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WASHINGTON: The Taliban‘s takeover of Kabul has deepened the mutual mistrust between the US and Pakistan, two putative allies who’ve tangled over Afghanistan. However each side nonetheless want one another.
With the Biden administration searching for new methods to cease terrorist threats in Afghanistan, it’ll doubtless look once more to Pakistan, which stays essential to US intelligence and nationwide safety due to its proximity to Afghanistan and connections to the Taliban leaders now in cost.
Over twenty years of conflict, American officers accused Pakistan of enjoying a double sport by promising to combat terrorism and cooperate with Washington whereas cultivating the Taliban and different extremist teams that attacked U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Islamabad, in the meantime, pointed to what it noticed as failed guarantees of a supportive authorities in Kabul after the U.S. drove the Taliban from energy following the Sept. 11, 2001, assaults as extremist teams took refuge in jap Afghanistan and launched lethal assaults all through Pakistan.
However the U.S. desires Pakistani cooperation in counterterrorism efforts and will search permission to fly surveillance flights into Afghanistan or different intelligence cooperation. And Pakistan desires US army support and good relations with Washington, whilst its leaders overtly rejoice the Taliban’s rise to energy.
“Over the past 20 years, Pakistan has been important for varied logistics functions for the US army. What’s actually been troubling is that, sadly, there hasn’t been numerous belief,” mentioned U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, an Illinois Democrat who sits on the Home Intelligence Committee. “I believe the query is whether or not we are able to recover from that historical past to reach at a brand new understanding.”
Former diplomats and intelligence officers from each international locations say the chances for cooperation are severely restricted by the occasions of the final twenty years and Pakistan’s enduring competitors with India. The earlier Afghan authorities, which was strongly backed by New Delhi, routinely accused Pakistan of harboring the Taliban. The brand new Taliban authorities consists of officers that American officers have lengthy believed are linked to Pakistan’s spy company, the Inter-Companies Intelligence.
Husain Haqqani, a former Pakistani ambassador to the US, mentioned he understood “the temptation of officers in each international locations to attempt to benefit from the state of affairs” and discover frequent floor. However Haqqani mentioned he anticipated Pakistan to provide “all potential cooperation to the Taliban.”
“This has been a second Pakistan has been ready for 20 years,” mentioned Haqqani, now on the Hudson Institute suppose tank. “They now really feel that they’ve a satellite tv for pc state.“
US officers are attempting to shortly construct what President Joe Biden calls an “over the horizon” capability to observe and cease terrorist threats.
With out a accomplice nation bordering Afghanistan, the U.S. has to fly surveillance drones lengthy distances, limiting the time they can be utilized to look at over targets. The US additionally misplaced most of its community of informants and intelligence companions within the now-deposed Afghan authorities, making it essential to seek out frequent floor with different governments which have extra sources within the nation.
Pakistan may very well be useful in that effort by permitting “overflight” rights for American spy planes from the Persian Gulf or allowing the U.S. to base surveillance or counterterrorism groups alongside its border with Afghanistan. There are few different choices amongst Afghanistan’s neighbors. Iran is a U.S. adversary. And Central Asian international locations north of Afghanistan all face various levels of Russian affect.
There are not any identified agreements to this point. CIA Director William Burns visited Islamabad earlier this month to fulfill with Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, Pakistan’s military chief, and Lt. Gen. Faiz Hameed, who leads the ISI, based on a Pakistani authorities assertion. Burns and Hameed have additionally individually visited Kabul in current weeks to fulfill with Taliban leaders. The CIA declined to touch upon the visits.
Pakistani Overseas Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi famous this week that Islamabad had cooperated with U.S. requests to facilitate peace talks earlier than the Taliban takeover and that it had agreed to U.S. army requests all through the conflict.
“Now we have typically been criticized for not doing sufficient,” Qureshi advised The Related Press on Wednesday. “However we have not been appreciated sufficient for having completed what was completed.”
Qureshi wouldn’t straight reply whether or not Pakistan would permit the basing of surveillance tools or overflight of drones.
“They do not must be bodily there to share intelligence,” he mentioned of the U.S. “There are smarter methods of doing it.“
The CIA and ISI have an extended historical past in Afghanistan, courting again to their shared aim of arming bands of mujahedeen – “freedom fighters” – in opposition to the Soviet Union’s occupation within the Eighties. The CIA despatched weapons and cash into Afghanistan by Pakistan.
These fighters included Osama bin Laden. Others would develop into leaders of the Taliban, which emerged victorious from a civil conflict in 1996 and gained management of many of the nation. The Taliban gave refuge to bin Laden and different leaders of al-Qaida, which launched lethal assaults on People overseas in 1998 after which struck the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001.
After 9/11, the U.S. instantly sought Pakistan’s cooperation in its combat in opposition to al-Qaida and different terrorist teams. Declassified cables revealed by George Washington College’s Nationwide Safety Archive present officers in President George W. Bush’s administration made a number of calls for of Pakistan, from intercepting arms shipments heading to al-Qaida to offering the U.S. with intelligence and permission to fly army and intelligence planes over its territory.
The CIA would perform lots of of drone strikes launched from Pakistan focusing on al-Qaida leaders and others alleged to have ties to terrorist teams. Lots of of civilians died within the strikes, based on figures stored by exterior observers, resulting in widespread protests and public anger in Pakistan.
Pakistan, in the meantime, continued to be accused of harboring the Taliban after the US-backed coalition drove the group from energy in Kabul. And bin Laden was killed in 2011 by U.S. particular forces in a secret raid on a compound within the Pakistani metropolis of Abbottabad, dwelling to the nation’s army academy. The bin Laden operation led many within the U.S. to query whether or not Pakistan had harbored bin Laden and angered Pakistanis who felt the raid violated their sovereignty.
For years, CIA officers tried to confront their Pakistani counterparts after accumulating extra proof of Pakistani intelligence officers serving to the Taliban transfer cash and fighters right into a then-growing insurgency in neighboring Afghanistan, mentioned Douglas London, who oversaw the CIA’s counterterrorism operations in South Asia till 2018.
“They might say, `You simply come to my workplace, inform me the place the placement is,”’ he mentioned. “They might simply normally pay lip service to us and say they could not verify the intel.”
London, writer of the forthcoming e book “The Recruiter,” mentioned he anticipated American intelligence would take into account restricted partnerships with Pakistan on mutual enemies similar to al-Qaida or Islamic State-Khorasan, which took duty for the lethal suicide assault exterior the Kabul airport final month through the ultimate days of the U.S. evacuation.
The danger, London mentioned, is at occasions “your accomplice is as a lot of a menace to you because the enemy who you are pursuing.”
With the Biden administration searching for new methods to cease terrorist threats in Afghanistan, it’ll doubtless look once more to Pakistan, which stays essential to US intelligence and nationwide safety due to its proximity to Afghanistan and connections to the Taliban leaders now in cost.
Over twenty years of conflict, American officers accused Pakistan of enjoying a double sport by promising to combat terrorism and cooperate with Washington whereas cultivating the Taliban and different extremist teams that attacked U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Islamabad, in the meantime, pointed to what it noticed as failed guarantees of a supportive authorities in Kabul after the U.S. drove the Taliban from energy following the Sept. 11, 2001, assaults as extremist teams took refuge in jap Afghanistan and launched lethal assaults all through Pakistan.
However the U.S. desires Pakistani cooperation in counterterrorism efforts and will search permission to fly surveillance flights into Afghanistan or different intelligence cooperation. And Pakistan desires US army support and good relations with Washington, whilst its leaders overtly rejoice the Taliban’s rise to energy.
“Over the past 20 years, Pakistan has been important for varied logistics functions for the US army. What’s actually been troubling is that, sadly, there hasn’t been numerous belief,” mentioned U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, an Illinois Democrat who sits on the Home Intelligence Committee. “I believe the query is whether or not we are able to recover from that historical past to reach at a brand new understanding.”
Former diplomats and intelligence officers from each international locations say the chances for cooperation are severely restricted by the occasions of the final twenty years and Pakistan’s enduring competitors with India. The earlier Afghan authorities, which was strongly backed by New Delhi, routinely accused Pakistan of harboring the Taliban. The brand new Taliban authorities consists of officers that American officers have lengthy believed are linked to Pakistan’s spy company, the Inter-Companies Intelligence.
Husain Haqqani, a former Pakistani ambassador to the US, mentioned he understood “the temptation of officers in each international locations to attempt to benefit from the state of affairs” and discover frequent floor. However Haqqani mentioned he anticipated Pakistan to provide “all potential cooperation to the Taliban.”
“This has been a second Pakistan has been ready for 20 years,” mentioned Haqqani, now on the Hudson Institute suppose tank. “They now really feel that they’ve a satellite tv for pc state.“
US officers are attempting to shortly construct what President Joe Biden calls an “over the horizon” capability to observe and cease terrorist threats.
With out a accomplice nation bordering Afghanistan, the U.S. has to fly surveillance drones lengthy distances, limiting the time they can be utilized to look at over targets. The US additionally misplaced most of its community of informants and intelligence companions within the now-deposed Afghan authorities, making it essential to seek out frequent floor with different governments which have extra sources within the nation.
Pakistan may very well be useful in that effort by permitting “overflight” rights for American spy planes from the Persian Gulf or allowing the U.S. to base surveillance or counterterrorism groups alongside its border with Afghanistan. There are few different choices amongst Afghanistan’s neighbors. Iran is a U.S. adversary. And Central Asian international locations north of Afghanistan all face various levels of Russian affect.
There are not any identified agreements to this point. CIA Director William Burns visited Islamabad earlier this month to fulfill with Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, Pakistan’s military chief, and Lt. Gen. Faiz Hameed, who leads the ISI, based on a Pakistani authorities assertion. Burns and Hameed have additionally individually visited Kabul in current weeks to fulfill with Taliban leaders. The CIA declined to touch upon the visits.
Pakistani Overseas Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi famous this week that Islamabad had cooperated with U.S. requests to facilitate peace talks earlier than the Taliban takeover and that it had agreed to U.S. army requests all through the conflict.
“Now we have typically been criticized for not doing sufficient,” Qureshi advised The Related Press on Wednesday. “However we have not been appreciated sufficient for having completed what was completed.”
Qureshi wouldn’t straight reply whether or not Pakistan would permit the basing of surveillance tools or overflight of drones.
“They do not must be bodily there to share intelligence,” he mentioned of the U.S. “There are smarter methods of doing it.“
The CIA and ISI have an extended historical past in Afghanistan, courting again to their shared aim of arming bands of mujahedeen – “freedom fighters” – in opposition to the Soviet Union’s occupation within the Eighties. The CIA despatched weapons and cash into Afghanistan by Pakistan.
These fighters included Osama bin Laden. Others would develop into leaders of the Taliban, which emerged victorious from a civil conflict in 1996 and gained management of many of the nation. The Taliban gave refuge to bin Laden and different leaders of al-Qaida, which launched lethal assaults on People overseas in 1998 after which struck the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001.
After 9/11, the U.S. instantly sought Pakistan’s cooperation in its combat in opposition to al-Qaida and different terrorist teams. Declassified cables revealed by George Washington College’s Nationwide Safety Archive present officers in President George W. Bush’s administration made a number of calls for of Pakistan, from intercepting arms shipments heading to al-Qaida to offering the U.S. with intelligence and permission to fly army and intelligence planes over its territory.
The CIA would perform lots of of drone strikes launched from Pakistan focusing on al-Qaida leaders and others alleged to have ties to terrorist teams. Lots of of civilians died within the strikes, based on figures stored by exterior observers, resulting in widespread protests and public anger in Pakistan.
Pakistan, in the meantime, continued to be accused of harboring the Taliban after the US-backed coalition drove the group from energy in Kabul. And bin Laden was killed in 2011 by U.S. particular forces in a secret raid on a compound within the Pakistani metropolis of Abbottabad, dwelling to the nation’s army academy. The bin Laden operation led many within the U.S. to query whether or not Pakistan had harbored bin Laden and angered Pakistanis who felt the raid violated their sovereignty.
For years, CIA officers tried to confront their Pakistani counterparts after accumulating extra proof of Pakistani intelligence officers serving to the Taliban transfer cash and fighters right into a then-growing insurgency in neighboring Afghanistan, mentioned Douglas London, who oversaw the CIA’s counterterrorism operations in South Asia till 2018.
“They might say, `You simply come to my workplace, inform me the place the placement is,”’ he mentioned. “They might simply normally pay lip service to us and say they could not verify the intel.”
London, writer of the forthcoming e book “The Recruiter,” mentioned he anticipated American intelligence would take into account restricted partnerships with Pakistan on mutual enemies similar to al-Qaida or Islamic State-Khorasan, which took duty for the lethal suicide assault exterior the Kabul airport final month through the ultimate days of the U.S. evacuation.
The danger, London mentioned, is at occasions “your accomplice is as a lot of a menace to you because the enemy who you are pursuing.”
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