That mammoth Pakistan gamble

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See the Sol Sanders Archive By Sol Sanders SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

Had it not been obvious earlier, news that Osama Bin Laden is alive and operating from the Pakistan-Afghanistan tribal areas shows how much is riding for the U.S. on the current crisis in Pakistan.

It would be easy to paint Gen. Pervez Musharraf as a doughty little warrior on our side [as the treachery of King Hussein of Jordan was presented for so long]. ThatÕs not necessary. The fact is that the U.S. has put a lot of chips on Musharraf, that he has put himself in jeopardy, and that the outcome will be crucial ø not only to President BushÕs war on terrorism but probably the future of the Islamic world.

Pakistan has always been an anomaly. Its existence goes back to personalities in British India. In those Òmight-have-been-scenariosÓ had Jawaharlal Nehru not welched on an agreement with Mohammed Ali Jinnah in the 1936 elections, Pakistan might never have existed. For Pakistan was very much the whiskey-drinking, bon vivant, sophisticated Bombay lawyerÕs creation Ñ he told the Pakistan assembly in his last speech that it must not become a theocracy. But Jinnah for all his sophistication came to believe that ethnic myth among Subcontinent Moslems that in any encounter with a Hindu, somehow, some way, they will be cheated through rhetoric and guile.

So Pakistan, with that hapless and feckless egoist Louis Mountbatten absentmindedly running the show, came into being in the final moments of Mahatma GandhiÕs ÒQuit IndiaÓ campaign. Gandhi could have perhaps called it all off, waited a bit longer, negotiated a bit more, and maintained a unified India. But a close collaborator told me that he never indicated any wish for this in those final hours of the breakup ø and the slaughter that followed.

Henry Ford had a point: history is bunk for it is dangerous to draw analogies from one period to another. But it is important to recall this background for too many are looking at lines on maps, accepting stereotypical explanations of ethnicity, religion, and accepting at face value military and other claims.

Whatever Musharraf did in the past [the Indians believe he played a major role in the bloody nose that was handed the Indian army at Khargil in Kashmir two years ago when the Pakistanis crossed the armistice line and that he worked hand in glove with the radical Islamicists who once dominated Pakistan intelligence], today he is attempting to pull Pakistan back from the edge. Perhaps it is a good thing that he ø like IndiaÕs ÒstrongmanÓ deputy Prime Minister Advani ø is a creature of the 1948 horrors. Ironically, he comes from the old Moslem world in what was once the Delhi Sultanate; Advani is from the Sindh around Karachi, PakistanÕs huge and ungovernable port metropolis, where virtually all the landlords [except the Bhuttos, among the worst] were Hindus.

Musharraf is balancing ethnic groups ø the Punjab feudals, the Northwest tribals, the Sindhi feudals, the always obstreperous Baluch, and the Karachi UP-wallahs ø refugees like himself run by a gangster ensconced in London. Internationally, he like other Pakistanis is committed to a Kashmir settlement that fulfills the promise of Partition, that Moslem-majority areas would go to Pakistan. He may Ñ or may not Ñ be able to control infiltrators from Pakistan who with local supporters have penned down a half million Indian security forces. He has to worry about the tacit alliance between Afghanistan Northern Alliance warlords and President KarzaiÕs longtime Indian connections. And about the mine-enemyÕs-enemy-is-my-friend alliance between New Delhi and Tehran. He owes a debt to the Saudis who paid for his nuclear weapons development. And he is beholden to China, IndiaÕs competitor and potential enemy since the 1962 war, and North Korea, who transferred missile and, perhaps, nuclear technology.

If that were not enough, bending to pressure from the State Dept ø the same people who gave us the present UN Iraq inspection mess ø he held elections. In the present environment, predictably, six feuding religious parties won a disproportionate representation. ÒThe KingÕs PartyÓ, MusharrafÕs backing, has failed to get a majority and is going through the same old Pakistan [and Indian] buying of members.

Most of all, in New Delhi Musharaff faces a Hindu revivalist-led government which not only refuses to talk, but is pursuing a policy of using Hindutuva [political Hinduism] to gain votes. On Dec. 12, that policy will be tested in Gujarat where a thuggish Chief Minister Narendra Modi has led state-supported pograms against Moslems since last spring. If the strategy works, notoriously moderate Prime Minsiter Vajpayee will give way to Advani.

It apparently has occurred to no one in power in New Delhi that the first victim of MusharrafÕs failure and a nuclear missile armed Pakistan implosion will be India, particularly its 150 million Moslems [more than Pakistan].