Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT)

[Ray]

Headley testimony details ISI handling of LeT on 26/11
Chicago - A key co-plotter of the Mumbai attacks, David Coleman
Headley testified in the trial of Chicago businessman Tahawwur Rana describing how he gave frequent updates about his progress to his two Pakistani handlers -- one from a militant group and the other from the country's main intelligence agency.

The federal terrorism trial of businessman Tahawwur Rana is being
closely watched around the world for what the attack's scout --
Rana's longtime friend David Coleman Headley -- might reveal about possible links between the anti-India militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, known as the ISI.

http://groups.google.com/group/soc.c...fc57155be0eb6a

[davidbfpo]

Hat tip to Abu M for carrying a review of a new book on LeT by Stephen Tankel:http://www.cnas.org/blogs/abumuqawam...r-e-taiba.html

The last sentence:

Tankel has produced one of the definitive accounts of Lashkar’s rise as well as the 2008 Mumbai attacks, and his book should be the go-to-guide for those looking to understand Pakistan’s reliance on proxies against India and its attached baggage.

Link to:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/023...SIN=0231701527

[davidbfpo]

Stratfor have published a summary briefing 'The Evolution of a Pakistani Militant Network' and it is republished with their permission.

Link:http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20110...itant-networks

[Polarbear]

This morning, while doing some other research, I came across this paper from the Indian Center for Land Warfare Studies. It might be of Interest for you.

Singh, Rohit, Understanding the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, Center for Land Warfare Studies, Manekshaw Paper No 26, 2011

http://www.claws.in/download.php?act...13258MP_26.pdf

Regards PB

[Polarbear]

The current issue of the "Survival" magazine contains an article from Georgetown professor and AfPak expert C. Christine Fair. Therein she tries to revise the widely accepted opinion that Pakistan relies on terrorist groups like LeT to solve its external security needs especially vis-a-vis India. For Fair this view "overlooks the domestic significance of militant groups. In fact, LeT plays an important role within Pakistan, countering other militants that have begun attacking the state and citizens alike, especially since 2002."
This means that solving the Indian-Pakistani rivalry is only one part of the solution and will not motivate Pakistan to cut its ties to these radical groups.

C. Christine Fair, Lashkar-e-Tayiba and the Pakistani state, Survival 53, 4, 29-52

[davidbfpo]

By none other than Zenpundit, albeit in an Indian magazine, pg.26-28 on the PDF link:http://zenpundit.com/wp-content/uplo...ommunityed.pdf

His review ends:

Storming the World Stage is a solidly researched book by Stephen Tankel that is apt to become the mandatory reference on Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and a useful resource on the general subject of Pakistan’s historical resort to proxy warfare. With his examination of Lashkar-e-Taiba, Tankel has made a worthy contribution to our understanding of terrorism and jihad in South Asia.

We have elsewhere discussed the Mumbai attack in 2008 and Zen comments, if not qualifies his review:

LeT also demonstrated in Mumbai a fluid tactical excellence in its use of off-the-shelf technology, small arms and mobility to reap an enormous return-on-investment by attacking soft targets, much along the asymmetric lines advocated by warfare theorist John Robb. Tactics that are a critical threat to any open society by forcing it to take preventive measures which are ruinously expensive and contraindicated to keeping society free and democratic. This is another topic that might have received greater analytical exploration.

[omarali50]

Mishandling by the dominant post-imperial powers (?driven in part by individual official's guilty conscience about having supported multiple evil proxies of their own? I am always curious if such psychodynamics plays any significant role in world affairs? or is it just grist for novelist's mills and can be ignored? I am never sure..) has allowed this threat to grow. I know colonel Roberts and many others will disagree, but I think some critical skill sets and organizations nurtured by the Pakistani state COULD have been shut down or pushed into small-scale criminality if the international community had been clear about its own objectives. That chance may now be lost.
In short, I continue to push the theory that ruinous expensive countermeasures are not the only option. The weak spot on the terrorist side was the state apparatus, not the clandestine networks themselves. By focusing on street level criminals, the operation as a whole was allowed to get away in what may have been a limited "window of opportunity".
I continue to believe that the PEOPLE of Pakistan would have been much better off it the STATE of Pakistan had faced some more pressure on this account. I genuinely believe that my obsessive carping about this issue is driven by a sincere desire to see the people of Pakistan and the Indian subcontinent leave stupid zero-sum games behind and grab a chance to transform living standards for one fourth of the world. But even I can see that I probably come across as some kind of pakiphobic monomaniac. I do try to step back and re-examine my assumptions. Maybe not hard enough?
It seems genuinely hard to know our own motives.

[zenpundit]

By none other than Zenpundit, albeit in an Indian magazine, pg.26-28 on the PDF link:http://zenpundit.com/wp-content/uplo...ommunityed.pdf

His review ends:

We have elsewhere discussed the Mumbai attack in 2008 and Zen comments, if not qualifies his review:

Hi David

Thank you for linking. I would give Tankel's book a strong recommendation, I learned a lot about LeT from it, but his thrust is predominantly a political-historical narrative. The subject could use a theological drill-down as well as a critical assessment from a security threat perspective