Notes from the Pak Frontier - Volume 2

The second week of Fall 2009 in the AfPak witnessed the tragic collapse of a remote Coalition security bubble in Kamdesh on the Afghan side of the Durand Line, the disappearance of Baluchistan from America's sight, and the beginnings of a pledged terror campaign throughout the Pak Frontier. Telegraphing their intentions to strike the TTP in Waziristan for nearly three months, the push into Ramzak fortifications in Waziristan by the paramilitary Frontier Corps and elements of the Pak military the previous week signaled the beginnings of an escalation in kinetic activity, if not the opening of a full-fledged campaign against the TTP and Haqqani Taliban networks of Al Qaeda. 

According to a David Ignatius Washington Post report from Wana, Waziristan on October 1, "A new battle for control of Waziristan is coming, as the Pakistani military prepares a ground offensive in the Mehsud areas against Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters. The army has code-named the operation 'Rahe Nijat,' which the commander here translates loosely as 'The Way to Get Rid of Them.' The assault could start within the next month." Yet as the Pak military was setting up barricades and road blocks in forbidding frontier terrain in preparation for this coming fight, the Taliban, uncowed, mobilized a suicide bomber and struck the UN sponsored World Food Program in Islamabad, penetrating the security of the international aid facility and delivering a dose of jihad into the central nervous system of Pakistan with terrifying ease. 

On September 29, nine Taliban were killed and eight wounded on two separate drone strikes in Waziristan. The first targeted the South Waziristan compound of Taliban commander Irfan Mehsud in the TTP stronghold of Sararogha village, killing five and wounding six fighters. Four Taliban militants were killed and two wounded in the second strike, in North Waziristan, aimed at the Danday Darpa Khel house of an Afghan National named Emarati, known to work with the Haqqani network.  Sources have not indicated whether Emerati or Irfan were killed in the strikes. 

In response to the Ramzak troubles on September 28, long-range artillery of the Pak military pounded the Makeen area of Waziristan, killing four militants. The Pakistan Airforce also bombed Taliban bunkers in Kotkai, killing three more Waziristan-based militants. According to open sources, in addition to the sixteen Taliban militants killed in Waziristan, five militant members of the banned jihadist organization Lashkar-e-Islam were killed during an internal skirmish in the Tirah valley, located in the Khyber Agency.

The Pak military spokesman, Athar Abbas, indicated an estimated enemy presence of 10,000 TTP and associated fighters in the Waziristan agencies, relaying that an assault on the area would aim to wipe out terrorist networks such as the TTP. 

On September 30, five Taliban militants were killed and six injured in two US drone strikes on vehicles traveling along North Waziristan's Miranshah-Bannu Road. Meanwhile, the Pak military focused its efforts on tying up loose ends in their Swat Operation Rah-e-Raast. According to the Daily Times, security forces rounded up and arrested 28 Taliban militants in Swat and parts of Malakand, including a suicide bombing mastermind named Umer Nawaz - 16 others surrendered voluntarily to the forces of the broad-ranging security sweep.  

In the shadow of the highly effective and disruptive US drone strikes in Waziristan in recent weeks, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, following Ambassador Patterson's admission of a US intelligence black hole in Baluchistan, announced that Pakistan would not allow US drone strikes on Baluchistan targets. 

Following close on the devastating decision, the Taliban commander Hayatullah Khan, in an apparent bid at misdirection and propaganda, announced that Pakistan was no longer safe for Taliban, stating that the entire Taliban leadership, including Mullah Omar, is now in Afghanistan. According to Khan, "The Americans are making the Quetta shura an excuse for an expansion of their drone strikes to Balochistan, nothing else." The question is which failure is more devastating: America's inability to stop Afghanistan from becoming a safe haven for Pakistan Taliban and Al Qaeda elements, or the intelligence shortfall which has allowed a Baluchistan escape route for Waziristan Taliban elements seeking a readily accessible refuge from the coming storm of Rahe Nijat?

By October 1, Sean Maroney of Voice of America noted that the US Embassy's Deputy Chief of Mission in Islamabad, Gerald Feierstein, "strongly believes" Osama bin Laden is operating out of the tribal regions and that the Quetta Shura is a primary source of Taliban command and control strength - a charge which the Pak Interior Minister Rehman Malik coined "mere speculation". In terms of geopolitical strategy, then, Baluchistan is officially a no-go zone for US operations against the Taliban and Al Qaeda. 

According to an October 1 report by Ismail Khan of the New York Times, Pakistan believes Waziristan, rather than Baluchistan, is the Taliban "epicenter" and has, since June, mounted an economic blockade on the agency, cutting off electricity to the area and installing troops on its borders in anticipation of a coming strike on the Mehsud network of the TTP. General Kayani noted that targets for air strikes in Waziristan were dwindling and that the Al Qaeda stronghold was increasingly becoming a black hole for Pakistani intelligence. Ironically, the intelligence vacuum, has spurred the Pak military's General Kayani into a decision to move in to Waziristan in the coming weeks. 

Hundreds of thousands of "civilians" had already sought refuge in neighboring Tank and Dera Ismail Khan; however, though the refugee movement has provided the Pak military with a relatively clear seek and destroy path in Waziristan, little evidence has surfaced on whether or not the Pakistan government seriously sought to interdict any Taliban members who may have fled the region amid the cover of civilians, or whether a best practice methodology for such an interdiction is in play in Pakistan's effort to root out the Mehsud and Haqqani networks.

On October 2, the private news agency NNI reported that as a result of a jirga in Wana between the Ahmedzai Wazir Tribe Taliban leaders and the Waziristan Political Agent Shahab Ali Shah, "A Taliban faction led by Mullah Nazir on Friday parted ways with the banned group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and assured the government that it will remain impartial in the military offensive against TTP."  

In addition to this Friday setback for the TTP in Waziristan, sources in the Pak Frontier Corps indicate that 27 Taliban militants were killed in the FATA in Khyber when their Tirah valley training camps were hit by Pakistan attack helicopters which yielded the deaths of two key commanders, Ghulam Nabi and Farooq Swati, as well as the complete destruction of 19 vehicles, two hideouts and three caves. In Swat, a search and seizure ended in the suicide bomber detonation of a Taliban militant and the injury of two Pakistan security personnel. Also in Swat, five militants surrendered and one Taliban commander named Rehmat was arrested.

On October 3, local Pak media noted the Friday discussions of the success of the Swat operations addressed by Prime Minister Gilani to the Senate. According to Gilani, the Swat campaign has yielded the deaths of over 2,000 Taliban militants, including many key Taliban commanders, the surrender of 3,000 other militants as well as a strong likelihood of 2,000 more Taliban surrendering to security personnel in coming weeks. While noting the success of the Pakistan administration bringing law and order to Swat, Gilani related the current inability of the Pak government to accommodate and house all of the Taliban prisoners of the Swat offensive, raising questions on whether Pakistan's prison system has the capacity to match the task of detaining militant jihadists. 

Unfortunately, the simplest of quantitative and qualitative questions remain blank out unknowns: (1) What percentage of the Taliban membership in custody were members of TNSM?; (2) What are the names and where are the profiles of the Taliban commanders in custody?; (3) How many have been released?; (4) How many have been tried and convicted by a Pakistan court this past six months?; (5) How many different organizations are represented in the 3,000 militant pool?; (6) How many were asked about the Quetta and Peshawar Shuras; & (7) what definition of national sovereignty does each detainee espouse? Is it too much to ask that our partner in the war on the Al Qaeda network keep our leaders informed as to the nature of intel derived for the cost of dozens of Pakistani soldiers and millions of dollars in donated treasure? Does the Pak leadership not respect America enough to provide it with these simple answers, or does it have something to hide; or worse, is America’s government guaranteeing that something remains hidden via diplomatic omission and naked bribery?   The glaring disconnect is staggering. 

Also on Friday, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, addressed the possibility that Pakistan Military may be responsible for nearly 400 executions of Taliban operatives in the province. Over 250 corpses had been found in the province by September with varying degrees of torture, and recently two mass graves were uncovered in Swat in which previously detained prisoners of the Pakistan Government were identified among the dead. A military spokesman in Swat, Col. Akhtar Abbas, denied that anyone in army custody has been killed.   In mid July, Joshua Partlow of the Washington Post writing from Swat of the Taliban in Mingora's downtown green square, "It was at the center of the square that Taliban fighters used to dump their victims' bodies when they controlled Mingora. These gruesome killings initially occurred on Thursday evenings . . . but then became nightly affairs. Eventually, the area was dubbed Slaughterhouse Square."

The detainee issue of the Pak military's Taliban prisoners has received little attention in America, where the Guantanamo prison issue captures sensational headlines. But even though Pakistan is considered America's partner in the war against the Takfiris, and even though the Taliban had resorted to sheer butchery in the Capitol of Swat, it is currently impossible to determine the level of access American investigative teams and military intelligence officials have been permitted in the examination and interrogation of the increasing number of Taliban detainees from Swat since April. And here again, another chasm of unknowns follows: (1) How many of the corpses unearthed and found this year in Swat were detained by the Pakistan security forces?; (2) How many of the dead were interrogated by the ISI?; (3) How many of the dead were foreign fighters?; (4) How many were involved in smuggling rackets?; & (5) How many ethnic groups, tribal lines, Islamist organizations and jihadist groups are represented in the nearly 400 executed Taliban, does a pattern exist and were any known syndicates dealt heavy damage, regardless of who murdered the butchers? The chasm widens.

The Swat locals, for their part, are unmoved when a Talib gets clipped in mercenary relief and consider the findings of the Human Rights Commission out of focus.   In an October 2 McClatchy report by Saeed Shah, a hotel owner in Mingora named Mohammad Ali expressed the local derision for the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, saying "Where were these champions of human rights when the Taliban would slit the throats of people in front of their women and children?" Mohammad continues, "Even the Israelis have not done such bad things to the Palestinians as the Taliban did to us."

In the Bajaur agency in the restive North West on Saturday, 12 suspected Taliban were arrested in a security sweep following two explosions. The Salarzai tribe of Bajaur announced that no Taliban would be allowed in their tehsil as Bill Roggio at The Long War Journal reported on October 3 that "Malik Abdul Majeed, a tribal leader in the Mamond region in the Bajaur tribal agency, was gunned down while driving through the town of Damadola in Mamond. At the time of his murder, Majeed was on his way to meet with government officials to discuss efforts to beat back the Taliban in the Mamond areas." The murder of Majeed marks the tenth anti-Taliban lashkar leader killed by the Taliban in as many days. Interestingly, in previous interviews with Salarzai lashkar members, the tribal leaders have consistently charged the ISI with directing Pak military strikes against the anti-Taliban villages of the borderlands rather than against Taliban positions. 

As news of the Kamdesh strike in Nuristan, in which 8 Americans were killed and dozens of Afghan security personnel were abducted filtered into Pakistan News agencies, rumors of Hakeemullah Mehsud's possible death in an internal struggle gained legs only to be completely quashed the next day. Multiple reports of Taliban leadership deaths either in battle situations or in drone strikes in Western news agencies have been found completely false. The Taliban and Al Qaeda feed off of the confusion, so much so that Ayman Al Zawahiri did not officially eulogize Baitullah Mehsud, who was killed on August 5, until September 28...a deceptive move that perhaps stalled operation Rahe Nijat in its tracks. News of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) leader Tahir Yuldashev's death was confirmed on October 4, after a week of reports, starting on September 28 in which Yuldashev's bodyguard called the Uzbek service for Radio Liberty, Radio Ozodlik, revealing that a late August US drone strike took his arm, his leg and his life. According to a Bill Roggio report, "The man who identified himself as Yuldashev's bodyguard said Yuldashev had been replaced by 'an ethnic Tatar by [the] name of Abdurakhman.'" 

In terms of disrupting the Al Qaeda financing network, the death of Yuldashev was a fantastic American victory which has received virtually zero media attention. Gretchen Peters, in her book Seeds of Terror: How Heroin is Bankrolling the Taliban and Al Qaeda, highlights the value of the IMU to Al Qaeda:"The insurgent group with the deepest reach in the drug trade is unquestionably the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). With a network of fighters extending from South Waziristan up through the former Soviet republics, the IMU was cultivated by bin Laden in the 1990s to develop roots in Central Asia. ...Interpol and the DEA report that the IMU controls as much as 70 percent of the multibillion dollar heroin and opium trade through Central Asia." 

Interestingly, the same Qari Hussein Mehsud, who immediately pledged to avenge the death of Kalimullah Mehsud with a campaign of suicide bombings around Pakistan on September 28, the same day, denied the death of Yuldashev. The cumulative weight of Baitullah and Kalimullah Mehsud's death, along with the final reckoning of Yuldashev's demise would not go unanswered.  

On October 5, a Taliban commander let loose a suicide bomber upon the UN World Food Program in Islamabad - the capitol and heart of Pakistan. Dressed in a Frontier Corps uniform, the jihadist asked to use the restroom and detonated sixteen pounds of explosives in the lobby, destroying the finance department, killing four UN aid workers and a UN diplomat, injuring six others. 80 workers and 20 Diplomats were in the highly secure WFP offices at the time of the explosion. Fikret Akcura, the UN's Resident Coordinator for the World Food Program, which feeds some ten million hungry Pakistan civilians, announced "In light of this incident all UN offices in Pakistan have been closed till further notice." 

In the fog of the terror strike's aftermath, Interior Minister Rehman Malik declared that the Swat operations broke the back of the Taliban, adding "I want to make it clear to the terrorists that the entire nation is united, and the entire nation says no to Taliban, no to oppressors, no to terrorists, no to extremists." Exclamation points were added to the Interior Minister's bluster later in the day in Malakand where 8 Taliban were killed and 13 were arrested and then in Khyber, where a rocket attack on Fort Saloop which caused injury to three Pak military personnel was answered by a two hour air assault in which Pak gunships shelled Taliban positions on Gurguri hilltop for over two hours, a violent affair which ended in the deaths of five Taliban militants.

Little note was made in Western presses over the Pakistan government's decision to ban journalists from reporting in Waziristan on October 3. Of all the quakes along the Pak frontier in the second week of Fall 2009, only the terror strike on the UNWFP was deemed worthy of prime time news coverage in America. 

Cautiously scaling the Rahe Nijat pass, Pakistan braces for a promised wave of Jihad.