Opinion: Pakistan’s military spokesman has Osama bin Laden ties

medium121074185In an age where perception management is very much a part of the information war that underlines kinetic action, Pakistan has added another feather to its terrorist cap by wheeling out its equivalent of ‘Baghdad Bob’ — the propagandist who claimed Iraq was on the verge of victory even as it was being decimated by the US.A small problem, though, for the smooth-talking Pakistani military spokesman Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry as he plies the familiar, discredited trope of “Pakistan is a frontline state in the war on terror / Pakistan is itself a victim of terrorism”: his father was a close associate of Osama bin Laden and came under the scrutiny of global terrorist watchdogs in the weeks after 9/11.Chaudhry, a three-star Lieutenant General in the Pakistan Army, is currently serving as the 22nd Director General of the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) and is the face of Pakistan’s official messaging in its spat with India. He has a difficult task on his hands.The global perception of Pakistan is that of a failed state that exports terror across the world, particularly to India, under a nuclear umbrella. It is an economic basket case that produces little of consequence, and its hair-trigger posture of waving its nuclear “bomb” has only enhanced its reputation as an irresponsible entity.In recent days, the international community has also been reminded of how almost every major terrorist attack in the world — from 9/11 to the London train bombings to the Mumbai 26/11 attacks — has had Pakistani fingerprints on it, causing Islamabad considerable embarrassment. It is a reminder that Pakistan is a frontline state — in fostering terrorism. medium nocaptionhttps://eoh.ikan3.com/3sw658_7hzteqpqoj/1kajFvmOpBVRQ2?2qxpm=9nqPVBjazTI0iYL7pY7Ssg add to that Chaudhry’s bin Laden connection. His father, Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, was a Pakistani nuclear scientist who began his career at the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) in the 1960s, working under Munir Ahmad Khan, one of the many fathers of Pakistan’s nuclear “bomb”.(AQ Khan got all the headlines because he was a publicity hog; he was just a glorified thief because he stole enrichment designs). Mahmood went on to become a key figure at the Kahuta Enrichment Plant (Khan Research Laboratories) and later served as project director for the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant and the Khushab Nuclear Complex.Mahmood retired in 1999 and went on to found an organisation called Ummah Tameer-e-Nau (UTN). Apparently, he was done with formal science, and his post-retirement work centred on, as someone put it felicitously, how to produce electricity from djinns after capturing them in the country founded by Djinnah. He wrote books about this and, at some point, trekked up to Afghanistan to meet bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri shortly before 9/11.US intelligence, which tracked bin Laden’s meetings after the 9/11 attacks, was alarmed when they discovered that bin Laden had met with a prominent Pakistani nuclear scientist. Mahmood was hauled in for interrogation by the CIA and FBI, with the assistance of the ISI. He claimed that he had only discussed humanitarian issues like food, health, and education with bin Laden.He was eventually released, although he was placed on an exit control list by Pakistan (as was AQ Khan) because the Pindi boys, of whom his son is now one, were afraid he would be seized by Western intelligence and might spill the beans.TOI+ complete coverage of Operation Sindoor here