Benazir

Bhutto Assassination is a tragedy on every level

©Bryan Zepp Jamieson
http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/Politics/bhutto.htm
12/28/07

I hadn’t even poured my first cup of coffee when I read of the Benazir Bhutto assassination in Pakistan on my screen. Typically for me at 5:30 in the morning, it took a couple of seconds for the import of what I was reading to sink in. I always remember my response to the John F. Kennedy assassination: Who’s Kennedy, and what does “assassinated” mean? It took me a couple of seconds to put the two words in context with one another. I had the same gap in response, the same numbness of disbelief, when Lennon was shot. Lennon? John Lennon? You mean the former Beatle?

This time, it wasn’t shock that such a thing could happen to someone I admired. It was merely early morning fog. Ever since the failed assassination attempt against Benazir Bhutto last October in which 140 died, I had been expecting more such attempts, and realized that they would, eventually, succeed.

Bhutto herself knew it, telling people in the months before her death that if she were to die before the election, she held the Musharraf regime responsible. Not responsible in the sense that they plotted to kill her, although some most assuredly were, but simply by their uncaring negligence in providing her with inadequate security protection.

That came true today when someone armed with a rifle and with several pounds of explosive strapped on rode up to her car on a motorcycle, shot her twice, mortally wounding her, and then blew him- or herself up, finishing the job.

A motorcycle. Hell, the mayor of a medium sized city in America can expect better security than that.

Musharraf probably had good reasons to prefer her alive. Word is he had the elections well rigged, but if he could defeat her in a way that was credible, if no more honest than a Florida vote, then that would greatly strengthen his claim to power and make it nearly impossible for the moderates to continue to fight him. Beating her in a somewhat credible election would greatly enhance his legitimacy and even give him a little respectability.

But I also suspect that if al Qaida or the Taliban killed her, and Musharraf could pin it on them, he wouldn’t be too upset with that, either. Thus the lack of any real security for her.

Of course, the drawback is that whether he had anything to do with it or not, a large portion of the Pakistan population would conclude that he was complicit in some way, and this would further erode his position.

I’ve heard people blame the Putsch junta, and while there isn’t much of anything I would put past that lot, in this case I just don’t see it. Much as they like Musharraf, they appeared convinced that they could work better with Bhutto, who at least was willing to fight the problem of terrorist enclaves in Pakistan. With Musharraf, one has the feeling that his desire to rid Pakistan of Osama bin Laden and his lot would pretty much evaporate the moment American money for the war on terror stopped filling his coffers.

India similarly isn’t a main suspect. I listened carefully to the Indian PM as he spoke of Bhutto’s death today, and his regret and admiration for Mrs. Bhutto both seemed sincere and went beyond the necessary diplomatic niceties. It was no secret that India, like America, felt that Benazir Bhutto was a leader they could work productively with, and would be a significant improvement over the present regime.

Bhutto’s other rival slash ally was Nawaz Sharif, head of the Pakistan Muslim League. While usually adversaries, they were not bitter enemies, and Sharif made a big show of rushing to the hospital where Bhutto was taken after she was shot. How much of that was to lend support or pay condolences and how much of it was just political grandstanding is anybody’s guess.

The Pakistani military is a lead possibility. General Zia ul-Haq unseated Bhutto’s father, and had him hanged two years later. Musharraf, of course, was until very recently a member of the military himself. They have power in Pakistan, and they don’t want to share it.

But the lead suspects have to be the religious fundamentalist extremists typified by al Qaida and the Taliban. They bitterly opposed everything Bhutto stood for: democracy, personal and individual freedoms, a social net for the poor, and positive interaction with the West. She was a woman who strutted about half-naked, with the entire bottom half of her face showing, and she presumed to do the work of a man.

In fact, she presumed to do the work of ten men, and to the moral and emotional cripples who find meaning for their worthless lives in religious fundamentalism, this made her an intolerable threat.

So what happens now? For the Putsch junta, the assassination is a catastrophe, and for once I’m sympathetic. Pakistan is supposed to be America’s chief ally in the region against the Taliban and al Qaida, but Pervez Musharraf is a duplicitous and vicious pig who has already duped the Americans on his nuclear program and passed along a lot of the knowledge and technology to such nations as North Korea and Libya. Even a drooling moron like Putsch has to realize that as an ally, Musharraf isn’t worth shit.

India is watching events attentively. There has been talk of civil war in Pakistan, although I don’t find it likely in the immediate future. The lines aren’t delineated, and the separations aren’t regional. Further, the Islamic extremists in the hills know that they can’t face Pakistan’s military face-on, so they’ll resort to the resistance tactics that have served them so well.

India isn’t going to jump in unless faced with a clear and demonstrable direct threat. For one thing, Pakistan can do massive damage in return, and for another, both nations will be under intense pressure from the big members of the nuke club – the US, China and Russia – to refrain from mixing it up.

In short, not a lot will happen. Musharraf will retain power, the pretense at democracy will be dropped, and eventually things will sift into a new alignment, presumably one in which America is still dealing with a duplicitous and dishonest thug, but one who at least provides al Qaida and the Taliban with some inconvenience.

Pakistan, however, is much poorer today than it was yesterday. They didn’t just lose a candidate. They lost a national icon, and a potentially great leader.

The world, too, is poorer for her loss. But then, when did religious fundamentalists ever have anything positive to offer the world?