- Failure to detect Indian tank divisions location in 1965.
- Failure to predict the magnitude of polarisation in East Pakistan in 1970-71 which led to Pakistans breakup.
- Failure to detect Indian infiltration 35 miles inside Pakistani territory in 1983-84
Agha H Amin
CIA-ISI Stand off
Published: The Nation Lahore March 2, 2011A. R. Jerral
There are reports that cooperation between CIA and ISI is at the lowest ebb, if not altogether severed. This breakdown has occurred following the Raymond Davis operation, which was launched in Pakistan at the behest of CIA and without ISI's knowledge. According to an unnamed ISI official, the relations are "strained, but not broken", and "cooperation and operations together will continue at a lesser scale." This may be a diplomatic way to describe the lack or absence of mutual trust between the two spy agencies of the allies in the war on terror.
Davis, whose identity still is at best a speculation, did not prove to be a seasoned intelligence operative and blew his cover in panic. He opened a Pandora's Box of CIA's clandestine activities in Pakistan, which caught our intelligence and security agencies completely off guard. Since then Pak-US diplomatic relations are passing through difficulties, despite being allies in the war on terror. And there is no amicable solution in sight till Pakistan lets Davis go free citing complete diplomatic immunity.
General Zia plunged the ISI in CIA's ghost war in Afghanistan in early 1980s at America's behest. So ISI fully cooperated and assisted CIA to plan and conduct anti-Soviet operation in Afghanistan with command, control, logistic and training bases in Pakistan. This relationship continued for 10 long years till the interstate relations snapped. This was a long enough time for a world class spy agency of CIA's repute to build clandestine facilities in an 'allied' country for any possible future operations. Thus, Pakistan being a professed ideological Muslim country with open hostility towards Israel and a declared nuclear ambition was a good target for future CIA clandestine operations. This fact should not have been lost on those who are responsible for the country's national security. Security is not a one-time operation; it is a continuous process of evaluation and planning, and deployment of resources to thwart any hostile venture. So, the Mozang tragedy discloses that our intelligence agency faltered somewhere along the line.
The ISI is a secret service agency. Nothing much is known about its organisation and its method of operations - one can only speculate and conjecture. It is fair to assume that it will or should have an internal security apparatus to counter hostile espionage activities within the borders of Pakistan. This apparatus should have been alerted when the local press splashed stories about the large-scale deployment of Blackwater or DynCorp in Pakistan. At that time it was reported that operatives of these contract security agencies were roaming in Pakistan in suspicious vehicles fully armed and dressed as Talibans. A number of hostile incidents took place between these agents and the police. Also, there were rumours that these guys were renting out accommodations in posh areas of Islamabad and other cities at exuberant prices. Then our Interior Minister had vehemently denied these stories, despite police encounters with these operatives. These stories also leaked that our Ambassador in Washington was issuing an undisclosed number of visas to US nationals on the authority given by the top political hierarchy in power. These stories were sufficient for the intelligence agency of any nation to be wary of security situation in domestic environment. One expected that the ISI would be alive to these stories with proper measures in place for any eventuality, but Davis' case indicates slackness in this direction.
A.H Amin
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