Daily Pakistan Feb 14 2009

The Great Game revisited

by Charles Ferndale, Arab News.

The Israeli Army — which, despite Israel’s veneer of democracy, actually runs that country — has for some decades now pursued certain policies of direct relevance to Muslim countries in its vicinity. Amongst these countries are Iraq, Iran and Pakistan. First and foremost amongst these Israeli policies is the determination of that army to remain the pre-eminent military power in the region. And in order to retain its military hegemony, the Israeli Army must necessarily prevent any Muslim country the region from obtaining effective nuclear weapons. And if, like Pakistan, such a country already has nuclear weapons, then the Israelis believe it is essential to disable that country to the point where it ceases to operate as a nation militarily. Once we have understood the centrality of this policy to the Israeli Army, then much of what has happened, and is happening, in the region falls into place.

For example, Iraq was developing a nuclear bomb. Israel destroyed the facility where Iraq’s bomb was reputedly being developed. But Iraq still remained a militarily powerful nation that might be a threat to Israel, and it was too powerful for Israel to defeat alone, so Bush and Cheney obliged the Israelis by invading Iraq on false pretexts. The result was the decimation of the Iraqi Army, the division of the country into three areas so it ceased to operate militarily as a nation, and the control of Iraqi oil by companies amenable to US interests. Job done.

The persistent threats to Iran issuing from the White House under Bush were designed to generate a political climate at home that would allow the US to bombIran’s nuclear facilities, so as to disable its supposed nuclear weapons program. If Iran had a bomb, it would be of little danger to anyone, because, were Iran to use such a bomb against Israel, as Hillary Clinton said, America would “obliterate” Iran. On the other hand, were Iran to use a nuclear weapon defensively against an Israeli attack, then America would have to respond with more care. So the only result of Iran possessing a nuclear weapon would be to curtail Israel’s power to bully countries in the region. 

 

It follows that any American attack on a supposed nuclear weapons program in Iran could only be designed to maintain Israel’s military pre-eminence in the region. An American attack on Iran’s nuclear program could only have been on behalf of Israel. A clear case of Israel controlling US foreign policy on its own behalf. IfIran is building a bomb, the main reason would be to defend itself against Israel. So the best way to put an end to the supposed Iranian nuclear weapons program would be (i) to disarm the nuclear threat from Israel, and (ii) for NATO militarily to guarantee Iran against attack from its neighbors, especially from Israel. Why has the West not pursued this effective policy that would also reduce the number of nuclear weapons in the world? If India were disarmed and Pakistan were guaranteed military protection against Indian attack, why would Pakistan need nuclear weapons? When perfectly rational policies are ignored in favor of dangerously ineffective ones, something fishy is usually up. The Kashmir dispute also falls into this category.

 

Why are NATO forces in Afghanistan killing Afghans? Surely not for the good of the Afghans. As for democracy, the overwhelming wish of the people is for NATO forces to leave immediately. This is the principal reason for the Afghan national revolt that people in the West call Islamic militancy. The NATO forces are there for two reasons: One, for the oil and gas reserves around the Caspian Sea, which, at the very least, the NATO countries would like to deny to Russia andChina; and, two, to destabilize and weaken Pakistan on behalf of Israel. That India would also like Pakistan to be weakened is just an added bonus ensuring India’s participation in the skullduggery, partly by means of a close covert alliance with Israel.

 

In order to maintain its military dominance in the region, Israel has for years set about destabilizing any Muslim country that poses a threat to its dominance.Pakistan is the only Muslim country with nuclear weapons and Israel is within range. So Pakistan must be weakened to the point at which it ceases to operate militarily as a nation. Pakistan is supposed to be the West’s foremost ally in the fight against Islamic militancy, so Israel cannot attack Pakistan directly, and, ifIsrael did, she would certainly be defeated. So what to do? Well, two strategies come to mind: One, use America to attack Pakistan for you; and two, train and send into the border regions of Pakistan gangs of thugs willing to commit atrocities that will then be blamed on “barbaric Muslim militants”, suggesting that Pakistan has lost control of its territory to dangerous extremists and so may lose control of its nuclear weapons. Is there any evidence that these policies are being pursued by Israel in Pakistan? Yes, though regrettably my sources must remain anonymous. Perhaps the best-informed person in Afghanistan has said that he knows for sure that the Israelis are training teams in Badakhshan and are sending them into Pakistan’s border regions to commit atrocities. Two British friends who have covered Afghan wars since 1980, tell me the same thing. Rumors of Israeli-trained provocateurs amongst the tribesmen in the Khyber Agency and in Swat are rife. Then there is, of course, the completely public evidence of the daily US infringements of Pakistani sovereign airspace by drones. These drone attacks always kill many more innocents than so-called insurgents. The traditional authority of the tribal elders is weakened because they cannot protect their people, thus further destabilizing the region and allowing the infiltrators easier access. In addition, they weaken the authority of the Pakistan government and of the army, both of which are made to look as if they condone the attacks, which surely is one of the main purposes of the attacks. Perhaps Asif Ali Zardari’s government and the army do condone the attacks, but if so, they do so against the interests of a group of people — the Pashtuns — who already feel alienated from central government. Thus Pakistani unity is further eroded, much to the satisfaction of the Israelis.

 

That the destabilization of Pakistan has been on the minds of US officials for some time is suggested quite strongly by an article in the Guardian of Aug. 27, 2008. The article entitled “Take this war into Pakistan” was written by the Afghan ambassador to Norway, Jawed Ludin. I assume that Ludin was speaking as Afghan ambassador to Norway and so had the approval for what he said from his government. I am assuming also that since the Afghan government is simply the instrument of the US, the US authorities knew in advance of the contents of the article. Maybe they were testing the water. In this article Ludin says: “Without having to invade Pakistani territory, (a) coalition (of US, Afghan and Pakistani military forces) should establish a viable presence by opening military bases on Pakistani soil. A supreme commander, with deputies from Afghanistan and Pakistan, should be appointed to devise and implement an effective counterterrorism strategy on both sides of the Durand Line... The coalition should also ensure the security of Pakistan’s dangerous nuclear arsenal.”

 

Earlier in the article the author says, “the US must recognize the utter futility of working with the Pakistani military” which he suggests is untrustworthy and unfit to protect Pakistan’s interests. This implication is rather odd given that later he says that the “coalition of the willing”, that must set up bases in Pakistan to run an efficient counterterrorism offensive, should include the Pakistan military (I take it in only a junior capacity). So here we have a proposed force led by a “supreme commander” of unnamed nationality that will lead Afghan and Pakistani soldiers (the Pakistani leadership having been sidelined) on Pakistani soil (which somehow they have entered without invasion) to take control of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and to beat all the terrorists, by means undescribed.

 

Frankly, so bizarre a scheme is too stupid even for Indian and American intelligence officials stationed far from the action. But, if not, then its drift is obvious: The Pakistani military command should be fragmented, disabled, sidelined and the country’s nuclear “arsenal” should come under responsible control (like that of the Afghans, I suppose). Pakistan should be deprived of central military national command.

 

Events in Waziristan, in the Khyber Agency and in Swat Valley all suggest that the central authorities of Pakistan have indeed relinquished control of these border areas. Balochistan is also in a state of turmoil that makes it impossible for the central authority of the Pakistan government and army to govern there. Much of this is the result of 60 years of gross incompetence and nepotism in the central government and in the army, but it has created an environment easily exploited by Pakistan’s enemies. The Baloch tribes on the Iran side of the border are also being financed by outside agencies, so their insurgency will weaken the central control of the Iranian government.

 

In short, Israel’s foreign policy in the region, has, with the aid of the US, become a very successful one. The only thing I fail to understand is why the people of these countries let it happen. Especially the militants: They are supposed to be true Muslims, yet they really seem to relish doing their enemies’ dirty work. I suppose when you are very poor, money can buy just about anything. And when you are ignorant, you are easily fooled.

— Charles Ferndale has degrees from the Royal College of Art, Oxford University, and the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. He divides his time between the UK and Pakistan. E-mail: charlesferndale@yahoo.co.uk

 

What a great nation and what a great leader we have!!

Stay tuned for Gilani's and Zardari's daily announcement that Pakistan is a sovereign country and no foreign troops will be allowed to operate in Pakistan.

In a shocking discovery reports have emerged from simply Google Earth images evidence of three drones parked on an airfield in some remote destination within Baluchistan, the images were captured by orbiting satellites and archived within Google Earth data warehouse to suddenly be discovered recently. Though there is no denying that during the Musharraf regime bases were rented out to the American army costing them a massive deficit to the tune of $10 Billion. But what probably irks the nation is that the Pakistani government have categorically denied that the Pakistani bases are being used to launch drones-
























The picture of the drones on the Pakistani soil, taken in 2006, has three drones, all Global Hawks. The picture has coordinates and they can be vaguely read as 27 degrees, 51 minutes North; 65 degrees, 10 minutes East. These coordinates place the strip not far from the nearby Jacobabad airbase which is around 28 degrees north, 68 degrees east.


One can easily verify the authenticity of the picture taken in 2006 with the 2009 image found online on Google Maps by merely inserting the above coordinates [or follow this LINK] in satellite modeThe Times Online also carried the report
The CIA is secretly using an airbase in southern Pakistan to launch the Predator drones that observe and attack al-Qaeda and Taleban militants on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan, a Times investigation has found. The Pakistani and US governments have repeatedly denied that Washington is running military operations, covert or otherwise, on Pakistani territory — a hugely sensitive issue in the predominantly Muslim country.The Pakistani Government has also repeatedly demanded that the US halt drone attacks on northern tribal areas that it says have caused hundreds of civilian casualties and fuelled anti-American sentiment. But The Times has discovered that the CIA has been using the Shamsi airfield — originally built by Arab sheikhs for falconry expeditions in the southwestern province of Baluchistan — for at least a year. The strip, which is about 30 miles from the Afghan border, allows US forces to launch a Drone within minutes of receiving actionable intelligence as well as allowing them to attack targets further afield But it all started a few days earlier when Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee commented on 13th of February that unmanned CIA Predator aircraft operating in Pakistan are flown from an air base in Pakistan. The disclosure also marked the first time a U.S. official had publicly commented on where the Predator aircraft patrolling Pakistan take off and land.

The CIA declined to comment, but former U.S. intelligence officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information, confirmed that Feinstein's account was accurate.While Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University, said Feinstein's comments put Pakistan's government on the spot.

If accurate, what this says is that Pakistani involvement, or at least acquiescence, has been much more extensive than has previously been known," he said. "It puts the Pakistani government in a far more difficult position [in terms of] its credibility with its own people. Unfortunately it also has the potential to threaten Pakistani-American relations.


But now the cat is out of the bag. So that is once more proved that how much regard American and our own government has for the people who reside in Pakistan. Their lives are of no value and our own government is involved in the killings. What a shame and what a sorry state of affairs. Another lie of our president has been caught and nobody knows how many more are on the way.

For now the Government of Pakistan has a lot of explaining to do and just mere diversion tactics towards Musharraf might alone not help their case.

The Long Retreat

by Patrick J. Buchanan

"The situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating," said President Obama, as he announced deployment of 17,000 more U.S. troops. "I'm absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region, solely through military means." "(T)here is no military solution in Afghanistan," says Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. Said U.S. Commander Gen. David McKiernan yesterday, U.S. and NATO forces are "stalemated." Such admissions by our military and political leadership in a time of war call to mind other words heard back in 1951, when Gen. Douglas MacArthur delivered his farewell address to the Congress: "(O)nce war is forced upon us," said MacArthur, "there is no other alternative than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end. War's very object is victory, not prolonged indecision. "In war, there is no substitute for victory." But if victory over the Taliban has been ruled out by the United States, have the Taliban ruled out a victory over the American Empire to rival the one their fathers won over the Soviet Empire? What price are we prepared to pay, in "prolonged indecision," to avert such an end to a war now in its eighth year? America had best brace herself for difficult days ahead. For stepping back from the dreary prognosis for Afghanistan, a new reality becomes clear. The long retreat has begun. Whether it is in the 23 months Gen. Petraeus favors, or the 16 months Obama promised, the United States is coming home from Iraq. The retreat from Central Asia is already underway. Expelled from the K-2 air base in Uzbekistan in 2005, the United States has now been ordered out of the Manas air base in Kyrgyzstan. Abkhazia and South Ossetia, ripped away from Georgia by Russia last August, are never going to be returned. And we all know it. Georgia and Ukraine, most realists now realize, are not going to be admitted to NATO. We're not going to fight Russia over the Crimea. And the U.S. anti-missile missiles and radars George Bushintended to deploy in Poland and the Czech Republic will not now be deployed. For Washington has fish to fry with Russia, and the price of her cooperation is withdrawal of U.S. military forces from her backyard and front porch. And the warm words flowing between Moscowand Washington suggest the deal is done. With tensions rising in Korea, too, it is hard to believe President Obama will bolster ground forces on the peninsula, when even Donald Rumsfeld was presiding over a drawdown and a shifting of U.S. troops away from the DMZ. In Latin America, the United States seems reconciled to the rise of an anti-American radical-socialist coalition, led by Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and embracing Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Cuba. Partisans of President Bush may blame Obama for presiding over a strategic retreat, but it is the Bush administration that assured and accelerated such a retreat. As Robert Pape of the University of Chicago writes in The National Interest: "America is in unprecedented decline. The self-inflicted wounds of the Iraq war, growing government debt, increasingly negative current-account balances and other internal economic weaknesses have cost the United States real power in today's world of rapidly spreading knowledge and technology. If present trends continue, we will look back at the Bush administration years as the death knell of American hegemony." Pape's harsh verdict is rooted in his reading of history, that the "size of an economy relative to potential rivals ultimately determines the limits of power in international politics." In other words, when a great nation's share of world product shrinks, the nation's strategic position follows. Between 2000 and 2008, the U.S. share of world product plunged from 31 percent to 23 percent, and is expected to fall to 21 percent by 2013 -- a decline of 32 percent in 13 years. China's share of world product over the same period will more than double to 9 percent. Pape went back to the 19th century to correlate the rise of the great powers like Britain and the commensurate growth in their share of world product. He found the Bush decline had no precedent. "America's relative decline since 2000 of some 30 percent represents a far greater loss of relative power in a shorter time than any power shift among European great powers roughly from the end of the Napoleonic Wars to World War II. It is one of the largest relative declines in modern history. Indeed, in size, it is clearly surpassed by only one other great-power decline, the unprecedented internal collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991." With an economy still three times that of China, America continues to be the world's most powerful nation, fully capable of defending all of its vital interests. We can no longer, however, defend every ally to whom we made a commitment over the six decades since NATO was formed. Obama's assignment: Rebuild U.S. productive power, and execute a strategic withdrawal from non-vital commitments. COPYRIGHT CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

Patrick J. Buchanan was twice a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination and the Reform Party’s candidate in 2000. He is also a founder and editor of the new magazine, The American Conservative. Now a commentator and columnist, he served three presidents in the White House, was a founding panelist of three national television shows, and is the author of seven books. 

Mary Robinson, panel chair Arthur Chaskalson and Hina Jilani at the launch of the report (Keystone)

A panel of eminent judges and lawyers has called on the international community to repeal abusive laws and policies enacted in the global counter-terrorism campaign.

In a report based on three years of investigation, the eight-member panel, established by the Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists, has documented the human rights violations committed around the world in the name of combating terrorism.

These include torture, enforced disappearances, secret and arbitrary detentions and unfair trials. The report drew on public and private hearings covering 40 countries.

"The world has not become more secure but more divided," former United Nations Human Rights Commissioner Mary Robinson told swissinfo at the launch of the report in Geneva.

Robinson deplored collusion between liberal democracies and countries with very bad human rights records.

"There is such cynicism at the moment that countries preach democracy and human rights but actually undermine them. That is a very dangerous situation for our world," she said.

The former Irish president referred to the lessons of history. "To justify these measures, governments are using the same language as was used in the past in the bad times in South American dictatorships," she added.

Robinson also recalled the example of Northern Ireland and the introduction of internment without trial in the 1970s, which was used to clamp down on attacks by the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

"The police themselves said that [internment] was an unmitigated disaster," she said.

More transparency

Robinson called for more transparency and accountability above all. "There is the rhetoric of human rights in countering terrorism. There is no rigorous scrutiny and I feel very strongly as former high commissioner for human rights that that has to change."

The report points out that many states have fallen into a trap set by the terrorists, allowing themselves to be rushed into hasty responses and introducing measures which undermine cherished values.

"The panel calls on policymakers to rely on civilian legal systems, utilise criminal courts and not resort to ad-hoc tribunals or military courts to try terror suspects," it said.

"It is time for the international community to regroup, take remedial action and reassert the core principles of international law."

Testimonies

The panellists listened to testimonies from government officials, victims of terrorism, rendition survivors and civil society groups. It concluded that the legal systems in place after the Second World War were well equipped to handle current terror threats.

"We've seen intelligence services around the world acting with insufficient accountability and intelligence cooperation being undertaken outside the rule of law," said panel member Hina Jilani, lawyer of the Supreme Court of Pakistan and former UN Special Representative on Human Rights Defenders.

"This intelligence is then used in various legal proceedings and cannot be contested. Secrecy is becoming a pervasive feature in our legal systems," she added.

The scale of the problem is remarkable, according to Swiss panel member Stefan Trechsel, former appeals judge at the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

"Almost every country is involved, as well as international organisations," he said.

"Wake-up call"

However, Trechsel acknowledged that for Switzerland, where legislation and practice in dealing with counter-terrorism were acceptable enough, the report was more of a reminder to stay on guard. An allusion perhaps to the secret CIA transporthowevers of terrorist suspects through Swiss air space.

It remains to be seen if this report will finish – like so many others – on the scrapheap of fine principles that were never respected.

To avoid this fate, the panellists hope to convince the UN Security Council and the Human Rights Council to lead the drive to re-establish the rule of law in the fight against terrorism.

The report repeatedly remarks upon the extent to which undemocratic regimes with deplorable human rights records have referred to counter-terror practices of countries like the US to justify their own abusive policies.

Signs from Washington are promising, according to the former Irish president. "The new administration in the United States recognises the seriousness of the damage done and President Obama has taken some steps to address this already. I hope this is a wake up call for all governments."

What Does Holocaust Denial Really Mean?

by Daniel McGowan In April 2007 the European Union agreed to set jail sentences up to three years for those who deny or trivialize the Holocaust.1 More recently, in response to the remarks of Bishop Richard Williamson, the Pope has proclaimed that Holocaust denial is “intolerable and altogether unacceptable.” But what does Holocaust denial really mean? Begin with the word Holocaust. The Holocaust2 (spelled with a capital H) refers to the killing of six million Jews by the Nazis during World War II. It is supposed to be the German’s “Final Solution” to the Jewish problem. Much of the systematic extermination was to have taken place in concentration camps by shooting, gassing, and burning alive innocent Jewish victims of the Third Reich. People like Germar Rudolf, Ernst Zundel, and Bishop Williamson who do not believe this account and who dare to say so in public are reviled as bigots, anti-Semites, racists, and worse. Their alternate historical scenarios are not termed simply revisionist, but are demeaned as Holocaust denial. Rudolf and Zundel were shipped to Germany where they were tried, convicted, and sentenced to three and five years, respectively. Williamson may not be far behind. Politicians deride Holocaust revisionist papers and conferences as “beyond the pale of international discourse and acceptable behavior.”3 Non-Zionist Jews who participate in such revisionism, like Rabbi Dovid Weiss of the Neturei Karta, are denounced as “self-haters” and are shunned and spat upon. Even Professor Norman Finkelstein, whose parents were both Holocaust survivors and who wrote the book, The Holocaust Industry, has been branded a Holocaust denier. But putting aside the virile hate directed against those who question the veracity of the typical Holocaust narrative, what is it that these people believe and say at the risk of imprisonment and bodily harm? For most Holocaust revisionists or deniers if you prefer, their arguments boil down to three simple contentions: 1. Hitler’s “Final Solution” was intended to be ethnic cleansing, not extermination. 2. There were no homicidal gas chambers used by the Third Reich. 3. There were fewer than 6 million Jews killed of the 55 million who died in WWII. Are these revisionist contentions so odious as to cause those who believe them to be reviled, beaten, and imprisoned? More importantly, is it possible that revisionist contentions are true, or even partially true, and that they are despised because they contradict the story of the Holocaust, a story which has been elevated to the level of a religion in hundreds of films, memorials, museums, and docu-dramas? Is it sacrilegious to ask, “If Hitler was intent on extermination, how did Elie Wiesel, his father, and two of his sisters survive the worst period of incarceration at Auschwitz?” Wiesel claims that people were thrown alive into burning pits, yet even the Israeli-trained guides at Auschwitz refute this claim. Is it really “beyond international discourse” to question the efficacy and the forensic evidence of homicidal gas chambers? If other myths, like making soap from human fat, have been dismissed as Allied war propaganda, why is it “unacceptable behavior” to ask if the gas chamber at Dachau was not reconstructed by the Americans because no other homicidal gas chamber could be found and used as evidence at the Nuremburg trials? For more than fifty years Jewish scholars have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to document each Jewish victim of the Nazi Holocaust. The Nazis were German, obsessed with paperwork and recordkeeping. Yet only 3 million names have been collected and many of them died of natural causes. So why is it heresy to doubt that fewer than 6 million Jews were murdered in the Second World War? “Holocaust Denial” might be no more eccentric or no more criminal than claiming the earth is flat, except that the Holocaust itself has been used as the sword and shield in the quest to build a Jewish state between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, where even today over half the population is not Jewish. The Holocaust narrative allows Yad Vashem, the finest Holocaust museum in the world, to repeat the mantra of “Never Forget” while it sits on Arab lands stolen from Ein Karem and overlooking the unmarked graves of Palestinians massacred by Jewish terrorists at Deir Yassin. It allows Elie Wiesel to boast of having worked for these same terrorists (as a journalist, not a fighter) while refusing to acknowledge, let alone apologize for, the war crimes his employer committed. It makes Jews the ultimate victim no matter how they dispossess or dehumanize or ethnically cleanse indigenous Palestinian people. The Holocaust story eliminates any comparison of Ketziot or Gaza to the concentration camps they indeed are. It memorializes the resistance of Jews in the ghettos of Europe while steadfastly denying any comparison with the resistance of Palestinians in Hebron and throughout the West Bank. It allows claims that this year’s Hanukah Massacre in Gaza, with a kill ratio of 100 to one, was a “proportionate response” to Palestinian resistance to unending occupation. The Holocaust is used to silence critics of Israel in what the Jewish scholar, Marc Ellis, has called the ecumenical deal: you Christians look the other way while we bludgeon the Palestinians and build our Jewish state and we won’t remind you that Hitler was a good Catholic, a confirmed “soldier of Christ,” long before he was a bad Nazi. The Holocaust narrative of systematic, industrialized extermination was an important neo-conservative tool to drive the United States into Iraq. The same neo-con ideologues, like Norman Podoretz, routinely compare Ahmadinejad to Hitler and Nazism with Islamofascism with the intent of driving us into Iran. The title of the recent Israeli conference at Yad Vashem made this crystal clear: “Holocaust Denial: Paving the Way to Genocide.” “Remember the Holocaust” will be the battle cry of the next great clash of good (Judeo/Christian values) and evil (radical Islamic aggression) and those who question it must be demonized if not burned at the stake. Associated Press, “EU approves criminal measures against Holocaust denial,” Haaretz, 19 April 2007. [↩] Holocaust. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005. [↩] Statements of Senator Hillary Clinton. [↩]

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2009/02/what-does-holocaust-denial-really-mean/

Secrecy and denial as Pakistan lets CIA use airbase to strike militants

Tom Coghlan in Kabul, Zahid Hussain in Islamabad and Jeremy Page in Delhi


The CIA is secretly using an airbase in southern Pakistan to launch the Predator drones that observe and attack al-Qaeda and Taleban militants on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan, a Times investigation has found.
The Pakistani and US governments have repeatedly denied that Washington is running military operations, covert or otherwise, on Pakistani territory — a hugely sensitive issue in the predominantly Muslim country.
The Pakistani Government has also repeatedly demanded that the US halt drone attacks on northern tribal areas that it says have caused hundreds of civilian casualties and fuelled anti-American sentiment.
But The Times has discovered that the CIA has been using the Shamsi airfield — originally built by Arab sheikhs for falconry expeditions in the southwestern province of Baluchistan — for at least a year. The strip, which is about 30 miles from the Afghan border, allows US forces to launch a Drone within minutes of receiving actionable intelligence as well as allowing them to attack targets further afield.

It was known that US special forces used Shamsi during the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, but the Pakistani Government declared publicly in 2006 that the Americans had left it and two other airbases.
Key to the Times investigation is the unexplained delivery of 730,000 gallons of F34 aviation fuel to Shamsi. Details were found on the website of the Pentagon’s fuel procurement agency.
The Defence Energy Support Centre site shows that a civilian company, Nordic Camp Supply (NCS), was contracted to deliver the fuel, worth $3.2 million, from Pakistan Refineries near Karachi.
It also shows the fuel was delivered last year, when the United States escalated drone attacks on Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas, allegedly killing several top Taleban and al-Qaeda targets, but also many civilians.
A source at NCS, which is based in Denmark, confirmed that the company had been awarded the contract and had supplied the fuel to Shamsi, but declined to give further details.
A spokesman for the US embassy in Pakistan told The Times: “Shamsi is not the final destination.” However, he declined to elaborate and denied that the US was using it as a base.
“No. No. No. No. No. We unequivocally and emphatically can tell you that there is no basing of US troops in Pakistan,” he said. “There is no basing of US Air Force, Navy, Marines, Army, none, on the record and emphatically. I want that to be very clear. And that is the answer any way you want to put it. There is no base here, no troops billeted. We do not operate here.”
He said that he could not comment on CIA operations The CIA declined to comment, as did the Pentagon. But one senior Western source familiar with US operations in Pakistan and Afghanistan told The Times that the CIA “runs Predator flights routinely” from Shamsi.
“We can see the planes flying from the base,” said Safar Khan, a local journalist. “The area around the base is a high-security zone and no one is allowed there.”
He said that the outer perimeter of Shamsi was guarded by Pakistani military, but the airfield itself was under the control of American forces.
Shamsi lies in a sparsely populated area about 190 miles southwest of the city of Quetta, which US intelligence officials believe is used as a staging post by senior Taleban leaders, including Mullah Omar. It is also 100 miles south of the border with Afghanistan’s southern province of Helmand and about 100 miles east of the border with Iran.

That would put the Predators, which have a range of more than 2,000 miles and can fly for 29 hours, within reach of militants in Baluchistan, southern Afghanistan and in Pakistan’s northern tribal areas.
Paul Smyth, head of operational studies at the Royal United Services Institute, said that 730,000 gallons of F34, also known as JP8, was not enough to supply regular Hercules tanker flights but was sufficient to sustain drones or helicopters.
Other experts said that Shamsi’s airstrip was too short for most aircraft, but was big enough for Predators and ideally located as there were few civilians in the surrounding area to witness the drones coming and going.
Farhatullah Babar, a spokesman for the President of Pakistan, Asif Ali Zardari, said that he did not know anything about the airfield. HOwever, Major General Athar Abbas, the chief military spokesman, confirmed that US forces were using Shamsi. “The airfield is being used only for logistics,” he said, without elaborating.
He added that the Americans were also using another airbase near Jacobabad, 300 miles northeast of Karachi, for logistics and military operations.
Pakistan gave America permission to use Shamsi, Jacobabad and two other bases — Pasni and Dalbadin — for the invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001. US Marine Special Forces were based at Shamsi and, in January 2002, a US Marine KC130 tanker aircraft crashed close to its runway, killing seven Marines on board.
Jacobabad became the main US airbase until Bagram, near Kabul, was repaired, while Pasni, on the coast, was used for helicopters and Dalbadin as a refueling post for special forces’ helicopters. However, in December 2001, Pakistan began sharing Jacobabad and Pasni with US forces as India and Pakistan began massing troops on their border. In July 2006 the Pakistani Government declared that America was no longer using Shamsi, Pasni and Jacobabad, although they were at its disposal in an emergency.
The subject has become particularly sensitive in the past few weeks as President Obama has made it clear that he will continue the strikes while reviewing overall US strategy in the region.
The latest strike on Monday — the fourth since Mr Obama took office — killed 31 people in the tribal agency of Kurram, and another on Saturday killed 25 people in South Waziristan, according to Pakistani officials.
Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the Pakistani Foreign Minister, responded on Sunday by categorically denying that Pakistani bases were used for US drone attacks.
Aerial assault
— Armed predator unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have been in use since 1999
— The aircraft is controlled from the ground using satellite systems and onboard cameras
— The MQ9 craft, which is used in Afghanistan, is 11m long, has a 20m wing span and a cruise speed of up to 230mph. Each can carry four Hellfire missiles and two bombs
— Three systems were bought by the RAF last year for £500m

Sources: Jane’s Information, US Airforce, RAF, Times archives