Author: Rajinder Puri
Publication: The Statesman
Date: November 285, 2011
URL: http://thestatesman.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=391282&catid=39
One cannot fight an enemy without knowing
who the enemy is. That is how India has been trying to fight terror. That
is why India continues to fail. There are three points that have been repeatedly
hammered in these columns. First, it was written that there is one mastermind
behind the different violent insurgencies and terrorist outfits coordinating
diverse operations to serve a single strategy. Secondly, overwhelming circumstantial
evidence backed by credible official US and Indian Intelligence reports suggests
that the mastermind is the People's Liberation Army (PLA) as distinct from
Beijing's civilian government. And thirdly, that this transnational fifth
column has successfully penetrated and subverted the governments of America,
India and Pakistan. Unless this is recognised and a suitable strategy to deal
with it is formulated, there can be no success in the war against terror.
It was the assertion that a pro-terrorist
fifth column could have penetrated all three governments of America, India
and Pakistan which got stuck in people's throats. It was pointed out how sensational
and explicit Intelligence information provided by the FBI to Indian authorities
preceding the 26/11 terror attack was not only ignored by the government but
the security agencies actually endangered the safety of the Indian Prime Minister
by giving clearance for his presence in one of the targeted hotels at that
critical time. Providentially, the PM averted disaster by 72 hours. On 18
December, 2009, I wrote in these columns: "Circumstantial evidence suggests
that Headley could have received logistic support from rogue official sources
in America, Pakistan and India. In other words he may be more than a rogue
double agent. He could be serving a rogue fifth column that aids terrorism
and has penetrated governments in America, India and Pakistan." After
explicit information provided by FBI, the 26/11 terror was not prevented by
either the US or the Indian government. How else might this riddle be explained?
Subsequently, various official decisions including
some allegations by the National Investigative Agency (NIA) have raised questions
that were never satisfactorily answered. A questions arising from the purported
confession of Swami Aseemanand for his alleged role in the Samjhauta Express
bomb blast is one of them. The Indian government's possible vulnerability
to subversion by a transnational terrorist fifth column cannot be seriously
disputed. Pakistan as the acknowledged epicentre of global terrorism has,
of course, the government most obviously subverted by transnational terrorism.
It was the assertion that America itself was subverted which was hard to swallow
by most people.
Well, the latest revelations by the ProPublica
investigative website might alter public perception. Quoting a US government
memo, ProPublica wrote: "Several senior Indian security officials said
they believe that US warnings provided to India before the Mumbai attacks
came partly from knowledge of (David Coleman) Headley's activities. They believe
he remained a US operative." ProPublica went on to quote former home
secretary Mr GK Pillai as saying: "David Coleman Headley, in my opinion,
was a double agent. He was working for both the US and for Lashkar and the
ISI." Mr Pillai has a reputation for sobriety and competence. If he has
not been quoted accurately, he can contradict ProPublica. He has not done
so up till now. So what does that say about my assertion that a transnational
terrorist fifth column has subverted sections of the American, Indian and
Pakistan governments?
Unless there is conscious effort by governments
to counter the mastermind behind this fifth column by every conceivable diplomatic
and political device, the war against terror will take us nowhere. Hopefully,
the US government under President Obama seems to have woken up to the danger
of further prevarication. The US is adopting a more realistic attitude towards
China's PLA. It remains to be seen how for how long this new approach is sustained.
