pakistan’s

involvement in violence in Indian-controlled Kashmir, of complicity in terrorist acts from New
Delhi to Mumbai to Kabul, and of duplicity in working both with and against the United States
in the war on terrorism. The ISI also has been known for the making and unmaking of civilian
governments since the late 1980s. 46
Both the United States and Pakistan are reaping the bitter harvest sowed by their premier spy
agencies in the 1980s in the Afghan jihad. Two generations of extremists and militants fired up with
the ideology of jihad—taught by the ISI during the Afghan and Kashmir operations—have played
havoc with Pakistan’s stability, security, economy, and culture. Most of the militant organizations
that now threaten Pakistan’s peace and sovereignty and terrorize its citizens—the TTP, LeT, Jaishe-Muhammad,
the Punjabi Taliban, and a host of Kashmir-centered militant groups—owe their
origins, directly or indirectly, to the ISI.
The civilian intelligence agencies complain that they are oten let out of the loop by the ISI in
matters concerning threats to national security. In many cases, information available to different
agencies is scattered, and no mechanism is in place for sharing intelligence with other agencies—a
classic case of turf wars. With this in mind, the Ministry of Interior, in its new national security
policy, decided to establish the Joint Intelligence Directorate for coordination and intelligence
sharing among the 26 intelligence agencies operating in the country. 47 It is doubtful, however, that
this new institution will have any teeth unless it is headed by a senior military officer who has the
confidence of the army chief. Still, in a situation in which even the ISI and Military Intelligence do
not usually see eye to eye on many issues and reportedly sometimes even work at cross-purposes,
it would be naive to think that the Joint Intelligence Directorate will become a real clearinghouse
of all intelligence in the country. 48
The dreaded Criminal Investigation Department of police in the provinces—the one that acted
as the eyes and ears of British rule at the district level—was the most important spy arm of the
government of Pakistan until the late 1960s. The department provided authorities with timely
information about suspicious activities, both of a criminal and a political nature. The gradual
decline and neglect of this important network that operated from the neighborhood to national
levels with its own army of informers has deprived the central government of a vital source of
information about terrorism and sectarian violence.
Concluding Remarks
I have argued in this essay that, despite a long history of political crises and socio-religious and
ethnic conflicts, as well as the fundamental structural weaknesses of governmental institutions,
the state of Pakistan has survived thanks to two structurally solid and self-consciously cohesive
institutions: the military and the civil bureaucracy. Although the predominant political
position of the military-bureaucratic oligarchy over the years undoubtedly thwarted political
46 General Hamid Gul, a former ISI chief, proudly takes credit for forming a political alliance of right-wing parties under the auspices of
the spy agency that brought Nawaz Sharif into power in the center for the first time. General Aslam Beg, a former chief of army staff, also
admitted in a hearing before the Supreme Court in 2010 that he asked the ISI to collect millions of rupees from private banks and businesses
to distribute among the politicians whose election campaigns were approved by the ISI.
47 “Security Policy to Focus on Agencies Coordination: Nisar,” Dawn, January 19, 2014, http://www.dawn.com/news/1081341.
48 Ali K. Chishti, “Intelligence Agencies & Civilian Supremacy,” Friday Times, May 20–26, 2011, http://www.thefridaytimes.com/20052011/
page6.shtml.
MAPPING PAKISTAN’S POLITICAL SUPERSTRUCTURE u AHMAD
29