Instructions
This assignment is part of a group project in which you work both independently as well as jointly to present, assess, confirm or refute, collected information. The class will be divided into groups (check announcements for group assignments no later than Week 8) in which you will select partners and brainstorm.
Part 1 (Week 9): You will select a single partner or rival from your group and discuss your crisis scenario through the discussion board using his/her input to assist you in developing and writing your assessment. Part 1 is due at the end of Week 9.
Part 2 (Week 11): Your goal for Part 2 is refining your work and argument by heeding comments from your group and professor and then critiquing your partner’s Part 1 from the perspective of a US security official.
The success of your individual reports will absolutely be a function of the success of your ability to interact and coordinate and communicate with others. This is an important skill to acquire and in almost all areas of the intelligence community you will be expected to skillfully work with other members. Thirty percent of each part’s grade will be based on your exchanges with your group and partner/rival.
You must participate in your group discussion board and ultimately select and work with a partner. I expect each participant to have at least eight (8) posts in the DB by the end of Part 1. By the end of Week 11 (Part 2) you should have another six (6) posts minimum for a total of 14 posts for both weeks.
Your Part 1 papers must be a minimum of 1000 words using at least four (4) outside sources. Your Part 2 critique must be at least 750 words with another four sources. In all cases, cite your sources clearly and completely.
Part 1 Assignment: Week 9
Read the article posted below. You will be asked to work in your groups to interact with each other and debate a ‘general assessment’ that will detail the background of the charges being made in this article (that Pakistani intelligence service, the ISI, is actively funding and supporting the radical religious group, the Taliban, in Afghanistan).
You will select a partner or rival from your group with whom you will for Parts 1 and 2. Please discuss with your rival/partner the evidence and theories behind this accusation, helping each other and formulating an opinion. At that point you will, as INDIVIDUALS, write up that general assessment (not less than 750 words), detailing whether you believe, as an individual, the evidence supports the accusation, or the accusation is still too ambiguous or vague. You must use at least four (4) outside sources for this general assessment and detail why you confirm or refute the accusation.
Part 1 Grading (50 points):
• Part 1 paper (35 points)
• Discussion Board interaction (15 points)
Part 2 Assignment: Week 11
For Part 2, you will return to your group discussion boards, continuing to give feedback to one another. You will need to post your Part 1 paper for your group and partner to review.
This part of the assignment requires you to assume the role of a senior intelligence official for the United States. Given the information and accusations you presented in Part 1, feedback from the professor, group and partner, and other collected evidence, you must now critique your partner’s Part 1 paper from your perspective as a senior intelligence official.
Your goal in Part 2 is to continue working within a team (your group and partner) environment while critically assessing collected information and remaining laser-focused on the ultimate goal maintaining and improving US national security.
In the intelligence community you often work in a team environment which requires remaining respectful while critically analyzing information. Similarly, for this assignment you are to respectfully debate the merits of your partner and group’s positions while supporting your own arguments.
For Part 2 you must:
• Submit your original Part 1 with any changes recommended by the professor or your partner (5 points)
• Submit your partner’s Part 1 (5 points)
• Submit your critique of your partner’s Part 1 (minimum of 750 words and four outside sources) (25 points)
• have posted an additional six posts (minimum) to the discussion board resulting in a total number of 14 posts for the two parts (15 points)
(Total 50 points)
You are to SUBMIT all three elements of Part 2 as one fused document at the END of WEEK 11! Failure to abide by these instructions will result is a significant negative impact to your grade for the assignment!
Good Luck and Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!
ARTICLE
The Times of India – July 13, 2010…
KABUL: Pakistani military intelligence not only funds and trains Taliban fighters in Afghanistan but is officially represented on the movement’s leadership council, giving in significant influence over operations, a report said. The report, published by the London School of Economics, a leading British institution, on Sunday, said research strongly suggested support for the Taliban was the “official policy” of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI).
Although links between the ISI and Islamist militants have been widely suspected for a long time, the report’s findings, which it said were corroborated by two senior Western security officials, could raise more concerns in the West over Pakistan’s commitment to help end the war in Afghanistan.
The report also said Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari was reported to have visited senior Taliban prisoners in Pakistan earlier this year, where he is believed to have promised their release and help for militant operations, suggesting support for the Taliban “is approved at the highest level of Pakistan’s civilian government.” A Pakistani diplomatic source described that report as “naive,” and also said any talks with the Taliban were up to the Afghan government. “Pakistan appears to be playing a double-game of astonishing magnitude,” said the report, based on interviews with Taliban commanders and former senior Taliban ministers as well as Western and Afghan security officials.
“Duplicity”
In March 2009, Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, said they had indications elements in the ISI supported the Taliban and al-Qaida and said the agency must end such activities. Nevertheless, senior Western officials have been reluctant to talk publicly on the subject for fear of damaging possible cooperation from Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state Washington has propped up with billions of dollars in military and economic aid.
“The Pakistan government’s apparent duplicity — and awareness of it among the American public and political establishment — could have enormous geo-political implications,” said the report’s author, Matt Waldman, a fellow at Harvard University. “Without a change in Pakistani behavior it will be difficult if not impossible for international forces and the Afghan government to make progress against the insurgency,” Waldman said in the report.
The report comes at the end of one of the bloodiest weeks for foreign troops in Afghanistan — more than 21 have been killed this week — and at a time when the insurgency is at its most violent. More than 1,800 foreign troops, including some 1,100 Americans, have died in Afghanistan since US-backed Afghan forces overthrew the Taliban in late 2001. The war has already cost the United States around $300 billion and now costs more than $70 billion a year, the report said, citing 2009 U.S. Congressional research figures.
Violent regions
The report said interviews with Taliban commanders in some of the most violent regions in Afghanistan “suggest that Pakistan continues to give extensive support to the insurgency in terms of funding, munitions and supplies.”
“These accounts were corroborated by former Taliban ministers, a Western analyst and a senior UN official based in Kabul, who said the Taliban largely depend on funding from the ISI and groups in Gulf countries,” the report said. Almost all of the Taliban commanders interviewed in the report also believed the ISI was represented on the Quetta Shura, the Taliban’s supreme leadership council based in Pakistan. “Interviews strongly suggest that the ISI has representatives on the (Quetta) Shura, either as participants or observers, and the agency is thus involved at the highest level of the movement,” the report said.
The report also stated that Pakistani President Zardari, along with a senior ISI official, allegedly visited some 50 senior Taliban prisoners at a secret location in Pakistan where he told them they had been arrested only because he was under pressure from the United States. “(This) suggests that the policy is approved at the highest level of Pakistan’s civilian government,” the report said.
Afghanistan has also been highly critical of Pakistan’s ISI involvement in the conflict in Afghanistan. Last week, the former director of Afghanistan’s intelligence service, Amrullah Saleh, resigned saying he had become an obstacle to President Hamid Karzai’s plans to negotiate with the insurgents. In an exclusive interview with Reuters at his home a day after he resigned, Saleh said the ISI was “part of the landscape of destruction in this country.”
Sample Solution
