Crisis in Pakistan leaves Bush admin with ‘nightmare’ scenario

November 4, 2007

For several years, the Bush White House has said “stability” in the Middle East is a misguided foreign policy goal. The president’s vision demanded that transformative democracies spread throughout the region, and that maintaining stability does little more than tolerate dictatorships.

It made for pleasant rhetoric, but the administration never really meant a word of it. Bush looked for partners in the Middle East, whether they were true democracies or not was irrelevant. Pakistan and its military dictatorship certainly fit the bill.

Which makes yesterday’s developments all the more troublesome.

The Pakistani leader, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, declared a state of emergency on Saturday night, suspending the country’s Constitution, firing the chief justice of the Supreme Court and filling the streets of this capital city with police officers.

The move appeared to be an effort by General Musharraf to reassert his fading power in the face of growing opposition from the country’s Supreme Court, political parties and hard-line Islamists. Pakistan’s Supreme Court had been expected to rule within days on the legality of General Musharraf’s re-election last month as the country’s president.

The emergency act, which analysts and opposition leaders said was more a declaration of martial law, also boldly defied the Bush administration, which had repeatedly urged General Musharraf to avoid such a path and instead move toward democracy. Washington has generously backed the general, sending him more than $10 billion in aid since 2001, mostly for the military. Now the administration finds itself in the bind of having to publicly castigate the man it has described as one of its closest allies in fighting terrorism.

Well, you’d think so, except castigating in these circumstances is apparently kind of tricky. The White House, for example, described Musharraf’s desperate anti-democratic crackdown as “disappointing.”

But the LAT notes the administration’s emphasis on pragmatism: “[T]he Pakistani leader’s action will not mean an automatic suspension of U.S. military aid, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said Saturday. ‘At this point,’ Morrell said, “the declaration does not impact our military support for Pakistan.'”

In other words, U.S. officials are upset about Musharraf arresting lawyers, stifling the press, flooding the streets with troops, and seizing control of everything — but they’re not that upset.

It’s worth noting that Musharraf has been inching closer to these steps for a while, but the U.S. has successfully walked him back. Apparently, our ability to influence events has all but disappeared, leaving us in a “nightmare” scenario.

For more than five months the United States has been trying to orchestrate a political transition in Pakistan that would manage to somehow keep Gen. Pervez Musharraf in power without making a mockery of President Bush’s promotion of democracy in the Muslim world.

On Saturday, those carefully laid plans fell apart spectacularly. Now the White House is stuck in wait-and-see mode, with limited options and a lack of clarity about the way forward.

General Musharraf’s move to seize emergency powers and abandon the Constitution left Bush administration officials close to their nightmare: an American-backed military dictator who is risking civil instability in a country with nuclear weapons and an increasingly alienated public.

The Council on Foreign Relations’ Walter Russell Mead suggested yesterday’s developments could plunge Pakistan into chaos, including an increase in violence by Islamic fundamentalists.

“You could have chaos in the street, or a situation where it would be suicidal for Bhutto to try to participate in the process,” he said, adding, “Either of those scenarios puts the U.S. in a very difficult position.”

And in perhaps the most jaw-dropping tidbit from yesterday, the WaPo noted that a State Department official traveling with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Turkey yesterday found a silver lining in the Pakistani crisis. “Thank heavens for small favors,” the official said. Compared to Pakistan, “Iraq looks pretty good.”

Somehow, that just doesn’t seem funny right now.

The US has a long history of aiding odious military dictators in exchange for their support in the current American “war on whatever.” Bush and Rice can give us their platitudes about democracy, but they don’t value open societies abroad any more than they do at home.

Is Henry Kissinger available for consultation?

  • Given that nowadays “U.S. officials” in places like Pakistan and Iraq tend to be handpicked neocon nutjobs with a distinct preference for the BushWorld over reality, I’m a little nervous that the “U.S. officials” aren’t especially upset but are instead concentrating on taking detailed notes for possible use in 2008/2009.

  • Pakistan is too rough and tumble for Musharraf to give up power totally. He’s going to have to worry about retaliation. The guy should get out of the country if he wants to get out of Pakistani politics, and get some kind of asylum in the U.S. or something. Whether or not that would be the best thing for Pakistan, or would just encourage more disorder there (or more order, if more capable voices are able to fill the vaccuum he leaves?) is something I can’t say.

    I can’t remember if I wrote a comment about this yesterday, but I find all this pretty shocking, too.

  • And in perhaps the most jaw-dropping tidbit from yesterday, the WaPo noted that a State Department official traveling with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Turkey yesterday found a silver lining in the Pakistani crisis. “Thank heavens for small favors,” the official said. Compared to Pakistan, “Iraq looks pretty good.”

    Oh, God. These are the people we have guiding foreign policy for us? It’s “I failed my test, but at least I got suspended for dealing drugs, so Dad won’t get so pissed off about the test”???

  • If there’s a “silver lining”, maybe it’s that this will take the administration’s attention away from attacking Iran.

    General Musharraf’s move to seize emergency powers and abandon the Constitution left Bush administration officials close to their nightmare: an American-backed military dictator who is risking civil instability in a country with nuclear weapons and an increasingly alienated public.

    I suppose the Bush administration worst fear is that Musharraf’s power-grab will fail and, in the worst case scenario, al Qaeda-types will unleash Pakistan’s nuclear weapons against the US and its allies. If that’s the fear, the US will no doubt want to send land forces to support Musharraf. But what forces? Those in Iraq?

    The evil consequences of Bush’s illegal and dictatorial ventures multiply in surprising directions.

  • Only and idiot, or Cheney and Rice, could not see this coming. Yeesh. We are truly ruled by incompetent imbecils.

  • The US’s hypocrisy will now be more apparent than ever. In that they do not practice what they are constantly preaching and lecturing other countries about. If the US continues to finance the Musharaff dictatorship they will once and for all show the world how hypocritical they are. Indeed they will be supporting human rights abuses, no free press, and downright totalitarianism…so long as it still serves their best interest…Although this will not surprise anyone who has a walnut sized brain, perhaps some of the less fortunate victims of US media manipulation will be enlightened a fraction of the truth behind their government. I hope at the very least this will shut them up and keep them from lecturing Russia and Putin for a while.

  • This has the potential to turn into the “two-front” scenario on the battlefield, squeezing NATO forces in Afghanistan between Iran’s rabid dislike for Bush and an “Islamo-Liberated” Pakistan. One driving forward to acquire nuclear technology—and the other already possessing not only the technology, but the weaponry associated with that technology.

    The worst part of the Pakistani scenario right now is that US forces are not capable of entering into a third conflict. Troops have been ground down by attrition and reduced benefits; equipment has broken and not been replaced, or is replaced with substandard ordnance; brigades currently at home have not been resupplied or remanned.

    Think we’ll see the “D” word before next year’s election? One to ten that the draft is “on Pelosi’s table” by Spring—and everyone will blame it on those tail-tucking YellowDog Dems.

    Canada’s looking pretty darned good right now….

  • Just when you think American foreign policy has hit bottom, it drops.

    Whatever Bush touches, breaks.

  • Bush may have been against nation building when he ran in 2000, but he instead came up with an even more catastrophic notion with his grand but intellectually lazy concept of region building. So Bush’s vision of a democratic Middle East, at least that was his excuse after he invaded Iraq and didn’t find any WMDs, has yielded: Hamas leading the Palestinians, Syria as a threat to reinvade Lebanon, Israel wounded from a botched invasion of Lebanon, Hezbollah increasingly influential in Lebanon, friendly to US but despotic at home governments still in power in Egypt and Saudi Arabia that foster increasingly militant Islamism and anti-US groups, a formerly defeated Taliban resurgent in Afghanistan, Turkey desirous of attacking a country we attacked and occupy, Iraq heading toward a tense and ethnicly cleansed future, Iran having good reason to become increasingly hard-line Islamist due to US saber rattling, Pakistan under martial law by a guy we’ve given $10 billion to to support the armed forces that are now arresting oppostion leaders — what a breathtaking turn of events since Bush took office! It’s going to taking an enormous amount of diplomacy and time to unsh*t this bed. Thanks Bushies! Your hubris has come home to roost.

  • yeah, continuing to send cash to the Pakistani military to enforce martial law while we allegedly occupy Iraq to promote democracy in the Middle East. . . that’s a principled stand that will surely help convert those hearts and minds to the American way. hy. po. crits.

  • Does anyone know WHY Musharraf took this step? Did he decide he wasn’t going to allow Pakistan to be a “democracy” anymore and he would be a dictator? Or were other forces working against him, like the anti-American forces in dissident circles, and he’d gotten word that a coup was in the making?

  • I bet Bush and Cheney are drooling at Musharraf’s “arresting lawyers, stifling the press, flooding the streets with troops and seizing control of everything.” They wish they could do that here!

  • Just one small bone to pick:

    Washington has generously backed the general, sending him more than $10 billion in aid since 2001, mostly for the military…

    Of course the generosity is really a form of self promotion.
    The 10 billion is used to buy weapons made by certain American corporations.
    The CEOS then reinvest some it back into the Republican party.
    That’s all up-front and legal.
    God only knows how many slush funds are slopped on the sly.

  • anney (#13), it is widely believed there were two triggers to this step.

    the lesser of the two in importance was the upswing in militant Islamic violence and the inability of the central government to control the increasing threat, mainly in more remote provinces but slowly moving towards and increasing activity in larger population centers — by imposing martial law, the military can engage in a much more severe and efficient crackdown, and by stiling the media, they can deny the insurgents much of their needed attention.

    the key trigger, however, of personal importance to Musharraf is a rumor the the Pakistan Supreme Court was nearing the issuance of a ruling that his re-election violated the law because he failed to relinquish his title as Chief of Staff of the Army prior to being re-elected President — the Constitution prohibits holding both offices.

    they cynical version is that reason (1) gave cover for reason (2), and moreover the real reason he did it was (3) – because he could.

  • zeitgeist

    I should have more closely connected that upcoming Pakistani Supreme Court decision as possibly stripping Musharraf of some of his powers to get to the bottom of this.

    I do suspect that his power-grab and the military crackdown will be very offensive to anti-American Pakistani dissidents, the Taliban and al Qaeda in the forefront, and perhaps even non-dissidents, so there could very well be a revolt against him. Many assassination attempts have already been made against Musharraf, even very recently, so that’s still a threat to him if anger increases. How possible an anti-American coup actually is must be anybody’s guess, but that reality would turn a great deal of the current US-related balance of world power upside down.

    Musharraf seems to have put himself in a position where he MUST win this one or bring down the whole house of cards built around him. I really believe Bush will demand that the US send in ground forces if it looks like Musharraf is going to fail.

    We’ll see.

  • If General Musharraf can suspend the constitution and flood the streets with militia, couldn’t George W. Bush do the same next year, just prior to Inauguration Day — and flood the streets with his own private militia, the boys from Blackwater?

  • zeitgeist

    On another forum, someone linked this Report from “Outlook India”, which makes the claim that Musharraf made this move at the behest of the US:

    [Excerpts] Musharraf’s decision to impose Emergency came in the wake of consultations with Admiral William J Fallon, US commander of CENTCOM, who reached Pakistan on Thursday to discuss war on terror in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Concerns about not derailing Pakistan’s transition to full-fledged democracy had to be balanced against the military situation on the ground. Presumably this figured in the talks between Musharraf and the Admiral. The imposition of Emergency indicates that Musharraf succeeded in convincing the US that nothing short of a total military assault could succeed. This required consolidating President Musharraf’s power in the short term. That’s why the Emergency.

    ….the Taliban must be administered a fatal blow militarily. The fundamentalists must be purged of Al Qaida elements. That’s a tall order. It cannot be achieved without a total military assault. That required either Martial Law or the imposition of Emergency.

    I dunno what to think now. I don’t see how Musharraf can accomplish those goals, even if he’s got Pakistan under military rule right now without terrible brutality and bloodshed AND on-the-ground US help.

    So what the hell’s going on?

  • Well, it doesn’t appear from this piece that Musharraf made his move at the behest of the US but rather TOLD them that he was going to do what he’d been talking about for months. Note that this is an opinion piece from someone in India, and who knows what perspective the author is filtering his conclusions through.

    Musharraf’s real reasons for declaring this “emergency”, however, are still very murky to me.

  • I do suspect that his power-grab and the military crackdown will be very offensive to anti-American Pakistani dissidents,[…] anney, @19

    Never mind the *anti*-American elements; even the *pro*-American people are pissed off with Musharraf’s power grab. My husband used to have a Pakistani student whose entire family is pro-American (educated here and in Canada). She used to hate Bhutto and defended Musharraf, no matter what he did. That ended yesterday. We got an e-mail from her following the crack-down and she now hates them both. I think it was the stifling of the press and the closing of the Supreme Court that did it for her. Since she’s, generally, a biddable girl (went back to a pre-arranged marriage without a blink, even though she’d never met her bride-groom), I have to assume that her opinion of Musharraf is shared by the rest of her — large and rich — family. Which doesn’t bode well for Musharraf or our future relationship with Pakistan, if that’s how the powerful there are now thinking of him…

  • Musharraf’s power was weakening from the threatened return of Bhutto (sp?) and the attitude of the Supreme Court at a time when the Taliban and the terrorists residing or hiding in Pakistan were increasing. Musharraf does not like playing by the rules and the Taliban had gotten totally out of hand. He decided they needed to be quashed and not through ‘diplomatic’ or legal means. The cities were starting to succumb to radical Muslims because the army just didn’t want to start killing citizens they knew and were friends with. Musharraf decided a strong military action was what was needed to remain in power and get rid of those who opposed his rule…he knew he could count on continued military aid from the US who wanted the Taliban and the terrorists destroyed. America cannot afford to let these fanatics take over a country with military nukes at their disposal…the US has no choice but to back the only supporter they have in Pakistan, no matter what he does.

  • For more than five months the United States has been trying to orchestrate a political transition in Pakistan that would manage to somehow keep Gen. Pervez Musharraf in power without making a mockery of President Bush’s promotion of democracy in the Muslim world.

    That should be “making a further mockery.” I’m sure BushBrat has considered declaring Mushmouth a terrist and invading Pakistan so he could establish a “real” democracy, maybe this is the break he’s been waiting for.

    “Thank heavens for small favors,” the official said. Compared to Pakistan, “Iraq looks pretty good.”

    If I weren’t already used to incredibly callous and just plain wrong bullshit from this mAdministration, my jaw would be in my lap.

    Oh well, looks like its time for Rice to sing another verse of “No one could have possibly foreseen…”

  • The very last thing we’ll see is US forces in Pakistan. We’ve got “duct-tape-and-baling-wire” combat brigades hunkered down In Iraq right now, staring the possibility of a second three-month erxtension of their rotations square in the eye—because there are not enough forces to replace them with. We have NATO doing the Afghan boogie for us—again, because we lack the prerequisite manpower to do the job.

    And just as American youth do not want to fight Mr Bush’s War on Thought, so too does what was once “the coalition of the willing” draw away from the Forever War scenario.

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