Daily Times

Intelligence has been defined in many ways. Some define it as the ability to learn about, learn from, understand and interact, but Michael Herman (2011) understands that intelligence is a classified knowledge that support its own state’s information security by advising on and setting standard of defensive, protective security measures. In his recent book, he describes intelligence in these words: “Intelligence supply assessments of intelligence threat; engages in counter espionage; and seeks evidence of hostile countries’ intelligence successes through counterintelligence penetrations of their organisations.” In the case of Afghan intelligence agencies, we observed that they never adopted these and other measures of intelligence and counterintelligence to lead the government in positive directions.

The stories of the failure of Afghan intelligence agencies and their political and religious affiliations and loyalties have badly affected military strategies and counter insurgency measures of NATO and US intelligence circles; secret political and military reports are feared to have gone into the hands of war criminals, regional states and the Taliban insurgents. As per the nature of their controversial work, Afghan agents belong to various ethnic and political groups; therefore, they are bound to report to their masters. Like the Afghan police and army, intelligence network has also been divided between states, warlords, NGOs and foreign intelligence agencies. On July 13, 2012, Khaama Press reported that intelligence organisations of neighbouring states had acquired Afghan intelligence cards and operated independently.

There are many sections within the intelligence agencies; some report about the NATO, US, UK and ISAF military activities to the Taliban; some report to ‘war criminals’; some report to Karim Khalili; some report to the vice president and leader of the Northern Alliance and some report to Iran and Pakistan. An addition to the political and ethnic influence of the Taliban and the former Mujahedeen war criminals in KHAD, the influence of foreign intelligence networks is further making the task of the agency controversial. Recently, a source within the agency told me that the leakage of many important political and military reports has put in danger the lives of many Afghan and NATO soldiers. From a membership card to important intelligence reports, everything is for sale cheaply.

All players in the battlefield use Afghan intelligence for their own purposes while the recruitment of its members on ethnic basis is more worrisome. Experts say that this is the main cause of the failure of the Afghan, US and NATO forces in undermining insurgency and terrorism in Afghanistan. Mujahedeen, Taliban, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, India, China and Russia play their own roles. Afghan intelligence is playing a double game, providing false information to international community about the military plans of insurgents. The former Pakistani president Musharraf once alleged that Afghan intelligence was being used by the RAW against Pakistan. “Afghan intelligence, the Afghan president and the Afghan government don’t talk of them. I know what they do. They, by design, mislead the world…The Afghan intelligence is entirely under the influence of Indian intelligence. We know that.” Mr Musharraf said.

After the US intervention in 2001, General Hamid Gul says that the Afghan government along with CIA, RAW and FBS formed a new intelligence agency (RAMA) to use it against the regional states. Russia, the US and India provide training to its members. The agency is divided among three states and works on three different directives. According to the Glob and Mail report: “A member of Afghan intelligence service boasted to Canadian military officers in the spring of last year that his organisation was able to ‘torture’ or ‘beat’ prisoners during the course of its investigations.” On December 17 last year, President Karzai authorised the intelligence agencies to torture prisoners in prisons but his new decree further imperilled the rights of prisoners.

Like his predecessors, the present Afghan intelligence chief is a known ‘war criminal’ who tortured innocent civilians in the Kandahar province. In a recent CNN report, President Karzai has been criticised for his appointment: “The man tapped as Afghanistan’s next intelligence chief faces allegations of drug trafficking and torture.” In September 2012, the Human Rights Watch allegedly reported the appointment of the alleged war criminal Assadullah Khalid as worrisome as KHAD already has a long and well-documented history of torture of detainees.

The way intelligence works is a joke. Appointments on political and ethnic bases are an irksome story. No professional measures of intelligence are adopted; every sectarian and ethnic member of the agency is bound to report his leader, not to help the state in fighting Taliban insurgency. In his well-written book, Michael Herman understands, “We have already seen how national intelligence can be used for mediation and conflict resolution, including such means as its provision to potential antagonists as a stabilising measure; its use in international cooperation on counter terrorism and limiting international arms transfer; and the verification of arms control and other international agreements. Afghan intelligence with its non-professional strategies and security measures, never served the interests of the Afghan state, it served the interest of other states”. KHAD is known for the torture and killing of innocent Afghans in the 1980s and 1990s while murders and illegal means of interrogation are still part of the intelligence infrastructure.

In October 2012, a radicalised member of the Afghan intelligence blew himself up using a suicide vest, killing two US soldiers and four Afghan intelligence men. This is a new and secret tactic of war against the US and NATO forces. The prominent Afghan intellectual and historian, Muhammad Hassan Kakar, in his research book (1982-2004) complains, “The Afghan society may now be regarded a murderous society. The sad thing about it is that there is no investigation for murder cases. Human life has become the life of sparrow, and the principle that might is right dominates. In the past, murder cases were investigated not only among the people where the murder had taken place but also among neighbours, who were summoned to the security centres for questioning. In this way social conscience against murder was awakened.”

The writer is author of Policing in Multicultural Britain, can be reached atzai.musakhan222@gmail.com