For KPFK 90.7 FM in Los Angeles, I'm Scott Horton.
This is Anti-War Radio.
All right, y'all, welcome to the show.
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I'm Scott Horton.
This is Anti-War Radio.
We're here every 630 to set every Friday from 630 to 7 Here on KPFK 90.7 in LA That's 98.7 in Santa Barbara 93.7 in San Diego and 99.5 in Ridgecrest and China Lake Of course, we're also streaming live worldwide at KPFK.org If you go to my archive at scotthortonshow.com, you'll find more than 1,800 interviews going back to really the day of the fall of Baghdad April 9th, 2003 and You'll also find that more than a hundred of those 1,800 are of Dr. Gareth Porter Independent historian and journalist for interpress service That's IPS news net and we reprint just about everything He writes for IPS and everything else to at anti-war.com Porter and he's got two very important pieces this week.
I think are worth your consideration And so I'm happy to welcome Gareth to the show right now.
How's it going Gareth?
All right, fine.
Thanks very much for having me on the show again Well, I'm very happy to have you here, let's start with Pakistan your most recent piece It's called Pakistan moves to curb more aggressive drone strikes and spying and this has at least something to do with the reaction to the case of Raymond Davis the CIA agent or asset who killed a couple of people and Then bribed his way to freedom a couple of weeks back So I guess go ahead and tell us about What more aggressive drone strikes and spying and then a bit about the expulsions and the reaction to it this week in Pakistan?
Right just to sort of begin with the the issue that you just raised about Raymond Davis the CIA contract Spy basically who was arrested after killing?
Who was arrested after killing Two actually responsible for the death of three pakistanis In january, I think the point that I want to make in this story is that?although That was the occasion for The pakistanis to start taking a much stronger View much stronger attitude towards the u.s.
Military uh campaign through drone strikes as well as the increase in the number of spies It it was really more a an opportunity for them to raise these issues Than the reason for it.
In other words.
He was it was a symbol Of some underlying problems that had really from the pakistani point of view and I think objectively speaking Had gotten out of control that is to say The uh, the drone strikes by the united states and the use of spies particularly unilateral intelligence agents that is agents which were Not being made known to the pakistanis and thus were Operating without the pakistanis knowledge uh in pakistan those two problems from the pakistani military leadership's point of view Had really gotten out of control and and the point that I want to make Uh, is that the pakistanis had indeed?agreed to both, uh, the drone, uh war in pakistan and to Uh the a number of u.s.
Intelligence Uh specialists both military and civilian operating within pakistan under the musharraf regime And that agreement had continued Uh during the post-musharraf regime Uh, and so the to some degree the pakistanis Uh when when they did sort of publicly complain on occasion about drone strikes they were being Hypocritical.
I mean they were really Uh sort of Privately going along with it while publicly complaining in order to play to their domestic audience but I think now it's very clear that this has changed and that's what my story is about that this uh the the two uh issues of drone strikes and spies in pakistan have now Gotten to the point where the pakistanis realize That what they had originally agreed to is no longer what they're dealing with Uh, it's a much more serious set of of u.s.
Activities That uh leave the pakistani government and military much more vulnerable politically Than was the case earlier on well, so Uh when obama came in he made no secret of the fact that he wanted to expand the war in pakistan And increase the number of drone strikes that kind of thing and mccain even Chastised him during the campaign for uh, and I think hillary clinton did too Uh for uh stating too plainly that he wanted to escalate the war there Um, and so I guess you know, you're saying the zadari government has gone along with that Um, but only to a certain degree I wonder why is it that the obama team had to um escalate the number of covert operatives cia and jsoc types and I guess probably blackwater and whoever else there, uh, increased the number of drone strikes beyond What they had an agreement with with the pakistani government because it seems like now they just blew it and caused a reaction That that is indeed a very important issue.
Let's start with the drone strike Program the drone the drone war if you will Uh, this is a policy that was begun In 2004 under the bush administration And at that point it was targeted at uh, high level al-qaeda leaders And uh in that regard it was certainly something that the the pakistanis felt was justified Uh, and and they felt that it was in their interest uh, because at that point, uh, the the al-qaeda folks in 2004 2005 Al-qaeda in pakistan was linking up with uh, the extreme sort of religious extremists uh who were increasingly calling for violence against the pakistani government and military Uh, but what has happened since 2004 2005 is that that program?
Has followed a certain sort of bureaucratic logic where the cia operations directorate which is in charge of it Has sought to increase the level Of the scope of the drone strikes Like any good bureaucracy, they want to grow they want to have more money They want to have more staff and they want to have more activities and in this case what that meant was Getting the bush administration to agree to a much longer larger target list Of not just high-ranking al-qaeda people and not even al-qaeda people in general but uh anybody uh in pakistan who Could be regarded as somehow related to al-qaeda allied with al-qaeda or affiliated with al-qaeda And not just the leaders of its organizations, but the rank and file as well And so you have well and anyone who?
Is on the pakistani side of the line who's deemed to be helping the afghan insurgency whether related to arab afghans or not Right exactly.
This is one of the major developments Uh, which has come particularly since the bush administration I just wanted to fill in the background of this which is that that the cia got the got george w bush To agree to a huge increase In the size of the target list the length of the target list, but when obama came in the target list became even wider And uh, what what happened was then the united states increasingly Began to the cia began to target Anyone who was involved with or allied with?the afghan taliban who took uh, of course Went on the pakistani side of the border and and found a place for rest and recreation and a place to To be rearmed and to to go back, uh to to fight in afghanistan.
So in other words This became a new front Uh in the war in afghanistan and thus what happened was that the drone war was increasingly in fact a real war not just individuals being targeted, but basically uh whole populations in parts of uh of the tribal, uh area northwest of pakistan Uh, so so this became a much bigger Uh war and a much bigger issue for the pakistani military then that began to really create some Tension between the pakistanis and the americans because as you well know The pakistani military and intelligence services and then the pakistani government generally does in fact support the afghan taliban as a Movement and a an army that Really represents pakistani interests in the context of of the afghan the afghanistan war and so that was one of the reasons why uh, the pakistanis became increasingly alarmed about the uh about the drone war, but I think even More important than that is the fact that the drone war has now come to Kill so many civilians so many people who are not holding Offices in any jihadist organization of any kind That it was becoming clear to the pakistanis That this was a provocation to uh the population and to the tribal leadership and the Fatah region in northwest pakistan and it was going to cause them very very great problems Of uh increased opposition to the pakistani military.
So I think that's the fundamental reason why They have finally come around to saying enough is enough.
We have to do something about this And now who all's been kicked out and how many and and what effect is that going to have say for example?
On the effort against the insurgents in afghanistan well with regard to the espionage uh Presence of the united states both civilian and military What has happened is that the united states over the past several months.
This is going back to uh mid to late last year the united states, uh Has increased the number of of spies in pakistan enormously According to the new york times story the pakistanis are saying they want 25 to 40 percent of the uh A total number of spies the united states has has now placed in pakistan to be removed to be withdrawn And they're saying that that represents a few hundred perhaps 300.
So that means that the total number of spies that the united states has Infiltrated into pakistan has grown to more than 1300 Uh, so so this is really quite a I mean, it's quite an army of u.s Spies and a very large number of those it turns out Were infiltrated without the knowledge of the pakistanis Meaning that the united states has unilateral spies treating the pakistani government and military Essentially as an enemy rather than as an ally So this has caused a great deal of of difficulty with the pakistanis in part uh, because The spies are being used Uh for a couple of purposes one, of course as you've suggested has to do with The afghan taliban and so it works at cross purposes with the pakistani interest the other one Uh, the other purpose of the spies is increasingly to try to track some of these Uh terrorist organizations, uh militant organizations, which the pakistanis have been supporting Operating against the indians and in some cases, of course in either kashmir or in india proper And of course, this is another case where the pakistanis are completely at odds with the united states And uh, they feel the united states is putting increasing pressure on them in that regard So in other words perhaps, uh, you're saying that the pakistani military is basically happy to have the americans do drone strikes and wage this covert war against the taliban movement in pakistan that they Deem as a threat to themselves But if once the war starts getting cranked up to the degree that it's actually becoming effective against the insurgency in afghanistan And also, of course the civilian casualties and all that i'm not discounting that completely because they got domestic political consideration But sounds like once once the war in pakistan gets so effective that it starts helping the american side in the war in afghanistan That's when the pakistanis want to call off their help or their permission to let the cia and the jsoc continue to do this certainly, that's one of the Factors that is is impacting on pakistani attitudes toward the us Presence in pakistan.
Uh, you know, it's it's clearly not just one factor.
It's a combination of things Up and and it's difficult to judge exactly how they they weigh the the afghan taliban aspect of this versus The killing of civilians and and by the way, not just ordinary civilians But in many cases and most recently in mid-march of this year uh the the tribal elders of uh areas in Uh the northwest region of pakistan, which means that basically the community leadership Of in these areas are being killed by these drone strikes and and by the way These are people who are perfectly willing to live and let live with the pakistani government These are not people who are up in arms against the pakistani government, but people who have either made their peace with The pakistani military or who've made it known that they're willing to do so And so one of the issues here as uh, my friend Uh the specialist on on pakistan at king's college Has has told me the the the pakistanis are really have lost Uh the uh their confidence the united states has any judgment whatsoever About who to target in pakistan, and they're very worried about that Well, and as well they should be it The question is do the americans know who to target when they're firing off their hellfire missiles?
There's Plenty of indication that no mostly they don't which um, you know makes me Want to ask I don't want to spend too much time in afghanistan because I want to switch over to iraq here But I wonder you know after all these years of fighting uh, nine and a half years really of uh of war in afghanistan Does hamid karzai control anything more than a few city blocks of kabul at this point still?
Is is there anything like a nation building exercise actually happening in afghanistan?
Well that depends on whether you mean uh a formal exercise versus the reality of it Obviously the u.s.
And nato are claiming that they're involved in a nation building exercise.
That's part of the official doctrine of the War in afghanistan The reality is that they're no closer to building a nation than they were before they started I would argue that they're even farther away from that In fact, I mean really with this guy karzai They might as well install me in power there as far as how much legitimacy he has to be the ruler of those people Am I right?
Yeah, I mean karzai in terms of the pashtun population across the south of afghanistan Really has no uh, no credibility or legitimacy because he has Uh done two things one.
He has aligned himself with warlords and local uh, you know former uh jihadist former uh activists uh generals in the uh in the army the united states put together to fight the uh, the soviets in afghanistan who turned out to be just uh thugs and uh who raped uh children and uh beat up The population and stole their money their land and everything else um, and and so, you know, one of the Strikes against uh karzai is just that he's aligned with the worst Uh elements of the power structure in in southern afghanistan.
The other one of course is that he uh has presided over a foreign military presence that has turned out to be a disaster for uh, particularly the pashtun population of afghanistan All right.
Well, I think probably if everyone just You know conjures an image of david petraeus and repeats 100 times really fast The surge is working the surge is working.
Everything will turn out just fine over there like it has in iraq Uh, which is what we got to talk about now.
It's anti-war radio.
I'm scott horton.
I'm talking with gareth porter and uh, another important article that you wrote this week gareth is Again at anti-war.com/porter maliki's doubts threatened post 2011 iraq troop presence so obviously to break that in pieces here What post 2011 iraq troop presence the deal was we're going to be out of iraq Every single one of our combat forces by the end of this year and uh, and then what's this about maliki's doubts?threatening this uh extended troop presence you're referring to the 2008 uh withdrawal agreement right the one that george bush signed which which george w bush signed with with the al-maliki government after uh, the the al-maliki regime and al-maliki personally Really shocked the bush administration and the u.s.
Military by demanding Uh in july of 2008 that the united states had to get out Uh, whereas the bush administration had been under the illusion That it was going to have a decades long Presence military presence in iraq with access to all those Beautiful big bases that they'd built up during the war Which would continue to be a means of the united states projecting power into the rest of the middle east well, uh maliki had a a nice surprise in store for them because Uh, he forced them to sign this agreement, which they didn't want to sign Uh, the only reason that bush signed this agreement, by the way Is that a certain candidate named obama had won the election?
Uh or was about to win the election was clear of what what the result was going to be in 2008 in october 2008 and he was afraid that obama would do something even worse And so he signed the agreement thinking that uh, it was the lesser of two evils in any case well, and he didn't really have a choice simply because Even if it had been mccain coming up next bush had to have something signed before he could leave power, right?well, you know, I I think that And maliki wasn't given in patrick coburn said in the spring of 08 that bush is pushing for 56 bases maybe it was 58 and I never can remember and then You know, it was reported over and over throughout that summer that bush keeps coming back with a lower and lower number And maliki will not budge maliki insists out by the end of 2011.
No bases.
No personnel No, nothing and bush really had no choice by the end of his turn He had to either uh defile maliki at some political risk And also, of course, you know looking bad with his own public at home, which in 2008 was Absolutely opposed to a long-term presence by the united states Uh, so so he was in a bit of a fix.
Um, but but I do think that You know had the uh, obama, uh candidacy not looked like it was going to win Uh bush might have tried to stake out an even tougher position.
So I think that's part of the storyline in any case What we have now is uh that obama has caved in once again Uh to the wishes the interests of the military and the pentagon And agreed to a plan to station 15 to 20 000 troops In iraq, but only on the condition, of course that muriel maliki makes an official request to the white house By a letter from the prime minister And uh, it's very clear now that our maliki Is is uh not going to do that I would be very very surprised if uh before The end of of this year, there's a letter that goes to the white house requesting those troops to stay And there are at least three reasons for that.
One is that a maliki Has actually moved closer to iran Actually, you know Uh aligned, uh, I think even more openly with iran than he had before On the international politics of the middle east primarily because of saudi arabia's outrageous aggression in in barayn uh moving troops into barayn in order to aid the uh, the sunni, uh monarchy there in putting down violently a shia majority of Democratic movement, um and the the iranians as well as the iraqis were outraged by that but iraq a shia majority country, uh has very clearly, uh, Aligned itself with the iranian position against saudi arabia and and strongly supporting the shiite majority in In barayn and I think this has meant that it would be much more uh difficult and I think impossible for him to accept the presence of u.s.
Troops, even though He might feel that it would be in his interest in some other respects Uh in order to protect him from the possibility of a renewal of sunni insurgency And even possibly a war against the kurds Uh, but and and the iraqi military, by the way is very intent on having u.s Troops data for precisely that reason And i'm not at all.
Sure that uh al-maliki is going to Uh to survive 2011 because it's very possible that he might be overthrown By the iraqi military with uh, you know with the good wishes, of course of the u.s military But there's another reason of course and that is there's another reason that al-maliki Is not likely to make that request and that is that?
Muqtada al-sadr is back.
His movement is still very strong Once again, very strong particularly in the south And al-maliki needs him.
He's he's accepted him as a partner in the government.
He uh, Muqtada al-sadr controls 40, uh seats in the Uh in the uh, iraqi parliament and that those 40 seats are extremely important to al-maliki's Position as a prime minister And should he make the request?
It's very clear that muqtada al-sadr's Uh movement will try to unseat Nur al-maliki, so why is that very clear?
Well, I because of particularly recently there have been a some major Demonstrations by the sadrists in which they have read statements by muqtada al-sadr from iran Stating very clearly that they will not accept of any request for american troops American troops must leave before the end of this year if The troops stay then they will go on the war path once again and they have not stated explicitly that they're going to unseat al-maliki, but that is certainly the Certainly implicit in that set of circumstances Well, you know when you talk about the reverberation of what saudi arabia is doing in bahrain right now Uh in iraq and the import that that has for the future of the region I have to it reminds me of the wiki leaks and I have to go back to them where uh, king abdullah says To the americans.
I can't understand why you would get rid of saddam hussein.
The policy has always been It's you and me and him against the iranians to contain that iranian revolution and now really all that george bush and dick cheney did was reverse the policy of ronald reagan and import that iranian revolution to Iraq, which is not, you know completely under the thumb of the iranians But clearly it's in their orbit and and as you say is as everybody in the region Is watching king hamad khalifa in bahrain with the help of the saudis put down the shiite majority there And knowing that the americans are in on all of that all along as well Uh that only pushes them closer and closer to iran So I guess it really is going to come down to whether or not there's a coup d'etat in that country And which way they're going to go my main source on what the united states It was planning in iraq to to keep 15 to 20 000 troops again, of course Only on the proviso that maliki makes an official request my official my source in the iraqi, uh intelligence uh service on this Has told me that the americans from the iraqi point of view have completely underestimated the significance of of this saudi move Uh to the international politics of the region.
I mean they did not understand that this is going to alienate Very seriously the uh, the shiite government in iraq and push it closer to iran Uh, and and this I think uh is is just one more indication of the cluelessness of the The u.s.
Government with regard to iraq the degree to which it has continued to live in a sort of A wonderland of sort of wishes and dreams Rather than being basing its policy on objective reality Well, uh, you know, I wonder when it comes to kurdistan It seems like if they're going to be able to get anybody to invite them to stay at all I think you indicate in your article.
They're working on trying to entrench the third infantry division up there Our current secretary of state obama's opponent and the primaries hillary clinton said well We've got to at least keep air bases there Uh for the long term and I guess I wonder with all these competing interests Can we basically just flip a coin?
To try to figure out which side america will be on if iraq and kurdistan go to war over kirkuk well, I mean, I I think that if you know If what i'm suggesting in my article, uh is correct that the united states is not going to support anybody We're not going to be in a position Uh to uh to be a major factor in that Assuming it doesn't happen till after next december, right?
Yeah, I mean, I don't think it's going to happen this year um, although you know, it's possible that that there may be efforts by Uh certain people in in the iraqi power structure to to make that happen Uh, I mean that's that's again.
That's not out of the question.
Uh, but but Barring a coup d'etat in iraq Uh, I would not look for for the united states to be involved in a war there uh, but nevertheless that that is still a possibility, uh, because of the instability the uncertainty of What is going to happen to the al-maliki regime?
Uh, you know one thing that we can certainly Count on about iraq is that it's going to remain unstable for for years to come.
All right, everybody That is the heroic gareth porter Independent historian and journalist for interpress service.
That's ips news.net.
We run all of it at anti-war.com Slash porter.
Thanks very much for your time.
Thanks for having me again scott All right, everybody and that's the show for today anti-war radio.
We're here every friday from 6 30 to 7 On kpfk check out the archives of the show at anti-war.com/radio And at scott wharton show.com more than 1800 interviews going back through the years for you there And one more time check out gareth porter's articles at anti-war.com/porter pakistan moves to curb more aggressive drone strikes and spying And maliki's doubts threatened post 2011 iraq troop presence.
Thanks again to gareth and for all y'all to listen for for listening See you next week You
