In announcing his new Afghanistan and Pakistan policy, President Barack Obama articulated "a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and to prevent their return to either country in the future."
This is a sound conception of both the threat and U.S. interests in the region. Mr. Obama took a giant step beyond the Bush administration's "Afghanistan policy" when he named the issue "AfPak" -- Afghanistan, Pakistan and their shared, Pashtun-populated border. But this is inverted. We suggest renaming the policy "PakAf," to emphasize that, from the perspective of U.S. interests and regional stability, the heart of the problem lies in Pakistan.
The fundamental question about Afghanistan is this: What vital national interest does the U.S. have there? President George W. Bush offered an ever-expanding answer to this question. As he once put it, America's goal is "a free and peaceful Afghanistan," where "reform and democracy" would serve as "the alternatives to fanaticism, resentment and terror."
In sharp contrast, during the presidential campaign Mr. Obama declared that America has one and only one vital national interest in Afghanistan: to ensure that it "cannot be used as a base to launch attacks against the United States." To which we would add the corollary: that developments in Afghanistan not undermine Pakistan's stability and assistance in eliminating al Qaeda.
Consider a hypothetical. Had the terrorist attacks of 9/11 been planned by al Qaeda from its current headquarters in ungoverned areas of Pakistan, is it conceivable that today the U.S. would find itself with 54,000 troops and $180 billion committed to transforming medieval Afghanistan into a stable, modern nation?
For Afghanistan to become a unitary state ruled from Kabul, and to develop into a modern, prosperous, poppy-free and democratic country would be a worthy and desirable outcome. But it is not vital for American interests.
After the U.S. and NATO exit Afghanistan and reduce their presence and financial assistance to levels comparable to current efforts in the Sudan, Somalia or Bangladesh, one should expect Afghanistan to return to conditions similar to those regions. Such conditions are miserable. They are deserving of American and international development and security assistance. But, as in those countries, it is unrealistic to expect anything more than a slow, difficult evolution towards modernity.
The problem in Pakistan is more pressing and direct. There, the U.S. does have larger vital national interests. Top among these is preventing Pakistan's arsenal of nuclear weapons and materials from falling into the hands of terrorists such as Osama bin Laden. This danger is not hypothetical -- the father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb, A.Q. Khan, is now known to have been the world's first nuclear black marketer, providing nuclear weapons technology and materials to Libya, North Korea and Iran.
Protecting Pakistan's nuclear arsenal requires preventing radical Islamic extremists from taking control of the country.
Furthermore, the U.S. rightly remains committed to preventing the next 9/11 attack by eliminating global terrorist threats such as al Qaeda. This means destroying their operating headquarters and training camps, from which they can plan more deadly 9/11s.
The counterterrorism strategy in Pakistan that has emerged since last summer offers our best hope for regional stability and success in dealing a decisive blow against al Qaeda and what Vice President Joe Biden calls "incorrigible" Taliban adherents. But implementing these operations requires light U.S. footprints backed by drones and other technology that allows missile attacks on identified targets. The problem is that the U.S. government no longer seems to be capable of conducting covert operations without having them reported in the press.
This will only turn Pakistani public opinion against the U.S. Many Pakistanis see covert actions carried out inside their country as America "invading an ally." This makes it difficult for Pakistani officials to support U.S. operations while sustaining widespread popular support.
As Mr. Biden has warned: "It is hard to imagine a greater nightmare for America than the world's second-largest Muslim nation becoming a failed state in fundamentalists' hands, with an arsenal of nuclear weapons and a population larger than Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and North Korea combined."
Avoiding this nightmare will require concentration on the essence of the challenge: Pakistan. On the peripheries, specifically Afghanistan, Mr. Obama should borrow a line from Andrew Jackson from the battle of New Orleans and order his administration to "elevate them guns a little lower."
Monday, March 30, 2009
Terrorists risk Pakistan's future
Article from: The Australian
KARACHI: The assault yesterday on a police school and a wave of spectacular attacks underline Pakistan's weakness and the danger posed by Islamist militants to the future of the nuclear-armed nation.The commando-style assault on the training ground transformed a normally peaceful commuter belt near Pakistan's cultural capital of Lahore into a war zone, leaving as many as 35 people dead in pitched battles with the security forces.Analysts said the attack was a defiant message to US President Barack Obama, who has put Pakistan at the heart of the fight against al-Qa'ida, tripling US aid in a strategy that is aimed at reversing the war in neighbouring Afghanistan.Such is the scale of violence in the Muslim nation that Mr Obama called al-Qa'ida and its allies "a cancer that risks killing Pakistan from within", and he urged Islamabad to demonstrate its commitment to eradicating the extremists.Mutahir Shaikh, an international relations expert at the University of Karachi, said the wave of attacks were a response to the US stand."The terrorists want to tell Obama and his Western allies they cannot be contained as Obama desired, and are still as powerful and strong as they have been for years now," Professor Shaikh said. "The attack proves the weakness of the state institutions and shows that a mere half-a-dozen professionally trained terrorists can take anyone hostage and occupy any establishment they like."Urban terrorism is now in vogue in our major cities."
Yesterday's attack mimicked the March 3 assault on Sri Lanka's cricket team in Lahore, where assailants on foot carrying backpacks of high-energy food and hand weapons killed eight Pakistanis and wounded seven members of the cricket squad.
Extremists opposed to the Pakistan Government's decision to side with the US in the war on terror have carried out a spate of bombings and other attacks that have killed nearly 1700 people in less than two years."This is further evidence of the growing threat of terrorism to Pakistan's state and society," security analyst Hasan Askari said after yesterday's assault."These groups want to paralyse the system of state in order to have greater freedom to pursue their ideological and political agenda inside and outside Pakistan," he said."An isolated Pakistan will be easily overwhelmed by terrorists, which the world should not allow them to do."Much of the unrest has been concentrated in the northwest, where the Pakistani army has been fighting the Taliban and al-Qa'ida. On Friday, a suicide bomber ripped through a packed mosque near the Afghan border, killing nearly 50 people.But the second attack in the Lahore area this month will fan fears that the net of violence is spreading."Such attacks again prove that all the outside world's security fears about Pakistan's lack of governance are true," said Tauseef Ahmed Khan, an academic at Karachi's Urdu University."These repeated attacks show total failure on the part of the Government's law-enforcement agencies and intelligence agencies. Pakistan's future is at massive risk."Pakistan shelters a number of extremist groups, spanning banned Islamist organisations fighting for independence from Indian rule in Kashmir in the east, to the Taliban and al-Qa'ida in the west.Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik hinted that home-grown militant groups were behind yesterday's raid."Who is supporting them? Who is giving them weapons? Everyone knows these banned organisations, namely Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad," Mr Malik told the private-sector Geo television channel.Top officials in the US, Pakistan's key ally, have openly accused elements in the country's powerful intelligence agency of abetting al-Qa'ida.
"What we need to do is try to help the Pakistanis understand these groups are now an existential threat to them and we will be there as a steadfast ally for Pakistan," US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Sunday.
Petraeus: Military Reserves 'Right of Last Resort' for Threats Inside Pakistan
The U.S. military will reserve the "right of last resort" to take out threats inside Pakistan, but it would prefer to enable the Pakistani military to do the job itself, Gen. David Petraeus said Monday in an exclusive interview with FOX News.
The commander of U.S. Central Command was interviewed as the Obama administration prepares to step up the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
Asked about lingering concerns that Pakistan is not fully on board, Petraeus told FOX News' Bret Baier that the U.S. military is putting "additional focus" on rooting out ties between Pakistan's intelligence service and the Taliban.
One incident of obvious cooperation between the Pakistani intelligence community and extremists has already been uncovered, he said. "There is a case in the past year or so that we think was unambiguous. There appears to have been a warning prior to a Pakistani operation," Petraeus said.
But he said trust between the two countries will be key as President Obama seeks more Pakistani cooperation and calls for billions in aid to the country.
"I think we are building that kind of trust. And that's the way I think is the best description for that. And it's hugely important that that trust be built," Petraeus said, pointing to "gradually increasing intelligence sharing" among Afghan, Pakistani and U.S. forces along the border.
Obama, in unveiling his regional plan for Afghanistan and Pakistan on Friday, said the U.S. will "insist that action be taken, one way or another, when we have intelligence about high-level terrorist targets."
He added on Sunday that "we're going after" such targets, though the U.S. will need to work with Pakistan's government to do so. He did not specifically say U.S. troops could be sent into the country.
Asked about the president's comments, Petraeus signaled that all options would be on the table.
"I think we would never give up, if you will, the right of last resort if we assess something as a threat to us, noting that what we want to do is enable the Pakistanis, help them, assist them to deal with the problem that we now think, and their leaders certainly now think, represents the most important existential threat to their country, not just to the rest of the world," he said.
The Pakistanis have expressed frustration over unmanned U.S. drone strikes to take out terrorist targets inside their border.
But Petraeus said the U.S. is mindful of perceptions in the region.
"It's hugely important that we be seen as good neighbors, as friends, certainly fierce warriors who will go after the enemy and stay after them -- but also as individuals who try to avoid civilian casualties whenever possible and are seen again as supporting the people and trying to help them achieve a better life," Petraeus said, specifically referring to the fight on the Afghan side of the border.
On the Pakistani side, Petraeus acknowledged an effort to put a halt to any collaboration between Taliban members and individuals in Pakistani intelligence.
"There are some relationships that continue. It is not as clear as one would like. There's certainly additional focus on that," Petraeus said. "Obviously, we've had these conversations with our counterparts (in Pakistan)."
Obama has announced that he's sending 21,000 more troops to Afghanistan and is requesting $1.5 billion a year for the next five years in aid for Pakistan -- he is also planning to call for $2.8 billion just for Pakistan's military.
As to threats elsewhere in the region, Petraeus said Iran is still "some years away" from a nuclear weapon.
"They have low-enriched uranium that is about the amount that would be required perhaps to make a weapon, but there are many, many more steps that are required.
You have to highly enrich it," he said. "But are they a threat? Certainly."
Petraeus also dismissed online speculation that he is considering a run for office (the speculation was fueled by a posting, later revealed to be a joke, that he is planning a 2010 speaking engagement at the University of Iowa).
"I do not (have interest in running for office)," Petraeus said. "Not at all. And I've tried to say that on numerous occasions."
He said he's not heading to Iowa.
TIMELINE-Attacks destabilise strife-torn Pakistan
Militants holed up in a police training centre in the Pakistani city of Lahore on Monday after storming the complex and killing cadets, with estimates of the dead ranging up to 20.Militant violence has surged in nuclear-armed Pakistan since mid-2007, with numerous attacks on security forces and government and Western targets. Following is a timeline of major attacks in Pakistan since late 2007:
Oct. 19, 2007 - At least 139 people are killed in a suicide bomb attack on former prime minister Benazir Bhutto's motorcade as she is driven through the financial capital of Karachi at the end of eight years of exile. She was unhurt.
Dec. 21 - A suicide bomber kills at least 41 people in a mosque in Charsadda district, in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), during the Muslim Eid festival prayers.
Dec. 27 - Bhutto is killed in a gun and bomb attack after a rally in northern garrison town of Rawalpindi. At least 16 others are killed.
Feb. 29, 2008 - A suicide attack on a police funeral kills 40 people in the turbulent northwestern district of Swat, 160 km (100 miles) from Pakistan's capital, Islamabad.
March 2 - At least 40 people are killed as suicide bomber attacks gathering of tribal elders in Darra Adam Khel, a northwestern tribal region.
March 11 - Two suicide car bombers kill 24, most of them in an attack on a government security office in the country's second largest city, Lahore, near the Pakistan-India border.
March 15 - A bomb attack at an Italian restaurant in Islamabad, a favourite hangout for foreigners, kills a Turkish woman and wounds several others, including four FBI agents.
Aug. 19 - Suspected suicide bomber kills 23 in compound of hospital in Dera Ismail Khan in the NWFP, southwest of Islamabad, as Shi'ite Muslims protest a leader's killing.
Aug. 21 - Two suicide bombers blow themselves up outside the main defence industry complex in Wah, 30 km (18 miles) northwest of Islamabad. Nearly 50 people are killed and about 70 wounded.
Sept. 20 - Suicide truck bomb attack blamed on Islamist militants kills 55 people, destroys Marriott hotel in Islamabad.
Dec. 5 - A car bomb kills at least 20 people and wounds scores in Peshawar, capital of NWFP.
Dec. 28 - At least 30 people are killed in a suicide car bomb blast at a polling station near Buner, in the NWFP, during a by-election for a provincial assembly.
Feb. 5, 2009 - At least 24 people are killed in a suspected suicide bombing near Shi'ite mosque in Dera Ghazi Khan, central Pakistan.
Feb. 20 - Suicide bomber kills 27 people and wounds 65 in an attack on a funeral procession for a Shi'ite Muslim killed a day earlier in Dera Ismail Khan.
March 3 - Gunmen attack a bus carrying Sri Lanka's cricket team outside a Lahore stadium, killing seven people, including six policemen, and wounding six of the cricketers and a British coach.
March 7 - Eight Pakistani police and soldiers are killed in a booby-trapped car bomb attack on a police van on the outskirts of the northwestern city of Peshawar.
March 16 - A bomb explodes near a bus stop in Rawalpindi, killing seven people.
March 27 - A suicide bomber kills 37 people when he blows himself up in a crowded Pakistani mosque near the Afghan border. Among the dead are 14 policemen and paramilitary soldiers.
March 30 - Militants armed with guns and grenades storm a police training centre in Lahore.
Lahore terrorist strike
The lethal terrorist strike on the Lahore police training school manifests chillingly the damning unpreparedness of the state to face up to a vicious monstrosity threatening its very existence. Not just that the strike came within days of a deadly attack on Sri Lankan cricketers not far off from this police academy in the city, whose perpetrators escaped scot-free and remain still at large. It was yet another security establishment to bear a daring terrorist assault. Over the time, terrorists have been systematically attacking security targets, supposed to be highly protected. They have struck military cantonments, training centres and various other establishments. Spared they have not even state intelligence apparatus’ key facilities. The ISI has been so attacked. Even the GHQ in Rawalpindi bore their wickedness in close vicinity. In Lahore itself, a naval college and the FIA complex were attacked. Doesn’t this reflect a method to their madness? Isn’t the intent more than evident that they want to degrade the state security apparatus in the people’s eye, erode their trust in it, demoralise the apparatus itself, and emasculate the state from inside so destructively as to survive? Then, why is the state top hierarchy acting so lackadaisically, showing itself to be out of its depth, just vacillating between certainty and uncertainty without conviction? Internal security czar Rehman Malik is routinely given to ascribing instantly every terrorist assault to Baitullah Mehsud’s brigands, without ever substantiating his charge. And since the Mumbai strike, his usual suspect is Lashkar-e-Taiba. At times, he alludes to a “foreign hand”. But with certainty he speaks not even long after a terrorist act. But even if he is right on his assertion of local militants’ involvement, the question he never answers is as to who is training, arming and bankrolling these thugs, without which they cannot attack and kill a lamb, what to talk of taking on a security establishment? Nor do those intellectual lights, gracing nightly media’s talk shows. They think big, they talk big, and such a “petty thing” registers not on their high minds. What agitates them troublingly is what they euphemistically call our military establishment’s “strategic depth” in Afghanistan and its “extraterritorial interest” in the Indian-occupied Kashmir. Their argumentation’s upshot is that this establishment is harbouring its proxies in its obscure havens for its ventures in Afghanistan and Kashmir; and it is these touted proxies of theirs they point their finger at for every terrorist act in the country. But is it really plausible that the military establishment trains, arms and bankrolls these proxies and unleashes on its own people to kill and maim them? This bunk has gone too long; it must now cease. Too much is at stake. This country’s very existence is at great risk, presently enmeshed as it is precariously in the throes of an international conspiracy. The fountainhead of this diabolical conspiracy lays in Afghanistan where it is being spearheaded by America’s CIA in league with India’s RAW, Israel’s Mossad and Afghanistan’s Northern Alliance-dominated intelligence agency, Central Directorate of Security. And Islamabad’s top hierarchy too must come out of its sweet delusion about Obama administration’s benign hand on its back. The mere carrot of $7.5 billion in aid that this administration has dangled before it has transported this hierarchy in a binge of song and dance. But it has just to listen to President Barack Obama’s imperial tone about Pakistan in his latest American television channel, talking of us as if we are no self-respecting people but another Puerto Rico, an American protectorate. In the American lexicon, this hierarchy must know, there is no free lunch. And for this aid, we have to barter away our independence, living in subjugation of America’s will and diktats, giving our army and the ISI to the subordination of Pentagon and the CIA. And if with an orchestrated vociferous vilification campaign they have discredited the Pakistan army and the ISI to be their credible partners in Afghanistan, worse is to come. While they have already embraced India warmly as their real partner in Afghanistan and helped it massively to embed there menacingly to us, they are now toying with the Indian army’s induction there as well. Their top soldier Admiral Mike Mullen has publicly stated India has a military role in Afghanistan. The Indian army chief too has spoken of it. So the Islamabad establishment must come out of its delusions, see what the country is up against, and think out how to cope with surging terrorism having its roots across our borders, and act to counter it bravely.
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Dated: Tuesday,March 31, 2009, Rabi-us-Sani 03, 1430 A.H.
Saved from: http://www.thefrontierpost.com/News.aspx?ncat=ed&nid=286&ad=31-03-200
Dated: Tuesday,March 31, 2009, Rabi-us-Sani 03, 1430 A.H.
Wave of attacks in Pakistan imperils state’s future
KARACHI: Monday's assault on a police school and a wave of spectacular attacks underlines Pakistan's weakness and the danger posed by militants to the future of the nuclear-armed nation, analysts said.The commando-style assault on the training ground transformed a normally peaceful commuter belt near Pakistan's cultural capital Lahore into a war zone, leaving at least 20 people dead in pitched battles with security forces.Analysts said the attack was a firm message to US President Barack Obama, who has put Pakistan at the heart of the fight against al-Qaeda, tripling US aid in a strategy aimed at reversing the war in neighbouring Afghanistan.Such is the scale of violence in the Muslim nation that Obama called al-Qaeda and its allies 'a cancer that risks killing Pakistan from within' and urged Islamabad to demonstrate its commitment to eradicating extremists.'Terrorists want to tell Obama and his western allies that they cannot be contained as Obama desired and are still as powerful and strong as they have been for years now,' said Mutahir Shaikh, an international relations expert.'The attack also proves the weakness of state institutions and shows that a mere half a dozen professionally trained terrorists can take anyone hostage and occupy any establishment they like,' he added.Monday's attack mimicked the March 3 assault on Sri Lanka's cricket team in Lahore, where assailants on foot carrying back packs of high-energy food and hand weapons killed eight Pakistanis and wounded seven members of the squad.'Urban terrorism is now in vogue in our major cities,' said Shaikh, a professor at the University of Karachi.Extremists opposed to the Pakistan government's decision to side with the United States in its 'war on terror' have carried out a spate of bombings and other attacks that have killed nearly 1,700 people in less than two years.'This is further evidence of the growing threat of terrorism to Pakistan's state and society,' security analyst Hasan Askari told AFP after Monday's assault.'These groups want to paralyse the system of state in order to have greater freedom to pursue their ideological and political agenda inside and outside Pakistan,' he said.'An isolated Pakistan will be easily overwhelmed by terrorists, which the world should not allow them to do.'Much of the unrest has been concentrated in the northwest, where the army has been fighting Taliban and al-Qaeda. On Friday, a suicide bomber ripped through a packed mosque near the Afghan border, killing around 50 people.But the second attack in the Lahore area this month will fan fears that the net of violence is spreading.'Such attacks again prove that all the outside world's security fears about Pakistan's lack of governance are true,' said Tauseef Ahmed Khan, an academic at Karachi's Urdu University.'These repeated attacks show total failure on the part of the government's law enforcement agencies and intelligence agencies. Pakistan's future is at massive risk,' he said.Pakistan shelters a litany of extremist groups, spanning banned outfits fighting for independence from Indian rule in Kashmir in the east, to Taliban and al-Qaeda in the west.Interior ministry chief Rehman Malik hinted that home-grown militant groups were behind Monday's raid.'Who is supporting them? Who is giving them weapons? Everyone knows these banned organisations, namely Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, Lashkar-i-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-i-Mohammad,' he told a private television channel.Top officials in Pakistan's key US ally have openly accused elements in the country's powerful intelligence agency of abetting al-Qaeda.'What we need to do is try and help the Pakistanis understand these groups are now an existential threat to them and we will be there as a steadfast ally for Pakistan,' US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Sunday.
Mission accomplished; forces overpower Manawan attackers
Security forces on Monday overpowered attackers who besieged a police academy and declared victory as scores of policemen took up position on the rooftop of the centre.Ambulances raced in and out of the compound at top-speed ferrying casualties to hospital. The road outside the academy, just outside the city of Lahore, was clogged with ambulances, onlookers and army vehicles.The army cordoned off the entire area and prevented reporters from going inside the compound, as a military helicopter flew overhead at low altitude.At least three bearded men in vests put their hands in the air and surrendered to the small group of armed security forces and commandos on the rooftop of the main academy building just outside the city of Lahore.The forces shouted "Allahu Akbar" (God is greater), flashed V for victory signs and pumped bullets into the air, a traditional sign of celebration, nearly eight hours after attackers stormed the compound.A crowd of several hundred people gathered near the training centre at the conclusion of the operation shouting "long live the Pakistan army".A five-minute walk away, a horse lay motionless on the road, apparently dead, an AFP reporter said.Police officer Babar Baluch told AFP that he had been inside the training camp during the operation."I saw eight to 10 bodies," he said but there was no top-level confirmation of the overall death toll.Two isolated gunshots rang out in the vicinity of the centre in the first 30 minutes after the security forces declared victory, said an AFP reporter.
Pakistan blames Taliban-allied militants in Lahore attack
Elite army and paramilitary troops battle for eight hours with gunmen who overran a police academy outside Lahore. About 20 people are dead, including at least four of the assailants.
Pakistani authorities Monday blamed Taliban-linked militants for a daylong assault on a police academy outside the eastern city of Lahore that left about 20 people dead, including at least four of the assailants.In a chillingly methodical strike, heavily armed gunmen stormed the training center as recruits gathered for morning drills. The assailants held off elite army and paramilitary troops for nearly eight hours before finally being overpowered. At least three of the attackers blew themselves up as troops overran their last stronghold, an upper floor in the compound's main building. Afterward, black-clad Pakistani commandos chanted "God is great!" and fired off rounds of celebratory gunfire.The audacious attack was yet another sign of the intensifying turmoil in Pakistan, considered a crucial U.S. ally in the fight against Islamic militants even though the year-old civilian government has been struggling to stay in control. President Obama declared last week that quelling the insurgency in Pakistan was key to success in the war in neighboring Afghanistan. He tied the continuation of U.S. aid to progress in confronting the militants. The assault on the police compound, which began about 8 a.m., was swift and sudden. Pakistani news reports cited witnesses as saying that the gunmen, some in civilian dress and some in what appeared to be police uniforms, hit the lightly guarded compound from several directions at once, hurling grenades and gunning down police cadets on the compound's parade ground. After initial confusion, hundreds of army and paramilitary troops, including elite Rangers, were rushed to the scene. The Dawn news television channel reported that a helicopter was hit by assailants' gunfire as it flew in troops, but managed to land safely.Shortly before 4 p.m., acting Interior Minister Rehman Malik announced that authorities had regained control of the compound. He told reporters later that the attackers were linked to Baitullah Mahsud, commander of Pakistan's Taliban movement.About 90 people were reported hurt, with many of the wounded trapped inside for hours as the battle raged around them. Some police trainees said they leaped from windows to escape, or scaled the compound's high walls to get away.At one point, the assailants appeared to repel an armored personnel carrier that tried to enter the compound. The provincial governor, Salman Taseer, described the chaotic events as a "total siege."It was the second major attack within a month in Lahore, the cosmopolitan capital of Punjab province and once considered a relatively peaceful corner of the country. On March 3, six police guards and a bus driver were killed when gunmen attacked the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team.Monday's attack was also reminiscent of the November onslaught in Mumbai, when teams of gunmen hit luxury hotels and other sites around India's commercial capital in a series of coordinated strikes, leaving nearly 170 people dead.In Lahore, the police trainees who were in the compound as the attack unfolded described an operation almost military in its precision."They kept on spraying bullets at us without stopping, and I saw many of my colleagues getting hit, crying out and falling to the ground," said a 23-year-old recruit, Mohammed Atif, who suffered minor injuries.Throughout the day, Pakistanis were transfixed by live television coverage of the assault, which included images of dead police recruits lying inside the compound. Footage also showed a captured assailant prone on the ground, being kicked by police before they hauled him to his feet and led him away.Analysts said the attackers may have been seeking to demoralize the government by humiliating the security forces. Many recruits could be seen sobbing as they emerged from the compound. Some quit the force on the spot."It's very likely this group had perfect knowledge of the targets and knew the operational environment well," said Rohan Gunaratna, director of the International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research in Singapore. "They had familiarity with law enforcement operations and their targets, and studied them very carefully over a period of time."