Uh oh....NOT good. Bhutto Assasinated

[sirs]

We're in Pakistan because Pakistan is supposed to be an ally in dealing with AlQeada.  If Pakistan is going to act like AlQeada, then we to treat them like they were Afghanistan, under the Taliban.  That's what makes sense to me

I don't think we gave them a lot of choices on being an ally.

They could have said no.  They could have acted defiant like Iran, Syria, and Iraq at the time, and told us to go pound sand.  They did have choices

But your solution is interesting.

Well, I'm glad I posted something that was interesting   ;-)

[Henny]

They could have said no.  They could have acted defiant like Iran, Syria, and Iraq at the time, and told us to go pound sand.  They did have choices

But to compensate for their efforts we gave them huge amounts of money. That was never offered to the others.

[sirs]

They could have said no.  They could have acted defiant like Iran, Syria, and Iraq at the time, and told us to go pound sand.  They did have choices

But to compensate for their efforts we gave them huge amounts of money. That was never offered to the others.

Seriously Miss Henny, you think Iran, Syria, and Iraq would have actively worked against AlQeada, as Pakistan has done, if we had presented them with $$??

[Xavier_Onassis]

Seriously Miss Henny, you think Iran, Syria, and Iraq would have actively worked against AlQeada, as Pakistan has done, if we had presented them with $$??
============================================
Many moot questions here. Silly questions.




Al Qaeda in Iraq during Saddam was about as big an influence as the Provo IRA or La Brigada Rossa. It wasn't any sort of problem in Iran, either, and thre Iranians government is never going to accept money from the USA for political cooperation, as the Shah did.

The US will never offer money to Syria because of Israel.

[Henny]

They could have said no.  They could have acted defiant like Iran, Syria, and Iraq at the time, and told us to go pound sand.  They did have choices

But to compensate for their efforts we gave them huge amounts of money. That was never offered to the others.

Seriously Miss Henny, you think Iran, Syria, and Iraq would have actively worked against AlQeada, as Pakistan has done, if we had presented them with $$??

Seriously, I do think that money lubes a lot of things.

But back to the main point - none of the countries were ever the front line in the war against Al-Qaeda, and Pakistan is.

[sirs]

Seriously Miss Henny, you think Iran, Syria, and Iraq would have actively worked against AlQeada, as Pakistan has done, if we had presented them with $$??

Seriously, I do think that money lubes a lot of things.  But back to the main point - none of the countries were ever the front line in the war against Al-Qaeda, and Pakistan is.

Because, they HAVE been a staunch supporter of our efforts, and they HAVE been taking on AlQeada & militant islam.  Musharraf HAS been the target of terrorist assisination attempts.  That can't be said of messers Iran, Syria, or Saddam Iraq.  As such, they should receive $$$ assistance......unless of course we find out that Musharraf was behind the Bhutto assasination.  Then all bets are off

[Henny]

Because, they HAVE been a staunch supporter of our efforts, and they HAVE been taking on AlQeada & militant islam.

And I maintain that this is because of the financial assistance we give (note, not all is military assistance) - NOT because Musharraf is such a great friend. I believe that Pakistan's assistance was so critical that any price was going to be paid to gain it. Any attempts made on Musharraf's life as proof do not work as some "proof" that he is a friend. He took the money, he's done some of what is required of him, hence he is a target now.

[_JS]

It should also be noted that Syria HAS fought with Muslim terrorists as had Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Assad had nearly been assassinated in a bomb attack by the Muslim Brotherhood on a trip to Mali. He had survived numerous attempts on his life by Islamist militants.

The way in which the Baathist regimes dealt with terrorists was not the way we deal with them. Assad, for example, destroyed an entire town deemed sympathetic to the Islamist cause. It was a very Stalinist approach where family members and friends were considered just as guilty through association as the suspected terrorists.

Iran is different for many reasons. First, al-Qaeda is a Sunni organisation and Iran is a Shia Theocratic Republic. To the most radical fringe Sunni the Shia are as terrible as infidels (if not more so as they dare corrupt the true faith). Second, Iran is a nation that has felt the pain of being used by the United States as a Cold War pawn. It is a prime example of "blowback" if you prefer the CIA term. To think that they would aid us in combatting other Muslims to further our imperial actions in Southwest Asia is supreme arrogance. Lastly, Iraq is filled with people that Iran has sheltered from Hussein's regime for years. Despite whatever alleged negative actions Iran has taken, they've also built hospitals, schools, and consulates in Kurdish and Shi'ite areas of Iraq and Afghanistan. It rarely makes CNN or the BBC - but that isn't the point. It makes a difference for the local people and that means more support for Iran.

Let's remember that the military regime in Pakistan was never going to be a "rogue" regime anyway. Musharraf was never a radical Islamist. In fact, it was the former Prime Minister's stupid (but brief) war with India that led to his overthrow (well, it was the primary reason). Henny is correct, the money was there, Musharraf knew that the "War on Terror" absolutely required Pakistan - just like aiding the Afghanistan fighters against the Soviets required spending a fortune on Pakistan's military.

But this time Musharraf made some critical errors. One was actually taking the army into Waziristan. Another was allowing the United States to meddle in Pakistani internal affairs.

Bt and Domer made excellent points. Musharraf may very well have nothing to do with this - maybe one of his people thought he was doing him a favor? There are many possibilities. But don't mistake Pakistan's working with the west as a show that the people appreciate what we've done in their part of the world.

[Lanya]

Links at the URL http://www.juancole.com/2008/01/musharrafs-watergate-physicians-coerced.html
Via Juan Cole's site
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Musharraf's Watergate?
Physicians Coerced by Military;
Nawaz: Musharraf Must Go

It looks increasingly as though someone in the military government in Pakistan may have been somehow complicit in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

An attorney for the physicians who put out the story that Ms. Bhutto died of a concussion went to CNN on Monday and said that his clients were pressured by the military. They appear not to have actually agreed with the concussion story, and felt coerced but could not speak out because they had been threatened with being fired if they did.

So what we can conclude is that elements in the Pakistani military forced government physicians to deny that Bhutto was shot. But newly surfaced videotape shows conclusively that she slumped after shots rang out; and she did not throw her head back against the sun roof lever as the physicians were coerced into maintaining.

So, why did these military elements make the physicians file a false report? About that we can only speculate. But it should be noted that lying about a crime is usually a sign of guilt. If the military was completely uninvolved, why should it care how she died?

You could construct a speculative scenario in which the shooter used a standard army issue revolver (I'm not a hardware guy, but I think that would be a .38) because he saw a target of opportunity, but that Plan A had been to detonate a belt bomb. If he used a service revolver, that would raise the question of who gave it to him and why. What if the bullet were found, say at the crime scene? If Benazir were not struck by a bullet, then the army could always maintain that it was fired by a soldier on the scene in the midst of the chaos, and was aimed at the perpetrators. But if she was killed by the army bullet, then it could not be explained away. (In fact, the bullet has not been found, but someone may have been afraid it would be).

Motive? Well, the military's suspicions of her would have been rather heightened in mid-November when she reacted heatedly to then Gen. Musharraf's declaration of a state of emergency:

    '?It is time for him to go. He must quit as President,? she said as police detained dozens more of her supporters on the tenth day of a state of emergency. ?There are no circumstances in which I could see myself serving with General Musharraf.? '



She later reconsidered, but there are some things you cannot take back. For instance, say you threatened a Mafia don that you would pull his guts up through his nose. Then later you said you didn't really mean it.

The government stonewalling on the issue of an autopsy and the coercion of government employees to toe a pre-determined line, smells to high heaven of complicity. It could be incompetence or stupidity, of course. And the Pakistani military is not all one thing. There is the Inter-Services Intelligence, some members of whom have long ties to Muslim militants. There is the officer corps, etc.

Three further notes: The Pakistan People's Party members and other opponents of Musharraf already were thinking like this before circumstantial evidence emerged that made it even more plausible. I fear their conviction will now be unshakeable, which does not bode well for social peace. It would be a feud.

Second, the physicians would not have had their lawyer speak out about their having been coerced by the military if they thought that Musharraf was likely to continue in office. That is, they have made a bet on a PPP prime minister and are more afraid of being punished by the new government than they are of being punished by the old one. Do they think the old one is about to be overthrown?

And, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, head of the Muslim League (N), called Monday for Musharraf to resign, saying of him, "He is a one-man calamity and the source of all the problems. The country is burning."

Oooops?

---

PS McClatchy says Benazir was about to go public with charges that the Inter-Services Intelligence had intended to fix the elections in favor of Pervez Musharraf.

PPS A kind reader pointed out that the Pakistani military had taken over security for Benazir's appearance at Liaqat Bagh, raising questions about how a gunmen and bomber got through.

posted by Juan Cole @ 1/01/2008 06:26:00 AM

[BT]

Sounds like a double coup to me.

[Lanya]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=114685&title=pervez-musharraf-pt.-1

Jon Stewart interviews Musharraf in 2006.  I thought I remembered him saying something like he didn't have a lot of choice in the matter (of supporting the US). 

[Lanya]

And this is really interesting, via TPM:
Why She Died 4.0
01.01.08 -- 7:50PM
By Josh Marshall

From the Times of India ...

    In a dramatic U-turn, Pakistan government has "apologised" for claiming that former premier Benazir Bhutto died of a skull fracture after hitting the sunroof of her car during a suicide attack.

    Caretaker Interior Minister Hamid Nawaz Khan has asked the media and people to "forgive and ignore" comments made by his ministry's spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema which were slammed by her Pakistan People's Party as "lies" and led to an uproar at home and abroad.

    The Interior Minister made the apology during a briefing for Pakistani newspaper editors on Monday.

    ...

    The government's apparent damage control exercise on Cheema's comments made at a news conference a day after Bhutto was assassinated at Liaquat Bagh in Rawalpindi on December 27, came after TV channels aired privately shot photos and video footage which showed a gunman shooting at Bhutto.

    The Pakistan People's Party leader is seen in the footage falling through the sun-roof before the suicide bomber detonated his explosives.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/062356.php

[Henny]

It should also be noted that Syria HAS fought with Muslim terrorists as had Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Assad had nearly been assassinated in a bomb attack by the Muslim Brotherhood on a trip to Mali. He had survived numerous attempts on his life by Islamist militants.

The way in which the Baathist regimes dealt with terrorists was not the way we deal with them. Assad, for example, destroyed an entire town deemed sympathetic to the Islamist cause. It was a very Stalinist approach where family members and friends were considered just as guilty through association as the suspected terrorists.

Iran is different for many reasons. First, al-Qaeda is a Sunni organisation and Iran is a Shia Theocratic Republic. To the most radical fringe Sunni the Shia are as terrible as infidels (if not more so as they dare corrupt the true faith). Second, Iran is a nation that has felt the pain of being used by the United States as a Cold War pawn. It is a prime example of "blowback" if you prefer the CIA term. To think that they would aid us in combatting other Muslims to further our imperial actions in Southwest Asia is supreme arrogance. Lastly, Iraq is filled with people that Iran has sheltered from Hussein's regime for years. Despite whatever alleged negative actions Iran has taken, they've also built hospitals, schools, and consulates in Kurdish and Shi'ite areas of Iraq and Afghanistan. It rarely makes CNN or the BBC - but that isn't the point. It makes a difference for the local people and that means more support for Iran.

Let's remember that the military regime in Pakistan was never going to be a "rogue" regime anyway. Musharraf was never a radical Islamist. In fact, it was the former Prime Minister's stupid (but brief) war with India that led to his overthrow (well, it was the primary reason). Henny is correct, the money was there, Musharraf knew that the "War on Terror" absolutely required Pakistan - just like aiding the Afghanistan fighters against the Soviets required spending a fortune on Pakistan's military.

But this time Musharraf made some critical errors. One was actually taking the army into Waziristan. Another was allowing the United States to meddle in Pakistani internal affairs.

Bt and Domer made excellent points. Musharraf may very well have nothing to do with this - maybe one of his people thought he was doing him a favor? There are many possibilities. But don't mistake Pakistan's working with the west as a show that the people appreciate what we've done in their part of the world.

Very well said JS.

[sirs]

Bt and Domer made excellent points. Musharraf may very well have nothing to do with this - maybe one of his people thought he was doing him a favor? There are many possibilities. But don't mistake Pakistan's working with the west as a show that the people appreciate what we've done in their part of the world.

Very well said JS.

And keep in mind, I never said or implied such, either

[_JS]

Bt and Domer made excellent points. Musharraf may very well have nothing to do with this - maybe one of his people thought he was doing him a favor? There are many possibilities. But don't mistake Pakistan's working with the west as a show that the people appreciate what we've done in their part of the world.

Very well said JS.

And keep in mind, I never said or implied such, either

No, but you did say this:

That can't be said of messers Iran, Syria, or Saddam Iraq.

Which is not true. It implies that those nations supported al-Qaeda and militant Islam when in fact they were targets as well, with the exception of Iran who's quite different from the other two in nature and has no reason to support al-Qaeda.