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Book review: Taliban and Anti-Taliban by Farhat Taj

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  • Book review: Taliban and Anti-Taliban by Farhat Taj

    Another book to kill for?

    In her new book, Farhat Taj demolishes some of the basic assumptions about terrorism in KP and FATA and challenges several authors on their earlier findings

    By Khaled Ahmed

    Another bombshell will have to be endured by the national Taliban narrative with 'Taliban and anti-Taliban' by Farhat Taj (Cambridge Scholars Publishing 2011), a Research Fellow at Centre for Interdisciplinary Gender Research, University of Oslo, Norway, an MPhil in Gender and Development from the University of Bergen, Norway. The book demolishes some of the basic assumptions about terrorism in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and challenges several authors on their earlier findings.

    Taj says her book is based on '2,000 face-to-face interviews, discussions and seminars with people across FATA and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province for two years'. The interviews have been conducted with 'tribal leaders, leaders and volunteers of anti-Taliban lashkars, khasadars and officials recently retired from the political administrations in FATA, daily-wagers and jobless people, internally displaced people (IDPs) from FATA - displaced as a result of military operations in the area - and people hosting the IDPs in their houses on humanitarian grounds or tribal and kinship basis'.

    The book seeks to establish that:
    1) the Afghan Taliban plus Al Qaeda Arabs and Uzbeks and their local supporters were made to become dominant inside Pakistan under a considered policy by Pakistan Army
    2) local leadership opposed to them was allowed to be decimated and political agents were subordinated to the terrorists after the destruction of the local tribal jirga
    3) loyalty to the Taliban was obtained through intimidation allowed by Pakistan
    4) local lashkars willing to fight the terrorists were discouraged and allowed to be destroyed
    5) this was facilitated by 'peace treaties' between the Army and the Taliban
    6) there were no FC desertions and FC Pakhtuns felt no ethnic attachment with Taliban
    7) local marriages of Pakhtun girls to Arabs and Uzbeks remain unproven
    8) drone attacks by the CIA are popular with the local population
    9) Pakistan's pro-Taliban policy was a part of the 'strategic depth' Pakistan sought against India, aimed at controlling Afghanistan
    10) Taliban attracted individuals of dubious moral character, joining terrorism with the criminal underworld.

    Taj begins by asserting: 'Well-armed and battle hardened Al Qaeda terrorists never surrendered their weapons to the tribes in FATA. Instead they have overpowered the tribes and brutally killed those tribesmen who defied them. They entered Waziristan with full support and state consent and all the tribesmen who opposed their entry were killed with state collusion by the militants. Those that were left ran away or were overpowered by the militants covertly backed by the Pakistani state. If today the Pakistani state wants, no militants can ever stay in Waziristan or elsewhere in FATA' (p.3).

    The nexus was old, going back to the days when Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Ahmad Shah Massoud were trained in Frontier Corps and Special Services Group (p.7) against the Soviet Union, but it is difficult to say if Pakistan ever adequately controlled them or prevented them from controlling some of its own officers.

    This arrangement began to be disturbed by the induction of the unmanned drone aircraft deployed by the CIA against the Taliban. The book quotes a 2009 Aryana Institute for Regional Research and advocacy (AIRRA) study that found the population favouring the drones eliminating terrorists who threatened their lives. The book refers to the Peshawar Declaration (December 2009) signed by 'political parties, including the ANP, civil society organisations, businessmen, doctors, lawyers, teachers, tribal labourers, and intellectuals of FATA and NWFP, following a grand tribal jirga in Peshawar'. It said: 'If the people of the war-affected areas are satisfied with any counter-militancy strategy, it is drone attacks that they support the most' (p.19).

    The following year the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ruling party, the ANP, went back on the Peshawar Declaration. The book gives the reason in a footnote: 'There have been life attempts on the top ANP Leader, Asfandyar Wali, and his sister. The only son of the ANP provincial minister, Mian Iftikhar, has been target-killed. Ajmal Khan, a close relative of Asfandyar Wali, has been kidnapped and is still in the custody of the militants. Most probably he would be killed if the ANP openly expressed support of the drone attacks' (p.30).

    Author Taj follows the spoor of one Karim Khan from North Waziristan who appeared on the TV channels swearing that he would sue the CIA in the US for killing his close relatives in a drone attack. Who was this Karim Khan? The book notes: 'Karim Khan was educated in Islamic Studies at the University of Peshawar in the 1990s. One of his (former) fellow university students describes him as a religious person with close links to the pro-military establishment and pro-Taliban JUIF during his time in the university. Some people in Waziristan describe him as a person very close to the political administration in North Waziristan as well as the ISI operatives' (p.21).

    And the Karim Khan episode followed the November 2010 issuance from a US court summons to the ISI chief Ahmad Shuja Pasha causing the killing of Americans in the coordinated terrorist attacks on Mumbai in 2008 (p.25).

    She agrees with Zahid Hussain, author of Scorpion's Tail, that it was the treaty signed by General Safdar Hussain with Nek Muhammad in 2004 which was responsible for all the jihadi terrorism that Pakistan was now experiencing. It left all the tribal elders at the mercy of militants as the militants were indirectly declared by the military establishment as politically legitimate to override the authority of the tribal leaders (p.37).

    What did Nek Muhammad, the Wazir warrior, say at the ceremony which shows General Safdar Hussain, FATA secretary Brigadier Mehmood Shah and Nek Muhammad, in an ecstatic pose on the cover of the book? He said: 'Pakistan's authority has become a thing of the past; now the Taliban will rule' (p.67).

    The collusion that followed disenchanted the local population: 'Tribesmen across FATA had learnt their lesson from Waziristan. They knew what happens when an area (Waziristan in this case) is taken over by the Taliban. One or more fake military operations follow, in which local civilians are killed and the Taliban are given safe passage during, or even before, the onset of the operations. Subsequently, there is a large scale human displacement from the area (p.37).

    How were the tribes betrayed? Conversations showing local leaders talking against Taliban were taped: 'Within days after the meeting, sometimes even hours, the Taliban would confront the tribal leaders with their taped conversations with the authorities and warn them to prepare for death. The tribal leaders were bewildered. They were angry with the military authorities. Soon afterwards the Taliban or Al Qaeda would eliminate the tribal leaders' (p.64).

    Taj mentions Ayaz Wazir who was our diplomat at Mazar-e-Sharif when the Taliban attacked it in 1998 and is an important commentator on the TV channels. Local people disclosed to her that 'tribal leaders, including Faridullah Khan, were eliminated at the behest of the ISI. They also opine that Ayaz Wazir would never show the courage to publicly point the finger at the real killers of his own brother; he is too afraid for his own life to do so' (p.73). Pro-Taliban generals included General Kayani, the current Chief of Army Staff of Pakistan, who imposed the deadly managed chaos on FATA (p.78).

    Among the local tribal leaders who stood up to the Taliban was Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, a towering Wazir, who knew within minutes of sharing his views with an official that he would be killed. Knowing that martyrs' clothes are not changed before burial he went to the undertaker and told him not to change the clothes of his corpse. Within hours he was killed (p.88). He had told Governor NWFP Iftikhar that he would fight the Taliban even as the Governor was scared into silence by the Taliban commander, Javed Karmaz Khel.

    Just as one is getting confused over the proof of a Taliban-ISI collusion, one comes across events that show that Pakistan periodically needs to eliminate its own proteges because of lack of obedience. Disobedience is rampant. Wazir Taliban leader Mullah Nazir refused to attack the Uzbeks. Punjabi Taliban - who contained also those looking like ISI officers - were equally vague in their subordination.

    Incident: 'One Wazir interviewee once saw a Punjabi militant, whom he had seen many times in Wana, in full military uniform in Islamabad. The Wazir addressed him: "Are you the Talib from Wana?" The man, who was in a military vehicle, looked at the tribesman and immediately drove away. The tribesman was with a parliamentarian from Waziristan, who snubbed him for being too reckless. He told the tribesman that he must now pray for his life. The tribesman has lived in fear since then' (p.99).

    The fate of lashkars has been hair-raising. The Ali Khels of Orakzai - the biggest tribe there - were forced into taking on the Taliban and were successful in getting the upper hand, but when the Political Agent told them they had been too harsh, they knew what was coming. The Ali Khel jirga was blown up with a suicide-bomber in October 2008, killing 50 Ali Khel tribal elders, and forcing the survivors to become IDPs. Sikhs and the Shia, left behind, now pay 'jazia' (p.137).

    Farhat Taj is an Afridi from Darra Adam Khel and her field work tends to focus on Orakzai and South Waziristan in the neighbourhood of Darra. Her information has depth because of her outreach. For instance, she is able to say who among the Taliban commanders are given to pederasty (batcha-bazi). Her account of the Adeyzai anti-Taliban lashkar from near Peshawar is touching and brings out the anti-Taliban instinct among the Pakhtun.

  • #2
    One for the list definately; ty.

    Comment


    • #3
      1980s Reply

      Thanks for providing this review. Our Pakistani friend, IHM, alerted me to this book a few weeks ago and suggested I introduce it here. I declined, hoping that he'd do so instead.

      His schedule is very busy just now so I understand the delay. Nonetheless, I suspect this book will prove a valuable read.

      Ms. Taj is nothing if not provocative to conventional thinking within the Pakistani political/cultural milieu. My e-mail exchanges with her displayed both an acute understanding and sympathy for the plight of the pashtun citizenry caught in this war within FATAville and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. She also possesses a gentle naivete regarding America's capacity to influence proceedings there.

      Nonetheless, she's a powerful voice in the wilderness, particularly with respect to the effect of drone attacks and their relative high degree of acceptance among pashtuns of that afflicted area. This naturally puts her at odds with both the Pakistani nationalist elite and military as well as a large number of poorly-informed academic scholars here in the west-notably David Kilcullen along with Thomas Johnson and John Arquilla of the U.S. Naval Post-Graduate Institute. Powerful names within the U.S. Counterinsurgency academic community yet none of the aforementioned men have conducted one iota of detailed research in the region to which they offer opinions as axioms of truth.

      Taj has. Lots and lots of research-most of which dispells the comfortable myths preferred by so many "academics" and "experts".

      I believe Dr. Ayesha Siddiqa important published work- Military Inc.-Inside Pakistan's Military Economy has been banned inside Pakistan. There's a high liklihood that Ms. Taj's recent effort will find the same treatment. I hope not as I've been in her corner for two and one-half years now. That, of course, is a personal sentiment yet, more importantly, it is a reflection of the esteem for which I hold her work.

      May she stay safe.
      "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski
      "The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." Lester Bangs

      Comment


      • #4
        Can't seem to get a hold of it, Amazon is "Out of Print--Limited Availability". Will have to wait a few weeks I guess.
        Cow is the only animal that not only inhales oxygen, but also exhales it.
        -Rekha Arya, Former Minister of Animal Husbandry

        Comment


        • #5
          Originally posted by S2 View Post
          Nonetheless, she's a powerful voice in the wilderness, particularly with respect to the effect of drone attacks and their relative high degree of acceptance among pashtuns of that afflicted area. This naturally puts her at odds with both the Pakistani nationalist elite and military as well as a large number of poorly-informed academic scholars here in the west-notably David Kilcullen along with Thomas Johnson and John Arquilla of the U.S. Naval Post-Graduate Institute. Powerful names within the U.S. Counterinsurgency academic community yet none of the aforementioned men have conducted one iota of detailed research in the region to which they offer opinions as axioms of truth.
          I hope that US policy-makers will find the time and effort to seriously read through and reflect on her work. Her courage to undertake an investigation in FATA alone warrants such attention especially to then go public with it in light of what happened to Saleem Shahzad. But whether the book will end-up censored in Pakistan or not i presume it will be dismissed and rubbished anyway by a limitless number of self-appointed 'pundits' (of which i imagine most will never even read her work).

          Foreign Policy ran this report 3 days ago by another Pashtun journalist who's own interviews and investigations corrobates much of Ms Taj's work:

          ---

          What Pakistan's Army Didn't Do in Kurram Agency - by Daud Khattak | The AfPak Channel
          By Daud Khattak : Thursday, August 25, 2011

          On Aug. 18, Pakistan's most powerful man, Army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, secretly flew to Kurram agency in the country's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and declared it free of "miscreants."

          No doubt the Pakistani Army did a great job clearing militants from Central Kurram, the focus of the operation, as it did in areas like the Swat Valley. But Kayani's visit and announcement raise the following question: What do "clear" and "miscreants" mean for a Pakistani Army fighting to regain control of the area from a discreet force that can shift, hit, kill, and target anywhere, any place, and any time? And if the area had been successfully cleared, why did Kayani not travel by road, and why did he not meet the open jirgas of tribal elders in that area, as was the tradition when top Pakistani officials visited the tribal belt before 2001?

          Indeed, it would have been great fun if Kayani had taken the governor of Khyber-Puktunkhwa province (the federal government figure who is actually in charge of administering the FATA) along with him, traveling by road to the "cleared" area so that the youth of Kurram could welcome them with the beating of drums and traditional dance, attan, instead of welcoming Kayani's visit from afar while begging him to finish the job and lift the siege on Kurram's main city, Parachinar. Only then would the people of Kurram come to believe that their area had truly been secured.

          However, what is clear in Kurram and the rest of the tribal areas is that the people continue to live under the threat of terrorists operating under different names, from Jaish to Lashkar to Tehrik, despite numerous operations and claims of victory by Pakistan's security forces.

          ***

          Although the Army announced that the Kurram operation was launched after a demand from the area's tribal elders, locals contradicted that statement in conversations with the author, saying they never asked for the military operation, whose key objective was to open the Tal-Parachinar road for people traveling to Parachinar, the center of Upper Kurram, from Peshawar via Sadda, the headquarters of Lower Kurram Agency. Instead, they had been asking for more than two years for the government simply to provide them basic security, with no response in return.

          However, locals told this writer, they still cannot travel on the Tal-Parachinar road without risking their security, despite the two-month-long operation and ensuing "victory."

          All the available accounts from Central Kurram suggest that one of the major impacts of the operation was that it forced the local population to leave their homes, allowing the Taliban to go from village to village, burning the villages vacated by the people. According to reports aired by the Pashto-language radio station Mashaal, so far 16 villages have been burned to the ground by the Taliban in spite of the Army operation, with each village consisting of an average of 50 to 60 houses.

          Similar operations have already been conducted in other tribal agencies -- South Waziristan, Mohmand, Bajaur, and the Bara area of Khyber, where the security forces have been engaged in combat operations for the past two years while the people live under a curfew -- and been declared successes. All the while, the displaced people from those areas continue to live in tents, leaving the field open for the Army and the Taliban. Once the playing fields for their children, the land of the tribesmen is now known as a recruiting center for suicide bombers and jihadists.

          FATA's nearly 7 million tribesmen, once fiercely independent, stunningly hospitable, and unbelievably proud, are now living as a vanquished nation robbed of their land, resources, independence, customs, and traditions by the imported jihadists and the state security agencies.

          Many in these tribal areas can't live and even visit their homes and villages for fear of being kidnapped by armed bandits, killed by the Taliban, arrested by the Army or intelligence agencies, or targeted accidentally by American drones. And those who have not left or have since returned can't dare to utter a word either against the Army or against the militants.

          Two weeks ago, when armed Taliban raided some shops in the central bazaar in Miram Shah, the capital of North Waziristan, and burned pieces of women's garments for being un-Islamic and too thin, this writer tried to talk to some shop owners about the incident. Those who would speak agreed to do so only on the condition that they would not condemn the act and would only discuss their financial losses. Yet the situation is little different between the Taliban-controlled Miram Shah and in "cleared" areas of Mohmand, South Waziristan, Bajaur, and Kurram.

          In fact, the threat for the common citizen in all those areas is as widespread as it was before the military operations. And this is the reason they are staying in tented villages despite the hot summer and chilly winter, with no proper food, water, medicines, and schooling for their children. Many others have migrated to other cities and towns, shutting down their businesses and leaving their farms.

          While the sacrifices of the Pakistani Army and Frontier Corps over the years are no secret, the failure to achieve peace and security despite the substantial use of force and displacement of hundreds of thousands leaves room for many questions -- most importantly, whether the Army is unwilling to definitively crush the militants, or instead if it is incapable of doing so.

          In Kurram, the road to Parachinar has been closed by militants for the last few years, while the security forces have merely looked on. Suddenly and unexpectedly, these same forces announced a clearing operation, but only in an area where the situation was quite calm and peaceful. Thousands of families were displaced to live in camps, and then suddenly the Army announced victory one evening while the displaced people, as scared as before, find their situation unchanged.

          The road to Upper Kurram that goes from Peshawar to Parachinar via Tal is still closed, and the people, scared of being kidnapped or killed, still travel through the Afghan cities of Jalalabad, Kabul, Khost, and Gardez to reach Parachinar.

          Many locals with whom this writer talked on the phone say the real militant problem existed in Lower Kurram, while the Army was engaged for the past two months in Central Kurram. During the whole operation, it was not made clear who or which group of militants was being targeted, or whether any prominent militant leaders had been killed or arrested.

          It is equal parts interesting and tragic that only a day after Gen. Kayani's visit to Central Kurram and the announcement regarding the "clearance" of the area, a teenage bomber wreaked havoc on worshippers in a mosque offering Friday congregational prayers in the Jamrud subdivision of Khyber agency, an area previously declared "clear" of militants.

          Seeing the bomb blasts in a supposedly secure area, how could people in Kurram be expected to believe that their lives and property would be safe following the military operation in their backyard? And while the key road to Parachinar stays closed, it does not matter much for the people if some portion of the agency is cleared or not; the agency will always struggle to survive while its heart remains blocked.

          Daud Khattak is a journalist working with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Pashto-language Mashaal Radio in Prague.

          Comment


          • #6
            Quite explosive stuff, most of it of course has been guessed at for some time.

            No wonder the "Pakistani nationalists" are so pissed off with her.
            There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don’t..

            Comment


            • #7
              Terry Glavin Comments on the book:

              The Final Nail In The Coffin Of The Pakistani Pantomime?

              If the history of the 21st century's first decade is ever properly written, the words "the war in Afghanistan" could probably serve as little more than an index entry from a footnote in a prominent chapter about Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Agency. The ISI deserves at least a chapter of its own, if only for the spectacularly cunning confidence trick it managed to play, year after year after year, with the United States of America as its most gullible victim.

              Billions of dollars wasted and tens of thousands of lives lost, all the result of an elaborate pantomime carried off by the ISI, a parasitic, third-rate military-industrial lie machine that the White House still fancies as an American "ally." Chief among the ISI's successes, from 2001 until even now, is the propaganda fiction that after September 11, 2001, the Pakistani military stopped providing succor and sustenance to Al Qaida and the Taliban, and that if those entitities were present in Pakistan after 2001 at all it was only on account of those savage Pakhtuns from the hill country in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), and their primitive "hospitality" code of Pakhtunwali.

              I strike a glancing blow at all that in my book, Come from The Shadows, which is due out in October. It's one of several myths about Afghanistan that I easily dispose of (evidence is our friend) in the opening chapter, Welcome to Absurdistan. In dispelling the myth that the Pakhtuns of FATA are as angry about NATO drone strikes as the troops-out lobby keeps telling us, I have relied heavily on the splendid front-line work of the Pakistani journalist Farhat Taj, a research fellow at the University of Oslo. Last year, I noted her finding: “I have been discussing the issue of drone attacks with hundreds of people of Waziristan. They see the U.S. drone attacks as their liberators from the clutches of the terrorists into which, they say, their state has wilfully thrown them.”

              Two years ago, she told the Washington Times that most of what passes for informed punditry about Pakistan's tribal areas is drawn from third-hand journalism written by journalists who don't know the first thing about what they're talking about. "They constantly distort the realities of our people and area. Most of them do not even bother to come and see what is happening.”

              Now, Taj has got a book out, Taliban and Anti-Taliban. It is the result not just of historical scholarship but also roughly 2000 interviews and discussions undertaken throughout FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkwa (formerly the Northwest Frontier Province) over the past two years. A lot of nasty and violent people, along with very smart and well-situated people, are going to be quite displeased with what the book exposes, not least the nonsense that the Pakistani government would surrender the jihadist Arabs and Talib crackpots in the hill country, but the stubborn tribes just won't permit it because of that "Pakhtunwali" thing. Taj writes: "Some first-hand interactions with the tribesmen would have provided the scholars and journalists with a wealth of empirical evidence to establish that no tribes in FATA can dare to host anyone wanted by the state."

              Further: "Where do Usama Bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri or other foreign terrorists fit in to this notion and practice of hospitality? Well-armed and battle hardened Al-Qaida terrorists never surrendered their weapons to the tribes in FATA. Instead they have overpowered the tribes and brutally killed those tribesmen who defied them. They entered Waziristan with full state consent and all the tribesmen who opposed their entry were killed with state collusion by the militants. Those that were left ran away or were overpowered by the militants covertly backed by the Pakistani state. If the Pakistani state wants today, no militants can ever stay in Waziristan or elsewhere in FATA.

              "It is a myth that FATA tribes gave refuge to Al-Qaida terrorists under the code of Pakhtunwali. In the tribal context, public backing of any issues, including refuge to anyone, has to be discussed and agreed upon in a tribal jirga (council). . . I would challenge the scholars and journalists to produce evidence of any such jirgas. The fact is that Taliban and Al-Qaida banned the institution of jirga wherever they took control in FATA or at least rendered it ineffective through targeted killing and intimidation of the tribal leaders, and all this was thoroughly facilitated by the ISI. . ."

              It's pretty straightforward. The Frontier Crimes Regulations that apply in the otherwise lawless FATA region allow the Pakistani military to bulldoze entire towns if a tribe refuses to hand over a fugitive. The ISI has done precisely that for offences less grave than harbouring al Qaida. Indeed, the ISI did bulldoze villages, recklessly and unnecessarily, when it finally felt obiged to go after the Haqanni Talibs. What has the ISI done to go after Mullah Omar's Taliban? Nothing. Why? Pakhtunwali? Please, get real.
              Terry Glavin: The Final Nail In The Coffin Of The Pakistani Pantomime?
              Peace, Peace, Peace

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by Tronic View Post
                Can't seem to get a hold of it, Amazon is "Out of Print--Limited Availability". Will have to wait a few weeks I guess.
                Home - Cambridge Scholars Publishing

                Looking forward to getting it
                In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

                Leibniz

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Parihaka View Post
                  Home - Cambridge Scholars Publishing

                  Looking forward to getting it
                  There's no official ban on this book in Pakistan as it is not yet available in Pakistan. However, I anticipate that this book will be banned as soon as it becomes available in Pakistan.
                  Peace, Peace, Peace

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by IHM View Post
                    There's no official ban on this book in Pakistan as it is not yet available in Pakistan. However, I anticipate that this book will be banned as soon as it becomes available in Pakistan.
                    Wouldn't surprise me at all: I can post it to you once I've finished reading it if you like.
                    Last edited by Parihaka; 18 Sep 11,, 22:23. Reason: typo
                    In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

                    Leibniz

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Parihaka View Post
                      Wouldn't surprise me at all: I can post it to you once I've finished reading it if you like.
                      Sir, thank you for such kind offer. However, I'm afraid to say that I will not be able to receive it even by post. All postal dispatches are duly checked/examined on its entry to Pakistan. And if this book is officially banned by then, it may bring me in state's radar (Hope, you get it what I mean) - although our state's radars are obsolete as it doesn't work and Americans have stolen our "golden goose" from Abotabbad under our noses but our radars couldn't detect. :)

                      On serious note, the writer Ms Farhat Taj is my acquaintance. And I have been in touch with her when she was writing her book. She has done extensive inquiry, and interviews on the ground; hence, I'm already aware of the major contents of the book. And being from FATA, I'm first hand witness to what she has primarily documented in her book.

                      Regards,
                      Last edited by IHM; 18 Sep 11,, 22:52. Reason: Syntax error corrected
                      Peace, Peace, Peace

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by IHM View Post
                        Sir, thank you for such kind offer. However, I'm afraid to say that I will not be able to receive it even by post. All postal dispatches are duly checked/examined on its entry to Pakistan. And if this book is officially banned by then, it may bring me in state's radar (Hope, you get it what I mean) - although our state's radars are obsolete as it doesn't work and Americans have stolen our "golden goose" from Abotabbad under our noses but our radars couldn't detect. :)

                        On serious note, the writer Ms Farhat Taj is my acquaintance. And I have been in touch with her when she was writing her book. She has done extensive inquiry, and interviews on the ground; hence, I'm already aware of the major contents of the book. And being from FATA, I'm first hand witness to what she has primarily documented in her book.

                        Regards,
                        My pleasure Sir, I'm grateful for the posts you've done here, in a murky area of the world they've been extremely enlightening.
                        In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

                        Leibniz

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Aryana Institute-A Survey

                          It's interesting to remember where this all started. Back in March, 2009 Ms. Taj conducted her first survey of which I'm aware regarding the impact of drone attacks throughout FATA and then NWFP (now Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa).

                          Her essential argument has not been challenged despite the vehement disagreement and efforts at deflection by no-nothing pseudo scholars and journalists from Islamabad/Lahore through the U.S. Naval Post-Graduate School to Washington D.C.

                          Drone Attack Survey-AIRRA March 2009

                          I hope she knows that she has friends whom believe her.
                          "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski
                          "The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." Lester Bangs

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Some permanent apologists of the deep state are now claiming that Farhat Taj's work has been "proven false" by many Western surveys. How far is that true?
                            There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don’t..

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by Vinod2070 View Post
                              Some permanent apologists of the deep state are now claiming that Farhat Taj's work has been "proven false" by many Western surveys. How far is that true?
                              These claims of western surveys and apologists are ludicrous. Ms Farhat Taj has excellently debunked such "western surveys" in her book. Here is one of her old articles, discussing the unethical surveys about FATA.

                              ...............

                              ANALYSIS: An unethical survey on FATA —Farhat Taj

                              The people of FATA perceive state collusion with the Taliban. They want the termination of this collusion before the military operations. Until then, they are comfortable with the drone strikes on militant positions

                              Recently, a survey was conducted by the New America Foundation (NAF), a US think tank, and Terror Free Tomorrow (TFT) about the tribal public opinion in FATA about the war on terror, including the US drone strikes in the area. The two organisations claim to “have conducted the first comprehensive public opinion survey covering sensitive political issues in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan”. It is further claimed that, “the unprecedented survey, from June 30 to July 20, 2010, consisted of face-to-face interviews of 1,000 FATA residents aged 18 or older across 120 villages/sampling points in all seven tribal agencies of FATA.”

                              A critical analysis of the survey by anyone aware of the ground realities in FATA can render the survey unethical, in terms of research ethics, and methodologically inaccurate on many counts. This is not the occasion to critically analyse the survey. I will, however, comment on two grand claims made by the survey. First is the claim that “the people in Pakistan’s tribal areas strongly oppose the US military pursuing al Qaeda and Taliban fighters based in their region. American drone attacks are deeply unpopular (76 percent are against the drone strikes).” Secondly, it says, “The residents of the FATA back, instead, the Pakistani military fighting against the militants.”

                              In June and July 2010, when the survey was conducted, many, if not most, people of FATA were the internally displaced persons (IDPs) in other parts of Pakistan. The entire Upper Orakzai, parts of Lower Orakzai and the whole Mehsud area in South Waziristan were empty of their people due to the ongoing military operations in these areas. People in most parts, if not entire, of Bajaur, Mohmand, Bara in Khyber and several parts of Kurram and North Waziristan were also IDPs. How much is the survey representative of the residents of FATA in such a situation? Before declaring the survey ‘unprecedented’ or ‘comprehensive’, the surveyors must seriously address these questions.

                              The survey is claimed to have been conducted in parts of FATA that are totally under the writ of the militants in collusion with the intelligence agencies of Pakistan. The local people are overpowered in these areas, which are inaccessible for independent investigation due to bad security. There is no question of locals giving honest answers in a survey like this, because doing so means their instant beheading. Many have been brutally killed for displeasing the militants by freely expressing their opinions. The survey report does not elaborate how it made sure that the people freely expressed their opinion. The NAF and TFT must disclose what deals they had to make with Commander Nazir, the gangster of South Waziristan, Caliph Haqqani, the de facto ruler of North Waziristan, Mangal Bagh, the devil occupying Bara, the local Gestapo (ISI agents) and Arab, Punjabi and Uzbek terrorist gangs in all these areas to make sure that the respondents responded to the survey without fearing for their lives, especially about sensitive issues like drone strikes.

                              The second claim of the report about people in FATA backing the Pakistan Army operations is only a half-truth. The full truth is that the people of FATA have greatly suffered in the army operations. The government of Pakistan’s own FATA secretariat report informs that over 3,000 died, over 3,000 were injured and property worth millions of dollars was destroyed in the ongoing crisis in FATA. The IDPs from all over FATA that I have been interacting with say that most of the damage has been caused by the army. They allege that the army is deliberately killing innocent people and avoiding targeting the militants. They want targeted army operations against the militants. They perceive state collusion with the Taliban. They want the termination of this collusion before the military operations. Until then, they are comfortable with the drone strikes on militant positions. Let me share with the readers that the people from the most drone-hit areas of Waziristan get seriously upset when there are no drone attacks. Their apprehension is that the governments of Pakistan and the US might enter an agreement to halt the drone attacks. They want the drone strikes to continue. Anyone who can somehow manage to win the confidence of the people of FATA will find that most of them welcome the drone strikes.

                              CAMP, a local NGO in Pakistan, conducted fieldwork for the survey. I have heard researchers, journalists, NGO activists and intellectuals from across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and FATA accuse CAMP of fabricating data about FATA and making quick bucks out of it. Those FATA tribesmen who have had the opportunity to actually observe the fieldwork conducted by the NGO either ridicule its work or, at best, question it on many counts. This column is not the place to critically analyse the FATA research of this NGO. Suffice it to say that a critical analysis by anyone who is well informed about the factual reality in FATA would find previous research by CAMP, known as ‘Understanding FATA’, highly questionable.

                              I want to challenge the FATA ‘experts’ at the NAF and TFT to show some scholarly courage. I urge them to come over to FATA (not under the auspices of the Pakistan Army as David Kilcullen of Accidental Guerrilla did), apply some research ethics and conduct a real survey, rather than spreading misleading information about FATA from the US or engaging dubious Pakistani NGOs to engineer data about FATA.

                              This is not the first time NAF has spread distorted information about the drone strikes in FATA. Recently, the think tank produced a research report, ‘The year of the drone’, that claims that 32 percent of those killed in US drone strikes are innocent civilians. I have questioned the authenticity of that report through my research paper, ‘That year of the drone misinformation’, published in Small Wars and Insurgencies.

                              Researchers, both western and Pakistani, routinely violate research ethics in their research on the people and culture of FATA. Had the researchers applied some research ethics, we would not have had the piles of research reports that produce stereotypical images of FATA in line with the colonial discourse and narratives of the Pakistani military establishment about the tribesmen and women. More importantly, the reports are often factually wrong and thus mislead people around the world about the ground reality in this most important battleground in the war on terror. The message is clear: research ethics do not matter at all when it comes to the people of FATA.

                              The writer is a PhD Research Fellow with the University of Oslo and currently writing a book, Taliban and Anti-Taliban

                              Source :Daily Times
                              (Pakistani Liberal Newspaper)
                              ...................

                              I openly invite these apologists to Wazirastan to come forward and look at the ground realities. I got tired of writing again and again to all Pakistan apologists in Media, but they all fear because most of them get dictations from GHQ.
                              Last edited by IHM; 20 Sep 11,, 17:32.
                              Peace, Peace, Peace

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