Anti-Americanism in Pakistan and the Taliban Menace Mr. Hoodbhoy,
As long as Pakistanis support a Taliban government for Afghans, many Pakistanis will themselves be ready to share such a blessing with Afghans. If Pakistanis are willing to even determine this question for Afghans in favor of Taliban, you can't deny such Pakistanis self-determination on this question.

It is Pakistanis who want a Taliban government for Afghanistan and FATA but want the currently existing Karzai-like government for Pakistan, who have to resolve their mental confusion.

Attack in Mohmand The US DoD claims this is a video of the incident:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/video/2008/06/12/VI200 8061201047.html

Attack in Mohmand IMO it is just a signal that Pak Army can't play on both sides of the US vs Taliban war, and that the US is willing to inflict casualties on Pak Army too if it does.

Bhutto’s Judicial Murder Revisited Essensaur
A bigDa hua shehzada or much indulged prince, to pander to whose calculated tantrums and moods(or personality disorders, depending on degree), tens or hundreds of thousands have to die. This is the most dangerous type of personality to leave any public policymaking up to.

The Nawaiwaqt Generation and the Power of No! http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD186508
NawaiWaqt editor: We Should Not Hesitate To Use Nuclear Weapons to Take Kashmir from India March 8 2008

hamidm2 belongs to the NawaiWaqt generation :)

Is Decline of the Fourth-Estate Here and Happening? In 2005?, the Jharkhand Governor, an old Gandhi family associate, who was reportedly in constant touch with Sonia Gandhi during that period, asked the smaller political grouping(the Congress-led one) in the Jharkhand Assembly to form the govt. Rajdeep Sardesai of NDTV criticised the decision as did many others. But he directly mentioned Sonia Gandhi's name and perhaps named her as being responsible for the Jharkhand Governor's essentially unconstitutional decision. Sardesai left NDTV soon after he did that.

Just saying.

Is Decline of the Fourth-Estate Here and Happening? anil #19
You are welcome. I don't really disagree with you, but the Indian news market is so huge and diverse, I can't really say newspapers and TV news with their huge circulations/penetration don't rule. Corporate ownership and political influence is a reigning reality. I think the real problem is that the Congress Party has no strong effective opposition party to counter it nor does India have a strong "opposition" media criticising the govt(any govt), media which can have being anti-establishment as its business model(sort of like the leftist newspapers in the UK though I don't know too much about them) .

Is Decline of the Fourth-Estate Here and Happening? http://www.tehelka.com/story_main38.asp?filename=hub150308goodbye.asp
The sacking of top notch editor MJ Akbar bodes ill for the fraternity. SHANTANU GUHA RAY reports

The Naval War College Bomb Blasts It appears that Pak jihadis are now choosing to solve problems at home before venturing out to solve problems in other countries. Charity like theirs (such as using chanda for righteous causes) does indeed begin at home.

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment dost-mittar #136
"
PS: I am surprised by your posts, it is quite unlike you to use personal pain to make a point."

On the contrary, I now think personal pain is the only way to get Indians and Pakistanis to see outside their feudalist Stockholm syndrome-afflicted points of view that endemic jihadi violence is an excusable and forgivable 'tactic' used by Musharraf to get what he wants. It is apparent from your and many others(including Americans') uncompromising approval of Musharraf that even personal pain does not suffice.

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment dost-mittar #112
If the assassins of your friend had been Bajrang Dal goons who had trained in Gujarat, you would not write an article but would agree with the statement as a matter of fact that "'Modi must be given credit for not having any riots after 2002'". Correct so far?

My question in #101 was if the assassins of your friend had been Bajrang Dal goons who had trained in Gujarat, would you refrain from holding Modi responsible for continuing to train goons for murder and rather give him credit for the lack of riots after 2002?

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment dost_mittar #91
Let us be clear. If the assassins were Bajrang Dal goons who had trained in Gujarat, you would not hold Modi responsible for continuing to train goons for murder and prefer to point to the lack of riots after 2002?

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment dost-mittar
I am curious, if the assassins had been Bajrang Dal goons who had trained in Gujarat, would we ever have had an article from you saying 'Modi must be given credit for not having any riots after 2002'.

You are talking of ending of a Pakistani state policy which is run by those who care little for what people think. Their budget though a huge fraction of the national one and paid for by general public is a one-line item which no civilian official can question forget about ordinary people.

Musharraf cannot be given credit for promoting peace in the face of his continuing jihad and subversion policy, whatever reasons you cite for his continuing jihad and subversion policy.

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment jayp makes an important point. Under Musharraf, war for Pakistani Army has become jihadized. It was already headed that way before Musharraf came to power but with Kargil consolidated the jihadization. In earlier wars, it was two professional armies fighting each other and appreciating the other side's bravery and valour at the same time(whatever the rhetoric of war).

During Kargil the Pak Army showed that it has no compunction in mutilating and dishonoring enemy soldiers and in fighting alongside civilian jihadis who do the same to unarmed civilians and follow no professional code of fighting except absolute violence in the name of religion.

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment dost-mittarji
Sorry to touch upon the personal but this article will not be complete without an acknowledgement that the author's own unarmed friend was killed in a university campus by a Pak-trained Pak-funded attacker who got his orders from Musharraf's govt agents.

Pervez Musharraf and India Pakistan Rapproachment While we can fight Pakistani terrorists and their Pakistani state sponsors, there is nothing we can do about Indians who insist on being wilfully ignorant.


From satp.org

http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/countries/india/index.html

India Assessment 2007

Since 2002, terrorism-related fatalities have demonstrated a secular decline in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), and this trend continued in 2006, with a total of 1,116 persons killed. More than 40,000 people have lost their lives in the conflict since 1989, and, even at present, an average of nearly 100 lives is lost each month in J&K.

Despite the declines in indices of violence, the State continues to suffer from high levels of violence and subversion. Pakistan’s military regime, which was forced to scale down its proxy-war under intense international scrutiny, has nevertheless shown no indication of dismantling the vast infrastructure of terrorism on its soil. According to the Union Home Ministry’s (MHA) "Status Paper on Internal Security Situation" (presented in Parliament on November 30, 2006), the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan occupied Kashmir is yet to be dismantled and is being "used by Pak based and Pak ISI sponsored outfits like JeM [Jaish-e-Mohammed], LeT [Lashkar-e-Toiba], Al-Badr, HM [Hizb-ul-Mujahideen], etc."

Amidst the hype on people-to-people contacts and confidence-building measures (CBMs), it is evident that the reduced levels of violence in J&K primarily reflect a tactical rather than strategic shift in the Pakistani calculus, as a two-pronged strategy of parallel talks and terrorism is pursued by the Musharraf regime to secure its ambitions against India.

Talks between India and Pakistan thus continue under the aegis of the Composite Dialogue, even as terrorism in J&K, and sporadically in other parts of the India, persists. At the same time, Pakistan has been complaining bitterly about the slow pace of ‘progress’ towards the goals it seeks to secure on the negotiating table, having failed to achieve these through its vicious campaign of terrorism over 17 years. The peace process, consequently, remains, tactical rather than substantive, as the hiatus between the rival positions on Kashmir remains unbridgeable, and much of the ‘progress’ has been in peripheral areas, such as the restoration of communication links, people-to-people exchanges, Track Two diplomacy and a range of confidence building measures. At the same time, the ground situation in J&K remains a cause for concern, as a stream of infiltrators continues to find its way into the terror wracked State. While the various CBMs currently operational between the two countries may have strengthened processes of 'emotional enlistment', have failed to alter India's and Pakistan's stated positions on the Kashmir issue, or to change the fundamentals of the conflict in and over Kashmir. An end to the bloodshed in the State, consequently, seems as unlikely today as it was at any given point since the dramatic escalation of the militancy in 1989-90.

...

Islamist Terrorism outside J&K and the Northeast

At least 270 people died in Islamist terrorist violence in locations outside J&K and the Northeast during 2006. The significant incidents included:

March 7: At least 21 civilians were killed and 62 others injured in three serial bomb explosions at a temple and railway station in Varanasi. Seven bombs were later defused, including four that had been planted on the Gowdolia-Dasashwamedh Ghat Road near the Kashi Vishwanath Temple. Hours after the blasts, a suspected LeT terrorist was shot dead during an encounter with the police in the Gosaiganj area on the outskirts of Lucknow city.

April 14: Two bombs exploded inside the Jama Masjid at Delhi injuring approximately 14 persons, including a woman and a girl.

June 1: Three suspected LeT terrorists were shot dead during an abortive attempt to storm the headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a right-wing Hindu organization, at Nagpur in Maharashtra.

July 11: At least 200 persons were killed and over 700 others injured in seven bomb blasts targeting the railway network in the city of Mumbai. First class compartments of local trains at Mira-Bayandhar, Jogeshwari, Mahim, Santacruz, Khar, Matunga and Borivli stations on the Western Railway were targeted.

September 8: Forty people killed and 65 sustain injuries in three bomb explosions at Malegaon town in the Nashik District of Maharashtra.

According to the MHA’s Status Paper, the current strategy of Pakistan-based terrorist groups is to:

* Maintain a continuous flow of finances to sustain the terrorist networks in India

* Target vital installations and economic infrastructure in India

* Recruit and train local modules

* Attack soft targets like market places, public transport system, places of worship and congregation, etc.

* Provoke communal tensions to create a wedge between communities

* Supply hardware through land and sea routes

The Status Paper discloses that the LeT and JeM also use territory and elements in Bangladesh and Nepal for movement of terrorists and finances. Army chief J. J. Singh, on December 27, 2006, stated that "As terrorists are finding it hard to penetrate the fence and new anti-infiltration systems placed all along the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir and in Punjab… The areas bordering Nepal and Bangladesh are still porous and intelligence reports suggest that terrorists are trying to use them to infiltrate into India."

According to data compiled by the Institute for Conflict Management, at least 81 Inter-Services Intelligence-Jihadi modules have been disrupted just over the years 2004-2006, leading to hundreds of arrests across India – outside Jammu and Kashmir and the Northeast – in locations that extend from Uttaranchal in the North, to Andhra Pradesh in the South, and from Gujarat in the West to West Bengal in the East. These modules had been tasked to target security and vital installations, communication links, and commercial and industrial centres, as well as to provoke instability and disorder by circulating large quantities of counterfeit currency and by drug trafficking. The National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan had stated, on July 28, 2006, that Indian security and nuclear installations are under "very serious threat" from the LeT, which may be planning a "major assault".

Worse, terrorist attacks by Pakistan-backed groups have occurred in places as far as Delhi, Mumbai, Malegaon, and Varanasi in 2006. Terrorist attacks in places like Mumbai and Varanasi in 2006 and earlier at Bangalore (December 28, 2005) and New Delhi (October 29, 2005) are only the more visible evidence of a long-term war of attrition by Pakistani state agencies and their jihadi surrogates, intended to undermine India’s political stability, by increasingly attacking its economic, scientific and technological strengths. The frequency, spread and, in some cases, intensity of these operations in other parts of the country has seen some escalation in the past years, as international pressure on Pakistan to end terrorism in J&K has diminished levels of ‘deniable’ engagement in that theatre, and as violence in J&K demonstrates a continuous secular decline since the events of September 11, 2001 in the US.

It is important to note, however, that despite occasional and inevitable terrorist ‘successes’, this relentless strategy – which has targeted virtually every concentration of Muslim populations in India for decades – has overwhelmingly failed to secure a base within the community, beyond a minuscule radical fringe. Further, the record of intelligence and security agency successes against such subversion and terror, although lacking the visibility and drama of a terrorist strike, is immensely greater than the record of the successes of this strategy.