Evidence That Mumbai Attackers Were Pakistani

I admit it, I said a bad word when I saw evidence in today's New York Times that the Mumbai attackers were from Pakistan.

Both US and Indian intelligence agencies indicate that the gunmen were using non-Indian cell phones and making calls to foreign sites during the siege. One of the ten to twelve assailants was captured alive -- and he is Pakistani.

Perhaps most damning of all, an Indian eyewitness, fisherman Prasah Dhanur, reported seeing ten young men in T-shirts and jeans pulling into the port of Mumbai in an inflatable lifeboat. They each had a heavy backpack, and rebuffed the harbor official when he asked what they were doing.

The evidence suggests that the Kashmir-based terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba may have been responsible for this horrific attack. Lashkar-e-Taiba is loosely affiliated with Al Qaeda, and has "maritime capabilities."

Not to put too fine a point on it, but this is bad. India and Pakistan have been at each other's throats since the end of the British Raj in 1947 and the Partition of India. Oh, and also, they both have nuclear weapons. No doubt the Pakistani government had nothing to do with this attack, but tensions between these two neighbors are bound to increase, nonetheless... which is what the terrorists wanted.

Photo of the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel by Julian Herbert / Getty Images.