The Staggers

The New Statesman’s rolling politics blog

All eyes on Pakistan

Almost no one believes that the ISI could not have known of Bin Laden’s whereabouts.

By George Eaton Published 02 May 2011 13:14

Now that Bin Laden has gone to a watery grave, attention is focused on the role of Pakistan. Almost no one believes that he could have rented a mansion in Abbottabad, within a mile of "Pakistan's Sandhurst", without the knowledge of the Pakistani secret service (the notorious ISI).

Ming Campbell and Rory Stewart are among the British politicians who have argued that it is not credible for Pakistan to claim it did know where Bin Laden was hiding.

Elsewhere, Amrullah Saleh, the former head of Afghanistan's national security directorate, has declared: "Does Pakistan want the whole world to believe that the intelligence agency of a nuclear state did not know OBL was there?"

In an apparent attempt to deter suspicion, the ISI claimed joint responsibility for the operation but, as Barack Obama said in his statement, it was carried out by a "small team of Americans". He did, however, state that "our counterterrorism co-operation with Pakistan helped lead us to Bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding".

But, during a White House press briefing on the raid, a senior administration official pointedly noted that "we shared our intelligence on this Bin Laden compound with no other country, including Pakistan". He added: "That was for one reason and one reason alone: we believed it was essential to the security of the operation and our personnel. In fact, only a very small group of people inside our own government knew of this operation in advance."

In other words, the US simply did not trust Pakistan with the information.

UPDATE: Abdullah Abdullah, Afghanistan's main opposition leader, tells the Guardian: "It is very worrying that after ten years this man could only be captured in an operation that was kept secret from the Pakistani intelligence service. Just a few weeks ago, the Pakistanis were insisting that the US military and intelligence operations should be stopped in Pakistan and their agents should leave the country."

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Tags: Osama Bin Laden Pakistan

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17 comments

Mon, 2011-05-02 19:42 — anto (not verified)

Pakistan deserves to die and all the US has to really do is open lots of McDonalds all over the damned country, and watch them get obese and die very slowly.

Mon, 2011-05-02 19:44 — youngmonk (not verified)

haha Pakistan is a rogue country and deserves the slow death!!!

Mon, 2011-05-02 20:29 — Fat Yank (not verified)

Yeah, Pakistan deserves to die, yeah! slow death, yeah! the world is a safer place, yeah!

Mon, 2011-05-02 20:49 — Barny

Unsurprisingly there is wonder at the proximity of the compound to Pakistani military/secret service establishments but I've not seen anywhere how long ObL is thought to have been at that compound. If it is only a short time, then perhaps this is less of an issue. Can anyone provide a link to this info?

Mon, 2011-05-02 21:27 — Barny

@ Liza - I was sceptical from the url that this wasn't a link to answer my question and indeed it wasn't.

Anyone else?

Mon, 2011-05-02 23:51 — cederik (not verified)

Pakistan provided a sanctuary to OBL. Bomb Pakistan

Tue, 2011-05-03 02:45 — ash (not verified)

it seems the us goal to destabilise pakistan has worked! and now just waiting for them to to invade and take control of pakistans nuclear detterent, what a sad day that will be for pakistan, leaders of that country contstanly with a for sale sign on them

Tue, 2011-05-03 07:16 — Luddite (not verified)

Pakistan is the epicentre of Islamic terrorism. Pakistan gave aid and protection to Bin Laden. All the bombers of 7/7 were of Pakistani origin.

Tue, 2011-05-03 08:25 — Little Hans (not verified)

Commentators like "anto", "young monk" & "fat yank" have fallen for the spin and lies just as the spin doctors from cointel wanted. Turn that latent aggression against Pakistan, swallow the BS story about Osama being killed (Yay - an American victory considering just how poorly they are doing in Iraq and Afgahnistan!), but as a previous commentator noted - even Fox news claimed - bin Laden died (peacefully) in December 2001 & has never been linked to 911 (never featured as an FBI most wanted!). This is definitely a political game that Obama is playing: the conquering war hero prez, accomplishing what dubya couldn't even at the height of the neocon's war of terror.

America is the rogue state ... nuclear powered, egoist and jingoistic, considers itself the world police man and is increasingly presided over by fundamentalist crazies.

C'mon NS readers - you surely cannot buy this cointel nonsense. Wake up & smell the horse shit that permeates this whole story.

Tue, 2011-05-03 09:06 — amrita pai (not verified)

yay mcDeath for pakistan! make it a double, with extra cheese.

Tue, 2011-05-03 11:25 — Thomas (not verified)

Yankee jingoism at its best: cheering someone else's death in that sickening patriotic way, even though the whole death thing is a scam ... typical yanks swallow the whole thing, hook line and sinker. Even Bush is giving Obama "respect" - that should surely be your clue right there that this is one major scam.

Oh well - at least it keeps the over-fed, over-consuming jingoistic yankees a wet dream of being in control.

Sun, 2011-05-15 03:55 — Jobo (not verified)

Fools it's pretty obvious that this was a joint operation between the US and Pak with the Paks giving up their "trump card" OBL. They even staged a ridiculous air-vehicle chase just for the public FFS lol. Read between the lines ppl.

Mon, 2011-05-02 14:27 — Mr. Divine (not verified)

Pakistani's Sandhurst? Not an intelligency agency. Like an army thing. If you stay indoors it'll be difficult know if you were around.

I'm surprised at how well the Seals did. I'm think they must have been watching for some time, waiting for the best moment. I'm sure there would be escape routes for Osama but he must have been hit while out for his stroll.

Mon, 2011-05-02 14:54 — swatantra

Security Forces the world over have their own Agenda; even here we're not quite sure what MI5 or MI6 are really up to.
Its likely that the Govt of Pakistan didn't know but certain sections of the Army did know of his true whereabouts.
Sometimes it really does need a new CEO at the top to cull the heads of Chief Intelligence Personnel, and bring new trusted people in That may be what Obama did 2 years ago.
But Pakistan has been blackmiailing the World since its independence, and playing a double game. Its time it was stopped and this failed State forced into reform in its institutions and religion.
Its better Bin Laden was taken dead. Taken alive he could have become a martyr; and better his remains lie in the depths of the ocean and the Gates of Hades.

Mon, 2011-05-02 15:54 — Frederick (not verified)

They were protecting him, any child of 4 knows that!!! Pakistan is an illegal, racist, apartheid state that has NO RIGHT TO EXIST

Mon, 2011-05-02 16:38 — Gimmeabreak (not verified)

This is Obama playing a political card. OBL has been dead since late 2001, shortly after being visited by a CIA rep in hospital where he was receiving dialysis for his kidney disease.

Here are some links: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1212851/Has-Osama-Bin-Laden-dead...

http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/osama_dead.php

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,41576,00.html

Google for the remainder.

This is a political ploy on Obama's part and comes at a spectacularly convenient moment in the run up to elections. Unlike Bush jnr who used terror threats to secure political points, Obama has used OBL's alleged death. Interesting how the only photo of the OBL corpse turns out to be photoshopped ... just like all of the other post-2001 OBL fakes that have been dredged up whenever politically expedient to do so: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/02/osama-bin-laden-photo-fake