Quetta, the provincial capital, is now a vast privileged sanctuary for former Taliban officials and their fighters. They are known locally as new mohajirs (immigrants). They possess Pakistani ID and are free to conduct business and buy properties all over Baluchistan. MMA, with generous subsidies organized by ISI, is now free to hold constant rallies and processions against "the U.S. desecrator of Islam."
This reporter's informants in Islamabad and Quetta say that U.S. agents are unable to tell the difference between Baluchis, Pathans and Taliban, and that most people are convinced Osama bin Laden and Mullah Mohammed Omar, the former Taliban chief, are hiding safely somewhere in Baluchistan under the protection of ISI and its extremist allies in the provincial government.
Hamid Gul's agenda — which he barely conceals — is to create a deadly nexus between Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq. Those who know Gen. Gul say his longer-range objective is to widen the nexus to include Iran, Sudan and Saudi Arabia. The Pakistani nuclear establishment is, to a large degree, of the fundamentalist persuasion. From these geopolitical building blocks, it is not too much of a stretch to conclude, as the U.S. intelligence community now seems to believe, that Pakistani nuclear know-how has found its way, not only to North Korea (in exchange for missile technology), but also to Iran.
The CIA has also identified Iran, Saudi Arabia and Syria as the leading supporters of the Sunni insurgency against the U.S. military in Iraq. The Saudi government is clearly not involved, the CIA concluded, but Osama bin Laden's Saudi followers and members of the Wahhabi clergy, harassed for the first time by the government, have evidently organized desert crossings for volunteer guerrilla fighters. Anti-government feelings are running high in Saudi Arabia these days.