I already noted this over at Liberals Against Terrorism, but it's something that I want to expand on now as far as the need for the US to send as much aid as possible to Pakistan right now.
As noted by the Counter-Terrorism Blog, a lot of the Pakistani jihadi groups, many of which are members of bin Laden's terrorist coalition, got hit hard in this quake. The Jamaat ud-Dawaa (JuD), which is the legal name under which the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) operates in Pakistan, appears to have been hit exceedingly hard and lost most of its assets in and around the epicenter of the quake. According to Indian Army General JJ Singh and al-Sharq al-Awsat, the LeT and its allies all suffered heavy casualties, effectively neutralizing most of the terrorist training camps in Azad Kashmir and parts of the Northwest Frontier Province that had long been considered unreachable by US and Indian intelligence agencies.
This loss, however, is only going to be a temporary one, at least on the part of the LeT and I suspect several of the other Pakistani terrorist groups as well. The LeT, however, is the one I'm most worried about because it's now the de facto trainer for al-Qaeda operatives, including likely several of the 7/7 London bombers. Moreover, they also act as a secret police for al-Qaeda inside Pakistan. When al-Qaeda operations chief Abu Zubaydah was captured, he was staying at an LeT safehouse.
Like many other terrorist groups, the LeT maintains a social services wing inside of Pakistan that I described in the following manner in the threat dossier on the group that I wrote up on the group for the Manhattan Institute:
... It would seem not altogether inaccurate to compare the role played by MDI [Markaz ud-Dawa wal Irshad, a Wahhabi organization founded in 1987 by Zafar Iqbal and bin Laden's mentor Abdullah Azzam] within the LET as being not altogether dissimilar to that assumed by the political and social services branches of Hezbollah. Both organizations maintain elaborate political and social services infrastructures designed to provide both extremist ideological direction and social welfare services in environments of poor or non-existent government control in order to build up and maintain popular support. The influence of MDI in framing Pakistani perceptions of the LET cannot be ruled out. According to a recent article in Jang concerning the MDI’s Taiba hospital in Azad Kashmir, “According to official sources of the Markaz, around 9,000 outdoor patients visit this hospital every month to get free of cost or very inexpensive medical support. In spite of being a charity, it is considered to be the best private hospital in Azad Kashmir … The doctors are not supposed to offer treatment just for bodily ills; they also offer dawat to all their patients. They ask their Muslim patients to become better Muslims and non-Muslim patients to convert to Islam.” As long as the MDI is able to provide medical support at this scale within the context of Pakistan’s vapid health care infrastructure, support for the organization should not be expected to ebb in the near future.
While the earthquake may well have hit the group hard, it has more than sufficient resources and financial network to recoup these losses and solicit the necessary cash from its external support network, which is far larger and more successful than any of the other Pakistani jihadi groups because the LeT and its parent organizations are Wahabbi rather than Deobandi in outlook and hence are better able to solicit donations from the Gulf states.
As I noted in the same threat dossier cited above:
Through the framework of the MDI, the LET is able maintain ties to a vast array of Islamist NGOs, political parties, and guerrilla groups spanning from Western Europe to the Philippines, enabling it to draw on a wide variety of Pan-Islamist support prior to September 11, 2001. In addition, the LET’s ties to the Indian mafia don Dawood Ibrahim combined with its Salafist rather than Deobandi orientation have given the group the necessary contacts to establish itself in the Middle East as well as to recruit growing numbers of Indian Muslims into its ranks.The establishment of the LET’s Gulf network appears to date back to the late 1990s, when LET activists began distributing copies of the group’s journal Majallah al-Dawa among Indian Muslim expatriates living in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the UAE. These efforts appear to have been stepped up considerably following the 2002 anti-Muslim pogroms in Gujarat that radicalized many Indian Muslims living abroad.
... In contrast to other terrorist groups, the LET relies primarily on legitimate donations funnelled through MDI in order to finance its jihad. Hafiz Mohammed Saeed routinely travels to major Pakistani cities, exhorting huge crowds to join or contribute to the jihad and it is believed that tens of thousands in US dollars are raised for the group in this fashion. While Saeed rails against India and the United States, JUD activists armed with clubs hold up banners calling for contributions to jihad and set up collection boxes to support the jihad in Kashmir or the families of dead LET fighters. While the Pakistani government claims that these contributions are for legitimate social welfare purposes, it is generally accepted that a majority of the money raised is used to support the LET’s militant activities. It is also believed that a number of wealthy Pakistani and Kashmiri businessmen help to finance the group’s activities through donations separate to those raised during the group’s fundraising rallies.
Outside of Pakistan, the LET receives money from the Pakistani diaspora in the United Kingdom and other Western countries. The group is also believed to receive considerable support from an intricate network of wealthy Gulf donors and Islamist NGOs, very possibly the same “Golden Chain” network that is believed to support Al Qaeda. If the LET does not rely on the Golden Chain to finance its activities, it almost certainly relies on a similarly-modeled financial network.
So basically I think that the LeT has more than the financial endurance necessary to weather whatever hard assets they lost during the storm and provide support and relief services to God knows how many Pakistanis lost their home during this latest event. That is going to take some time for them to mobilize, however, which is one of the reasons why I'm more than confident that the US can beat them off at the pass on this one if we act quickly and decisively. This also fits into Dr. Gunaratna's recommendation of creating a parallel NGO and aid network in Muslim countries to serve as a challenge to Wahhabi charities like the LeT's parent MDI organization.
There are also broader issues of national interest here that need to be taken into consideration here. Riding on the wave of popular anti-Americanism that swept across much of the Muslim world during the run-up and aftermath of the US invasion of Iraq, the LeT claims that it recruited as many as 3,350 new members from January to June 2003. Even if these totals are inflated (and it certainly wouldn't be the first time), I think it's entirely fair to say that allowing several thousand people to become dependent on LeT social services for the immediate future does not serve US national interest. Moreover, Pakistanis assisted by the US will in all probability be far more likely to assist us at tracking down al-Qaeda and their allies.
Finally, if the heavy casualties suffered by the LeT and other Pakistani jihadi groups live up to hype, this would be an exceedingly good time for the US to press Pakistan on the dual issues of a permanent settlement over Kashmir or at least dissuading them from allowing the wounded groups to rebuild their destroying training infrastructure.
B. Raman on al Qaeda and the quake.
The US has already drawn a roadmap for permanent settlement on the waxed issue of Kashmir. India and Pakistan both seem to be agreed to accept the line of control (LoC) between the two parts of Kashmir as international border. However, the problem with the leaders in power in both the countries remain that how to convey this message to their citizens who have been constantly fed by the successive governments in Pakistan that 'it has to liberate the part of Kashmir under occupation of India' and in India that 'Kashmir is an integral part of India' and no withdrawal from the reported stand by both the sides. Though in desperate need for assistance for earthquake victims, Pakistan has turned down the offer of India to extend rescue work in those areas in the part of Kashmir, under occupation of Pakistan, not easily assessable to the Pakistani authorities in this hour of crisis. What good can one expect in the wake of this stubburn attitude of the Pakistan's authorities?
so one may call this damned quake as a good one! ;-)
See http://TheFuturum.com - you can send message to eternity there.
The earthquake will result in lots of broken families and lots of orphaned children. These people will be vulnerable. Without any other viable alternative, and Jihadi groups can easily lure them into their folds by their Islamic brotherhood rhetoric. With the mountains shaking, some old terrorist routes would have closed and some new ones would have opened, atleast towards Indian Kashmir. Effort and lives will have to go to identify and seal them. Lots of money is pouring in (atleast pledged) through organised and unorganised routes, not just from west but also from muslim countries. It would be a good opportunity to try to identify such routes which were hidden until some time back because of big numbers flowing fast. But it's unlikely that this money will not be used to reinvigorate the jihadis.
As a result of this quake, future jihadi terrorist camps will become more mobile and makeshift in the earth quake prone areas. Even if someone bombs them, it will come up again soon. This experience will flow from one islamic jihad area to another.
The Jihadis may have temporarily got a hit, but I don't think its going to affect a lot of their plans. Until Pakistan keeps supporting them and world keeps winking, it looks unlikely.
Now that I think about it, at a minimum this thing is going to weaken Musharraf and strengthen the MMA.
"the need for the US to send as much aid as possible to Pakistan right now."
I couldn't agree more. This is an opportunity to use US soft power to change the perceptual landscape of the muslem world as good as the Tsunami was. It's a chance to wage a hearts and minds offensive right in Bin Laden's very backyard. We shouldn't waste it.
Seth,
Pakistan has much largely survived on US and international aid itself. The Pakistani prime minister has prioritised aid and the first prioroty is money, tents and food come later (http://dawn.com/2005/10/12/top4.htm). You can well imagine what the majority of the money will go towards.
US perception hasn't changed much even after all the tsunami aid. Jihadis will always find a reason. Aid is not totally the answer, rebuilding schools (with modern education system) might be.
Its a terrible tragedy and we should help all we can. That being said, i couldnt help but gape when I saw a headline the day after the earthquake in the Guardian saying something along the lines of "West not reacting fast enough". Ok, its one thing to expect instant relief to New Orleans, unrealistic as it may be, but to expect that somehow the US and UK just have resources poised on the balls of their feet waiting in case a massive natural disaster strikes the center of Asia is insane.
There is apparently an article in an Iraqi paper claiming Bin Laden himself was killed in the earthquake. Unfortunately I cant read Arabic. It is referenced by Iraqpundit at:
http://iraqpundit.blogspot.com/
Sources? Truth? Who knows.
While there seems to be a lot of info about the hit suffered by the MUD/LET.
Let us not forget that there are at least a dozen other groups who may very well have escaped unscathed.
Any reliable info on them?
"US perception hasn't changed much even after all the tsunami aid."
Eh, Pew says it's had an effect:
"Positive opinions of the U.S. in Indonesia, which had plummeted to as low as 15% in 2003, also have rebounded to 38%. The U.S. tsunami aid effort has been widely hailed there; 79% of Indonesians say they have a more favorable view of the U.S. as a result of the relief efforts."
I agree nothing will change Jihadi minds, but if you change the minds of the mainstream muslem, the Jihadi view is marginalised. I agree just thowing money at Musharif is inefficient. What helps is when an American chopper crew brings people's children out of danger and saves their lives. It's the helocopters and other direct assistance I'm talking about.
While no one should stint to aid as much as possible, so much destruction has occurred, only a small dint will be made by all of it. And those who are not aided will see the failure to aid them as, at best, indifference.
If they are not destroyed, the surviving terrorists will hardly fail to maintain their gods have prevailed ... they live, while the U.S. has been and is being laid waste. (Katrina Relief efforts are presently being converted to NE US Relief efforts as that area sinks under the waters.)