Brigadier General Amir Sultan Tarar, also known by his ''

nom de guerre A ''nom de guerre'' (, 'war name') is a pseudonym chosen by someone to use when they are involved in a particular activity, especially fighting in a war. In Ancien régime, ''ancien régime'' Kingdom of France, France it would be adopted by each n ...

'' Colonel Imam (4 April 1944 – 23 January 2011), was a Pakistani

military officer An officer is a person who holds a position of authority as a member of an armed force or uniformed service. Broadly speaking, "officer" means a commissioned officer, a non-commissioned officer (NCO), or a warrant officer. However, absent c ...

and diplomat who served as the Consul-General of Pakistan at

Herat Herāt (; Dari/Pashto: هرات) is an oasis city and the third-largest city in Afghanistan. In 2020, it had an estimated population of 574,276, and serves as the capital of Herat Province, situated south of the Paropamisus Mountains (''Se ...

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

.Matinuddin, Kamal (1999) ''The Taliban Phenomenon: Afghanistan 1994-1997'', p 63. Oxford University Press US, , A

Pakistan Army The Pakistan Army (, ), commonly known as the Pak Army (), is the Land warfare, land service branch and the largest component of the Pakistan Armed Forces. The president of Pakistan is the Commander-in-chief, supreme commander of the army. The ...

officer and

special operations Special operations or special ops are military activities conducted, according to NATO, by "specially designated, organized, selected, trained, and equipped forces using unconventional techniques and modes of employment." Special operations ma ...

specialist, he was a member of the

Special Service Group The Special Service Group (SSG) are the special forces of the Pakistan Army. They are also known by their nickname of "Maroon Berets" due to their headgear. The SSG is responsible to deploy and execute five doctrinal missions: foreign inte ...

(SSG), Pakistan's army special forces, and was an

intelligence officer An intelligence officer is a member of the intelligence field employed by an organization to collect, compile or analyze information (known as intelligence) which is of use to that organization. The word of ''officer'' is a working title, not a r ...

in the ISI. A veteran of the

Soviet–Afghan War The Soviet–Afghan War took place in the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan from December 1979 to February 1989. Marking the beginning of the 46-year-long Afghan conflict, it saw the Soviet Union and the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic o ...

, he is widely believed to have played a key role in the formation of the

Taliban , leader1_title = Supreme Leader of Afghanistan, Supreme leaders , leader1_name = {{indented plainlist, * Mullah Omar{{Natural Causes{{nbsp(1994–2013) * Akhtar Mansour{{Assassinated (2015–2016) * Hibatullah Akhundzada (2016–present) ...

, after having helped train the

Afghan mujahideen The Afghan ''mujahideen'' (; ; ) were Islamist militant groups that fought against the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan and the Soviet Union during the Soviet–Afghan War and the subsequent Afghan Civil War (1989–1992), First Afghan Ci ...

on behalf of the United States in the 1980s. "Colonel Imam," as Tarar was also known, was a

commando A commando is a combatant, or operative of an elite light infantry or special operations force, specially trained for carrying out raids and operating in small teams behind enemy lines. Originally, "a commando" was a type of combat unit, as oppo ...

guerrilla warfare Guerrilla warfare is a form of unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military, such as rebels, partisans, paramilitary personnel or armed civilians, which may include recruited children, use ambushes, sabotage, terrori ...

specialist, trained

Mullah Omar Muhammad Umar Mujahid (196023 April 2013), commonly known as Mullah Omar or Muhammad Omar, was an Afghan militant leader and founder and the first leader of the Taliban from 1994 until his death in 2013. During the Third Afghan Civil War, the T ...

and other Taliban factions and leaders. Colonel Imam remained active in Afghanistan's civil war until the 2001 United States led War on Terrorism, and supported the Taliban publicly through media. Tarar was kidnapped along with fellow ISI officer

Khalid Khawaja Khalid Khawaja (; 3 July, 1951–April 30, 2010) was an officer of the Pakistan Air Force, and the Air Force's intelligence officer of the Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence agency.Asad Qureshi Asad Qureshi is a British filmmaker who was kidnapped on 26 March 2010 by a militant group called the " Asian Tigers" in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the Afghanistan border, where he was making a film in North Wazirista ...

and Qureshi's driver Rustam Khan on 26 March 2010. Khawaja was killed a month later. Qureshi and Khan were released in September 2010. Amir Sultan Tarar was killed in January 2011.

Education and military career

Amir Sultan Tarar was a graduate from the PMA and from

Fort Bragg Fort Bragg (formerly Fort Liberty from 2023–2025) is a United States Army, U.S. Army Military base, military installation located in North Carolina. It ranks among the largest military bases in the world by population, with more than 52,000 m ...

. After he graduated from the Pakistan Military Academy, he joined the

's 15th

Frontier Force Regiment The Frontier Force Regiment is one of the six infantry regiments of the Pakistan Army. They are popularly known as the ''Piffers'' in reference to their military history as the PIF (Punjab Irregular Force) of the British Indian Army, or as the ...

as 2nd Lieutenant. Amir Sultan Tarar was sent to the United States in 1974, and was trained among the

United States Army Special Forces The United States Army Special Forces (SF), colloquially known as the "Green Berets" due to their distinctive service Berets of the United States Army, headgear, is a branch of the United States Army United States Army Special Operations Comm ...

. Upon his graduation from the Special Forces School, Amir Sultan Tarar was awarded the American

Green beret The green beret was the official headdress of the British Commandos, a special-forces unit active during World War II. It is still worn by members of the Royal Marines after passing the Commando Course, and personnel from other units of the Roy ...

by his training commander. Following his return to Pakistan, Amir Sultan Tarar joined the

(SSG). In the 1980s, he participated in the

. Colonel Imam, as he became known, was increasingly involved in

's politics even after the

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

withdrawal from Afghanistan. After the Soviet–Afghan War, Colonel Imam supported and trained

fighters independently. It was alleged even in the 2000s that he still independently supported the Taliban independence movement in Afghanistan. He was a disciple of

Ameer Muhammad Akram Awan Ameer Muhammad Akram Awan (, ; 31 December 1934 in Noorpur Sethi, British India – 7 December 2017 in Rawalpindi, Pakistan) was an Islamic scholar and spiritual leader of the Naqshbandia Owaisiah order of Sufism. He belonged to Awan tribe. A ...

, the current sheikh of

silsila ''Silsila'' () is an Arabic language, Arabic word meaning ''chain'', ''link'', ''connection'' often used in various senses of :wikt:lineage, lineage. In particular, it may be translated as "spiritual genealogy" where one Sufi Master transfe ...

Naqshbandia Owaisia Naqshbandi (Persian: نقشبندیه) is a major Sufi order within Sunni Islam, named after its 14th-century founder, Baha' al-Din Naqshband. Practitioners, known as Naqshbandis, trace their spiritual lineage (silsila) directly to the Prophet ...

Relationships with United States

After the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

, Amir Sultan Tarar was invited to the White House by the then

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Film and television *'' Præsident ...

George Herbert Walker Bush George Herbert Walker BushBefore the outcome of the 2000 United States presidential election, he was usually referred to simply as "George Bush" but became more commonly known as "George H. W. Bush", "Bush Senior," "Bush 41," and even "Bush th ...

, and was given a piece of the

Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (, ) was a guarded concrete Separation barrier, barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and the East Germany, German Democratic Republic (GDR; East Germany). Construction of the B ...

with a brass plaque inscribed: "To the one who dealt the first blow." In the 2000s, Western

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. It can be described as t ...

agencies believed Colonel Imam was dead among a group of renegade officers from Pakistan's ISI who continued to help the Taliban after Pakistan turned against them following the attacks of September 11, 2001.

Authentic knowledge about Amir Sultan Tarar

Little is known of Amir Sultan Tarar's true history or operational profile as an agent of the ISI. Most information about 'Colonel Imam' was generated by his own admission, as well as news media speculation. Pakistan's secrecy over internal and external security, plus the code of conduct of

Pakistan Armed Forces The Pakistan Armed Forces (; ) are the military forces of Pakistan. It is the world's sixth-largest military measured by active military personnel and consists of three uniformed services—the Army, Navy, and the Air Force, which are backe ...

personnel serving in sensitive institutions, prevents such details from being available or verifiable. In 2010, however, Amir Sultan Tarar gave interviews to foreign and domestic journalists in

Rawalpindi Rawalpindi is the List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, third-largest city in the Administrative units of Pakistan, Pakistani province of Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab. It is a commercial and industrial hub, being the list of cities in P ...

. Tarar's initial objective, after the Mujahedin infighting after Soviet withdrawal and before his involvement with Taliban, were unclear; his objectives at that time were just to find new friends for Pakistan from where to operate later, such as Akhaundzada of Helmand who had a blood feud with Hikmatyar and was a warlord with 17000 men under command. According to Colonel Imam's own claims, Soviets when in Afghanistan had put a 200 million Afghani bounty on him. He also claimed that, when he presented operational details to Aslam Baig after General Zia's death about anti-soviet struggle, the later was surprised as to the extent. In Cathey Schofield's book ''Inside Pakistan Army'', Colonel Imam admitted meeting Osama Bin Laden in 1986.

Kidnapping and execution

In March 2010, Colonel Imam, former ISI officer

, and Qureshi's driver Rustman Khan were abducted by an unknown militant group which called itself Asian Tigers. Khawaja's body was found near a stream in Karam Kot in April 2010 with a note attached saying he was with the CIA and ISI, about seven kilometres south of

North Waziristan North Waziristan District (, ) is a Districts of Pakistan, district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan. It is the northern part of Waziristan, a mountainous region of northwest Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan and covering . The capital ...

's main town of Mirali. Qureshi and Khan were freed in September 2010. Colonel Imam was executed in captivity, as documented in a video released by

Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan The Pakistani Taliban, officially the Tehreek-i-Taliban-e-Pakistan (TTP), is an umbrella organization of various Islamist armed militant groups operating along the Afghan–Pakistani border. Formed in 2007 by Baitullah Mehsud, its current ...

. Both the

Haqqani network The Haqqani network is an Afghan Islamist group, built around the family of the same name, that has used asymmetric warfare in Afghanistan to fight against Soviet forces in the 1980s, and US-led NATO forces and the Islamic Republic of Afghanis ...

and the Afghan

were purportedly against the execution.Unity among North Waziristan militant groups crumbles, ''Dawn'', 28 Apr 2011
/ref> Colonel Imam's captors refused to release his body to his family unless a ransom was paid.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Imam, Colonel People from Chakwal District Pakistan Army brigadiers Frontier Force Regiment officers Pakistani expatriates in the United States Special Services Group officers People of the Soviet–Afghan War Pakistani anti-communists Assassinated Pakistani diplomats 2011 deaths Military government of Pakistan (1977–1988) Military personnel killed in the insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa People of Inter-Services Intelligence People killed by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan Pakistani expatriates in Afghanistan Pakistani Islamists People of the Afghanistan conflict (1978–present) Pakistani military personnel of the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 1944 births