broadly to the Intelligence Community.
NCTC and CIA are empowered to collate and assess all-source intelligence on the CT threat, but all-source analysts highlighted largely the evolving "strategic threat" AQAP posed to the West, and the U.S. Homeland specifically, in finished intelligence products. In addition, some of the improvised explosive device tactics AQAP might use against U.S. interests were highlighted in finished intelligence products.
The CT community failed to follow-up further on this "strategic warning" by moving aggressively to further identify and correlate critical indicators of AQAP's threat to the U.S. Homeland with the full range of analytic tools and expertise that it uses in tracking other plots aimed at the U.S. Homeland.
NCTC and CIA personnel who are responsible for watchlisting did not search all available databases to uncover additional derogatory information that could have been correlated with Mr. Abdulmutallab.
A series of human errors occurred----delayed dissemination of a finished intelligence report and what appears to be incomplete/faulty database searches on Mr. Abdulmutallab's name and identifying information.
"Information sharing" does not appear to have contributed to this intelligence failure; relevant all-source analysts as well as watchlisting personnel who needed this information were not prevented from accessing it.
Information technology within the CT community did not sufficiently enable the correlation of data that would have enabled analysts to highlight the relevant threat information.
There was not a comprehensive or functioning process for tracking terrorist threat reporting and actions taken such that departments and agencies are held accountable for running down all leads associated with high visibility and high priority plotting efforts undertaken by alQa'ida and its allies, in particular against the U.S. Homeland.
Finally, we must review and determine the ongoing suitability of legacy standards and protocols in effect across the CT community, including criteria for watch lists, protocols for secondary screening, visa suspension and revocation criteria, and business processes across the government.
ANNEXURE III
( Comments of Mark Mardell, the BBC Correspondent for North America )
Obama rounds on critics
Friday, 8 January 2010
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste," the Obama administration said in the midst of economic meltdown and the same must go for the attempted bombing of a transatlantic jet as it flew into Detroit on Christmas Day.
Borrowing that sign from Harry Truman's desk - "the buck stops here" - is a bit of a hostage to fortune. But his advisors must hope that taking personal responsibility will go down well with the American people. Apparently, it worked for JFK. He said the same thing after the Bay of Pigs debacle. His approval ratings shot up. Only later did he fire the head of the CIA. By the way, Mr Obama is only following a tradition - all US presidents since Kennedy have used the phrase at least once.
More importantly, Mr Obama has rounded on his Republican critics. They attack him for not using the term "war on terror". This is not surprising - it is an article of liberal faith that you cannot wage war on abstract nouns. But he sounded a note of battle, not for the first time.
"We are at war. We are at war against al-Qaeda, a far-reaching network of violence and hatred that attacked us on 9/11, that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people, and that is plotting to strike us again. And we will do whatever it takes to defeat them," he said.
But the nub of the criticism of Mr Obama is that by trying to close Guantanamo Bay, and by treating militants as criminals not enemies of the state, he is weak.
There is little doubt al-Qaeda scored a major victory over Detroit, even though no-one was badly hurt. After all, the core aim of al-Qaeda militants is not simply to kill people but to terrorise them, and so effect political change. The US is very jittery at the moment.
The criticism of some, immediately after the Christmas Day plot, was that Mr Obama was too cool, not emotional enough - in fact, insufficiently terrified. There is at least an argument that the most potent allies of the militants, the unwitting foot solders of al-Qaeda's cause, are all those columnists and bloggers who want to raise the status of the enemy from mere common criminal to warrior, and who worry that the US is not being sufficiently hysterical. The president seems aware that there is more ways than one for a militant group to win.
"We will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans, because great and proud nations don't hunker down and hide behind walls of suspicion and mistrust. That is exactly what our adversaries want, and so long as I am president, we will never hand them that victory. We will define the character of our country, not some band of small men intent on killing innocent men, women and children," he said on Thursday.
A poke in the eye for former Vice-President Dick Cheney at the end of that, followed up by a plea for unity, confidence and optimism, continuing: "That's what it means to be strong in the face of violent extremism."
Mr Obama is suggesting that it is his critics who have shown weakness and fear by abandoning American values. It is a bold attempt to turn this shambles into a statement that he is the really tough one, just tough in his own way.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
TERRORISM IN JAMMU & KASHMIR
B.RAMAN
According to the collations based on open source information put out by the South Asia Terrorism Portal of New Delhi, 69 civilians and 90 members of the security forces were killed in terrorism-related violence in Jammu & Kashmir in 2008. There were 49 explosions in different parts of the State using improvised explosive devices or landmines or hand-grenades in which 29 persons were killed. The remaining 40 civilians were killed in other incidents, not involving explosions. There were no incidents of suicide or suicidal (fedayeen) terrorism.
2.During 2009, 55 civilians and 78 members of the security forces were killed. There were only seven explosions in which 11 were killed. The remaining 44 civilians died in other incidents not involving explosions. There were no incidents of suicide or suicidal terrorism during 2009 either.
3. The Portal has not put out collated statistics regarding the annual infiltrations of Pakistan-trained terrorists into J&K , However, other reports indicate that the infiltrations continued to take place.
4. Thus during the last two years, there was a qualitative change in the ground situation marked by the following features:
The total absence of suicidal or suicide terrorism.
A significant decrease in the indiscriminate killing of civilians using explosive substances.
A decrease in fatalities of civilians as well as members of the security forces due to terrorism-related violence.
But continuing infiltrations of Pakistan-trained terrorists.
5. During this period, the strategy of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was marked by , firstly, keeping the clandestine and operational presence of the terrorists in J&K sustained by continuing the infiltrations so that they can be re-activated, if needed, and, secondly, bringing down the level of their acts of terrorism so that any escalation does not come in the way of the confidence-building process going on between the two countries as a result of initiatives taken by the Government of Dr.Manmohan Singh in India and the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Government headed by Asif Ali Zardari, which had come to power in Pakistan after the elections in the beginning of 2008.
6. The confidence-building process was actually initiated by the two countries when Pervez Musharraf was the President, and this continued under the PPP-led Government. In fact, Zardari tried to project a non-confrontational approach by talking, inter alia, of the need to reconsider the Pakistani policy of making the so-called Kashmir dispute come in the way of the normalisation of bilateral relations in other spheres such as trade. However, there were indications that the Army felt concerned over his non-confrontational approach. He did not go back to a confrontational approach, but stopped talking of the need for a non-confrontational approach.
7. The political situation in Pakistan has taken a turn for the worse following the ruling of the Pakistani Supreme Court declaring the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) promulgated by Musharraf in November,2007, null and void. The NRO, inter alia, paved the way for the return of Benazir Bhutto and Zardari from political exile in order to re-join the democratic process by closing the then on-going corruption investigations and prosecutions against them. Corruption cases against many other political leaders of different political parties were also withdrawn or closed.
8. The setting aside of the NRO by the Supreme Court has called into question the legitimacy of the election of Zardari as the President in September 2008. He has been desperately fighting to keep himself in office as the President through various strategems such as encouraging the Legislative Assemblies of the provinces to express their backing for him, by playing up the regional aspirations, by talking of unspecified conspiracies against not only him as an individual, but also against the PPP and by invoking the memory and fighting spirit of Benazir. His references to Kashmir are becoming confrontational. One is reminded of a similar turn in the attitude of Benazir Bhutto as the then Prime Minister in 1989 when she assumed a belligerant attitude towards India during a visit to Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir in order to save her position as the Prime Minister.
9. It should be a matter of concern---but not yet of alarm---- that the fedayeen attack by a group of two terrorists---- apparently from Pakistan --- in the Lal Chowk of Srinagar on January 6,2009, has come at a time when emotions are once again being whipped up in Pakistan over the Kashmir issue. The fedayeen attack resulted in a 22-hour confrontation between the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and the terrorists, who managed to entrench themselves in a local hotel before they were killed.
10. The whipping-up of emotions has the following objectives:
To divert attention away from the domestic challenges faced by Zardari and the PPP-led Government.
To placate the Army due to fears that the Army might get involved in any conspiracy to force the exit of Zardari.
To placate the Punjabi jihadi organisations, which have been itching for renewed action in J&K, in order to bring about a divide between them and the anti-Army Pakistani Taliban.
11. As a result of an improvement in the ground situation during the last two years, the Government of India, with the co-operation of the Government in Srinagar, had embarked on a policy with the following components:
A calibrated withdrawal and/or re-deployment of the Army troops in order to give the J&K Police and the CRPF a greater responsibility for maintaining peace and law and order in the State.
Maintaining on the ground the confidence-building measures already agreed upon with Pakistan before the bilateral dialogue came to be suspended following the 26/11 terrorist strikes by the Lashkar-e-Toiba in Mumbai.
Maintaining the momentum of the dialogue between the Government and representatives of different political formations in the State in order to work out a political solution to their demands which are considered legitimate.
12. The first fedayeen attack since 2007 need not call into question the wisdom of continuing this strategy. At the same time, the danger that a besieged Zardari-led Government might try to undermine this strategy by stepping up jihadi terrorism in the State has to be constantly studied, analysed and assessed by our intelligence agencies, the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) and the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
According to the collations based on open source information put out by the South Asia Terrorism Portal of New Delhi, 69 civilians and 90 members of the security forces were killed in terrorism-related violence in Jammu & Kashmir in 2008. There were 49 explosions in different parts of the State using improvised explosive devices or landmines or hand-grenades in which 29 persons were killed. The remaining 40 civilians were killed in other incidents, not involving explosions. There were no incidents of suicide or suicidal (fedayeen) terrorism.
2.During 2009, 55 civilians and 78 members of the security forces were killed. There were only seven explosions in which 11 were killed. The remaining 44 civilians died in other incidents not involving explosions. There were no incidents of suicide or suicidal terrorism during 2009 either.
3. The Portal has not put out collated statistics regarding the annual infiltrations of Pakistan-trained terrorists into J&K , However, other reports indicate that the infiltrations continued to take place.
4. Thus during the last two years, there was a qualitative change in the ground situation marked by the following features:
The total absence of suicidal or suicide terrorism.
A significant decrease in the indiscriminate killing of civilians using explosive substances.
A decrease in fatalities of civilians as well as members of the security forces due to terrorism-related violence.
But continuing infiltrations of Pakistan-trained terrorists.
5. During this period, the strategy of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was marked by , firstly, keeping the clandestine and operational presence of the terrorists in J&K sustained by continuing the infiltrations so that they can be re-activated, if needed, and, secondly, bringing down the level of their acts of terrorism so that any escalation does not come in the way of the confidence-building process going on between the two countries as a result of initiatives taken by the Government of Dr.Manmohan Singh in India and the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Government headed by Asif Ali Zardari, which had come to power in Pakistan after the elections in the beginning of 2008.
6. The confidence-building process was actually initiated by the two countries when Pervez Musharraf was the President, and this continued under the PPP-led Government. In fact, Zardari tried to project a non-confrontational approach by talking, inter alia, of the need to reconsider the Pakistani policy of making the so-called Kashmir dispute come in the way of the normalisation of bilateral relations in other spheres such as trade. However, there were indications that the Army felt concerned over his non-confrontational approach. He did not go back to a confrontational approach, but stopped talking of the need for a non-confrontational approach.
7. The political situation in Pakistan has taken a turn for the worse following the ruling of the Pakistani Supreme Court declaring the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) promulgated by Musharraf in November,2007, null and void. The NRO, inter alia, paved the way for the return of Benazir Bhutto and Zardari from political exile in order to re-join the democratic process by closing the then on-going corruption investigations and prosecutions against them. Corruption cases against many other political leaders of different political parties were also withdrawn or closed.
8. The setting aside of the NRO by the Supreme Court has called into question the legitimacy of the election of Zardari as the President in September 2008. He has been desperately fighting to keep himself in office as the President through various strategems such as encouraging the Legislative Assemblies of the provinces to express their backing for him, by playing up the regional aspirations, by talking of unspecified conspiracies against not only him as an individual, but also against the PPP and by invoking the memory and fighting spirit of Benazir. His references to Kashmir are becoming confrontational. One is reminded of a similar turn in the attitude of Benazir Bhutto as the then Prime Minister in 1989 when she assumed a belligerant attitude towards India during a visit to Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir in order to save her position as the Prime Minister.
9. It should be a matter of concern---but not yet of alarm---- that the fedayeen attack by a group of two terrorists---- apparently from Pakistan --- in the Lal Chowk of Srinagar on January 6,2009, has come at a time when emotions are once again being whipped up in Pakistan over the Kashmir issue. The fedayeen attack resulted in a 22-hour confrontation between the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and the terrorists, who managed to entrench themselves in a local hotel before they were killed.
10. The whipping-up of emotions has the following objectives:
To divert attention away from the domestic challenges faced by Zardari and the PPP-led Government.
To placate the Army due to fears that the Army might get involved in any conspiracy to force the exit of Zardari.
To placate the Punjabi jihadi organisations, which have been itching for renewed action in J&K, in order to bring about a divide between them and the anti-Army Pakistani Taliban.
11. As a result of an improvement in the ground situation during the last two years, the Government of India, with the co-operation of the Government in Srinagar, had embarked on a policy with the following components:
A calibrated withdrawal and/or re-deployment of the Army troops in order to give the J&K Police and the CRPF a greater responsibility for maintaining peace and law and order in the State.
Maintaining on the ground the confidence-building measures already agreed upon with Pakistan before the bilateral dialogue came to be suspended following the 26/11 terrorist strikes by the Lashkar-e-Toiba in Mumbai.
Maintaining the momentum of the dialogue between the Government and representatives of different political formations in the State in order to work out a political solution to their demands which are considered legitimate.
12. The first fedayeen attack since 2007 need not call into question the wisdom of continuing this strategy. At the same time, the danger that a besieged Zardari-led Government might try to undermine this strategy by stepping up jihadi terrorism in the State has to be constantly studied, analysed and assessed by our intelligence agencies, the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) and the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
CAN THERE BE RESTRICTIONS ON PERSONAL LIBERTIES FOR PROTECTING HUMAN LIVES?
FACE THE NATION
FTN: Security more important than personal liberties?
CNN-IBN
Published on Thu, Jan 07, 2010 at 07:02, Updated on Thu, Jan 07, 2010 at 11:09 in India section
The United States and the United Kingdom have introduced full-body scanners and racial and religious profiling of passengers following a botched Christmas Day bombing attempt by a Nigerian man on a Northwest Airlines flight into Detroit.
However, civil society voices say such security measures are nothing but racism.
The new security measures call for inspecting baggage and patting down US-bound passengers from four countries – Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria – that the US government considers state sponsors of terrorism and 10 other "countries of interest." They include Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.
Passengers from other countries heading for the US could also face random checks, pat-downs or baggage checks.
CNN-IBN show Face The Nation debated: Is racial profiling the need of the hour?
US racial profiling measures irk Muslims
On the panel of experts to debate the issue were former additional director of RAW B Raman, former diplomat KC Singh and South Asia Bureau Chief of Al Arabiya Dr Wael Awwad.
When the US makes a list of countries that are almost declared as terrorist countries and it says that all nationals from these countries will be checked, doesn’t this confirm official racism?
Raman began the debate by clarifying that it is not just nationals of these countries but also those who have visited these countries before going to the US who will be subjected to special security checks.
"Yes, there is a possibility of doing it in a better way by focusing on the individual like in the case of the Nigerian whose father had complained about him. But unfortunately the checks that he should have been subjected to were not done," Raman said.
However, Wael Awwad asked why are Islamist terrorists attacking the US and the UK? "It is because of their wrongdoing in the Middle East," he reasoned.
But other panelists argued that it is not just about Muslims because countries with big Muslim population like Indonesia and India are not in the list.
"The whole idea of putting countries like this in a list is that they (US) should admit that there is a failure in the system. Why is it that Japan and China are not in this list? It proves that this trouble is their own creation," Awwad said.
Isn’t this is a systematic infringement of the personal liberties of those who live in these 14 countries? After all political beliefs are not a crime. One should not be dubbed a terrorist just because one follows a hardliner religious law.
To which KC Singh said, "What the initial thought was that Barack Obama will bring in a fresh approach. Two things that have affected the reputation of the US in the last seven years – one is Guantanamo Bay and the second was the interrogations that took place. Now Obama apparently has overreacted because he comes under attack from the Republicans. The point is that you cannot target citizens of certain countries because you are turning all of them into suspects and therefore helping the terrorists as it will help in creating further disaffection."
Through this entire episode, Obama came across as someone who was not prepared to handle such situations. Perhaps his speech at Cairo University has not reached out and not healed hearts and minds.
Agreeing Singh said, "You can’t have a sledgehammer approach and we saw that in India also. Headley case happened and look at the corrections they had to make in the visa policy. Initial reaction for every security agency when it is caught in the wrong foot is to say ban everything. But you have to create a balance and a smart policy which serves your purpose and yet not create disaffection."
"The policy is likely to cause anger and unhappiness but nobody can question the reason behind the policy as security needs to be tightened up. So one cannot totally blame the Obama administration but yes, it could have been done it in a wise manner," Raman said.
Does this new list indicate that the world is accepting that this is where terrorism is emanating from?
"I do not mind the checking if it is done on an equal basis to all the members of a flight. More anger among people should not be created by taking such steps. After this why should any one of the Arab countries open a red carpet for any American official?" Awwad asked.
He also believed that Syria should not have been in the list. "It is the last secular country in the Arab world. The US is after Syria to change its policy towards Israel. It has nothing to do with terrorism. So it is a politically-motivated list," he added.
Disagreeing Raman said, "It is not a politically motivated list. It was prepared on the basis of the assessments made by intelligence agencies of the US. They made the list based on where terrorist training camps are located. So it is about being careful just as we are careful about Pakistanis. Those Pakistanis who come to India have to present themselves in a police station. No other citizen has to undergo this procedure. So just like we have a right to protect our people, the Americans have that right too."
If a list is being made of countries from where terrorism is emanating then why is UK not in this list? Or is UK an American ally and so it cannot be in the list?
"With UK I suppose they have sufficient confidence that there will be adequate screening at the UK end. You will find later that some of these countries will be taken out (of the list) if they can certify adequate screening. There has to be greater harmonisation of standards of international airports because al-Qaeda has shown a special preference for singling out civil aviation as a means of a terrorist attack. So everyone has to be careful," Singh explained.
The need of the hour is to sharpen up counter-terrorism. The objective is only to kill so then isn’t it necessary to take as many measures as you can?
"Absolutely. It is the responsibility of every country to protect but not by singling out certain citizens. Everybody should be on the same boat and then we should fight it out," Awwad said.
Raman concluded the debate by saying, "Protecting lives of its people is very important and no government can shed that responsibility. If a government comes to a conclusion that certain restrictions are necessary then it must take steps."
Final results of the SMS/web poll:
Yes – 56 per cent
No – 44 per cent
FTN: Security more important than personal liberties?
CNN-IBN
Published on Thu, Jan 07, 2010 at 07:02, Updated on Thu, Jan 07, 2010 at 11:09 in India section
The United States and the United Kingdom have introduced full-body scanners and racial and religious profiling of passengers following a botched Christmas Day bombing attempt by a Nigerian man on a Northwest Airlines flight into Detroit.
However, civil society voices say such security measures are nothing but racism.
The new security measures call for inspecting baggage and patting down US-bound passengers from four countries – Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria – that the US government considers state sponsors of terrorism and 10 other "countries of interest." They include Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.
Passengers from other countries heading for the US could also face random checks, pat-downs or baggage checks.
CNN-IBN show Face The Nation debated: Is racial profiling the need of the hour?
US racial profiling measures irk Muslims
On the panel of experts to debate the issue were former additional director of RAW B Raman, former diplomat KC Singh and South Asia Bureau Chief of Al Arabiya Dr Wael Awwad.
When the US makes a list of countries that are almost declared as terrorist countries and it says that all nationals from these countries will be checked, doesn’t this confirm official racism?
Raman began the debate by clarifying that it is not just nationals of these countries but also those who have visited these countries before going to the US who will be subjected to special security checks.
"Yes, there is a possibility of doing it in a better way by focusing on the individual like in the case of the Nigerian whose father had complained about him. But unfortunately the checks that he should have been subjected to were not done," Raman said.
However, Wael Awwad asked why are Islamist terrorists attacking the US and the UK? "It is because of their wrongdoing in the Middle East," he reasoned.
But other panelists argued that it is not just about Muslims because countries with big Muslim population like Indonesia and India are not in the list.
"The whole idea of putting countries like this in a list is that they (US) should admit that there is a failure in the system. Why is it that Japan and China are not in this list? It proves that this trouble is their own creation," Awwad said.
Isn’t this is a systematic infringement of the personal liberties of those who live in these 14 countries? After all political beliefs are not a crime. One should not be dubbed a terrorist just because one follows a hardliner religious law.
To which KC Singh said, "What the initial thought was that Barack Obama will bring in a fresh approach. Two things that have affected the reputation of the US in the last seven years – one is Guantanamo Bay and the second was the interrogations that took place. Now Obama apparently has overreacted because he comes under attack from the Republicans. The point is that you cannot target citizens of certain countries because you are turning all of them into suspects and therefore helping the terrorists as it will help in creating further disaffection."
Through this entire episode, Obama came across as someone who was not prepared to handle such situations. Perhaps his speech at Cairo University has not reached out and not healed hearts and minds.
Agreeing Singh said, "You can’t have a sledgehammer approach and we saw that in India also. Headley case happened and look at the corrections they had to make in the visa policy. Initial reaction for every security agency when it is caught in the wrong foot is to say ban everything. But you have to create a balance and a smart policy which serves your purpose and yet not create disaffection."
"The policy is likely to cause anger and unhappiness but nobody can question the reason behind the policy as security needs to be tightened up. So one cannot totally blame the Obama administration but yes, it could have been done it in a wise manner," Raman said.
Does this new list indicate that the world is accepting that this is where terrorism is emanating from?
"I do not mind the checking if it is done on an equal basis to all the members of a flight. More anger among people should not be created by taking such steps. After this why should any one of the Arab countries open a red carpet for any American official?" Awwad asked.
He also believed that Syria should not have been in the list. "It is the last secular country in the Arab world. The US is after Syria to change its policy towards Israel. It has nothing to do with terrorism. So it is a politically-motivated list," he added.
Disagreeing Raman said, "It is not a politically motivated list. It was prepared on the basis of the assessments made by intelligence agencies of the US. They made the list based on where terrorist training camps are located. So it is about being careful just as we are careful about Pakistanis. Those Pakistanis who come to India have to present themselves in a police station. No other citizen has to undergo this procedure. So just like we have a right to protect our people, the Americans have that right too."
If a list is being made of countries from where terrorism is emanating then why is UK not in this list? Or is UK an American ally and so it cannot be in the list?
"With UK I suppose they have sufficient confidence that there will be adequate screening at the UK end. You will find later that some of these countries will be taken out (of the list) if they can certify adequate screening. There has to be greater harmonisation of standards of international airports because al-Qaeda has shown a special preference for singling out civil aviation as a means of a terrorist attack. So everyone has to be careful," Singh explained.
The need of the hour is to sharpen up counter-terrorism. The objective is only to kill so then isn’t it necessary to take as many measures as you can?
"Absolutely. It is the responsibility of every country to protect but not by singling out certain citizens. Everybody should be on the same boat and then we should fight it out," Awwad said.
Raman concluded the debate by saying, "Protecting lives of its people is very important and no government can shed that responsibility. If a government comes to a conclusion that certain restrictions are necessary then it must take steps."
Final results of the SMS/web poll:
Yes – 56 per cent
No – 44 per cent
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