Title: ANI News
Show: ANI News
Date: 2025-10-25
URL: https://youtu.be/-USZZB6q--0
Duration: 13:00

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[00:00] you know, so we we had this hot war with Pakistan uh in May and it happened and the the nuclear question came up again and I thought what better person than you to sort of you know illuminate a little bit more about Pakistan's nuclear weapons and everything. So you were there on the ground in Pakistan in 2002 2003 we also saw Pakistan sort of lurch into almost like a civil war with the various terrorists it had propped up in its backyard. You know, was there ever a fear that these nuclear weapons would fall into a terrorist hands?

[00:32] >> Yes. When I was when I was stationed in Pakistan in 2002, I was told unofficially that that the Pentagon controlled the Pakistani nuclear arsenal, that Musharif had turned control over to the United States because he was afraid of exactly what you just described. But the Pakistanis in the intervening years and remember I was there 23 years ago over the last 23 years the Pakistanis have come to say that is

[01:04] absolutely not true. The United States has nothing to do with the Pakistani nuclear arsenal that Pakistani generals are the ones that control it. So I don't know if if that's true then I would be very worried about who is in charge politically in Pakistan. >> You know for example for example um Iran Khan I can't believe that I forgot his name. >> Who's in jail? A popular in jail. >> Yes. Yeah.

[01:34] >> Right. And still wildly popular. >> Wildly. Yeah. He told us when he was still the prime minister, he said, "Listen, I've got this political situation here domestically, I'm going to start blaming you for everything." And and the ambassador laughed and said, "We get blamed for everything anyway, so we don't care." So everything that happened, it was the United States fault, and it was the US, they turned their backs on us, and the US did this, and the US did that, and then they arrested him anyway.

[02:05] So he got a message out to the US government saying can you help me get out of this and we went to Jamaima Goldmid his gold whatever her name was ex-wife >> and she went to Pakistan and asked them if they would release him and they said no. So like you, I'm worried about continued disagreement in Pakistani politics that has the potential to spill into the streets because the Pakistanis have a

[02:35] tendency to get themselves spun up >> and people die during demonstrations and there are attacks against political figures and assassinations and and uh and the country is not known for its uh transformative, you know, leaders making positive decisions. I'll tell you another thing. When Benazer BH was in exile in uh Dubai, >> um I went to see her with another a senior officer, I went as the notetaker

[03:06] and um she lived in this $5 million palace on the on the Gulf. And we were sitting in the the front room, the the salon of of the house, and we heard a car pull up and she said her exact words, "So help me God. If he came home with another Bentley, I'm going to kill him." >> Is her daddy? >> Yeah.

[03:36] >> Her husband. >> And I said to my boss afterwards, "She makes $60,000 a year. She lives in a $5 million house and he has a collection of Bentleys. Aren't they ashamed of themselves? Like, how can they go back to Pakistan and look the Pakistani people in the face when their people don't even have shoes and enough food to eat? Like I understand corruption is a problem there, but that level of corruption.

[04:10] >> Yeah. >> Come on. Well, those are the kinds of politicians that the Pakistani people have to deal with. >> You know, in this uh war that happened in May, India for the first time escalated it to a level where we had cruise missiles flying into uh Pakistan with direct hits uh at the time. Um >> and the from the Indian side this constant uh line is is said right from the prime minister level up. He says that uh that we called their nuclear

[04:40] bluffs. You said that you were told unofficially that you knew that America knew where the nukes were. Do you think Americans told India that the control of Pakistani nukes also uh lies with America? I doubt it. Um, I doubt it because of the viciferousness with which the Pakistanis have come out publicly and said that they control the nukes. But I can tell you definitively

[05:11] >> that the State Department was telling both sides, if you're going to fight, fight. Keep it short and keep it non-nuclear. If nuclear weapons are introduced, the whole world is going to change. And so I think there was restraint on both sides. The Pakistanis need to come to a policy conclusion that there's nothing positive for them in fighting India. Nothing, literally nothing good will come of a of an actual war between India and Pakistan

[05:43] because the Pakistanis will lose. >> Mhm. >> It's as simple as that. They'll lose. And I'm not talking about nuclear weapons. I'm talking just about a conventional war. The Pakistanis will lose. >> Right. And so there's no benefit to constantly provoking the Indians. >> Right? Last question on the nuclear issue. I promise I'll move on after that. Okay, let's nx the control part. you you doubt that the actual control, but there was a New York Times article written by the by the New York Times editor at that time for national

[06:14] security that uh that President Bush had folded in hundreds of millions of dollars in grants uh to Pakistan to safeguard their nuclear assets. The New York Times knew about this program but decided to sit on it for a number of months before they finally published it. So even if they don't control it, did they give technology to safeguard it? >> Most likely. Yes. >> What would that be? >> Andy, that I don't know. I I it's not my

[06:46] area of expertise. I I couldn't speculate. But I will tell you that the fact that the New York Times sat on the article is a way of confirming its truth. M >> and what I mean is when one of the big outlets, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, you know, the Los Angeles Times or one of the big broadcast news networks, um when they come across information like this that's really it's

[07:19] big and it involves classified information, they always ask the White House to confirm or to deny >> if the information is truly classified and it's sensitive. The national security adviser will ask for a meeting. Sometimes the meeting is with the president and the head of the newspaper. Usually it's the national security adviser. and they'll say, "Look, yes, it's true, but it's so sensitive

[07:52] that if you publish it, it will put lives in danger. Almost always, they'll sit on the article until enough time passes that people aren't in danger anymore. The fact that they sat on the article is confirmation that it was true." M >> just a couple of months later in March of 2002, we raided a Lashkar Itaya safe house in Lahore. >> Okay. And

[08:22] >> and in that house, we captured three Lashkar Itayaba fighters who had with them a copy of the al-Qaeda training manual. And it was the first time analytically that we were able to connect Lashkaraya with al-Qaeda. The very first time I remember receiving a cable from the from the deputy director of the CIA for intelligence congratulating us on finding this

[08:54] training manual saying it was the very first time that we could attach the Pakistani government to al-Qaeda. What stopped you from going after Pakistan then? You you have the first smoking gun of a inextricably linked ISI because the le or the JM jud the various names that they come up with essentially ISI proxies propped up by the Pakistani government and now they have a direct correct

[09:26] >> yes >> why why didn't you ever bring this up >> that was the decision that was made at the white house >> and the decision was that that the relationship is bigger than India Pakistan at least temporarily the relationship we needed the Pakistanis actually more than they needed us at that point we were happy to throw money at them that's what they responded to >> but we really needed them to let us base our drones in Baluchistan for example um

[09:59] have what's called a picket line CIA officers all the way up and down the border with uh with Afghanistan So, so from Wazinistan all the way down to Baluchistan to >> Baluchistan. >> Mhm. >> We we needed a presence in Pashaw. We needed a presence in Queda. We needed a presence in Karachi and Lahore. And we needed for them to say yes to everything that we wanted to do. And so a decision was made at the White House that if we

[10:29] strategically ignore this terrorism problem visa v India the relationship would be much easier to negotiate and and so that's what we did. I'll tell you one other thing years later in 2008 >> um I had I had left the CIA. I had blown the whistle already and I was working as a as a uh counterterrorism advisor to ABC News, one of the big news networks

[11:00] here in the United States. >> And um and uh I got a call saying, "Are you watching the news?" I said, "No, it was the night before Thanksgiving, so it's a major American holiday. Major holiday." I said, "No, I I'm I'm not watching the news. Uh there's been a an enormous terrorist attack in Mumbai. They're attacking hotels. They're attacking Jewish centers. They're attacking this and attacking that." I said, "Oh my god." They said, "Um,

[11:33] can you come into the studio and talk about this?" I said, "Of course." Everybody else was on vacation because it's the eve of a major holiday. >> Yes. So, I jump in the shower, I shave, and as I'm getting dressed, my wife, who was still in the CIA at the time, she said, "You should watch, while you're getting dressed, you should watch what the other networks are saying about this." So, I I go to CNN, they said, "Alqaeda." I go to Fox, al-Qaeda, MSNBC, it's al-Qaeda. And these are all friends

[12:04] of mine who were saying it. And I said to my wife, I don't think this is al-Qaeda. She said, "Wow, you better really be sure of yourself if you're going to put your reputation on the line and tell the entire country that this is not al-Qaeda." So, I I drove down to ABC News to the studio. >> Mhm. >> And they wired me up and I was talking to the reporter in New York and I said, "Listen, I don't think this is al-Qaeda. I think this is this is the Pakistani

[12:37] uh supported Kashmir groups." I said, 'Ala doesn't care about India. They don't have any problem with the Indians. Their fight is with us. >> Yes. >> And he said, 'Oh my god. He said, you should You're going to need to be 100% sure because everybody is saying it's al-Qaeda. And I said, I I was in the CIA long enough that I can say that I feel strongly this is not al-Qaeda. And so I went on the air and I was the only

[13:08] person that said I believe that these are Pakistani Kashmir separatist groups supported by the Pakistani ISI. >> Right? >> And that turned out to be exactly the case >> to the point where ABC News made television commercials saying ABC News the Mumbai attacks we were the only ones that got it right. Right. But there was a bigger issue here, bigger story here. And the story was that Pakistan was committing terrorism in India

[13:40] >> and nobody did anything about it. >> [music]
