Security lapses

Naval chief Admiral Noman Bashir’s statement that there was no security lapse in the case of the PNS Mehran terrorist incident, instantly reminded me of customs at Gibraltar. Despite the fact that the greatest threat faced by the small city is from smuggling, customs close shop at 9 pm and there are very few officers patrolling the border between British Gibraltar and Spain. You really have to be a fool and riding on top of a tank to get noticed by border patrol after nine.

Interestingly, the prime minister has authorised the naval chief to conduct an inquiry. One wonders what the outcome will be since the gent rarely admonishes his ‘own kind’. In any case, the navy being the smallest and most insignificant service, naval officers tend to be more protective of their men, at times, at the cost of professionalism and efficiency. The navy never even investigated how the blueprints of some of its indigenously co-produced equipment landed in the black market in Dubai. Also, why would Admiral Bashir be expected to fire his men, when the larger service, which everyone wants to follow, never punished incompetence in the earlier Bin Laden case?

So, why bother the naval chief when what we seriously need is for someone to hold an inquiry into the involvement of some in the ISI in the Mumbai attacks. The David Headley trial is taking place in Washington in which Headley has named a few serving ISI officers. Apparently, there are informal suggestions, from within the army, that a couple of junior officers might be involved. In fact, the ISI took this story to western diplomats a day after Mumbai. If this is the case, then it sounds like a security lapse which needs serious investigation. We cannot let spooks run around wild blowing up other countries, our own, or even themselves. Or are we still going to hire Zaid Hamid and his ilk to contest all of this as some foreign conspiracy?

The media machinery of the agencies tends to come quickly into action after every case of omission or security lapse. This time, fingers are being pointed at India and the US for conspiring to blow up the P-3C Orions. These are naval reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare capable aircraft supplied by the US. If it were such a threat for the US, then why would Washington sell these to Pakistan in the first place?

The P-3C Orions certainly are force multipliers but there was never any naval staff requirement generated for these aircraft, which were initially obtained during the end of the 1980s because these were the only major equipment on offer from the US. Later, more of similar aircraft were ordered. The procurement of these aircraft was so badly handled that they were not even in a ‘fit-to-fly’ condition, until at least the mid-2000s. One has not come across any news to suggest that these are now in a ‘fit-to-operate’ condition, which would make them a strategic threat for the next door neighbour or anyone else. These are very sophisticated aircraft that are deemed as fully operational, only when the navy operating them has the capacity to operate all their features and has the capacity, in terms of spare parts and components, to operate them independently of the supplier. Since the navy is very bad at procurement planning, it acquired a lot of short-shelf life items at the cost of long-shelf life items. Therefore, the P-3C Orions were sitting when the US arms embargo hit the country in 1990. Despite the release of some spares and equipment after the Brown amendment was passed, the navy could not acquire the capacity to operate these aircraft fully. Consequently, at least one aircraft just lay sitting disused on the tarmac at PNS Mehran.

Lest someone gets upset and thinks that these are just allegations, it is important to note that now is the time to think of greater accountability of the defence sector. This is not to humiliate the officers and the brave men but to ensure that precious lives shouldn’t be lost just because those at the helm of affairs can’t mind their shops.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 29^th, 2011.