uses this segment to unleash terror in India!’ Tiwathia shook his head gravely. ‘Don’t the Pakis realize how badly all this shit is going to boomerang on them?’
None of them offered an opinion since they all knew from watching the news that most of Pakistan was in flames. The Swat Valley was already under Taliban control, Peshawar teetered on the edge, and now even the major Punjabi and Sindhi cities were under threat. Despite the elaborate denials issued by the civilian government ostensibly in control of Pakistan, it was no secret that in the NWFP, which in geographical terms was about one-sixth of Pakistan, women had already been forced back into the burqa, over two hundred girls’ schools had been destroyed, music was banned and barbers forbidden to shave beards. In an almost exact repeat of the scenario that had earlier played out in Afghanistan when the Taliban moved in to seize control, the beard patrols were out and the slightest infraction invited brutal, primitive punishments like flogging and stoning.
‘Everyone realizes that, Vikram,’ Anbu finally spoke up. ‘There has hardly ever been a terrorist incident anywhere in the world that hasn’t implicated Pakistan in some way or the other. Either there were Pakistani nationals or people of Pakistani origin involved, or the attackers had spent some time in Pakistan in the period preceding the attacks. And all the organizations that perpetrated these attacks continue to function with total impunity in Pakistan, though in some rare cases they have made some trivial, cosmetic changes to their names. In fact, just recently the British prime minister went on record to state that over 75 per cent of the terror attacks against Britain originated in Pakistan.’
‘Why is that surprising?’ Tiwathia flared up. ‘We all know that regular Pakistan Army troops and ISI paramilitaries were fighting alongside Al Qaeda when the Americans attacked Afghanistan. That’s why they even had to beg the Americans to give them a few hours’ window to get their troops out when Khost was attacked.’
‘The irony is that it was the CIA who helped Osama to build that massive complex of tunnels at Tora Bora.’ Sami gave a grim smile. ‘Then they had to expend so many American lives to capture it back.’
‘Well, serves the fools right. We warned them about this all along, but they never paid any attention to us, and now every bloody Al Qaeda idiot is either hiding in Pakistan’s Tribal Areas or being given safe sanctuary there. Funnily enough, the Americans had used these identical hideouts to launch mujahideen operations against the Russians in the eighties.’
‘And don’t forget how the Pakis kept Osama Bin Laden and about fifty of his Taliban fighters at the Chirat commando training facility in northwest Pakistan, in August 1998, when the Americans were pressurizing Mullah Omar to give him up.’
‘What else could they do? They could hardly leave their old Taliban buddy in the lurch. They hid Osama in Chirat so that Mullah Omar could tell the Americans he was not in Afghanistan.’
‘That’s the nub of the problem, Vikram.’ Anbu stepped into the discussion. ‘After creating this monstrous lot of terror organizations and supporting them all these years, the Pakis suddenly realized that they would have to turn on them or at least appear to turn on them when old George Bush gave them the “are you with us or against us” ultimatum after 9/11.’
‘They couldn’t turn on them even if they wanted to, sir. There’s no way in hell the Pak Army or the ISI will allow that to happen. Not after the massive Islamization programme that they went through under General Zia. Now they’re not only sympathetic towards the Taliban and Al Qaeda, they actually applaud their rabid ideology and support it fully. In fact, they regard these terror groups as strategic assets.’
‘Although that’s what the Paki general said in his famous memoirs.’
‘Yeah, right!
None of them offered an opinion since they all knew from watching the news that most of Pakistan was in flames. The Swat Valley was already under Taliban control, Peshawar teetered on the edge, and now even the major Punjabi and Sindhi cities were under threat. Despite the elaborate denials issued by the civilian government ostensibly in control of Pakistan, it was no secret that in the NWFP, which in geographical terms was about one-sixth of Pakistan, women had already been forced back into the burqa, over two hundred girls’ schools had been destroyed, music was banned and barbers forbidden to shave beards. In an almost exact repeat of the scenario that had earlier played out in Afghanistan when the Taliban moved in to seize control, the beard patrols were out and the slightest infraction invited brutal, primitive punishments like flogging and stoning.
‘Everyone realizes that, Vikram,’ Anbu finally spoke up. ‘There has hardly ever been a terrorist incident anywhere in the world that hasn’t implicated Pakistan in some way or the other. Either there were Pakistani nationals or people of Pakistani origin involved, or the attackers had spent some time in Pakistan in the period preceding the attacks. And all the organizations that perpetrated these attacks continue to function with total impunity in Pakistan, though in some rare cases they have made some trivial, cosmetic changes to their names. In fact, just recently the British prime minister went on record to state that over 75 per cent of the terror attacks against Britain originated in Pakistan.’
‘Why is that surprising?’ Tiwathia flared up. ‘We all know that regular Pakistan Army troops and ISI paramilitaries were fighting alongside Al Qaeda when the Americans attacked Afghanistan. That’s why they even had to beg the Americans to give them a few hours’ window to get their troops out when Khost was attacked.’
‘The irony is that it was the CIA who helped Osama to build that massive complex of tunnels at Tora Bora.’ Sami gave a grim smile. ‘Then they had to expend so many American lives to capture it back.’
‘Well, serves the fools right. We warned them about this all along, but they never paid any attention to us, and now every bloody Al Qaeda idiot is either hiding in Pakistan’s Tribal Areas or being given safe sanctuary there. Funnily enough, the Americans had used these identical hideouts to launch mujahideen operations against the Russians in the eighties.’
‘And don’t forget how the Pakis kept Osama Bin Laden and about fifty of his Taliban fighters at the Chirat commando training facility in northwest Pakistan, in August 1998, when the Americans were pressurizing Mullah Omar to give him up.’
‘What else could they do? They could hardly leave their old Taliban buddy in the lurch. They hid Osama in Chirat so that Mullah Omar could tell the Americans he was not in Afghanistan.’
‘That’s the nub of the problem, Vikram.’ Anbu stepped into the discussion. ‘After creating this monstrous lot of terror organizations and supporting them all these years, the Pakis suddenly realized that they would have to turn on them or at least appear to turn on them when old George Bush gave them the “are you with us or against us” ultimatum after 9/11.’
‘They couldn’t turn on them even if they wanted to, sir. There’s no way in hell the Pak Army or the ISI will allow that to happen. Not after the massive Islamization programme that they went through under General Zia. Now they’re not only sympathetic towards the Taliban and Al Qaeda, they actually applaud their rabid ideology and support it fully. In fact, they regard these terror groups as strategic assets.’
‘Although that’s what the Paki general said in his famous memoirs.’
‘Yeah, right!
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