Two notes earlier than we begin.
One: The time period canary lure is borrowed from fiction. It was coined by Tom Clancy in his novel Patriot Video games. The counterintelligence technique it refers to is definitely referred to as a barium meal check and has been in observe for a very long time. It’s a easy premise, albeit efficient. Right here, we use the previous for its dramatic impact.
Two: This piece is written towards the backdrop of the hijacking of the Jaffar Specific in Balochistan which, regardless of a heroic rescue on the finish, has uncovered a few of our worst demons as a nation as soon as once more. These demons have been uncovered so many instances previously that a few of us have grow to be desensitised. However allow us to face it – on condition that these challenges now pose an existential menace, we are able to ignore them solely at the price of our survival. With these issues in thoughts, allow us to start.
We should always have identified one thing was awry a very long time in the past. Maybe when a categorized report on the autumn of East Pakistan was carried by an Indian newspaper. Or when the nation plunged headlong into the Kargil disaster with out forethought concerning the strategic penalties — it drove India and America into one another’s arms, in any case — and as a substitute of elevating nationwide safety flags, it was skilfully become a political disaster.
Or maybe when the hijacking of Indian Airways flight 814, aside from bringing undesirable international consideration, additionally led to the discharge of three males from an Indian jail who would go on to deal an almost lethal blow to the Kashmir trigger and this nation’s nationwide curiosity. And even within the shady circumstances during which the attorneys’ motion started and fizzled out, and the way readily many people allowed our minds to be hacked by it.
How are you aware when a system is hacked? When you’re locked out of it and can’t impact any significant change with out crashing the entire thing. This helplessness or lack of company additionally manifests itself in video video games. In video video games, such sequences are referred to as cutscenes, the place gameplay is interrupted by a sequence that momentarily takes management away from the gamer.
You might need scaled a mountain, however now you need to fall, face the implications, and there may be nothing you are able to do to cease it. However for our present function, hacking is a greater analogy, whereas cutscenes merely describe the sense of helplessness a participant faces in such conditions.
How are you aware when you’re hacked? Until, after all, you’re programmed to not discover it. Clearly, when you’re locked out of the system and don’t have any means to reaccess it.
It’s then that you simply realise {that a} thoughts extra organised and resourceful than yours – maybe a hive thoughts – has overtaken the system. Now, use this analogy to look at our current historical past and suppose: what number of cutscenes have you ever encountered? Too many, I might say. If you’re , a separate piece could be organized to record all such occasions. Proper now, we are going to solely work with those that play a direct function in our narrative.
Whereas one would comply with the aforementioned developments and surprise, it was the 2014 sit-in that captured this scribe’s consideration. These have been prickly instances. Peacenik Manmohan Singh was voted out of energy in India, and hawkish Narendra Modi assumed energy in Might 2014. After a decade in energy, Hamid Karzai was on his means out. His ascent to energy had are available dramatic trend when a extra established chief, Commander Abdul Haq of Hizb-e-Islami, was hanged by the Taliban throughout an try and incite a preferred rebellion, whereas an obscure graduate of Himachal Pradesh College managed to outlive whereas pulling off an identical feat.
Throughout his tenure, Karzai had tried to sidestep Pakistan as a land path to India by working with Tehran to develop a street hyperlink between Kabul and Chabahar port. The one downside was that Iran was beneath sanctions, and Pakistan was already aggressively hawking the strategic location of Gwadar. Whereas the Iran nuclear deal was being negotiated, the prospect of a China-Pakistan financial hall utilizing Gwadar as the point of interest may have severely compromised the strategic benefit of the Kabul-Chabahar route. At the moment, cutscenes performed out in Pakistan.
A temperamental main journalist who had just lately used aggressive language towards Gen Musharraf was shot and injured in Karachi. His brother quickly appeared on the main information channel and blamed the serving DG ISI. Then got here the cutscene of Mannequin City. And eventually, we obtained a protracted sit-in that delayed the Chinese language president’s go to and the announcement of CPEC.
In the meantime, in a single televised speech, Tahir Qadri — a number one gentle of the sit-in motion — flashed an image on the display, claiming that he had acquired it earlier than it was launched to the press. It was a picture of Narendra Modi and President Xi sitting within the former’s ancestral residence in Gujarat. Qadri then proceeded to reward him for instance of an amazing chief.
The truth that this didn’t set off alarm bells was an excessive amount of for me. It was then that I began asking mates within the enterprise who weren’t too hooked up to both aspect to hold out sniff assessments. Provided that privileged state data quickly began leaking like a faucet, this train morphed into barium meal assessments. Elsewhere, I requested OSINT specialists to maintain a pocket book and a pen and take meticulous notes of all the pieces shady. They quickly turned up with mountains of knowledge. Thus started a decade-long quest for fact.
The 2014 disaster was averted as a result of Gen Raheel Sharif was very fashionable with the lots. Earlier than Common Bajwa took workplace, nevertheless, a marketing campaign had already begun to defame him. That severely impacted his capacity to manage parts. Whether or not he couldn’t management them or gave in to look in management is a dialogue for one more day. However then got here six lengthy years, throughout which paradox after paradox emerged, severely trapping Pakistan in gridlocked crises.
All this dialogue is supposed to point out you that we want a dispassionate audit — on the very least — of the previous decade. As a personal citizen, I’ve sufficient information to consider that we now have been hacked.
The following query is: by whom?
Good query. Superb query.
Who has the wherewithal and the intent? CIA, MI6 or RAW? The primary two have the wherewithal, however right here is the issue – they’ve additionally been hacked, with the assistance of Netanyahu’s Islamophobia.
This solely leaves India.
I do know it’s exhausting to consider. However that is the consensus of the specialists I’ve labored with. This additionally explains why each terrorist that strikes on this nation is best knowledgeable than any of us.
There’s a higher proof of this pudding out there — an across-the-board and dispassionate counterintelligence sweep, coupled with cruel accountability of everybody concerned.
With out this, no matter you achieve as we speak can be thrown away by your successors tomorrow.
The enemy’s hive thoughts will see to it.