The series of explosions since December last in Mumbai, culminating in the twin blasts of August 25, 2003, which killed over 50 innocent civilians, should be a matter of great concern to our policy-makers and public opinion for three reasons.
First, there seems to be a deterioration in the preventive and investigative capability of our security agencies in matters relating to terrorism outside Jammu & Kashmir (J&K).
Second, despite the reports of the task forces on the revamping of the intelligence apparatus and internal security management set up by the Government of India in 2000 and those of the three National Security Advisory Boards, there seems to be no significant improvement in our counter-terrorism capability.
Third, despite the periodic claims by Government spokesmen about the successes of our security agencies in detecting and neutralising dozens of jihadi terrorist and Inter- Services Intelligence (ISI) modules, dozens more of them continue to operate undetected and with their motivation and capability for action undiminished.
Effective counter-terrorism depends on the ability to collect preventive intelligence, effective physical security to deny success to the terrorists even if intelligence fails and a thorough investigation of the acts of terrorism committed in order to identify those responsible, their supporters and their networks and take action against them.
Penetration of terrorist organisations for the collection of preventive human intelligence (HUMINT) about their plans is very difficult. No intelligence agency in the world has effectively done so - not even in Israel, despite some occasional successes. A HUMINT gap is, therefore, inevitable. This has to be made good by effective technical intelligence (TECHINT) coverage and competent investigation of the acts of terrorism committed.
Evidence collected during the investigation through the interrogation of captured suspects and following up the clues provided by them could result in a fund of actionable intelligence.
The successes scored so far by the USA's Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in arresting or killing some of the senior leaders of Al Qaeda would not have been possible but for the excellent TECHINT coverage provided by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the clues collected during the interrogation of those arrested.
One has the impression that the Mumbai Police has not had the benefit of similar TECHINT back-up either from the Intelligence Bureau (IB), which is responsible for internal security, including counter-terrorism, or the Research & Analysis Wing (R&AW), which deals with the external ramifications of jihadi terrorism.
The excellent TECHINT support provided by the IB and the R&AW was one of the factors, which facilitated the success of our counter-terrorism operations in Punjab. One has not seen evidence of similar support in Mumbai. It is not clear what is this due to. Temporary weakening of our TECHINT capability due to the reported decision to set up a new TECHINT agency, which is still in the process of finding its feet? The non-use of modern means of communications such as telephones, the Internet etc by the terrorists in our territory for communicating with each other? Inhibitions arising from two different political formations being in power in New Delhi and Mumbai? One does not have the answers.
Even in the absence of adequate TECHINT back-up, the Mumbai police should have been able to get clues of a preventive nature during the investigation of the previous blasts. The importance of thorough investigation in identifying and neutralising perpetrators of terrorism was vividly demonstrated after the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi by the LTTE in 1991, after the Mumbai blasts of March 1993 by the Dawood Ibrahim gang and its terrorist associates and after the Coimbatore blasts of February,1998, in Tamil Nadu by Al Ummah.
The absence of similar results after the explosions in Mumbai since December last is an indicator of a possible deterioration in the investigative capability of the Mumbai Police since March, 1993. The same police, which did so brilliantly in investigating the blasts of March,1993, seems to be groping in the dark since December. What is it due to? Political interference in its functioning? Its hands being tied in the investigation of acts of jihadi terrorism due to a misplaced anxiety on the part of the ruling establishment in Mumbai not to antagonise the members of the Muslim community by too vigorous an action against the terrorists, many of whom have come from their ranks? Lack of adequate co- ordination between the central and State agencies due to their political masters being from opposite sides of the political spectrum?
The same political party was in power in New Delhi as well as in Punjab and Maharashtra during the height of our counter-terrorism operations in those areas in the early 1990s. This strengthened the hands of the police and other security agencies in dealing with terrorism and the mafia gangs. How to ensure equally effective co- ordination when different political formations are in power and bring about a convergence of approach in dealing with jihadi terrorism? Again these are questions difficult to answer satisfactorily, but they are none the less valid and relevant.
Effective physical security is an important component of counter-terrorism, especially when the terrorists target guarded establishments and personalities. Weak physical security has been responsible for many of the successes of the jihadi terrorists in J&K, such as their recent attack on an army establishment at Akhnoor, during which they killed a Brigadier and others. But, when terrorists attack soft unguarded targets through means such as the use of explosives in public places, as they have been doing in Mumbai, physical security, however effective, cannot deny them success. Hence, better intelligence collection and investigative capabilities are all the more important.
It is not as if the Mumbai Police and the central intelligence agencies helping them have not made break-throughs in the investigation of the earlier blasts. They have. Arrests of suspects have been made and clues obtained. But the fact that despite them, terrorist strikes continue to take place show that what they have detected so far is only the tip of the jihadi iceberg.
This jihadi iceberg has been forming for years since the Babri Masjid demolition of December, 1992 _ not only in Mumbai, but also in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, New Delhi and other parts of India. While we focussed on jihadi terrorism in J&K, we did not pay the same attention to this iceberg threatening the rest of India.
Even though India has been the worst victim of jihadi terrorism in the world today, neither the political leadership nor the moulders of public opinion nor even many of the professional experts have an adequate understanding of the nature and magnitude of the problem and of the international linkages of the jihadi terrorists operating in India since 1993.
Our comparative successes of the past in dealing with insurgency or terrorism in the North-East, Punjab, Mumbai (in the 1990s), Tamil Nadu and Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh were due to the fact that while the insurgents and terrorists were in receipt of financial, training and arms assistance from Pakistan's ISI, there was no involvement of Pakistani jihadis.
The difficulties faced by us in J&K since 1993 are due to the large-scale induction by the ISI of Pakistani and other foreign jihadis belonging to the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM), the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) and the Jaish-e- Mohammad (JEM). The HUM is a founding member of Osama bin Laden's International Islamic Front (IIF)since 1998 and the other three joined it subsequently.
Since the Kargil conflict in 1999, these four Pakistani components of the IIF, operating under the guise of Kashmiris, have taken over the leadership of the terrorist infrastructure in J&K and have been extending it from there to the rest of India. These are pan-Islamic organisations whose objectives were not restricted to J&K. They look upon J&K as the gateway of India and believe in bin Laden's objective of the creation of regional Islamic caliphates to bring the Muslim majority areas of Asia under a single ruling dispensation devoted to the implementation of the sharia.
Outside J&K, their initial focus was on creating a jihadi network in Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh and Junagadh in Gujarat because they feel these areas should have gone to Pakistan when India was partitioned in 1947. From there, they have extended their networks, under the instructions of the ISI, to Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Kerala because of their strategic significance in the eyes of Pakistan's military-intelligence establishment. In their perception, this strategic significance arises from Mumbai being the economic and financial capital of India and all the three States being the nerve- centres of India's nuclear and space establishments.
Of the four Pakistani components of the IIF, only the LeT would seem to have succeeded in good measure so far in extending its jihadi tentacles to Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. There is so far no evidence of similar successes by the other three components outside J&K and New Delhi.
While the LeT and the other pro-bin Laden Pakistani organisations now exercise the leadership of the terrorist infrastructure in J&K, the LeT's networks in Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and possibly Kerala are still in the process of formation and they have to rely largely on local organisations such as the Students' Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) in Maharashtra, Al Ummah and the Muslim Defence Force of Tamil Nadu etc for their sustenance and success. Their role has been more from the background as mentors and motivators than as jihadi foot-soldiers. This should explain the fact that while the Pakistanis constitute the largest number of terrorist suspects killed or captured in J&K, this is not so in the rest of India.
In India, there is not yet adequate appreciation of the implications for our internal security arising from the membership of these organisations in bin Laden's IIF. The implications are particularly ominous in respect of the LeT. It is the most well-motivated, well-funded and well-organised jihadi organisation in the Indian sub-continent today, with its tentacles spreading as far east as Indonesia, to the whole of the Gulf and even to the US as the recent arrests of an LeT cell there showed.
Abu Zubaidah, reportedly the then No. 3 in Al Qaeda, who is now in US custody, was arrested from the house of an LeT office-bearer in Faislabad in Pakistani Punjab in March last year. The Pakistani media had reported at that time that before coming to Pakistan, he had done a course in computer technology in Pune in India. Was this information developed further by the Indian intelligence agencies with the help of their US counterparts? Were they able to detect any network of sleeper-agents that he might have set up in Pune and Mumbai during his stay in Pune? Again more questions without satisfactory answers.
The social profile of the breed of jihadi terrorists, which has been playing havoc in India and the rest of the world, disturbingly brings to mind that of the breed of Marxist ideological terrorists of the 1970s and the 1980s such as Carlos, the jackal, and his followers, the Baader-Meinhof of Germany, the Red Army faction of Germany and Japan,the Red Brigade of Italy, the Action Dirercte of France etc.
It would be unwise to dismiss them as marginals of their society or as misled youth or as irrationals. Many of them have an affluent and educated background and are capable of independent thinking and action. What we view as irrational actions, they view as the only rational response available to them to deal with the perceived acts of injustices against their community. We cannot tolerate their giving vent to their anger through terrorism, but this is no excuse for closing our eyes and ears to their anger. Even if we cannot reduce their anger for the present, we should at least not aggravate it by unwise words and actions.
The Marxist ideological terrorist movements of the West collapsed post-1991 due to two reasons. First, the drying-up of the flow of aherents due to the increasing economic prosperity of their societies. Second, the collapse of the USSR, Yugoslavia and other communist States which were supporting and using them.
The flow of adherents to the jihadi terrorists from the Muslim communities in different countries shows no signs of abating. And the States, which have been helping and using them such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Syria for achieving their own objectives have not suffered the consequences of their actions. So long as this state of affairs continues, there is going to be no respite to the security agencies of the world from the ravages of jihadi terrorism.
International co-operation is important in our efforts to control them, but that alone will not help us in the absence of an effective national counter-terrorism capability. India has a capability, which is better than that of many other affected countries of the world, but the fact that despite this we have not been able to prevent the spread of their clandestine networks and activities would show that there are serious deficiences in our capability and internal security management.
Instead of continuing to rationalise our failures, we must honestly admit them and try to improve our capability. This has to be done not only at the professional level of the police and the security agencies, but also at the political level.
Poor internal security management at the political level has been India's Achilles heel. After 9/11 in the US, the US Congress, at the joint initiative of the USA's two political parties, has devoted about one-fourth of its sittings, if not more, to an examination of the counter-terrorism capability of the US and to reach bipartisan consensus on how to strengthen it.
India has been the worst victim of jihadi terrorism in the world today, as stated above. How many hours have our Parliament and the Legislative Assemblies of the States devoted to this task? Zilch.
Will it be fair then to blame the police and the security agencies alone? Every country gets the counter-terrorism capability its political leadership deserves.
(The writer is Additional Secretary
(retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, and, presently, Director,
Institute For Topical Studies,Chennai, and, Convenor, Advisory Committee,
Observer Research Foundation (ORF), Chennai Chapter. E-Mail: corde@vsnl.com
)