The one defining feature about the operation that led President Barack Obama to triumphantly declare “we got him” is the uncertainty surrounding if — and how much at all — Pakistan was onboard in nailing Osama bin Laden.
Given the rather secretive nature of not just the operation itself but also ties that bind the American and Pakistani intelligence agencies, it is going to take an equally sensational effort to get the truth out on this one.
For now, what we see is not necessarily what we get. What we know for sure are only statements to go by, which according to CIA Chief Leon Panetta and counterterrorism chief John Brennan clearly say the mission impossible was carried out solely by the US Navy SEALS and special forces to the exclusion of the Pakistanis.
Accounts have, in fact, suggested the Americans jammed all radar communications at Pakistan’s end before successfully completing their mission. That would obviously reflect a strong trust deficit with Pakistanis.
President Asif Zardari also went along with the same view: that it was an American enterprise about which his country had no knowledge.
“Although the events of Sunday were not a joint operation, a decade of cooperation and partnership between the United States and Pakistan led up to the elimination of Osama bin Laden as a continuing threat to the civilised world. And we in Pakistan take some satisfaction that our early assistance in identifying an Al-Qaeda courier ultimately led to this day,” the president wrote in a hurriedly written Washington Post op-ed piece a day after the Al-Qaeda chief was taken out.
Zardari admitted that while the world’s most wanted “was not anywhere we had anticipated he would be”, Pakistan “did its part” leading one reader to suggest sarcastically, that it was done by “staying away and doing nothing.”
The Foreign Office in Islamabad also issued a detailed response denying that Pakistan had advance knowledge of the operation and even took issue with how the US forces had entered its airspace and undertaken the mission without authorisation.
As well as taking the Pakistani civilian leadership by surprise, what the abode and killing of Osama bin Laden has done is to bring into sharp focus the role of Pakistan’s powerful security establishment.
Open-ended questions have been asked of how and what was the intelligence — premier of which is the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) — up to while the world’s most wanted fugitive lived right under the nose of Pakistan Military Academy Kakul in Abbottabad.
With ISI, it is of course, never an easy explanation. The BBC found an unnamed official from the agency expressing embarrassment about the episode.
Saying that the ISI had raided the place in 2003 but that the compound where Osama was holed up was not on their radar lately, he was quoted as saying, “We’re good, but not God”.
A gem of a quote to look good on a TV screen or in fine print perhaps, but not necessarily with any meat or bones given the hideout where Osama was lodged — for months, if not five years or so as is being suggested by the US — killed and taken away without so much as a whiff.
Even as ordinary Pakistanis and the world at large are at proverbial sixes and sevens as to how neither the Pakistani security establishment appeared to know about Al Qaeda chief’s Abbottabad lodging nor was onboard with regards the operation to get Osama, it is imperative to keep in mind that not all information trotted out in public holds true for strategic reasons.
A Pakistani military official in a background briefing said US Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen called up Army Chief General Ashfaq Kayani at 5am (PST) to say they had got Bin Laden.
Kayani reportedly congratulated him on the success before asking Mullen to announce it as soon as possible to avert confusion conspiracy theories. He also asked for Pakistan to be acknowledged by President Obama for its role in leading the trail to the world’s most wanted man.
Earlier President Obama was supposed to speak a few hours later, probably morning in the US but as a result of the chat between Kayani and Mullen, President Obama’s speech was first decided for 7.30am and finally, delivered at 8.30am Pakistan time. And it was this speech in which Obama mentioned Pakistan’s role in leading the hunt to Bin Laden.
According to my information — pretty reliable — against popular fiction, the Pakistani forces did detect US war jets but chose not to react after they were warned of dire consequences. It was a strategic decision to avert the worst possible fallout removed from any notions of sovereignty.
However, there’s a lot of explaining to do regarding Osama’s hideout. In the days and weeks ahead, Pakistan will find the kitchen heat rising and few avenues to get out.
The writer is a newspaper editor based in Islamabad. He can be reached at [email protected]
