The Pakistan Taliban's tribal rivals

Guardian reporter Declan Walsh has a fascinating half-interview with Misbahuddin Mehsud, leader of the Abdullah Mehsud group, one of at least four factions in Pakistan's Pashtun tribal areas that is opposed to the Tehreek-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) of Hakimullah Mehsud.
Walsh met Misbahuddin in the frontier town of Dera Ismail Khan, but after initial pleasantries, the tribal fighter declined to answer any direct questions, referring them all to an aide. The aide confirmed that the Abdullah Mehsud group is helping the Pakistan Army in its campaign against Hakimullah's TTP by sealing off the southern border of South Waziristan.
Like the other groups in the region that have come to an agreement with the Pakistan Army - the Turkistan Bhittani group, Maulvi Nazir's group and Hafiz Gul Bahadur's group - the Abdullah Mehsud group is primarily opposed to Hakimullah's TTP because of recent attacks on civilians and the Pakistan Army.
All of these groups are strongly in support of cross-border actions against the Afghan Army and Coalition forces in Afghanistan. In this aspect they neatly reflect the schizophrenic outlook of many in Pakistan's military and political elites, who only began to worry about the fundamentalist Islamists when they focussed their attention on introducing Wahhabism into Pakistan.

Signs of a deal between Mahsud and Pak Army

.....................................A shy Baitullah Mahsud.......................

Is the Pakistan Army going to press ahead with a major offensive in South Waziristan aimed at breaking the power of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan leader Baitullah Mahsud? Don't hold your breath.
After trumpeting the achievements of Operation Rah-e-Rast (Straight Path) in the Swat Valley and other districts in Malakand, the Army announced in mid-June it was launching its new offensive, called Path of Salvation (Rah-e-Najat), aimed at breaking Mahsud's power in his tribal homeland.
But unlike Swat, where the Taliban has little local support or depth, Mahsud has a formidable military presence in South Waziristan, with around 10,000 fighters, including many Arabs, Uzbeks, Chechens and other foreigners. Elements of al-Qaeda's leadership are also based in the area.
At first it looked as though the new offensive was progressing well. There was the formation of an anti-Mahsud alliance of the TTP leader's old foes - the Bhittani tribe, Waziristan Baba, and the quickly-murdered Qari Zainuddin, amongst others. The Americans and the Pakistani airforce appeared to be coordinating their air attacks for once and the Pakistani Army was soon shelling suspected 'hideouts' and cutting off roads of escape. Baitullah already had a $5 million bounty on his head from the Americans and a further $615,000 from the Pakistan government, as a result of his murderous campaign of suicide bombings.
But all this is to misunderstand the nature of the relationship between the TTP leaders and the Pakistani military and (more importantly) the ISI intelligence service. It was the ISI that encouraged the Taliban from Afghanistan to settle in Waziristan after the fall of their regime in Kabul and which has built up Baitullah into the figurehead he has since become. The formation of the TTP itself two years ago could not have taken place without ISI approval.
Baitullah Mahsud's mistake has been to operate and interfere too much in the internal politics of Pakistan, to the detriment of the military's campaign in Afghanistan, where Pakistan wishes to exert much more influence. In Swat the TTP lost all sense of perspective and thought they could do as they wished, even though there is no desire in the wider parts of the country for the extremist Wahhabism they profess and which is itself in stark contrast to the traditional ideals of Pakhtunwali.
So now we are hearing that the Army has 'temporarily' shelved its plans to push into militant havens in Waziristan, amid reports of secret talks between Mahsud and the Pakistani army. And elders from the Mahsud tribe have told the Taliban chief that the fight against the Pakistani army is "spoiling their plan" and that the only beneficiaries from the violence are the US-led troops stationed in neighbouring Afghanistan. In other words, they would prefer to concentrate on fighting in Afghanistan, rather than wasting their time in Pakistan.
A deal is already being talked about: Mahsud will be required to end suicide and other attacks against civil, military and foreign targets inside Pakistan and in return the army will delay the launch of attacks against him and his followers. Note that there is not a word about Afghanistan in all this.
Such a deal is not without precedent. Don't forget that the problems in Swat started with a similar deal and there have been similar agreements with Baitullah before, most recently in 2007.
If true, this deal will certainly lead to tensions with the Americans, who desperately want Mahsud neutralised. However, the Pakistanis will say that they are over-stretched in Swat, where hostilities continue and where soldiers will have to stay for months or years to help two million people uprooted by the conflict return to their homes and businesses.
And it is doubtful that anything short of a full military offensive could displace the militants from the harsh landscape - ideal for ambush - of south Waziristan anyway. If Mahsud is finally killed it will not be by the Pakistan Army, but either by a US drone missile strike or an assassin's bullet from one of his many tribal enemies.

Anti-Baitullah group formed in South Waziristan

I write from Pakistan, where two news items catch my eye. First a report in Dawn that says a new anti-Baitullah Mehsud alliance has come into being in South Waziristan, headed by Ikhlas Khan (also known as Waziristan Baba), but also including the Turkistan Bhittani faction and the Haji Tehsil Khan Wazir factions.
The report says the new group has already established offices in the Gomal, Umar Adda, Jandola, Pang and Sheikh Autar areas of South Waziristan. It adds that Waziristan Baba believes Baitullah was behind the assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto and that he would avenge the killings of innocent people by Baitullah. "Those who destroy hospitals and schools and kill our brothers and sisters are not our well-wishers," he is quoted as saying.
The new alliance follows the recent assassination of Qari Zainuddin (see my previous post on this subject), who had been urging tribesmen to rise up against Baitullah and the Tehreek-e-Taliban. It will be named the Abdullah Mehsud Alliance - the same name used by Qari Zainuddin for his organisation.
A second item that caught my eye, also in Dawn, refers to four bodies found on the Tank-Jandola road in South Waziristan yesterday. The bodies included two sons of Gul Pir, a Baitullah Mehsud commander who was himself killed in an army operation in the Sheikh Utar area three days ago.
The report does not say who killed them, but adds the following: "According to sources, incidents of target killing are taking place in the town of Tank and adjoining areas and Baitullah's men are at the receiving end. It may be added that earlier the Baitullah group virtually ruled the area but now it is under the control of its adversary, Turkistan Bhittani."
This is clearly an important development. Is the tide beginning to turn against Baitullah in his heartland? And who are the assassins?

Tide turns agains the Taliban in Pakistan?

Events in Pakistan may yet have a great bearing on the conflict in Afghanistan. This video, filmed in Pakistan in the Punjabi city of Jhelum a week ago, shows a protest against the Taliban and al-Qaeda after they murdered the renowned cleric, Dr. Mufti Sarfaraz Naeemi in Lahore in a suicide attack in his mosque. Dr Naeemi had issued a fatwa correctly stating that suicide bombings are forbidden by Islam and had also condemned Pakistan’s Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP) – sister organisation to its Afghan counterpart - as un-Islamic.
Despite Dr Naeemi’s killing and last week's bombing of the Pearl Continental hotel in Peshawar, it is clear that the TTP are now on the defensive in Pakistan. The Swat Valley, where for the last two months the Pakistan Army has been engaged in a fierce confrontation with Islamist militants, has now been cleared. Some of the estimated 2.5 million internal refugees will soon be able to start returning to their homes and harvesting their crops.
Significantly, in some areas of Swat local villagers took up arms against the TTP fighters. At least three villages in Upper Dir were cleared by local lashkars (militias) who killed more than a dozen TTP fighters.
The big test will be the Army’s campaign in Waziristan. Up to 10,000 fighters loyal to TTP Emir Baitullah Mahsud, along with hundreds of Arab, Uzbek and Chechen fighters from al-Qaeda are based in this remote tribal agency bordering Afghanistan. It is likely that much of the al-Qaeda leadership is also in this region.
The Army’s new offensive, known as ‘Path of Salvation’, is already underway, although it has so far only involved air strikes and artillery bombardments. But Pakistani officials have already been able to drive a wedge between Mahsud and two former allies, Turkistan Bhittani and Qari Zainuddin Mahsud, both of whom have called Baitullah an enemy of Islam.
Qari Zainuddin Mahsud, who comes from the same tribe as Baitullah, was killed today when one of his guards opened fire on him in the north-western town of Dera Ismail Khan. Turkistan Bhittani, 40, remains a significant threat.
According to a well-informed article published by the Jamestown Foundation

Bhittani told local jirgas that he will take revenge on Baitullah for killing innocent Pakistani civilians and security forces. The article describes him thus:
“Turkistan Bhittani, 40, once a friend of Baitullah Mahsud who fought alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan, is now his biggest enemy. Turkistan also served in the Frontier Corps (FC) until his retirement in 1998. He developed differences with Baitullah and parted ways with him when Baitullah slaughtered some FC officials and began using suicide bombing as a tool to terrorize his opponents inside Pakistan."
These divisions and the formation of lashkars are significant. Nothing similar has happened in Afghanistan so far, but if the jihadi infrastructure built up by Pakistan’s ISI intelligence service over many years begins to come apart, it will undoubtedly have an impact on the Afghan Taliban leadership, who are mostly based in Quetta in Baluchistan.