Sync & corrections by honeybunny www.addic7ed.com
This week on "Vice," we're in India and Pakistan to check
out the world's most dangerous border.
♪
SHANE: There's machine gunners on every building along
our route.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: And also an illegal escape from North Korea.
_
♪
SHANE: The world is changing.
Now, no one knows where it's going,
but we'll be there uncovering the news...
That's World War III.
culture...
and politics
and expose the absurdity of the modern condition.
That little child has a huge gun.
This scene isn't really kosher
by American standards.
I was interviewing suicide bombers,
and they were kids.
This is the world through our eyes.
MAN: We win or we die!
This is the world of "Vice."
♪
Hi. I'm Shane Smith.
We're here in the "Vice" offices
in Brooklyn, New York,
and for our first story
this week we go to Asia.
♪
North Korea is one of the worst places on Earth.
Its population suffers from political oppression, intense
poverty, and starvation.
So it's no wonder that every year thousands of people try
to escape the country.
Now, getting out is hard enough, but getting to a safe
place, as it turns out, is even harder.
So we sent Thomas to meet a group of defectors as they
flee from their oppressive regime.
♪
_
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: The country Kim has betrayed is
North Korea.
We can't show her face because if the North Korean government
finds out she's escaped, both Kim and her family could spend
the rest of their lives in prison camp.
Which, ironically enough, is one of the many reasons people
want to get the hell out of there.
To escape North Korea, you can't just slip across
the border into South Korea.
That is, unless you're willing to cross an 8-mile strip
of land mines, bears, and North Korean guards
with orders to shoot to kill.
So most defectors head for China, but China is still
dangerous, too.
The Chinese government refuses to give North Koreans refugee
status, in part because it sees North Korea as a buffer
between its own country and the American-backed
South Korea.
So if a North Korean is caught in China, they get sent right
back where they came from.
Those who don't get caught have to rely on a network
of human traffickers and brokers to guide them out
of that country to freedom.
Provided they don't just sell them into a life of sexual
bondage instead, which they often do.
_
♪
[Hands clapping]
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: That's where Pastor Kim comes in.
For the past 16 years, he's been wading into this black
market and plucking North Koreans from its horny
clutches, and for no personal gain, other than winning souls
for the glory of God the Father Almighty.
In fact, many of his congregants are North Koreans
he helped escape.
His latest rescue mission is our girl Kim.
How much does it cost, like, basically kind of like per
person, to get somebody out of North Korea?
So wait. I'm sorry.
The pimp made you pay for her abortion?
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: That was the first in a series of shady
deals the pastor had to make in order to get Kim,
a 23-year-old potato farmer, to freedom.
The next was paying to have her smuggled to a safe house
in Yanji, China.
Since being seen there with a bunch of foreigners might blow
her escape, we sent our Korean translator with a small camera
to meet her.
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: Since escaping her pimp, Kim has
been holed up in this safe house with three other North
Korean women, who were each sold as brides to Chinese men.
The pastor is also bankrolling their escape with their
kids in tow.
Back at the church, the pastor laid out his plan.
To get to South Korea, the girls have to take buses
several thousand miles to the southern Chinese border, then
sneak into Laos.
That's where we'll meet them and watch as they're smuggled
across the Mae Khong River into Thailand, the nearest
place that recognizes their refugee status.
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: Once we got word that Kim
and the other North Koreans had started their way south,
we headed to Laos.
This is obviously the most sketchy part of the trip--A,
because it is human trafficking, but also
because if these guys get caught, the defectors
are fucked.
I'm starting to get a little ill at ease.
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: Finally, we met Kim.
THOMAS: Hi. How are you?
Thank you.
TRANSLATOR: This is her first time meeting a foreigner.
THOMAS: Oh, wow. OK!
THOMAS: Do you remember how you felt
when Kim Jong-Il passed?
Can you describe how you got from your village to China?
Do you know what the next steps are for you?
To get to South Korea, do you know what you have to
go through?
Are you nervous?
Why not?
I would be nervous.
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: We set out in the middle of the night.
We had to race to make it across the river before
sunrise blew our cover.
Speeding down windy Laotian mountain roads, which is
especially nauseating for Kim and the others, considering
this is only the third or fourth time they've ever
been in a car.
THOMAS: It's fuckin' lunacy.
All this effort, all this money, just to get 4 nice
young ladies out of a country that can't feed them, doesn't
have any opportunities for them and stuff to get
somewhere that at least pays lip service to the idea
of wanting them there.
[Motor starting]
So at this point of the trip, if we get caught,
not only are these girls' lives basically forfeit,
they'll be turned back over and repatriated to North Korea,
and either sent to labor camps or summarily executed.
We'll probably end up in Laotian jail, Pastor Kim will too.
Kind of a lot riding on this boat ride.
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: Once off the boat, the girls have to
hide themselves to avoid being spotted by passing
river patrols.
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: Now we have to rush back across the
Mae Khong river before the next border patrol passes
so that we can legally reenter Thailand to meet up
with the girls.
♪
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: The bad news is that the girls have
been caught.
The good news is that they were caught by Thai police who
won't send them back to North Korea.
They're right behind this little, like, piece
of sheet metal.
We can hear them talking, actually.
And there's a hole here that people have been passing stuff
through, which speaks to Thai security around these parts.
THOMAS: Hey, Kim?
Hey, um, how are you? Are you OK?
THOMAS, VOICE-OVER: From here they have to wait
on a representative from the South Korean embassy, who via
the diplomatic alchemy of handing them a passport, will
turn Kim and the other girls from North Koreans to
South Koreans.
But even on the home stretch to her own freedom, which
granted is Thai jail, Kim is just realizing the actual cost
of her escape may be her family's lives.
Now, I grew up at the end of the Cold War, which was
essentially America and its allies had half of the world,
and the Soviet Union and its allies had the other half.
Both countries had massive nuclear arsenals, and for 50
years stood toe-to-toe on the brink of all-out war.
The only thing that really held them back was M.A.D.,
otherwise known as
Mutually Assured Destruction.
Quite simply put, if one side launches an attack, so does
the other, and the final result is we all die.
End of story.
And because the end of the world was such a good
deterrent, the Cold War ended peacefully in 1991.
However, the lunacy of Mutually Assured Destruction
didn't go away at all, it just relocated.
The most dangerous place in the world today, I think you
could argue, is the Indian subcontinent, in the Line
of Control in Kashmir.
SHANE: Now, Kashmir's been in the news a lot lately,
with escalating tensions between India and Pakistan.
So we went to Kashmir's Line of Control to see just how bad
this conflict is getting.
♪
[Loudspeaker and crowd]
We're here in Pakistan, right there is India, and this is
the most dangerous border in the world.
♪
MAN: There is a danger of war between India and Pakistan.
India cannot attack us [Pakistan]
because of the bomb.
DIFFERENT MAN: Everyone is always talking
about Pakistan's nuclear capabilities and everyone is
terrified by them, but we [India]
also have nuclear capabilities.
MAN: That [nuclear war]
must not happen, because the alternative is a subcontinent
that no longer exists.
♪
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: India and Pakistan really, really hate
each other.
Now, this antagonism started when Mahatma Gandhi finally
succeeded in gaining independence from
Great Britain.
And in the ensuing chaos of building a new State, India's
Muslims insisted on creating their own country.
As a consequence, millions of Hindus and Sikhs fled to
India, and simultaneously, millions of India's Muslims
migrated to the newly created Pakistan.
Now, during this partition, tens of millions of people
were relocated.
And in the process, over a million people on both sides
of the migration were murdered in brutal religious violence.
India and Pakistan have been fighting ever since.
The flashpoint of this lingering conflict is Kashmir,
a mostly Muslim region that is partially occupied by
the Indian State.
And you don't have to be in Kashmir long to realize that
emotions are running extremely high, as was explained to us
by a Kashmiri political leader, Syed Ali Shah Geelani.
GEELANI: I will tell you without any hesitation that we
are facing the worst kind of state terrorism under the
occupation of Indian forces.
And the killing by the police
and the pol-mil [political military] forces
is a continuous process.
This is all consequences of forcible occupation.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: We wanted to talk to these pol-mil
forces, so we went North, to the highly militarized area
closer to the border.
This is one of the main entrances from Pakistan
into India.
It's one of the most heavily militarized zones
in all of India.
MAN: Because of the geographical features
and the demographics of the area, they [terrorists]
have found a very soft corner here, and an environment
conducive for them to flourish.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: The reason why this is such a militant
superhighway is because A, it's so close to Pakistan, B,
the terrain makes it almost impossible to police, and C,
because Pakistan continues to train militants and sneak them
into India with the sole intent to destabilize
the region.
So the Line of Control is not the border.
It's not a border. No.
It's a temporary arrangement
between India and Pakistan.
SHANE: So if they get through the Line of Control, then you
have to catch them.
NOOR: When they hit the hinterland, then it becomes
our job eliminating the terrorists.
SHANE: And who's training them?
Reportedly ISI [Pakistani Secret Police]
and the Pakistan Army.
So the Pakistan Army and the ISI
are training insurgents
and then sneaking them into India to create unrest.
Unrest and carry on insurgency.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: India has good reason to fear these
Pakistani-based terrorists, because in 2008 they attacked
Mumbai and killed 106 people, wounded hundreds more,
and held the city hostage for more than 60 hours.
Indians refer to it as their 9/11.
Now, our 9/11 got us so riled up that we invaded both Iraq
and Afghanistan, starting two brutal and bloody wars.
The reaction in India was nearly as intense and very,
very anti-Pakistan, with tens of thousands taking to
the streets calling for all-out war.
Remarkably, the Indian government showed restraint
and did not attack Pakistan in retaliation.
But tensions between the two countries remain severely
strained, as was explained to us by a leading Indian defense
expert, Ajai Sahni.
SAHNI: Pakistan continues to be the principal supporter
of a range of terrorist organizations mobilized
on the basis of an Islamist extremist ideology.
And the fact that is backed by the State apparatus
of Pakistan is what makes it so dangerous for India.
SAHNI: Now, technically Kashmir falls into the legal
claim for India.
It is challenged on the basis of a majoritarian principle by
Pakistan saying that this is a Muslim majority state and that
Muslims cannot live with other communities.
KIDS: I love my country! CROWD: I love my country!
KIDS: And I'm proud of it! CROWD: And I'm proud of it!
SAHNI: I don't think India/Pakistan relations have
any future.
I think this enmity is and will remain irreducible until
Pakistan undergoes a complete cultural transformation.
And I do not believe that there is anything within
the dynamics of Pakistan that can facilitate such
a transformation.
SHANE: So we're going up into the Himalayas now.
This road leads to the LOC, the Line of Control.
It's a very hot zone, and we're hoping someone doesn't
lob a grenade into our open jeep up here.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: And actually, as I was stupidly
making jokes about someone throwing grenades at us,
a real terrorist threat was detected and counter-terrorist
procedures were immediately implemented.
We got information regarding the presence of some
militants here.
So we covered all the areas from where we could possibly
draw some fire.
Let's go.
SHANE: Let's go.
SHANE: So there's a lot of terrorists coming in.
Exactly.
It is the main infiltration route.
As you can see the terrain is unmanageable.
Right.
Very steep slopes. Very dense forest.
And they make use of this geography and sneak
in from here.
SHANE: How do they get across?
I think it's sheer motivation on their part,
and the brainwashing that is done in the camps.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: After we were given the all clear, we
continued on our way to the Indian side
of the Line of Control.
As-salamu alaykum.
Over there is Pakistan.
This is the Line of Control.
We're going over to the bridge.
We had to take off our military gear because it's
seen as an insult.
There's rangers over there, trained.
They said if you go out onto the bridge and you go one step
too far they'll shoot you.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: Now, to us, it all seemed very quiet
and peaceful for supposedly the most heavy place on Earth.
But then our Indian guards pointed out all the bunkers
and positions that the Pakistani rangers had set up
on the mountains and we were like, "Oh."
So there's bunkers all over there?
At 12 o'clock.
SHANE: Oh, I see, there, yeah.
They have guns.
They've got everything.
SHANE: So this is the zero line right here, in between
India and Pakistan.
If I go on that side, I can say good-bye to my toes.
I'm not going to go on that side.
Ha ha ha!
You wouldn't think it's one of the most dangerous
borders in the world because when you look up, it's just
shockingly beautiful.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: So, India has nearly a million troops
in Kashmir and a massive nuclear arsenal pointed
at Pakistan and after the Mumbai attacks, have vowed
quite publicly: never again.
But the ISI and the Pakistani Army keep sending insurgents
across the border, with the sole purpose of causing chaos
within India, and they send them almost every day.
♪
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: Now this constant badgering seems
insane, so we went to Pakistan to see first-hand why they
seem to be so hell-bent on continuing this conflict.
The first person we talked to when we arrived was Dr. Pervez
Hoodbhoy, a leading nuclear scientist.
And what he told us didn't make us feel any better.
SHANE: You have Pakistan
openly training and sending
in militants into Kashmir,
and you have the Indians who, if they suffer another Mumbai,
saying we don't know if we can hold back.
What do you think about that?
Well, what you're saying is a Doomsday scenario that, OK,
nuclear weapons then come into play.
But let me say that the Indian establishment does realize
that a war with Pakistan this time would be devastating.
It would be fatal.
Catastrophic.
For both countries.
Which brings us to the growing radicalization
within Pakistan.
There is still a lot of anti-Indian feeling within
the Pakistani military.
It's seen as something that is very unifying.
So the radicals and the ordinary officers and men,
they are united in this, that yes, India is our enemy.
Until we get out of this,
it's going to be-- it's going to get worse.
HOODBHOY, VOICE-OVER: Most countries of the world have armies.
Pakistan has an army that has a country, and it is now
in terrible trouble.
It is being attacked by the Jihadis which it helped
create, the general headquarters of the Pakistan
Army has been attacked, three ISI centers have been blown up
by suicide bombers, and this was done using
insider information.
So radicalization is now eating into its very marrow.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: According to Dr. Hoodbhoy, what is even
more troubling than the radicalization within the army
is that the Pakistani State is actually losing control over
huge swathes of its own territory.
He recommended we go to some of these areas to see
for ourselves just how bad things have gotten.
So we headed to North-West Frontier Province, the home
of the Pakistani Taliban.
♪
SHANE: So we're leaving the Bajaur Fort now, which used to
be, in 2008, the only part of the whole area that the
Pakistani Army controlled.
Just the fort.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: Now just to be clear, when we say the
Pakistani Army only controlled the fort, that means that
the rest of the province was controlled by the Taliban.
SHANE: There's machine gunners on every building along our
route, which makes me a bit worried that they say that
everything is under control.
This was the hub of the terrorist Talibans.
Right.
They were living over there,
and they were dominating this entire village.
SHANE: They would be training here, and then if anything
happened they could hide in the caves.
That's right.
SHANE: So we're gonna go in the caves now.
Oh, Jesus.
Can you see very small entrance?
It is by design.
SHANE: But so they dug these caves?
Yes, they dug these caves.
SHANE: That's a lot of work.
Yes, they're a lot of work.
SHANE: And how many cave complexes
like this are there?
Dozens of such complexes exist.
SHANE: It's like when they used to say in America that
they couldn't find Osama bin Laden
because he was in caves.
Maybe.
SHANE: We didn't understand what caves, how caves...
Because for us a cave is like, you know, with a bear in it.
Tunnels. All over tunnels.
But these are tunnels and whole complexes.
Well-knitted together.
Well-knit together, yeah.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: Now, the Taliban have been operating
in Pakistan for quite some time.
In fact, the quote unquote father of the Taliban is
actually a Pakistani general named Hamid Gul who was once
head of the ISI, which is kind of like the FBI, the CIA,
and the NSA all rolled into one, which made him at one
point one of the most powerful men in Pakistan.
Now, his views on the radicalization of the Army
were quite unexpected, as he quickly brought all of these
seemingly internal problems right back to the conflict
with India.
GUL: The army is being pushed around
and it is losing its direction.
America is forcing us to shift
our forces from the eastern
border to the western border.
It's called reversing the front.
That, there is the enemy but you reverse to a friend.
So there is the enemy India but we're reversing to our
friend, which is Afghanistan.
We are reversing to our friend, toward Afghanistan.
Yeah.
You've been called
the father of the Taliban because you
helped set up the Jihadis
who would fight against the Soviets.
But of course the Jihadis, I supported them.
Osama bin Laden was a very, sort of a genial
kind of a man.
A bit shy.
Intelligence oozed out of his eyes.
Flashing black eyes, you know.
Just oozed out of his eyes.
SHANE: After the Mumbai attack,
there was such a huge,
sort of, nationalistic outpouring in India.
Aren't you worried that
if you keep sending militants into
Kashmir or something, that there will be another attack?
Kashmir is a festering sore for us.
Sure.
Since 1971, there were
several occasions when there was a call for war.
But they didn't do this because they know
what will be the price.
What will be the price?
They can't attack us because we are nuclear.
Yeah.
And they cannot attack us,
because we are imbued with the spirit of Jihad,
which has defeated two superpowers
in our neighborhood.
And without settling the Kashmir dispute, the peace
cannot return to the subcontinent.
Right.
India or Pakistan.
So, I think Indians must come to their senses.
They are not understanding the course of history.
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: After talking to General Gul, we
thought things in Kashmir were bad enough, but recently a new
wrinkle has surfaced in this ongoing conflict.
That new wrinkle is water.
[Man shouting in foreign language]
SHANE: If Kashmir is the majority of Pakistan's water,
if Kashmir is the majority of India's water, it's already
highly politicized, it's the most militarized area
in the world, what are your thoughts on that?
Look, this country was 27 million when it came into
existence in 1947.
Today it is almost 200 million.
It's leading to water becoming a very scarce resource,
and these are the things that we really have to be
afraid of.
You have this sort of political perfect storm
of Pakistan radicalizing and then India at the same time
sort of hardening up.
HOODBHOY: We might be able to get some kind of a handle
on our disputes.
Water is something that you need and something we need,
and so let's figure out a decent way of doing this
without going to war.
SAHNI: Nobody is going to give away a piece of land
and a people just because somebody else asks for it.
SHANE: Like what is the worst-case scenario?
What, what, what happens, you know...
Well, the worst-case scenario
is what Carl Sagan told us a long time ago.
"The planet will no longer be blue anymore."
Do you think that Pakistan is in a state of denial?
Oh, yes.
Most certainly it's in a state of denial,
and there is absolutely no guarantee
that it will come out of this.
If one [warhead]
had been used, then you can bet that all of them
will be used.
SAHNI: If there is an attack I have no doubt in my mind,
there would have to be nuclear retaliation.
Everyone seems to think that it's more a question of when,
not of whether.
[Crowd shouting]
SHANE, VOICE-OVER: India and Pakistan have hundreds
of warheads pointing at each other, and things just seem to
be going from bad to worse.
Now, the problem with this is, that if India and Pakistan go
to war, it doesn't just mean the destruction
of the subcontinent, because leading atomic experts have
categorically stated that if over 100 warheads are
detonated anywhere on Earth, it means the destruction
of the world as we know it.
[Crowd shouting]
Sync & corrections by honeybunny www.addic7ed.com