IntelliBriefs

Jaipur to Raipur

2008-05-19T07:57:00.001-07:00

By Chandan Mitra
http://www.dailypioneer.com/

From Jaipur to Raipur and beyond, India is under a siege within. While the political class has predictably fulminated against Pakistan and Bangladesh, the fact is that every heinous crime against the people of India has been committed by Indians, even if funded and trained by outside forces.

For the ordinary citizen it comes as no solace to learn that something called HuJI has replaced LeT or JeM as the new face of terror in India. For the victims of terror, the jihadi terrorist remains an elusive, sinister figure irrespective of nomenclature. Periodically we are told that these shadowy organisations receive logistic support from yet another dangerous outfit, SIMI (or is it now called SIM?). Whether it is the Students' Islamic Movement that acts as the liaison agency for the executors of bomb blasts, it is quite inconsequential to the public at large. Jihadi terrorists have demonstrated their ability to strategise precisely, plan meticulously, strike at will and massacre innocents at destinations chosen by them. Every year India has reeled under three or more major terrorist outrages and just when complacency sets in, jihadis strike yet another deadly blow.

Where does Raipur fit in this scheme? Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and parts of Maharashtra and Karnataka have similarly been reeling under successive waves of terror of another kind. Although there is no concrete evidence yet of links between jihadis and Maoists, they share a common aim -- destabilisation of the Indian nation. The green flag of Islamic jihad and red pennant of Naxalites are fluttering virtually all over the country even if they have carved out separate areas of operation, the former focusing more on big cities and the latter on interior villages. The numbers decimated by Maoist marauders is probably no less than those felled by terrorist depredations. In vast stretches of the Indian heartland, the writ of the Government either does not run at all or runs cursorily only between dawn and dusk. Just as the jihadi terrorists are working in coordination with, or at the behest of, foreign powers and global terror outfits like Al Qaeda, Maoists in India too have a central command, swear allegiance to a foreign ideology and, after the tragic legitimisation of ultra-Left rule through elections in Nepal, will work in even greater concert with a neighbouring country's Government.

The similarity does not end there. Both jihadis and Maoists thrive on the back-up support of an army of secular fundamentalists and bleeding-heart intellectuals in India. These fifth columnists hold opinion makers in this country in an octopus-like grip, and are perpetually busy generating sympathy for the mass murderers. While every attempt by the state to act decisively against both jihadis and Naxalites is greeted with howls of protest, law-enforcement agencies are continuously berated and sought to be systematically demoralised. The self-styled cheerleaders of liberalism oppose the demand to bring back POTA or enact similar State laws needed to act aggressively against terror merchants.

Further, they are at the forefront of vicious campaigns against conscientious security personnel for their alleged excesses and so-called violation of human rights. One only has to recall their frenzied attempts to put Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on the mat for defending his police in the encounter that led to the fully justified liquidation of jihadi operatives such as teenage terror courier Ishrat Jahan. The subversive section of the Indian intelligentsia went almost berserk over the alleged crimes of VG Vanzara, the Gujarat police officer who eliminated terrorist Sohrabuddin. These effete intellectuals have been out to prove that the Government itself plotted the December 13 attack on Parliament and Afzal Guru is an innocent, honourable man who must be saved from the gallows irrespective of judicial verdicts. The India-baiters inevitably succeed because we are unfortunate enough to have a Prime Minister who confesses he could not sleep for nights without end worrying about the fate of an Indian-origin Glasgow airport bombing suspect detained briefly in Australia, although the same Prime Minister has shown no such concern for the thousands of his fellow-countrymen who die gruesome deaths at the hands of jihadis and Maoists.

Not surprisingly, closet sympathisers of India's destabilisation have now mounted a campaign to allow Naxalite intellectual Dr Binayak Sen to travel to Washington to personally collect something called the Jonathan Mann award from an organisation that describes itself as the Global Health Council. Apparently he is to be honoured for his "spectacular and pioneering" work among tribals of Chhattisgarh and also for "exposing" the "Government-backed vigilante group, Salwa Judum". It is remarkable how a Washington-based organisation came to know about Dr Sen's "spectacular" work when nobody in India (except Maoists and their frontal organisations) had heard of him, at least till he was caught smuggling vital correspondence to a Naxalite leader in detention, under the garb of attending to his medical condition. Moreover, the Goebblessian propaganda that Salwa Judum is a vigilante group, whereas it is an unarmed people's movement against Naxalites, has actually got embedded even in intelligent people's minds through sheer repetition. Although various agitations planned on the dubious doctor's behalf by Maoists and their fellow-travellers have not quite taken off despite high voltage publicity on websites, it would be naïve to rule out a crescendo of support as May 29, the date on which the award is to be conferred, comes closer.

Remarkably, Indian subversives have a huge international network, which includes various separatist outfits, Christian missionary groups and busybody NGOs. I recall being confronted by an earnest young Tamilian Christian student at Berkeley last August demanding my intervention as MP with the "fascist, communal" Chhattisgarh Government for Dr Sen, whose name I first heard at that seminar. Taken aback, I checked up with friends at home about the activist-doctor's antecedents that night and sparred with his misguided young supporters in the US thereafter. I have no doubt that India's terror network thrives because of such people. I even came across an article titled "India: No country for good men" detailing the Government's apparently disgraceful human rights record and condemning the "systematic crackdown" on dissenters in this country. If India were not mentioned a few times, anybody would have thought it was a write-up on the excesses of the Burmese military junta! Needless to add, the internet article was written by an Indian!

Thus, the siege within is much more pervasive than it appears at first sight. While the country needs more stringent anti-terror laws, better intelligence, superior equipment for security forces and other paraphernalia for combating jihadi, Maoist and separatist terror, apart from draconian measures to stop infiltration from Bangladesh, the war against the enemy within cannot be won by laws alone.

Till such time as we agree that "terrorism in all its manifestations" includes mindset that in effect protect and promote the cause of the perpetrators of terror rather than those of its victims, I am afraid the war can never be decisively won.

Innovation and inspiration

2008-05-16T10:46:00.000-07:00

Source: OXFORD ANALYTICA

Do we put too much emphasis on invention rather than innovation?

In the most recent edition of New Yorker, Malcolm Gladwell dedicates eight pages to former Microsoft wunderkind Nathan Myhrvold and his private company, Intellectual Ventures. The company has a lofty mission statement; to 'empower the next generation of Bells and Einsteins.' In practice, Intellectual Ventures' work is more prosaic: Myhrvold gathers a group of eggheads in a room to come up with ideas, patents them, and then licenses them to interested companies.

Nevertheless, Gladwell is impressed by Myhrvold's collaborative approach, apparently in the name of invention. And Intellectual Ventures is a successful enterprise, proving that the kind of insight that leads to invention can be engineered. Such collaborative approaches to scientific progress are seen as the unexplored 'third way.' Yet bloggers are questioning if the world gets anything useful from such ventures and if there are better ways to encourage innovation.

We is better than me?
Myhrvold’s formula for idea generation relies upon a multiplier effect; he knows that a group of really smart people brainstorming for a day can be prolific. The original expectation was that Intellectual Ventures would file a hundred patents a year. Now it is filing five hundred per year and has a backlog of three thousand ideas.
Myhrvold encourages knowledge sharing between those from different backgrounds, temperaments and perspectives so that insight can be orchestrated; Gladwell writes that "if someone who knew how to make a filter had a conversation with someone who knew a lot about cancer and with someone who read the medical literature like a physicist, then maybe you could come up with a cancer treatment."
Ideas are cheap
Yet Techdirt's Mike Masnick writes that Gladwell misses the point. He writes: "while ideas may be a dime a dozen, executing on those ideas is what's difficult." He even argues that Myhrvold's initiatives inhibit innovation, as filed patents make it more difficult for others to help actually make inventions useful. Portfolio's Felix Salmon agrees that ideas generation and appropriation is meaningless: "one thing I found unconvincing about Carly Fiorina, former chairman and chief executive of Hewlett-Packard, was that she constantly cited how many patents were being filed under her leadership as if that proved something.". He adds that Intellectual Ventures, far from encouraging innovation, actually acts as a 'patent troll', joylessly accumulating patents not to develop products, but to squeeze licensing fees out of large companies.

Cash for solutions?
There is still hope for genuine inventors and innovators amid the patent squatters. Tim Harford, the Financial Times' 'Undercover Economist' writes that governments, private foundations and even corporations are rediscovering the value of offering prizes for innovative products.

Mojave Aerospace Ventures won the $10 million Ansari X Prize, designed to promote private space flight in 2004, after the successful flights of SpaceShipOne.
Five national governments and the Gates Foundation are offering a $1.5 billion "advanced market commitment" to subsidise the developers and suppliers of a more effective vaccine against pneumococcal diseases such as pneumonia, meningitis and bronchitis.

Innocentive provides an exchange where 'seekers' can offer cash to 'solvers.'

You can’t force 'em

Inducing innovation may be a phenomenal waste of time and money. The proof is Toyota, which defines innovation as an incremental process in which the goal is not making quantum leaps, but improving ideas and work processes on a daily basis. The principle is often known by its Japanese name, kaizen -- continuous improvement. James Surowiecki writes that the Japanese company "rejects the idea that innovation is the province of an elect few; instead, it’s taken to be an everyday task for which everyone is responsible." He adds that Japanese companies get a hundred times as many suggestions from their workers as US companies do.

Jaipur Blasts expose - More Useful Idiots and still more Dangerous Consequences

2008-05-16T10:39:00.000-07:00

Source: OFFSTUMPED
No I am not referring to the newly christened Indian Mujahideen. Nitin has done a good job taking on their now confirmed cyber habits. Perhaps Sriprakash Jaiswal would like to comment the foreign nature of the otherwise “Indian” mujahideen. In the aftermath of the Hyderabad Blasts, Offstumped had warned of the Rd-X. It appears that our worst fears of the hunt for the unknown radical mind are coming true.

The public e-mail message from the Indian Mujahideen and a not so public e-mail from a section of the Psuedo-intellectual brigade bear an eerie similarity. It is this expose that Offstumped is focusing on in this post.

So who exactly are these “Useful Idiot” Apologists for the Indian Mujahideen ?

Offstumped today was alerted to an e-mailer titled “Jaipur Blasts Statement” signed “Concerned Citizens” which was circulated interestingly to the International Human Rights Organization, IRHO by an entity called the NAPM - National Association of People’s Movements.

Before we get to the identities and the backgrounds of the Useful Idiots who scripted this e-mail, let us focus on the dangerous consequences of their mischief mongering.

The e-mail from the Indian Mujahideen specifically calls out as its chief grouse India’s “support” for the United States in the International Arena. A match of the time-stamps of this e-mail from the Mujahideen and the other one by their apologist Useful Idiots should make for an interesting topic in another post. But for now it is pertinent to point out relevant text from the Apologist e-mail which after the usual sanctimony gets to the root cause, and surprise surprise ….

These acts of terror have deeper political causes. These causes relate to U.S. lust for oil, its help in forming Al Qaeda and local rise of communal politics around issues of religious identity.

Any guesses for how telepathically the Indian Mujahideen and the “Concerned Citizens” zeroed in onto the exact same root cause. They say great minds think alike, well idiots think alike too and dangerously so.

But the mischief mongering of this pack of Useful Idiots does not stop there. These Idiots then go on to lay out far deeper root causes, and as evidence they manufacture the mythical bogey of “Hindutva Terrorism”. Yep, the same myth that The Hindu first tried to peddle unsuccesfully after the Malegaon Blasts and then Digvijay Singh tried to peddle during the Gujarat elections campaign.

The present theory of investigating agency deliberately overlooks the case of two Bajarang Dal workers getting killed in Nanded in April 2006. It also does not want to give serious thought to the narco-analysis of one of the survivors of the Nanded episode who said that now we Hindus should also do the acts of terror, in front of crowded mosques, else we will be regarded as eunuchs.

The e-mail further goes onto make a very serious and dangerous allegation against the BJP

In a way, now communal violence is being substituted by the acts of terror to consolidate the electoral base by communal party.

These Useful Idiots then go on to remind us why they are “Useful” to Terrorists and more importantly “what makes them idiots” when they make this seemingly silly but profoundly subversive demand

There is a need to have a National body with due representation from the socially concerned citizens and Human rights activists who can have a say in these matters and also who in an unbiased way can go to the truth of these acts

So who are these Useful Idiots who lost no time in issuing an apology for the Indian Mujahideen ?

Well leading the pack of Useful Idiots is retired IIT Mumbai Professor and known Communal Socialist Ram Puniyani who is the author of the original e-mail. Keeping him idiotic company are fellow Useful Idiots and known apologists for all things leftist, maoist and jihadist - Asghar Ali Engineer, Digant Ozha, Shabnam Hashmi, M Hasan, L.S. Hardenia, Irfan Engineer.

Now some background on Useful Idiot-in Chief Ram Puniyani. Since yours truly is an almnus of IIT Mumbai I have had first hand experience of Ram Puniyani’s Left wing Acitivism and Political Correctness during the 1990s which he pursues with Taliban like Fanaticism. This is the same guy who amongst others ensured that IIT Mumbai disrobed Swami Vivekananda from Saffron to Blue for fear of hurting Muslim sentiments. This is also the same guy who amongst others pressured the IIT Mumbai Administration from denying permission to Chandraprakash Dwivedi of Chanakya from speaking on Campus on grounds that it would vitiate the atmosphere.

That the IIT Mumbai Administration allowed a Left wing extremist like Ram Puniyani to pursue his activism on campus while snuffing any kind of intellectual challenge speaks to the insipid and moribun intellectual environment in the IITs for all the academic excellence. It also is a reminder that JNU is not the only intellectual wasteland where Left Wing rodents breed.

Offstumped Bottomline: We may not know who the Indian Mujahideen are or where they are holed up. But we now know who their Useful Idiot Apologists are and how dangerous their agenda is. Perhaps some Narco-Analysis of Ram Puniyani and Co. would be in order to aid in the Hunt for the Unknown Radical, RD-X

Why Terrorist Attacks on Soft Targets?

2008-05-14T07:59:00.000-07:00

Source : South Asia Analysis Group
by B. Raman

(In connection with the serial blasts by unidentified terrorists in Jaipur on May 13, 2008, I am reproducing below a chapter from my forthcoming book titled "Terrorism: Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow" being published by the Lancer Publishers of New Delhi later this month . www.lancerpublishers.com)

Soft targets are those not subject to special protection that are frequented by the public, which could be local nationals or foreigners. Attacks on such targets cause many human fatalities and demonstrate the capability of the terrorist groups to operate without being detected by the intelligence and counter-terrorism agencies. Destruction of or damage to economic or other capabilities is not the primary aim of such attacks. The primary aim is to kill human beings, though destruction or damage of capabilities may also result from such attacks.

For such attacks on soft targets, a long period of preparations such as keeping a surveillance on the target etc is not required. All that is required is the creation or infiltration of a sleeper cell to undertake such attacks and reaching to the cell the weapons or explosive devices to be used. A sleeper cell is a small group of operatives specifically raised to undertake a terrorist strike. The cell generally consists of persons, who will actually undertake the strike with the help of hand-held weapons or IEDs, and some others, who will provide the logistics such as smuggling in the weapons or explosives, storing them safely till the time for the strike comes, providing a hide-out for those who will actually undertake the strike if they come from outside the area and facilitating their get-away after they have carried out the strike. Those, who carry out the strike, are generally specially trained in the handling of weapons and in the assembly of IEDs. Those, who help in the logistics, need not be specially trained, but they should support the ideology and objectives of the terrorist organization, which undertakes the terrorist strike, and should enjoy its confidence.

Those who carry out the strikes are generally from outside the area where a target is chosen for attack. A resident of the area may develop qualms of conscience about killing people whom he had known and with whom he had grown up. Moreover, his absence from the area after the terrorist strike makes the identification of the perpetrators by the police easier. An outsider is unlikely to have such qualms of conscience and his get-away may not attract attention. Those providing the logistics back-up could be from the same area or from outside. Thus, a sleeper cell could consist completely of outsiders infiltrated into the area of intended operation or could be a mix of outsiders and residents of the area. These are called sleeper cells because its members are specially trained or have a natural aptitude for maintaining a low profile and are able to lead a normal life as students or in some occupation without attracting attention to themselves. In the case of the Mumbai blasts of March,1993, the perpetrators were easily identified by the Police because many of them except Dawood Ibrahim were normal residents of Mumbai and not from outside. Their get-away from Mumbai after the explosions attracted the suspicion of the Police.

A new modus operandi (MO) for attacks on soft targets noticed in recent years is the use of unconscious bombers by the sleeper cells so that the explosions cannot be easily traced back by the Police to the real perpetrators. The ULFA in Assam has been periodically using this MO by paying unsuspecting individuals for leaving bicycles fitted with IEDs in markets and other crowded areas. Al Qaeda was reported to have used this MO in Casablanca in May,2003, and in Baghdad on February 1, 2008. In Casablanca, an unsuspecting individual was asked to carry a package containing a remote-controlled IED to a third person. As the carrier was walking in front of a restaurant the IED was activated through remote control. In Baghdad, two mentally disturbed women, who used to beg in market places, were fitted with IEDs and these were exploded through remote control as they were begging in the markets. The Chechens had also used this M.O.

There are various reasons for which terrorists periodically attack soft targets in widely dispersed areas. Firstly, they want to demonstrate their reach. They want to show that they can operate in any part of the country in the case of indigenous organizations and in any part of the world in the case of the pan-Islamic jihadi organizations. Outside J&K, the pan-Islamic jihadi organizations have struck on soft targets in places such as Mumbai, Delhi, Varanasi, Lucknow, Faizabad (in UP), Hyderabad, Bangalore, Chennai and Coimbatore. Al Qaeda and pro-Al Qaeda organizations have struck in places such as Bali (twice), Jakarta, Mombasa, Casablanca, Istanbul, Madrid, London and Sharm-el-Sheikh.

Secondly, they want to discredit the intelligence agencies, the Police and other security agencies in the eyes of the people by demonstrating their capability to strike despite the vigilance of these agencies. In their calculation, this could result in a gradual loss of faith of the people in the efficacy of these agencies.

Thirdly, they want to make the Police and the security agencies over-react in response to their successful strikes. Such over-reactions often come in the form of large-scale arrests of the members of the community from which the terrorists have arisen and the alleged use of harsh methods to interrogate them. This creates animosity towards the Police and the Government in the victim-community and adds to their sense of alienation. Such over-reactions could also create a divide between different communities, thereby resulting in the flow of more recruits to the ranks of the terrorists. Anger resulting from over-reactions facilitates their recruitment.

Fourthly, attacks on soft targets are also undertaken in reprisal for perceived wrongs allegedly committed by the Government or the Police towards the members of the community from which the terrorists have arisen or even towards the terrorists themselves. If they are not able to retaliate against hard (well-protected) targets, they retaliate against soft targets. The LTTE in Sri Lanka often resorts to such attacks on soft targets in retaliation for the government’s strikes against it. Such retaliatory attacks are meant to intimidate the security forces into going slow in their counter-terrorism operations. Reprisal attacks on soft targets may also be directed against foreign nationals, though local nationals may also die during the strikes. The two explosions in Bali in October, 2002, and October, 2005, by the Jemmah Islamiyah (JI) were directed mainly against Australian tourists in reprisal for Australia’s co-operation with the US in the so-called war against terrorism. Many Indonesian nationals also died during the strikes, but the possibility of such deaths of local nationals did not deter the terrorists from exploding IEDs in places crowded by Australian tourists. During the subsequent trial of the perpetrators, they apologized in public for the deaths of fellow-citizens and fellow-Muslims, but did not regret their action in carrying out the strikes. Similarly, Al Qaeda’s attack on a hotel in Mombasa in November, 2002, and in the Egyptian tourist resort of Sharm-el-Sheikh in July, 2005, targeted Israeli tourists in reprisal for Israeli’s policies towards the Palestinians, but many local citizens also died.

The three explosions outside courts in Lucknow, Faizabad and Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh on November 23, 2007, were also reprisal strikes against soft targets to protest against the perceived harsh sentences awarded to some of the accused in the Mumbai blasts of March, 1993, by a Mumbai court and against the alleged failure of the Government of Mumbai to act against certain police officers, who were blamed by an enquiry commission for allegedly committing excesses against Muslims during the communal riots that followed the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December,1992. An anonymous E-mail received by some TV channels on the day of the explosions alleged that the criminal justice system in India was unfair towards the Muslims.

While these are essentially tactical strikes, certain kinds of strikes against soft targets have a strategic purpose. Strikes in certain places of economic importance such as stock exchanges, crowded market places, offices of business companies and tourist resorts have the objective of disrupting the economy and discouraging the flow of foreign investments by creating a feeling of nervousness about security conditions in the minds of potential investors. The Mumbai blasts of March,1993, and the Delhi blasts of October,2005, would fall in this category. Strikes in places of religious significance-----whether holy cities or places of worship----- are meant to create a communal divide in the long-term interests of the terrorist organization. The blasts in Varanasi in March, 2006, in Malegaon in Maharashtra on September 8,2006, in Hyderabad on May 18, 2007, and in Ajmer Sharif on October 11, 2007, would fall in this category.

Soft targets do not have the benefit of protection of physical security measures by the Government, though some of them such as places of worship, business establishments etc may have their own physical security measures. There are hundreds of thousands of potential soft targets of terrorists all over the country. It would be just impossible for the Government to provide them with physical security. One cannot totally eliminate attacks on soft targets, but one can reduce them by effective intelligence capability and policing in order to detect and neutralize sleeper cells before they go into action, educating the public in matters such as looking out for suspicious-looking persons and objects, close police-community relations and close liaison between the police and those in charge of security in those cases where soft targets have their own security arrangements.

While there have been successful instances of sleeper cells being detected and neutralized in time by the intelligence agencies and the police acting in tandem, there are many other cases where the sleeper cells managed to evade detection and carry out the strike. Every successful terrorist strike on a soft target is due to the failure of the agencies and the police to detect the sleeper cell responsible. The agencies and the police do face difficulties due to the fact that the terrorists operate in a vast area and keep moving from State to State in order to attack. They operate like the old so-called criminal tribes, who used to keep attacking in different places in different times in order to make it difficult for the police to detect them. The only way of effectively countering this is through effective co-ordination of the police in all the States, the creation of a national data base to which the police of different States can have direct access and the quick sharing of the results of the enquiries and investigations through this data base. The creation of a Federal Counter-Terrorism Agency patterned after the FBI of the US, with powers to investigate all terrorism-related cases occurring in any part of the country, would facilitate action and prevention, but there continues to be strong resistance from the States to proposals for the creation of such an agency.

The ease with which the terrorists have been operating in different parts of the country is also due to a deterioration in the quality of policing in the urban as well as rural areas. Normal tasks, which the police are expected to perform such as making enquiries about suspicious-looking persons in hotels, inns, railway stations and airports , making a random background check of arrivals from outside etc no longer receive the required attention. Similarly, intense police-community relations, which encourage the people to share with the police information, which could have a bearing on terrorism, are increasingly neglected. The public will come forward to share information only with a police officer whom they know and in whose discretion they have confidence.

Close interactions between the police and the security officers of private establishments is more an exception than the rule. Sometimes, I am invited to address gatherings of such security officers in different urban areas. Almost all of them complained of a lack of accessibility to senior police officers and the reluctance of the police to keep them briefed on developments having a bearing on terrorism. They complained that it was rarely that police officers took the initiative in briefing them when the media carried sensational stories about the plans of the terrorists. When they asked for a briefing, they were asked to meet junior officers, who often were not in a position to brief them adequately and did not have the required self-confidence to be able to answer their questions. It is important that senior police officers interact with the security officers of important private establishments----particularly those from abroad---- at least once or twice a year as a matter of routine and also on other occasions, when there is a need for it. Senior police officers cannot be expected to interact with the private security officers of all establishments---big or small, important or unimportant. However, such interactions should take place with the private security officers of large establishments, which play an important role in our economy. Perceptions of police indifference towards them could have a negative impact on the investors’ confidence in the security environment in the country and in their particular areas of operation.

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)

India braces for surge in terror

2008-05-14T07:46:00.000-07:00

Asia Time Online
By Sudha Ramachandran

BANGALORE - The serial blasts that killed 80 people and injured 200 in the western Indian city of Jaipur on Tuesday occurred less than a week after a major infiltration attempt by militants was thwarted on the international border with Pakistan in Jammu and Kashmir state.

That incident set off a heavy exchange of fire along the border, the first major flareup since an India-Pakistan ceasefire took effect in 2003.

Intelligence contacts have told Asia Times Online that while there is "no direct cause-effect link" between the incidents on the border and the Jaipur blasts, the former indicate that "infiltration from across the border in Pakistan will increase as summer progresses and more attacks like the ones at Jaipur can be expected".

The contacts point out that in a week from now, Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee goes to the Pakistani capital Islamabad for his first interaction with the new government there. The "composite dialogue" between the countries, in cold storage for several months, will be revived.

The possibility of elements in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) seeking to disrupt this process with terror attacks in India cannot be ruled out. The ISI is known to have acted in the past to weaken initiatives by democratic governments in Pakistan to normalize relations with India. Pakistan only ended nearly eight years of military rule with parliamentary elections in February.

Any surge in violence is unlikely to be restricted to Jammu and Kashmir. Over the past couple of years, jihadi groups have clearly indicated that their agenda extends across India. They have carried out attacks in places as far apart as Ajmer, Panipat, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Varanasi, Rampur, Lucknow, Delhi, Mumbai, Gandhinagar, Faizabad, Ayodhya, Malegaon and now Jaipur. There are now few states in India that have not fallen under the shadow of the jihadis.

In 2007, outside Jammu and Kashmir and the turbulent northeast and excluding deaths due to Maoist violence in the country, civilian deaths from terrorist attacks ran into several hundreds.

No terror outfit has so far claimed responsibility for Tuesday's blasts in Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan state, although about a dozen suspects have been detained. Intelligence contacts say the needle of suspicion points to the Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami (HuJI) and the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), with Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) operatives providing the local logistical support.

The HuJI is a Bangladesh-based jihadi outfit and the LeT is Pakistan-based. Both have links with al-Qaeda and are constituents of the International Islamic Front, an umbrella organization founded by Osama bin Laden in 1998.

The string of eight blasts occurred on the 10th anniversary of India's nuclear tests at Pokhran, 500 kilometers from Jaipur. Noted terrorism expert B Raman said the "blasts could be to send across the message that India may have nuclear power, but you are powerless against terrorism".

The significance of the date notwithstanding, it does seem that the blasts were aimed at stirring communal trouble rather than sending out a message - there are a large number of Hindu temples in the vicinity of the attacks.

A curfew has been declared in parts of Jaipur to prevent the eruption of riots. The blast sites are close to the communally sensitive Ramganj area, which witnessed communal riots in 1992 following the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya by Hindu hardliners.

Although this is the first terrorist attack ever in Jaipur, Rajasthan is no stranger to terrorist activity. The state borders Pakistan. Consignments of cartridges, explosives and detonators have been interdicted in the past in the state. Intelligence sources say the SIMI, a banned outfit, has sleeper cells in Rajasthan. In October last year, a powerful bomb blast occurred in a highly revered Sufi shrine of Khwaja Moinuddin Chisthi in Ajmer, 135 kilometers southwest of Jaipur. That blast left two people dead and 17 others injured.

Located 265 kilometers to the west of the capital Delhi, Jaipur is also known as the "Pink City" for the color of its stucco buildings. It is a popular tourist destination; several thousand tourists visit Jaipur every day. Almost 60% of foreign tourists visiting India drop in at this city.

Emerging patterns

Terror attacks in India over the past couple of years indicate that terrorists are targeting Hindu and Muslim places of worship and crowded areas to stir communal passions and trigger Hindu-Muslim riots.

The eight powerful bomb blasts that rocked Jaipur took place within 13 minutes of each other and occurred in the city's most crowded areas, in markets, near historic monuments and places of worship.

Indeed, the blasts confirm another feature of this worrying pattern. Temples are being targeted on Tuesdays (an auspicious day for Hindus) and mosques and shrines are being attacked on Fridays, when thousands of Muslims go to the mosque to offer special prayers.

A blast at Varanasi's Sankat Mochan Temple on March 7, 2006, a Tuesday, left 28 dead and over a 100 injured. The blasts occurred at the time of the aarti (a prayer ritual, which thousands attend) when the temple was packed with devotees.

Low intensity blasts occurred at Delhi's Jama Masjid, India's largest mosque, on April 14, 2006, a Friday, even as Muslims were preparing for evening prayers.

A blast occurred at a mosque in Malegaon and an adjacent Muslim cemetery on September 8, 2006, a Friday. The day was Shab-e-barat (night of salvation), a festival when Muslims visit graveyards to offer night-long prayers for their dead relatives. Blasts in Hyderabad's Mecca Masjid on May 18, 2007, a Friday, during prayers killed a dozen people.

And now the blasts at Jaipur, near temples, on a Tuesday and at the time of the evening aarti. Clearly, those behind these attacks aim at stirring communal passions and riots by targeting places of worship at a time when people are praying.

Just as there is a pattern in the terror attacks, so also is there a pattern in the response of the government. Every attack is followed by profound observations that it is the work of terrorists. Top politicians express "deep regret" and anger at the "dastardly attack" and are quick to quash the rage of victims' families with offers of financial compensation.

Officials speedily reach conclusions regarding who carried out the attack within a couple of hours, if not minutes, of the incident. Senior ministers used to invariably blame and name Pakistan, now they are more circumspect, pointing an accusing finger at a "foreign hand". Within days of the blasts, the matter is forgotten, until the next terror attack happens and the same drama is enacted.

Police blame politicians for politicizing national security and for refusing to give the police a free hand in making arrests. Indeed, political parties with an eye on votes stand in the way of arrests or action against extremist outfits.

But the police are as much to blame. Their unprofessional approach is on public display every time bombs rip through Indian cities. Blast sites are never cordoned off to the public. Within minutes of a blast, it is not uncommon to see media and the public walking unhampered through the site. Investigations that follow then are unlikely to be any more professional.

Intelligence sources argue that it is unfair to blame security agencies as they are successful in preventing many attacks. They also point out that policing a country such as India is very difficult. Indeed, ensuring foolproof security in crowded Indian cities and railway stations is a near-impossible task. This becomes more daunting given the deficiencies in manpower of the police and intelligence agencies.

Despite several reports recommending augmentation of manpower in police and intelligence agencies, upgrading of electronic and other surveillance and better coordination between various security agencies, little has been done to put these recommendations into effect.

And yet the government does not see a problem, or rather does not want to admit to it. In a statement to the Upper House of parliament, the government said on April 30 that "the overall internal security situation has remained largely under control".

It is in a state of denial.

Sudha Ramachandran is an independent journalist/researcher based in Bangalore.

How the Pentagon is Organizing its Cyber Warfare System

2008-05-14T07:28:00.000-07:00

Source: IntelligenceOnline
15/05/2008 United States

With the US Strategic Command preparing for the debut of its Cyber Command, cyber warfare has cropped up on the agenda of both Congress and NATO.

Defense secretary Robert Gates last month received proposals concerning American doctrine on infowar operations that had been drafted by the Joint Staff’s Division for Cyber Policy. Two units within the US Strategic Command (Stratcom) will be tasked with applying the recommendations: the offensive side will be coordinated by JFCC-Network Warfare, a unit which has been carrying out covert computer attacks since 2005 and answers to the director of NSA, Keith Alexander; the defensive side will fall to the Joint Task Force -Global Network Operations. The Pentagon’s operational resources in the defensive and offensive cyber warfare fields will be marshalled by the Air Force Cyber Command which is to start functioning in October (see graph below).

Elsewhere, Congress is taking a close look at the matter. Its recent report “Information Operations, Electronic Warfare and Cyberwar” drafted by Clay Wilson raises a number of questions concerning the legality of cyber war operations, particularly when they target civilian infrastructure.

NATO, too, has taken up the subject. During its summit meeting in Bucharest in April, the Atlantic alliance confirmed the creation of a Cyber Defense Management Authority (CDMA). Based in Brussels and headed by major general Georges d’Hollander, it will see to the protection of computer networks in member countries. The move to set up the Authority followed on the heels of prolonged attacks on Estonia’s communications infrastructure (banking systems and government servers) last spring. A training center for NATO’s civil and military personnel is to be inaugurated.

4th annual Text Analytics Summit

2008-05-13T08:40:00.001-07:00

Your biggest challenges discussed and answered!

http://www.textanalyticsnews.com/4thannual08/index.shtml

Back for our 4th year, Text Analytics News is proud to present the only recognized annual meeting place focused entirely on Text Analytics applications, solutions, support and guidance - the 4th annual Text Analytics Summit (June 16 - 17, 2008, Boston).
This is your chance to learn from the people who are currently deploying the latest most powerful unstructured text based solutions in all sorts of commercial businesses including; the travel industry, market research, call centers, customer relationship management, airlines, internal auditing, electronic legal discovery and even federal government. Quite simply this is your A - Z of delivering mind blowing - and profitable - Text Analytics solutions. This un-missable opportunity gives you the chance to deliver projects, understand results and harness provable ROI.

Already, over 750 text focused business executives have attended our past summits but we're not happy with that and have pulled apart our event, conducted months of research, refined a tight agenda and sourced superb speakers to ensure we give you full return on your investment in time and money when you attend.

This year we're back and bigger and better than ever, We've expanded many of our existing features and even introduced a brand new format with tracks for both end users and solution providers. There's even more exhibitors , more of the largest commercial end users , more networking opportunities , bigger speakers and a better agenda.

Our blockbusting agenda will deliver fascinating insight from leading data experts from Microsoft, Ernst and Young, TDWI, Autonomy, IBM and Callminer- not only that but you'll receive topic specific sessions focused on technical developments in one track and end user case studies in the other. This years topics include;

Your biggest challenges discussed and answered!

Deploying Text Analytics for proven ROI: Hear from the largest commercial end users and take away a blueprint for budget justification and successful implementation in your organization
Voice of the customer: Leverage advances in sentiment extraction, psychological content analysis and qualitative research techniques to drill down into your customer data
Social media analysis for market intelligence - the next frontier: Assess the huge untapped source of market intelligence within social media such as social networks, online forums and blogs
New application areas for text analytics: Discover the latest applications of text technologies such as how text mining retrieval technologies are streamlining e-discovery capabilities and internal auditing
Convergence of text with other solutions : Learn how to integrate your Text Analytics technologies into existing legacy systems and how to take advantage of the latest technologies such as advanced sentiment, entity extraction and speech analytics
Technology update: Evaluate the very latest solutions for text analytics: through demonstration sessions, interactive workshops and live mining. Discover the tools that are impacting the bottom line for end users.
Sneak preview: Get up to speed on tomorrows text capabilities and new markets and discover who's next in line to deploy text analytics in a big way
Register your place right now before its too late

Leverage your technology: Whether you are a solution provider wanting to corner emerging markets or an end user wanting to make your data work harder, you'll get the information you need to build new applications with bottom line impact

Cross industry mindshare: Find out how text mining users in a broad range of vertical industries are making their data work harder and deliver

Text analytics ROI: End users are investing more and more in text analytics. Need a place to begin? Our sessions will give you a comprehensive model for ROI and Budget justification

Get a roadmap for commercial success: The greatest minds in the industry will tell you how the massive potential of text mining will be transformed into actionable intelligence and revenue for your business.

Real life case studies: Discover the business critical issues that spell the difference between success and failure in a text analytics deployment – what's already working well and what you should avoid at all costs

Inspiration for innovation: hear from tech savy end users who really know what they're buying. They will give us the overview of the product landscape, discuss their evolving needs and set their challenges for innovation

Industry Break-Out roundtables :More focus, more attention and more intimate networking. This session is designed for the ultimate in industry specific mind-share...

Live mining demonstration sessions: Watch the technologies at work to see how they can suit your needs and see the full range of capabilities available today... Our summit exhibition ensures you get to test out today's latest technologies!

TO SEE THE FULL 2 DAY CONFERENCE AGENDA CLICK HERE

Have you got a Text Analytics end user case study to share?

Text analytics news are currently recruiting commercial end user speakers from right across the text analytics value chain to ensure the conference delegates receive the very best and most in-depth briefing on the use of Text Analytics technologies. With this in mind we are looking for the most up to date and relevant case studies and discussion points.

If you would like to be part of this years speaker line up or would like to suggest a speaker please submit details to the conference director,

Joshua Bull, on josh@textanalyticsnews.com or call him directly on +44 (0)207 375 7277.

Padma Shri Award : Dr. Nirupam Bajpai

2008-05-13T08:29:00.000-07:00

The President of India, Her Excellency Pratibha Devisingh Patil conferred the Padma Shri Award on Monday, May 5, 2008 at the Rashtrapati Bhawan in New Delhi. Among those who attended the ceremony included the Vice President of India, the Prime Minister and his Council of Ministers, former Prime Ministers, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and a number of Members of Parliament among others.

Dr. Nirupam Bajpai
Senior Development Adviser &
Director, South Asian Programs
Center on Globalization & Sustainable Development
The Earth Institute at Columbia University
2910 Broadway, A-Level, Hogan Hall, #102
New York, NY 10025

U.S.A.

T: (212)854-9494

Cell: (212)203-3969

F: (212)854-5637

E: nirupam.bajpai@columbia.edu

Columbia University Homepage:

http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/cgsd/bajpai.html

CGSD Website:

http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/cgsd/advising/india_detailed.html

Lebanon: Hezbollah's Communication Network

2008-05-12T10:39:00.000-07:00

Source: STRATFOR
May 9, 2008 | 2252 GMT

ANWAR AMRO/AFP/Getty Images

A Shiite Hezbollah militant takes pictures with his mobile phone of a destroyed house

Summary
The Lebanese government has decided to dismantle Shiite militant group Hezbollah’s communications network — the very thing that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah called the group’s most important weapon. Not only did the government’s decision spark protests and violence, but the network — which spans Beirut and reaches through the Bekaa Valley to the area along the Israeli-Lebanese border — could prove difficult to take down.

Analysis
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah declared May 8 that the Shiite militant group’s communications network is its most important weapon, and that the government’s decision to target the network was tantamount to a declaration of war. As Nasrallah spoke, Beirut was swarming with Hezbollah supporters flashing victory signs, waving flags, burning tires, blockading roads and attacking rival government forces with everything from rocks to mortar fire.

Nasrallah was referring to a decision made by members of the Western-backed Lebanese government’s Cabinet two days earlier. After eight hours of deliberation, the Cabinet announced to the public that Hezbollah’s communications network was illegal and represented an attack on the country’s sovereignty.

The government crossed a red line when it decided to go after Hezbollah’s communications network. In Hezbollah’s view, its communications technology is just as essential for the group’s survival as its missiles. With the help of Iranian electronic engineers, the group has built an expansive network that stretches across Beirut and through the Bekaa Valley to the south along the Israel-Lebanon border. Indeed, during the 2006 summer conflict between Hezbollah and Israel, Hezbollah was effective in preventing Israeli electronic warfare (EW) units from jamming its networks south of the Litani River and even reportedly had the assets in place to jam parts of Israel’s radar and communications systems.

The Lebanese government is very aware of what it means to single out Hezbollah’s communication network. However, the government faces a daunting task in attempting to dismantle the Shiite group’s communications network. This analysis explores the intricacies of Hezbollah’s communications technologies, the EW tactics the group and its opponents face and the sheer difficulty of taking the system apart.

Hezbollah’s Tactical Communications Network
Land Lines/Hard Lines
Of the telecommunications networks available to Hezbollah, land line systems are among the simplest and cheapest to construct. Primarily, land line networks are constructed using either copper wires or fiber optic cable, the former being very vulnerable to EW practices (such as tapping and jamming) and the latter almost immune.

Copper wiring, the core material in traditional wiring applications, acts as an electrical conductor and transmits information via electrical signals. This design, however, allows anyone who discovers the cable to easily open it, splice in a connection and intercept communications taking place across the line.

But this vulnerability has not dissuaded Hezbollah from using it, at least in part, within their greater communications network. In fact, in addition to using the current national land line systems, Hezbollah has for several years constructed its own network of copper land lines and cables. Much of the organization’s network was laid alongside national phone companies’ and communications firms’ cables and wires, in an effort to take advantage of existing infrastructure and ensure a degree of security for the network itself. The remaining portions that were not built in proximity to the national networks extend throughout the country, connecting disparate offices and outposts to the centralized network. However, this portion of the land line system should not be viewed as a primary communication tool due to its vulnerabilities; it is best considered a secondary or emergency communication system.

The other type of land line communication network is constructed out of fiber optic cables and, because of the cables’ properties and operating principles, quickly is becoming one of the kinds of networks Hezbollah uses most frequently. Unlike copper and other types of cables, fiber optic cables are not vulnerable to electromagnetic interference; some have even claimed that it is impossible to tap a fiber optic cable and intercept data, but this is only partially true.

Related Special Topic Pages
Cyberwarfare
Hezbollah
The basis for this claim is rooted in the underlying design of the cables and technology, which transmit data via pulses of light rather than electrically. This renders them immune to electromagnetic interference, and that alone is of considerable benefit. However, their real worth is that they can be incredibly difficult to tap into.

There are two possible procedures to choose from to attempt to tap a fiber optic cable. The first of these is locating a coupling point between two strands of cable. Once the strands are detached, a signal interceptor can be inserted and data potentially can be captured. The second method relies upon physically severing the cable, inserting the interceptor, and reattaching the two ends. Regardless of which method is employed, a sharp drop in optical power transmission will occur. In a robust network the cables’ data stream would be rerouted automatically, but will still draw attention. Furthermore, when an interceptor is inserted, it has to absorb or divert some of that light in order to obtain the data being sent. This ultimately causes a noticeable decrease in optical power. If these two events take place in sequence, network technicians can be almost certain that someone has deliberately tampered with the cable. And even if the intruders were able to avoid detection, there is the issue of being able to decrypt the data stream and sort out relevant information, which is difficult even if the amount of data is fairly limited.

Though the process is difficult, many organizations and governments — including the United States, the United Kingdom and Japan — are known to have successfully intercepted data or engaged in cyber attacks through hijacked fiber optic cable connections. Although limited thus far, Hezbollah has also been able to engage in fiber optic cable tapping, enabling data interception and the hijacking of Internet and communication connections. All this being said, however, fiber optics will continue to be one of the most secure forms of communication.

Mobile and Satellite Phone Networks
Within Hezbollah’s communication infrastructure, the use of mobile phones is highly prevalent. Used for everything from battlefield communication to general organizational communication, the mobile phone is critical to Hezbollah’s ability to function efficiently.

Mobile phones and other wireless communication devices are very vulnerable to EW operations, even more so than land lines. Mobile phones function as full-duplex devices, simultaneously using two frequencies for wireless communication within a network. One of these is used to send voice and data from the user while the other receives; both must pass through a network tower. All that is required to cut off most mobile phones and systems is an active frequency jammer that floods the airwaves with a single frequency or a wide range of frequencies, cutting off access to the tower. Single-frequency jamming works for many mobile phones; once the phone loses one of its frequencies, it automatically drops the other one. Newer and more advanced models, however, often use multiple frequencies, and denying them access requires wide ranges of frequencies to be blocked simultaneously.

While the principles behind the jamming process are relatively simple, they are far more difficult to implement in large-scale military and counterterrorism operations. During the 2006 summer conflict with Hezbollah, the Israeli military deployed jammers into southern Lebanon in an attempt to disrupt Hezbollah members’ mobile phone communications. However, even the most powerful jammers can only flood a small range. In a combat theater like southern Lebanon, Israel would have needed hundreds of jammers to saturate the entire electromagnetic spectrum enough to actually block Hezbollah’s communication. Israel could only deploy jammers around high-value assets and selected areas due to the size and terrain of the area.

After recognizing Israel’s inability to block its mobile phone networks during the 2006 summer conflict, Hezbollah made a strategic decision to expand its own independent mobile phone network to enhance its operational security. The decision was made not only because Hezbollah’s communications went uninterrupted during the 2006 conflict while the group used the national phone networks and their own mobile networks but because Hezbollah also anticipates a future war with Israel.

The Israeli military knows how important mobile communications are to Hezbollah’s operations and likely will attack Lebanon’s cellular towers in order to cut off the group’s access in a rematch with the Shiite militant group. If this should happen, having a secondary mobile phone network to rely upon would be crucial to Hezbollah.

Should both of these networks fail, Hezbollah also operates several satellite phones to ensure reliable communications in all contingencies. The phones themselves are often reserved for high-ranking personnel or members performing critical tasks. Even if there were significant numbers of the phones in operation within a combat environment, their use would still be limited.

Satellite phones primarily use two types of satellites: geosynchronous and low Earth orbit (LEO). While both of these types offer users satellite uplinks in almost every corner of the globe, each has fundamental limitations. Geosynchronous satellites, which operate at an average altitude of 22,000 miles, allow for constant uplink access to a limited geographic range. The uplink itself, however, often suffers from significant travel time for voice calls and data transfers. In a future military conflict, the lack of real-time communications could significantly impede Hezbollah’s operations. LEO satellites overcome this issue by operating at altitudes ranging from 400-700 miles. Though real-time communication is possible, satellites are usually only in range at certain intervals in their orbits. With large satellite networks, LEO phones can often have considerable amounts of dedicated service times, but the process of constantly switching between satellites is a significant drawback.

Internet Networks
Though mobile phone networks are used most frequently by Hezbollah, the group also relies heavily on the Internet for secure communication. While today the Internet is often associated with insecurity and vulnerability for its many users, it is in fact one of the most secure forms of communication. Of particular use are secure, free e-mail accounts.

Within the field of electronic and cyberwarfare, intercepting an e-mail is not a particularly difficult task so long as the computer or device which accesses it can be reliably identified. Once this is done, it can be intercepted by a wide range of programs, including keylogger programs, which have the ability to copy the keys that are pressed on a computer to pick up things like passwords, log-ins and other information.

But without pinpointing the target computer or device, cyberwarfare technicians would have to rely on picking up messages directly off a cable and deal with the sheer volume of information that comes along with it. This would require vast amounts of data farming, as tens of thousands of e-mails across a number of different networks would be collected every day. Not only is this impractical for intelligence gathering, but the information gleaned from it is often dubious without knowledge of the source of the information.

Under these circumstances, Hezbollah fully uses e-mail for a wide range of organizational activities, from basic communication to tactical planning. Not only does it not have to be too concerned about its messages being intercepted, but if members feel that their accounts or messages might have been hacked, they can simply change the account or the device which accesses the account. During the construction of its cellular phone networks, Hezbollah not only made the networks capable of supporting e-mail and Short Message Service (SMS) messages, but designed the networks to handle e-mail and SMS as the primary communication methods.

In addition to using e-mail and electronic messages, Hezbollah’s hacker corps has long been known to hijack servers and Web sites to meet the organization’s needs. These electronic resources, once hijacked, often serve as centralized communication nodes for members to relay valuable information on things like recruiting, tactical planning and fund-raising. In the process of hijacking these resources the hackers will often make a note of not disrupting the services the resources offer so that it is less likely that their activities will be discovered. That being the case, few of the hackers’ activities have been noticed or disrupted, which allows for a highly reliable and secure external communication mode.

While these two methods serve as the primary communication uses of the Internet for Hezbollah, there are still many other services the group employs, albeit to a lesser extent. Among these are instant messaging applications and voice over internet protocol (VoIP) programs. Although Hezbollah uses these capabilities less frequently, instant messaging and VoIP are likely to eventually become backup communication media or be integrated directly into Hezbollah’s primary communication networks. VoIP is the most likely to be given greater priority due to the large numbers of fiber optic cable networks Hezbollah has. Once VoIP services are paired with these cables, Hezbollah would possess an extremely resilient communication medium that would be largely immune to standard EW disruption or interception.

The Scale of Hezbollah’s Communication Networks
The early version of Hezbollah’s internal telecommunications network was comparatively small in scale. The earliest portions were centralized in Beirut and branched off to critical nodes and facilities within the organization’s hierarchy. This included standard copper wiring, a primitive and experimental mobile phone network, limited radio use and some Internet/electronic networks. In recent years, much of these early networks have been supplanted by more advanced and expansive versions, which have enhanced Hezbollah’s operational security and efficiency.

The copper wire-based communication and Internet networks were among the first of the networks to be displaced. Fiber optic cables, with their numerous benefits — including high data stream capacity and EW defenses — make an ideal communication medium for the organization and are undoubtedly the most prolific type within the organization. Almost every facility and building — including Hezbollah’s headquarters, television and radio stations, military compounds and most recently the group’s mobile rocket launch facilities — is wired within this network. This newest addition not only enables secure e-mail, instant messaging and other useful applications, but also the remote control of rocket facilities without risking personnel or possibly losing communication. Much of the network is concentrated in Beirut, but it now effectively covers the entire southern, western and eastern portions of Lebanon and can be easily expanded to connect new facilities or nodes to the greater network. More recently, new work has begun to push the network far into Lebanon’s northern regions so that communications can be conducted anywhere in the country.

Mobile phone networks have experienced a similar expansion, although the organization also continues to use public mobile phone networks. The earliest experimental networks were based in Beirut, but soon after technical hurdles were overcome the network quickly expanded into southern Lebanon. This region was chosen first to support operations against Israel and years later proved instrumental in Hezbollah’s fight against the Israeli military in 2006. Today the network provides almost complete coverage in western and eastern Lebanon, and there is evidence of limited service in the north.

The Challenge of Dismantling Hezbollah’s Communication Network
Though the Lebanese government has threatened to dismantle Hezbollah’s communication networks, a number of obstacles stand in the way. The biggest complication is that the scale and layout of the network is largely unknown except to a small number of the organization’s officials and technicians, so many of the networks quite simply cannot be disassembled. As discussed earlier, several different communication networks are used simultaneously to support the needs of the greater organization. Each of these networks presents its own challenges, and dismantling them will be extraordinarily difficult.

The most basic (yet critical) of the networks are those composed of land lines, such as copper or fiber optic cable, which were laid down alongside or within existing bundles or were spliced into national networks. With so much of Hezbollah’s systems in close proximity or tied into national networks, any attempts to remove Hezbollah’s network will undoubtedly cause significant disruption to the national network, driving up the economic cost nationwide of going after Hezbollah.

As for the components that were installed independent of the national networks, the principal issue is not of removal, but rather of simply locating components. This is far easier said than done. Trying to locate a single cable or cluster of cables without a detailed map is extremely difficult. Detection methods, such as metal detecting, are often time consuming and costly in terms of resources and manpower and often do not yield results. For fiber optic cables this method does not work at all. Most often, communication nodes must be captured or identified so that their land lines can be traced. No matter how good the detection systems are, many of these cables will not be discovered without insider knowledge.

Unlike landline systems, wireless communication networks — such as those that support mobile phone networks — are simpler to locate. Much of this is because of their distinct physical presences and the fact that they are emitting carrier signals, which are easily traced and intercepted. Jamming is another option, but doing this often proves difficult even for nations with substantial resources and technical expertise. In the Lebanese government’s case, the only option is to attempt to locate the emitter stations and communication nodes and shut them down. Hezbollah communication officials could go mobile with many of these systems, since the technological principles are simple, but mobility would also compromise reliability. A rapidly shifting mobile or wireless network will inherently leave gaps in the communication network and disrupt Hezbollah’s activities. But the group is well-prepared to switch over to national networks if their local networks were seriously threatened.

Locating and disassembling the networks is only part of the equation. While the government can certainly attempt to pursue this policy, it must also consider the distinct possibility that Hezbollah will simply replace the portions that are lost. Such interference will certainly complicate matters for Hezbollah, but they likely will be able to replace connections faster than the government can locate and terminate them.

Most of the networks Hezbollah uses, such as mobile phone networks, the Internet and others, are all available for public use. Should Hezbollah’s private networks be cut off, Hezbollah would simply have to increase its usage of these networks to retain its current capacities. Since many of these networks offer anonymity to their users due to their nature or the quantity of users, it is possible that Hezbollah’s communications could become even harder to intercept, further frustrating the Lebanese government and Hezbollah’s foreign rivals.

Egypt: bread riots and mill strikes

2008-05-12T10:38:00.000-07:00

‘Work is politics’
Source: mondediplo.com/2008/05/08egypt

The Mubarak regime has promoted a new, privatised Egypt in which only 10% of Egyptians participate; the rest of society is trying to cope with high inflation and shortages of crucial subsidised food. Strikes and collective action have provoked reprisals, yet also secured some pay rises.

By Joel Beinin

Outrage against soaring inflation, the scarcity of subsidised bread and discontent with the regime of President Hosni Mubarak exploded on 6 April in Mahalla al-Kubra, a major industrial city north of Cairo. Muhammad al-Attar told Al-Ahram Weekly: “The city is burning. Thousands of demonstrators are out on the street, throwing stones, chanting anti-government slogans and defying the batons of the riot police, tear gas and bullets” (1). Al-Attar is a member of the elected strike committee of the 25,000 workers at the gigantic Misr Spinning and Weaving Co, a public-sector textile conglomerate and the largest industrial enterprise in Egypt. In January, the committee announced that the Misr workers would strike on 6 April to force the company to fulfil promises made after successful strikes in December 2006 and September 2007.

This developed into a call for a nationwide strike to protest against the sharp increase in the prices of many basic foods, especially bread, and to demand a rise in the minimum wage from $21 a month, set in 1984, to $222. Between 2005 and 2008 food prices rose by 33% for meat and as much as 146% for chicken, and this March inflation reached 15.8%. Severe shortages of subsidised bread, the main source of calories for most Egyptians, have made things worse – low-paid government inspectors often sell subsidised flour on the black market. Rows in long bread lines caused injuries and even deaths. The cost of unsubsidised bread has nearly doubled in the past two years.

On 2 April security forces occupied the city of Mahalla and the Misr mill, and pressed al-Attar, Sayyid Habib and other members of the committee to call off the strike. The company granted several outstanding demands: increases in basic monthly pay to $65 for unskilled workers, $69 for high school and trade school graduates, and $74 for college and university graduates; a doubling of the monthly food allowance; and a commitment to implement a promise of free transport to work. These gains will raise the rates of the best-paid Misr workers to about $185 a month.

Carrot and stick
The National Council on Wages and the state-sponsored Egyptian Trade Union Federation also began discussing raising the national minimum wage. They will certainly recommend far less than the $222 a month proposed by the Misr workers, which is still below the World Bank poverty line of $2 a day for each person in a family of four.

The combination of carrot and stick induced the committee to call off the strike but some workers were not happy. Just after the 3.30pm shift change, a few workers mingled with a crowd of mostly young boys and women in the main square of Mahalla al-Kubra. The leaderless crowd began chanting: “Oh pasha, oh bey, a loaf of [unsubsidised] bread costs a quarter of a pound.” In response, hired thugs threw volleys of rocks to disperse them. Uniformed Central Security forces fired tear gas and prepared to beat the demonstrators with batons. As the violence escalated, the crowd burned the banners of ruling National Democratic Party candidates for the municipal elections scheduled two days later.

The elections aroused little interest and had no legitimacy: hundreds of Muslim Brothers candidates were arrested in the weeks before the balloting, eliminating the main opposition.

On 7 April violence continued for a second day when a crowd of several thousand, much larger than the day before, gleefully defaced a large poster of President Mubarak. Security forces arrested 331 people, beat up hundreds, critically wounded nine, and killed 15-year-old Ahmad Ali Mubarak with a bullet to his head as he was standing on the balcony of the family flat.

On 8 April a delegation of high government officials led by prime minister Ahmad Nazif rushed to Mahalla al-Kubra to restore calm. Nazif announced a bonus of a month’s pay for Misr workers and 15 days for all other textile workers. The minister of investment promised better transport, special bakeries for subsidised bread, and a revival of the cooperative store to provide subsidised rice, oil, sugar and flour. The city’s general hospital will receive new medical equipment and specialised staff. (Faulty equipment may have caused the deaths of eight patients in Mahalla’s cardiac centre in March.)

As the first Egyptian-owned mechanised textile mill (established in 1927) and the largest industrial enterprise of the public sector nationalised in 1960, Misr has enormous symbolic importance. Events there often set the pace for wages and working conditions for other industrial workers. So the government was willing to pay a high price, as it has in the past, to satisfy its workers.

Call for a general strike
The Mahalla workers’ plan for a national labour strike escalated into a call for a general strike endorsed by the Egyptian Movement for Change – Kifaya (a multi-tendency pro-democracy coalition), the Islamist Labour Party, the Nasserist Karama Party and the Bar Association. A FaceBook group with more than 60,000 members also called on Egyptians to remain at home on 6 April. Some went on strike and there were large demonstrations on the steps of the Bar Association and at several universities. In downtown Cairo there was less traffic, and reduced activity in poorer districts such as the market area of Imbaba.

But the general strike was aborted by the arrest of nearly 100 political activists on the eve of 6 April. Khalid Ali Umar, a lawyer at the Hisham Mubarak Law Centre, criticised the call as a “premature act on behalf of the leaders of ineffective political parties and groupings”. He regarded organising through text messages, emails, and FaceBook as “political opportunism” (2).

The 11 December 2004 demonstration organised by Kifaya began political ferment in Egypt. Breaking a taboo, demonstrators personally criticised Mubarak and demanded that he should not run for re-election in 2005 (he did), that his son Gamal should not succeed him in the presidency (most Egyptians expect he will) and that the powers of the presidency should be reduced (the constitutional amendments of March 2007 expanded them). Although Kifaya initially showed much promise, it lost steam after the 2006 Lebanon war. The Communist Party, the newly established Social Democratic Party and the Trotskyist Revolutionary Socialists have made some gains among workers since 2004. But Kifaya has not been a big factor in the labour movement.

Kifaya’s support for a general strike on 6 April was considered so threatening that on 9 April George Ishak, a founding member of Kifaya, was arrested followed by 50 others. The charges against Ishak were typical of the spurious accusations the Mubarak regime directs against opponents: “Organisation of a gathering in collaboration with others with the aim to commit crimes of aggression against individuals, treasury and public property; the use of force and violence with the aim of affecting the performance of public authorities” (3).

Twenty-five academics organised by Kifaya travelled to Mahalla on 11 April to visit families of the injured. They were detained 20km from the city and prevented from entering. This suggests that the Mubarak regime is escalating repressive measures against its secular opponents besides repressing the Muslim Brothers.

Their successful strikes projected the Mahalla workers into the leadership of a massive upsurge of working class collective action, in which as many as 400,000 have occupied factories, gone on strike, demonstrated or taken other collective action since 2004. Industrial workers have inspired strikes or strike threats by professionals such as doctors, university professors and dentists. It is the largest and most sustained social movement in Egypt since the campaign to oust the British after 1945.

Primary impulse
The main cause is the neo-liberal agenda which is creating a new Egypt for 10% of the population while disenfranchising industrial workers and white collar employees, especially those in the diminishing public sector. Following Egypt’s Economic Reform and Structural Adjustment Programme agreements with the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, Law 203 of 1991 stipulated that 314 public sector enterprises were eligible for privatisation. By mid-2002 190 had been privatised (4). Then, in July 2004, a new government headed by Ahmad Nazif took office. The economic portfolios were entrusted to western-educated PhDs or businessmen close to Gamal Mubarak (5). The government of Gamal Mubarak’s entourage initiated more sell-offs: a record 17 firms were sold in its first fiscal year in office (6).

This provoked fears about the loss of jobs and unwillingness of new private investors to pay long overdue social benefits, such as dividends in shares of firms owned by workers or contributions to retirement funds, which some public sector managers had neglected for as long as a decade. Real wages have declined sharply, and the gap between the rich and the poor has widened. A common estimate is that 40% of Egyptians live below the poverty line.

These conditions have impelled the unprecedented strikes and collective action since 2004. There were 74 collective actions in the first half of 2004 and 191 after the installation of the Nazif government in July (7). Some 25% were in the private sector, more than before. On 2 March 2008 the liberal daily Al-Misri al-Yawm reported 222 strikes, factory occupations and protests during 2006. Egyptian Workers and Trade Union Watch reported more than 580 episodes of industrial action in 2007.

During 2007, strikes spread from the textile and clothing industry to workers in building materials, transport, the Cairo metro, food processing, bakeries, sanitation, telecommunications, oil workers in Suez, the Helwan Iron and Steel Mills, the National Cement Company in Helwan and many others. Private sector industrial workers were a significant part of the labour movement for the first time in many decades.

In summer 2007 the movement broadened to white-collar employees, civil servants and professionals. The single largest collective action was the December 2007 strike of 55,000 real estate tax collectors employed by local authorities. After months of demonstrations, they went on strike for 10 days and won their demand for wage parity with their counterparts employed directly by the ministry of finance.

The workers’ movement – even more than the demonstrations of the intelligentsia organised by Kifaya – has popularised a culture of protest and is contributing to consciousness of citizenship and rights far more successfully than the moribund secular opposition political parties or the most active NGOs. Addressing a rally after his release from jail during the September 2007 strike at Misr, Muhammad al-Attar said: “I want the whole government to resign – I want the Mubarak regime to come to an end. Politics and workers’ rights are inseparable. Work is politics. What we are witnessing here – this is as democratic as it gets.”

This strike ended after the workers forced the government to negotiate with their elected strike committee; the tax collectors’ strike was ended likewise. These are significant political defeats for the state-sponsored trade union federation, which many hope are steps towards establishing an independent trade union. While there is not yet an adequate organisational vehicle to express this new culture of protest, it has radically undermined the legitimacy of the Mubarak regime.

What did 1968 ever do for us?

2008-05-09T07:53:00.001-07:00

Source: OXFORD ANALYTICA

It is forty years since 'May 1968', a series of student protests in France. Rebellion was not confined to the cobbled streets of Paris's Latin Quarter that year; revolutionary waves also rippled across the streets of Prague, Belgium, Poland, Pakistan, the Philippines, Mexico, Kenya and Brazil. In the UK, women demanded equal pay and in the United States, students protested the Vietnam War and beauty contests. The spirit of '68, or the undermining of authoritarianism, is celebrated, exaggerated and exploited four decades on.

Achievements
There is disagreement over what les evenements in Paris and beyond achieved over the short and long-term:

Peter Lennon believes the protests were about more than hippie youngsters railing against the 'heavy' establishment who had shuttered their cinematheques; he thinks the students effectively brought down a head of state. This is open to conjecture; the protests reached such a point that de Gaulle created separate military operations headquarters to deal with the unrest, dissolved the National Assembly and called for new parliamentary elections a month later. After a face-saving interval, the most influential leader in modern French history retired a year later.
Geoffrey Wheatcroft is doubtful that the global rebellion led to a lasting shift in political values, and warns against grizzled soixante-huitards hijacking the 1968 zeitgeist. He writes that the "brief orgasmic thrill of 1968 was followed by years of post-coital depression" and that the intervening 40 years has seen the right win politically and the left win culturally. There is some truth here: the right has inhabited the Elysée palace for 26 of the last 40 years; the Conservative Party has dominated political life in the UK for almost half of the last four decades, and in the United States, Republicans have been in the White House for 28 of the 40 years.
Chris Harman, the Editor of International Socialism agrees that many of 1968's political and cultural gains were rolled back. "That was what the coups in Chile and Argentina were about. That was what Thatcherism and Reaganism were about. That is what the transformation of women's liberation into sexual commodification is about."

The new climate of cultural liberalism certainly gave the business world new opportunities to exploit. "The structure of capitalist society was beginning to shift in a manner barely evident at the time. How could we have known that empowerment would be the adman's dream ticket or that the market would zoom in so thoroughly on personal identity," writes Sheila Rowbotham.
Legacy of hope

Although many are sceptical of 1968's impact today, most agree that rebellion -- in Paris and further afield -- contested the space between personal life and politics. The French students discombobulated the old authoritarian society of which they had had enough, and workers advanced a broader, more political and more radical agenda. Both wanted to change a society where housewives needed the permission of their husbands to open a bank account and workplaces were draconian establishments reminiscent of Victorian England.

Christopher Hitchens, one of the most articulate soixante-huitards, agrees that the desire to undermine authority and the hope for change, if not real change, is 1968's true legacy: "the antitotalitarian ethos embraced by the best soixante-huitards remains an option…and I believe that it will have further opportunities to declare itself long after the pseudo-revolutionary silliness has been forgotten."

A disgruntled Belgian contributor to The Guardian's Comment is Free forum would agree. "1968 was also more than just a bunch of students, it was about inequality between the Walloon and the Flemish population. We are still in the same mess though," he writes.

AHMEDINEJAD'S VISIT: IN PERSPECTIVE

2008-05-08T06:10:00.000-07:00

By B. Raman

In response to an invitation issued by President Mahinda Rajapaksa of Sri Lanka during his visit to Teheran in November, 2007. President Mahmud Ahmadinejad of Iran paid a two-day official visit to Sri Lanka on April 28 and 29, 2008.

2. Since last year, Sri Lanka has been facing economic difficulties due to the drying-up of economic assistance from countries of the European Union (EU) such as Germany because of what they perceive as the indifferent attitude of the Rajapaksa Government to complaints regarding the violation of the human rights of the Tamils and its refusal to seek a political solution to the problem.

3. Instead of succumbing to the EU pressure on the subject, the Rajapaksa Government turned for increased assistance to other countries such as China and Iran, which did not raise human rights issues as a condition for such assistance. Assistance from Iran was of crucial importance to Sri Lanka because of the Government's inability to pay for its increasingly costly oil imports.The Goverenment of Ahmadinejad readily agreed to provide oil at concessional rates to Sri Lanka and to train a small team of officers of the Sri Lankan Army and intelligence in Iran. It also agreed to provide a low-interest loan to Sri Lanka to enable it to purchase defence-related equipment from China and Pakistan.

4. In addition, it agreed to invest US $ 1.5 billion in energy-related projects in Sri Lanka. One of these projects is for the production of hydel power and the other to double the capacity of an existing oil refinery in Sri Lanka. Work on the construction of the hydel project started during Mr. Ahmadinejad's visit. Iranian engineers have already been preparing the project report for doubling the capacity of the refinery and for modifying it to enable it to refine in future Iranian crude to be supplied at concessional rates. The existing capacity is 50,000 barrels a day.

5. The interest shown by Iran in Sri Lanka since last year is attributed to its desire to counter the Israeli influence in Sri Lanka and to use Sri Lanka as a base for monitoring the movements of US naval ships between the Pacific and the Gulf. Since Mr. Rajapaksa came to power, the visit of US naval vessels and officers to Sri Lanka has increased. Even before he came to power, Israel had emerged as an important supplier of military equipment, particularly for the Sri Lankan Air Force. The fact that even at the risk of misunderstanding with Israel, Mr. Rajapaksa chose to approach Iran and accepted its ready offer of assistance underlined the serious economic situation in which Sri Lanka found itself.

6. In view of the operation of a NATO Naval task force in the Gulf to provide logistics support to the NATO's military operations in Afghanistan, the officers in charge of Ahmadinejad's security were not in favour of his aircraft flying over the seas on his way to and back from Colombo. They reportedly decided that his aircraft should fly to Colombo over Pakistan and India and use the same route for its return journey.

7. The Iran Air Force has aircraft which can fly directly from Teheran to Colombo without the need for any intermediate halt. However, they are in a poor state of maintenance due to difficulties in procuring spare parts because of the sanctions imposed by the UN and the US against Iran. It was, therefore, decided that his aircraft should stop over briefly in Islamabad on his way to Colombo and in New Delhi on his way back. It is learnt that the initiative for stop-over visits came from Teheran because of considerations relating to the security of Mr. Ahmadinejad's plane.

8. Pakistan, which has not been worried about any adverse reaction from the US, welcomed the proposal and extended to him a high profile welcome while he was on his way to Colombo on April 28.His engagements in Islamabad included separate meetings with President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani and a lunch hosted by the Prime Minister. While the local media hype focussed on the reported forward movement in the negotiations for a gas pipeline to supply Iranian gas to Pakistan and India----- a proposal, which has been under periodic discussions since Benazir Bhutto's second term as the Prime Minister (1993-96) within ups and downs in hype and euphoria--- the real reason for the satisfaction of the Pakistani leadership was the Iranian President's positive response to Pakistan's request for urgent economic assistance.

9. The Pakistani economy has been in a bad shape since the beginning of this year due to shortages of food grains, flour and electricity. The shortages in foodgrains and flour have caused acute economic hardship to the people. The erratic electric supply has affected industrial production, which has also been affected by frequent disruptions in the supply of gas from Balochistan due to attacks on the pipelines from Balochistan to Punjab by the Balochistan Liberation Army(BLA). In response to reportedly desperate requests from Musharraf and Gilani, Mr. Ahmadinejad is learnt to have agreed to supply an unspecified quantity of foodgrains, flour and electricity to Pakistan.

10. On the question of the gas pipeline from Iran to Pakistan, there were contradictory versions of the outcome of the talks despite the orchestrated atmosphere of optimism which Mr. Ahmadinejad himself tried to spread in Islamabad and New Delhi. While the "News" and the "Daily Times" gave an optimistic assessment as if all issues involving India, Pakistan and Iran had been sorted out on matters like price, the transit fee etc during the visit of Mr. Murli Deora, the Indian Petroleum Minister, to Pakistan before the Iranian President's visit, the "Dawn" of Karachi, which is better informed and which has its feet firmly on the ground, gave a more guarded picture. Quoting what it described as "diplomatic observers", the "Dawn" (April 29) said: "Several contentious issues remain to be addressed." It did not specify what were those contentious issues.

11. The 'Hindu" of Chennai was even more cautious than the "Dawn". It reported as follows on April 30,2008: " Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon reaffirmed Mr. Ahmadinejad's optimism, but cautioned that a long road lay ahead to ensure that the project was commercially viable, financially acceptable to India and all security concerns were taken care of."

12. There are various dimensions to this castle-building in the air over the gas pipeline from Iran. Among them, the following:

Financial: Both India and Pakistan are reported to have made it clear that Iran has to raise the funds (about US $ 7.5 billion) for the construction of the pipeline. Where is it going to get it when it has been facing difficulty for years in raising in the international market the funds required by it for the modernisation of its own oil and gas industries. The Americans are determined to see that unless and until it winds up its nuclear enrichment plant at Natanz, it is not able to raise a single cent in the international market.
Technical: The proposed pipeline will pass through earthquake prone areas on both sides of the Iran-Pakistan border. Iran does not have the required technology for its construction. Only Western pipeline construction companies and those in Russia and China have it. The Western (including Australian) companies would not help because of the US pressure and the UN sanctions. Russia might help, but would want to be paid for it in cash. China would be prepared to help provided it is paid in kind in the form of a share of the gas to be transported. If Iran agrees to it, it would become a four-party project involving Iran, Pakistan, India and China and the entire proposal will have to be re-negotiated.
Security: The pipeline has to pass through Baloch majority areas on both sides of the Iran-Pakistan border. The Balochs in Iran, who are Sunnis, are being assisted by the Americans through organisations such as the Jundullah to destabilise the border areas of Iran. The Balochs in Pakistan have also risen in revolt against the Government in Islamabad and are fighting for an independent Balochistan. They are demanding that they should also be a party to the gas pipeline project, which will pass through their homeland, and that they should get a share of the transit fee, which Pakistan hopes to get from India.
13. None of these really major issues has so far been addressed. The only issues addressed so far are the price of the gas and the transit fee to be paid by India to Pakistan. These are the least complex and the least difficult of the issues. The above-mentioned issues are much more complex and difficult. Iran, Pakistan and India have been misleading public opinion by creating an impression that just because an agreement has been reached on the pricing and transit fees, the pipeline is for tomorrow. It is not. There is still a long road ahead.
14. Spins, meant to generate an unwarranted atmosphere of optimism, are not confined to the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline. The spins also cover the proposed oil/gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to Pakistan via Afghanistan. Iran is not involved in this project, which has the total blessing of the US. The idea of this project was originally initiated by the UNOCAL of the US in 1994, when Benazir was the Prime Minister. Since then it has been under discussion. After the Taliban captured power in Kabul in September,1996, UNOCAL lost interest in the project. After 9/11, most Western companies lost interest in the project because of the on-going military operations against Al Qaeda and the Neo Taliban in the area. Only the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which is keenly interested in the project, kept the talks going even though there were no takers from major Western pipeline construction companies.

15. In the case of the Iranian pipeline, there is neither money nor construction offers. In the case of the Turkmenistan pipeline, money is available, but concrete construction offers are not forthcoming due to the security situation. As per the current proposal, the pipeline will pass through Herat and Kandahar in Afghanistan to Multan in Pakistan. While the security situation in Herat is improving, that in Kandahar is as bad as ever. Till Al Qaeda and the Neo Taliban are decisively defeated by the NATO forces, this pipeline is unlikely to take off. In response to an invitation from the sponsors, India has also joined this project and Mr. Deora participated in discussions on this project also during his recent visit to Pakistan. The US was also keen that India should join this project as it could provide an attractive alternative to the Iranian pipeline project. When both the projects are struggling to take off, the question of an attractive alternative does not arise.

16. The "Dawn" wrote on April 19, 2008: "Pakistan had planned to start work on the (Turkmenistan) project in 2007 and complete it by 2011. But the target was missed. The project is now envisaged to be completed by 2018."

17. India had no difficulty in accepting Iran's proposal for a stop-over visit by Mr. Ahmadinejad to New Delhi. In view of the slowing-down of the operalionalisation of the India-US nuclear co-operation deal due to opposition from the Communists, likely US sensitivities on Iran were not an inhibiting factor in the way of inviting him. However, caution dictated a low-profile visit, which would not be too jarring to the US. While Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh hosted a private dinner for the Iranian President, he avoided any public fraternisation with him similar to the fraternisation which one saw in Islamabad and Colombo. However, the Iranian Embassy in New Delhi succeeded in giving to the visit a higher profile than what the Government of India had wanted. Mr. Ahmadinejad fully utilised his press conference, which was not attended by the Indian Prime Minister, to taunt and ridicule the US as a bully and a decaying power.

18. As one saw Mr. Ahmadinejad doing it, one's mind went back to the period before 2003 when another West Asian leader was using similar language against the US. He and his country paid a heavy price for it. His name was Saddam Hussein.

19. As one witnessed the demeanour and heard the anti-US rhetoric of Mr. Ahmadinejad during his diplomatic foray into South Asia, one got the impression that he feels that he no longer has to fear any US intervention in Iran over the issue of its uranium enrichment project. More by coincidence than by design, two reports, which should be worrisome for the Iranian leadership, came from Washington DC before the diplomatic foray of Mr. Ahmadinejad. First, the US decision to send a second aircraft carrier to the Gulf. Second, a briefing for a Congressional Committee by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) on a mysterious bombing of a construction site in Syria in September, 2007, by an unidentified aircaft. The CIA confirmed what was being speculated about since then, namely, that the construction site was destroyed by an Israeli aircraft because it was to be a nuclear reactor being set up by Syria with North Korean assistance.

20. Was it a message to Mr. Ahmadinejad that what Israel did to Iraq by destroying the Osirak nuclear construction site in the early 1980s and to Syria last September, it could do to the uranium enrichment plant at Natanz in Iran. Of course, it won't be that easy. In Iraq and Syria, the Israelis bombed a construction site and not operational nuclear reactors. Natanz is not a project under construction. It is an already constructed and operational set-up located underground. The Iranians feel confident that Israel will not be able to damage or destroy Natanz. Their confidence also derives from the fact that Iran is a much stronger military power than Iraq or Syria and that the US, in their perception, has to depend on Iran for restoring normalcy in Iraq.

21. But the history of Israel shows that when it genuinely fears a threat to it and its people from the potential nuclear capability of an adversary state, it finds a way of neutralising that threat, whatever be the difficulties. Mr. Ahmadinejad's self-confidence may prove to be short-lived.

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)

Copy-Cat Attack on Karzai

2008-05-03T17:02:00.001-07:00

- International Terrorism Monitor---Paper No. 390

By B. Raman

President John F. Kennedy of the US was assassinated on November 22, 1963, at Dallas, Texas, as he was being taken in a tightly-protected motorcade. In view of the strict access control, which might not have allowed access to his car, Lee Harvey Oswald, the assassin, took up position in an unoccupied room on the sixth floor of the Texas Book Repository and fired at Kennedy. The incident highlighted the need for perimeter security, meaning the physical security of buildings in the vicinity of a VIP motorcade or a place of meeting of the VIP to prevent anyone taking shelter in a building and opening fire.

2.On October 6, 1981, the then President Anwar Sadat of Egypt was assassinated during the annual 6th October parade in Cairo marking the eighth anniversary of what the Egyptians view as their victory over Israel in the Yom Kippur war of 1973. As Sadat and his security staff were engrossed watching a spectacular fly-past in the sky, Khalid Islambouli of the Islamic Jihad, who was a member of the military formations participating in the parade, ran towards Sadat and shot him dead. Eleven others were also killed by other terriorists, who indiscriminately opened fire

3. The subsequent investigation brought out that a fatwa ordering the assassination had been issued by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a blind cleric who is presently in jail in the US after having been convicted for his role in the New York World Centre explosion of February 1993. Over 300 members of the Islamic jihad were arrested and prosecuted by the Egyptian authorities. Prominent among them were Dy. Ayman al-Zawahiri, the present No.2 of Al Qaeda, who now operates from the tribal areas of Pakistan, Omar Abdel Rahman and Abd al-Hamid Kishk. Zawahiri and Omar were released by the Egyptian authorities in 1984. Both of them travelled, along with a brother of Islambouli, to Pakistan and offered their services to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in the jihad against the Soviet troops. The ISI recruited them and sent them to Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden joined them subsequently. They were later to constitute the initial hard core of Al Qaeda.

4. Some of the perpetrators of the attack, which killed Sadat, were allegedly members of the Egyptian Army. The investigation brought out that they participated in the parade carrying weapons loaded with live ammunition. The security precaution of a pre-parade inspection of all weapons carried by those participating in a parade to ensure that no weapon was loaded with ammunition was introduced by security agencies of the world thereafter.

5. The modus operandi (MO) used in the attempt to kill President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan during a national day parade at Kabul on April 27, 2008, partly resembles the MO used by Oswald for killing Kennedy and partly the MO used by the Islamic Jihad of Egypt for killing Sadat. The perpetrators decided to strike during the parade held to mark the 16th anniversary of the collapse of the Government of then President Najibullah, which led to the occupation of Kabul by the Mujahideen. During such spectacular parades, the attention of the security staff tends to get diverted by the spectacle, thereby providing the would-be assassin with an opportunity to strike. However, since the access control in the parade ground was apparently tight, the perpetrators took up position in a room of a low-class hotel normally used by migrant labour, which was located about 500 metres from the saluting base, and opened fire with machine guns and grenade launchers.

6. They opened fire at the moment when Mr.Karzai had returned to the base after inspecting the formations, which were to participate in the parade.His personal security guards managed to have him removed safely out of the parade ground without his being hurt. There was an exchange of fire between other security personnel posted in the parade ground and the perpetrators. The security personnel ultimately managed to stop the firing from the building, raid it and make a number of arrests.

7. A self-styled spokesman of the Neo Taliban has claimed responsibility for the terrorist strike and said that a team of six persons participated in the operation of whom three died and the other three managed to escape. A tribal elder on the stage was directly hit and killed by the terrorist fire. A member of parliament, who was injured, succumbed to his injuries later. A 10-year-old child, which was reportedly hit by a bullet fired by the security personnel, also died.

8. While Afghan security sources have projected the incident as an attempt to kill Mr. Karzai, the Neo Taliban has projected it as an operation to demonstrate its capability even in Kabul, despite all the security precautions taken by the Government. The incident has revealed serious deficiencies in route security and perimeter security. The deficiencies in route security enabled six terrorists heavily armed enter the city and reach the hotel without being detected and intercepted anywhere. The deficiencies in perimeter security enabled the perpetrators to take up position in a room of the hotel without being detected and fire from there.

9. Apart from these physical security deficiencies, was there also a complicity by any members of the security forces? That is a question, which should be worrying the Afghan authorities. In Iraq, many successful terrorist strikes have been made possible by internal complicity. In Afghanistan, till now, there have been few instances of such complicity.

10. It has to be stressed that while the Neo Taliban's capability to carry out terrorist strikes in different parts of the country, including Kabul, has remained unimpaired, its capability for large-scale conventional actions involving stand-and-fight battles with large numbers of its men deployed has not been much in evidence this year as compared to 2006-07. The death of Mulla Dadullah, a very competent conventional commander, in a clash in May, 2007, seems to have impaired the Neo Taliban's capability for conventional fighting. It has not yet been able to produce a commander with a similar capability.

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)