# Was it ever proved that Pakistani Intelligence was involved with the Mumbai terror attacks **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 19, 2012, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684 "2012-07-19T05:13:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/1 "2012-07-19T05:13:49Z")
It’s been a while since this happened. Just curious if Indian government came to any hard conclusions regarding Pakistani Intelligence Services involvement in planning the attack. > **[2008 Mumbai attacks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Mumbai_attacks)** > > The 2008 Mumbai attacks (also referred to as 26/11 attacks or 26 November attacks)\[a\] were a series of terrorist attacks that took place in November 2008, when 10 members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a militant Islamist organisation from Pakistan, carried out 12 coordinated shooting and bombing attacks lasting four days across Mumbai. The attacks, which drew widespread global condemnation, began on Wednesday 26 November and lasted until Saturday 29 November 2008. A total of 175 peo Eight of the attac... ---
**Author:** ![bldysabba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@bldysabba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bldysabba)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/2 "2012-07-19T12:09:04Z")
I’ll take a stab at this. There is of course the fact, proved beyond doubt, that the attackers(members of Lashkar-e-Taiba) were Pakistani, came from Pakistan, and were in constant contact with a ‘control room’ in Pakistan for the duration of the attack. Reconnaissance for the attacks was carried out by a Pakistani American David Headley(originally Daood Gilani) who was apparently a DEA double agent, was arrested by American authorities and who [implicated](http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/david-headley-witness-in-terror-trial-ties-pakistani-spy-agency-to-militant-group/2011/05/23/AFEEb99G_story.html) the ISI in no uncertain terms. > [@](#): > > David Coleman Headley’s long-awaited testimony at the start of a trial with international repercussions resolved one question at the outset: Federal prosecutors did not hesitate to connect Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) to the attacks that killed 166 people, including six Americans. > … > Headley testified that Lashkar “operated under the umbrella of the ISI” even after the group was banned in Pakistan in 2001. The ISI and Lashkar “coordinated with each other,” Headley testified. “And ISI provided assistance to Lashkar: financial, military and moral support.” > … > After he trained three years with Lashkar, Headley said, a “Major Ali” of the ISI recruited him when he was briefly detained near the Afghanistan border in 2006. Ali referred him to an officer known as Major Iqbal, who became Headley’s handler and worked separately but in coordination with Lashkar chiefs, directing Headley’s reconnaissance in India and providing $25,000 to fund his mission He’s apparently not the most reliable of witnesses, but then again, it’s not like he’s making particularly unbelievable accusations. There has recently been some corroboration for his account - The latest news is that an Indian named Abu Jundal(alias Sayed Ansari) was arrested by Saudi authorities, and handed over to India. He was in Saudi Arabia on a Pakistani passport(which are apparently machine readable and biometric and hence ought to be difficult to fake), and carried Pakistani nationality cards. It’s been widely reported that he was handed over to India over Paksitani protests because a) the US insisted on it and (b) Indian investigators recovered DNA from his family in India and it matched. He was apparently the guy who went to Pakistan and helped train the attackers in Hindi. He was present in the control room in Pakistan and in constant communication with the attackers over the phone while the attacks took place. The people he names match the ones earlier fingered by David Headley. From the [Chicago tribune](http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-07-02/news/sns-rt-us-india-attacksbre8611c5-20120702_1_hafiz-saeed-mumbai-carnage-nariman-house) - > [@](#): > > Indian officials who analyzed the phone conversations with the gunmen had long suspected that one of the handlers was an Indian because he used words only a fluent Hindi speaker would use, while the others spoke the mix of Punjabi and Urdu common to large parts of Pakistan. > > Ansari, investigators say, has provided the names of four other people in the Karachi control room, which New Delhi maintains could not have operated without some state support. > > Two of them he named as Sajid Mir, also known as Sajid Majid, and Sameer Ali. > > A Pakistani-American, David Headley, who was convicted of scouting targets in Mumbai ahead of the attacks, gave the same two names to a Chicago court last year as helping mount the operation. > > Headley identified Sameer Ali as a major in the ISI who had recruited him when he was briefly detained near the Pakistan-Afghan border in 2006 and Sajid Mir as a man handling foreign recruits for the LeT. > > Mir was also believed to be the handler of a Frenchman accused of plotting an attack in Australia soon after the September 11 attacks. French judge Jean-Louis Brugiere who investigated the case said he believed Mir was an officer of the Pakistani military. So. Is there hard, incontrovertible, smoking gun level proof that Pakistani intelligence were involved? I’m not sure. There is enough proof however that nobody in India doubts that there was some level of involvement. Of course, India’s experiences with Pakistani involvement in terrorist activity go far back enough that most Indians don’t really need proof. I don’t think I come under that category, but I too think there’s enough proof here to believe that the Pakistani state, or, given its schizophrenic nature, at least some elements of the Pakistani state, were involved in the attack. More importantly, given Pakistan’s reputation in these matters, I don’t think most of the world really doubts they were involved either. Sort of like OBL. What really concerns me though is not so much that they were involved in the past, but that there are no serious indications that they are attempting to, able to, or even _want to_ reign in this kind of activity in the future. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/3 "2012-07-19T16:36:48Z")
Thanks for that exhaustive reply blddysbba. You have covered pretty much everything. One of the masterminds, LeT chief zakiur rehman lakhvi, is sitting in their jail and operating LeT from there: > **[Lakhvi still active in Pak; Lashkar module busted in Kashmir | India News -...](https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/zaki-ur-rehman-lakhvi-still-active-in-pakistan-lashkar-module-busted-in-kashmir/articleshow/14675997.cms)** > > India News: The mastermind of 26/11 attacks, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, is still active, commanding the main LeT communication centre from a jail in Rawalpindi. Nearly 4 years after the incident, the Pakistani authority haven’t match his voice samples with recorded phone conversations of the handlers given to them by India. Since they have acquired Nuclear weapons, the possibility of a full blown was has been nullified otherwise India would have attacked Pakistan in 2008. The last full blown war in 1971 resulted in abject surrender of 93k Pakistani armymen to Indian army and breaking away of east Pakistan (Bangladesh) within 13 days. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/4 "2012-07-19T16:41:12Z")
Reported second half of **truthseeker** ’s post. ---
**Author:** ![bldysabba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@bldysabba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bldysabba)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/5 "2012-07-19T16:57:01Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Reported second half of **truthseeker** ’s post. For? I see that it’s not in the best taste, but I don’t see which rules he’s breaking. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/6 "2012-07-19T17:06:12Z")
It’s got nothing to do with OP and will invariably lead to [del]nuclear war[/del] a dick waving contest over who’d win a full-scale war if it happened today. I don’t think it merits a warning or anything. ---
**Author:** ![bldysabba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@bldysabba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bldysabba)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/7 "2012-07-19T17:25:03Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > It’s got nothing to do with OP and will invariably lead to [del]nuclear war[/del] a dick waving contest over who’d win a full-scale war if it happened today. I don’t think it merits a warning or anything. O ye of little faith. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/8 "2012-07-19T18:08:45Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > It’s got nothing to do with OP and will invariably lead to [del]nuclear war[/del] a dick waving contest over who’d win a full-scale war if it happened today. I don’t think it merits a warning or anything. I am not interested in dick waving contest in this thread. The reason why Pakistan executes such audacious attacks is because they know that a full blown war wouldn’t take place as they have the nukes. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/9 "2012-07-19T18:20:29Z")
> [@truthSeeker2](#): > > I am not interested in dick waving contest in this thread. > > The reason why Pakistan executes such audacious attacks is because they know that a full blown war wouldn’t take place as they have the nukes. I think they’re complaining because you’re in General Questions and offering opinions instead of provable facts. And they’re opinions of a political nature, the type of thing better suited to GD. The problem is that eventually something that qualifies as a political jab gets tossed in by someone, and them someone gets warned. That results in a pointless ATMB thread, which devolves into a request for avatars. And that’s pretty much the basis of the India/Pakistan conflict. Some of them believe in avatars, and some don’t. ---
**Author:** ![truthSeeker2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7cd45c/32.png) [@truthSeeker2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthSeeker2)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/10 "2012-07-19T18:28:28Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > I think they’re complaining because you’re in General Questions and offering opinions instead of provable facts. And they’re opinions of a political nature, the type of thing better suited to GD. The problem is that eventually something that qualifies as a political jab gets tossed in by someone, and them someone gets warned. That results in a pointless ATMB thread, which devolves into a request for avatars. And that’s pretty much the basis of the India/Pakistan conflict. Some of them believe in avatars, and some don’t. I understand your point. But there is universal acceptance that Pakistan can’t win a conventional(non-nuclear) war with India. There defense minister has been quoted saying the same: > **[We cannot match India militarily: Pak defence minister - Times of India](https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/We-cannot-match-India-militarily-Pak-defence-minister/articleshow/9026739.cms)** > > Pakistan News: Pakistan defence minister Chaudhry Ahmad Mukhtar said this while responding to a question on whether the projection of India as Pakistan's greatest en ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-it-ever-proved-that-pakistani-intelligence-was-involved-with-the-mumbai-terror-attacks/628684/11 "2012-07-23T03:23:10Z")
Thank you for the info.