This Op-Ed piece was printed in today’s The News, written by former Pakistan People’s Party Senator Farhatullah Babar, it provides an interesting look into dealing with sieges and hostage situations and what the government needs to do.
According to some newspaper accounts the number of hard-core militants holed up in Lal Masjid were no more than two dozen. But the week long ’siege and hostage’ situation they created and the casualties they inflicted on trained soldiers dramatized the militants’ power and reach and raise questions about our own preparedness to meet such situations.
The Lal Masjid incident holds several important lessons, one of which is the need to review our ability to deal with such situations. Pakistan, being at the center of the war against militancy can only expect more, and not less, of siege and hostage situations in the days to come and therefore the need for soul searching.
Militancy is no ordinary crime and therefore cannot be dealt with through the normal crime-control mechanisms. Ordinary crime control rests on holding out a credible threat of death and execution, at the most, to the offender. A militant on the other hand not only proclaims readiness to die but also makes it known that before dying he wishes to kill many more. The traditional response therefore cannot contain militancy. What do you do with someone who is ready to die and also wants to kill?
The objectives of hostage-takers are quite familiar. They demand the release of fellow militants and safe passage to themselves at the threat of executing the hostages. States have, however, learnt from experience that once safe passage is allowed the hostage-takers are emboldened to commit more acts of revenge and militancy. It has therefore been an unwritten but universally accepted principle not to negotiate with terrorists.
In 1999 an Indian passenger airliner was hijacked from Nepal to Kandhar. The hijackers demanded the release of some militants in Indian jails. Initially the Indian government refused to negotiate but later under public pressure succumbed. The Vajpayee government relented and released the wanted militants. Two years later when Indian parliament was attacked in December 2001, New Delhi came to rue itself.
In the event of a policy of ‘no negotiations’, a state has to prepare itself to secure the release of hostages without being blackmailed and with minimum collateral damage. What is our record? A major incident of siege and hostage occurred on March 2, 1981 when a PIA plane bound for Peshawar from Karachi was hijacked first to Kabul and later to Damascus. Prolonged negotiations spread over two weeks were held with the hijackers. Finally about 50 activists in Pakistani jails were released in exchange for the release of hostages. Although press reports at the time said that Pakistan also seriously considered a daring commando operation but the plan was abandoned.
Another major incident was the taking as hostage of 370 passengers of a Pan American flight in September 1986 at Karachi airport. In a rescue operation twenty-three hostages were killed raising questions about ability to handle siege and hostage situations. The third incident is that of Lal Masjid. Keeping in view the casualties both of the militants and the trained professional soldiers and the duration of the operation, several questions arise that provide an occasion to pause and reflect on our preparedness to deal with such situations.
Nonetheless, there are instances of daring rescue operations carried out in hostile environment from which one can learn. One such incident is the well-known Entebbe airport operation. On June 27, 1976 an Air France flight with 250 passengers flying from Ben Gurion Airport to Paris via Athens was hijacked and taken to Entebbe, Uganda. It landed at Entebbe in the wee hours of June 28 to a warm welcome by the government of Idi Amin. The hostage passengers were taken to the airport terminal and guarded by Ugandan soldiers and the hijackers.
The hijackers demanded the release of convicted militants in jails in France, Germany, Switzerland and Kenya. The Israelis began negotiations to get the deadline set by the hijackers extended but secretly planned a rapid air assault, extraction and withdrawal operation. It was a highly risky operation as Uganda was a hostile territory. The Israelis however had decided not to yield to blackmailing.
According to plans five C-130 aircraft for the 200 strong assault force and two Boeings for medical and communication teams took off at 13.20 on July 3 on way to Entebbe. The Israeli cabinet was told of the plan to get its approval but only after the squadron was already airborne. The C-130s, carrying also some cars and jeeps, reached the destination at 23.01 only 13 seconds off the planned schedule.
The first team of assault commandos jumped from the aircraft even before it had taxied to a halt and ran towards the terminal building where the hostages had been kept. Resistance by guards was mercilessly eliminated. In the first phase the Israelis suffered only one casualty. Lt Col Yoni Netanyahu, the brother of Benjamin Netanyahu, was killed by a sniper shot.
The assault was completed in a little over three minutes. Another assault team had run to take over the control tower and the fuel stations and a third had gone to secure all access roads to the airport. Within seven minutes the hostages, the crew of the hijacked aircraft, the wounded and the dead Israeli soldiers had been evacuated and were on board waiting planes.
The Israelis had also brought heavy fuel pumps with them. These were used to refuel for the return journey from the Entebbe airport. With hostages and dead and wounded Israeli soldiers on board and the planes refuelled, they left the airport deserted with the dead bodies of eight hijackers. The Ugandan MiGs on the ground were also destroyed to eliminate any chance of chase. The entire operation was completed in less than one hundred minutes. As the international media broke the news, the hostages were already in mid air on way back to their country.
More than thirty years apart the Entebbe and Lal Masjid operations together bring into focus the need for our security agencies to set up a special rapid assault, extraction and withdrawal team. Practically led by Vice Chief of Army Staff General Ahsan Saleem Hayat, who is known for level-headedness and professionalism rather than for bravado and clenched fists, the GHQ seems well placed to give it a thought.
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