OBAMA’S DRONE CLAIMS THREATEN TO BOOMERANG

       

B.RAMAN

The use of the Drone (unmanned aircraft) strikes to kill Al Qaeda suspects in the Wazirisan area of Pakistan and in Yemen started under former President George Bush. These strikes are carried out by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).  Mr.Bush carefully maintained the deniability of any role that he might be playing from the White House in ordering these strikes.

2. Under the CIA’s charter as revised in the 1970s, the CIA cannot undertake any operation to kill an individual without a written directive from the President. Keeping this view, the Bush Administration kept the circumstances surrounding the Drone strikes vague and unclear.

3. After coming to office, President Barack Obama has ordered a dramatic escalation of Drone strikes in the Waziristan area as well as in Yemen to neutralise identified suspects of Al Qaeda. These strikes have killed many important operatives of Al Qaeda. At  the same time, they have also killed many innocent Pakistanis adding to anti-US anger in Pakistan.

4. To give a heroic image to Mr.Obama, his advisers have been projecting the Drone strikes as carefully chosen and decided by Mr.Obama himself, thereby weakening the deniability of his role.

5. This is now threatening to boomerang by raising two issues: Firstly, is it legal for the US President to knowingly  order a Drone strike meant to kill a US citizen? Secondly, is it legal for the US to knowingly undertake Drone strikes despite the knowledge that they might kill innocent civilians? The first question has been raised in the US itself and the second before the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

6. The relevance of the first question in the US arises from the fact that Anwar al-Awlaki, the chief of Al Qaeda in Yemen, who was allegedly killed in a US Drone strike, was stated to have been a US citizen before he fled from the US to Yemen and took over the leadership of the local Al Qaeda. Those who have raised this issue in the US suspect that Mr.Obama might have ordered other Drone strikes against US citizens knowing them to be US citizens.

7. The US Civil Liberties Union and “The New York Times” have filed separate petitions before a US federal court requesting for access to Government documents relating to the Drone strikes. The Obama Administration has strongly opposed their petitions on grounds of national security and urged the court to reject their petitions outright. After having boasted that Mr.Obama personally orders the Drone strikes, the Government is now refusing even to confirm whether any documents on the subject exist.

8. In a counter filed before a district court in New York on June 20,2012, the Government said: “Whether or not the CIA has the authority to be, or is in fact, directly involved in targeted lethal operations remains classified.”

9.The American Civil Liberties Union and “The New York Times” have requested  for access to the documents explaining the legal basis for the raids and the killing of terror suspects who are US citizens. The Government has  asked the court for a summary judgement to dismiss their petitions.

10.The Government’s counter-petition said: “Even to describe the numbers and details of most of these documents would reveal information that could damage the government’s counterterrorism efforts.”

11. Describing the Government’s argument as “absurd”,  the ACLU said the Drone strikes were an open secret that Government officials had boasted about to reporters.

12.  “Senior officials have discussed it, both on the record and off. They have taken credit for its putative successes, professed it to be legal and dismissed concerns about civilian casualties,” ACLU Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer said in a statement.

13.“The public is entitled to know more about the legal authority the administration is claiming and the way that the administration is using it.”

14.The ACLU called on the  Obama administration to reveal information “about the process by which individuals, including American citizens, are added to government kill lists”.

15. The White House has simultaneously organised a series of speeches and briefings by officials, including Mr. Obama’s chief counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, to explain to the American people “the legal analysis and process involved.”

16. In the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Mr.Ben Emmerson, a Special Rapporteur, urged the US on June 21  to demonstrate that its Drone strikes are legal. Otherwise, he warned  that the Council may be called on to investigate. He added: “Each and every US attack will be investigated. Somebody needs to do right by these victims. The international community is extremely concerned about the use of targeted killings”. ( 22-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )

PAK JUDICIARY VS EXECUTIVE: WHAT NEXT?

B.RAMAN

Makhdoom Shahabuddin,  who was Minister for Textiles in the outgoing Cabinet headed by Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani, has reportedly  been nominated by President Asif Ali Zardari to be the new Prime Minister of Pakistan. Barring unlikely surprises, he is expected to be elected to the vacant post by the National Assembly on June 22,2012.

2.On the instructions of Mr.Zardari, the Pakistan People’s Party members and legislators have conducted themselves with dignified anger and restraint in the wake of the controversial ruling of a three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry disqualifying Mr.Gilani from holding office because of his earlier conviction for contempt of court. The  conviction was triggered off by  his failure to carry out the directive of the court to write to the Swiss Government for re-opening investigation into a case in which allegations of money-laundering had been made against Mr.Zardari and the late Benazir Bhutto.

3. The PPP has decided not to challenge the ruling of the Supreme Court and to accept its verdict despite its serious reservations over its validity. The Election Commission, apparently with the prior concurrence of Mr.Zardari, promptly carried out the directive of the court to declare Mr.Gilani disqualified to hold the post of the Prime Minister and to  function as a member of the Parliament. Immediately thereafter, Mr.Gilani vacated his official residence and shifted to the Islamabad Club. The PPP has advised its cadres against holding any public demonstrations on this issue.

4.”The Daily Times” of Lahore (June 21,2012) has quoted an unnamed leader of the PPP as saying as follows :“We will protest over this highly politicised and PPP-specific judgement, the way the democratic forces should protest yet will desist from taking it to a point of no return for the continuation of the current system and ensure a democratic transition.”

5.Now that the PPP  has decided to comply with the verdict against Mr.Gilani, the question is whether the confrontation between the Executive and the Judiciary at the institutional level and between Mr.Zardari and the Chief Justice at the personal level will continue and, if so, in what form and with what consequences.

6. While the analysts of the Pakistani political scene have focussed on the institutional confrontation between the Executive and the Judiciary, they have overlooked the personal confrontation between the Chief Justice and Mr.Zardari, which has also played a role in the dogged determination with which the two institutions have fought each other.

7. This personal confrontation had its roots in the lack of enthusiasm of Mr.Zardari for the re-appointment of Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry , who had been removed from office by Gen.Pervez Musharraf, as the Chief Justice and the nullification of  the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) of Musharraf, which enabled Zardari and Benazir to return from political life and resume their political activities, by the Chief Justice after re-assuming office.. The nullification of the NRO created the danger of Mr.Zardari’s election being questioned by the court at some stage. It was the NRO that removed the disqualification against Zardari on the ground that he was facing a criminal investigation.

8. The Chief Justice avoided creating the impression of his being vindictive against Mr. Zardari because of the latter’s dragging his feet over the question of his re-appointment. He kept the pressure on Mr.Gilani, who was really carrying out the wishes of Mr.Zardari, and avoided directly targeting Mr.Zardari by questioning the legality of his election once the NRO was set aside.

9. The Chief Justice has hit out against Mr.Gilani directly and Mr.Zardari indirectly by framing the verdict of the bench headed by him as based on constitutional principles and not caused by personal petulance. The constitutional principle that he has asserted is that in determining the constitutionality of the actions of the Executive and the Parliament, the interpretation of the Judiciary will be final. This is a judicial position that nobody can question despite suspicions that exterior factors have influenced the judgement.

10.From the acceptance of the verdict by the Election Commission and the Government without delay, it is apparent that Mr.Zardari and his advisers have decided to come to terms with the  reality that in this case they are on a weak wicket. The Government’s options have been reduced and it cannot hope to prevail ultimately in any confrontation with the judiciary presided over by the present Chief Justice on the question of asking the Swiss Government to re-open the investigation into the pending allegations against Mr.Zardari.

 

11.Will the court now ask the new Prime Minister to write to the Swiss Government? If so, will he do so? If he too refuses to do so, the drama could be repeated---- with the danger of Mr.Zardari becoming the direct  target on the ground that he was unable or unwilling to make his Prime Minister comply with the directive of the court.

12. These questions were posed by some journalists to Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan, who represented  Mr.Gilani before the court. He has been quoted as replying as follows: “ A decision would be taken in this regard once the court directs the new Prime Minister to do so.” His reply gives no clue as to what the new Prime Minister might do.

13. However, there are other indicators which suggest that Mr.Zardari feels that the confrontation on this particular issue should not be allowed to reach a point of no return. Such a confrontation could be counter-productive. Among such indicators are the Government’s  decision not to appeal against the judgement to a larger bench and to implement the verdict however unpalatable it might be.

14. The confrontation would most probably continue, but not necessarily on the issue of a letter to the Swiss Government. The Chief Justice, who was till now occupying the moral high ground, has been placed on the defensive by serious allegations of his son Arsalan Iftikhar being the beneficiary of a financial relationship with a businessman of questionable credentials. Apparently realising that this case could be a mine-field , the Chief Justice has sought to pre-empt any allegations of inaction by him by suggesting an enquiry into the allegations against his son by the National Accountability Bureau.

15. This investigation could provide Mr.Zardari and his advisers with an opportunity to keep up the campaign to have the Chief Justice discredited. The confrontation will continue in other forms and other arena, but to describe the recent judgement disqualifying Mr.Gilani as a judicial coup would be overstating its significance and  implications . ( 21-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )

WANTED: SECRET AGENTS

B.RAMAN

The Government of India has before it two comprehensive reports on the measures that need to be taken for improving our intelligence capabilities and for making our intelligence agencies more efficient and accountable.

2. The first report is part of a larger study on the modernisation of the national security apparatus undertaken by a high-powered Task Force headed by Shri Naresh Chandra, former Cabinet Secretary and presently Convenor of the National Security Advisory Board. It is a classified report prepared after extensive secret  interactions with serving and retired officers of the intelligence agencies and Ministries and Departments dealing with national security which are consumers of the products of the intelligence agencies. The results of secret interactions with senior police officers from States facing internal security problems such as insurgency and terrorism have also gone into the preparation of the report of the intelligence sub-group of the Naresh Chandra Task Force.

3. This sub-group has had access to secret data relating to the functioning of the agencies and the views of the consumers of their products. Its focus has been on the inner core of the problems and difficulties faced by the agencies and their inadequacies as seen by the consumers of their products.

4. The second report has been prepared by a small Task Force set up by the Institute For Defence Studies and Analyses. The three-member Task Force was headed by Shri Rana Banerji, one of the finest Pakistani analysts produced by the R&AW, who retired a couple of years ago. Having been a Task Force not enjoying the cover of the Official Secrets Act, it does not appear to have had the benefit of secret interactions with the serving officers of the intelligence agencies. Its interactions, as one could see from its comprehensive report, have been largely with the community of retired officers.

5. The result naturally has been an over-focus on the external shell of the intelligence community and a lack of insight and understanding of the inner core issues. Among the outer shell issues usefully covered by it are the need for a legislative cover, the importance of external oversight by professionals as well as parliamentary representatives, greater institutional co-ordination etc. These are important issues but hardly touch the inner core issues which really would determine whether India has the intelligence capability it needs now and it would need in the years to come.

6. These two exercises have been undertaken at a time when there has been considerable criticism of our intelligence agencies after the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai and of their seeming helplessness in neutralising notorious terrorist leaders such as Dawood Ibrahim and Hafiz Mohammed Sayeed of the Pakistani Lashkar-e-Toiba who have been operating with impunity from Pakistani territory since 1993.

7. Our agencies have not so far been able to neutralise Dawood and his accomplices who took shelter in Karachi after the March 1993 terrorist strikes in Mumbai. Nor have they been able to neutralise Sayeed of the Lashkar-e-Toiba. The criticism of our agencies and expressions of disenchantment and scepticism over their functioning by large sections of public opinion have increased after the spectacularly successful US neutralisation of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad on May 2 of last year.

8. A discomfiting question serving and retired intelligence officers often face from their public interlocutors is: If the US intelligence and special forces located thousands of kms away from Pakistan can plan and execute a clandestine intelligence operation of this nature, why the Indian agencies based  next door to Pakistan are not able to do so. They watch helplessly as these terrorist leaders carry out one daring strike after another in the Indian territory.

9. To cover our discomfiture, we often try to put the blame on the political leadership by alleging that our soft political leadership does not allow us to carry out such operations in foreign territory. This is not incorrect, but does not explain adequately our helplessness.

10. Let us presume we get a political leadership like President Barack Obama and he tells our agencies: Forget about foreign territory. Dawood and Sayeed have killed too many Indians. Go and get them. Will our agencies be able to do it? One would be justified in having doubts.

11.That is where the capability of their inner core comes in. The agencies may have the best of legislative cover, parliamentary oversight, co-ordination mechanism etc. But if they do not have  this inner core capability, all these outer shell reforms will be of little use.

12. From time to time, we undertake exercises to revamp our intelligence apparatus. In the past, such exercises were governmental. To my knowledge, the IDSA exercise is the first non-governmental one.

13. All these exercises largely tend to be more academic than practical, more copycating the beaten track of other countries than stimulating innovative ideas of our own. I would have been happier if the recent exercises by the Naresh Chandra Task Force and the IDSA had gathered together a group of serving and retired officers of the agencies and posed the following questions to them for a brain-storming:

(a).Would you have been able to carry out an operation similar to the Abbottabad operation of the CIA? If not, why not?

(b).If you are given political instructions to neutralise Dawood and Sayeed, would you be able to do so? If not, why not?

14. Such brain-storming exercises would have brought   out the state of the inner core of our intelligence agencies and  drawn the attention of our policy-makers to the problems and deficiencies of our agencies.

15. In my limited knowledge, the police Special Branch culture still largely governs the thinking and functioning of our intelligence agencies. They collect intelligence largely on the basis of discussions with casual and peripheral sources having limited access to inside intelligence. Our record in penetration operations has been poor.

16. Forty-four years after the R&AW was formed, it has not been able to develop the culture of the secret agent. It has many brilliant intelligence officers, who function more or less as Special Branch officers operating in foreign territory or as secretive pseudo-diplomats. They are not secret agents in the real sense of the term as it is understood in the intelligence agencies of other countries.

17. A real secret agent is an officer who is a risk-taker, who foregoes diplomatic and other protections and penetrates the sanctum sanctorum of the adversary---whether it be another state or a terrorist organisation--- and clandestinely and successfully carries out opportunistic tasks of the nature assigned by Obama to the CIA officers and Navy Seals who located OBL in Abbottabad and ultimately neutralised him.

18.Unless we are able to develop such an intelligence culture of a secret agent, we will continue functioning as glorified Special Branch officers, collecting useful bits of intelligence here and there, but unable to clandestinely strike at our national adversaries.

19. Why we have not been able to develop such an intelligence culture of secret agents for 44 years and what we should do now to develop it is a question that should be addressed by the Government as it examines the two Task Force reports.(19-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )

TALIBAN’S SEEMING OVERTURES TO INDIA

B.RAMAN

There has been some understandable curiosity and puzzlement over a statement attributed to the Afghan Taliban which was disseminated on June 17,2012, through the Internet.

2. The statement, provided it is authentic, appeared to be a reaction to the recent visit of Mr.Leon Panetta, the US Defence Secretary, to India and Afghanistan. During his stay in New Delhi, there was speculation in the local media that Mr.Panetta, who made no secret of the USA’s continuing exasperation with Pakistan, was keen that India should play a greater role in the training of the Afghan Army.  This, if true, was a reversal of the past reluctance of the US to encourage an Indian military training role in Afghanistan lest it add to the concerns of Pakistan.

3. These reports regarding Mr.Panetta’s   interest in a greater Indian military training role led to excited comments by non-governmental analysts, but the Government of India itself maintained a discreet silence on the subject. This discreet silence has now been interpreted by the Taliban in the statement attributed to it as amounting to a rejection of the US nudging on this issue.

4.The Indian policy generally has been not to be amenable to pressure from the US to play a military role in areas of strategic interest to the US lest perceptions of Indian military collaboration with the US affect  India’s own interests. When Mr.George Bush was the US President and Mr.Atal Behari Vajpayee was our Prime Minister, the Government of India had resisted US pressure to send Indian troops to Iraq. India did agree  to allow its naval ships to escort through the Malacca Straits US ships on way from the Pacific to the Gulf, but beyond that declined to play any military role.

5. Now that the administration of President Barack Obama is planning to reduce the US military’s operational role in Afghanistan and to increasingly confine the US role to training the Afghan Security Forces, it seems to be keen that India should supplement the US efforts in this regard by undertaking more training missions. This, if correct, would be a reversal of the past policies of the US.

6. US policies with regard to any Indian military training role in Afghanistan have passed through various stages. In the days when the US relations with Islamabad were good, the US was opposed to any Indian military training role keeping in view the concerns of Pakistan. Subsequently, the US did not oppose any training of Afghan military personnel in India, but continued to have reservations about any Indian role on the ground in Afghan soil. The reports on Mr.Panetta’s discussions in New Delhi carried by the Indian media indicated that as a result of the US exasperation with Pakistan over its stopping the transit of logistic supplies for the NATO forces through its territory, the US was inclined to reduce its reservations and encourage a more active Indian role. It is not clear whether the reported change in the US views was tactical to spite Pakistan or strategic and would be enduring.

7. The Government of India needs to be congratulated for not jumping into responding positively to the US suggestions and for taking time to examine the implications of an increased Indian military training role. While there need be no reservations about increasing the training of Afghan military personnel in Indian territory, increased ground involvement of Indian military personnel in Afghan soil could have long-term implications that need to be carefully examined with our feet firmly on the ground.

8. The Taliban has chosen to interpret the lack of open Indian enthusiasm for the ideas of Mr.Panetta as Indian rejection of the US feelers on this issue. One should not be surprised  if the Taliban statement encouraging India to turn down the US feelers  had been drafted in consultation with Islamabad.

9. The Taliban statement goes beyond giving its reactions to the perceived lack of positive outcome to Mr.Panetta’s discussions in New Delhi. It repeats a formulation of September 1998 of the Taliban, issued when it was in power in Kabul, in which it had expressed its benign intentions towards India and sought to remove any impression that it might be hostile to Indian interests because of India’s close association with the Government of Najibullah. It had claimed in that statement that the Taliban did not believe in exporting jihad to other countries and that while the Taliban supported the right of the Kashmiris to self-determination, it would not get involved in the insurgency on the ground in Jammu & Kashmir. An analysis made by me in September 1999 on the attitude of the Taliban and Al Qaeda to India may be seen  at http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/%5Cpapers%5Cpaper83.html

10. Things have changed considerably on the ground since then. Gulbuddin Heckmatyar’s Hizbe Islami, which was having serious differences with the Taliban in 1998, is now its ally. The Hizbe Islami, close to the Jamaat-e-Islami of Pakistan, has been actively involved in training ISI-sponsored Pakistani jihadi organisations that are active against India. The Haqqani Network, which had no importance in 1998, has now come to the forefront and has been acting in tandem with Al Qaeda on the one side and the Taliban on the other.

11. Both the Hizbe Islami and the Haqqani Network are implacably opposed to India. The involvement of the Haqqani Network in acts of terrorism against the Indian Embassy in Kabul, in complicity with the Lashkar-e-Toiba, was strongly suspected. The Taliban has done nothing to dissociate itself from the anti-India activities of the Hizbe Islami and the Haqqani Network. The Taliban may not believe in exporting jihad to other countries, but it has not discouraged or condemned terrorist attacks on Indian nationals and interests in Afghanistan.

12. Against this background, caution should be the keyword in determining our reaction. Our interests in Afghanistan, which are considerable and important, will be best served by strengthening the durability  and the stability of the Hamid Karzai Government which has entered into a strategic partnership with India. It is not in our interest for the Taliban to prevail on the ground in Afghanistan.

13. We should continue to work in close co-operation with the Hamid Karzai Government while examining whether we should expand our supportive role in Afghanistan and how. At the same time, sense of realism should indicate that the Taliban is not a spent force. It has shown tremendous resilience. It is going to be an important factor in the ground situation. It would, therefore, be in the common interest of India and the Karzai Government not to spurn the positive-seeming feelers of the Taliban.

14. We should maintain a low level of backchannel interaction with the Taliban by taking advantage of its presence in Qatar in order to understand its positive feelers and encourage it on the path of national reconciliation in Afghanistan. ( 18-6-12 )

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )