Pervez Musharraf: The last days!

President General (retd) Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan

| RUPEE NEWS  | August 18th, 2008 | Moin Ansari |  معین آنصآرّی | The last days of the dictator are a reflection of his entire life. In the aftermath of 911, Musharraf reached out to Collin Powell. The phone call right after the coup was to bring legitimacy to his coup de etat. In August 2008, he called President Bush several times. His calls were not returned for sevreal weeks.

“Musharraf had lost his utility as a useful asset for the ‘war on terror’,”

Like Field Marshall Ayub Khan , and General Zia ul Haq, General Pervez Musharraf used America to stay in power and America used him to fight its war on terror.

Many in American however believe that like Ayub Khan, and Zia ul Haw, Pervez Musharraf also double crossed the Americans.

General Gul Hamid said it best when he said, “Pakistani dictators become very patriotic in their old age“. Ayub Khan was the American man in Asia–holding the fort for SEATO, and CENTO. President John did not like the mercurial Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in his cabinet and told Ayub “kick him out”. Ayub obliged. However in his old age he wrote a book called “Friends Not Masters” and did not want the US in Pakistan. Ayub Khan kicked the Americans out of Pakistan and closed down the Badabar Airforce base.

Senator Biden, possibly a vice presidential candidate said it best. He said “the Pakistanis looked me in the eye and lied to me”. He was referring to the American plant President Zia Ul Haq. Zia did the American bidding by eliminating the much hated Bhutto, but Zia did not stop the nuclear program. He kept on telling the Americans that he was not pursuing nuclear power, but he was. When the US found out how close he was to nuclear detonation, Zil Ul was eliminated with a case a exploding mangoes.

The third dictator kind of happened by accident–if you believe that the version of events narrated by Pervez Musharraf. If you believe the conspiracy theorists, Nawaz Sharif is hated by America, and was removed for his decision to detonate five nuclear bombs in response to India becoming a world power.

In a fascinating interview with General Hamid Gul of the ISI, Saleen Shezad of Asia Times shed some deep light on the demise of Pervez Musharraf.

Musharraf had lost his utility as a useful asset for the ‘war on terror’,” retired general Hamid Gul, a security analyst and former director general of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), told Asia Times Online.

“The Americans had been putting pressure on Islamabad since February for him to get its act together against the Taliban and al-Qaeda and Pakistan’s foreign minister [Shah Mahmood Qureshi] and Pakistan’s ambassador to Washington, Husain Haqqani, always told Washington that the government could not move forward independently because of Musharraf,” Gul said.

“Hence, Musharraf was politely told by Washington through various channels to gracefully resign, but he remained defiant and ultimately Washington pulled its support of him and the ruling coalition moved for his impeachment, which forced him to resign,” Gul said.

“The army will play the same role it played from 1996 to 1998,” Gul said, without elaborating. What he meant was that the military will maintain an independent and strong policy on Afghanistan in which the political government has no role or its role is restricted to giving political support to the military’s operational policies.

“The American role has always been paramount in Pakistan’s politics. The late General Zia ul-Haq was defiant of Washington’s interests and he faced an accidental death [in a mysterious plane accident in 1988]. Had Musharraf tried to exercise [his constitutional powers to dissolve the assemblies], he would also have been obstructing American interests in the region and would have faced a Zia-like fate,” said retired spy master Gul, who was in charge of the ISI at the time of Haq’s demise.

“Now the Americans will have to use the two remaining national assets for their interests - the political parties and the army chief [Kiani]. Washington abhors Nawaz Sharif, so they will distance themselves from him and focus on Asif Zardari [the widower of Benazir Bhutto and head of the PPP].

“Zardari, because of corruption cases [that have been leveled against him] can be easily manipulated and therefore he will act obediently on their advice,” Gul maintained, adding that the crucial role is that of the army chief, so the Americans will focus on him. “I suspect that Kiani is already part of their game.”

If Musharraf’s exit was a part of the American game, the US needs to make sure that its third asset in the country, along with the political parties and the military, is close to Washington.

Asfandyar fulfills this criterion. He is a grandson of “Frontier” Gandhi Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, whose family has always been close to Delhi and Kabul and he would be the best connection in helping shut down the war theater in Afghanistan. As a Pashtun nationalist, he and his party are opposed to the Taliban.

 
Asfandyar was a flagbearer of the red revolution in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but he switched sides soon after September 11, 2001, after he visited the US under an international visitors’ leadership program.

Gul comments, “Yes, he could be the one, but Asfandyar failed to uphold his promised role to control militancy in the tribal areas without [resort to] military operations. During the period his party [ANP] has governed North-West Frontier Province, military operations have been conducted in Khyber Agency, Bajaur [Agency] and South Waziristan. “In my opinion, Nawab Attaullah Mengal, a Baloch politician, should be the president of the country, given the recent mistreatments done in Balochistan province in the name of military operations,” Gul said.

The few weeks before Musharraf’s exit witnessed a major military operation in Bajaur Agency on the border with Afghanistan’s Kunar province to root out al-Qaeda and Taliban militants. Such operations are not new in the troubled tribal areas, but this one was characterized by heavy aerial bombardment, eventually forcing the Taliban to pull back. They had targeted the agency to disrupt the flow of supplies into Afghanistan to support the Western coalition there.

“There was no reason to use such brute force in a tribal area like Bajaur,” said Gul. Compared to North and South Waziristan, where militancy is deep-rooted, the terrain is much more hospitable in Bajaur.

“The only reason for such military action was to destroy the Taliban’s approaches to Kunar, where American forces are all-out to get the Taliban. Kunar province lies in the northeast [and connects to Kabul]. Previously, the Taliban were focused only on southeastern provinces,” Gul said.

“This is the role Washington wants the Pakistani army to play. The cost is paid by Pakistanis and 250,000 people were displaced during the Bajaur operation,” Gul added, pointing to the fact that in terms of security issues, especially those relating to Afghanistan, Pakistan is still joined at the hip with the US, for which it has since 2001 received over US$10 billion in aid and military equipment.

Saleem Shehzad of The Asia Times brings good information to its readers. However he is not right all the time. Many of his predictions on the Summer offensive of the Taliban have not come true. Similarly, his discussion of Pakistan and Afghanistan is based upon opinions which may or may not come true.

These facts cannot be denied:

1) Pervez Musharraf is disliked by the USA. President Bush did not even return his phone called for several weeks.

2) Nawaz Shairf is abhorred by by America. The USA does not want him in power.

3) Asif Zardari is the darling on of the USA

These three factors will determine the future of Pakistani politics.

The huge quesiton is, will he be able to return to Pakistani politics after his Umra and his exiled existance in Sauid Arabia, Turkey or the USA. Mr. Sharif was able to. Will we see Pervez Musharraf back or will be fade into oblivion like Idi Amian of Uganda?