Why Are We NOT in Pakistan!?!?!
February 6, 2008 at 4:49 am | Posted in Pakistan | 6 CommentsThat question just screams out at Mitch McConnell’s testimony yesterday in front of Congress.
Al Qaeda is gaining in strength from its refuge in Pakistan and is steadily improving its ability to recruit, train and position operatives capable of carrying out attacks inside the United States, the director of national intelligence told a Senate panel on Tuesday.
The director, Mike McConnell, told lawmakers that Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, remained in control of the terrorist group and had promoted a new generation of lieutenants. He said Al Qaeda was also improving what he called “the last key aspect of its ability to attack the U.S.” — producing militants, including new Western recruits, capable of blending into American society and attacking domestic targets.
If this is the case, WHY THE HELL ARE WE NOT IN PAKISTAN TO STOP THEM!!!!!!!!!!!
Is it really that hard of a question to ask? Com’on Congressmen! Com’on journalists! Ask!
The CIA Blames Al-Qaeda for Bhutto’s Assassination
January 18, 2008 at 10:16 am | Posted in CIA, corruption, Pakistan | Leave a commentBecause of course they can be trusted to be definitive. And of course, they have no bias, and are not protecting the Pakistani Intelligence Service (which is most likely the real culprit).
Many Pakistanis have voiced suspicions that Musharraf’s government played a role in Bhutto’s assassination, and Bhutto’s family has alleged a wide conspiracy involving government officials. Hayden declined to discuss the intelligence behind the CIA’s assessment, which is at odds with that view and supports Musharraf’s assertions.
Huh, one has to wonder why Mr. Hayden refuses to show the evidence…
“This was done by that network around Baitullah Mehsud. We have no reason to question that,” Hayden said.
Um…sorry Mr. Hayden, but you bet your CIA butt we do!
Curveball was the pseudonym given by the Central Intelligence Agency to Rafid Ahmed Alwan (Arabic: رافد أحمد علوان), an Iraqi citizen who defected from Iraq in 1999, claiming that he had worked as a chemical engineer at a plant that manufactured mobile biological weapon laboratories as part of an Iraqi weapons of mass destruction program.[1] Alwan’s allegations were subsequently shown to be false by the Iraq Survey Group’s final report published in 2004. Despite warnings from the German Federal Intelligence Service regarding the authenticity of the claims, the US Government utilized them to build a rationale for military action in the lead up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, including in the 2003 State of the Union address, where President Bush said “we know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs”, and Colin Powell’s presentation to the UN Security Council, which contained a computer generated image of a mobile biological weapons laboratory.[2][1] On November 4, 2007, CBS 60 Minutes revealed Curveball’s real identity.[3] Former CIA official Tyler Drumheller summed up Curveball as “a guy trying to get his green card essentially, in Germany, and playing the system for what it was worth.”[1]
The CIA does not have the credibility to be given the benefit of the doubt anymore, Mr. Hayden. If you make a definitive accusation, you better have the evidence to back you up.
Back to the story…
Some administration officials outside the agency who deal with Pakistani issues were less conclusive, with one calling the assertion “a very good assumption.”
One of the officials said there was no “incontrovertible” evidence to prove or rebut the assessment.
So you’ve got analysts dissenting, yet the CIA’s director making definitive statements. We haven’t had that before, now have we? (“Slam dunk!” anyone?).
Hayden said that the United States has “not had a better partner in the war on terrorism than the Pakistanis.” The turmoil of the past few weeks has only deepened that cooperation, he said, by highlighting “what are now even more clearly mutual and common interests.”
I’m sure, and here is where the real answer lies. The CIA is protecting its “never-a-better-partner-in-the-war-on-terrorism” even though it is a complete failure of a partner.
The article ends with this:
Regarding the public controversy over the CIA’s harsh interrogation of detainees at secret prisons, Hayden reiterated previous agency statements that lives were saved and attacks were prevented as a result of those interrogations.
He said he does not support proposals, put forward by some lawmakers in recent weeks, to require the CIA to abide by the Army Field Manual in conducting interrogations. The manual, adopted by the Defense Department, prohibits the use of many aggressive methods, including a simulated-drowning technique known as waterboarding.
“I would offer my professional judgment that that will make us less capable in gaining the information we need,” he said.
Meaning quite clearly without stating it of course, that the CIA continues to torture its prisoners and will not change its tactics anytime soon, damn all Congressmen and critics, and damn the law!
Benazir Bhuttto Was Shot to Death
December 31, 2007 at 9:45 am | Posted in Pakistan | 3 Commentsand written evidence
(courtesy of New York Times – Max Becherer/Polaris, for The New York Times)
The Assassination of Benazir Bhutto
December 27, 2007 at 9:30 am | Posted in Pakistan | Leave a commentShe was shot by an assassin who then supposedly blew himself up, killing fourteen others. One has to ask, who benefits most from her death. Al-Qaeda and other Islamic extremists obviously don’t want women in power. But neither does Musharraf like Ms. Bhutto in power either. It is really hard not to question whether Musharraf was behind this assassination in some way, whether the sin of commission or the sin of omission. In either case, this is a terrible day for Pakistan and democracy in South Asia and the Muslim world. There is more coming to this story, of course. Americans should be keeping their eyes on Pakistan not Iraq. This is where our real enemy lies in hiding.
Cross-posted at Council of Fifty
A Terrorist Escaped! Quick! Enact Martial Law!
December 16, 2007 at 9:16 pm | Posted in Musharraf, Pakistan | 11 CommentsA dastardly terrorist got away in Pakistan. A day after Musharraf ended martial law, no less.
The disappearance of a terrorism suspect wanted in Britain is an embarrassment to the government of Pakistan a day after President Pervez Musharraf ended six weeks of de facto martial law, announcing that security forces had broken the back of militants fighting in the northwest and that stability was returning.
There are many ways that the government of Pakistan is an embarrassment. This is but a piece of hay in the haystack.
US Accepted Musharraf’s Emergency Rule Decree
November 24, 2007 at 5:23 am | Posted in American politics, Bush Administration, Democracy, Diplomacy, Musharraf, Pakistan | Leave a commentNot that anyone is really surprised, but our “we believe in democracy” president new in advance that Musharraf was going to declare martial law, and stayed silent, giving Musharraf the green light.
Looks like democracy is not the end all be all after all
Musharraf’s Supreme Court Clears Musharraf
November 19, 2007 at 5:57 am | Posted in Musharraf, Pakistan | 1 CommentMusharraf and Bush, Bush and Musharraf, two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl
November 13, 2007 at 8:45 pm | Posted in Bush Administration, corruption, George W Bush, Musharraf, Pakistan | Leave a commentand
Musharraf: Protests are Producing Negative Vibes, Negative Optics
November 13, 2007 at 12:56 pm | Posted in Bush Administration, conservatives, corruption, Foreign Policy, Pakistan | Leave a commentThat’s why he must be a dictator, because the protesting will “disturb” the election process:
The president of Pakistan, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, vigorously defended his declaration of emergency rule in a 40-minute interview, insisting that it would not interfere with the holding of free and fair elections.
He defended the decree issued 10 days ago that scrapped the Constitution, dismissed the Supreme Court and resulted in the arrests of 2,500 opposition party workers, lawyers and human rights advocates, and rejected an appeal by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to lift emergency rule.
“I totally disagree with her,” General Musharraf said in an interview with The New York Times at the presidential building here on Tuesday. “The emergency is to ensure elections go in an undisturbed manner.”
General Musharraf said the decree was justified because the Supreme Court had meddled in politics, specifically the validity of his re-election, and because of the serious threat from terrorists.
In the interview General Musharraf was critical of the opposition leader, Benazir Bhutto, saying she was confrontational and would be difficult to work with.
General Musharraf complained about her conduct since her return a month ago, saying: “You come here on supposedly on a reconciliatory mode, and right before you land, you’re on a confrontationist mode. I am afraid this is producing negative vibes, negative optics.”
In the interview, the general, dressed in a gray suit and blue tie, described Pakistan as suffering from a “disturbed terrorist environment.”
“I don’t know, I don’t know,” he said, when asked when the emergency rule would end. “We need to see the environment.”
Can you say, whacked! Can you say, unhinged from reality! The man is holding on to power he knows he is losing. He’s not going to last long, see. So he has to do whatever he can. Including coming up with the dumbest excuses for his emergency decrees.
This is George Bush’s man. This is the foreign policy of the Bush administration. Coddle dictators who give false promises on democracy. See, if we were to actually have real democracy in the lands of our enemies, it just might end up that our enemies will win power. In the end, democracy is not our overriding priority. We are hypocrites.
Here’s Your Chance, George W. Bush, Stand For Democracy!
November 13, 2007 at 5:34 am | Posted in Bush Administration, Foreign Policy, George W Bush, Pakistan | Leave a commentYou’ve got a chance to redeem yourself, Mr. Bush. You want to be known as one who stands for democracy? Then get Musharraf to stop his actions, now! The more Musharraf continues to undermine protests against him, the more the dream of democracy in Pakistan goes away. Do it now, Mr. Bush. Stand up to Musharraf. Just say no! I know you previously sacrificed the Lebanese democracy at the altar of the war on terror, but you can redeem some part of your utterly battered reputation. Say no to Musharraf. Don’t let him get away with this. If this was Ahmadinejad doing what Musharraf is doing, you’d be going bananas about wanting to bomb the hell out of Iran. Why not keep the same standard, eh? When you don’t, it completely undermines your principles in the eyes of everybody else around the world. It tells everybody around the world that you REALLY ARE NOT interested in democracy, only in democracy in your enemies, as a way to overthrow their regimes. What a sad and pathetic foreign policy.
General Musharraf, the Good Orwellian President
November 11, 2007 at 8:00 pm | Posted in Bush Administration, Pakistan | Leave a commentContinuing to hone the skills he learned from George W. Bush, President Musharraf announced today:
The Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, refused Sunday to give a date for the end of the de facto martial law that he imposed on the country more than a week ago and suggested that it would continue indefinitely, including during parliamentary elections in early January.
Speaking at a news conference one day after President Bush called him the best president for Pakistan, General Musharraf said the emergency decree he issued on Nov. 3 was justified by the need to fight terrorism and would “ensure absolutely fair and transparent elections.”
Mr. Bush said Saturday that he supported General Musharraf because “we share a common goal” in the fight against Al Qaeda, an endorsement the general appeared to use to his advantage on Sunday as he justified his extrajudicial measures.
“I cannot give a date,” General Musharraf said when asked directly about the lifting of the emergency decree, under which several thousand civilians have been jailed, the nation’s Constitution suspended and the Supreme Court dissolved. “We are in a difficult situation, therefore I cannot give a date.”
“The emergency reinforces the war on terror,” he said.
He also declined to give a date for stepping down as military leader, a move that the United States and other Western countries have requested as a sign of his seriousness about a transition to democracy.
General Musharraf repeatedly stated he had not violated the Pakistan’s Constitution, which he suspended and replaced with a provisional constitutional order drawn up by his aides. At one point he said, “I had to take a drastic measure to save the democratic process.”
The general described his action as a selfless one. “I found myself between a rock and a hard surface,” he said. “I have no egos and no personal ambitions to guard.”
Ah such the nobel spirit. Because the democratic process was in such danger, the only course is to go totalitarian. Huh…This is Bush’s world, where bad is good, evil is right, etc.
General Musharraf Learned Much From George W. Bush
November 9, 2007 at 1:26 pm | Posted in Bush Administration, corruption, Foreign Policy, Pakistan | 3 CommentsIn the interest of self-preservation, knowing that the Supreme Court was going to rule against him, General Musharraf ordered martial law last week in Pakistan, jailed the Supreme Court justices he knew would vote against him and installed his own loyal judges. Lawyers across the nation protested, were beaten and arrested by Musharraf’s men. Today was to be a day of protest led by Benazir Bhutto, in what just simply seems a weirdly scripted scenario. Maybe she’s just ineffectual as a true revolutionary leader, but she seems to be taking this all in strides. Maybe Pakistan is still in denial about what Musharraf is doing, consolidating his power like he is.
Take his actions today, putting Bhutto under de facto house arrest.
Benazir Bhutto, who had threatened to lead a major protest rally in the military garrison town of Rawalpindi to challenge President Pervez Musharraf’s emergency rule, never made it out of her quiet, tree-lined street in Islamabad. By dawn Friday scores of helmeted riot police, some armed with automatic weapons, had cordoned off the road at each end, blocking it with coils of barbed wired and armored cars. Police were also picketed just outside the gate and wall of her two-story house. Clearly, Musharraf had placed her under de facto house arrest.
Later in the morning the police rather politely rolled back the barbed wire to allow several senior Bhutto aides and members of parliament from her Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) to walk to her house and meet with her. But the same courtesy was not extended to perhaps three dozen party activists and supporters who came individually or in small groups. As they approached the barricade they were quickly arrested and thrown into police vans. Several women, both young and old, one carrying a bouquet of flowers for Bhutto, were among those arrested. Some of those arrested went quietly, others raised a V sign with their fingers, others wailed and shouted, and some unfurled red, black and green PPP flags and shouted, “Long live Benazir!” and “We will not obey the emergency!”
The New York Times puts it this way:
In a huge show of force, the Pakistani government stopped a protest rally by the opposition leader, Benazir Bhutto, before it started today, blanketing the rally site with thousands of police today, blocking roads to stop demonstrators, and barricading Ms. Bhutto inside her residence in Islamabad.
In Rawalpindi, the nearby garrison town where the rally had been due to take place, double lines of police and police vans prevented most of the thousands of demonstrators from entering the city to protest emergency rule, which the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, declared six days ago. Thousands of party workers had already been arrested over the past few days, party officials said.
Now, the reason I said this was weirdly scripted is because of this:
On the surface, the crackdown on the rally and Ms. Bhutto’s detention appeared to be an obstacle to power sharing negotiations that had been taking place for several weeks between Ms. Bhutto and General Musharraf. But the events today do not exclude the possibility negotiations continue by back channels.
I wonder, just what does Ms. Bhutto think she will be negotiating with a general who is so blatantly disregarding the rule of law? That’s why I mean this is like following a script. Why does Ms. Bhutto trust the General? I mean, look at his justification for stomping on her protest:
In justifying Ms. Bhutto’s detention, the Pakistan government said that that there had been credible evidence she could have been the target of a terrorist attack during the rally.
Um, huh, how would he know something like that? She may indeed, but the terrorist might not have been an Islamic fundamentalist from the Pashtun region. He may have been in Islamabad, sitting in a pretty palace…
Seriously, what kind of threat is Ms. Bhutto to Islamic fundamentalists? After all, she is pushing for democracy in Pakistan. They WANT democracy in Pakistan, because it would mean more influence for them! The only person Ms. Bhutto is a real threat to is the General, Mr. Musharraf.
So why do I title my post “General Musharraf Learned Much from George W. Bush?” Because of that last quote there, where the reason Musharraf decided to squash Ms. Bhutto’s protest was because of some anonymous terror threat to her life. Does that sound familiar to anyone? Why does President Bush justify torture? Why does President Bush justify spying on Americans? Why does President Bush justify violating the Constitution? Because of some vague anonymous terror threat!
Pakistanis know that this clampdown by Musharraf has nothing to do with terrorism. From the elite to the lowest Pakistani:
In interviews on the streets of Islamabad, the capital, and in this nearby garrison city over the last three days — rich and poor, professionals and laborers, members of the security forces and civilians — they overwhelmingly opposed the president’s emergency decree, rejecting it as a naked attempt by General Musharraf to bolster his fading powers.
“People are not fools,” said Muhammad Saleem, 35, a phone shop clerk in a wealthy section of Islamabad, the capital. “They do understand it’s not to stop militancy.”
Uniformly, they said the decree had reduced General Musharraf’s already low popularity. “If I stood for election here,” said Jehangir Ahmed, a welder from Rawalpindi, “I would win more seats than Musharraf.”
And what the United States doesn’t seem to get a real good grasp of is that General Musharraf’s naked power grabs severely affect our “war on terror.”
It never had to be this way. Bush could actually have stuck to his principles and not backed a dictator, but instead tied funding of this dictator to verifiable promises that he would move away from totalitarianism. Problem is that Bush would never have done this, because he AGREED with Musharraf’s choice of governance over Pakistan.
So sad.
Was Musharraf Behind Bhutto’s Assassination Attempt?
November 7, 2007 at 12:07 am | Posted in Pakistan | 9 CommentsLast week, after Musharraf called for martial law, I wondered to myself about the assassination attempt on Bhutto, who had just come back from exile. I wondered if Musharraf might not have been the guy behind that assassination attempt. After all, who represented the greatest threat to his rule than the popular Ms. Bhutto. I didn’t want to actually say anything, because that’s a pretty hefty accusation to make without any evidence.
But now Benazir Bhutto writes in an op-ed in the New York Times about Musharraf’s martial law, and she states a most interesting thing:
In my view, General Musharraf’s ruling party understood that it would be trounced in any free elections and, together with its allies within the intelligence services, contrived to have the Constitution suspended and elections indefinitely postponed. Very conveniently, the assassination attempt against me last month that resulted in the deaths of at least 140 people is being used as the rationale to stop the democratic process by which my party would most likely have swept parliamentary elections. Maybe this explains why the government refuses to allow the F.B.I. and Scotland Yard to assist in a forensic investigation of the bombings.
She would know better than I. I wonder when he might make another attempt on her life.
Sacrificing Pakistan
November 5, 2007 at 8:54 pm | Posted in Bush Administration, Pakistan | Leave a comment
(courtesy of Arif Ali/Agence France-Presse–Getty Images)
The lawyers are protesting Musharraf, and it’s not looking good. The Bush administration is fairly silent (imagine if this was Iran, for example, or remember what they said about Burma), because they are caught red handed propping up this military dictator, a complete slap in the face to their own soaring rhetoric on democracy. Their hypocrisy has not known a bigger target than Pakistan.
Who knows in what direction this will go. You generally can’t tell with civil wars, revolutions, and clampdowns by totalitarian regimes.
How long the lawyers could keep up their revolt without the support of opposition political parties, which so far have been lying low, remained in question.
That is indeed a great question. The military is highly pervasive in Pakistani culture and life. Just how could someone overthrow Musharraf unless they come from within the military? Pakistan has been unstable throughout its young history, and will likely remain so for a long while. One has to wonder, with all the lawyers protesting, just what is the relation between lawyers and the military? I’ve seen that retired military officers go on to do business. I’m curious how many lawyers used to be in the military…
A Supreme Court justice, Rana Bhagwandas, who is also under house arrest, said in a telephone interview that the United States should press for the restoration of democracy in Pakistan.
“The United States is a democratic government and democratic governments should work for democratic values across the globe,” Mr. Bhagwandas said. “Pakistan is no exception.”
Unfortunately for Pakistan (and the rest of the world), the Bush administration will do no such thing, because they’ve never had at their heart the movement of democracy. They have sacrificed democracy on the altar of the war on terrorism before (think Lebanon in the summer of 2006) and they will do it again in Pakistan. The irony, of course, is that Bush’s administration is so inept and so clumsy that if they really did have terrorism as their top priority, Pakistan would never have come to this.
Bush’s priority has always been, and always will be, the furthering of the Republican party domestically. It doesn’t matter who else loses as long as they win.
Musharraf, Bush’s Man in Pakistan Declares Martial Law
November 3, 2007 at 2:58 pm | Posted in American politics, Bush Administration, Pakistan | 6 CommentsThis must be talked about. I’ve warned before that Pakistan is our most dangerous situation in the world right now. Not Iraq. And certainly not Iran. Both Bush and Bin Laden have the same exact strategy, “fight them in Iraq so we don’t fight them here.” For Bush it is so we don’t fight them in America. For Bin Laden, it is so we don’t fight them in Pakistan.
Today, General Musharraf, our dictator in Pakistan, who has several nukes in his arsenal, has declared martial law in Pakistan. This is of course very significant. The reason he declared martial law is because his position is weakening. So instead of bowing out (which is what happens in democracies) he holds on to his power by tightening his grip. This is going to end badly for Pakistan. Nothing good will come of this. And who knows, mayhap in the not too distant future, we might have to get involved. After all, if Musharraf falls and Pakistan goes to the Islamic fundamentalists…well, what is the stated goal of our GWOT (Global War on Terror)? One wonders then if part of the deal we gave to India in exchange for providing them nuclear technology back in 2005, was not also that they would be our proxy in Pakistan should Musharraf fall.
Our dear leader really is doing what he can to exacerbate another world war.
Tonight, Senator Enver Baig, a leading member of Ms. Bhutto’s party, stood in front of the country’s Supreme Court building and called on the United States and its allies to rein in General Musharraf.
“The only answer to all these problems is a fair election and a civilian government,” he said, as police cordoned off the court building. “It’s a very sad day for Pakistan.”
Indeed it is.
Deadly Violence in Pakistan As Bhutto Returns (UPDATED)
October 18, 2007 at 3:50 pm | Posted in Pakistan, Terrorism, violence | 1 CommentBenazir Bhutto returned to Pakistan and just like that, bombs went off close to her convoy killing many Pakistanis.
(courtesy of B.K.Bangash/Associated Press)
Two explosions ripped through this city late Thursday night, killing dozens of people, after Benazir Bhutto, the Pakistani opposition leader and twice prime minister, returned from exile to her home city.
Her celebratory welcome, with hundreds of thousands of people lining the streets and dancing atop vehicles, turned chaotic when the blasts went off near a truck carrying the former prime minister, who was returning after eight years in exile.
The Associated Press, reporting on the explosions, said Ms. Bhutto herself was unhurt, although at least 30 people were killed and 100 wounded.
An Associated Press photographer at the scene said he saw 50 to 60 dead or badly wounded people. He said some of the bodies were ripped apart.
After an initial small explosion, a huge blast came just feet from the front of the truck carrying Ms. Bhutto during a procession through Karachi. The blast shattered windows in her vehicle, The A.P. said.
Televised views of the scene showed bodies in the nighttime city streets, crowds running through traffic that is at a standstill and the noises of sirens and people screaming.
This is really not good.
It seems the number dead has climbed well past 100. The updated article has the death toll at 126 with over 250 injured.
(courtesy of Aamir Qureshi/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images)
Our War On Terrorism Is Going SOOOO Well…
October 3, 2007 at 8:18 am | Posted in Bush Administration, corruption, Iran, Iraq, Military, Osama Bin Laden, Pakistan, War, War on Terror | 16 Commentsthat Pakistan, a country that has several nukes, is losing the fight against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
Um, er, uh, what are we doing in Iraq again? The same thing that Bin Laden apparently sent some of his goons into Iraq for…
Heck’v’a job, Bushie!
Oh, and instead of preparing Americans to go into Pakistan WHERE WE SHOULD BE ALREADY, Bush and Cheney are preparing Americans to go into Iran! Huh?
Fighting Them In Iraq, So We Don’t Have To Fight Them Here
July 19, 2007 at 4:11 pm | Posted in Afghanistan, American politics, Iraq, Osama Bin Laden, Pakistan, secret combinations | 1 CommentThis says it all:
“No One Can Fight the Power of the Government”
July 8, 2007 at 6:41 am | Posted in American politics, Bush Administration, corruption, George W Bush, Pakistan, secret combinations, War, War on Terror | Leave a commentSo says General Musharraf of Pakistan, the man George W. Bush would rather defend than attack Al-Qaida.
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