Pak was uncooperative in helping US in rooting out al-Qaeda: Tenet

Former CIA director George Tenet has said that Pakistan had been singularly uncooperative in helping the US in rooting out Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan as it (Pakistan) feared a two-front conflict from India and the Taliban.

Islamabad, May 5 : Former CIA director George Tenet has said that Pakistan had been "singularly uncooperative" in helping the US in rooting out Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan as it (Pakistan) feared a two-front conflict from India and the Taliban.

In his just-published book "At The Centre Of The Storm: My Years At The CIA", Tenet says that the toughest terrorism issue i.e. the rooting out of the Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, was thought of as "the Pakistan problem".

He adds: "For years it had been quite obvious that without the cooperation of the Pakistanis, it would be almost impossible to root out Al-Qaeda behind its Taliban protectors. The Pakistanis always knew more than they were telling US and they had been singularly uncooperative in helping US run these guys down."

"My own belief, one widely shared within CIA, was that what the Pakistanis really feared was a two-front conflict, with India ... And the Taliban mullahs trying to export their radical brand of Islam across the border from Afghanistan," The Nation quoted him writing in his book.

He further says: "A war with India also posed the grim spectre of a nuclear confrontation, but from the ruling Generals' point of view the best way to avoid having their nation Talibanised was to keep their enemy close. That meant not co-operating with US in hunting down (Osama) bin Laden and his organisation."

In his book, Tenet argues that the US-Pak relationship was complicated by "further mistrust and resentment" and the dominant thinking in the Pakistani officer corps was that Washington had "ulterior" motives in Afghanistan - wanting instability in that part of the world to discourage construction of oil and gas pipelines, for example.

"The Pakistani leadership for the most part felt that the United States had abandoned them, especially when we imposed economic sanctions on both Pakistan and India in the wake of their nuclear tests," Tenet further says and adds that simultaneously the military-to-military relationship between the US and Pakistan also began to wane over the years with the younger generation of Pakistani officers not being in American military academies.

ANI