Twenty persons were killed and more than 150 injured in a failed attack on the office of the ISI in Faisalabad. According to reports the bomb went off in a nearby CNG station which blasted gas cylinders and spread havoc. It is the first ever terrorist attack in Faisalabad, and on the office of ISI. The irony is that the terrorists have made the same institution its target that has a major role in spreading terror in the region. ISI largely widened its network of terror during the Afghan mujahideen war. ISI trained special cadres for waging jihad in Kashmir. When jihadi organizations perfected their training and launched subversion in Kashmir, Pakistani rulers gloated over developing a powerful structure that would insulate its security preparedness. They said that they had now a dependable vanguard that would fight as frontline offensive force in a war against India. ISI played crucial role in training, motivating and arming anti-India jihadis. It embarked on a massive disinformation campaign. International media was hijacked and international opinion was maligned against India. Kashmir came to be projected as a human rights violation issue. Known biased NGOs like Amnesty International and Asia Watch, whose antecedents are well known, made Kashmir "human rights" a cause and made baseless allegations. But today the same ISI has become the target of attack for the terrorists of its creation. Civilian government in Pakistan is unable to control it. The Mumbai attack of 2008 is also related to ISI and even the 9/11 tragedy has had links in ISI. The fact of the matter is that ISI is the bastion of military, feudal lords and powerful bureaucratic lobby nexus. It is a parallel government which goes by its own laws. It has close relations with the ISI and that is the main reason why the TTP has made it a target. Within Pakistani Army, there is a strong section of younger officers and soldiers who have been brought up in Wahhabi radical environs and are sworn enemies of the US. In the past, Pakistani army foiled a coup in which the main actors were some Pakistani army and air force personnel of Wahhabi ideology. Some of the staunch Wahhabis of ISI and Pakistani army have left these organizations and joined hands with TTP. It becomes easier for the TTP to identify persons and locales to be subjected to attacks and destruction. From the recent attack in Faisalabad, it appears that now ISI office is their target and if they failed in blowing it up this time, subsequent attempts could make them achieve their mission. That is how terrorism boomerangs.
