Former CIA officer John Kiriakou has disclosed that the United States paid tens of millions of dollars in cash to Pakistan's intelligence service, the ISI, as part of its counterterrorism cooperation in the early 2000s.

Speaking to ANI, Kiriakou highlighted how this transactional relationship often benefited groups hostile to India and created divisions within Pakistan’s own intelligence machinery.

Kiriakou, who served as the CIA’s counterterrorism chief in Pakistan in 2002, stated that American defence contractor funds were used to reward the ISI, though little oversight existed on how the money was spent. He added, “Pakistani groups with an eye towards India benefited because of those American defence contractor monies... their defence parts were all turned towards India.”

He elaborated that during his tenure in Pakistan immediately after the 9/11 attacks, his mission was to locate and capture al-Qaeda operatives. Operating primarily from Islamabad, he frequently travelled between Karachi, Lahore, Faisalabad, Peshawar, and Quetta, leading several high-profile raids, including the capture of Abu Zubaydah, once mistakenly believed to be al-Qaeda’s third-ranking leader.

Discussing the CIA’s distrust of the ISI, Kiriakou revealed that his team never disclosed the target identities to their Pakistani counterparts. “We were afraid word would leak to al-Qaeda,” he explained, referring to the internal split within the ISI — one faction cooperating with Western agencies and another aligned with extremist movements.

Kiriakou described the dual nature of the ISI: one “professional and Western-trained” group committed to counterterrorism, and another harbouring sympathies for militant networks. The latter, he said, included members who had fostered Kashmiri terrorist organisations such as Jaish-e-Mohammed and targeted both Shia Muslims and Americans.

He noted that U.S. strategy after 9/11 was initially reactive rather than proactive, taking more than a month to launch airstrikes on Afghanistan. The priority was to ensure regional stability and avoid premature escalation.

Recalling the tense atmosphere during Operation Parakram in 2002, Kiriakou recounted widespread evacuations from Islamabad amid fears of imminent war between India and Pakistan. “Families had been sent home; everyone expected conflict at any moment,” he said.

Kiriakou also disclosed a crucial breakthrough in early 2002 when the CIA traced operational links between Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT) and al-Qaeda. A raid on a LeT safe house in Lahore led to the seizure of al-Qaeda training manuals, providing the first analytical proof of collaboration between the two terror networks.

He described the U.S.-Pakistan alliance as deeply transactional, emphasising that Washington’s dependence on Islamabad for operational bases in Balochistan, Peshawar, Quetta, Karachi, and Lahore led the CIA to “throw money” at the Pakistanis. “We needed them more than they needed us,” he admitted.

Reflecting on his later years, Kiriakou discussed his whistleblowing on CIA torture practices and the legal retribution he faced under the Obama administration. Though initially accused of espionage, charges were eventually dropped after his financial ruin, leaving him to serve 23 months in prison for confirming the identity of a former colleague in an email.

Now an outspoken critic of CIA misconduct, Kiriakou said attitudes toward him had shifted. “They used to call me the insider threat,” he remarked, noting that during recent CIA briefings, younger officers defended him as a whistleblower worthy of respect. “It took 20 years,” he concluded, “but I won.”

Based On ANI Report