Carlotta Gall Bandwagons Christine Fair

Sarah Khan

It needs no justification that Indian intelligence agency RAW has hired few writers of international reputation to defame Pakistan, its armed forces and its intelligence agency by writing and publishing articles based on mere propaganda. Writers working on Indian payroll include ex-CIA official Bruce Reidel, Professor at George Town University Christine Fair and NY Times Correspondent Carlotta Gall. Their writings usually follow same theme which is provided by their RAW masters. Their articles are mostly repetition of same old propaganda and their fake reporting always refers anonymous people. Their irrational writings have affected their reputation as objective neutral analyst.

Recently, Carlotta Gall has published article titled, “Pakistan’s Hand in the Rise of International Jihad” in one of the World’s leading newspaper The NY Times. As expected the theme was immediately picked up by Indian Newspapers and Indians carried out propaganda against Pakistan, continuously for two days time and again quoting Carlotta Gall and NY Times. Even Indian backed media in Pakistan i.e. Express Tribune also published the account of lies by Carlotta Gall on 08 February. As usual, this article is also based on fake reporting and anonymous references without any logical argument. The main argument of Gall in the recent article is role of ISI in creation of ISIS. Here is the truthful account of ISIS creation.

It has been widely published in Western media that CIA has played a key role in creation of ISIS. Probably, Ms. Gall has not read the accounts of so many Western writers on ISIS creation. Seumas Milne, a British journalist and political aide appointed as the Labour Party's Executive Director of Strategy and Communications published an article in The Guardian in June 2015 titled “Now the truth emerges: how the US fuelled the rise of Isis in Syria and Iraq”. He stated that reports were cited that MI6 had cooperated with the CIA on a “rat line” of arms transfers from Libyan stockpiles to the Syrian rebels in 2012 after the fall of the Gaddafi regime. A revealing light on how we got here has now been shone by a recently declassified secret US intelligence report, written in August 2012, which uncannily predicts – and effectively welcomes – the prospect of a “Salafist principality” in eastern Syria and an al-Qaida-controlled Islamic state in Syria and Iraq.

The Defense Intelligence Agency document identified al-Qaida in Iraq (which became Isis) and fellow Salafists as the “major forces driving the insurgency in Syria” – and states that “western countries and the Gulf states” were supporting the opposition’s efforts to take control of eastern Syria. Raising the “possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality”, the Pentagon report goes on, “this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime. A year into the Syrian rebellion, the US and its allies weren’t only supporting and arming an opposition they knew to be dominated by extreme sectarian groups; they were prepared to countenance the creation of some sort of “Islamic state” – despite the “grave danger” to Iraq’s unity.

Seumas Milne noted that US created ISIS, of course, though some of its Gulf allies certainly played a role in it – as the US vice-president, Joe Biden, acknowledged last year. But there was no al-Qaida in Iraq until the US and Britain invaded. And the US has certainly exploited the existence of ISIS against other forces in the region as part of a wider drive to maintain western control. US and western habit of playing with jihadi groups, which then come back to bite them, goes back at least to the 1980s war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, which fostered the original al-Qaida under CIA tutelage. Creation of ISIS was recalibrated during the occupation of Iraq, when US forces led by General Petraeus sponsored an El Salvador-style dirty war of sectarian death squads to weaken the Iraqi resistance. And it was reprised in 2011 in the Nato-orchestrated war in Libya, where Isis took control of Gaddafi’s home town of Sirte.

The fact that the CIA was actively working to help the Libyan rebels topple Gaddafi was no secret, https://sg.news.yahoo.com/cia-sends-teams-libya-us-considers-rebel-aid-20110331-065759-284.html nor were the airstrikes that Obama ordered against the Libyan government. http://articles.latimes.com/2011/mar/29/world/la-fg-obama-libya-20110329. With the assistance of U.S. and NATO intelligence and air support, the Libyan rebels captured Gaddafi and summarily executed him in the street. Now after Gaddafi was overthrown, the Libyan armories were looted, and massive quantities of weapons were sent by the Libyan rebels to Syria. The weapons, which included anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles were smuggled into Syria through Turkey. The times of London reported on the arrival of the shipment on September 14th, 2012. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/middleeast/article3537770.ece.

Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh released an article in April of 2014 http://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line which exposed a classified agreement between the CIA, Turkey and the Syrian rebels to create what was referred to as a “rat line”. The “rat line” was covert network used to channel weapons and ammunition from Libya, through southern Turkey and across the Syrian border. The US and its allies were now fully focused on taking down Assad’s government in Syria. As in Libya this regime change was to be framed in terms of human rights, and now overt support began to supplement the backdoor channels. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/25/world/middleeast/arms-airlift-to-syrian-rebels-expands-with-cia-aid.html?pagewanted=all The growing jihadist presence was swept under the rug and covered up. However as the rebels gained strength, the reports of war crimes and atrocities that they were committing began to create a bit of a public relations problem for Washington. It then became standard policy to insist that US support was only being given to what they referred to as “moderate” rebel forces. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/syria-civil-war-us-will-arm-moderate-rebels-says-barack-obama-confirming-use-of-chemical-weapons-by-president-bashar-alassads-regime-8658368.html

This is the account of creation of ISIS by Western writers. Carlotta Gall’s propaganda theme of Pakistan’s role in creation of ISIS has already been negated by the reports of US intelligence agencies including Defense Intelligence Agency. In reality, US and western policy in the Middle East is in the classic mould of imperial divide-and-rule. American forces bomb one set of rebels while backing another in Syria, and mount what are effectively joint military operations with Iran against ISIS in Iraq while supporting Saudi Arabia’s military campaign against Iranian-backed Houthi forces in Yemen.

During interaction with journalists, a US journalist stated that anti-Pakistan writings has become a best seller theme in USA because Indian lobby is very active in US. Carlotta Gall writings are a proof to it. Like her book, The Wrong Enemy, Carlotta Gall’s recent article is a tale of lies provided by RAW. It seems Carlotta Gall is trying to bandwagon Christine Fair who has lost her credibility especially after reports of her links with Baloch dissidents getting arms and finances from RAW to create instability in Balochistan province.