Pakistan's Fifth Column

By Daveed Gartenstein-Ross

I published an op-ed in Canada's National Post yesterday examining the problem of religious militancy in Pakistan's military and intelligence services. An excerpt:

Pakistan has engaged in a two-month offensive against Islamic militants in the country's Swat region, a campaign that began when the Taliban captured a district just 60 miles from Islamabad, the nation's capital. As the campaign winds down, and local residents begin to return, significant questions remain about future counterinsurgency operations. For example, while Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has asked Washington for his own armed Predator drones for use against the Taliban, regional newspaper Dawn reports that U. S. intelligence officers oppose this move -- in part because several years ago "American officials gave Pakistan advance word of planned Predator attacks, but stopped the practice after the information was leaked to militants."

This relatively minor disagreement highlights an issue that cuts to the heart of many of the challenges Pakistan faces: support for religious militancy within the country's military and Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI).

At its founding, Pakistan's military was shaped by the country's colonial experience. Scholar Shuja Nawaz, whose instalment in this op-ed series appeared earlier this week, notes that Pakistan's army began with an elitist orientation, filled at the upper echelons with British officers who "were in turn succeeded by their native clones, men who saw the army as a unique institution, separate and apart from the rest of civil society and authority."

In the 1970s, two major changes had a lasting impact. First, prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto broadened the ISI by creating an internal wing. He wanted to bolster his own power, and had the ISI spy on friend and foe alike. Ironically, the wing Bhutto created would play a role in the coup that toppled him in 1977.

The second change was brought by the man who came to power in that coup, General Muhammad Zia ul-Haq. Zia's religious zeal translated into overtly Muslim public policy positions and imposition of Islamic norms. Zia devoted particular attention to the military, where officers were required to read S. K. Malik's The Quranic Concept of War, and a Directorate of Religious Instruction oversaw their Islamic education. Religious criteria were incorporated into promotion requirements, and Zia mandated formal obedience to Islamic rules within the military.

Click here for the full piece. For more on this subject, see an extended article that I wrote earlier this year for the Journal of International Security Affairs.