The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is the latest act in the tragicomedy that envelops Pakistani politics. As will no doubt be repeated endlessly the next few days, her father, former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was murdered at the orders of Zia ul-Haq, military dictator of Pakistan during the late 1970s and early 1980s. As will no doubt turn out to be the case, Ms. Bhutto has also been assassinated by the Pakistani government – though most of the international media reports will focus on militant tribal, Taliban, or Al Qaeda elements from the country’s northwestern frontier, as if said groups acted without the knowledge or encouragement of influential parts of the Pakistani government.
The Players
We must understand that the inter-twining of the Pakistani government and militant Islamist groups has been common practice (and common knowledge within international circles) at least since Zia ul-Haq became military ruler in 1977. Many of the generals in the fearsome military intelligence and secret police agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), have been adherents of the Deobandi sect of Islam, a militant version of Islam which arose in India as a reaction to British occupation. Deobandi teachings influenced the Taliban, who were of course trained in Deobandi madrassahs within Pakistan.
The ISI detested Bhutto for multiple reasons: they did not want civilian control to disrupt the development of Pakistan’s nuclear program, nor did they trust that a civilian government would continue to fight their guerrilla war against India within the Kashmir. With a mixture of realpolitik and militant ideology, the ISI leadership feared détente and abandonment of terrorist actions supporting those fighting for Kashmiri independence. During Zia’s reign the ISI had been the driving force behind the development of the nuclear arms bazaar run by scientist A.Q. Khan. They were also the main people behind Gulbuddin Hekmatyar – perhaps the most extreme of the mujahedeen, and later they essentially created the Taliban. Let us note that the current head of the Pakistani military, General Ashfaq Kayani, was formerly head of the ISI. While Bhutto did not pose a threat to the ISI – she was not going to dismantle its apparatus nor did she attempt to during her two terms as prime minister – she would not have entirely been their puppet, either, given how apparent it was that the United States backed her campaign to reclaim the prime ministerial slot.
Pervez Musharraf fits into all of this in a more subtle manner than might be gathered by watching television analyses of Bhutto’s assassination. Yes, he has been the subject of assassination attempts from parts of the Pakistani government impatient with his alliance to the United States and how little has been achieved, in their eyes, on the Kashmiri question. Musharraf, however, likely declared martial law recently because he desired to negotiate a power-sharing deal with Bhutto from a position of strength. Musharraf has been pinned between a Bush administration that is increasingly displeased with his lack of action against Pakistani militants, and by those same militants (who made up most of his support base) for being too tied to the United States. The death of Bhutto may have been to send a signal to the Bush administration – there is no alternative now to an open theocracy in Pakistan besides a Musharraf administration.
For similar reasons, we must also inquire how much Nawaz Sharif knew about the attack. Mr. Sharif, birthed into politics from a right-wing Islamic movement and the military as a counter to Ms. Bhutto, is now the only non-military alternative to Musharraf. Given that he had recently entered into an electoral alliance with Benazir, it is unlikely his partisans carried out the attack. How much he may have known, however, is another question.
Governmental complicity?
It is highly unlikely that militant groups inside Pakistan would carry out an attack on Benazir Bhutto without at least tacit acceptance by high-ranking figures inside the Pakistani government. To do so would invite retribution from their allies in Islamabad, who would be displeased with unrest for which they were unprepared. Therefore, unless we see a major crackdown on militant groups over the next week, the most likely culprits are either militants moving with approval from the ISI or Musharraf, or a government directed assassination with their own agents. The Bush administration will now negotiate with the military, or no one at all. It indeed works out in Musharraf and the ISI’s favor, and to the detriment of Sharif, regardless of who wins the soon-to-be postponed elections.
Regardless, Pakistan will enter a period in which the military will likely desire to secure its place, either via elections and negotiation with the new prime minister, or through continuance of military rule via Musharraf’s new presidential term, with elections as window-dressing – business as usual in Pakistan. Although the media will likely portray Ms. Bhutto as a democratic saint, she was not – her desire to see her own return to power far outweighed any desire for a radical reformation of Pakistani politics. However, with her death, it is far less likely that the remaining oppositional leadership, who will immediately assume government complicity, will risk their lives the way Ms. Bhutto seemed willing to do. We have, of course, never really seen a full-fledged civil war in a nuclear power, and it is unlikely we will see Pakistan fall into such a conflict at the present time, but the future – to quote an overused Chinese proverb – will be an interesting time for the Pakistani people.