Hamid Gul
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lieutenant General Hamid Gul (Urdū:حمید گل), is a retired Pakistani general famous for heading the Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistani intelligence agency, after the Soviet-Afghan War, and for instigating the Kashmir insurgency in 1989 with the support of mujahideen that fought in the Soviet-Afghan war.
Hamid Gul served as the director general of Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence during 1987-89, mainly in the time when Benazir Bhutto was Prime Minister of Pakistan. He was instrumental in the anti-Soviet support of the mujahideen in the Afghanistan War of 1979–89[1], a pivotal time during the Cold War, and in establishing the Taliban. He also was a vehement supporter of the Kashmir insurgency against India.[2]
Contents |
[edit] Army career
Hamid Gul was born in Sargodha, Punjab, and steadily rose to be the ISI chief succeeding General Akhtar Abdur Rahman in March 1987. He was later replaced as the ISI commander by PM Benazir Bhutto in May 1989 and Gul was transferred as the commander, II Corps in Multan. In this capacity, Gul conducted the Zarb-e-Momin military exercise in November-December 1989, the biggest Pakistani Armed Forces show of muscle since 1971 Indo-Pakistani War.
General Asif Nawaz upon taking the reins of Pakistan Army in August 1991, had Gul transferred as the DG Heavy Industries Taxila. A menial job compared to Gul's statute, Gul refused to take the assignment, an act for which he was retired from the army.[3]
[edit] Career as ISI Chief
[edit] Execution of failed Jalalabad operation
During his time as the DG ISI and the period when Afghanistan was under the control of DRA, former General Hamid Gul was blamed for planning and executing the operation to capture Jalalabad from the Soviet-supported Afghan Army in the spring of 1989. This switch to conventional warfare was seen as a mistake by some mujahideen leaders who considered that the mujahideen did not have the capacity to capture a major city. They advocated guerrilla warfare and evetually bringing down the communist regime. But the Pakistan Army was intent on installing a fundamentalist-dominated government in Afghanistan, with Jalalabad as their provisional capital, Abdul Rasul Sayyaf as Prime Minister, and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar as Foreign Minister.
[edit] Organization of IJI against PPP
During his tenure as ISI chief in 1988, General Gul successfully gathered right-wing politicians and helped them create Islami Jamhoori Ittehad, a religio-political conservative coalition against the left-leaning liberal Pakistan Peoples Party. He has recently acknowledged this fact in various interviews and for this he was harshly rebuked in one of editorials of a major Pakistani newspaper, which asked the general to apologize first to the PPP for having done the sordid deed and after that, apologizing for lack of wits because the IJI could not maintain its two-thirds majority for long.[4]
[edit] Kashmir Insurgency
[edit] Indian front
According to B Raman, an Indian strategic analyst, Gul actively backed Khalistani terrorism. "When Bhutto became prime minister in 1988," Raman says, "Gul justified backing these terrorists as the only way of preempting a fresh Indian threat to Pakistan's territorial integrity. When she asked him to stop playing that card, he reportedly told her: Madam, keeping Punjab destabilized is equivalent to the Pakistan army having an extra division at no cost to the taxpayers." "Gul strongly advocated supporting indigenous Kashmiri groups," adds Raman, "but was against infiltrating Pakistani and Afghan mercenaries into Jammu and Kashmir. He believed Pakistan would play into India's hands by doing so."[5]
[edit] Iranian front
In Islamabad, Gul asked that Iran should explain its bona fides regarding the pact signed with India to jointly counter terrorism. According to him, "Iran should come clear on the nature of agreement with India. Otherwise this will create doubts and apprehensions in Muslim Ummah that Iran helps RAW in putting down Kashmir jihad". He also added that in case doubts about the agreement came true and Iran was seen as working with India against "Kashmir freedom struggle", then it will be concluded that the country also supports Mossad, Israeli external intelligence agency.[6]
[edit] Turning Against America
General Gul worked closely with the CIA during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan when he was the ISI chief. But, he became passionately anti-American after the United States turned its back on Afghanistan following the 1989 Soviet withdrawal, as the United States had promised to help build a prosperous Afghanistan.[5] He was further disconcerted when the USA began punishing Pakistan with economic and military sanctions for its secret nuclear program. General Gul then went on to declare that "the Muslim world must stand united to confront the U.S. in its so-called War on Terrorism, which is in reality a war against Muslims. Let’s destroy America wherever its troops are trapped."[7]
General Gul personally met Osama Bin Laden in 1993 and refused to label him a terrorist unless and until irrefutable evidence was provided linking him to alleged acts of terrorism.[8]
[edit] Post-Army career
[edit] Solidarity with Osama bin Laden
According to Zahid Hussain, in his book Frontline Pakistan, Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul and former Army chief General Mirza Aslam Beg were part of the 9 January 2001 Darul Uloom Haqqania Islamic conference held near Peshawar, which was also attended by 300 leaders representing various radical Islamic groups. The meeting declared it a religious duty of Muslims all over the world to protect the Taliban government, and the Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden it was hosting, whom they considered as a 'great Muslim warrior.'[9]
[edit] Support for Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry
On March 12, 2007, Gul marched shoulder-to-shoulder with activists from the liberal democratic parties and retired former senior military officers against General Pervez Musharraf. General Gul faced down riot police when they tried to arrest him at a rally outside the Supreme Court in Islamabad protesting against attempts to dismiss Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry.[10]
[edit] Accusation by Benazir Bhutto
Days after the 2007 Karachi bombings, Benazir Bhutto in a letter to President Musharaf written on 16 October 2007 named Hamid Gul as one of the four persons including the current Intelligence Bureau (IB) Chief Ijaz Shah, the then chief minister of Punjab Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, then then chief minister of Sindh Arbab Ghulam Rahim, she suspected were behind the attacks.[11] Gul responded furiously to these claims. He was arrested on November 4 in Islamabad during President Pervez Musharraf's declared state of emergency.[12]
[edit] References
- ^ Afghanistan War Infoplease.com, July 22, 2007
- ^ Bhutto Conspiracy Theories Fill the Air Time Magazine, December 28, 2007
- ^ Ayaz Amir, "Another myth of independence" Dawn, 23 May, 2003
- ^ Editorial: What the generals must apologise for Daily Times, February 01, 2008
- ^ a b 'We are walking into the American trap' Rediff.com, February 12, 2004
- ^ ISI in Bangladesh Geocities.com, October 1, 2001
- ^ God will destroy America, says Hamid Gul Daily Times, August 30, 2003
- ^ Hamid Gul Interview with Tehelka.com Robert-fisk.com, September 14, 2001
- ^ Frontline Pakistan: The Struggle with Militant Islam by Zahid Hussain, Columbia University Press, 2007, page 81-82.
- ^ Pakistan dictator lashes at 'plotters' The Australian, March 19, 2007
- ^ Shakeel, Syed Faisal PPP demands probe based on Benazir’s letter Dawn Newspaper, December 30, 2007
- ^ Al Jazeera - Reactions To Pakistan Emergency Al Jazeera English, November 4, 2007
[edit] Bibliography
- Zahid Hussain. Frontline Pakistan: The Struggle with Militant Islam, New York: Columbia University Press, 2007.
- Husain Haqqani. Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military, Washington D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2005.
| Military offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Lt. General Akhtar Abdur Rahman |
Director General of the Inter-Services Intelligence 1987–1989 |
Succeeded by Lt. General (retd.) Shamsur Rehman Kallue |
