New India

The Israel Lobby in the U.S.

2007-09-08T17:24:00.000+05:30

Here is an interesting and insightful article from Stratfor on the the Israel Lobby in U.S. This one, if true, will put to rest some popular myths about the "most powerful" lobby in U.S.

By George Friedman

U.S. President George W. Bush made an appearance in Iraq's restive Anbar province on Sept. 3 -- in part to tout the success of the military surge there ahead of the presentation in Washington of the Petraeus report. For the next month or two, the battle over Iraq will be waged in Washington -- and one country will come up over and over again, from any number of directions: Israel. Israel will be invoked as an ally in the war on terrorism -- the reason the United States is in the war in the first place. Some will say that Israel maneuvered the United States into Iraq to serve its own purposes. Some will say it orchestrated 9/11 for its own ends. Others will say that, had the United States supported Israel more resolutely, there would not have been a 9/11.

There is probably no relationship on which people have more diverging views than on that between the United States and Israel. Therefore, since it is going to be invoked in the coming weeks -- and Bush is taking a fairly irrelevant pause at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Australia -- this is an opportune time to consider the geopolitics of the U.S.-Israeli relationship.

Let's begin with some obvious political points. There is a relatively small Jewish community in the United States, though its political influence is magnified by its strategic location in critical states such as New York and the fact that it is more actively involved in politics than some other ethnic groups.

The Jewish community, as tends to be the case with groups, is deeply divided on many issues. It tends to be united on one issue -- Israel -- but not with the same intensity as in the past, nor with even a semblance of agreement on the specifics. The American Jewish community is as divided as the Israeli Jewish community, with a large segment of people who don't much care thrown in. At the same time, this community donates large sums of money to American and Israeli organizations, including groups that lobby on behalf of Israeli issues in Washington. These lobbying entities lean toward the right wing of Israel's political spectrum, in large part because the Israeli right has tended to govern in the past generation and these groups tend to follow the dominant Israeli strand. It also is because American Jews who contribute to Israel lobby organizations lean right in both Israeli and American politics.

The Israel lobby, which has a great deal of money and experience, is extremely influential in Washington. For decades now, it has done a good job of ensuring that Israeli interests are attended to in Washington, and certainly on some issues it has skewed U.S. policy on the Middle East. There are Jews who practice being shocked at this assertion, but they must not be taken seriously. They know better, which is why they donate money. Others pretend to be shocked at the idea of a lobbyist influencing U.S. policy on the Middle East, but they also need not be taken seriously, because they are trying to influence Washington as well, though they are not as successful. Obviously there is an influential Israel lobby in Washington.

There are, however, two important questions. The first is whether this is in any way unique. Is a strong Israel lobby an unprecedented intrusion into foreign policy? The key question, though, is whether Israeli interests diverge from U.S. interests to the extent that the Israel lobby is taking U.S. foreign policy in directions it wouldn't go otherwise, in directions that counter the U.S. national interest.

Begin with the first question. Prior to both world wars there was extensive debate on whether the United States should intervene in the war. In both cases, the British government lobbied extensively for U.S. intervention on behalf of the United Kingdom. The British made two arguments. The first was that the United States shared a heritage with England -- code for the idea that white Anglo-Saxon Protestants should stand with white Anglo-Saxon Protestants. The second was that there was a fundamental political affinity between British and U.S. democracy and that it was in the U.S. interest to protect British democracy from German authoritarianism.

Many Americans, including President Franklin Roosevelt, believed both arguments. The British lobby was quite powerful. There was a German lobby as well, but it lacked the numbers, the money and the traditions to draw on.

From a geopolitical point of view, both arguments were weak. The United States and the United Kingdom not only were separate countries, they had fought some bitter wars over the question. As for political institutions, geopolitics, as a method, is fairly insensitive to the moral claims of regimes. It works on the basis of interest. On that basis, an intervention on behalf of the United Kingdom in both wars made sense because it provided a relatively low-cost way of preventing Germany from dominating Europe and challenging American sea power. In the end, it wasn't the lobbying interest, massive though it was, but geopolitical necessity that drove U.S. intervention.

The second question, then, is: Has the Israel lobby caused the United States to act in ways that contravene U.S. interests? For example, by getting the United States to support Israel, did it turn the Arab world against the Americans? Did it support Israeli repression of Palestinians, and thereby generate an Islamist radicalism that led to 9/11? Did it manipulate U.S. policy on Iraq so that the United States invaded Iraq on behalf of Israel? These allegations have all been made. If true, they are very serious charges.

It is important to remember that U.S.-Israeli ties were not extraordinarily close prior to 1967. President Harry Truman recognized Israel, but the United States had not provided major military aid and support. Israel, always in need of an outside supply of weapons, first depended on the Soviet Union, which shipped weapons to Israel via Czechoslovakia. When the Soviets realized that Israeli socialists were anti-Soviet as well, they dropped Israel. Israel's next patron was France. France was fighting to hold on to Algeria and maintain its influence in Lebanon and Syria, both former French protectorates. The French saw Israel as a natural ally. It was France that really created the Israeli air force and provided the first technology for Israeli nuclear weapons.

The United States was actively hostile to Israel during this period. In 1956, following Gamal Abdul Nasser's seizure of power in Egypt, Cairo nationalized the Suez Canal. Without the canal, the British Empire was finished, and ultimately the French were as well. The United Kingdom and France worked secretly with Israel, and Israel invaded the Sinai. Then, in order to protect the Suez Canal from an Israeli-Egyptian war, a Franco-British force parachuted in to seize the canal. President Dwight Eisenhower forced the British and French to withdraw -- as well as the Israelis. U.S.-Israeli relations remained chilly for quite a while.

The break point with France came in 1967. The Israelis, under pressure from Egypt, decided to invade Egypt, Jordan and Syria -- ignoring French President Charles de Gaulle's demand that they not do so. As a result, France broke its alignment with Israel. This was the critical moment in U.S.-Israeli relations. Israel needed a source of weaponry as its national security needs vastly outstripped its industrial base. It was at this point that the Israel lobby in the United States became critical. Israel wanted a relationship with the United States and the Israel lobby brought tremendous pressure to bear, picturing Israel as a heroic, embattled democracy, surrounded by bloodthirsty neighbors, badly needing U.S. help. President Lyndon B. Johnson, bogged down in Vietnam and wanting to shore up his base, saw a popular cause in Israel and tilted toward it.

But there were critical strategic issues as well. Syria and Iraq had both shifted into the pro-Soviet camp, as had Egypt. Some have argued that, had the United States not supported Israel, this would not have happened. This, however, runs in the face of history. It was the United States that forced the Israelis out of the Sinai in 1956, but the Egyptians moved into the Soviet camp anyway. The argument that it was uncritical support for Israel that caused anti-Americanism in the Arab world doesn't hold water. The Egyptians became anti-American in spite of an essentially anti-Israeli position in 1956. By 1957 Egypt was a Soviet ally.

The Americans ultimately tilted toward Israel because of this, not the other way around. Egypt was not only providing the Soviets with naval and air bases, but also was running covert operations in the Arabian Peninsula to bring down the conservative sheikhdoms there, including Saudi Arabia's. The Soviets were seen as using Egypt as a base of operations against the United States. Syria was seen as another dangerous radical power, along with Iraq. The defense of the Arabian Peninsula from radical, pro-Soviet Arab movements, as well as the defense of Jordan, became a central interest of the United States.

Israel was seen as contributing by threatening the security of both Egypt and Syria. The Saudi fear of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was palpable. Riyadh saw the Soviet-inspired liberation movements as threatening Saudi Arabia's survival. Israel was engaged in a covert war against the PLO and related groups, and that was exactly what the Saudis wanted from the late 1960s until the early 1980s. Israel's covert capability against the PLO, coupled with its overt military power against Egypt and Syria, was very much in the American interest and that of its Arab allies. It was a low-cost solution to some very difficult strategic problems at a time when the United States was either in Vietnam or recovering from the war.

The occupation of the Sinai, the West Bank and the Golan Heights in 1967 was not in the U.S. interest. The United States wanted Israel to carry out its mission against Soviet-backed paramilitaries and tie down Egypt and Syria, but the occupation was not seen as part of that mission. The Israelis initially expected to convert their occupation of the territories into a peace treaty, but that only happened, much later, with Egypt. At the Khartoum summit in 1967, the Arabs delivered the famous three noes: No negotiation. No recognition. No peace. Israel became an occupying power. It has never found its balance.

The claim has been made that if the United States forced the Israelis out of the West Bank and Gaza, then it would receive credit and peace would follow. There are three problems with that theory. First, the Israelis did not occupy these areas prior to 1967 and there was no peace. Second, groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah have said that a withdrawal would not end the state of war with Israel. And therefore, third, the withdrawal would create friction with Israel without any clear payoff from the Arabs.

It must be remembered that Egypt and Jordan have both signed peace treaties with Israel and seem not to care one whit about the Palestinians. The Saudis have never risked a thing for the Palestinians, nor have the Iranians. The Syrians have, but they are far more interested in investing in Beirut hotels than in invading Israel. No Arab state is interested in the Palestinians, except for those that are actively hostile. There is Arab and Islamic public opinion and nonstate organizations, but none would be satisfied with Israeli withdrawal. They want Israel destroyed. Even if the United States withdrew all support for Israel, however, Israel would not be destroyed. The radical Arabs do not want withdrawal; they want destruction. And the moderate Arabs don't care about the Palestinians beyond rhetoric.

Now we get to the heart of the matter. If the United States broke ties with Israel, would the U.S. geopolitical position be improved? In other words, if it broke with Israel, would Iran or al Qaeda come to view the United States in a different way? Critics of the Israel lobby argue that, except for U.S. support for Israel, the United States would have better relations in the Muslim world, and would not be targeted by al Qaeda or threatened by Iran. In other words, except for the Israel lobby's influence, the United States would be much more secure.

Al Qaeda does not see Israel by itself as its central problem. Its goal is the resurrection of the caliphate -- and it sees U.S. support for Muslim regimes as the central problem. If the United States abandoned Israel, al Qaeda would still confront U.S. support for countries such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. For al Qaeda, Israel is an important issue, but for the United States to soothe al Qaeda, it would have to abandon not only Israel, but its non-Islamist allies in the Middle East.

As for Iran, the Iranian rhetoric, as we have said, has never been matched by action. During the Iran-Iraq War, the Iranian military purchased weapons and parts from the Israelis. It was more delighted than anyone when Israel destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981. Iran's problem with the United States is its presence in Iraq, its naval presence in the Persian Gulf and its support for the Kurds. If Israel disappeared from the face of the Earth, Iran's problems would remain the same.

It has been said that the Israelis inspired the U.S. invasion of Iraq. There is no doubt that Israel was pleased when, after 9/11, the United States saw itself as an anti-Islamist power. Let us remind our more creative readers, however, that benefiting from something does not mean you caused it. However, it has never been clear that the Israelis were all that enthusiastic about invading Iraq. Neoconservative Jews like Paul Wolfowitz were enthusiastic, as were non-Jews like Dick Cheney. But the Israeli view of a U.S. invasion of Iraq was at most mixed, and to some extent dubious. The Israelis liked the Iran-Iraq balance of power and were close allies of Turkey, which certainly opposed the invasion. The claim that Israel supported the invasion comes from those who mistake neoconservatives, many of whom are Jews who support Israel, with Israeli foreign policy, which was much more nuanced than the neoconservatives. The Israelis were not at all clear about what the Americans were doing in Iraq, but they were in no position to complain.

Israeli-U.S. relations have gone through three phases. From 1948 to 1967, the United States supported Israel's right to exist but was not its patron. In the 1967-1991 period, the Israelis were a key American asset in the Cold War. From 1991 to the present, the relationship has remained close but it is not pivotal to either country. Washington cannot help Israel with Hezbollah or Hamas. The Israelis cannot help the United States in Iraq or Afghanistan. If the relationship were severed, it would have remarkably little impact on either country -- though keeping the relationship is more valuable than severing it.

To sum up: There is a powerful Jewish, pro-Israel lobby in Washington, though it was not very successful in the first 20 years or so of Israel's history. When U.S. policy toward Israel swung in 1967 it had far more to do with geopolitical interests than with lobbying. The United States needed help with Egypt and Syria and Israel could provide it. Lobbying appeared to be the key, but it wasn't; geopolitical necessity was. Egypt was anti-American even when the United States was anti-Israeli. Al Qaeda would be anti-American even if the United States were anti-Israel. Rhetoric aside, Iran has never taken direct action against Israel and has much more important things on its plate.

Portraying the Israel lobby as super-powerful behooves two groups: Critics of U.S. Middle Eastern policy and the Israel lobby itself. Critics get to say the U.S. relationship with Israel is the result of manipulation and corruption. Thus, they get to avoid discussing the actual history of Israel, the United States and the Middle East. The lobby benefits from having robust power because one of its jobs is to raise funds -- and the image of a killer lobby opens a lot more pocketbooks than does the idea that both Israel and the United States are simply pursuing their geopolitical interests and that things would go on pretty much the same even without slick lobbying.

The great irony is that the critics of U.S. policy and the Israel lobby both want to believe in the same myth -- that great powers can be manipulated to harm themselves by crafty politicians. The British didn't get the United States into the world wars, and the Israelis aren't maneuvering the Americans into being pro-Israel. Beyond its ability to exert itself on small things, the Israel lobby is powerful in influencing Washington to do what it is going to do anyway. What happens next in Iraq is not up to the Israel lobby -- though it and the Saudi Embassy have a different story.[Stratfor]

Stratfor on Osama bin Laden's Latest Video

2007-09-08T16:17:00.000+05:30

Stratfor on Osama bin Laden's latest video.

NBC News released the text of an alleged new video of Osama bin Laden on Sept. 7. Though the video is addressed to the United States, the message is clearly meant for al Qaeda's constituency as the jihadist leader provides justification for young mujahideen to continue their war against the West.

In the 25-minute video, bin Laden addresses the American people and lays out his argument for why U.S. Democrats are unable to stop the Iraq war. He spends a great deal of time echoing the works of Noam Chomsky in condemning capitalism and globalization, arguing that the "money talks" notion is hardwired into the U.S. political system and is what drives the war industry. Toward the end of the speech, he calls for Americans to convert to Islam and makes an awkward outreach to Christians by noting how the Koran mentions Jesus and Mary dozens of times and even affirms the concept of the virgin birth. It is quite possible that the speech was written or influenced by Adam Gadahn, also known as Azzam the American, who is also referred to in the video. Bin Laden has not exhibited detailed knowledge of American political discourse in any of his previous communiques.

The fact that he referenced the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as being observed "a few days ago" (the anniversaries are Aug. 6 and Aug. 9) means the tape was probably recorded in mid-August. This would be in line with the pattern of bin Laden's statements taking at least three weeks to be released after being recorded.

If the video is authentic, the main takeaway from the message is that bin Laden is, in fact, alive. He has not appeared in a video since November 2004, and for operational security reasons has avoided making any media appearances. The last video was made at what was perceived as a major turning point for the United States ahead of the congressional elections. Bin Laden likely chose to risk making his reappearance at this time to take advantage of a critical juncture in U.S. politics over how to proceed in Iraq. His speech will strike a chord among al Qaeda's sympathizers and franchise jihadist groups, but it does not necessarily raise the threat level for attacks against the West. The gradual degradation of al Qaeda's apex leadership has significantly hampered the group's ability to carry out meaningful attacks against Western targets. Moreover, bin Laden's vision of creating an Islamic Caliphate by toppling corrupt Muslim regimes has proven unattainable. Even in this new video, bin Laden has no accomplishment to tout other than 9/11, nor does he make any specific threats.

Nonetheless, bin Laden remains the central inspirational figure to the modern jihadist movement, and the perceived proof of his continued survival from this video could aid regional jihadist nodes in recruitment and maintenance of their support networks.[Stratfor]

Stratfor's Forecast for US Military

2007-09-06T19:45:00.000+05:30

Here is Stratfor's 2005-15 decade forecast for US Military.

The peaks and troughs and localized strains the U.S. military has felt during the war on terrorism in general and the Iraq war in particular will prove to be immaterial in the coming decade. Regardless of the outcome of the war -- though Stratfor suspects it will end in Washington's favor -- U.S. military dominance will remain absolute during the next decade.

The U.S. military is the unquestioned and sole global military power; this is based primarily on the ability of the U.S. Navy to dominate the world's oceans. This condition of hegemony is only partially based on the superior numbers and technology of U.S. naval vessels and augmented significantly by U.S. dominance in space-based reconnaissance technology. On a broad scale, this situation will not change in the next 10 years -- especially regarding U.S. naval dominance -- but the next decade probably will see the emergence of cautious challengers to U.S. dominance over space.

Fundamental technological breakthroughs have often driven fundamental changes in warfare, and Stratfor expects the next decade to be no different. The next step in revolutionary warfare likely to become operational by 2015 is hypersonic scramjet technology. Having been developed by the United States for going on two decades now, this technology -- capable of traveling at 15 times the speed of sound, meaning an aircraft with a weapons payload could fly from Seattle to Beijing in less than half an hour -- will have a coming-out party of sorts over the next 10 years.

The availability of such a unique standoff weapon will allow for rapid response and battlefield dominance in every corner of the world. This already is provided in part by the U.S. Navy, but now weapons can be delivered to a target far from any substantive naval presence and rapidly enough to negate any conventional countermeasures an enemy might have on hand. Technology like this solves many logistics-associated force projection problems simply because assets do not have to be in theater in order to launch a strike. Naturally, this will be another warfare tool for the United States and will not supplant traditional tactics and techniques. As situations require, ground forces will still have to be sent in to hold ground and force a political outcome favorable to the United States. This weapon would, however, give the United States rapid first strike or retaliatory capability in corners of the world where U.S. forces cannot instantaneously interdict or where the overriding geopolitical concerns do not require the physical presence of traditional U.S. military assets.

This will force those seeking to counter the United States to look to asymmetric methods and toward the one area the U.S. military is still subject to competition -- space. After all, the quickest, stealthiest, most expensive aircraft in the world is still rendered useless if it cannot navigate or if intelligence on the target cannot be gathered quickly.

Given the virtual inevitability of U.S. naval dominance, state and non-state actors' only viable recourse will be the pursuit of asymmetric naval forces to limit Western mercantile and U.S. military access. Guerrilla navies are limited to regionally focused militant organizations (Tamil Tigers) and oceangoing pirates; in 10 years, however, the use of these navies might rise. Considering the ability of a single small craft to disable a U.S. naval vessel -- as evidenced by the attack against the USS Cole -- it is a logical step for anyone seeking to disrupt U.S. naval operations but without the conventional military strength to do so. Southeast Asia is the most likely area for this development, since the region already plays host to a number of maritime pirates and criminal organizations that can find safe sanctuary in areas of limited security and governance -- the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia, for example. Elsewhere, increased naval activity in and around the Gulf of Guinea might inspire guerrilla navies to use the existing pirate havens of Nigeria and the surrounding area to launch attacks against mercantile and U.S. naval vessels and ships of allied navies.

Though a strategic competitor is not likely to emerge by 2015, missile technology will continue to develop. States such as Iran and North Korea could be able to deliver first-strike nuclear weapons to targets within their regions, including U.S. military bases and staging points. This is part and parcel of the unconventional threat that could trump the U.S. military's ability to project power wherever and whenever Washington sees fit.

Of course, hypersonic payload delivery technology partially mitigates this threat, since it is best used against fixed infrastructure targets. The broadening of the U.S. missile defense umbrella is another line of defense for countries within range of regional nuclear powers, but missile defense technology is still spotty, will likely lag behind offensive technology and will never be 100 percent reliable.

The possibility of non-state actors acquiring nuclear weapons either through collusion with or because of the incompetence of a state government cannot be ruled out. A non-state actor in possession of nuclear weaponry allows for the weapons' use without political encumbrances and throws a volatile variable into military planning and operations in the next decade.

There will be at least six potential rivals emerging to challenge the United States' sole ownership of global, real-time, space-based reconnaissance and navigation: Russia, China, Japan, India, Iran and Europe. All six have their own internal limits on what they can and will do as far as space-based technology goes, but each will attempt to deploy such assets one way or another.

Russia is the only competitor with an outside shot of actually reforming its existing space program to the point of creating a near-global, near-real-time reconnaissance system. Add this to existing ballistic missile technology, and a space-capable Moscow would pose a genuine threat to U.S. hegemony. The variable here is the economic and political status of Russia throughout the decade; the country is in a cycle of decline, but Stratfor expects that to reverse sometime in the next decade. Once that reversal kicks in, Moscow will pay far more attention to improving its space-based capabilities as the only viable hedge to U.S. global naval dominance.

India and China are hamstrung by their indigenous space programs' limitations and the limitations created by economic difficulties, such as those forecast for China. Nevertheless, both countries maintain fairly substantial missile programs they will seek to augment with space-based assets to multiply their missiles' capabilities and deny the perception of free passage through their territorial waters. A rise in Chinese nationalism/militarism could serve as an impetus for this despite economic and social limitations. India's economy will continue to grow, and a severe economic crunch will not negatively impact its fledgling space program. It is possible -- and probable, in India's case -- that a limited space program, coupled with indigenous and exogenous missile development, could provide checks to U.S. naval dominance on a regional scale.

Japan's national security interests currently are in line with U.S. global and regional interests. In the long term, however, Japan likely anticipates its interests diverging from Washington's and could seek to use good relations now to incrementally launch a space-based reconnaissance and navigation program further down the road. This will be done slowly and innocently -- dual-use satellites, for example -- so as not to raise the United States' hackles and likely will not be completed by 2015, given Japan's economic and political limitations.

Iran and Europe are even further behind the power curve than other potential rivals. Europe has demonstrable space-based and satellite capabilities but does not, and likely will not, have the internal structure or political willingness to pursue a militaristic space program -- though Europe might be interested in a purely defensive domestic intelligence/surveillance space program. Iran has the motivation and the initiative, demonstrated by its planned March 2005 launch of its very first satellite. Additionally, Iran has a relatively capable missile program that will continue to improve, unless indigenous and exogenous factors interfere with Iranian military development. Their space program is still in its embryonic stages and not likely to be robust enough to challenge U.S. naval power even regionally.

The limiting factor for all these programs is not so much time as it is indigenous political willpower and economic capability. With the exception of Russia -- should its reversal come sooner rather than later -- none of the potential rivals has the necessary political willpower and economic leeway to complete a space-based defense program by 2015 that would be robust enough to challenge U.S. space hegemony.

Of course, geopolitical and military alliances between any of these rivals could accelerate indigenous programs and capabilities. It is worth noting that Russia has made a virtual cottage industry out of exporting its own space expertise and technology to countries such as India, China and Iran. Whenever Russia reverses course and begins to rebuild its military and space programs, this cooperation is likely to be somewhat curtailed, mitigating the benefits of these relationships.

Since U.S. naval dominance will not be challenged and power projection capabilities will remain near absolute, the United States will naturally respond in kind to a growing threat to its space hegemony. Stratfor expects a substantial increase in research and development into yet-to-be-realized anti-satellite technology to counter the potential rise of competing space powers. Whatever system is decided upon -- kinetic energy, high energy lasers, satellite parasites, jamming or chemical lasers -- it is not likely to be operational by 2015. Working prototypes, however, could be seen in limited operation by 2015. These will become even more indispensable when satellite-dependent hypersonic scramjet aircraft are put to use.

Stratfor India Forecast for 2005-2015

2007-09-06T19:04:00.000+05:30

I was going through Stratfor's archives and read some of their old forecasts regarding India and her neighbours. It was quite interesting. So I thought flagging some of them.

Here is one of their forecasts for India made in July of 2001. Looking back, I am impressed with their accuracy.

India is a major country to watch during the third quarter and the next few years. India is effectively an island, with swamp and jungle to the east, the Himalayas to the north and the economic and political wastes of Pakistan and Afghanistan to the west. India's economy is strong, with a growing base in technology, and its domestic politics are at least resilient, if not stable. With a navy that is growing and challenged by no one except the U.S. Fifth Fleet, India is fast becoming the predominate power in the Indian Ocean basin.

India is already being wooed by Russia, which offers arms, and the United States, which offers technology and investment. As it has the potential to control the gates to the Red Sea, as well as the straits of Hormuz and Malacca, India will spend the next few quarters choosing between suitors, rather than seeking them out. The United States, with more to offer, may emerge as New Delhi's partner of choice.

Stratfor also publishes "Decade Forecasts". In 2005 they published forecasts for the decade 2005-2015. Here is their forecast for South Asia.

As this forecast was done before India's manufacturing boom became visible, Stratfor missed taking into account the benefits accruing out of this sector.

In our 1995-2005 decade forecast, Stratfor correctly said that India, as South Asia's leading player, would be contained by regional forces. India might continue to claim the title of regional hegemon, but the last 10 years have demonstrated New Delhi's inability to overcome social and political impediments to achieving superpower status. Furthermore, as the global hegemonic power of the early 21st century, the United States will undoubtedly extend its influence -- already felt in Pakistan -- into the Indian subcontinent.

As India enters the next decade, its center of gravity will be the economy. Economic growth is the key to a country's success or failure, and India is fully aware that it has the potential to create a position for itself among the world's leading nations. Though the popular message in international media is that India is on the brink of explosive growth and is following the path of its eastern neighbor, China, Stratfor holds a slightly more pessimistic view of India's future.
India has grown at an average annual rate of 6 percent during the past decade and will be able to sustain a strong level of GDP growth at rates reaching as high as 6 percent to 8 percent in the coming decade. However, India will not be able to reach China's current level of economic growth in the next 10 years.

On the surface, India has several factors favorable to rapid economic growth. With a population of more than 1 billion, it has a massive and highly-educated labor pool from which to draw its resources. In addition, India does not face the language barrier China has, since English is prevalent throughout the country. This significantly contributes to its fast-growing software development sector by facilitating communication with India's Western trading partners.

India will continue to occupy the profitable niche of value-added services driven by the information technology (IT) and telecom sectors. The states that have most benefited from these industries include the "Silicon Valley" cities of Bangalore and Hyderabad. However, the economic successes of these pockets of "Shining India" are not easily replicable and have not been adopted by India's other state governments. Even if these successes were to be replicated at the state level across the country, it would take at least another 20 years and a more diversified economy for India to reach economic growth levels comparable to China.

To a large extent, India faces the same immense developmental obstacles it did at the beginning of its cycle of economic liberalization in 1991. On a basic level, the poor conditions of roads, railways, ports, airports and power supplies illustrate the enormity of India's task of modernizing its infrastructure to attract more FDI and allow businesses to operate more efficiently. While India's IT-driven states require only minimal levels of infrastructure, particularly in fiber-optic networks and electricity, the rest of India is largely underdeveloped. Thus, India is not in the position to become a highly industrialized country.

The India-China comparison has become common discourse, but is not an easy comparison to make. China began its economic reforms in 1979 under an extremely focused and strategic "period of readjustment" that has been successfully implemented through the effective central control of China's authoritarian regime. In contrast, India is arguably a highly diverse, massive and fractionalized democracy lacking the central control necessary to put policy reforms into action. No democratic country comparable to India in terms of size and diversity has succeeded in implementing wide-scale democratic reforms to achieve rapid economic growth.

Though India's current government is economically focused, actually getting state governments to implement reforms is a chore. In addition to rampant corruption and bloated bureaucracies in the Indian public sector, the Indian government's democratic structure and competing views of India's openness to trade and investment allow the states' chief ministers to ignore government policy reforms and pursue each political party's agenda, which is usually designed to garner votes through populist appeals. An important distinction to make is that while FDI is strongly sought after and encouraged in China, it is merely approved of and often resented by state governments in India. These differing attitudes toward reform define the contrast between the Chinese and Indian approach to economic development.

With about one-fourth of the population living in absolute poverty, India has a significant number of voters who are not interested in FDI or global competition; the average voter is more concerned with where his next meal is coming from. This poverty is a developmental issue that must reach a manageable level before ruling governments can think past elections and toward long-term economic reforms. However, as local governments are forced to leverage poverty reduction and economic liberalization, the downward trend of poverty levels and upward rate of liberalizing India's markets will counter each other, thus preventing a rapid pace of economic development or poverty reduction.

Given the number of developmental constraints on its economic potential, India still has a long way to go before it can catch up to China's current economic growth rate. The good news for India is that its economy is in a stronger position than the Chinese economy as we look into the coming decade. Stratfor has forecast the burst of the Chinese economic bubble, signaling the inevitable halt to China's unprecedented growth trajectory. Combined with a massive and highly-skilled labor force, India's vital sectors provide a solid foundation for the country to pursue policy reforms at a strong yet gradual rate.

On the geopolitical front, India will view Russia's disintegration as an opportunity to build its strategic alliance with the U.S. superpower. Although China will slow down economically, the East Asian giant will continue its attempts to tilt the balance of power on the Asian continent in its own direction, providing more reason for India to align with the United States and become part of the "winning" team in the global arena. India also will use this alliance to counter its historical opponent to the west -- Pakistan. India realizes the United States values the Indo-U.S. alliance in the long-term over its short-term alliance with Pakistan, which was primarily built in the last half of the previous decade because of the U.S.-led war on terrorism.

The dispute over Kashmir is the driving factor of Indo-Pakistani relations. Domestic constraints in India and Pakistan lead Stratfor to believe the issue of Kashmir will not be resolved in the coming decade. However, New Delhi and Islamabad will continue the process of normalization and will likely reach a point by 2015 at which the two states will begin implementing a "road map" solution.

The United States' final battle against al Qaeda will be fought within Pakistani territory early in the coming decade. Stratfor has been forecasting a U.S. incursion onto Pakistani soil targeting al Qaeda militants with or without Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's cooperation. We expect the operation to be successful for the United States but costly for Musharraf, as domestic instability will rise in opposition to U.S. forces in the region. With the Pakistani government centered around Musharraf's leadership, political instability in Pakistan will continue to loom over the horizon.

Regardless of the domestic upset Musharraf is bound to face when U.S. troops enter the region, Stratfor expects the current military regime in Pakistan to stay in power until 2007, given that there are no viable opposition forces strong enough to unseat Musharraf. The balance of forces among the military, bureaucracy and centrist political groups ensures the survival of the state, despite any instability that occurs at the regime level.

After 2007, Musharraf probably will reach a deal with his regime to step down as military commander of Pakistan, enter a civilian role as the elected president of Pakistan and assume leadership of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League.

The centralization of power around Musharraf does not suggest that the Pakistani government would collapse in his absence. In accordance with historical precedent, the military and bureaucratic establishments would reach a consensus and Pakistani politics would shift back to increased civilian control until the domestic situation settled.

Pakistan will undoubtedly be influential in the nation-building effort in Afghanistan, given the large presence of ethnic Pashtuns in the two Pakistani provinces -- Northwest Frontier and Balochistan -- located along the Afghan-Pakistani border and the fact that Pashtuns account for at least 40 percent of Afghanistan's population.

The United States also will maintain its military presence in Afghanistan as part of its operation against al Qaeda. Opposition to U.S. forces in Afghanistan is significantly less than in Iraq, and the U.S. presence in the region will allow for much-needed stability to aid Afghan President Hamid Karzai's emerging state. The Taliban movement has collapsed and evidently splintered into at least three different factions, one of which wishes to lay down its arms and become part of the developing political system. As a result, the Taliban will be unable to make a comeback in the next decade.

However, Karzai's government does face effective opposition from Afghan warlords, Uzbeks and Tajiks, all of whom have a vested interest in representing their respective communities in the government. Stratfor expects a consensus to be reached among the key players of each major ethnic community to work toward extending Kabul's influence to the 29 Afghan provinces.

A Slap on the Face of Terrorists

2007-09-04T20:43:00.000+05:30

The world's tourists have just certified India as the best travel destination. This is certainly a tight slap on the nameless, ruthless, and pointed terrorist.

.....India has now emerged as the numero uno travel destination trailing beauties of Italy, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand, according to survey by a tourism magazine.

India's rise from the fourth spot last year was contained in a survey conducted by a widely-read British magazine Conde Nest Traveller, which gives away Readers Travel Awards, considered to be the Oscar awards of the tourism industry.

"India was the 10th most preferred destination in 2004, 4th in 2006 and is now at the top in 2007 and that is where we want to be," Union Tourism Minister Ambika Soni said while receiving the award at a ceremony in London on Monday night.

Conducted among the readers of the magazine that includes some of the most sophisticated and avid travellers across the world, the survey included a range of criteria for each category from 'range of accommodation' to 'environmental friendliness', the magazine said in a release.

In the April issue of the magazine, readers were asked for nominations for the world's best hotels, spas, cities, airports, cruise lines and tour operators and to rate them. To discern their list of 'best of the best', each nomination was ranked to produce the world's Top 100 in each field.

The replies were then collated and analysed by an independent market research company before giving away with the awards.[IE]

The Bumbling Indian Police

2007-09-04T20:27:00.000+05:30

Here is another example of bumbling by Indian Police which allows a terror suspect to escape.

Taking forward the probe into the August 25 twin blasts in Hyderabad, the police have arrested one more Bangladeshi woman in Bangalore. But another suspect Rizvan Ghazi once again managed to give a slip to the cops.

Afsana, 28, was arrested late on Monday from a house in Bannerghatta in Bangalore but her accomplice Rizvan once again escaped the police dragnet. She is the second Bangladeshi woman to be arrested in the case.

Police sources in Hyderabad said Afsana is a relative of Shafeera Rustomjah, a Bangladeshi arrested in Hyderabad four days ago for overstaying.

Shafeera's brother Rizvan, who resembled the sketch of the bomb planter at Lumbini Park, escaped on Sunday when a police team from Hyderabad was reportedly arguing with an autorickshaw driver over the fare after reaching a house in Bangalore.

Shafeera, Rizvan and their parents were allegedly staying in Bangalore even six years after their visas expired.[HT]

The Coming Changes in Pakistan

2007-09-04T14:56:00.000+05:30

Stratfor takes a look at what’s in store for Pakistan and its Military after President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's fall. According to them it no longer is a matter of if, but of when Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf will leave the helm in Islamabad.

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced Aug. 30 that he will return to Pakistan from forced exile Sept. 10. The same day, another exiled former leader, Benazir Bhutto, announced breakthroughs in negotiations with President Gen. Pervez Musharraf that would ease the general out of power. Meanwhile, the country's Supreme Court began proceedings on petitions challenging on constitutional grounds Musharraf's bid to seek re-election.

Stratfor forecast months ago that Musharraf would have to concede his position as military chief if he intended to stay on as a civilian president, and that he would have no choice but to work out a political agreement with Pakistan's opposition parties, specifically Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party. Prompted by advice from his closest aides, Musharraf is now quietly working toward securing an honorable exit from the scene. He could be forced to throw in the towel sometime after the appointment of a successor military chief on or around Oct. 8.

Once Musharraf vacates the presidency, events will pretty much unfold as per the constitution -- the way they did when the death in 1988 of Pakistan's last military dictator, Gen. Mohammed Zia-ul-Haq, created a power vacuum. A caretaker government headed by an acting president and an interim premier will be charged with holding fresh legislative elections, which will likely produce a highly divided parliament resulting in a coalition government.

Beyond the change in political personalities and groups, a far more important shift will take place in Pakistan in the coming months. For the first time since the army took control of the state in 1958 under Field Marshal Ayub Khan, the military's grip on the reins of the state is in the process of weakening.

This did not happen even when Pakistan's second military dictator, Gen. Yahya Khan, stepped down in 1971 after civil war led to the secession of a major chunk of the country and the surrender of some 100,000 troops to Indian forces. Neither did it happen when Zia-ul-Haq and his top generals died in a mysterious plane crash, ending his 11-year stint. In both cases, the military merely went into the background for some years -- only to return when the politicians could not agree to disagree. Even when the army was not directly ruling, the civilian leaders had to look over their shoulders continuously to see whether the generals were still with them nearly each step of the way.

That was in the past, however, when there were essentially two players in Pakistan -- the army and the political parties. Today, a vibrant civil society and increasingly independent and assertive judiciary have emerged within the country.

The empowerment of Pakistan's civil society was catalyzed by Musharraf's ill-fated decision to sack Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry in March. Chaudhry, breaking with tradition, would not fold, which set in motion a series of events that, within a matter of days, energized bar associations across the country. In turn, this emboldened the judiciary to assert its independence and challenge the military's hold on power.

The Supreme Court already has asserted its power, reversing a number of the Musharraf regime's decisions. The court reinstated the chief justice, released a top Musharraf opponent who was jailed on charges of treason and ensured Sharif's right of return. The judiciary also has taken steps to limit interference by the military and the intelligence agencies in matters of governance.

Meanwhile, the country's media, particularly the private television news channels, also have emerged as a powerful driver of events. In the wake of the judicial crisis, Musharraf tried June 4 to place restrictions on the electronic media through new ordinances empowering the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) to block transmissions, suspend licenses and confiscate equipment of electronic media organizations deemed in violation of the new laws. But five days later, under intense domestic and international pressure, he was forced to withdraw the controversial restrictions.

Pakistan also has witnessed an unprecedented surge in civil society activism. Instead of the political parties that historically have led protests, civil society groups -- especially the legal syndicates -- drove the protests during the legal crisis. There also has been an unprecedented outbreak of social debate on national issues, not only regarding the military's role in politics but also on the issue of rule of law. This debate has included criticism of men in uniform, as well as politicians.

All of this has been made possible by several structural changes that took shape mostly during the first seven years of Musharraf's rule. In order to counter the perception that he was a military dictator, Musharraf created a hybrid political system with a significant civilian component. Despite having manipulated the constitution on a number of occasions, he relied heavily on it to strengthen his grip on authority. In the process, he inadvertently strengthened the country's constitutional roots, which is now weakening the very power he consolidated.

Even within the military, Musharraf's repeated reshuffling of positions has contributed to his own undoing. It has brought to the fore a junior crop of generals that is inexperienced in politics and government. For a long time, this worked to his advantage by preventing any of his subordinates from rising up to challenge him. Now, however, as he faces challenges from Pakistan's civilian sectors, his top generals are unable and/or unwilling to support him.

In essence, the law of unintended consequences has worked against Musharraf. Moreover, it has weakened the military's ability to dominate the state. For now, this is limited to the political sphere. Eventually, the judicial branch can be expected to empower the legislative branch by forcing the military and the intelligence community to open up their books to parliamentary scrutiny. The weakening of the military's hold over the country's economic sector will be the next stage in the ongoing systemic change.

The question moving forward is: How far will the military's grip slacken before arrestors force the generals to take a firmer role? For now, the trend is running against the military -- and historical positions are being reversed. As the civilians entrench their power, it is the military -- not the civilian politicians -- that will mostly have to contend with limitations imposed by the judiciary. And civil society will serve as the watchdog.

And yet, there are plenty of issues that have the potential to topple this emerging civilian structure, such as the ability of Sharif and Bhutto to get along with one another and cooperate in order to check the military's power; the Islamists' level of power in the political system; the level of security in the country's Northwest; the status of the war on terrorism; the amount of pressure from the United States; and, of course, how India reacts to the changing political dynamic in Islamabad.

Any of these issues could lead to the military's return. Pakistan might be moving into the hands of civilians, but half a century of political culture does not die easily.[Stratfor]

Is NDTV Committed to the Nation?

2007-09-03T19:41:00.000+05:30

It is a well known fact that NDTV is a leftist media organisation. Prannoy Roy's relation with the Commie couple the Karats is also well known. Because of these facts, NDTV's commitment to the nation is always questioned just like the Indian Commie's commitment is questioned. NDTV also came out editorially in strong defence of the Commies when they were accused by the center-right media of being agents of Communist China.

Here is an example of NDTV's nationalism. A commander-in-chief of a north-east militant organisation drops in at NDTV's Guwahati office and NDTV instead of calling the authorities and getting these militants arrested treats them like kings and makes a news story out of their visit.

Unexpected visitors dropped by at NDTV's Guwahati office on Monday morning.

It's not everyday that the commander in chief of a militant outfit walks in, and this one had an unusual request.

He wanted to tell his side of a story NDTV had run last week.

The Dimasa group commander asked to see a CD NDTV had aired which had visuals of two boys being tortured by kidnappers.[NDTV]

Cartoon Speak: The Hindu on the Indo-US Nuclear Deal

2007-08-31T17:41:00.000+05:30

The Decision Time is Now

2007-08-31T17:16:00.000+05:30

Around last year this time the Janata Party’s president Subramanian Swamy came up with an incredulous plan to make India a mighty economic power by 2020 and overtake China by then. According to him as the UPA had dumped economic reforms that are required to put India on the fast track of growth and development, it is imperative to get back the BJP led NDA back to power at the center with a mighty majority. And how does he envisage this to happen? According to Mr. Swamy “the BJP will return to power riding on a wave of support arising from the backlash of continuous hemorrhaging from terrorist attacks.”

Narendra Modi whom the courts called a modern-day Nero because he allowed the Sanghis to unleash unimaginable terror on Gujarati Muslims to avenge the Godhra carnage is known among Sanghis as “Hindu Hriday Samrat” (emperor of Hindu hearts). Why? Because they say he taught Gujarati Muslims a lesson that they will never forget. In today’s booming economy of Gujarat, its Muslims have no place. They have become second-class citizens in their own land.

The Gujarat riots which was the first one to be televised live was the last straw and it gifted South Indian Muslims into the hands of Pakistan’s ISI. Muslims recruited from Andhra Pradesh who were then trained in Pakistan by ISI assassinated ex- minister Haren Pandya. Now Hyderabad has become a safe haven for ISI’s Islamic terrorists. So much so that they are able to perpetuate their insidious wickedness with impunity in their haven and still hang around till further orders from ISI.

After every terror outrage since 2002, India’s Center-Left Media almost justifies them as Muslim revenge for the 2002 Gujarat riots. Sadly India’s Muslims too have fallen for this lie completely.The Center-Left media has hijacked the recent terror bombings where Indian Muslims too have lost many lives, to promote their pathetic agenda of painting Pakistan as an equal victim of terror and thus implying that these trerror outgrages could be the handiwork of Hindu "terror groups".

Today in Andhra Pradesh except BJP all other parties are wooing the Muslims as a strategic vote bank to supplement their various dedicated caste vote banks. For BJP, the Muslims are just cannon fodder. In Andhra Pradesh and particularly in Hyderabad, BJP and Muslim parties like MIM would love to polarize the society on communal lines to serve their narrow agendas.

When the Islamists brief is to destroy India, it doesn’t mean co-religionists are exempted from being body bags in this war. This is yet to be comprehended by Indian Muslims. The earlier the Indian Muslims realize this fact, the sooner we can wipe this menace out.

It is up to India’s Muslims to decide their future (and probably India’s too). There are three points they have to decide on. One, whether they want BJP back in power at the center as a result of Hindu backlash as envisioned by Mr. Swamy. Two, whether they want a "Hindu Hriday Samrat" in each and every state of India and become pariahs like today’s Gujarati Muslim. Three, whether they want to live and enjoy life in tomorrow’s third biggest economy. The decision time is now.

The Desired Effects

2007-08-31T12:48:00.001+05:30

The repeated targetting of Hyderabad by Pakistan's ISI trained Islamist terrorists is having its desired effects.

In what could be the first aftershock of the recent macabre bomb blasts, the city has just lost a unit of a multinational corporation and along with it 5,000 jobs.

This was disclosed by Sanjaya Baru, media advisor to the Prime Minister, while delivering Dr. Waheeduddin Khan memorial lecture on “The local and global in Hyderabad’s development”, at the Centre for Economic and Social Studies here on Thursday.Responding to questions from the audience, Dr. Baru narrated how a passenger, a top executive of the MNC, broke this news to him on board the New Delhi-Hyderabad flight. The board of the MNC was to decide whether it should set its shop in Hyderabad or Kuala Lumpur.

The bomb blasts led the board to plump for Kuala Lumpur.[The Hindu]

These lost 5000 jobs could have created an additional almost equal number of support and auxiliary services which could have benefitted the people of Hyderabad including a large number of Muslims.

INS Viraat off the Visakhapatnam Coast

2007-08-31T12:29:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: The Hindu

This was published in today's "Young World", children's supplement of "The Hindu". Quite a beautiful setting. INS Viraat is docked off the Vizag coast because it is here to participate in the Naval exercise with US, Australia and Japan.

Stratfor on the Latest Hyderabad Terror Outrage

2007-08-29T17:36:00.000+05:30

Stratfor's Fred Burton and Scott Stewart analysing the latest Hyderabad terror bombings opines that the terrorists are learning fast but still have a lot to learn to be really deadly. As for me, after reading their analysis, I am of the opinion that Stratfor has some more to learn about India, her Society and her Muslims.

An explosion ripped through a crowd watching a laser show at an outdoor amphitheater in the Indian city of Hyderabad on the evening of Aug. 25. At about the same time, a second device detonated in a popular outdoor restaurant in the city. The twin blasts killed at least 42 people and injured about 80.

Following the bombings in Lumbini Park and the Gokul Chat Bhandar restaurant in the Koti market, Indian police reportedly recovered as many as 19 unexploded devices in the city, though Stratfor has confirmed the recovery of only two devices, one under a footbridge in the Dilsukhnagar commercial area and a second in a movie theater in the Narayanaguda district. Regardless of the number of bombs planted, it appears the attack was intended to be more wide-ranging -- and deadlier -- than it was. The targets selected and the unexploded devices not only provide insight into the attackers' intent but also serve as a gauge of their level of competence. The unexploded devices will also provide investigators with a treasure trove of forensic evidence.

While the number of malfunctioning devices points to an inexperienced bombmaker, the fact that the devices were planted without detection indicates the organization responsible for the attack is practicing fairly good operational security. No arrests have been made in connection with the case, meaning the cell members involved -- including the all-important bombmaker -- remain at large. Indian investigators, therefore, are racing against the clock to locate and apprehend the attackers before they can learn from their mistakes and launch another, more devastating attack.

Dissecting the Attack

The choice of targets in this attack says a great deal about the cell that staged it. Because the cell attacked soft Indian targets, rather than some of the many soft Western targets in and around the city -- Hyderabad is a high-tech hub for Indian and Western corporations -- it clearly is focused on striking what jihadists term the "near enemy" (India) and not the "far enemy" of the United States and other Western powers. Additionally, the targets were clearly civilian, rather than the type of targets normally selected by the Maoist Naxalites, such as infrastructure or government sites. The Naxalites normally seek to avoid indiscriminate civilian causalities, since they believe such attacks will undercut their popular support. This, then, does not appear to be the work of either Naxalites or those jihadists who adhere to al Qaeda's targeting philosophy.

Therefore, based on the target selection, this attack appears to have been conducted by Kashmiri-type Islamist militants seeking specifically to kill Hindus in order to stoke intercommunal Hindu/Muslim violence. Furthermore, the intent of this attack appears similar to that of an Islamist militant attack in May against the Mecca Mosque in Hyderabad. That attack, though, revealed a strategy to strike at Muslim targets in order to incite communal riots between Hindus and Muslims. However, Hyderabad's Muslim community failed to take the bait and instead turned increasingly hostile toward these militant groups, further threatening their support.

The backlash experienced following the Mecca Mosque bombing likely encouraged the Islamist militants to shift their focus toward Hindu targets in their effort to stir up communal animosity. Furthermore, the choice of soft targets suggests the attackers did not consider themselves capable of hitting any of the city's many symbolic -- and therefore more highly protected -- Indian/Hindu sites.

Following the June 29-30 attempted bombings in London and Glasgow, Scotland, -- plots that involved militants born in India -- Indian authorities asked information technology companies in Hyderabad and other places to step up security. In addition, although the threats that surfaced Aug. 21 involved Chandigarh, the warning served to keep security high at India's high-tech companies in places such as Bangalore and Hyderabad. Following the May 18 bombings at the Mecca Mosque, security at religious sites in the city also was increased.

In addition to the type of target selected, the type of attack conducted can provide insight into those behind it. In this latest attack, the perpetrators left improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in unsecured public places -- the modus operandi (MO) also employed in the Mecca Mosque attack. While using this common MO does not necessarily mean the same group is behind both attacks, it does signify that the groups that conducted the two attacks are operating at roughly the same level of operational sophistication. This type of attack against a soft target does not incur much risk and requires few resources. Additionally, it does not require the intense dedication/indoctrination required for successful suicide bombings, and it does not consume human resources as quickly; the operatives who planned and conducted this attack are still at large.

The selection of soft, vulnerable targets and the fact that at least half the IEDs deployed did not function as designed points to a low level of professionalism. However, it is significant that the cell obtained the explosives and components necessary for the devices, constructed them and deployed them without detection. This is not a small feat, which indicates the organization practices an acceptable level of operational security. It also seems to highlight the shortcomings of street-level Indian intelligence officers. The weaknesses of this militant cell appear to be in bombmaking and lack of imaginative operational planning -- the kind of planning that could allow the attackers to use their devices to target more high-profile figures or sites. However, these are areas in which militants traditionally improve with experience.

The Importance of Bombmakers

One of the key positions in any militant organization is that of the bombmaker, since his work can literally make or break an operation. This was dramatically reflected in the difference between the impacts of the July 7 and July 21, 2005, London attacks. Because of the mistakes made by the July 21 bombmaker, that attack is now only a footnote to the successful July 7 attack.

In spite of popular wisdom, a person does not become a proficient bombmaker by reading a few Internet sites that offer instructions on bomb construction. Indeed, as demonstrated by the would-be London and Glasgow bomber, Bangalore-born Kafeel Ahmed, even an advanced engineering degree does not provide the practical skills required for a person to become an effective bombmaker. This skill is even more critical when the bombmaker is working in an environment such as the United States or United Kingdom, where strict controls on explosives require that a bombmaker construct his own improvised detonators and explosive mixtures, a dangerous process in which one mistake can result in a serious injury or death. When making improvised explosive mixtures, even experienced bombmakers, including militant mastermind Abdel Basit, occasionally catch themselves on fire.

However, even when commercial or military explosives are available, designing an effective and reliable firing chain can be difficult. Inexperienced bombmakers often will take shortcuts when constructing their devices (especially when they have been ordered to construct multiple devices) and, in addition to making other mistakes, will not take the care to thoroughly test each of their firing chains for functionality. However, through trial and error, bombmakers tend to learn from past mistakes and improve their devices to make them increasingly reliable and deadly.

CSI: Hyderabad

Although a remarkable amount of forensic evidence can be recovered from any blast site, the unexploded devices picked up in Hyderabad will provide invaluable forensic evidence for Indian investigators. It obviously is far quicker and easier to work with intact devices than to try to recover and piece together a device after it detonates. One of the first items examined will be the IEDs' main explosive charge, which in this case appears to have consisted of cartridges of commercial explosives. These cartridges should have lot numbers on them that will allow authorities to trace them from the manufacturer to the last legitimate purchaser. Although explosives are frequently stolen from quarries and construction company warehouses (even by unscrupulous employees), tracking the explosives used in an attack to a specific robbery or theft could help authorities locate the cell.

In addition to the main charge, the devices could contain detonators (blasting caps) or booster charges that also might be marked with lot numbers or other traceable manufacturer markings. Other components used to construct the devices, such as the clocks used for the timers, the wires, the batteries and the containers, will be carefully studied and efforts will be made to trace them. The components also will be checked for fingerprint and DNA evidence, while evidence such as the marks made by the pliers or wire cutters likely will be studied and databased. It must be remembered, however, that CSI: Hyderabad is not the same as CSI: Miami -- and even Miami's real crime scene investigators are nowhere near as advanced as their fictional counterparts.

In addition, investigators will study myriad small details pertaining to the way the device was designed and constructed -- little touches referred to as the bombmaker's "signature" -- in an attempt to tie this specific bombmaker to previous plots. The signature can include unique items used in fashioning the firing chain; the way wire was stripped, cut, twisted and soldered; and the use of electrical tape and shrink tubing. In this case, it will be interesting to compare the signature of the person who made the two unexploded devices with that of the person who made the two unexploded devices recovered from the Mecca Mosque attack.

As we said after the Mecca Mosque bombing, the attackers' MO, the placement of the devices and the number of unexploded devices indicate the organization behind that attack was not very sophisticated. The group behind this latest attack has exhibited many of the same characteristics. It does not appear to be overly advanced at this time -- though its ability to obtain explosives and deploy devices without detection is troubling for Indian authorities.

While some sources in India say they believe Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency was involved in this latest attack, the simplicity of the attack and the lack of skill on the part of the bombmaker suggest there was no ISI connection. The operatives trained and directed by the ISI tend to be more professional than those behind this latest attack. Also, commercial explosives were used in this latest attack, which is not without precedent, but an ISI-connected operation likely would have involved military explosives, such as RDX, which seem ubiquitous among militant groups on the subcontinent.

Although the Mecca Mosque bombing involved military explosives and targeted a different side of the communal line, there are many similarities between these attacks -- including intent, MO and level of professionalism. The Mecca Mosque bombing killed five people, while this latest twin bombing killed more than 40. If the same group is behind both attacks, it appears to be improving -- and getting deadlier. This learning curve will place additional pressure on Indian authorities to identify and capture the perpetrators before they can improve their tradecraft enough to stage larger, mass-casualty attacks or begin to attack harder, more secure targets, such government buildings, Indian high-tech companies or Western companies doing business in the country.[Stratfor]

R.I.P. Osama bin Laden?

2007-07-17T11:34:00.000+05:30

Stratfor after examining the latest Osama video is of the opinion that Osama might just be dead. I am not buying it yet especially when it is strongly 'rumoured' that Osama is in a safe house in Pakistan after he was airlifted along with those Pakistani military personnel who were helping the Taliban in Afghansitan.

Al Qaeda's media branch, As-Sahab, released a 40-minute video July 14 featuring several jihadist figures paying tribute to "martyred" militants. Attention to the video, however, is centering on a previously unseen 50-second clip of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who extols the virtues of martyrdom.

Although the bin Laden video is new in that it has not been seen before, it is not new chronologically. In fact, the "new" footage appears to have been taped at the same time as a bin Laden video released by the United Kingdom-based Islamic news agency Al-Ansaar in May 2002. Bin Laden's dress, the camera angle and the setting for both videos are identical. In both tapes, a mountain rises up next to bin Laden's right shoulder, there is a tree to his left and the same bodyguard stands behind him, occasionally visible over his left shoulder.

One other similarity about these two videos is that they both were released under similar circumstances: during a time when there was doubt about bin Laden's well-being.

At the time of the May 2002 video release, there was some doubt that bin Laden had survived the December 2001 U.S. assault on Tora Bora. Al-Ansaar reported that it believed the video had been recorded in March 2002, and that this proved bin Laden had survived the attack. Al Jazeera, however, reported that it had seen the video in early 2002 but did not air it. Al Jazeera further said it believed the video was recorded in October 2001 and that it therefore did not prove bin Laden survived Tora Bora. Later tapes that were deemed authentic new releases, however, did prove bin Laden survived the attack.

Today, the question of whether bin Laden remains alive is being debated again. He has not been seen on video since October 2004 and he has not issued a new audio statement since July 2006. This silence stands in stark contrast to the flurry of audio statements he released in 2006. That series began with a January audiotape, in which he warned Americans that an attack against the U.S. homeland was imminent, and ended with a July 1 message discussing Somalia. Bin Laden's silence also is remarkable when compared to the media activity of his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, who has issued a number of statements this year, including three audios and a video within the past month.

Al Qaeda has little to gain by keeping bin Laden out of the spotlight. Indeed, it could gain far more by trumpeting his ability to evade the massive U.S.-led manhunt for him. Al Qaeda also is under a great deal of pressure to demonstrate that bin Laden is alive and well, and in command of his organization. These factors suggest there is another reason for bin Laden to maintain a low profile. Perhaps he is dead, although based on al Qaeda's acknowledgement of the death of other senior figures, we would expect the organization to acknowledge such a loss, eulogize its "great martyr" and attempt to gain a public relations advantage out of the situation.

There also have been continuous reports that bin Laden is seriously ill, so al Qaeda might not want to show him in poor health. Indeed, there was much speculation about his health after his last video, when he stood behind a lectern and did not move much. This was in contrast to a 2003 video (aired around the second anniversary of 9/11), in which bin Laden was shown walking with the aid of a cane on a hillside in the Afghan-Pakistani border region. If, indeed, bin Laden is in poor health, his voice might be too weak to come across forcefully on audio.

Although al Qaeda faces an operational security risk related to video messages -- al-Zawahiri has curtailed his video appearances markedly since the October 2006 missile attack in Chingai, Pakistan -- it should not be as concerned with an audio message. Audio equipment is compact, easy to conceal and easy to use without the need for a crew or lighting equipment. Bin Laden, therefore, could easily record his own voice.

There must be another reason for his silence.[Stratfor]

A new al Qaeda tape is circulating; a sort of montage honoring the "fallen martyrs" of the Afghan war. Within the tape is a 50-second clip of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden discussing his thoughts on the subject.

The tape was first released July 14, but now news commentators aplenty are citing the video as proof of al Qaeda's strength in general, and of bin Laden's vitality in particular. However, judging from the camera angle, the clothing and what appears in the video's background, the tape is more than five years old and was filmed on the same reel used to assemble a video released in May 2002.

That means it has been more than a year since al Qaeda released any evidence indicating bin Laden is still alive, and roughly five years since the apex leadership of al Qaeda has been conclusively linked to any attack outside the Middle East or South Asia.

We certainly understand al Qaeda's effort to make its leader loom large; there are few organizations whose need to do something spectacular outweighs that of al Qaeda, and there is arguably no one who needs to prove he is a player more than bin Laden does. But barring a secret plan that, for some as-yet-undisclosed reason, necessitates hiding in Pakistani caves for years, bin Laden is either dead or incapacitated to the point that he cannot speak -- or his condition is such that his handlers prefer he does not.

So, whatever other axes one might have to grind with the U.S. administration -- and these days there seem to be enough to outfit an army of Vikings -- take this for what it is: Bin Laden is probably gone for good, and al Qaeda likely lacks the ability to strike in any strategically meaningful way.

But with the war against al Qaeda now disposed of, what of the other?[Stratfor]

Rest of that article is on the mess in Iraq.

More Stratfor Reports on Al Qaeda

2007-07-13T11:34:00.000+05:30

Here are three Stratfor reports issued after their last report titled "Many faces of Al Qaeda"

The Reality of Al Qaeda's Resurgence

A leak from the U.S. defense community revealed a document titled "Al Qaeda better positioned to strike the West" on Thursday, touching off a firestorm of debate within the United States over the status of the war on terror. According to the leak, al Qaeda is "considerably operationally stronger than a year ago," has "regrouped to an extent not seen since 2001," and is "showing greater and greater ability to plan attacks in Europe and the United States."

Stratfor cannot analyze the contents of the report because we have not read it; so far, no one has felt it necessary to commit a felony by leaking this specific document to us. But the general thrust of the document, that al Qaeda has regenerated, is clear. Many of Stratfor's readers have noted that this position clashes with our recently clarified assessment that, while al Qaeda remains dangerous, the group's day in the sun is over.

The first and most important question to ask when looking at this leaked report, then, is which al Qaeda is being discussed. Evolution and misuse of terminology means there are now two.

The first is the al Qaeda that carried out the 9/11 attacks. This group deeply understands how intelligence agencies work, and therefore how to avoid them. After the 9/11 attacks, however, this group's security protocols forced it to go underground, pushing itself deeper into the cave each time it thought one of its assets or plans had been compromised. The result was a steady degradation of capabilities, with its attacks proving less and less significant. Stratfor now estimates that, while this al Qaeda -- which we often refer to as the apex leadership, or al Qaeda prime -- still exists and is still dangerous, it is no longer a strategic threat to the United States. Its members can carry out attacks, but not ones of the grandeur and horror of 9/11, or even of the Madrid bombings, that achieve the group's goals of forcing policy changes on Western governments.

The second al Qaeda is a result of the apex leadership's isolation. It represents a range of largely disconnected Islamist militants who either have been inspired by the real al Qaeda or who seek to use the name to bolster their credibility. While many of these groups are rather amateurish, others are deadly efficient. It is best to think of them as al Qaeda franchises. However, these franchises lack the security policy or vision of their predecessor, and they do not constitute a strategic threat.

The difference between a strategic and a tactical threat is the core distinction, and one that should not be trivialized. There are hundreds of militant groups in the world that pose tactical threats, and many of them are indeed affiliated with al Qaeda in some way. As a bombmaker or expert marksman, a single person possesses the skills to kill many people, but that does not make that individual a strategic threat to the United States.

Posing a strategic threat requires the ability to carry out operations in a foreign land, raise and transfer funds, recruit and relocate people, train and hide promising agents, a multitude of reconnaissance and technical skills, and -- most important -- the ability to do all this while avoiding detection before striking at a target of national importance. Yes, an attack against a local mall or a regional airport would be a calamity, but it would not be the sort of strategic attack against national targets that reshapes Western geopolitics as 9/11 did.

Charging that al Qaeda is as strong now as it was in 2001 simply seems a bridge too far. Prior to 9/11, al Qaeda was running multiple operations across multiple regions simultaneously. Its agents were traveling the globe regularly and operating very much in the open financially. Their vision of resurrecting the caliphate was a large and difficult one. Achieving that vision required mobilizing the Muslim masses, and this required spectacular attacks.

A spectacular attack is what they carried out -- once. Since then, all the apex leadership has done is issue a seemingly endless string of empty threats, and consequently its credibility is in tatters. No one doubts al Qaeda's desire to strike at the United States as hard and as often as possible, but the lack of activity indicates its capabilities simply do not measure up.

And even if al Qaeda did not have a goal that required regular attacks, we would still doubt the veracity of this report. If an intelligence agency has penetrated an organization sufficiently to be aware of its full capabilities, the last thing the agency would want to disclose is this success. The agency would keep its intelligence secret until it had neutralized the militants. Shouting to the world that it knows what the militants are up to tells the militants they have been penetrated and starts them on the process of going underground and sealing the leak.

Which, of course, raises the question: What is this report actually seeking to accomplish? That depends on who commissioned the report in the first place, and -- considering the size of the U.S. intelligence community -- it could well mean just about anything. A partial list of justifications could include:
an effort to pressure Pakistan into cracking down on al Qaeda for fear that the group is just about ready to launch another attack,
an effort by the U.S. administration to regenerate its political fortunes by reconsolidating national security conservatives under its wing,
a plea for more funding for this or that branch of U.S. security forces,
a general warning to force any militants currently planning attacks to pull back and reassess -- in essence, an effort by intelligence services to disrupt any cells they have been unable to penetrate,
or even an effort by one branch of the government to discredit the efforts of another.

But regardless of which memos are floating about Washington these days, al Qaeda prime itself is not feeling all that confident of late. In his most recent taped release (al Qaeda's attacks have sputtered recently but its multimedia arm is booming), deputy al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri calls on Muslims everywhere to focus their efforts on the jihad in Afghanistan. He does not focus on Iraq, where the fires burn bright, or on Pakistan, where the apex leadership resides.

It appears the Pakistani government is on the verge of finally moving in force against al Qaeda in the country, and a looming U.S.-Iranian rapprochement is making the position of foreign jihadists in Iraq increasingly tenuous. That leaves the movement with only the mountains of Afghanistan for shelter. After all, there is no spot on the globe farther away from what the West might consider friendly shores.[Stratfor]

Al Qaeda After the Red Mosque

Deputy al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri's most recent taped message, which addresses the Red Mosque standoff in Pakistan's capital, contains very telling insights about the situation facing the apex leadership of the transnational jihadist organization, despite being issued before Pakistani security forces overran the mosque/madrassa complex. Now that the mosque operation has ended, having whipped up a great degree of anti-government sentiment, al-Zawahiri can be expected to release a follow-up tape to try to exploit the situation. But even in this initial tape, which was made some time after Red Mosque cult leader Maulana Abdul Aziz was arrested while trying to escape from the facility wearing female robes, al-Zawahiri demonstrates an awareness of the threat to al Qaeda that lies ahead.

As far back as June 2005, we identified that al Qaeda's clandestine global headquarters had relocated to the area comprising the districts of Dir, Malakand and Swat in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) following the ouster of the Taliban regime in neighboring Afghanistan. Being based in Pakistan meant al Qaeda could not go too far in staging attacks in country for fear of attracting unwanted attention. It therefore tried to ensure that jihadist activity in the country did not become a security liability for the apex leadership.

Clearly, a great deal of militant activity within Pakistan is not commissioned by al-Zawahiri, but rather is the handiwork of domestic jihadist actors. Despite several attacks against Western and Pakistani government targets since Islamabad joined the U.S. war against jihadism, the government of Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf refrained from engaging in major action against the Islamist militancy. The Red Mosque crisis, however, forced the Pakistanis to change their attitude. Not only did the government decided to engage in an unprecedented assault against a mosque, but in a July 12 address to the nation Musharraf also announced plans to go after militant groups all over the NWFP and the adjacent tribal badlands.

We forecasted this move, predicting it could prove devastating for al Qaeda prime. Al-Zawahiri is well aware of the potential for such an outcome, which explains his remarks urging Pakistanis to focus on jihadist activity in Afghanistan as opposed to the situation in Pakistan -- which, from al Qaeda's point of view, is hopeless. Al-Zawahiri said, "Muslims of Pakistan ... you must now back the mujahideen in Afghanistan with your persons, wealth, opinion and expertise, because the jihad in Afghanistan is the door to salvation for Afghanistan, Pakistan and the rest of the region. Die honorably in the fields of jihad."

The call to focus on Afghanistan makes sense given the strategic and tactical situation al Qaeda faces. Pakistan has thus far provided the leadership sanctuary, but at the cost of significantly diminishing al Qaeda's operational capability. Furthermore, despite the significant radical Islamist presence within Pakistan, the country poses significant structural impediments to al Qaeda's objectives.

What al Qaeda really needs is the anarchy Afghanistan offers, presenting conditions conducive not only to the group's survival but also to a revival of its operational capabilities. Al Qaeda calculates that, given U.S. problems in Iraq and the disarray among NATO member states, the United States eventually will force the West yet again to abandon Afghanistan. The jihadists would then be able to use Afghanistan again for their purposes. The West is not going to leave Afghanistan anytime soon, but al Qaeda prime, which faces only bad options, will pursue the best one.

Although al Qaeda would love to exploit the anti-government sentiments that have arisen among Pakistanis in the wake of the storming of the Red Mosque, the group probably is bracing for what Stratfor has identified as the beginning of a long-term struggle between the Pakistani state and the jihadist Frankenstein it created over an extended period. While the struggle against the jihadists will be a long engagement, the founders of al Qaeda could get caught in the cross-fire between Islamabad and its former proxies in the not-too-distant future.[Stratfor]

Intelligence Guidance on Al Qaeda

There have been many warnings by the government of potential and impending attacks in the past six years in the United States. None have come to pass. The credibility of these warnings has to be judged on this basis. When you have a source that has consistently claimed knowledge of an impending event of the same class and the event has consistently not occurred -- and this has happened over the course of years -- you have difficulty taking any claim seriously. In fact, according to the craft, given this track record, the best thing to do is rigorously avoid listening to the claim and, well before this point, start looking at the motive for a trail of erroneous calls.

It is always possible that this time the government has better intelligence than before, but that is not the most likely explanation.

Warnings from the government of potential attacks are always suspect for the following reason: If you have penetrated an organization sufficiently that you are aware of its intentions, the last thing you want to give away is that you have penetrated. You keep it secret for exploitation. Your mission is to find and kill the enemy, and telling the world that you know what they are up to tells the enemy that they are penetrated -- it tells them to shut the leak. You do not want that. So in one sense, the administration's latest announcement rests on a dubious pedigree, and in addition, the question has to be asked: Why would an intelligence organization tip off an enemy that it has been penetrated by humint or electronic means? Why warn them that you are on to them? The warning gives away a huge advantage.

From these two facts, it is very difficult to take this seriously. So, since U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff is no fool, we have to look for other reasons:

1. We are attempting to abort a potential and poorly understood operation. We do not really know very much, but there has been chatter about an attack. Since the attackers will not chatter, this is a dubious pedigree, but again, it is one that has to be reacted to. By issuing a nonspecific warning, all potential groups, if they are out there, will hopefully reassess and abort. This is not bad strategy, but it is used only when your intelligence is of a relatively poor quality and not actionable, and you want to put the other side off balance. You do not do this when you have really good penetration.

2. There is currently a collapse in the Bush administration's political position in the Republican Party. A warning like this coincides precisely with such a situation. A warning at this time reminds everyone that the main enemy is out there, and puts those who oppose the Iraq war on the defensive. The administration has used warnings for political purposes in the past, but this particular warning is so blatant it is hard to take seriously.

3. The warning takes place at the same time as events in Pakistan. There is a warning of a reconstituted al Qaeda, the leak of the 2005 incursion, the Red Mosque, and three carrier battle groups are about to be in the region. The warning can be taken as a prelude for military action in Pakistan. Certainly, we have established just cause with the warning.

4. There is a semantic issue. The administration has historically mulched together al Qaeda as a strategic terrorist organization, with al Qaeda as a paramilitary force in Afghanistan and Pakistan. They have also confused Taliban and Al Qaeda. The reconstitution of the Taliban is a known fact. They undoubtedly have extensive paramilitary training facilities. Given past administration usage, these camps (the 10,000 terrorists al Qaeda was training in 2001) could be what they are seeing and the finding is being deliberately used in the way it was in 2001 -- conflating poorly trained Taliban fights with al Qaeda prime.

Finally, please note that if al Qaeda has reconstituted itself in Pakistan, this is an admission of a massive failure in the intelligence community. Given the resources spent to prevent such a reconstitution, the community is saying it has again been out-thought and outmaneuvered by al Qaeda. It has managed to rebuild in spite of the intense operations conducted to stop it from doing so. Not only have we not captured Osama bin Laden, but we have not even been able to interfere with al Qaeda's activities. Interestingly, the government seems to be saying that we have penetrated the organization well enough to know its status, but were impotent to have prevented its moves.

Given the government's track record and its warning, it is difficult to take this seriously. If the government indeed had deeply penetrated al Qaeda, announcing it publicly would make no sense, when no meaningful defensive measures could be taken and it would undermine the penetration. In addition, the claim of knowledge coupled with the admission of impotence makes no sense.

It could be that this warning should be taken more seriously than prior warnings that never amounted to anything. But we have been at this for six years, with prior warnings about actions in the continental United States that never came to fruition. Six years is a long time to generate false positives. But they have done this much. For the moment, the conversation has shifted from Iraq to al Qaeda. And if something does happen -- and who knows? It may -- the government has protected itself. If nothing happens, it will be forgotten. We know there have been no attacks in the United States since Sept. 11. We know there have been numerous alerts. It would be interesting for pure academic reasons to count the number.[Stratfor]

Stratfor: Red Mosque Fallout Could Derail Election Schedule

2007-07-11T13:25:00.000+05:30

Stratfor on Red Mosque fallout.

The much-anticipated Red Mosque operation in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Monday was in its final stages. Security forces were cleaning up and trying to fully secure the mosque/madrassa complex. Intense fighting between security forces and the militants lasted about four hours. At least 40 militants and roughly six security personnel reportedly were killed. Dozens were wounded on both sides, and some 50 militants were arrested. As of the writing of this piece, however, there is not much information on the fate of the women and children the militants were holding hostage.

After the dust settles and more information becomes available regarding casualties and damage to the mosque, Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's government likely will face the wrath of radical and Islamist militant forces in the country. This likely will involve a significant wave of attacks against government, military and Western targets throughout the country. There also could be assassination attempts against Musharraf and other key government and military officials.

Meanwhile, there already are indications that the government is going to engage in anti-terrorism and counterinsurgency operations elsewhere, especially in the North-West Frontier Province and Federally Administered Tribal Areas. A militant reaction to the Red Mosque operation or a sweeping government action against jihadist forces -- or both -- is likely to lead to significant violence and unrest. The United States likely will be watching the situation closely and will be ready to act should the situation arise. In such a situation the government could move to impose some form of emergency rule.

The imposition of emergency rule could allow the government to get a handle on the militancy in the country and even lead to the capture or elimination of al Qaeda-related high-value targets -- albeit after a long and bloody campaign. But it would further complicate the political situation because the parliamentary and presidential elections slated for the fall would have to be postponed. This could create political unrest in addition to a militant insurgency.

Even if Musharraf decides against imposing emergency rule, the fallout from the Red Mosque operation could still cause a delay in the elections. At the very least, parliament could be dismissed, which would allow Musharraf to continue as a president leading a caretaker government for some time before new elections could be held. But this will only allow him a limited amount of time to conclude ongoing back-channel talks with his political opponents to secure his own political future.

In the wake of the Red Mosque operation, Musharraf will need not just the support of the Pakistan People's Party, whose secular ideology he shares, he also will need the support of some of the more pragmatic Islamist elements to help counter extremists and militants. Here is where Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam -- the largest component party of the Islamist coalition Mutahiddah Majlis-i-Amal -- could play a role.

But this depends on whether the president will be able to press ahead with the elections and deal with the militancy at the same time. Musharraf no longer has the luxury of dealing with them separately.[Stratfor]

The Many Faces of Al Qaeda

2007-07-11T12:45:00.000+05:30

Here is another excellent article from Stratfor’s Peter Zeihan on Al Qaeda. It also looks at the core Al Qaeda’s possible Armageddon battle.

With all the talk about al Qaeda "leaders," al Qaeda "factions" and militants with "links" to al Qaeda, it is useful to take a step back and clarify precisely what al Qaeda actually is. Al Qaeda is a small core group of people who share strategic and operational characteristics that set them apart from all other militants -- Islamist or otherwise -- the world over. All signs indicate this group is no longer functional and cannot be replicated. Whether or not Osama bin Laden is still alive, al Qaeda as it once was is dead.

Strategically, these men envisioned a world in which the caliphate would rise anew as a consequence of events they would set into motion. The chief obstacle to this goal was not the United States but the panoply of secular, corrupt governments of the Middle East. Al Qaeda knew its limited numbers precluded it from defeating these governments, so it sought to provoke the Muslim masses into overthrowing them. Al Qaeda also knew it lacked the strength to do this provoking by itself so it sought to trick someone more powerful into doing it.

By al Qaeda's logic, an attack of sufficient force against the Americans would lure the United States to slam sideways into the Middle East on a mission of revenge, leading to direct and deep U.S. collaboration with those same secular, corrupt local governments. Al Qaeda's hope was that such collaboration with the Americans would lead to outrage -- and outrage would lead to revolution. Note that the 9/11 attacks were not al Qaeda's first attempt to light this flame. The 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings and the 2000 USS Cole bombing were also the work of this same al Qaeda cell, but the attacks lacked the strength to trigger what al Qaeda thought of as a sufficient U.S. response.

The Real Difference

But al Qaeda is hardly the first militant group to think big. What really set al Qaeda apart was its second characteristic -- its ability to evade detection. That ability was part and parcel of the way in which al Qaeda formed. Al Qaeda's roots are not merely within the various militant groups of the Arab Middle East but deep within the geopolitical struggles of the Cold War. Many of the mujahideen who relocated to Afghanistan to resist the Soviet invasion found themselves recruited and funded by Saudi intelligence, equipped and tasked by U.S. intelligence and managed and organized by Pakistani intelligence.

This exposure not only leveraged the Afghan resistance's paramilitary capabilities but also gave the mujahideen a deep appreciation for, and understanding of, the strengths and weaknesses of the U.S. and Soviet intelligence systems. When the Cold War ended, some of those mujahideen reconstituted their efforts into what came to be known as al Qaeda, and those deep understandings became part of the organization's bedrock.

Such knowledge enables al Qaeda to operate beneath the radar of nearly all intelligence agencies. It knows how those agencies collect and analyze intelligence, where the blind spots are and, most important, how long it takes for an agency to turn raw information into actionable intelligence.

This characteristic is al Qaeda's greatest asset. Al Qaeda's standards of operation assume that intelligence agencies are always waiting and watching, and only al Qaeda's understanding of those operations keeps the "base" from being busted. Operational security -- not operational success -- is al Qaeda's paramount concern; its attacks are meticulously planned, fantastic in scope and sacrificed in a heartbeat if the leadership suspects a breach in security. This makes al Qaeda nearly impossible to track.

It also means that al Qaeda, by necessity, is a very small, close-knit group. The organization's core -- or the apex leadership, as we often call it -- consists of little more than Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and a double handful of trusted, heavily vetted relationships stretching back more than a decade. Disposable operatives with minimal training can be picked up for specific missions, but these people cannot do anything very complex (such as infiltrate a foreign country and hijack a civilian airliner).

Replacement of lost assets within this small group is negligible due to security concerns. Ultimately, the same security protocols that empowered al Qaeda to be a player of strategic scope are what removed al Qaeda from the chessboard.

Once the CIA and its affiliated allies named al Qaeda public enemy No. 1, al Qaeda's security instincts became its greatest liability. The rapid U.S. invasion of Afghanistan caught al Qaeda off guard -- the group had assumed it would have months of U.S. pre-mission staging before the invasion, a lesson it learned from watching the first Gulf War. The quick U.S. response meant al Qaeda was forced to go into hiding before it had fully secured redundant communication, funding and travel routes. Intelligence agency efforts to penetrate al Qaeda forced the group to constrict information flow, limit financial transfers, reduce recruiting and abandon operations. Once the United States succeeded in co-opting Saudi assistance against al Qaeda in 2003 -- something brought about both by a U.S. presence in Iraq and al Qaeda's own efforts to destabilize its ideological homeland -- al Qaeda's star stopped falling and started plummeting.

Al Qaeda has not only failed in its attempts to trigger region-wide uprisings against the Middle East's secular governments, it has also lost the ability to launch strategically meaningful attacks -- that is, attacks resulting in policy shifts by its targets. Al Qaeda can operate to a certain degree in regions where it has allies, many of whom flowed through its training camps in the 1990s, but the ability of the group that planned the 9/11 attacks to operate beyond the Middle East and South Asia seems to have disappeared. Attrition after years of confrontation with the Americans, coupled with self-imposed isolation, has rendered al Qaeda useless as a strategic actor. Not only is its ability to provide command and control nonexistent, but its self-enforced invisibility and inactivity have undermined its credibility.

Furthermore, al Qaeda has left no one truly capable of taking up its mantle. The training camps in the 1990s processed hundreds of would-be jihadists, but the quality of that training for the rank and file has been exaggerated. Most of it was a combination of poor conventional combat training and ideological indoctrination. Hence, most "veterans" of those camps have neither access to the core al Qaeda leadership nor the operational security or tactical training that would allow them to reconstitute a new elite core. They are no more members of the real "al Qaeda" than today's skinheads are members of the real Nazi party.

By the only criterion that matters -- successful attacks -- al Qaeda has slipped from readjusting global priorities (9/11) to contributing to the change in government of a middling U.S. ally (the March 2003 Spain attacks) to affecting nothing (the 2005 London bombings). No attacks since can be meaningfully linked to al Qaeda's control, or even its specific foreknown blessing. Al Qaeda had hoped for a conflagration of outrage that would sweep away the Middle East's political order; it only managed to raise a few sparks here and there, and now it is a prisoner of its own security.

Yet, public discussion of all things "al Qaeda," far from fading, has reached a fever pitch. But this talk -- all of it -- is about a fundamentally different beast.

Enter Al Qaeda the Franchise

It all started with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who put himself forward as the leader of the Iraqi node of al Qaeda in 2004. While one can argue that al-Zarqawi might have been through an al Qaeda training camp or shared many of bin Laden's ideological goals, no one seriously asserts he had the training, vetting or face time with bin Laden to qualify as an inner member of the al Qaeda leadership. He was a local leader of a local militant group who claimed an association with al Qaeda as a matter of establishing local gravitas and international credibility. Other groups, such as Southeast Asia's Jemaah Islamiyah, had associations with al Qaeda long before al-Zarqawi, but al-Zarqawi was the first to claim the name "al Qaeda" as his own.

For al Qaeda, prevented by its security concerns from engaging in its own attacks, repudiating al-Zarqawi would make the "base" come across as both impotent and out of touch. Accepting "association" with al-Zarqawi was the obvious choice, and bin Laden went so far as to issue an audio communique anointing al-Zarqawi as al Qaeda's point man in Iraq.

Others have also embraced the al-Zarqawi/al Qaeda association, as dubious as it was. Al Qaeda's operational security protocols -- and its ongoing presence just beyond the United States' reach in northwestern Pakistan -- meant that destroying al Qaeda (the real al Qaeda) was at best a difficult prospect. But al-Zarqawi was local and active and clearly valued launching attacks over maintaining hermetically sealed security. Al-Zarqawi could be brought down. And just as al-Zarqawi's "association" with al Qaeda increased his street cred with the Arab world, that "association" also increased his value to the U.S. military as a target. Taking down an "al Qaeda-linked terrorist" was much better for purposes of public relations and funding than taking down any random militant. The media, of course, stand ready to help; reporting on a militant with direct connections to bin Laden is sexy -- even if that connection was only catching a glimpse of Big "O" walking by during breakfast.

The result has been the formation of an odd iron triangle among an al Qaeda desperate for relevance, local jihadists seeking a fast track to importance and Western intelligence and law enforcement seeking credibility and funding. In the common lexicon, al Qaeda is no longer that core of highly trained and motivated individuals who tried to change the world by bringing down the World Trade Center, but a do-it-yourself jihadist franchise that almost anyone can join. Some nodes are copycats who look to the real al Qaeda for inspiration; others are existing militant groups -- such as Algeria's Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, now called the al Qaeda Organization for the Countries of the Arab Maghreb -- that can identify with their ideological brethren. But few to none have any real connections to al Qaeda.

Violence is certain to continue, but the lack of meaningful attacks in the West in general and the United States in particular suggests al Qaeda's degraded capacity and the West's improved security have minimized the chances of a geopolitically significant attack for the next several years.

This does not mean would-be "al Qaeda" groups are not dangerous, or that the "war on terror" is anywhere near over. While some of the would-be al Qaeda groups almost seem comical, others are competent militants in their own right -- with al-Zarqawi perhaps being the most lethal example. Their numbers are also growing. The ongoing war in Iraq has provided potential militants across the Islamic world with the motive to do something and the opportunity to gain some serious on-the-job training. Just as Soviet operations in Afghanistan created a training ground for a generation of Middle Eastern militants in the 1980s and 1990s, the Iraq war is in part a crucible for the next generation of Arab militants. Add in al Qaeda's offer of open association and we will be hearing from dozens of "al Qaedas" in the years to come.

Luckily, links between these new groups and their erstwhile sponsor are limited mostly to rhetoric. There might be a few thousand people out there claiming to be al Qaeda members, but the real al Qaeda does not exercise any control over them. They are not coordinated in their operations or even working toward a common goal. And while many of these new al Qaedas might be competent militant groups, they lack the combination of strategic vision and obsession with security that ultimately allowed the original al Qaeda to move mountains.

Top it off with terminology buy-in from Western intelligence, law enforcement and the media and the result is a war literally without end; the definition of al Qaeda is stretched by nearly any player to fit nearly any political need. The United States is now waging a war against jihadism as a phenomenon, rather than against any specific transnational jihadist movement.

Back to Square One?

The political situation in Pakistan has long imposed an unstable stasis on what many feel should have been the real focus of the war on terror all along. Since escaping from Afghanistan in 2001, the true al Qaeda has spent most of its time taking refuge in northwestern Pakistan, where a mix of political complications and ethnic and tribal allegiances have allowed it to stay out of harm's way.

The United States has been aware of al Qaeda's presence there, but ultimately has not attacked for three reasons. First, al Qaeda's internal security protocols forced the organization to isolate itself. During a time when the United States had a great many fish to fry, al Qaeda seemed to have put itself into lockdown; it was issuing videos, not starting wars like Hezbollah or reconstituting like the Taliban. Second, while U.S. intelligence knows the region in which al Qaeda resides, it has never gotten enough detail to allow for airstrikes to take care of business. Such not-quite-there intelligence has always been just diffuse enough to necessitate boots on the ground -- and raise the specter of a disastrously botched and politically problematic military operation.

Which brings us to the third and, in many ways, most important reason for leaving al Qaeda alone. The United States felt it could not risk an assault for fear of political fallout. Ultimately, the United States needs Pakistani cooperation to wage war in Afghanistan -- after all, Pakistan has the only easily traversable land border with the landlocked country -- and support for radical Islam runs deep in both Pakistani society and government. So, yes, U.S. attacks against militant sites located on Pakistani soil happen all the time, but they are small pinprick operations. Any large attack could not be disavowed and, therefore, could result in the fall of the very Pakistani government that makes the hotter parts of the war on terror possible.

Back in 2005, the United States believed it had credible intelligence about a planned meeting of the core al Qaeda leadership in northwestern Pakistan. A strike force of several hundred to several thousand was assembled in order to punch through the Pakistani tribes hiding and shielding bin Laden and his allies, but the strike was ultimately abandoned because then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld felt the operation could not be kept quiet. It is one thing when Pakistanis think there are a few Americans running over the border to do something tactical. It is quite another when Pakistanis know that several thousand Americans with heavy air support are surging across to do something strategic. The U.S. might have been able to take out its target, but probably not without losing a critical ally.

Details of this attack plan were leaked July 8 to The New York Times. For us at Stratfor, news of the plans was nothing new. It made perfect sense that this plan, and likely dozens of others like it, were at various times in the works stretching back as far as 2003 (and we have noted such on numerous occasions). What caught our attention was the timing of The New York Times article. The United States has been eyeing northwestern Pakistan for years. Why draw attention to that fact now?

The United States' core fear in 2005 was that the Pakistani government would destabilize. Well, in 2007, the Pakistani government is horrendously unstable. On July 10, Islamabad launched a multi-hour raid replete with Branch Davidian overtones against the Red Mosque complex and a gathering of radical (some would say mentally unhinged) Islamists challenging the government's writ. Be worried when the government of an Islamic republic feels it must take such action. Be doubly worried when the government taking the action already seems to be in its death throes.

Previous efforts by Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to strengthen his political grip on the country by firing the chief justice rebounded on him so severely that he cannot even depend upon his oldest allies. Various political, military and cultural power centers are sniping at the president, making their own independent and often contradictory demands. There are also hints that Musharraf's faculties are beginning to crack. The government -- as well as the president -- is now teetering on the edge of oblivion, facing an unsavory menu of crushing compromise with one force or another to stay in power in name, and risking the turbulent waters of emergency rule over an increasingly hostile population.

If the threat of a government fall was the only thing holding Washington back in 2005, and now that the fall is imminent through no action of the United States, what does Washington have to gain from restraining itself any further?

This is more than a rhetorical question. The relative inactivity of al Qaeda these past six years, as well as the political situation in Pakistan, has imposed a shaky equilibrium on the issue. Al Qaeda's security protocols curtail al Qaeda's threat level, and that has allowed the United States to shelve the issue for another day. Meanwhile, the instability of Musharraf's government limits the United States' ability to pressure Islamabad over the issue of al Qaeda. Consequently, al Qaeda has been more or less hiding in plain sight.

Alter any aspect of this scenario -- in this case, drastically increase the tottering of the Musharraf government -- and the "stability" of the other pieces immediately breaks and the United States is forced to surge assets into Pakistan.

Washington has to assume that an al Qaeda anywhere but Pakistan is an al Qaeda that will act with less conservatism. By the American logic, al Qaeda assets in Saudi Arabia, long drilled that security is paramount, would naturally doubt that a telegram from bin Laden ordering a new attack is genuine -- but they would certainly believe bin Laden himself should he show up at their door. By al Qaeda's logic, Musharraf's fall would force al Qaeda to relocate from Pakistan because the group would have to assume that the Americans would be coming.

Which means the odd stasis in the war on terror these past six years could be about to loosen up, and a front that has proven oddly cold might be about to catch fire.[Stratfor]

This Stratfor article on Al Qaeda is from an American perspective. From this we in India can get an insight into the way Pakistan’s ISI manages its terror jihad against India. Pakistan has clearly taken portions from Al Qaeda’s terror handbook (or is it other way round that ISI’s terror manual is Al Qaeda’s guidebook?) and has put it to work in India and the results are horrendously spectacular. So much so that today, after every terror attack, the investigations usually arrive at dead ends.

One thing that is clear from this article is that we Indians have more to fear from ISI instigated terrorism than from the main Al Qaeda. But actually, there is no difference between the two - what with ISI’s terror wings in India like LeT, JM, HM all being members of Al Qaeda’s Int’nl terror org.

Cartoon Speak: Eighth Wonder of the World

2007-07-10T11:01:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: The Hindu

Stratfor: Plotters' Al Qaeda Links Not Likely

2007-07-10T10:55:00.000+05:30

Stratfor on why the London and Glasgow terror perpetrators wouldn't have met anyone from the core Al Qaeda leadership and why it is important to link the botched attacks to Al Qaeda.

British media reported July 9 that Kafeel Ahmed, one of the two men in the sport utility vehicle that rammed into a passenger terminal at Glasgow International Airport on June 30, had ties to a "senior al Qaeda" leader. Ahmed, who was severely burned in the attempted attack and remains hospitalized, is believed to have once associated with Abbas Boutrab, an Algeria-born man arrested in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in 2003 and sentenced to six years in prison for plotting to blow up an airliner. The men reportedly met in Belfast while Ahmed was studying engineering.

British media also reported that at least one individual connected to the London and Glasgow plots traveled to Pakistan and met with al Qaeda leaders. U.S. officials have repeated the claims reported in British media that SO15, Scotland Yard's counterterrorism command, uncovered evidence that at least one of the suspects communicated with militant leaders in Iraq.

Though Ahmed could have crossed paths with another amateur jihadist, it is very unlikely that he -- or any other participants in the botched attacks in Glasgow and London in June -- would have been able to meet with anyone who is actually part of al Qaeda's core leadership. However, linking the sloppy attempts at militant attacks in the United Kingdom to al Qaeda helps authorities remind the public of the threat of similar attacks and show that al Qaeda's operational capacity actually has declined.

Several things indicate that the London and Glasgow plotters were not tied to any significant element of al Qaeda's leadership. First, for its own security, al Qaeda's core leadership remains extremely isolated, taking refuge in the remote areas of the Afghan-Pakistani border region. Al Qaeda's leaders limit their contact with the outside world to the extreme minimum. If any of the plotters did meet with al Qaeda members, these members likely were lower-level field operatives who are not in direct contact with the apex leadership. Western intelligence officials believe that after the Taliban regime's ouster in Afghanistan in 2001, al Qaeda's leadership regrouped in the Afghan-Pakistani border region. Though jihadists certainly operate in the area, some intelligence officials and the media use the term "al Qaeda leader" very liberally, since locals and visitors alike in the border region tend to think every armed Pashtun is with the Taliban and every armed non-Pashtun is with al Qaeda.

Another indication is the amateurish nature of the attempted attacks. Any operation sanctioned by the core -- or even the second or tertiary tiers -- of al Qaeda's leadership would probably display more thoughtfulness and skill than the London and Glasgow incidents showed. The attacks' complete failures, combined with the speed with which British authorities detained individuals connected to the attacks, indicate poor planning. Even the July 7, 2005, London Underground bombers -- some of whom trained in jihadist camps and pulled off a very successful attack -- did not meet with anyone close to al Qaeda's core leadership.

Some of the plotters could have gained access to militant facilities and individuals in the Afghan-Pakistani border region. Some British citizens of Pakistani origin -- former members of the now-defunct London-based al-Muhajiroun organization -- relocated to Pakistan around the time of the 9/11 attacks and set up a conduit to funnel British Muslim youth to training camps operated by Taliban and al Qaeda elements. These former al-Muhajiroun members went offline after the arrests of several operatives who used this conduit and the London Underground bombings spawned a worldwide counterterrorism dragnet. However, the conduit could still be operational (though limited). Even if the London and Glasgow plotters used this channel to gain access to militants and their facilities, those militants would not necessarily be al Qaeda or Taliban members, as there are plenty of local Pakistani militants in the Afghan-Pakistani border region.

The al Qaeda link story will be allowed to proliferate among the media. Governments have an interest in linking even amateurish militant operations to al Qaeda because the name itself is instantly recognizable and associated with major jihadist attacks. This keeps anti-terrorism issues high on the public agenda, which can increase overall vigilance and helps various government intelligence and law enforcement agencies when budgets are being drawn up. Additionally, by allowing the botched attacks in the United Kingdom to be associated with al Qaeda, Western governments can emphasize to the Islamic world just how far al Qaeda has declined from the days when it was able to plan and execute spectacular attacks.[Stratfor]

The War Between Pakistan and its Ex-Proxies

2007-07-09T13:13:00.003+05:30

Stratfor asks some questions on the type of people holed up at Lal Masjid and looks what this means for Pakistan on the security front.

After days of avoiding an all-out assault on the mosque/madrassa complex, Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf reportedly has issued orders to storm the Pakistani capital of Islamabad's Red Mosque. The government also has claimed that the Islamist militants holed up in the mosque include both wanted hard-core Pakistani jihadists as well as foreign fighters -- mostly Arabs -- affiliated with al Qaeda. The six-day security operation to dislodge Islamist militants from the Red Mosque thus appears to have entered a decisive stage.

The government's new claims may have some merit to them, thus warranting an examination of the facts associated with the operation. The Pakistanis, fearing possible public backlash in an already-charged political atmosphere, have up till now avoided taking the facility by force. Nonetheless, the government has brought in some of its best security units to flush the militants from the mosque. These include the army's 111th Brigade, its Special Services Group (SSG) commando force, the 9th Wing of the Rangers paramilitary force, and the elite anti-terrorism squad of Punjab Police.

Despite being up against some 12,000 well-trained, professional and heavily armed security personnel, the militants inside the Red Mosque have managed to hold their ground. They have managed to survive several days of intense bombardment in the form of shelling and gunfire. Moreover, they have managed to kill a commander of the SSG (a lieutenant colonel) during one operation Friday night.

All of this does not appear to be the work of mere seminary students who are followers of the rogue mullahs running the Red Mosque, perhaps boasting only a little experience handling an AK-47. Radical seminary students do not possess the skills to strategize -- let alone hold off -- a superior force. Holding out in the face of insurmountable odds demands a certain level of nerves as well.

The leaders of the resistance in the mosque probably are battle-hardened jihadists, not a mere ragtag band of seminarian zealots, which raises a number of questions. How did these elements establish themselves in a major mosque in the South Asian country's capital, just a few miles from the city's diplomatic enclave, key government institutions, --- and above all, the headquarters of the country's premier spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate? How were the fighters able to procure the weapons and other supplies needed to sustain such a standoff without setting off alarms? Why are the militants able to make back-channel contacts with some key top officials even after the government has made it clear the fighters must surrender unconditionally?

The answers to such questions are not readily available, but the questions themselves bolster claims that the Pakistani state, especially its military and intelligence agencies, are significantly infiltrated by jihadist elements. This has directly resulted from the army's past practice of employing Islamist militant actors to pursue its domestic and foreign policy objectives.

Pakistani media reported July 7 that a close relative of the mullahs controlling the Red Mosque is the driver for Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao, as he was for the minister's two predecessors in office. Meanwhile, the bodyguard of the deputy leader is an employee of the National Crisis Management Cell, led by retired Director-General Brig. Javed Iqbal Cheema -- who is also the Interior Ministry's spokesman.

Consequently, these militants are not just challenging the writ of the state, they enjoy a significant number of sympathizers both within the government and the wider society. The military leadership led by Musharraf may have embarked upon a strategic shift as far as the role of Islam in state and society is concerned, but clearly a large number of people both inside and outside the government do not subscribe to his philosophy of "enlightened moderation."

Though radical Islamist forces constitute a minority, they constitute a significant one. And while the vast majority of Pakistanis do not support jihadists, they do not necessarily support Musharraf's agenda either. Overall, Pakistan lacks a national consensus regarding Islam's role in public affairs, something extremist and radical forces are exploiting to their advantage.

Therefore, the Red Mosque operation does not amount to a one-off event. Rather, it is likely the beginning of a long confrontation between the state and radical/militant Islamist forces. Such a clash will involve military operations in areas like the North-West Frontier Province and Federally Administered Tribal Areas, as well as nationwide social unrest.[Stratfor]

Emoticons and You

2007-07-05T15:15:00.000+05:30

It is 25 years since emoticons or smilies made their debut and Yahoo! came out with this survey.

People in the age group 19-25 are the most smitten by emoticons, with about 68 per cent using smileys daily, a survey by online portal Yahoo! revealed.

.... Emoticons changed the way emails were perceived in the early years.

......

However, its not just the younger generation embracing emoticons. Nearly 48 per cent of users over 50 use emoticons in their everyday communication.

The Yahoo! survey further indicates that 82 per cent of Yahoo Messenger subscribers use emoticons while chatting. The perception though is that emoticons are used more by women. Men, said the survey, are more prone to use instant messengers and emoticons to fire someone (14 per cent) versus women (11 per cent).

The majority of survey respondents said they best express themselves in IM using emoticons. Nearly two-thirds (61 per cent) rely on emoticons to best express their feelings, while 17 per cent on internet slang (i.e. LOL, GR8) and 13 per cent on photo-sharing.[B-S]

Cartoon Speak: Playing With Letters

2007-07-05T11:45:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: Indian Express

Courtesy: The Hindu

Cartoon Speak: "Commie-cal" Ethics

2007-07-02T20:51:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: Indian Express

Reality Hits MSM

2007-06-30T15:29:00.000+05:30

Has the MSM realised that their exclusive dominance of the news dissemination field is over?

When senior ministers of the government said that the “President is not elected through SMS campaign, “ they were dismissing SMS and blogs as tools of a participatory democracy...

Mr Dasmunsi’s comments were made in the light of the campaign carried in the electronic media about the desirability of a second term for President Kalam. And while he was technically correct in dismissing the role that people and hence their SMS and blogs had to play in electing the President, the fact is that in being dismissive the ministers revealed a certain lack of understanding of the power of this new medium.

It could be argued that internet penetration in India is low, at the end of May, there were 2.46 million broadband connections in the country. Even if all landline connections — at the end of May there were 40.26 million connections — were to be treated as potential dial up internet connections, penetration of the internet is rather low. When it comes to wireless phones, to determine the catchment area for SMS campaigns, there are 177.79 million subscribers. At the end of May, India had a teledensity of 19.26, that is for every hundred persons only 19.26 had a physical phone, which could be a cellular or a landline phone.

It could be this low penetration of telephones as well as a negative growth pattern for broadband subscribers that could have made the ministers dismiss the importance of the SMS and blog campaign for President Kalam. But the power of this medium lies not in its numerical strength but in the momentum it creates.

........

.....the SMS campaign for Kalam, or the blogs on Pratibha Patil’s suitability as president help form a certain kind of opinion. The SMS campaign for President Kalam showed overwhelming support for the idea of a second term for him. The message that seemed to go out was that the government was willing to turn a deaf ear to the voice of the people. It didn’t matter that the voice of the people represented through the SMS campaign was not representative of the electorate. So when ministers dismiss the SMS polls, they reinforces the feeling of a lack of understanding of the power shift to the new media.

Blogs and SMS, limited as they may be in there spread, seem to have democratised opinion making. Blogs about Pratibha Patil’s credentials or alleged lack thereof, gives rise to discussions all of which centre on the credentials of those who supported her candidature. [ET]

So, the Main Stream Media (MSM) have at last realised the power of Web 2.0 and that the days of its domination is over or soon to be over. Now we hope confrontational articles deriding Bloggers from MSM journalists will wane and a new beginning of cooperation between the MSM and Web 2.0 will start.

If the MSM and Web 2.0 can join hands, then the power of the new and old mediums can be put to better use of making our country a better place for all of us.

The Paradise Called "Azad Kashmir"

2007-06-29T09:51:00.000+05:30

There are many in Jammu Kashmir who still today believe the other side of the LoC i.e. in “Azad Kashmir” controlled by an Islamic Pakistan offers Muslims better life than J&K “controlled” by an ‘Infidel’ India. However, after the establishment of bus links between the two parts of J&K, this notion is fast falling apart.

In J&K, Gurjjars make up the third-largest ethnic group — after Kashmiri-speaking Muslims and Dogra Hindus. Over the years, they have emerged as a significant political entity in J&K, wielding considerable electoral influence in a quarter of the constituencies. Since the early 1990s, the group’s inclusion in the list of Scheduled Tribes has led to a significant improvement in its socio-economic profile, and now it is demanding political reservations as well.

The Partition of 1947 saw the division of the Pir Panchal region — the traditional Gurjjar heartland. This led, in turn, to the separation of lakhs of [Muslim] Gurjjar families...

Given the close ties that exist between the Gurjjars on both sides of the border, the troubles and fortunes of families and friends across the border have long been a subject of keen interest to the community. With the re-establishment of contact between J&K and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (POK) by way of the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad and Poonch-Rawalakot bus links, there was suddenly an opportunity to find out about how relatives across the border were faring.

As it turned out, many Gurjjar families in POK were found to be living in difficult conditions, and the community itself was on the verge of losing its identity. As those who came across to J&K from POK put it, the symbols of Gurjjar culture — its folk songs and music, traditions and age-old rituals — which are still visible in J&K, are missing on the other side. The majority of Gurjjars in POK seem to have forgotten the life of dhoks and mergs — the high-alpine meadows to which Gurjjar communities traditionally moved during the summer, and which are such an essential part of the Gurjjar heritage.

One of the reasons why Gurjjar traditions were better preserved in J&K was the fact that the community enjoyed special privileges guaranteed under the tribal quota. No such legislation exists in Pakistan. In POK, it is said, nobody dares to speak Gojri in the bazaars and at public functions. In contrast, the J&K Cultural Academy regularly publishes books in Gojri, while NGOs such as Gurjjar Desh Charitable Trust and Gojri Anjumans are also working to preserve the language. There are even local radio programmes in Gojri. In fact, those who do write in Gojri in POK — like Rana Fazal Rajourivi — have to get their books published through the J&K Cultural Academy.

... Abdul Latief, an elderly Gurjjar from Bandi Abasspur in POK, who had come to visit his relatives in the village of Kalai in Poonch, attributed the dilution of his community’s ethnic, cultural and linguistic identity in Pakistan to state-sponsored marginalisation. “Our economic condition is vulnerable,” Latief says. “We are mostly illiterate and work as land-tillers on other people’s farms, or as shepherds.”...

If this does not happen, the Gurjjars of POK may soon face extinction in a region that was part of their traditional homeland.[IE]

India’s Next President: Mrs. Pratibha “Notorious” Patil?

2007-06-27T17:19:00.000+05:30

It was an idea whose time should have been much earlier in a Parliamentary Democracy’s life. Albeit late in the day, that someone thought of nominating a woman for the largely ceremonial post of India’s President only in the sixtieth year of Independence would nevertheless have been a welcome decision.

But the muck that is being thrown on the UPA presidential candidate on a daily basis and the amount of that sticking to her has definitely crossed the threshold limit. So much so that Mrs. Pratibha Patil has gone from “Mrs. Who” to “Mrs. Notorious” in a matter of days.

Sonia may have silenced the Left with her ‘masterstroke’ of nominating Mrs. Pratibha Patil, a virtual unknown, out of the blue as its nominee for the President’s post but can she silence the public who now demand answers from UPA on the credibility of their Presidential candidate?

In the sixtieth year of Independence, India surely doesn’t need a scam-tainted notorious lady as President. Such a woman can never be a role model to Indian women and definitely hasn't anything to do with women’s empowerment. Out with her!

India's Own String of Pearls Around China

2007-06-25T20:57:00.000+05:30

China’s official statements on Arunachal Pradesh and the larger border dispute since late last year clearly indicate a conscious change in China’s policy towards India. China, which used to have border disputes with almost all its neighbours, has settled it amicably with the sole exception of India.

China’s strategy towards India on the border and territorial dispute was clear for some time now – delay the settlement till China can negotiate it from a position of considerable military and economic strength. China pinned its hopes on the economic reforms, which it started in the 1970s to make it economically, militarily and politically strong vis-à-vis India. All of a sudden in the early 1990s circumstances forced India too to embark on the economic reforms route. This, China was never able to foresee and today an India growing at 9% has upset China’s calculations.

China, realising what economic reforms can do to a nation, embarked on its contain India strategy. China got down to its business of encircling India with its strategic string of pearls, which are pressure points to make India uneasy and vulnerable. The results have been fantastic as far as China is concerned; what with India’s supposed allies like Maldives, Seychelles, Sri Lanka, etc joining the party.

As India found herself at the world’s high table as a consequence of her unprecedented economic growth and post cold war geopolitical realties, China’s strategy of playing for time failed miserably. Today India is an Asian ally of USA and rapidly getting economically and militarily closer to it. This has clearly rattled the Chinese and IMHO exactly because of this we are hearing those noises from China on the border and territorial dispute.

B. Raman, however, is of the view that China wants to settle the Tibet issue after the death of the present Dalai Lama by incorporating Tawang or possibly the whole of Arunachal Pradesh in to China Occupied Tibet by any means including another war if necessary.

Now the question is what should be India’s response to an increasingly belligerent China?

On the one hand China wants the trade relation, because it is heavily tilted in its favour to continue and grow further but also wants to have a multi-faceted relation covering all spheres with India. And on the other hand it wants to settle the border and territorial dispute in its favour, on its terms and at a time of it’s choosing. By its string of pearls strategy China wants to confine India to the subcontinent by making it feel strangled and thus vulnerable.

India too has an interest in continuing and boosting the trade relation with China particularly if India’s export share of value added products increases. But that definitely shouldn’t undermine India’s interests or its territorial integrity. If anything that is clear from China’s policies or official statements is that it doesn’t want to do anything that will disrupt its “peaceful” growth. This means China surely can get belligerent but will not be stupid enough to get into a full-scale war to settle the border dispute when it knows unlike in 1962, today, India can hit back hard.

If one studies the geopolitical situation in the subcontinent and the belligerent noises emanating from China, then it is time for India to stop being pusillanimous in its relation with China. In other words, it is time to reciprocate China’s policy of encirclement. Some joint Naval exercises and some security meetings between India, USA and allies have rattled the Chinese like anything. So how much more will China be rattled if India replicates its version of string of pearls around China?

China’s Achilles Heels

To fuel it’s voracious growth, China is signing up oil, gas, and minerals deals of all kinds around the world. From South America to Australia, from Central Asia to Africa, the Chinese are rummaging for stuff to keep their country running. Signing up deals is the easy part but getting it to their country is the difficult part.

China and Pakistan have lined up ambitious plans for their growth. Pakistan hopes to benefit financially and economically from being a trade and energy corridor to the Central Asian Republics and China. China, which is building the Gwadar port in Pakistan, hopes to lay oil and gas pipelines to route crude and gas from the Persian Gulf and Africa to China through Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (POK). Not only this, for China the shortest route to transport raw materials it plunders from the African continent to the mainland will be via the soon to be laid all-weather Karakoram Highway. A rail link is also planned.

The Karakoram Highway that connects Pakistan with China passes through the Khunjerab Pass in POK. If what Pakistan and China have planned for themselves - by exploiting India’s legitimate territory - comes to fruition, then the Karakoram Highway, the pipelines, the rail link all well could become China’s Achilles heel. In other words, destruction of these economic links will make China highly vulnerable. This is an important pressure point India can exploit to make China feel the pressure. The strategy of targeting this vital economic corridor of China should be on two fronts. One, from Jammu and Kashmir and the other from the Wakhan Corridor in Afghanistan, which is nearer to the Karakoram Highway. To get access to Wakhan Corridor and establish a military outpost there, it would take India’s best diplomatic efforts in cajoling Afghanistan to grant it. One way of getting access is on the pretext of building roads that benefit Afghanistan in the Wakhan Corridor.

One of the reasons China is keen on routing oil and gas from Gulf and Africa through PoK is to avoid the shipping lanes of Malacca Strait, which are patrolled by USA and allies. As India increasingly engages with USA and allies on security matters, sooner or later if India can play its cards shrewdly, it can hope to be given the exclusive or major responsibility of safeguarding the shipping lanes of SE Asia and the Malacca Strait. Once this fructifies China will surely know the pressure.

China’s economically important areas are in Eastern China – the coastal areas to be precise. That is were China’s SEZs are. India’s IRBM Agni III, which is still in the developmental stage, can very well target these areas. But the distance just will not make China feel the pressure because China’s BMD system will have ample time to knock them out.

India’s relation with Vietnam has been strong from the Cold War days. Apart from political and economic relations, India also has military relations with Vietnam. Vietnam’s northern borders are very close to China’s economically important coastal regions. India needs to have a full-fledged military base in this area with a battery of appropriate missile targeting China’s SEZs. Once again it would take India’s best diplomatic efforts in cajoling Vietnam to grant it. USA is also increasing its political and economic relation with Vietnam in order to pressure China on trade issues such as intellectual property rights and currency reform.

Another country with which India’s relation has been strong from the cold war days is Mongolia. An Indian military base here would be a good bet to put additional pressure on China.

Finally there is the Taiwan card. Nothing rattles China more than Taiwan getting any type of political importance particularly from countries that matter. India suffering from Sino-phobia after the 1962 war refused to have anything to do with Taiwan lest it annoyed China some more and China rubbed its nose in the mud again. Today, India has at last allowed a harmless (for China) Taiwanese politician to set foot in India only after taking due permission from Communist China. India needs to change its policy on Taiwan This card is to be kept aside till the appropriate time and let China know it.

What I wrote on the strategy to contain China is no fairytale but something that is achievable. To achieve this, as I mentioned earlier, it would take strong political resolve and India’s best diplomatic efforts. A military base each in Northern Vietnam immediately and the Wakhan Corridor later is of paramount importance if India wants to keep the boisterous and belligerent dragon away from mischief directed at it. Once China realizes that India can take out its vital economic assets and it can’t respond before it is too late, it will have no option but to behave.

At the end of the day India also wants the border and territorial dispute with China settled amicably. This cannot be achieved as long as India decides not to confront the dragon with the ground realties.

If India remains complacent it will surely pay the price in not too distant future. If it is too incompetent to come up with a “contain China” strategy of its own, then the next best way to keep the dragon away and secure its borders is to get into full military alliance with the United States of America.

The Quiet Campaign against Al Qaeda's Local Nodes

2007-06-22T19:55:00.000+05:30

Here is Stratfor's article on the quiet campaign against Al Qaeda's local nodes.

Indonesian authorities announced June 15 they had arrested Zarkasih, the acting head of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), an al Qaeda-linked militant group that has conducted several major attacks in Indonesia. Zarkasih, who succeeded Abu Bakar Bashir and Abu Rusdan as JI leader, was captured June 9 in the same operation that netted another top JI leader, Abu Dujana, an operative trained by al Qaeda in Afghanistan who headed the group's military wing.

The capture of these two major figures alone would be a significant blow to JI. However, when they are combined with the steady stream of other JI leaders who have been killed or captured since JI carried out its most devastating attack -- the October 2002 bombings in Bali that killed more than 200 people -- the impact becomes even more significant. In other words, few of the leaders remain who directed JI up to and including the 2002 attacks.

The Indonesian government's campaign against JI, part of the global "war on terrorism," has been bolstered by assistance from the United States, Australia and other Western nations. Moreover, the fight against JI is not confined to Indonesia itself, but is a regional effort involving other governments in Southeast Asia. These efforts have kept JI off balance and unable to launch a major attack since the October 2005 suicide bombings in Bali. The Indonesian government also has been able to seize large quantities of weapons and explosives -- ordnance that no longer can be used in terrorist attacks.

The success against JI underscores one important fact: Although much of the world's attention regarding the war on terrorism -- which really is a war against jihadists -- has been focused on Iraq and to a lesser extent Afghanistan, a quiet and quite successful campaign is being waged against the local nodes, those regional or national militant groups supporting al Qaeda in places like Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and North Africa. The war on jihadism, however, is at its heart an ideological war; and as long as the ideology of jihadism survives, these regional nodes -- and al Qaeda itself -- cannot be eradicated.

The Local Nodes

Al Qaeda's leaders have always known that al Qaeda, as an organization, lacks the strength to achieve its goals of ending infidel influence in Muslim lands and overthrowing the "corrupt" regimes ruling them. Because of this, al Qaeda has viewed itself as a "vanguard organization" and, as such, aims to serve as an example for the larger Muslim community (or ummah) to follow and to convince the ummah to join the jihad (or rather, its definition of it). Al Qaeda's hope is that its example will lead to a global uprising among the ummah and that this "awakened" community will wield the force necessary to achieve jihadist objectives.

This context helps to explain the relationships al Qaeda's leaders have fostered with local groups in such places as Indonesia, Afghanistan, Algeria and Iraq. They believe these local or regional organizations are important partners that provide a bridge for the transfer of their ideology to the ummah in the various regions where they operate. Many, indeed most, of the thousands of fighters al Qaeda has trained over the years in camps in Sudan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere were not al Qaeda members per se, but rather men like Dujana who would return home and join regional groups like JI, or others who would go back and form grassroots cells, like Mohammed Siddique Khan, who established the cell that conducted the July 7, 2005, London bombings.

Al Qaeda's attention to local jihadist groups, therefore, clearly is not the result of the group's difficulties following the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. In fact, al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has always placed emphasis on working with these groups. For example, in February 1998, when bin Laden announced the formation of what he called the "World Islamic Front," the organization's fatwa calling for "jihad against Jews and crusaders" was also signed by Ayman al-Zawahiri, who at the time led a faction of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ) group; Rifai Ahmad Taha, leader of his faction of the Egyptian Gamaah al-Islamiyah (GAI); Shaykh Mir Hamzah, secretary of his faction of the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Pakistan; and Fazlul Rahman, leader of the Jihad Movement in Bangladesh.

Al-Zawahiri's EIJ was one of the first of these regional or local groups to officially join forces with bin Laden and al Qaeda, though when that union took place, EIJ had splintered and its new militant wing had suffered major setbacks. The militant faction under al-Zawahiri not only had been largely decimated inside Egypt, but U.S.-led operations also had resulted in the capture or death of many of its senior operatives outside of Egypt in locations such as Albania and Kuwait.

Although many of these local groups received training from al Qaeda and worked closely with it, for the most part they maintained their independence. During the 1990s, for example, GAI members were trained at al Qaeda facilities in Sudan and Afghanistan, and some, including GAI leader Mustafa Hamza, even worked for businesses bin Laden owned in Sudan. Furthermore, bin Laden and al Qaeda helped organize and fund GAI and EIJ's cooperative attempt to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Addis Ababa in 1995.

When GAI fractured in the late 1990s and the bulk of the group denounced violence and jihadism, Taha, the militant faction's leader, maintained close relations with al Qaeda. He even appeared alongside bin Laden and al-Zawahiri in a September 2000 video calling for the release of GAI spiritual leader Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, who was (and is) in a U.S. prison. Abdel-Rahman was convicted in October 1995 on charges of seditious conspiracy for, among other things, issuing a verbal fatwa that condoned a plan to attack several targets in New York, saying the plan was permissible under Islam. However, in spite of the close relationship, GAI's militant faction did not announce its merger with al Qaeda until August 2006.

The Rush to Join the Caravan

Though the 9/11 attacks did not spark the widespread uprising of the ummah al Qaeda was hoping for, the spectacular success of the attacks made bin Laden a household name and vaulted al Qaeda into the media spotlight. Despite the Taliban's quick defeat in Afghanistan, which resulted in the scattering of al Qaeda and the relocation of its leadership to Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province, al Qaeda continued to be perceived as the apex of the jihadist movement in the Western media and, perhaps more important, on the streets of the Muslim world.

Following the aggressive action of the U.S. government and its allies against jihadist groups in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, many people who previously praised bin Laden and al Qaeda renounced the group's tactics, including GAI leader Hamza. However, in October 2004, the leader of a little-known jihadist group in Iraq, Jamaat al-Tawhid and Jihad (Monotheism and Jihad), changed the name of his group to Tandheem al Qaeda fi Bilad al-Rafidain (al Qaeda Organization in the Land of the Two Rivers) and swore allegiance to bin Laden. In a December 2004 statement, bin Laden confirmed this alliance, referring to the leader of that group, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as the "leader of al Qaeda in Iraq."

This move by al-Zarqawi was hugely successful. By associating his network with al Qaeda, al-Zarqawi made it prominent among the many jihadist and nationalist insurgent groups operating in Iraq -- and quickly achieved name-brand recognition. This recognition rapidly translated into an influx of fighters, both foreign and Iraqi, for the group and a much-needed infusion of capital. In fact, al-Zarqawi's organization was so flush with cash that in a July 2005 letter, al-Zawahiri asks al-Zarqawi to send financial assistance.

Within a short period of time, al-Zarqawi's group became one of the pre-eminent militant groups in Iraq. Al-Zarqawi himself became a household name since his group posted frequent statements and videos of its operations against coalition and Iraqi forces on the Internet. In some ways, al-Zarqawi had even surpassed bin Laden in terms of media coverage and notoriety.

Though al-Zarqawi's meteoric rise was cut short by his death in a June 2006 airstrike, the success he enjoyed by adopting the al Qaeda brand was not missed by other interested observers. In August 2006, the militant wing of the Egyptian GAI released a video announcing it had formally joined al Qaeda. Three months later, Algeria's Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) announced that it was forming a unified command with Morocco's Islamic Combatant Group, Libya's Islamic Fighting Group and several Tunisian groups. The new group was to be called the al Qaeda Organization for the Countries of the Arab Maghreb.

Kashmiri Islamist militant groups also are now attempting to jump on this bandwagon, as demonstrated by the "Declaration of War against India" they issued in the name of al Qaeda earlier in June.

Status of the Nodes

To date, none of these newer local nodes has realized the same level of success that al-Zarqawi's group did. The Egyptian node has carried out no successful attacks since its highly publicized announcement. The Moroccan element of the new Maghreb al Qaeda node apparently attempted to go operational in March and April but its poor tactics and inadequate planning resulted in the death of more suicide bombers than targets.

Perhaps the most successful of these new groups is the Algerian element of the Maghreb al Qaeda node, the former GSPC. The Algerian group has conducted several attacks, including an April 11 double suicide attack involving vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices. Those bombs struck the prime minister's office and a police station in Algiers. The Algerian government, however, has cracked down on the group and its supporters since those attacks.

In many ways, the Algerian group seems to be following a trajectory previously seen elsewhere, in which a local node emerges, conducts some successful attacks and then is hit hard by local authorities (often with assistance from U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies.) This is essentially what has happened to some of the older nodes, such as JI in Indonesia, Egypt's Tawhid wa al-Jihad in Sinai, and the Saudi al Qaeda node. There were signs in January of a possible revival of the Saudi node, but other than a simple shooting attack in late February -- followed by a major hit against the group by Saudi authorities -- the node has been quiet.

Even al-Zarqawi's node, which undertook several operations in Jordan before his death, including the November 2005 Amman hotel bombings, has been unable to project its power outside of Iraq as of late. This node also has been receiving pressure from elements in Iraq and has started to fight Iraqi nationalists. If a political settlement is reached between the United States and Iran regarding Iraq, this node could quickly find itself unwelcome in Iraq -- and even more embattled.

The Future

Given that most of the al Qaeda local nodes currently are doing poorly, and those that are doing fairly well now are looking at possible bleak futures, does that mean they pose no threat? Absolutely not.

Though the campaign to disrupt the local nodes -- the war against jihadism -- has been very successful, it is important to remember that this is not so much a war against a group of individuals as it is a war against an ideology. The problem is, ideologies are harder to kill than people. Consider, for example, how the revolutionary ideas of Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and Che Guevara have outlived the men themselves.

In the same way, the al Qaeda ideology will outlast bin Laden, as the call to jihad outlasted bin Laden's friend and mentor, Abdullah Azzam. So even if bin Laden were to be eliminated next week, the struggle would continue. The nodes may be disorganized and their operations disrupted, but as long as they can recruit new fighters and raise money, they will retain the ability to reorganize and carry out attacks. The key therefore will be in undermining the ideology of jihadism and thereby cutting into the jihadist recruiting pool and drying up its fundraising operations.

The problem for the United States is that it cannot fight this ideological war, and any efforts it openly supports -- including the Arabic television station Al Hurra -- are quickly tainted and discredited. The U.S. government, therefore, must sit on the sidelines while moderate Muslim scholars refute the theology of jihadism. Meanwhile, Washington can only hope the message gets through.[Stratfor]

China's Plan to Quash Rural Instability

2007-06-22T15:20:00.000+05:30

Stratfor on China's new economic development zones blueprint using which China hopes to quell a key cause of rising rural instability.

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China's top economic planner, on June 9 added Chongqing and Chengdu -- two cities in China's western province of Sichuan -- to its portfolio of pilot reform cities (PRC). The PRC blueprint is essentially a reincarnation of the "special economic zones" and "economic development zones" (EDZ) zoning approach. This time, it is being applied to separate clusters of cities, with each cluster testing a mixture of policy experiments dedicated to one central government objective. These clusters are strategically located to push manual labor-intensive industries inland and to cultivate new financial industries in China's more prosperous coastal cities that are ready to move away from manufacturing-intensive industries and toward more service-intensive development.

The Zoning Approach

China first used a "zoning approach" in the 1980s to cordon off specific cities for piloting new export-promoting policies along its coast. These cities were selected for a number of reasons, the most obvious being their proximity to exporting ports. This EDZ blueprint was so wildly successful that two decades later, the stark difference in living standards between EDZ cities and non-EDZ rural areas -- the urban-rural wealth gap -- has become one of the greatest threats to Chinese single-party rule.

As a result, the State Council started merging EDZs in 2003, leaving only one in each county or city suburb, before finally terminating all expansion plans in April 2007. The PRC concept was not introduced until 2006, when Tianjin's Binhai New Area was named as the first "zone for comprehensive policy experimentation" and used to pilot foreign exchange reform.

Pilot Reform Cities

Since then the Shanghai Pudong area and Shenzhen special economic zone have been added to the first PRC cluster dedicated to financial innovation reforms. Chongqing and Chengdu make up a separate second cluster dedicated to minimizing the urban-rural wealth gap. Though both clusters' overall experimental objectives might seem distinct, they are both pieces of a wider plan by Beijing to direct intra-regional migrant labor flows back inland in order to balance China's currently imbalanced regional development.

The three cities selected for financial innovation reform are in the more economically advanced coastal region -- Tianjin Binhai in the north, Shanghai Pudong in the east and Shenzhen in the south. For several years, Beijing has been trying to disperse the foreign direct investment (FDI) concentrated along this coastline into the lesser-developed central and western regions, but with little success. This is unsurprising, given that the majority of FDI in China is in manufactured exports; moving inland would simply increase the costs and logistical difficulties of transporting finished goods for foreign-owned operations.

The two cities selected for wealth-gap reform lie at the frontier edge of the relatively poorer and backward western regions, where 50 percent to 80 percent of the population live in rural areas. Chongqing and Chengdu's positions -- straddling the line between regions of excess manual labor supply and manual labor shortage -- are significant. In the last two years, manual labor wages have been rising in coastal cities because of region-specific shortages of manual labor. Meanwhile, manual laborers are abundant in the central and western regions, where jobs are in short supply for lack of foreign investors.

This regional imbalance can be resolved in two ways: move the jobs inland, or move the workers outward. Beijing has tried the former and does not desire the latter. China already has more than 150 million floating migrant workers it is struggling to pin down and does not want the west-to-east outflows to increase. To stem the outflow, Beijing is creating an intermediate pit stop on the western-eastern borderland to absorb the rural migrant workers before they flood into eastern coastal cities. Chongqing and Chengdu might also attract foreign investors one day, when it becomes apparent that manual labor shortages on the coast are not about to be alleviated with migrant workers fresh off the bus from the west.

Although the theory sounds good, there are many primary complications. Like all local government officials across China, those in the two wealth-gap reform PRCs will likely already have significant stakes in urban development projects and be loath to divert state resources away from these to more needy rural areas. Economic concessions also will be needed if foreign investors are to be attracted inland (with or without rising wages along the coast), but China is obliged under its World Trade Organization membership conditions to maintain a level regulatory/taxation playing field for all domestic and foreign investors. If coastal labor wages stop rising, or if financial reforms fail in the cluster of PRCs along the coast, then the cost pressures forcing foreign investors to look inland could disappear. The cost of moving Chinese coastal operations inland for foreign investors might be even higher than that of relocating to neighboring Asian countries such as Vietnam; this would cause an emigration, as opposed to internal relocation, of foreign investment-generated jobs. And finally, the crux of any successful government policy lies in its implementation, especially in the hierarchical maze of Chinese politics, so uniform central government direction across PRC clusters will be difficult. For example, Beijing does not hold the same degree of control or influence over Shenzhen as it does over Shanghai following the September 2006 crackdown.

Difficulties aside, being a PRC includes a certain domestic political elevation. Local governments gain prestige from having a direct channel of influence from Beijing over their regional rivals. Should Chongqing and Chengdu improve the lot of their rural populations, more and more western frontier cities will want to join in the PRC program to draw idle manual workers eastward from the rural areas and draw foreign investment-generated jobs westward from the coastal cities.

Should Beijing succeed at using this zoning approach to balance regional economic growth and close the urban-rural wealth gap, it will relieve one key source of unrest among China's 800-900 million rural or migrant workers. At the pilot level, results could well be attained in a matter of years, but it will take decades before any results are achieved at the national level. Nevertheless, for now, the domestic propaganda the PRC program generates could be enough to keep rural discontent under control, as Chinese President Hu Jintao consolidates internal party control ahead of the autumn Communist Party Congress.[Stratfor]

The U.S. Nuclear Deal and Indian ICBMs

2007-06-22T14:44:00.000+05:30

CNN-IBN reported on June 18 that India had halted the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles as a good-faith gesture aimed at facilitating the troubled civilian nuclear deal with the United States. According to Stratfor, though the gesture may have appeared magnanimous, intercontinental reach is far down New Delhi's list of priorities.

New Delhi appears to have halted -- at least temporarily -- development of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), CNN-IBN reported June 18. The halt appears to be an effort to address Washington's discomfort with the proposed U.S.-Indian bilateral civilian nuclear deal. Though the report has not been confirmed, it also has not been denied.

U.S. concerns, however, have nothing at all to do with Indian ICBMs. India has only moderate interest in such a capability, since its most pressing international concerns are hardly at intercontinental distances. As such, India's need for ICBMs -- especially in the near term -- is quite limited.

Pakistan

Ultimately, India is fairly geographically secure. Oceans and mountains constitute the bulk of New Delhi's border. The Himalayas provide a nearly impenetrable barrier to meaningful military confrontation with China. Pakistan, which along with Afghanistan occupies the Hindu Kush to the northwest, is the only real power within India's immediate geographic zone.

The Indo-Pakistani rivalry has been well entrenched since 1948 -- but Indian strategic missiles are well-suited to deal with that threat. Moreover, the nuclear balance between the two has matured to the point that it now injects an element of stability and restraint into the rivalry. An ICBM has almost no relevance to a direct confrontation with Pakistan. The 3,000-kilometer (about 1,800 miles) distance from Bangalore in southern India to the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, in northern Pakistan is probably approaching the minimum range of a true ICBM.

Thus, unlike the intercontinental ranges of the U.S.-Russian Cold War rivalry, the Indo-Pakistani rivalry is not a long-distance rivalry. The medium-range Agni II, the longest-range ballistic missile yet deployed by the Indian military, already allows India to cover the entirety of Pakistan from nearly anywhere in India.

In terms of this particular rivalry, the Agni II will suffice for New Delhi's ballistic missile needs. Other avenues, like the BrahMos cruise missile and the Prithvi-derived Dhanush ship-launched ballistic missile now under development, can be pursued to complement this ability. Any additional range actually would be counterproductive.

China

The Sino-Indian balance, however, is another story. With the Himalayas as a geographic buffer, neither country represents an imminent strategic threat to the other. And neither has much interest in any sort of arms race, since both have far better things to worry about.

This is where the Agni III intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) comes in. A successful test in April followed a serious stumble in 2006, when a failure with the first-stage exhaust nozzle destroyed the test mission in the first minute of flight. It took nearly a year to retool and test a second missile. The Agni III gives New Delhi the ability to target Beijing, though this is not something New Delhi is in any particular hurry to do given the two countries' distracted bilateral relationship.

Beijing, by contrast, already can target all of India with most of its strategic arsenal. With another major power so close by, New Delhi could only consider it prudent to establish a basic counterbalance. Given the state of the two countries' current relations, such a counterbalance could be more than sufficiently accomplished with a small force of Agni III missiles.

Other Motivators for India

This is not to say India does not want an ICBM capability; who would not? But just like anyone else, India has priorities -- with establishing the military capability to obliterate Pakistan ranking near the top. Achieving a basic parity with China also is important. But for the immediate future, the importance of the nuclear deal with Washington ranks far above its desire for intercontinental reach.

While an ICBM is indeed within India's grasp, the nation's missile programs reflect that this is not a top priority. Development of the Surya ICBM has been rumored for more than a decade without tangible results. This is despite continued progress with the indigenous geostationary and polar orbit satellite launch vehicles on which the Surya theoretically is based. (Ultimately, the distinction between a satellite launch vehicle and an ICBM comes down to payload.) What is more, India is poised to become only the sixth country in the world to field a cryogenic upper stage, a particularly complex technology. So if it were a real priority, the Surya would surely be further along.

On the other hand, few things are more important to India right now than maintaining control over its own nuclear fuel cycle (and thus retaining the ability to extract its own weapons-grade plutonium for military purposes). This has been a contentious issue in the nuclear negotiations with the United States. India's defense establishment is extremely wary of the conditions the United States wants to place on India before the civilian nuclear deal can pass, and New Delhi is offering very little leeway on any concessions that would set India back militarily. Before the announcement of the Indian ICBM halt, the Indian Cabinet ratified an amendment June 15 to the International Atomic Energy Agency convention providing for protection of nuclear material from acts of terror and sabotage. This was another key U.S. demand for India (a nonsignatory of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty) to facilitate the ongoing negotiations.

In essence, the apparent sacrifice of the ICBM program is nothing more than a low-cost way for India to promote itself as a responsible nuclear player deserving of the civilian nuclear agreement with the United States. India can certainly stand to take a missile program essentially already on the back burner off the stove for a little while. But with the continued development of the Agni III IRBM and launches of its geostationary and polar satellite launch vehicles, India will continue to progress in this direction regardless.[Stratfor]

Stratfor is right on the importance and priority of ICBMs for India at this moment. Recent Chinese statements on Arunanchal Pradesh and the larger border dispute are of any indication, then development and deployment of Agni III IRBM should now be the main priority of the Indian government.

Surveillance in the Internet Age

2007-06-15T09:08:00.000+05:30

Here is Stratfor's article on the importance of the Internet in Surveillance.

Those who conduct surveillance -- either for nefarious or protective security reasons -- frequently have used available technology to aid them in their efforts. In earlier times, employing such technology might have meant simply using a telescope, but in more recent years, surveillants have used photographic and video gear, night vision aids and electronic equipment such as covert listening devices, beacons and programmable scanners. These efforts have been greatly enhanced by the advent of personal computers, which can be used to database and analyze information, and the Internet, which has revolutionized information gathering.

Doubtlessly, modern technology has radically altered the surveillance process. What it has not done, however, is render physical pre-operational surveillance obsolete. Despite innovative Internet tools, a person sitting in an Internet café in Quetta, Pakistan, cannot get everything he or she needs to plan and execute a terrorist attack in New York. There are still many things that can only be seen in person, making eyes-on surveillance vital to pre-operational planning. And, as long as actual physical surveillance is required, countersurveillance will remain a key tool for proactively preventing terrorist attacks.

The Internet as a Tool

The Internet has proven to be an important asset for those preparing a surveillance operation. If the target is a person, open-source Internet searches can provide vital biographical information, such as the target's full name, address, occupation, hobbies, membership in organizations, upcoming speaking engagements and participation in charity events. It also can provide the same information on the target's spouse and children, while image searches can be used to find photos of the target and related people.

In most instances, public records checks performed on the Internet also can provide a vast amount of personal information about a potential target, including property, vehicle and watercraft ownership, voter registration data, driver's license information, criminal history, professional license information and property tax data. The property tax data can be especially revealing because it not only tells the surveillant which property the target owns, but in some jurisdictions can even include photographs of the front of the home and even copies of the floor plan. In addition, many commercial services will, for a fee, provide an extremely detailed public records dossier on a desired subject -- often with little regard for how the information will be used.

There also are a number of Internet sites that offer maps and aerial photographs of specific locations. In videos released by the al Qaeda Organization for the Countries of the Arab Maghreb, the group has shown how it has used Google Earth to obtain aerial photographs to help it plan its attacks in Algeria.

An additional aspect of the Internet is that posters -- wittingly or unwittingly -- often meet hostile surveillants halfway, so to speak. For example, several environmental, animal rights, anti-globalization and anti-abortion groups have even gone so far as to publish lists of potential targets on their Web sites, frequently including personal data and sometimes also photographs. Real estate agencies also use the Internet to post detailed photographs, and even video tours, of homes on the market, which can provide additional information to surveillants. Buildings that lease office space also frequently post a great deal of online information. And, of course, many people are quite obliging to would-be surveillants and post a great deal of information about themselves -- including numerous photographs -- on blogs, personal home pages or networking Web sites like MySpace and Facebook.

Importantly, not only can surveillants use the Internet to collect an abundance of information on a person or location, they can do so quickly -- and anonymously. Before the Internet era, hostile surveillants were forced to expose themselves at a far earlier stage in the attack cycle, if only to request information from a public agency or collect photographs to initially identify a person or location. Now, much of this information can be obtained without the need for surreptitious behavior or for providing false information -- and from the comfort and safety of one's own home.

Of course, the Internet also can be used for protective reasons. Security managers, for instance, can conduct "cyberstalker" operations to determine how much information is available on the Internet regarding a person or building they are responsible for protecting. Though it is hard to get some information removed from the Internet once it is out there, it is important to realize that such information is available, and to identify where information vulnerabilities exist.

The Limits of Technology

One of the major problems associated with relying solely on information found on the Internet is the possibility of error. Because there is a great deal of erroneous information on the Internet, one cannot take every post at face value. Additionally, public data sources tend to have a considerable lag time (sometimes of several months) between an event and its posting on the Internet. For example, it is possible to pay a company to run a detailed public records profile on someone and then find that the person actually sold the property listed as the "confirmed" address on that profile two months earlier.

When information gathered from a source such as the Internet is not confirmed, it can lead to the failure of an entire operation. A militant group is unlikely to win much sympathy among its intended audience if it shoots the wrong person or leaves a timed incendiary device at the wrong residence (as the Animal Liberation Front did in June 2006.) Furthermore, terrorist attacks require a large amount of time and effort, and in some cases utilize a large proportion of the resources available to a militant group. Such attacks also carry with them the possibility of death or long imprisonment for the person conducting them. They are, therefore, too costly to be conducted without adequate planning -- and sophisticated planning requires information that can only be collected by conducting physical surveillance.

Biography data and photos, maps to help find the target's house, aerial photos of the target's property and even street-level views of a target's apartment building or home are very useful to operational planners. In fact, an operational commander can use these tools to help plan the surveillance and to quickly orient the surveillance and attack teams to the target and the area around it. However, even at their best, these sources of information provide a potential attacker with a static (and usually quite limited) view of a person or building. It simply cannot provide the richness of perception that comes from actually watching the building or person over time.

Additionally, the targeted person or building does not exist in a vacuum, and potential attackers must also have an understanding of the environment around the target if they are going to determine the best time, location and method for the attack, how best to take advantage of the element of surprise and how to escape afterward, if escape is called for in the plan. It is hard to place a target into context based solely on the information available on the Internet.

Internet information also cannot provide what is perhaps the most important element of operational planning: an understanding of human behavior. If the target is a person, the surveillance team is looking not just for static facts, but for patterns of behavior that will predictably place the target in an ideal attack site at a specific time. Internet research can reveal that the target owns two cars and works for a particular company, but it will not reveal which vehicle he drives to work or whether he has a driver, the time he leaves the house, the Starbucks he visits every morning on his way to work, or the odd little shortcut he takes every morning to avoid traffic.

If the target is a building, the surveillance team will be looking to define the security in place at the site and for gaps in the security both in terms of physical security equipment and in guard coverage that can be exploited. They will make diagrams of the building, including any bollards, cameras and access control measures. They also will monitor the guards to see how they operate, and note their level of training and alertness. Militant groups have been known to test the adequacy and response time of building security by attempting to park a vehicle illegally in front of a building or by entering the building without the proper identification. In the past, al Qaeda has even entered potential target buildings and collected detailed engineering data such as the measurements and locations of building support pillars, elevator equipment and air handling systems. This is simply not the type of information that can be obtained by looking at overhead photos or even at 3D street-level views of the targeted building on the Internet.

Though the Internet can provide surveillance teams with information that allows them to become quickly oriented to their target, and to condense some of the initial surveillance they would otherwise need to conduct, it has not been able to replace physical surveillance altogether. In fact, the same video in which al Qaeda's Maghreb node uses Google Earth to demonstrate how to plan attacks also shows operatives conducting physical surveillance of the attack sites. It also shows videos of attacks, meaning a surveillance team was on hand to record the event.

Although the Internet has become a valuable tool in the surveillance process, it has not come close to eliminating the need for eyes-on monitoring of a target. As such, countersurveillance remains a powerful and proactive tool in the counterterrorism toolbox.[Stratfor]

Musharraf to Eat Crow?

2007-06-13T15:39:00.000+05:30

According to Stratfor Musharraf in order to dissolve the growing political storm in Pakistan and secure his own re-election, has decided to eat crow and for a begining reinstate the suspended Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry. Even then Musharraf at best could only hold on to power as a president sharing power with a prime minister at the head of a coalition government.

Richard Boucher, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs, arrived June 12 in Islamabad on a two-day official visit. Topping the agenda of discussion between Boucher and Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf is Pakistan's increasing crisis of governance. Boucher will relay Washington's interest in having Musharraf remain at the helm, but also will communicate that Musharraf needs to reach an accommodation with his opponents.

The two main reasons informing Musharraf's decision to tough it out in the face of the South Asian nation's rapidly expanding crisis are U.S. backing and the support of the senior generals within Pakistan's military hierarchy. Musharraf also knows that he must demonstrate to both Washington and his own generals that he very much controls the situation to ensure their continued support. To do so he has devised a plan to defuse the political crisis involving reinstating suspended Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, something that also will help create conditions conducive for his own re-election.

Though Chaudhry's reinstatement might provide the embattled general with a brief respite, his bid for re-election is going to be extremely hard to pull off in part due to the increasingly assertive nature of Pakistan's judiciary and the media. Ultimately, there is just too much that can go wrong in the process of securing a second term.

The first step in defusing tensions was the government's June 9 move to withdraw restrictions on the media; this had two effects. First, it satisfied concerns within the Bush administration, which was finding it difficult to support Musharraf while his government was openly limiting free speech. Second, it prevented the anti-Musharraf movement from receiving a sudden and major boost.

In the meantime, the government produced a budget significantly increasing government employee salaries and announced that an election schedule would be released soon after parliament approved the budget. Musharraf himself said June 8 that the nation would hear the good news about the end of the ongoing political crisis. "The ongoing drama will end itself very soon and there is nothing to worry about it," he told members of parliament from the ruling coalition and Cabinet members.

The next step will be allowing Pakistan's Supreme Court to reinstate the chief justice, which will be Musharraf's way of neutralizing the legal community's protests. Once back on the job, Chaudhry will not be able to participate in rallies given his position as a nonpartisan national figure -- thus taking the chief justice and his supporters out of the limelight. The government also will try to block Chaudhry from presiding over cases involving the president on grounds that as a party to a dispute with the president, the top jurist cannot appear unbiased against Musharraf. The chief justice and his allies indeed would like to see Chaudhry's restoration and Musharraf's ouster. The government, however, hopes the restoration will forestall the latter.

The chief justice's reinstatement could provide some brief respite to Musharraf. But the president general must go through the process of re-election, which according to the government must take place between Sept. 15 and Oct. 15. The presidential election is highly controversial because Musharraf is seeking re-election from the same electoral college, composed of the current national and provincial legislatures, that elected him in the first place. His opponents have demanded fresh parliamentary elections before the presidential vote. But the main opposition group, the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto might be willing to negotiate a deal whereby Musharraf can be re-elected on the condition he steps down as military chief.

Accepting a president in uniform is a redline the PPP cannot cross and sustain its position as the country's largest political party and its reputation of being anti-establishment. Musharraf's uniform constitutes the basis of his power, and assuming the role of a civilian president is a prospect fraught with perils. Even so, mounting pressure to defuse the crisis could force his hand and make him decide to retire from the military, though that would entail another set of complexities.

Ideally, Musharraf wants to remain army chief of staff until after the parliamentary elections to be held sometime in November, though even he knows that under the present conditions that is asking too much. At a bare minimum, however, he wants to remain military chief until the first week of October so he can oversee the next round of routine promotions and retirements of senior generals. That would allow him to stack the military deck with people he can theoretically work with even after becoming a civilian president.

Another hurdle to his re-election is that even if he were to have a deal with the PPP, members of parliament from the Islamist coalition, the Mutahiddah Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) -- which controls one and a half provinces and is one of the largest opposition blocs in parliament -- could see its members tender their resignations, thereby rendering the electoral college dysfunctional. And street protests would come back with a bang should Musharraf try to force his way to re-election. So any deal would have to include not just the PPP, but the MMA and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, whom Musharraf ousted from power in 1999.

Balancing the civilian side of his government with the military side is rapidly becoming untenable for Musharraf. As a result, the resolution to the current crisis requires a very complex arrangement that under the present conditions is unlikely to hold. Thus Musharraf at best can hope to share power as a civilian with a much broader array of far more assertive civilians.[Stratfor]

In another report Stratfor dispels the notion that anyone needing to topple the present regime in Pakistan should first get the green signal from Uncle Sam. In other words, America is ready to do business with anyone at the helm in Pakistan and that US-Pakistan relation is strictly a business relationship.

Great expectations have been attached to U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher's visit to Islamabad, which began on Tuesday. Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf is hoping the visit will help him sustain his faltering hold on power. Musharraf's opponents hope the Bush administration will help them eventually force Musharraf from office. The day of Musharraf's departure is imminent; he has simply made too many mistakes and burned too many bridges.

Yet, despite all of his eminent and obvious weaknesses, Musharaff's (many) opponents have not been able to eject him from the scene. This is in part because of an odd belief within Pakistani structures.

Many within the Pakistani political world believe that the player with the most irons in the Pakistani fire is the United States. Understanding that mindset is not particularly difficult. One of the commonalities in Pakistani governments going back to nearly the country's creation is that the United States has ultimately played the role of security supporter, if not outright guarantor. Regardless of whether the opponent was Soviet or Indian, the United States has played a critical role in Pakistani security, leading to the cynical view among many Pakistanis that their governments have been supported by three As: Allah, the army and America. And with the war in Afghanistan almost exclusively supplied via Pakistani supply routes, that does not appear about to change.

Therefore many Pakistani political players -- particularly within the military -- are unwilling to move against Musharraf, no matter how bad things get, without a green light from Washington, for fear they could get burned.

Ultimately, however, such thinking not only misses the point, it is simply wrong. It is Pakistan that holds the balance of power in this relationship, not the United States. And though Islamabad depends on financial and military assistance from Washington, it is Washington that cannot fight the war in Afghanistan without Pakistan, not the other way around. It is the United States that is bogged down in Iraq, not Pakistan.

Strategically, Washington would much rather count India as an ally. It is bigger, richer and the political culture is more similar. Yet the United States is fighting a war that requires troops and materiel to be moved through Pakistan. That means the United States will work with whoever happens to be in Pakistan's big chair, not because Washington wants to, but because it must.

The United States, then, is not allied with Musharraf the person, or the Musharraf government, but with the state of Pakistan -- read: its military. This means should Musharraf suddenly be out of the picture, the United States, after few heartburn-filled meetings, will simply hammer out a new deal with his replacement.

Put another way, the United States does not much care who runs Pakistan as long as there is stability in Islamabad; after all, it currently is supposedly enamored with a man who rose to power via a coup in 1999. And as soon as the various power players in Pakistan recognize that little fact, Musharraf's days truly will be numbered.[Stratfor]

2007 is not 1989

2007-06-11T19:37:00.000+05:30

Last week was the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre where in 1989 an uprising of Chinese University students for multiparty democracy was brutally put down by PLA using battle tanks. A number of ordinary Beijing residents too were killed by the PLA then.

The exact number of people who were killed in that uprising is still not known. UK Telegraph’s Beijing correspondent Richard Spencer published a list of the people still imprisoned for the uprising in his blog.

In 1989 there was not much for the Chinese University students to look forward to. So in the campus they had ample time to dream about democracy, free speech, individual liberties, etc. All these thoughts almost culminated in that uprising of 1989.

As years passed the Chinese economy gathered pace and the University graduates never had it so good when it came to job opportunities. All that dream of life in a real free world took a back seat and gradually faded away so much so that today the Chinese have made it a taboo even to mention about the Tiananmen Square Massacre. Some Chinese today even feel that in 1989 Mainland China was not ready for Democracy!

In the comments section of that blog entry, a very interesting and eye-opening debate took place illuminating vividly this very point. Remember, these are just the views of the educated, economically well off, Internet using, white-collar urban Chinese.

Some of them have become so drunk on state propaganda unleashed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that they believe the Chinese themselves are responsible in making their country a manufacturing hub of the world. They just don’t believe that Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from Japan, Europe, US, etc played the most important part in the economic development of China and making China a manufacturing hub.

They have no idea how much China depends on FDI to keep its economy going and that how desperate the CCP is to create an economy that depends on internal consumption.

They sincerely believe that it is by the ‘heroic’ efforts of the CCP sans foreign financial help that pulled millions of Chinese out of utter poverty.

Today’s Internet using, educated, well of Chinese who have benefited from the Chinese economy just wont take any criticism of the CCP and are very uncomfortable discussing the past and present sins of the CCP. In fact some are ready even to condone the unforgivable sins committed by the CCP against its own people when the govt. suppresses frequent peasant uprising in the interiors with barbaric brutality.

The China baiters are promptly countered by bringing up the ‘misadventures’ of George Bush and Tony Blair.

The CCP, along with liberalising the Chinese economy, also gave limited freedom to the Chinese, which was not there in 1989. So today as a booming economy is giving the educated Chinese their dream jobs and making them unbelievably rich, they just don’t want to do anything silly that can upset the status quo. In other words, talk of democracy, free press, liberty, etc are passé and the continuation of CCP rule and the free market economy with ‘Chinese characteristics’ is all that matters for them.

Certainly 2007 is not 1989.

What if Nehru Never Took the Kashmir Issue to the UN?

2007-06-09T15:44:00.000+05:30

Vikram Sood, former head of RAW in an article writes on the major implications of Nehru's first blunder.

From the 1970s, Pakistan began trying to detach Gilgit and Baltistan from the rest of Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (POK). By 1982, General Zia was suggesting that while the question of Kashmir could be examined afresh, Gilgit, Hunza and Skardu were an integral part of Pakistan and were separate from POK. Pakistan gradually tightened its hold on the region. Dissent and nationalism have been suppressed with singleminded ruthlessness. There has been systematic discrimination against the locals and Sunni Pathans imported to offset the Shias of Gilgit and Baltistan to change demographic patterns.

In the early 1980s, Pakistan made serious attempts to move from Skardu towards the Karakoram Pass near Aksai Chin. This intended linking with Shahidullah on the Kashgar-Shigatse road that goes through Aksai Chin and runs parallel to the Tibet-India border would have enabled an outflanking of India in Ladakh. Alarmed at this, India asserted that the Karachi Agreement of 1949, which stipulated that the Line of Control (LoC) would run north towards the glaciers from Pt NJ 9842, be fully implemented. North meant the true north and also meant the Siachen Glacier, not the Karakoram Pass, which is north-east from NJ 9842. Troops had to be sent to the Saltoro Ridge to ensure this. Later, in 1994, the Lahore High Court ruled that administrative separation of these areas from the rest of POK was illegal; the Pakistani authorities had the Supreme Court overturn this in 1996.

There are good strategic reasons why Pakistan has followed this policy. The mighty Indus that irrigates Pakistani Punjab passes much of its distance in India through Ladakh and then Baltistan and Gilgit. Imagine for a moment if today the entire J&K were with India. We would have a border with Afghanistan and the Wakhan Corridor would have provided access to Central Asia. India would have had a border with Chitral, Swat and Hazara districts of the NWFP. The Karakoram Highway, which enters China at the Khunjerab Pass and through which Pakistan has acquired strategic material, would not have been built. Pakistan would not have had direct access to China. Pakistan may have its own reasons to keep the Kashmir issue alive. But it wants the world to assume that Gilgit and Baltistan is a settled issue - settled in favour of Pakistan.

China, too, would be interested that Pakistan has total control over Gilgit and Baltistan. Otherwise the $ 298 million investment in the development of Gwadar is a financial or strategic waste. Xinjiang is only 2,500 km away from the Arabian seaport of Gwadar. On the other hand, it is 4,500 km away from the Chinese east coast. A fully developed port at Gwadar would help in the economic development of Xinjiang. Gas and oil pipelines from Gwadar to Xinjiang and Tibet would enable China to overcome the uncertainty of sealanes from the Persian Gulf through the Malacca Straits patrolled by the US. Therewill be a special SEZ for China in Gwadar.

China has set aside $ 150 million to upgrade the Karakoram Highway and widen it from 10 metres to 30 metres for heavy vehicles in all-weather conditions. A rail link is also planned in the region with technical advice from an Austrian firm to connect Pakistan and China. This link will be connected further south into the main Pakistani rail grid. Fibre optic cables are being laid. An Islamabad Kashgar bus service will start from August 1.

Both China and Pakistan are getting ready for an economic boom that will include transit trade to Central Asia. The Pakistani Army's National Logistics Cell, which has a near monopoly, will handle this freight traffic all the way up to Kazakhstan and Xinjiang. There is money to be made. Thus development of both Gwadar and control of Gilgit and Baltistan are interlinked and the Pakistani Army will gain financially from both. In fact, it is going to be a financial bonanza for the already huge corporate interests of the Pakistani Army. All this is being done by using territory that we say is an inalienable part of India.

In retrospect, it can be said that it was a mistake to have halted our troops at Uri and Gurez in 1948. It was a blunder to have then gone to the UN for succour. But it would be a strategic catastrophe to withdraw from Siachen without the entire issue of J&K satisfactorily and unequivocally resolved. Since distortion of facts is possible, a mere signing of documents about the Agreed Ground Position Lines would not be an adequate guarantee enabling troop withdrawals.[Vikram Sood]

With China's strategy of encircling India with its strategic string of pearls, India too should have some strategic pressure points that can make China vulnerable. India should not waste anytime in making the Karakoram Highway this very pressure point. And RAW should be very active in the Northern Areas.

The Secrets of Counter-Surveillance

2007-06-09T13:14:00.000+05:30

Stratfor in another of its innumerable insightful articles takes a look at the secrets of counter-surveillance (CS), which is the process of detecting and mitigating hostile surveillance. Counter-surveillance (CS) is also an important, though often overlooked, element of counter-terrorism and security operations.

According to Stratfor, counter-surveillance is especially important because it is one of the few security measures that allows for threats to be dealt with before they can develop into active attacks.

The First Secret

Various potential assailants use different attack cycles, which vary depending on the nature and objectives of the plotter. For example, the typical six-step terrorist attack cycle does not always apply to a suicide bomber (who is not concerned about escape) or a mentally disturbed stalker (who is not concerned about escape or media exploitation). It is during the early phases of the attack cycle -- the target selection and the planning phases -- that the plotters conduct their surveillance, though they even can use a surveillance team during the actual attack to signal that the target is approaching the attack zone.

The purpose of pre-operational surveillance is to determine the target's vulnerabilities. Surveillance helps to quantify the target, note possible weaknesses and even to begin to identify potential attack methods. When the target is a person, perhaps targeted for assassination or kidnapping, surveillants will look for patterns of behavior such as the time the target leaves for work, the transportation method and the route taken. They also will take note of the type of security, if any, the target uses. For fixed targets such as buildings, the surveillance will be used to determine physical security measures as well as patterns of behavior within the guard force, if guards are employed. For example, the plotters will look for fences, gates, locks and alarms, but also will look for times when fewer guards are present or when the guards are about to come on or off their shifts. All of this information will then be used to select the best time and location for the attack, the type of attack and the resources needed to execute it.

Since an important objective of pre-operational surveillance is establishing patterns, the operatives will conduct their surveillance several times, often at different times of the day. Additionally, they will follow a mobile target to different environments and in diverse locations. This is when it is important to know the first "secret" of CS: surveillants are vulnerable to detection. In fact, the more surveillance they conduct, the greater the chances are of them being observed. Once that happens, security personnel can be alerted and the entire plan compromised. Additionally, surveillants who themselves are being watched can unwittingly lead intelligence and law enforcement agencies to other members of their organization.

Surveillance

A large and professional surveillance team can use a variety of fixed and mobile assets, including electronic listening devices and operatives on foot, in vehicles and even in aircraft. Such a large team can be extremely difficult for anyone to spot. A massive surveillance operation, however, requires an organization with vast assets and a large number of well-trained operatives. This level of surveillance, therefore, is usually only found at the governmental level, as most militant organizations lack the assets and the number of trained personnel required to mount such an operation. Indeed, most criminal and militant surveillance is conducted by one person, or by a small group of operatives. This means they must place themselves in a position to see the target -- and thus be seen -- with far more frequency than would be required in a huge surveillance operation. And the more they show their faces, the more vulnerable they are to detection. This vulnerability is amplified if the operatives are not highly trained.

The al Qaeda manual "Military Studies in the Jihad against the Tyrants" and its online training magazines not only instruct operatives planning an attack to conduct surveillance, they also point out the type of information that should be gathered. These documents, however, do not teach jihadist operatives how to go about gathering the required information. In the United States, the Ruckus Society's Scouting Manual provides detailed instructions for conducting surveillance, or "scouting," as the society calls it, on "direct action" targets. Following written instructions, however, does not automatically translate into having skilled surveillance operatives on the street. This is because, while some basic skills and concepts can be learned by reading, applying that information to a real-world situation, particularly in a hostile environment, can be exceedingly difficult. This is especially true when the application requires subtle and complex skills that are difficult to master.

The behaviors necessary to master surveillance tradecraft are not intuitive, and in fact frequently run counter to human nature. Because of this, intelligence and security professionals who work surveillance operations receive in-depth training that includes many hours of heavily critiqued practical exercises, often followed by field training with experienced surveillance operatives.

Most militant groups do not provide this level of training, and as a result, poor tradecraft has long proven to be an Achilles' heel for militants, who typically use a small number of poorly trained operatives to conduct their surveillance operations.

What does "bad" surveillance look like? The U.S. government uses the acronym TEDD to illustrate the principles one can use to identify surveillance. So, a person who sees someone repeatedly over Time, in different Environments and over Distance, or one who displays poor Demeanor can assume he or she is under surveillance. Surveillants who exhibit poor demeanor, meaning they act unnaturally, can look blatantly suspicious, though they also can be lurkers -- those who have no reason for being where they are or for doing what they are doing. Sometimes they exhibit almost imperceptible behaviors that the target senses more than observes. Other giveaways include moving when the target moves, communicating when the target moves, avoiding eye contact with the target, making sudden turns or stops, or even using hand signals to communicate with other members of a surveillance team.

The mistakes made while conducting surveillance can be quite easy to catch -- as long as someone is looking for them. If no one is looking, however, hostile surveillance is remarkably easy. This is why militant groups have been able to get away with conducting surveillance for so long using bumbling operatives who practice poor tradecraft.

The Second Secret

At the most basic level, CS can be performed by a person who is aware of his or her surroundings and who is watching for people who violate the principles of TEDD. At a more advanced level, the single person can use surveillance detection routes (SDRs) to draw out surveillance. This leads to the second "secret": due to the nature of surveillance, those conducting it can be manipulated and forced to tip their hand.

It is far more difficult to surveil a mobile target than a stationary one, and an SDR is a tool that takes advantage of this difficulty and uses a carefully designed route to flush out surveillance. The SDR is intended to look innocuous from the outside, but is cleverly calculated to evoke certain behaviors from the surveillant.

When members of a highly trained surveillance team recognize that the person they are following is executing an SDR -- and therefore is trying to manipulate them -- they will frequently take countermeasures suitable to the situation and their mission. This can include dropping off the target and picking up surveillance another day, bypassing the channel, stair-step or other trap the target is using and picking him or her up at another location along their projected route. It can even include "bumper locking" the target or switching to a very overt mode of surveillance to let the target know that his SDR was detected -- and not appreciated. Untrained surveillants who have never encountered an SDR, however, frequently can be sucked blindly into such traps.

Though intelligence officers performing an SDR need to look normal from the outside -- in effect appear as if they are not running an SDR -- people who are acting protectively on their own behalf have no need to be concerned about being perceived as being "provocative" in their surveillance detection efforts. They can use very aggressive elements of the SDR to rapidly determine whether the surveillance they suspect does in fact exist -- and if it does, move rapidly to a pre-selected safe-haven.

At a more advanced level is the dedicated CS team, which can be deployed to determine whether a person or facility is under surveillance. This team can use mobile assets, fixed assets or a combination of both. The CS team is essentially tasked to watch for watchers. To do this, team members identify places -- "perches" in surveillance jargon -- that an operative would need to occupy in order to surveil a potential target. They then watch those perches for signs of hostile surveillance.

CS teams can manipulate surveillance by "heating up" particular perches with static guards or roving patrols, thus forcing the surveillants away from those areas and toward another perch or perches where the CS team can then focus its detection efforts. They also can use overt, uniformed police or guards to stop, question and identify any suspicious person they observe. This can be a particularly effective tactic, as it can cause militants to conclude that the facility they are monitoring is too difficult to attack. Even if the security forces never realized the person was actually conducting surveillance, such an encounter normally will lead the surveillant to assume that he or she has been identified and that the people who stopped him knew exactly what he was doing.

Confrontational techniques can stop a hostile operation dead in its tracks and cause the operatives to focus their hostile efforts elsewhere. These techniques include overt field interviews, overt photography of suspected hostiles, and the highly under-utilized Terry stop, in which a law enforcement officer in the United States can legally stop, interview and frisk a person for weapons if the officer has a reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot, even if the officer's suspicions do not rise to the level of making an arrest.

Also, by denying surveillants perches that are close to the target's point of origin or destination (home or work, for example) a CS team can effectively push hostile surveillance farther and farther away. This injects a great deal ambiguity into the situation and complicates the hostile information-collection effort. For instance, if surveillants do not know what car the target drives, they can easily obtain that information by sitting outside of the person's home and watching what comes out of the garage or driveway. By contrast, surveillants forced to use a perch a mile down the road might have dozens of cars to choose from. CS teams also can conduct more sophisticated SDRs than the lone individual.

In addition, the CS team will keep detailed logs of the people and vehicles it encounters and will database this information along with photos of possible hostiles. This database allows the team to determine whether it has encountered the same person or vehicle repeatedly on different shifts or at different sites. This analytical component of the CS team is essential to the success of the team's efforts, especially when there are multiple shifts working the CS operation or multiple sites are being covered. People also have perishable memories, and databasing ensures that critical information is retained and readily retrievable. CS teams also can conduct more sophisticated SDRs than the lone individual.

Although professional CS teams normally operate in a low-key fashion in order to collect information without changing the behaviors of suspected hostiles, there are exceptions to this rule. When the team believes an attack is imminent or when the risk of allowing a hostile operation to continue undisturbed is unacceptable, for example, team members are likely to break cover and confront hostile surveillants. In cases like these, CS teams have the advantage of surprise. Indeed, materializing out of nowhere to confront the suspected surveillant can be more effective than the arrival of overt security assets.

Well-trained CS teams have an entire arsenal of tricks at their disposal to manipulate and expose hostile surveillance. In this way, they can proactively identify threats early on in the attack cycle -- and possibly prevent attacks.[Stratfor]

Wonder whether India has any CS programme. How long will Indians be sitting-ducks to terrorists of all kinds operating with impunity allover India?

Stratfor on Al Qaeda's Declaration of War on India

2007-06-09T12:42:00.000+05:30

Here is Stratfor report on Al Qaeda's declaration of war on India. They are of the opinion that jihadist movement in India is likely to be unsustainable as the country lacks a strong radical Muslim current from which these groups can draw.

Media organizations in Srinigar, the summer capital of India's Jammu and Kashmir state, received a DVD and statement June 8 in which al Qaeda purportedly declares war on India. The DVD features a man wearing a black mask and calling himself Abu Abdul Rehman Ansari (likely a pseudonym), who claims he is a top al Qaeda cadre. The statement is in Arabic and Urdu.

Stratfor has long observed the growing nexus between al Qaeda affiliates and Kashmiri Islamist militants operating in India. CDs with footage from al Qaeda and Taliban training camps and interspersed with recordings of Osama bin Laden calling for Muslims to join the "jihad" have appeared in the Patna and Bhojpur districts of Bihar in northeastern India. A number of attacks during the past year also reveal how these Kashmiri groups have become increasingly influenced by al Qaeda tactics, such as the 2006 railway bombings and a move toward Muslim-on-Muslim attacks against religious targets that aim to inflame communal tensions and create the conditions necessary for militant cells to take root throughout the country.

Despite these indications, a jihadist movement in India likely is unsustainable, as the country lacks a strong radical Muslim current from which these groups can draw. This has been illustrated by the failure of Indian Hindus and Muslims to provide the wide-scale violent response the Islamist groups have been hoping for by targeting both Hindu and Muslim sites in recent attacks.[Stratfor]

There is no guarantee that this can be the case always. Now that Muslim-specific parties have started popping up allover India at an alarming rate and some even winning elections, anti-national Muslim elements can easily find an outlet to execute their nefarious designs. The last state elections in Kerala has shown us how radical Islamists there are hand-in-glove with the Communists of Kerala and helped them win election in Muslim strongholds.

The Future of Pakistani Military Leadership

2007-06-09T12:15:00.000+05:30

Pakistani dictator Gen. Musharraf's position has weakened so much that according to Stratfor an energetic intern could knock him out of office anytime soon. Stratfor looks at what moves can Musharraf make, and who will ultimately replace the General.

In a speech to lawmakers from Pakistan's ruling coalition, embattled Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf said he is worried and warned that a change in the current political order would be disastrous for the country, Pakistani media reported June 7. Musharraf accused his parliamentary allies of abandoning him in the ongoing political crisis and said he constantly receives reports about what they are saying privately. The president went on to criticize his allies for not supporting him publicly and questioned their usefulness if they are not willing to step up and defend him in the media and other public forums against criticism from the opposition.

These comments -- Musharraf's first admission of concern since the political crisis began March 9 -- show that the Musharraf regime is buckling under the weight of the crisis, which has created serious fissures within the civilian side of the hybrid Musharrafian political system. Infighting among his allies -- upon whom he depends to secure a second presidential term -- and the rapidly intensifying unrest in the country raise serious doubts about Musharraf's ability to win the next presidential election, scheduled for the second half of September. If the president cannot win re-election, he could try to impose an emergency rule of sorts, but that would only exacerbate matters.

When Musharraf cannot seek re-election, his generals likely will force him to throw in the towel, and a caretaker government, whose main task will be holding fresh parliamentary polls, will be created. It is too early to predict which political force will form the next government, since a number of elements are in play. Whatever happens to Musharraf politically, the composition of Pakistan's military -- with or without Musharraf -- is relatively easier to discern.

If Musharraf Wins Re-election

Musharraf not only wants to get re-elected as president, but he also wants to do so while holding onto the position of military chief. This is because he wants to oversee the forthcoming round of promotions and retirements in order to build the right team to ensure his hold on power -- a step that would be an absolute necessity if Musharraf later caves to domestic pressure and steps down as military chief.

The military deck is scheduled to undergo a routine reshuffle in the first week of October. The most prominent change to come is the retirement of Musharraf's two senior-most subordinates: Vice Chief of the Army Staff (VCOAS) Gen. Ahsan Saleem Hayat and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) Gen. Ehsan ul-Haq. Currently, these two are the only four-star generals besides Musharraf himself. If he wins re-election in September, Musharraf's priority will be to fill the vacant positions. This process will bring to the fore younger generals, among whom there are a number of possible candidates based on merit and seniority, as well as on personal ties to Musharraf:

Lt. Gen. Tariq Majeed: commander of the 10th Corps, who is considered to be the most capable among all the corps commanders, and who is the front-runner for the No. 2 position of VCOAS
Lt. Gen. Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani: director-general of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and another senior general who could be appointed to the No. 3 post, the CJCSC
Lt. Gen. Salahuddin Satti: current chief of the General Staff who, though a bit junior to other generals, could be moved to a key position
Lt. Gen. Muhammad Yousaf: current vice chief of the General Staff, who also could be appointed to a critical position

While effecting promotions and appointments, he would want to make sure that his own position is not threatened, especially given the growing movement to oust him from power. Moreover, should he need to step down as military chief and become a civilian president, he would want the next military chief to be beholden to him. This involves not just loyalty but also the creation of dependency. Therefore, he could go beyond the top tier of generals and elevate others, such as 4th Corps Commander Lt. Gen. Shafaatullah Shah, Quarter Master General Lt. Gen. Afzal Muzaffar or 30th Corps Commander Lt. Gen. Waseem Ahmed Ashraf. Director-General of Military Intelligence Maj-Gen. Nadeem Ejaz could also become a three-star general and be made director-general of the ISI.

There is a downside to filling the top slots with second-tier commanders. These generals are inexperienced in political matters, especially in situations like the current crisis. Therefore, they are more likely to press Musharraf to step down if the existing situation escalates, especially with political forces mobilizing for the parliamentary polls slated for November.

Considering the pace and magnitude of the anti-Musharraf movement's growth, it is becoming increasingly unlikely that Musharraf can win re-election. Once Musharraf realizes that an election victory is beyond his reach, he could attempt to impose emergency rule as a means of prolonging his hold on power. This will only accelerate the unrest and lead to the point at which his generals will likely have to force him to quit.

If Musharraf is Forced to Step Down

Though he is the army chief, Musharraf has not had time to oversee the day-to-day running of the military because of his duties as a president -- especially as a president who has had to deal with an extraordinary number of domestic and foreign policy issues. As a result, Hayat has been running the military on Musharraf's behalf and could easily step into the role of military chief.

But the task of removing the increasingly unpopular Musharraf -- especially since Hayat is due to retire -- would make the process very complicated, to say the least. Furthermore, Hayat is known to be mild-mannered, which makes him unlikely to initiate Musharraf's removal. Instead, a consensus among corps commanders and certain key agency heads would be required.

This is where the other four-star general, Ehsan-ul-Haq, who has served as head of the military's two intelligence directorates, could play an important role. However, Ehsan-ul-Haq's position is ceremonial, so he does not have the authority to get the ball rolling or even secure a position in a post-Musharraf military leadership. This makes the role of the corps commanders -- who already are key because they are in command of the troops -- all the more important.

From the seniority standpoint, Majeed and Kiyani would be the key deciding players, while Satti and commander of the Mangla-based 1st Corps Lt. Gen. Sajjad Akram would be the prominent players from a logistical standpoint. At the end of the day, a consensus would be needed among the three-star generals, who likely would back Hayat to succeed Musharraf as army chief and get a three-year extension, thereby avoiding his scheduled retirement.

Hayat's first order of business as military chief would be to work with the political forces and the civilian establishment to install an acting president and caretaker government headed by an interim prime minister, which would hold parliamentary elections within 90 days. Though Hayat would not inherit Musharraf's political powers, he would be the one to oversee the reshuffle of the military deck, at which point every position aside from his own would be up for grabs. That said, those who would have played leading roles in the removal of Musharraf will be the ones most likely to assume key posts in the post-Musharraf military hierarchy.

After Musharraf's departure from the helm, regardless of how and when that happens, the military is unlikely to continue to directly run the country. Moreover, because of the assertiveness of the judiciary and the media, and an increasingly vibrant civil society, the military will have to give the civilian setup more freedom than it did in 1988, when military rule came to an end after military-chief-cum-president Mohammed Zia-ul-Haq died in a mysterious plane crash. But, for the foreseeable future, the military will continue to maintain a strong hold over the state -- partly because it is the most disciplined and professional institution in the country.[Stratfor]

Cartoon Speak: The Politician's Evil Magic

2007-06-05T17:31:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: The Hindu

Cartoon Speak: Big B's Superduper Flop

2007-06-05T17:25:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: The Hindu

The Clock is Ticking

2007-06-05T09:53:00.000+05:30

Stratfor's latest report on Musharraf.

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on Monday amended laws governing the country's electronic media, GEO television reported. Musharraf empowered the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) to block transmissions, suspend licenses, confiscate equipment and seal the buildings of electronic media organizations deemed in violation of PEMRA regulations. This, combined with the ongoing political crisis, has increased the number of protests in Pakistan. The same day Musharraf also chaired a special meeting of the National Security Council, during which he discussed ways and means of dealing with the increasingly deteriorating crisis of governance.

Thus far all the steps taken by the Musharraf government to fix the growing political instability have backfired, and even have made matters worse. For the most part, this outcome is the result of serious miscalculations. This is not altogether surprising because Musharraf is now relying on a small circle of bureaucratic advisers, and is no longer listening to his political allies in the ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML).

However, not heeding the PML's advice might not have major consequences, since it is the party that is dependent on Musharraf for its position of power. But Musharraf is critically dependent on the military's support to ensure his regime's continuity. This is why Musharraf on June 1 called an emergency meeting of the corps commanders and army's agency heads, during which the top generals reportedly expressed complete support for the president.

During this meeting Musharraf made use of the increasingly loud criticisms of the military's domination of the state. He was able to convince the generals that the government's opponents are not just out to force the country's military chief from power, but also want the military establishment to lose control of the political system.

In this regard, Musharraf also exploited the recent release of the new book "Military, Inc: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy," authored by Ayesha Siddiqa, a top Pakistani political and military analyst. Siddiqa's book, which provides a detailed account of the military's hold over Pakistan's economic system, has further fueled the public ire against the military's domination of the country. As a result the government scrambled to torpedo the launching ceremony of the book and has accused the author of spreading lies and of being an enemy of the state. There are reports that Siddiqa is being intimidated by intelligence officials.

Taking all of this into account, the generals are currently rallying around Musharraf and are saying they will support his efforts to do all what is necessary to remedy the faltering situation. But they, more than anyone else, know that the need to hold such a special meeting indicates a weakness in Musharraf's position.

Therefore, the generals will be watching the situation more closely than ever and will be considering contingency plans as the political temperature rises in the coming weeks. Then, if needed, they can intervene and force Musharraf to step down in order to avoid risking an ugly confrontation on the streets.

For now, the generals figure the anti-Musharraf movement, though growing in size, lacks direction, organization and critical mass because the main opposition parties remain divided. Put differently, they believe their interests can still be secured through a compromise involving the reinstatement of the chief justice, and perhaps even with Musharraf assuming the role of a civilian president. But Musharraf does not believe he can both compromise and sustain power, which is why he has decided to tough it out in an effort to get past the re-election in September.

The generals would prefer a situation in which they are not forced to move against Musharraf because they know such a situation does not necessarily help them salvage the position of the institution. Having Musharraf step down could land them in a situation in which the new military leadership would be forced to negotiate a new civil-military power-sharing mechanism with the political forces, and from a position of relative weakness. Part of this has to do with the fact that Musharraf has been reshuffling the military deck so much that most of the top generals have not had much experience in dealing with national politics.

But when the generals know things have reached a point of no return, they will act; this could happen before the end of summer depending on how fast events progress. The prevention of news broadcasts and political talk shows deemed critical of the government on private television channels could prove to be one key step in that direction. Because of the immense popularity of these private channels, the anti-Musharraf movement is likely to gain greater momentum -- and rapidly.

The growing public unrest will only get worse because the government is determined to deal with the situation by cracking down. Unless Musharraf reverses course and opts for the path of accommodation with his opponents -- both among the political parties and with civil society -- it is quite feasible that the unrest, which is expected to peak around the time of the presidential vote in September, could surge earlier. Even his key civilian partner, the PML, is starting to show signs of hemorrhaging, indicating that it might not be possible for Musharraf to secure a second term.[Stratfor]

The BMW Case, NDTV Sting Op and Some Questions

2007-06-02T06:36:00.000+05:30

NDTV usually doesn’t do sting on big fishes. So when NDTV does a big sting, some questions always pop up.

The BMW hit and run case dragging for eight years took a new turn after NDTV aired a previously unseen tape of the BMW car in a badly damaged condition just after the accident. The question here is how did NDTV get hold of this tape? Was this tape, which was in the custody of the police, made available to NDTV by someone in the govt or obtained by NDTV after bribing the police with moolah or other obvious means?

At that time NDTV also aired a report on a private party given by Sanjeev Nanda. In it, NDTV reporter interviewed Nanda where he talked about his business, etc. How did NDTV get access and permission – which no other channel got - to record and telecast Nanda’s private party? Doesn’t this show that NDTV and the Nandas were on good terms not so long ago? So what turned NDTV against the Nandas and what made NDTV telecast a tape that is potentially damaging to Sanjeev Nanda? Is NDTV settling old scores with the Nandas?

NDTV’s telecast of the sting tapes was only after Kulkarni testified in the court that a fat man was in the driver’s seat, which effectively could let Sanjeev Nanda off the hook. So if we take this into consideration, then NDTV timed the telecast to tarnish only IU Khan and RK Anand. After the telecast the Nandas have distanced themselves from their lawyer, RK Anand.

From Barkha Dutt’s article in the HT it is clear that Kulkarni’s motives were suspect from day one. He was doing it for money and he had approached other channels too- looking for the highest bidder obviously - about the sting. This and Kulkarni’s previous ambiguous statements clearly make him an unreliable witness. Still NDTV knowing very well about the fallout went ahead telecasting the tapes “in public interest” after consulting its legal team. Who are the members of NDTV’s legal team?

IU Khan and RK Anand according to Barkha Dutt "are ingenious, influential, notoriously aggressive and famously successful". So if NDTV is taking them on, then it must be only because people more powerful than these two are backing NDTV. Only the UPA govt. is more powerful than these two in India. Is anyone in the govt. backing them?

Why is NDTV hiding the fact that its correspondent the baby faced Poonam Aggarwal transcending the limits of journalistic ethics - so ‘dear’ to Barkha Dutt and Prannoy Roy – was indulging in blackmailing IU Khan and demanding he give her the case diary and confidential police documents pertaining to the case?

Why is NDTV hiding the fact that after Khan didn’t part with the prosecution documents, Poonam Aggarwal had threatened him that he should be prepared to face the consequence?

Why is NDTV hiding the fact that this warning by their reporter had prompted Khan to send a legal notice to NDTV on April 19, to which NDTV replied on April 26 expressing regret over the happening?

Why is NDTV hiding the fact that its reporter Poonam Aggarwal had also been hauled up repeatedly by the court of another additional sessions judge, Ravinder Kaur, for misreporting the court proceedings?

For me, this collusion between the prosecution and the defence is nothing new. Such things happen daily allover India. But in this particular case there is more to it. It is like killing two or more birds with one stone. Don’t ask me to explain.

Stratfor on Musharraf's Crack Down

2007-06-01T12:00:00.000+05:30

Stratfor on Musharraf's latest crack down on the media in Pakistan.

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on Thursday called an emergency meeting of the country's top military brass, including corps commanders and agency heads, for June 1 to discuss the domestic political situation. The same day, Information and Broadcasting Minister Sen. Muhammad Ali Durrani announced that all private electronic media outlets must now obtain permission from the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority before each live broadcast. Pakistan's Supreme Court also said it plans to investigate reports of state authorities and political groups harassing and threatening journalists.

The country's increasingly assertive judiciary and media have played a key role in the growing crisis of governance. The most recent blow to Musharraf came May 26 during a Supreme Court Bar Association seminar entitled "Separation of Powers and Independence of the Judiciary," when several prominent lawyers harshly criticized the government and the military's control of the state. Several TV channels carried the event live.

The seminar enraged the Musharraf regime, which responded by saying abusive and derogatory remarks about national institutions, especially the armed forces, will not be tolerated. In a May 30 speech to officers at the Jehlum garrison, Musharraf warned the media to stop politicizing the judicial crisis, though media criticism of the Pakistani government is hardly unprecedented.

In fact, the country has seen a major proliferation of private television channels under Musharraf's rule. The government allowed this in order to counter public criticism that it is a military-dominated autocratic regime. It also could afford to allow the increasingly vibrant media its freedom since Musharraf faced no real challenge to his rule.

But in the wake of the suspension of Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, this vibrancy has damaged the public perception of the government. Yet, because the country's opposition parties continue to be divided over how to move against Musharraf, media coverage of political events and the broadcasting of damning criticism have not resulted in the protests attaining critical mass. Nonetheless, the government is moving toward a major crackdown that will drastically curtail free speech.

The nature of the criticism -- which has been aimed not only at the president, but also at the military's domination of the state -- and its reception within Musharraf's own constituency could present major problems for Musharraf's ability to rule.

Musharraf's most important source of power is the support he receives from the military, particularly the army. Criticism of Musharraf due to his dual role as military chief and president is one thing, but the questioning of the military's control over the state changes things dramatically. This forces the top generals to question Musharraf's ability to look after the military's interests. Hence, Musharraf is rushing to clamp down on the media. He must now show the generals he is very much in control and is capable of ensuring that the military maintains its hold on the state. Losing the confidence of the army's senior leadership would prove fatal to his own hold on power.

It is unlikely a crackdown on political dissent will help Musharraf shore up his position; in fact, it likely will make the situation worse for him. The verdict in Chaudhry's appeal case and the controversial presidential vote set to take place in September will only accelerate the momentum of the country's growing unrest.[Stratfor]

Not the end of the World

2007-06-01T11:40:00.000+05:30

Starfor reports that Washington appears to be preparing New Delhi for disappointment by giving quiet assurances that the United States is still firmly committed to pursuing a strategic partnership with India even if the nuclear deal falls through.

When asked how close Indian and U.S. negotiators are in sealing a pending civilian nuclear deal, U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said May 31, "we're almost there." Burns is now in India, where he will spend the next two days trying to iron out a bilateral deal termed the "123 agreement" needed to bring India out of 30 years of nuclear isolation so the energy-starved South Asian giant can start receiving nuclear fuel and technology from the 45-member Nuclear Suppliers Group.

The deal has stagnated for close to two years now because of some critical sticking points that the Indians and Americans simply cannot afford to back down on. The main sticking points involve clauses added to the original agreement by the U.S. Congress that stipulate India will not be allowed to reprocess nuclear fuel (which would allow for the extraction of weapons-grade plutonium) and the nuclear deal will be nullified should India conduct a nuclear test. For economic, political and national security reasons, India is not willing to concede on these U.S. demands and is looking for some leeway from Washington.

That leeway will not be easy to come by, especially since U.S. President George W. Bush knows the 123 agreement is going to have to come back to Congress for final approval. With the U.S. election season already in full swing and a vociferous nonproliferation lobby in Washington breathing heavily over the nuclear deal, it looks like these negotiations are not going to be wrapped up as quickly as both sides are hoping.

Bush has set the June 6-8 G-8 summit in Germany as an unofficial deadline to get this nuclear deal wrapped up and use the international conference as a platform to commemorate the cementing of a strategic partnership between India and the United States. This nuclear deal is the main stepping-stone the United States needs to formulate a geopolitical balance in the Indian Ocean basin. Such a balance would allow Washington to use India as a hedge against China, safeguard U.S. energy interests in the Persian Gulf, dilute Russia's ties with New Delhi and sustain pressure on Pakistan to cooperate on containing the transnational jihadist movement.

The ruling Congress party in India is keen on expanding ties with the United States, but also realizes the need to allay domestic political concerns that India is straying from its generally nonaligned foreign policy stance in the post-Cold War world. For New Delhi to move forward with this strategic alliance, it needs to show that it is getting a good deal with this nuclear agreement to alleviate India's energy concerns substantially.

Though Burns and his team are hard at work in New Delhi, the Bush administration appears to be making moves of its own to keep India interested in case the nuclear deal ends up taking even longer than expected. Indian officials said May 30 that Bush recently called up Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and invited him to his ranch in Crawford, Texas. The dates are still being sorted out, but Singh could be donning cowboy boots as early as September.

Singh's trip would be a personalized visit, not another stuffy meeting at the White House with 30-member delegations. Bush does not invite just anybody to the ranch for one-on-one face time over barbeque. So far, less than two dozen world leaders have been hosted by Bush at the ranch since he came into office in January 2001. To get an invitation to Crawford, one must be a close friend or ally of Bush (like British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi or Australian Prime Minister John Howard), or someone Bush feels he must deal with for strategic reasons (like Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Jiang Zemin and Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah). Singh likely falls into the latter category.

Singh's addition to the Crawford guest list has also been coupled with an announcement by the U.S. Defense Department of a $1.1 billion deal to sell India six C-130J Hercules transport aircraft and related equipment. These fully modernized C-130s are a significant update to the Indian air force's airlift capacity. Its 30 or so Soviet-era Ilyushin Il-76 transports are getting old, and the C-130 is a fairly unique airframe with more than 50 years of ongoing active service with the U.S. military. But this is not to say that Washington is pulling out all the stops in terms of military aid to India -- Pakistan (along with Cameroon and some 60 other countries around the world) operates older variants of the venerable transport. The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency, however, is making a point to glamorize the proposed deal as a way for the United States to enhance its foreign policy and national security by strengthening the U.S.-Indian strategic relationship.

While Pakistan and China may be pleased to see the nuclear deal faltering over recent months, Washington is sending a clear message that it is still dead serious about its strategic alliance with India. But though the United States has its eyes set on India for long-term purposes, India's perspective is more short-term. India is not willing to go back on 50 years of its nuclear doctrine to satisfy U.S. demands for the deal to pass, and New Delhi's stance is becoming increasingly hardened. For India, the nuclear deal will have to materialize for this developing strategic alliance to bear fruit. Burns might be able to work some magic in New Delhi to get the agreement inked, but it is going to be a long shot.[Stratfor]

We dont need the civilian nuclear deal if it is not on our terms. It is better the deal falls through. The UPA as well as Bush want to ink the deal asap for political reasons. For that India cannot sacrifice its strategic interests.

India and the Modern Islamist Terrorist

2007-05-31T18:06:00.000+05:30

Even five years after the 9/11 terror attacks, India’s security forces haven’t learned anything about modern Islamist terrorists. In their zeal to safeguard one of Delhi’s showpieces the Delhi Metro, the CISF, which has the responsibility of its security, has rightly decided to introduce a series of tough security measures including profiling of suspicious passengers. They have already decided the target for profiling – “bearded youths wearing caps” (read: Muslim youth wearing skull caps).

After that what are we supposed to do? Cry or laugh?

The modern Islamist terrorist is completely different from the stereotypical image engrained in the minds of India’s security forces. They are highly educated and ambitious. They come from simple middle-class families who are not overtly religious or are secular. They are well acquainted with Western lifestyle. They are clean-shaven, suave looking and don’t sport anything that will give their identity away. They are intelligent, courteous and friendly. To their families and the outside world, they would be the last anyone would suspect of being Islamists.

It is once they come under the influence of jihadi recruiters looking out for the modern would-be jihadi, their life takes a 180° turn. They are imparted lessons in radical Islam and brainwashed into believing that Islam is in danger from the infidels. In India, the meticulously planned and executed Gujarat riots of 2002 - in the wake of the heinous Islamist terror activity of burning and killing innocent but boisterous Kar-Sevaks at Godhra - where the state BJP govt and the larger Sangh Parivar actively participated and perpetuated the pogrom for more than two months is today used by Pakistan's ISI controlled Indian Islamists to brainwash the young and impressionable Indian Muslims to indulge in anti-India terrorism. Apart from this, as Mullahs teach the faithful to be more concerned about their fellow Muslim in another country than the welfare of their country, the Islamists have many excuses like Palestine, Iraq, Bosnia, Kashmir, etc to motivate innocent Muslims into jihad. Killing them - even if that means fellow Muslims get killed in the process - is the only way to save Islam and establish it as the dominant religion in the world. They are further brainwashed into believing that if they die for Islam, they will be in paradise and rewarded with 72 virgins for non-stop pleasure. Their background helps them from giving away their new identity. Ultimately their passion for radical Islam and jihad turn them into Islamic zombies.

But that doesn’t stop them from enjoying the vices defined by Islam before their final act. This is what some of the 9/11 terrorists who were supposed to be pious Muslims did before they boarded the flights that changed the world: Some of them called prostitutes to their rooms and indulged in earthly pleasures before their encounters with the virgins waiting for them in Paradise, others watch pornographic movies, some others gulped down liquor, some visited strip clubs. After that surely Allah wouldn’t have been that pleased and cancelled their tickets to paradise.

So the question is: are the Indian security agencies going to update their notes on the Islamist terrorists or are they going to harass innocent Muslims while letting the modern Islamist terrorist through the green and yellow channels.

Related Link: Tavleen Singh on the movement to de-Indianise Indian Muslims by imposing an Arabic idea of Islam.

India Boosting Pakistan's Economy

2007-05-30T17:51:00.000+05:30

For sometime now after the removal of quotas, Pakistan has been losing out in the world textile market due to superior products and offers from its main competitors like India, China, Bangladesh, etc. On one hand India is partly stealing Pakistan’s textile pie in the international market and thus reducing its foreign exchange earnings but on the other hand India is boosting Pakistan’s internal economy.

The popularity of Indian TV dramas among Pakistani women has lead to an increasing trend of attiring sarees, which has boosted the business of local saree manufacturers.

Popular Indian TV dramas such as “Kiunkay Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi”, “Kahin Tu Hoga”, “Kumkum” and “Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki” have played a major role in setting a new fashion trend in the country.

This emerging fashion has had a positive impact on clothing and jewellery businesses in domestic markets and creating employment among the lower class people. On the other hand, imports and smuggling of Indian sarees has also surged notably in the country, owing to a soaring demand among female customers for this product.

Traditionally, married women belonging to Bihari and Hyderabadi families in the country prefer wearing Banarsi sarees in ceremonies and wear silk and shafoon sarees at home. But the rising fashion trend has breached all ethnic differences and age-limits among women for adopting saree in their culture.

A survey conducted by Daily Times at various big shopping centres and manufacturing areas of the metropolis revealed that the production and sales of sarees have increased following a rising demand among the women from elite and middle classes.

Scores of entrepreneurs, who have newly established their business with large stocks of this popular dress, have been generating profitable revenues while cashing in on the saree fever.

One of the saree retailers at Tariq Road in Karachi, Muhammad Sohail told Daily Times that the sale of sarees has increased tremendously since last three years.

He estimated that the business of every big saree emporium at Tariq Road has surged by four times in just two years and scores of saree shops have been opened in various shopping centres. “If one (shopkeeper) used to sell 20 sarees in a week, now he is selling around 100 sarees in the same period.

“The Saas-Bahu dramas have played a magnificent role as advertisement campaign for sarees, and provided a remarkable boost to our sales,” he said.

According to shopkeepers, the majority of the customers purchase sarees ranging between Rs 2,500 and Rs 5,000, whereas some also demand costly and exclusive sarees ranging between Rs 8,000 to Rs 15,000 per item, especially for dowry purposes.

Banarsi, silk and shafoon sarees are highly demanded by the customers. The local manufacturers design sarees with valuables embroidery and handiwork to imitate the Indian style.

Interestingly, the most demanded and costly sarees in the market are those, which look similar to the saree worn by Indian actresses in Indian TV dramas. Keeping this in view, the local manufacturers have adopted a simple technique to name their sarees after the popular characters in the dramas.

“Kumkum and Kashish sarees are very popular among young and unmarried customers,” Sohail said.

For instance, a saree similar to one worn by a popular TV character Kashish is available in the market for Rs 20, 000 under the name of “Kashish saree”. A saree worn by Kumkum –another famous TV character - branded as “Kumkum saree” is being sold at Rs 25, 000.

Besides, huge quantities of sarees are being imported from Dubai via India. It is also smuggled directly from India by some cloth merchants.

The surging fashion craze created by Indian TV dramas has not only boosted the business of cloth merchants, but has also increased profits of the jewellery industry.

Mangalsuther (necklace), bangles and earrings, similar to those worn in Indian TV dramas, have rose in demand.[Daily Times]

So once again India's Softpower rocks. One more reason for Pakistan to lift the ban of Indian News Channels - who knows what that can do to Pakistan's economy. One more reason to liberalise trade between the two countries - to put an end to smuggling and cut the middle-men of Dubai out. I am looking forward to know the reactions of the Pakistani political parties to this revelation. I am sure the Mullahs will be aghast at this news.

Cartoon Speak: Tick, tick, tick

2007-05-28T12:35:00.000+05:30

Courtesy: The Hindu

The Chinese Espionage Style

2007-05-26T17:03:00.000+05:30

In the wake of the arrest and subsequent trial of Chi Mak, a naturalized Chinese-American accused of acting as an agent of the Chinese government and exporting military information, among other charges, Stratfor, examining the the testimony and evidence presented in this case, reports how the case provides an inside look at the methods the Chinese use in the United States to acquire cutting-edge technology and the U.S. government's efforts to counter them. Chi's wife, brother, sister-in-law and nephew are awaiting trial in connection with the case.

An Age-Old Problem

Espionage, often called "the world's second-oldest profession," has been practiced since the beginning of recorded history. In the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the launch of the global war on terrorism, however, the FBI redirected nearly all of its assets for foreign counterintelligence (FCI) programs into the counterterrorism effort. This meant that for the first time in the bureau's history, practically no counterintelligence efforts were taking place. Although the scope of the damage caused by this virtual FCI hiatus might never be fully appreciated, the October 2005 arrest of the Chi family was one sign that the pendulum was beginning to swing the other way -- that resources were being allocated to address the enormous problem of foreign spies.

While the FBI's limited FCI programs run up against the espionage efforts of dozens of foreign countries, no country poses a more aggressive or widespread intelligence threat to the United States than China.

The Chinese in many ways use the espionage version of the "human wave" attacks they employed against U.S. military forces during the Korean War. Due to China's size and the communist government's control of society, the Chinese can devote immense manpower to gathering intelligence. For example, the U.S. State Department issued 382,000 nonimmigrant visas and 37,000 immigrant visas to Chinese citizens in 2006. Additionally, more than 62,000 Chinese students were studying at U.S. universities last year. Granted, very few of these people were spies, though the number still represents an enormous pool of potential suspects to vet and watch, especially when one considers that there are only 12,575 FBI agents in the United States -- most of whom are assigned to tasks other than FCI, such as terrorism and white-collar crime.

The bottom line, therefore, is that it is very difficult to determine which of these visitors are in the United States to steal secrets and technology. Indeed, many serve in both capacities: They are legitimate students and part of the intelligence effort. Furthermore, not everyone who collects information for the Chinese government realizes they are doing so. By engaging in normal conversations with Chinese friends or relatives about all manner of things, including work, the average person can be providing these friends -- the real intelligence agents -- with critical information.

Additionally, in many cases, the activities of Chinese agents do not fit the legal definition of espionage. Scouring open-source material for new and emerging technologies, attending technology conferences and trade shows and hiring firms to look at new technologies are all legal activities -- and U.S. companies do this all the time. Some Chinese agents, then, are engaging much more in business intelligence than in true espionage. Given the blurred lines between civilian and government/military technology in China, however, the information gleaned can easily find its way into military applications.

The Chinese Style

The Chinese are renowned for their patient and persistent espionage methods, and for their technological reverse-engineering capabilities. They also are noted for taking an extremely long view of their political and military needs and of the intelligence required to meet them. Because of this, the Chinese pose the greatest intelligence threat to U.S. technology.

Aggressive efforts by the Chinese government to obtain critical technologies are no secret. The Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology, for instance, lists science and technology acquisition programs such as its National High-tech R&D Program (known as the 863 Program) on its official Web site. This program provides guidance and funding for acquiring or developing technology that will have a "significant impact on enhancing China's overall national strengths." Targeted technologies include those for civilian use in areas such as information technology (IT), biotechnology, agriculture, manufacturing, energy and the environment. Many of these technologies, however, also have military applications.

While the 863 Program calls for the Chinese to acquire or develop these technologies, it is far cheaper and quicker to acquire them -- and China has a long history of doing so. A great many of China's weapons systems have been developed either by stealing designs and technologies or by outright copying the entire system. In addition to copying small arms such as the AK-47, the RPG-7 and the Makarov pistol, Chinese military industries have even reverse-engineered fighter aircraft. The Chengdu F-7 fighter, for example, is a copy of the Soviet MiG-21. This crash technological advancement program is intended not only to close China's technological gap with the West, but also to leapfrog ahead of it.

To acquire critical technologies, then, the Chinese rely not only on traditional espionage, but also on collecting the needed information via open sources. Such open-source collection is both faster and easier than engaging in espionage -- and it is legal. In effect, the Chinese are exploiting the openness of the U.S. research and development (R&D) system. Such openness allows faster development of technologies in the United States because scientists and engineers from various institutions and companies can share ideas, and thus contribute to different aspects of the concept. The openness, however, also makes it easy for others to "eavesdrop" on the ongoing technological conversation.

Other countries, including Israel, France, India and South Korea, do the same thing -- though none has matched China in the amount of effort and resources devoted to this process. To obtain the desired technology, China is sending students, scholars and researchers to work and study in the United States and other industrialized countries. Some of these visitors then return to China to work in high-tech "incubator parks," where R&D takes place. Among this group, however, are real intelligence officers who are sent to steal critical technologies.

The Chi case provides insight into this process at work in the United States. According to the U.S. government, Chi was employed as a principal support engineer for Power Paragon, a subsidiary of L-3 Communications/SPD Technologies/Power Systems Group in Anaheim, Calif. Chi, who was born in China and became a U.S. citizen in 1985, was granted a "secret-level" security clearance in 1996 and worked on more than 200 U.S. defense and military contracts as an electrical engineer.

During the investigation into Chi's activities, the FBI performed a "trash cover" on him -- literally combing through his trash for evidence -- and found two documents containing instructions for Chi to attend more seminars and lists of the technologies he was to obtain. The lists had been torn up into small pieces, but the FBI was able to reconstruct and translate them. The FBI then performed surreptitious searches of Chi's residence and reportedly found documents pertaining to a number of the technologies listed on both documents.

Redefining the 'Company'

Efforts to collect sensitive technology are conducted not only by individual intelligence agents, but also by the many corporations established and controlled by the Chinese government. One such corporation is the Xinshidai Group, which was established by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) and is one of China's two largest military hardware conglomerates. One of the armaments companies Xinshidai controls is Norinco, which is widely known in the United States for sales of light arms and ammunition.

While conglomerates such as Xinshidai are not officially part of the Chinese government, they were established solely to serve the needs of the PLA and the Chinese military-industrial complex. And one important need of the Chinese government is to acquire advanced defense technology. Many Xinshidai subunits, including Norinco, own subsidiary companies in the United States, and employees of these companies attend trade shows and technology conferences, and also meet with representatives from other companies. Of course, with so much information available online, much of this open-source collection can be accomplished from a desk in China

Many times, early technologies related to the defense industry are not yet classified and therefore not protected. These technologies often become classified only after the U.S. government has purchased them. Information on these emerging technologies, then, can be obtained during the early stage, when their developers are applying for patents or looking for venture capital, partners and/or customers.

The technology acquisition process more often crosses the line into traditional espionage inside China, where Chinese intelligence officers -- operating without fear of prosecution -- frequently steal sensitive documents or copy a target's hard drive. This situation is further complicated when one considers that many of the major U.S.-based corporations doing business in China or seeking to expand market share there also have lucrative contracts with the U.S. Defense Department or other federal agencies. Some of these companies are going beyond Chinese manufacturing and are establishing design and software development centers in the country, meaning even more technology and proprietary information must be made available there.

The expansion of foreign companies into China brings a host of potential targets right to the Chinese intelligence apparatus, allowing China to apply even more pressure to even more points in its quest for technology. Moreover, the techniques used against companies and travelers in China can be far more aggressive than those employed against similar targets in the United States.

In addition to the threat posed to U.S. national security, allowing China to close the technology gap through the acquisition of proprietary information -- legally or not -- ultimately will hurt U.S. multinationals as Chinese companies use the information to become competitors. This means U.S. companies wishing to remain competitive by operating in China or partnering with Chinese firms and their subsidiaries in the United States must maintain a high level of vigilance.[Stratfor]

An Insightful Look at US-Chinese Relationship

2007-05-26T16:41:00.000+05:30

In an insightful and enlightening article Stratfor analyst Rodger Baker takes a deeper look into Sino-USA relations. He looks at the past, the present and the future of this relationship between the world’s sole superpower and a fast emerging China. This was published on the eve of the second biannual Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED) between the two countries, which just concluded.

By Rodger Baker

Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi is in Washington to meet with U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson for the second of the planned biannual Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED) sessions between the two countries. The dialogue brings together representatives of numerous ministries on both sides of the Pacific, covering finance, labor, trade, agriculture and the environment, among others. As the talks get under way, business and media attention is focused almost exclusively on two main issues: the Chinese-U.S. trade imbalance and China's undervaluing of the yuan.

The dialogue, however, is designed to integrate a much broader array of issues between Beijing and Washington, moving beyond trade to the larger matter of how the world's only remaining superpower deals with the rapid emergence of China on the international economic and political scene. For Washington, the dialogue is a tool to manage China's international relations as much as China's economic development. And for Beijing, the dialogue represents an attempt to shape relations with the United States in terms of economic cooperation, rather than strategic competition.

The economic framework for discussions seems to appeal to both Washington and Beijing, and the current dialogue, then, serves as a convenient tool for managing relations that sit on a much broader geopolitical framework. Still in its early stages, the SED reflects a changing dynamic in the management of U.S.-Chinese relations. From Beijing's perspective, the SED is a way to focus on the potential positive elements of U.S.-Chinese ties -- business and trade -- and reduce attention on questions of the "China threat" and the emergence of China as a military competitor to the United States.

The SED serves, in Beijing's mind, as one way of using the U.S. administration as a balance to the U.S. Congress. If the administration is looking at the broader strategic issues posed by China's global emergence, then it will be less likely to accede to congressional politicking on the China issue -- or so Beijing hopes. China sees the U.S. Congress as "unsophisticated" on China issues, and Capitol Hill as a place where short-term political interests, based to a large degree on electioneering and campaign contributions, drive periodic spurts of anti-Chinese rhetoric. However, during the past two decades, Beijing itself has grown a little more sophisticated in its understanding of U.S. politics, and has moved past dealing primarily with image management at the presidential and ministerial level to trying to shape U.S. political views from the ground up.

With the rapid rise of the Chinese economy in the aftermath of the Asian economic crisis and Beijing's entry into the World Trade Organization, China looked to both protect its growing economic connections and expand its international influence in the post-Cold War environment. With the Soviet Union gone and Europe failing to rise as a counterbalance to the United States, China set its sights on Washington as the biggest challenge to Chinese power -- and yet the best economic path to Chinese growth. Washington was headed for a presidential change, Beijing was dealing with increasing U.S. warnings of the China threat and the Chinese government was looking at its own upcoming leadership transition and the internal battle over best economic policies and security posture. For each of these issues, managing relations with the United States became the critical common factor.

In the late 1990s, Beijing ramped up a program of perception management in Washington, moving from trying to buy influence through campaign contributions to a more subtle approach of accelerating political and economic dialogue with U.S.-based think tanks, research institutes and academic institutions. Chinese scholars, both in the academic fields and in semi-government research institutes, embarked on numerous exchanges, dialogues and forums, sharing insights into policy debates and internal economic inconsistencies in China. At the same time, the state began releasing economic statistics that, through close examination, painted a picture not of a strong and unbreakable China, but of one that faced many of the same economic challenges and potential pitfalls as its Asian neighbors.

Through a carefully managed spread of information, China began shaping the perception of the key U.S. researchers on Chinese issues. Beijing seemed more open, more willing to admit mistakes and more receptive to suggestions for economic, social and even limited political reform. Discussions of the China threat shifted from a military concern to one of economics to one of potential Chinese collapse -- and the attendant ripples that would affect the international (and U.S.) economic systems. This information began trickling up to congressional aides, members of Congress and into the U.S. government bureaucracy and administration.

And Beijing is seeing a payoff, at least on the surface. When the current administration took power, relations with Washington were contentious to say the least. U.S. President George W. Bush came into office with a Cabinet that viewed China as the next strategic threat now that the Soviet Union was relegated to history. China's economic rise, and its military expansion that focused on new missiles and naval technology, was seen as a challenge to U.S. dominance of the seas, and thus to U.S. core national security. Now, the administration is pursuing strategic dialogue and cooperation with China, even if this is just a stopgap measure until Washington can free itself from Iraq.

In 2001, after the 9/11 attacks, Washington and Beijing came to a working arrangement. The United States would essentially leave China alone, and China would not present any direct challenge to the United States as Washington dealt with what it saw as a new strategic threat: al Qaeda and international Islamist militancy. Beijing welcomed the reprieve from the more contentious relations with Washington, which had declined precipitously following the collision that left a U.S. reconnaissance aircraft on a military runway in southern China.

At the time, Beijing was neither militarily nor politically prepared to square off against the United States. In fact, China was facing a major generational shift in leadership and needed the external buffer to allow Beijing to focus on internal issues. With the political transition completed, Beijing then shifted focus to economic and social stability -- and again used the minimal external pressure from Washington to give it breathing room while these issues took priority.

Internationally, Beijing used the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq and the North Korean nuclear crisis to try to raise the profile of international organizations such as the United Nations to counter the unipolar power of the United States. At the same time, it tried to raise China's profile and importance to Washington -- since, after all, the U.S. government could not face off against al Qaeda, Afghanistan, Iraq and North Korea all at the same time.

By 2005, Washington was looking at longer-term involvement in Iraq than it had planned, and then-U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick made an indirect offer to Beijing for closer potential cooperation -- offering to treat China as a global player if Beijing proved a "responsible stakeholder." The offer appealed to Beijing, and China, cautiously at first but with increasing boldness, launched into a more open dialogue with Washington, making token trades on currency issues and offering its services in "rogue" nations such as North Korea and, more recently, Sudan in order to demonstrate its "responsibility" and keep real pressure from the United states to a minimum.

While the U.S. administration, particularly the Pentagon, was not all that reassured by China's behavioral change (as seen in early 2006 with a series of reports labeling China a strategic threat and culminating in a several-minute-long tirade by a Falun Gong activist at the White House reception for Chinese President Hu Jintao), Washington, with the exception of Congress, has taken a relatively relaxed approach to China. Trade issues dominate the headlines, as does the yuan valuation, but the administration pushes for more cooperative dialogue with Beijing rather than punitive sanctions or tariffs.

On Beijing's side, shortly after the first SED meeting in December 2006, China's Foreign Ministry launched the Center for China-U.S. Relations Studies at its research institute, the China Institute for International Studies. The center is designed to bring together top Chinese scholars on U.S. issues from across a broad spectrum of China (economic, international relations, security and others) and encourage increased exchanges with counterparts in the United States -- thus managing the perception campaign from a unified center. Earlier this year, China also appointed Yang Jiechi as foreign minister, calling on Yang's years of experience in the Chinese Embassy in Washington, his work with both sides of Congress and his long-standing ties with the Bush family.

The SED, then, provides both Washington and Beijing with a more centralized (and less random) point of contact for managing bilateral relations. But management and fundamental alterations are very different things. China's trade and economic policies will not be set with Washington's concerns as the top priority. Beijing's first concern is the maintenance of Communist Party rule, followed closely by the maintenance of social stability (which allows the party to remain in power). Economics are a tool, one that must balance domestic social pressures with international concerns. Furthermore, while dialogue can provide a channel for managing relations with the United States, China is not abandoning other tools for preserving its increasing economic vulnerabilities as its trade and energy requirements are internationalized.

China's anti-satellite weapons (ASAT) test in January was a clear reminder that China still sees the United States as the top challenge to Chinese economic security. China is a land power, not a maritime power. But China's economics have grown increasingly linked to longer and longer supply lines, particularly with energy imports. As such, Beijing sees a major vulnerability in its supply routes, as a large portion of its energy must pass through waters that, for all intents and purposes, are controlled by the United States. The ASAT test was intended to notify Washington that Beijing has ways to deal with the U.S. strategic dominance of the seas by threatening critical U.S. communications and guidance infrastructure.

China's vulnerabilities as a land power increasingly dependent on sea routes makes Beijing always extremely nervous about the United States, regardless of whether Washington intends to interdict Chinese trade and energy supplies. At the same time, China's expanding trade and political links around the globe are starting to rub up against U.S. strategic interests, particularly where China taps into energy resources Washington wants, or where Beijing's relations in places like Africa and Latin America challenge U.S. access to raw materials. But economic competition notwithstanding, Washington is loath to directly confront China, as attacking a land power in Asia is never wise or easy.

There is a standoff, then, between Washington and Beijing. Washington is heavily occupied with Iraq and Iran, and Beijing is taking advantage of this to expand its political and economic ties as broadly as possible. At the same time, China is obsessed with internal economic and social instability, and Washington can use these concerns to needle Beijing and keep China from taking too much advantage of Washington's limited bandwidth. Both see the SED as a useful place to manage this dance. Neither sees the SED as a real forum for a strategic partnership between China and the United States, or a place for drastic changes in the relationship.

There is something beyond the SED, however, that could start bringing Washington and Beijing closer together: the re-emergence of Moscow.

Relations between Washington and Beijing have been rather manic since the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949. After Beijing's initial flirtations with Washington, China and the United States soon found themselves facing one another on the battlefields of Korea. China's ally at the time, the Soviet Union, largely sat out the conflict, leaving Beijing to ensure the communist revolution in Asia -- and letting China fight the United States while Moscow avoided the potential World War III feared by U.S. strategists at the time. Rather than using the opportunity presented by the Korean War to launch a simultaneous assault on Europe, Moscow let China fight, undermining the potential for any Sino-U.S. relations and tying China closer into the Soviet sphere of influence.

But by the late 1960s, tensions between Beijing and Moscow had risen to a fevered level, and significant border clashes broke out in 1969. Three years later, the mutually perceived threat from the Soviet Union brought U.S. President Richard Nixon to China to meet with Mao Zedong. The United States and China embarked on a new strategic relationship based on balancing the Soviet threat. This lasted until shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when China began seeking to expand its influence in East Asia and looked as though it were getting much more serious about war with Taiwan. In the late 1990s, China even flirted with the idea of establishing a strategic partnership with Russia to block the unipolar power of the United States, but never quite trusted its northern neighbor (and, for a while, Moscow had little to offer anyway aside from arms sales, which were already taking place). When 2001 rolled around, Beijing found new opportunities to deal directly with Washington.

But Russia has begun reasserting its influence around its periphery, and Cold War rhetoric is flowing from Moscow. On the surface, that would seem ideal for China, except that Beijing has been looking at Central Asia as a critical piece of its energy security puzzle, since Central Asian energy supplies never need to move by sea to China. As Moscow seeks to reclaim influence and control in its near abroad, China sees its potential role in Central Asia diminishing and its energy supplies challenged by the resurgent Russia. Add in Russian talk of reinvigorating the Russian presence in the Pacific, and China sees its energy and economic security once again challenged by its neighbor.

This could provide the impetus for a Beijing move closer to Washington -- to keep the United States focused on Russian threats rather than Chinese concerns. Beijing already has experience working with the United States to counter Russian influence, and keeping the current and former superpowers eyeing each other leaves China a less visible threat, and thus capable of continuing to deal with its own internal issues while facing minimal pressure from outside. As Beijing sees it, if a true multipolar world cannot be established any time soon, the hints of a return to a bipolar world order -- with Russia facing off against the United States -- could keep China out of the crosshairs and constrain U.S. actions. With the SED already in place, China has another pathway through which to shape its own image as cooperative, and perhaps drop a few hints of its concerns about Russia.[Strator]

Nasty Chinese Entertainment

2007-05-25T16:11:00.000+05:30

Entertainment in the People's Republic:

....for your eyes only!

Link via "Serendipity"

More Stratfor Reports on Mecca Mosque Blast

2007-05-19T13:03:00.000+05:30

Stratfor issued two more reports on the Mecca Mosque blast at Hyderabad which I am flagging here.

Tensions are high in Hyderabad, India, after an explosion during Friday prayers at the city's Mecca Mosque on May 18, in which at least five people were killed and 27 were injured. Many Muslims in the area, angered by the attack, reportedly are pelting local businesses and police forces with stones. The explosion took place far from the information technology business community in Hyderabad's northern suburbs, but businesses in the area should exercise caution.

While Hindu extremists in the area could easily be blamed for the attack, the bombing could well be the work of Kashmiri Islamist groups expanding their presence in southern India.

The idea of Muslims attacking fellow Muslims to incite riots is anomalous in India, though not completely unprecedented. In September 2006, a series of coordinated explosions killed 37 people and injured more than 125 in a Muslim cemetery next to a mosque in the northern town of Malegaon (about 180 miles northeast of Mumbai) in the state of Maharashtra. Most of those killed were Muslim pilgrims who were attending Friday prayers on the Shab-e-Baraat holy day. After a series of arrests and investigations, Maharashtra police reported that the attack was the work of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI). India's Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) then reported in November 2006 that the main perpetrator of the attack, whose nom de guerre is Shabbir Batterywala, is a Lashkar-e-Taiba operative who was working with SIMI member Raees Ahmad. Another member of SIMI, Noor-ul-Huda, reportedly admitted after his arrest that he organized the attack.

These militant Islamist groups have traditionally focused on Hindu targets to provoke extremist Hindu groups into retaliating against Muslims across India, along the lines of what happened in 1993 in Mumbai and 2002 in Gujarat when Hindu mobs went on violent rampages against Muslims, resulting in some of the deadliest communal riots in India's history. However, Indians have largely become inured to these militant attacks and have failed to provide the wide-scale, violent response the Islamist groups hope for.

The lack of a Hindu response could have led to a shift in thinking among the Kashmiri Islamist groups operating in India, who might have decided to risk alienating local support by staging attacks against Muslims in hopes of reigniting Hindu-Muslim tensions in locations that have a history of deadly communal violence. (It is important to note that these groups are rooted in Wahhabi doctrine, which justifies attacking mainstream Barelvi and secular Muslims.)

This strategy carries its fair share of flaws, however, as India's Muslim community is largely moderate and generally feels integrated within the Indian republic. Without much of a radical streak to draw from within India's Muslim population, the Kashmiri Islamist groups are likely to face a major popular backlash.[Stratfor]

Police forces were on high alert and security was tightened at potential targets in India on May 18 following the explosion of an improvised explosive device (IED) at the Mecca Mosque in Hyderabad that left at least seven people dead and more than two dozen injured. Two more live IEDs reportedly were defused at the mosque, located in the Charminar area of Hyderabad's old city.

Although it is unclear who is behind the bombing, the attackers' poor tradecraft indicates it was the work of a relatively inexperienced militant cell, and not one directly linked to one of India's more established militant groups. Regardless, the attack is likely to fuel Hyderabad's already tense relations between Hindus and Muslims.

The IED exploded around 1:30 p.m. local time when the mosque was crowded with worshipers performing Friday prayers. The blast occurred near the Wuzukhana, a fountain inside the mosque entrance where worshippers wash their hands and faces before praying. The two other devices had been placed near the entrance to the mosque complex, though it is unclear whether the devices were meant to target arriving worshippers or first responders and fleeing worshippers following the initial blast.

The failure of the other two bombs and the timing of the explosion indicate poor tradecraft on the part of the bombers. Poor design or workmanship in the detonation mechanism, remote controls or the actual composition of the explosives could have been what prevented the other devices from detonating. Moreover, the bomber would have wanted to maximize the casualty count, and would have timed the blast to coincide with the worshippers' arrival at the Wuzkuhana. Instead, the explosion occurred during prayers, when most worshippers already had washed and moved away from the fountain. Indian officials said the bomb would have killed many more people had it detonated a few minutes earlier, before prayers started. Because the bomb was detonated remotely, the bomber likely estimated when the fountain would be crowded, rather than having eyes on the target before triggering the device.

The Mecca Mosque, built in the 17th century, is the main, established mosque in Hyderabad. Rather than catering to one of India's many Muslim offshoot sects, which are considered heretical by orthodox Muslims, the mosque draws its congregation from the city's mainstream Sunni community.

The attack, the third major bombing of a mosque in India in the past 13 months, follows the attacks against the Maani Mosque in Maharashtra state and the Jamia Mosque in New Delhi. In all cases, the bombs detonated during or after Friday prayers, when mosques generally are the most crowded. In many cases, attacks against mosques are followed by riots, reprisal bombings of Hindu temples, and communal violence between Hindus and Muslims.

Hyderabad has seen militant activity before -- and been the scene of some of the country's worst communal violence -- but this is the first major attack against a mosque. Within minutes of the bombing, crowds of angry Muslims threw stones at Indian police, claiming they failed to provide adequate security. The police responded by deploying tear gas and firing rubber bullets, reportedly killing four protesters. In response to the bombing and the subsequent police shootings, the Council for Muslim Unity, a mainstream Muslim group, has called for a general strike in Hyderabad, indicating the bombing will only add to the city's already high communal tensions.[Stratfor]

Stratfor on Hyderabad's Mecca Mosque Blast

2007-05-18T20:14:00.000+05:30

Here is Statfor article on the Mecca Mosque bomb blast at Hyderabad.

Five people were killed and at least 27 injured May 18 when a bomb exploded in the historic Mecca Mosque in the Charminar area of the old city in Hyderabad, India. Two more live bombs reportedly were found in the vicinity and defused.

Mecca Masjid is the main mosque in Hyderabad, and thousands of people were gathered for Friday prayers when the bomb exploded around 1:30 p.m. local time. At least 7,000 to 8,000 people perform Friday prayers at the mosque and the fatalities would have been much higher if the bomb had exploded five to six minutes earlier, said Hyderabad member of parliament Asaduddin Owaisi, though he did not elaborate. The failure of the other two bombs to detonate and the low death toll indicates this was an amateurish attack.

The blast occurred against a backdrop of rising Islamist militancy in India's southern region by Kashmiri Islamist groups. The aim of the Kashmiri groups in the southern states appears to be focused on recruitment. These groups have had little success in radicalizing India's Muslim population, and so have been sending in teams to flare up religious fervor and reinvigorate the debate on Kashmir. The groups could be attempting to provoke Indian security forces to crack down on the Muslim population, thereby legitimizing militant groups' causes.

This appears also be the case in Karnataka, home of the high-tech city of Bangalore. Kashmiri Islamist group Hizbul Mujahideen recently issued a statement condemning the harassment of Kashmiri students in Bangalore, claiming such acts negate the claims of Jammu and Kashmir state Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad that no student would be harassed outside of Kashmir. The statement added that students and businesspeople working in other states are vulnerable. By bringing to light these alleged injustices against Kashmiris, these groups are attempting to draw more public support for their militant campaign against India.

Hyderabad has a large Muslim population, and this attack is likely to serve as a catalyst for communal riots in the area. A group angered by the attack already has begun throwing stones at nearby shops and police forces. As Hyderabad is one of India's major hubs for the information technology industry, businesses in the area should exercise caution.[Statfor]