The ISI
Moderator's Note: I have watched this thread 'The ISI' and 'After Obama What?' develop, wary that they were two halves of the question 'After the Bin Laden op, what is the impact?'. There's also another thread 'OBL's death & Terrorism's next move', which could be merged too, but for the moment will be left in place - for the impact on terrorism.
Apologies if some of the posts appear out of sequence.(Mod ends)
Osama's death proves that there is cooperation between the Pakistani intelligence agency and the military with Osama Bin Laden and the Taliban. It was previously suggested that Pakistan supported the killing of US troops in Afghanistan, and would limit their funding to 'Afghan' Taliban, particularly Maulana Jalaluddin Haqqani. This is false: Pakistan are using all three militant groups as proxies. Pakistan's war with the Pakistani Taliban and capture of random militant leaders, be they Arab, Pakistani or Afghan, is simply part of the double game Hamid Gul and Co. have been playing to ensure their geopolitical standing remains intact, that Afghanistan not become an Indian-clientele state, Kashmir become Pakistani land and US military aid to continue.
As someone who has seen his fair share of suicide bombings while in Afghanistan, we have also captured bombers who have failed to detonate their explosives. All would confess to having come from Pakistan, and all of them would list their ISI handlers. Our government would launch an official complaint, but nothing would precipitate because the US (under both Bush and Obama) would protect them from scrutiny.
Osama's death changes nothing but it does raise the troubling issue of how aware were the ISI for the 9/11 attacks. It has been proven by Afghan investigators that Pakistan was involved in the killing of Ahmad Shah Masoud, the leader of the Northern Alliance just two days before 9/11, so there is a definite relation. The US would have to demand a full inquiry and perhaps interview Hamid Gul and Omar Sheikh.
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