Pakistan, Land of Circuitous Problems

What to do, what to do? If we want to achieve some sort of success in Afghanistan (and what that might look like grows smaller as the years pass), there will have to be some breakthrough in Pakistan.

Musharraf is gone. Like most things that happen in Pakistan, that’s a mixed blessing, certainly for NATO forces in Afghanistan and probably for the Pakistanis themselves. Mushie might not have been a great ally to the West in the fight against al Qaeda but he was a somewhat effective keel for his country.

Without Musharraf, the two ruling parties will now have to try to govern and, in Pakistan, that’s a Herculean chore. The pols are going to have to carve out turf that has been traditionally dominated by Pakistan’s army. The military is actually far more than just an armed force. It’s also a wealthy and powerful political and economic institution and, as such, tearing the country out of the generals’ grasp may not be all that easy. Pakistan’s military is more than familiar with seizing power in coups.

The other key segment of the military is Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency or ISI. This secretive outfit is still believed to be harbouring Taliban forces in the tribal lands and is also strongly believed to have played a role in the July 7th bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul. Some experts believe the ISI remains a free agent utterly beyond the control of the civilian government.

While the attempted orderly transition of power into civilian hands proceeds there’s the question of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal and Dr. Kahn’s nuclear weapons export shop that was never completely dismantled. There are some experts who fear that Kahn & Co. could surreptitiously resume business if the fledgling government gets distracted.

Finally there’s al Qaeda and the Taliban operating relatively freely in the tribal lands. Mushie was never able to bring them to heel and he was Washington’s boy, something that severely wounded his popularity and political survival. The new bunch seems intent on distancing themselves from America and, when it comes right down to it, there’s really only one way to do that.

America keeps raising the notion of crossing into Pakistan to hunt down the terrorists and the insurgents but that’s probably just noise. The US and ISAF are woefully understrength in Afghanistan as it is. Where would they get the megaforce it would take to try to tame the tribal homelands and purge them of the insurgents? That’s really tough, forbidding territory and any infidel who seeks to take it on will be fighting more than the insurgents. They’ll have to fight the tribesmen themselves and they are genuinely tough customers.

There seem to be no good answers on how to deal with Pakistan. Perhaps with infinite patience, and perseverence and solid groundwork, some breakthrough may yet be achieved, eventually. And yet the Bush administration’s recent courting of India has created an enormous setback in relations with Pakistan.

What we ultimately achieve in Afghanistan may well depend on Washington’s ability to sort out its problems with Islamabad. Don’t hold your breath.

 

Pervez’ Purported Perfidy

The father of the “Islamic Bomb” alleges that the Pakistani military, then under the command of Pervez Musharraf, supervised a flight of nuclear centrifuges to North Korea in 2000. From BBC News:

“Disgraced scientist AQ Khan has said that Pakistan transported nuclear material to North Korea with the full knowledge of the country’s army.

At the time President Pervez Musharraf was head of the army.

Dr Khan said that uranium enrichment equipment was sent in a North Korean plane loaded under the supervision of Pakistani security officials.

The BBC’s Barbara Plett, in Islamabad, says that Dr Khan’s latest claims contradict a public confession he made in 2004 that he was solely responsible for exporting nuclear technology to Iran, North Korea and Libya.

Our correspondent says that the comments are the most controversial accusation made by Dr Khan since he recently began defending himself in statements to the media.

His comments are also at variance with the oft-stated line of the Pakistani government that neither it nor the army had any knowledge of the exports.”

 

Musharraf Down In Flames

Pakistani strongman Pervez Musharraf has seen his party shot down by angry voters. From the New York Times:

“Almost all the leading figures in the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, the party that has governed for the last five years under Mr. Musharraf, lost their seats, including the leader of the party, the former speaker of Parliament and six ministers.

Official results are expected Tuesday, but early returns indicated that the vote would usher in a prime minister from one of the opposition parties, and opened the prospect of a Parliament that would move to undo many of Mr. Musharraf’s policies and that may even try to remove him.

The results were interpreted here as a repudiation of Mr. Musharraf as well as the Bush administration, which has staunchly backed him for more than six years as its best bet in the campaign against the Islamic militants in Pakistan. American officials will have little choice now but to seek alternative allies from among the new political forces emerging from the vote.
Politicians and party workers from Mr. Musharraf’s party said the vote was a protest against government policies and the rise in terrorism here, in particular against Mr. Musharraf’s heavy-handed way of dealing with militancy and his use of the army against tribesmen in the border areas, and against militants in a siege at the Red Mosque here in the capital last summer that left more than 100 people dead.”

The question now appears to be whether Washington has lost its most reliable supporter in Islamabad. At this point it’s probably best to keep a close eye on Pakistan’s military leadership to see whether they will long tolerate a significant reduction in their control of the country’s rule. The Pakistani military is heavily invested in the nation’s government, economy and, of course, security. Wrestling them under control will be the first and hardest challenge facing a new civilian administration – if they can oust Musharraf.

 

Musharraf to Bush – Back Off

Beleaguered Pakistani strongman and notional president, Pervez Musharraf, told Singapore’s Straits Times, that American forces would be considered “invaders” if they entered Pakistan to hunt down al-Qaida militants.

“Pakistan is under growing U.S. pressure to crack down on militants in its tribal regions close to the Afghan border.

The rugged area has long been considered a likely hiding place for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden as well as an operating ground for Taliban militants planning attacks on coalition forces in Afghanistan.

The New York Times reported last week that Washington was considering expanding the authority of the CIA and the military to launch covert operations within the tribal regions.

Several U.S. presidential candidates have also hinted they would support unilateral action in the area.

Musharraf told The Straits Times U.S. troops would “certainly” be considered invaders if they set foot in the tribal regions.

“If they come without our permission, that’s against the sovereignty of Pakistan. I challenge anybody coming into our mountains. They would regret that day,” he said in the interview. “

The US has suffered a great loss of support among the Pakistani people and it’s believed that any intrusion by American forces into Pakistan would only increase support for extremism and undercut Pakistan’s moderate political parties.

 

The Next Leader of Pakistan?

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto has plunged Pakistan into turmoil. Her Pakistan People’s Party was always a one-woman band so there is no natural successor to step into her shoes. That leaves Sharif and Musharraf. Of the two, Mushie is probably the strongest but is he strong enough?

What happens if Pakistan falls to a leader the nation cannot adequately support? It may fall back on the time-honoured alternative – military rule. That would mean that Musharraf’s own, freshly-minted army leader, Ashfaq Kiyani, could step into his boss’s old spot.

Kiyani is not only a career soldier from Punjab but he was also his nation’s spymaster as former head of the Interservice Intelligence Agency (ISI). It’s widely believed that Musharraf chose Kiyani to take over as head of the armed forces primarily because of his loyalty to Mushie but now that loyalty may be severely tested.

Musharraf’s power is waning and, in Pakistan, that’s not a good thing when political power is always shared with military power. As Mushie declines, Kiyani’s position is ascendant. Some analysts are now of the opinion that, if the unrest against Musharraf isn’t quieted soon, the army may “invite” him to step aside so that Kiyani can assume total control.

It’s also reported that Kiyani has strong links with Washington so he may been seen as the best option to put down unrest.

 

Mushie to Bushie – Get Lost! Bushie to Mushie – You’re the Greatest!

You can thank Pervez Musharraf for showing the world what happens when you tell the President of the United States to piss off. He wets his pants and then gives you a great big, Crawford, Texas hug.

In response to Mushie’s declaration of martial law in Pakistan three weeks ago, Bush reacted angrily. He said his aides warned the dictator that the state of emergency “would undermine democracy.”

Bush even sent his tough guy Negroponte to Islamabad to read the riot act to Musharraf.

In an interview with ABC News, Bush now says Musharraf “truly is somebody who believes in democracy.”

From The Washington Post:

Tom Malinowski, Washington director of Human Rights Watch said that “it’s hard to imagine how the administration will be able to achieve anything in Pakistan if the president is so disconnected from reality.”

“Almost everyone in Pakistan who believes in George Bush’s vision of democracy is in prison today,” Malinowski said. “Calling the man who put them in prison a great democrat will only discredit America among moderate Pakistanis and give Musharraf confidence that he can continue to defy the United States because Bush will forgive anything he does.”

Is it any wonder that a lot of Pakistanis now call their dictator “Busharraf”?

 

We’re Getting All Mushie About Pakistan Again

It has to be tough to be Pervez Musharraf. He seems to live in a world where people are either his avowed enemies or just tolerate him, sort of.

One thing about the guy is that he gets everybody nervous, really nervous at the first sign of instability in his administration. The fact is, he’s always made us nervous. Six years ago, on November 5, 2001, Gwynne Dyer explained why:

“…General Richard Meyers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on Sunday that he is ‘concerned’ about Pakistan’s stability and the safety of its nuclear arsenal. The Indian government said nothing at all, but you can guess what it is thinking.

It is thinking that if Pakistan should fall into the hands of Islamic fundamentalists as the result of a revolt against Musharraf, most probably from within his own armed forces, then India will have to ‘preempt’ – destroy Pakistan’s nuclear weapons on the ground before it can launch them – within the first hours after a new regime comes to power in Islamabad. And Washington, of course, is thinking exactly the same thing.

Seymore Hersh has just published a report in the New Yorker magazine, strenuously denied by the Pentagon (but then it would deny it, wouldn’t it?) that the United States already has a secret plan to destroy Pakistan’s nuclear weapons immediately if they seem likely to fall into fundamentalist hands.

This is insanely dangerous stuff even if it is true, as every one assumes, that the preemptive attack would be carried out using only conventional, not nuclear weapons. Pakistanis in all walks of life… …see their nuclear weapons as their last and maybe their only safeguard against far more powerful India.

A bungled or partial preemption would probably end with the new regime in Pakistan launching its [remaining] nuclear weapons …while it still could. The targets could be Indian nuclear bases and cities, or even US troops on the ground in Afghanistan.

How real is the danger? It’s not so much the civilian fundamentalists demonstrating against the West in the streets who pose the danger, but the generation of fundamentalist officers, brought into the armed forces by the late General (and President) Zia ul-Haq in the 1980s, who have now risen to command key army formations. Together with many senior officers of Inter-Service Intelligence – [the agency] that basically created the Taliban, …they comprise a large fundamentalist presence inside the only Pakistani institution that really works.”

And that’s why we’re getting all Mushie about Paksitan again because, in the six years since Dyer penned this particular column, things there haven’t gotten a bit better.

 

Mushie Dodges Another Bullet

Pakistan president and generalissimo Pervez Musharraf has been attacked – again. This time gunmen opened fire on Mushie’s aircraft over Rawalpindi.

Authorities recovered at least one anti-aircraft gun and one machinegun from a rooftop in the city. The nature of this assassination attempt points to inside collusion. Anti-aircraft guns are big and bulky. Moving and positioning them takes a lot of effort and would be almost impossible to conceal. The plotters would also need to know a) that Mushie was going to be taking a plane ride, b) the type of plane he’d be flying in, c) the route and destination, and d) the time that aircraft would be in a vulnerable position, say on final approach for landing where it could be both within range and much less maneuverable.

Meanwhile the siege of the Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, in Islamabad continues. Government officials have rejected a surrender offer by Abdur Rashid Ghazi, the leader of the mosque rebellion, which included a demand that he not be prosecuted.

Ghazi told the Associated Press, “We will be martyred, but we will not surrender.” The siege continues marked by intermittent, half-hour long exchanges of automatic weapons fire.