Former CIA officer John Kiriakou has revealed that in 2002, following the December 2001 Parliament attack in India, the United States feared that a full-scale war between India and Pakistan was imminent. Speaking in an exclusive interview with ANI, Kiriakou, who led the CIA’s counterterrorism operations in Pakistan after 9/11, explained that the US took the threat seriously enough to evacuate American families from Islamabad.
“Family members had been evacuated from Islamabad. We believed India and Pakistan would go to war,” Kiriakou recalled. He added that the Deputy Secretary of State was actively shuttling between Delhi and Islamabad to negotiate a settlement that would allow both sides to step back from the brink. Despite the severity of the situation, Kiriakou admitted that US attention was largely focused on Al-Qaeda and the war in Afghanistan, which left India’s security concerns somewhat overlooked. “We were so busy and focused on Al-Qaeda, we never gave two thoughts to India,” he said.
Reflecting on subsequent events, including the 2008 Mumbai attacks, Kiriakou highlighted that US intelligence correctly assessed that Pakistan-backed Kashmiri terror groups were responsible rather than Al-Qaeda. He said the larger problem was Pakistan’s duplicity and the lack of decisive global action: “Pakistan was committing terrorism in India, and nobody did anything about it.”
Kiriakou described India’s response to repeated acts of terrorism as a strategy of “strategic patience.” According to him, India exercised restraint after attacks such as the Parliament assault and the Mumbai attacks, but has demonstrated through more recent operations that it will not tolerate cross-border provocations. He cited examples including surgical strikes in 2016, the Balakot airstrikes in 2019, and Operation Sindoor in May of this year following the Pahalgam terror attack that killed 26 people.
Addressing the potential consequences of a conventional conflict, Kiriakou warned that Pakistan would inevitably lose in any direct military confrontation with India. “Nothing, literally nothing good will come of an actual war between India and Pakistan because the Pakistanis will lose — and I’m not talking about nuclear weapons. I’m talking just about a conventional war,” he stated. He emphasized that India’s military and strategic advantage is overwhelming and that constant provocation is counterproductive.
Kiriakou also shed light on Pakistan’s fragmented intelligence apparatus, describing it as having “two ISIs” operating in parallel. One faction, trained by institutions like Sandhurst and the FBI, focused on counterterrorism, while another faction supported terror groups such as Jaish-e-Mohammed. He recounted a 2002 raid in Lahore that uncovered direct links between the Pakistani government and Al-Qaeda, including the capture of Lashkar-e-Tayyiba operatives with an Al-Qaeda training manual. However, he noted that the White House decided not to act decisively against Pakistan at the time, prioritizing broader strategic relationships over pressing India’s concerns.
John Kiriakou’s career spans 15 years with the CIA, beginning as an analyst and later serving as chief of counterterrorism operations in Pakistan post-9/11. He tracked Al-Qaeda operatives across cities such as Peshawar, Karachi, Lahore, Faisalabad, and Quetta, and eventually became an executive assistant to the CIA’s deputy director for operations. In 2007, Kiriakou went public on national television to reveal the CIA’s use of torture during interrogations, including waterboarding, which led to a 23-month prison sentence. Despite this, he maintains he has no regrets about exposing the agency’s controversial practices.
Kiriakou’s revelations underscore the enduring tensions between India and Pakistan and highlight the complex calculations the US made in balancing counterterrorism priorities with broader geopolitical interests. His account also illustrates India’s long-standing strategy of measured restraint in the face of repeated provocations, even as Pakistan-backed terror activities persisted.
