Visitor From Pakistan
By Robert D. Novak
July 3, 2008
Page 2 of 2
On the contrary, as Bhutto predicted to me last year, the civilian government is focusing the country's army against Islamist militants instead of archrival India. Only recently, when an unmanned Predator aircraft had a terrorist target in its sights, the Pakistani military refused to pull the trigger. Now, more raids in lawless tribal regions are planned. While the country's generals previously concentrated U.S. aid on conventional armaments to prepare for war with India, money from Washington now flows into counter-guerilla activities.
Pakistani opposition to the army's rule was not just a utopian desire for democracy or even fear that their country would become a large, nuclear-armed replica of Myanmar, ruled by a hereditary caste of ignorant, intransigent officers. The real problem with the military dictatorship, obsessed over the Indian menace, was its lack of interest about George W. Bush's war of terror. When he sits down to lunch with Prime Minister Gilani July 28, the president should remember that his friend Musharraf in 2006 cut a deal with tribal leaders providing sanctuary for al-Qaida and Taliban fighters.
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