Understanding who’s behind the Mumbai attacks

Here’s what we know for certain:

1. There were ten simultaneous attacks.

2. The attackers were well armed, with large amounts of ammo and grenades.

3. A previously unknown organisation called Deccan Mujahideen has claimed responsibility for the act.

4. The Prime Minister of India has gone on the record about “external linkages.”

At this stage, we also have one major unqualified claim from a senior member of the security forces.

In Barkha Dutt’s interview with Major General R K Hooda, he says that in intercepted coversations between terrorists holed up in Nariman building and the Taj Hotel, the language spoken was Punjabi, and that there was a whole conversation about how people should remember to claim they are from Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh (an Indian state) and not Hyderabad in Punjab (Pakistan).

This interview has been shown on the NDTV network, as well as on the BBC multiple times.

Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh is located on the Deccan Plateau.

In the phone call on India TV (also posted on this blog) an alleged terrorist was talking to the anchor in a mix of Hindi and Urdu, in an accent that I’ve only heard in Kashmir or in Pakistan.

Now, on to complete conjecture:

Connecting the dots that are available to us, it is not too much a stretch of the imagination to assume that Pakistani nationals are involved.

It is, however, very difficult for me to believe that the civilian government in Pakistan is involved. It is far more likely, given Pakistan’s history, that factions of the Inter Services Intelligence and the military, are behind this operation.

I will continue to post about this as the situation evolves, and more information emerges. Feel free to join in.

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Connecting Dots … » Blog Archive » Mumbai Attack Impact Update says:

November 28th, 2008 at 1:54 am (#)

[…] to dismiss out of hand the notion that the civilian government in Pakistan was involved in anyway. Read this for more on who could be behind the attacks. And read this for more on the Deccan Mujahideen, the unknown group that has claimed responsibility […]

Recovered from the site’s WordPress archive, where it was published on 2008-11-27.