From Headley says Major Iqbal is Chaudhery Khan, 26/11 Mumbai attacks mastermind, May 25, 2011:
CHICAGO: The mysterious Major Iqbal, who India suspects is a Pakistani army officer in ISI, has now been identified as 'Chaudhery Khan' by Mumbai terror accused David Headley who said he is the mastermind of the 26/11 attacks plot.
50-year-old Headley also told a Chicago court during the trial of 26/11 co-accused Tahawwur Rana that an attempt to take the attackers to Mumbai in September 2008 failed as a boat in which they were to sail was lost.
He said before the jury that according to Major Iqbal, in September they lost the Pakistani boat which was supposed to take the attackers to sea for some distance after which they were to be shifted to an Indian fishing boat.
Iqbal also told Headley that they had lost 12 life jackets meant for the attackers.
Headley, a Pakistan-American, said that Major Iqbal, whose name keeps cropping up in the testimony, used the ID of 'Chaudhery Khan', made key decisions and was indeed the mastermind of the 26/11 plot.
In further testimoney, Headley identified India's movie capital as a possible target, and gave more information about "Major Iqbal"; from Headley identified Somnath temple, Bollywood as targets, May 26, 2011:
CHICAGO: A self-confessed key plotter of the Mumbai terror attack, David Coleman Headley Wednesday testified that he identified ancient Somnath temple in India and Bollywood among several more targets he "liked" for future terror attacks.
[snip]
Rana also said that nine of the 10 Mumbai attackers who died should be given Pakistan's highest military bravery award, Nishan-e-Haidar, Headley testified.
Headley also talked about his conversation with another of his Pakistani handlers Pasha and the new email he would create.
According to the transcript of Pasha-Headley conversation, read out by the federal prosecutor, Headley said: "Major Iqbal went to my house in Lahore in Pakistan, my employee told me over there."
Headley also testified that handlers of Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) guided the attackers on phone and even asked them to change tactics to challenge the advancing commandos as they watched the 2008 Mumbai carnage live from Pakistan.
Headley said his LeT handler Sajid Mir, who was in Karachi during the Mumbai attack, was in contact with the attackers via phone and he was watching TV coverage of the siege and seeing what was going on in India.
This Major Iqbal is a key figure. And, based on what we learned in Part 2, he is likely an interface for the ISI. From Mysterious 'Major Iqbal' is Pakistan's latest albatross dated May 26, 2011:
WASHINGTON: He's acquiring the status of mythic villain, and Bollywood scriptwriters may soon caricature him in the mold of Mogambo and Shakaal, among their more famous screen scoundrels.
But the way David Headley aka Daood Gilani describes him, Major Iqbal was not given to loud laughs or corny dialogues. A serving ISI officer, he was a cold, calculating operational mastermind of the Mumbai 26/11 terrorist attack who handled its logistical aspects, including forking out the money, choosing targets, and liaised with other shadowy ISI operatives and terrorist outfits.
From the time US Department of Justice attorneys named the mysterious "Major Iqbal" in their indictment following Headley's disclosure during investigations that he was his principle ISI handler, investigators have struggled to get a fix on him. Who did Major Iqbal report to? Where is he now? What is his full and real identity? And most importantly, will Pakistan identify and extradite him – or will it hide him as it has done with many wanted terrorists?
Interesting questions raised in that last paragraph....
It seems a safe bet that someone in Pakistan's military/government circles was helping Osama bin Laden, and that was how bin Laden was able to live right up the street from a military academy just a few dozen kilometers from Islamabad.
Osama bin Laden's Hideout North of Islamabad
We also know ISI is connected to LeT.
Needless to say, ISI is going to be protecting the guy who serves as their connection, at least as well as they covered for bin Laden... unless Major Iqbal gets bargained away as a pawn in the game? (Or killed to bury the story with him?)
In his testimony on Tuesday, Headley revealed that "Major Iqbal" was also known by the name "Chaudhery Khan." Exhibits presented by the prosecution showed Headley corresponded with him using a Yahoo ID. It was Khan aka "Major Iqbal" who recruited him, walked him through the Mumbai plot, and set him on his way with $25,000 to begin surveillance and identifying targets in Mumbai.
Headley says "Major Iqbal" disclosed to him that a previously scheduled attack on Mumbai in September 2008 had to be abandoned after terrorists deployed for the purpose lost their moorings -- and their boat. He also advised Headley to befriend influential people "who live in military facilities" in India, and while he was thrilled with the advances the Pakistani-American made in infiltrating Shiv Sena, he was disappointed that Headley did not scout the Mumbai airport as a target.
Headley also revealed that his principle ISI handler directed that the Jewish community center Chabad House be added to the list of targets because he believed it was being used as a front for Israel's Mossad intelligence agency. Chillingly, his associate Sajid Mir, who is also believed to be ISI official, told Headley that they had no compunctions killing women at Chabad House because Israeli women served in their army on account of mandatory draft.
In the rogue's gallery of Pakistani masterminds of 26/11, "Major Iqbal" clearly emerges as the operational chief. While Headley says he is an ISI official, the US chargesheet, while naming him as a defendant, does not mention his ISI affiliation, though this has been identified in both US and Indian case files.
This whole War on Terror is falling into the gap between what is said and what is done.
And that is convenient, because the War on Terror is a source of tremendous profiteering, and creates the instability that permits heroin trafficking while providing the exigency to allow the heroin trafficking to continue in order to prioritize counterterrorism - even though the terrorists fund their jihad with money from heroin trafficking.
It is worth recalling what Sibel Edmonds said in Cracking the Case: An Interview With Sibel Edmonds by Scott Horton, back on August 22, 2005:
SE: [snip]
You know, they are coming down on these charities as the finance of al-Qaeda. Well, if you were to talk about the financing of al-Qaeda, a very small percentage comes from these charity foundations. The vast majority of their financing comes from narcotics. Look, we had 4 to 6 percent of the narcotics coming from the East, coming from Pakistan, coming from Afghanistan via the Balkans to the United States. Today, three or four years after Sept. 11, that has reached over 15 percent. How is it getting here? Who are getting the proceedings from those big narcotics?
Heroin trafficking became a source of funding for the jihad against the Soviets in the 1980's. The heroin was shipped to the Soviet Union, where it was sold to fund the fight against the Soviet occupation in Afghanistan, even as the heroin helped destroy the Soviet Union from within. This was clandestine, "black" money, out of reach of Congressional oversight.
After the jihad, though, the channels continued to exist and, as the Cold War ended, with state funding of terrorism drying up, terrorist organizations turned increasingly to organized crime to fund their operations. Some terrorist organizations morphed into criminal organizations, criminal organizations began to look like terrorist groups... and, it is important to consider, organized crime has always sought to buy influence with government officials, law enforcement, and political leaders by bribery and illicit money.
As Edmonds pointed out in Former FBI Translator Sibel Edmonds Calls Current 9/11 Investigation Inadequate by Jim Hogue, May 7, 2004:
JH: Here's a question that you might be able to answer: What is al-Qaeda?
SE: This is a very interesting and complex question. When you think of al-Qaeda, you are not thinking of al-Qaeda in terms of one particular country, or one particular organization. You are looking at this massive movement that stretches to tens and tens of countries. And it involves a lot of sub-organizations and sub-sub-organizations and branches and it's extremely complicated. So to just narrow it down and say al-Qaeda and the Saudis, or to say it's what they had at the camp in Afghanistan, is extremely misleading. And we don't hear the extent of the penetration that this organization and the sub-organizations have throughout the world, throughout their networks and throughout their various activities. It's extremely sophisticated. And then you involve a significant amount of money into this equation. Then things start getting a lot of overlap -- money laundering, and drugs and terrorist activities and their support networks converging in several points. That's what I'm trying to convey without being too specific. And this money travels. And you start trying to go to the root of it and it's getting into somebody's political campaign, and somebody's lobbying. And people don't want to be traced back to this money.
By the way... did you know that Headley is a convicted heroin dealer? See Witness Implicates Rana in Mumbai Terror, May 25, 2011, by Bouboushian: "Headley, the prosecution's star witness, is a former heroin smuggler turned informant."
And, did you know that the LeT is connected to heroin trafficking? A brief article, Heroin seized from LeT carriers, dated October 22, 2007, is reproduced here in its entirety:
Jammu: Over 1 kg of top-grade heroin was on Sunday seized in Doda district of Jammu and Kashmir indicating the growing use of the Golden Crescent route by cash-strapped Lashkar-e-Taiba militants to smuggle narcotics for terrorist activities.
The consignment of A-999 grade heroin, manufactured in Afghanistan and packaged in Pakistan, with a street value of Rs 1.50 crore, was recovered from two persons in Bhaderwah town of the district, Doda range Deputy Inspector - General of Police Farooq Khan said.
He said preliminary tests carried at the local forensic aboratory confirmed that it was the "purest form of heroin."
The consignment which came in triple packs was handed by a LeT overground worker of Thatri to a tailor Abdul Khalid and cable operator Tahir Hussain for selling it in Bhaderwah.
Khalid and Hussain told the police that the money for the contraband consignment was to be paid back to the LeT worker once it was sold in the grey market.
"Bhaderwah does not have hard drug consumers nor is it close to India-Pakistan border. That points to one thing, that the cash-strapped LeT militants have chosen drug peddling for funding their activities," the IG told PTI.
Several Hawala rackets and drug networks, from which Rs. 8 lakh, several kg of heroin and SIM cards and mobile handsets were recovered have been busted by police in Jammu division in the past month. — PTI
This is a standard play out of the jihad playbook.
Heroin money finances the jihad, even as the heroin itself destroys the infidel country. And, since infidel politicians are on the payroll of the heroin traffickers, any investigation will only go so far - and that is not far enough to stop the terrorist attacks.
This is how 9/11 didn't get prevented.
A similar situation is how the Oklahoma City Bombing didn't get prevented.
And this is how future attacks by the LeT in the United States will not get prevented.
This campaign for the Land of the Pure isn't just about what happens to Pakistan, and who controls what's left; it's about terrorist sleeper cells here in America, heroin money in political campaigns in the US... it's about what happens to America, and who controls what's left.
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