A Stunning Account of the Bhutto Assassination
I watched this in today’s NY Times. I rarely click on these multimedia features, but this one was a spectacular photo and audio narrative of this terrible moment.
We are blessed to be living here in the United States, but as the world continues to converge, the need to be aware of events and consequences of those events around the world only increases in importance. While there is much gnashing of teeth over Iran, our biggest problem is what happens in Pakistan. The linkage between the US and Musharraf is doing us no good, I wonder what the plan to deal with that is…
December 31st, 2007 at 8:45 am
Pakistan is an increasingly unstable NUCLEAR-ARMED country run by an unfortunately unaware dictator. Its border with Afghanistan seems to be the one of the more important areas to secure and police for fomenting international terrorism along with the Horn of Africa. The conflict between it and India simmers and appears as if it could escalate if given the proper opportunity and that means it could be nuclear. The lawyers and opposition can smell blood, Musharraf has been blundering his way towards unpopularity which reinforces his status as an autocrat. Unfortunately as a result of Pakistan’s position, for the United States to lose control of the situation is not an option. Bhutto presented a convenient way to move towards more democratic representation while maintaining U.S. involvement. To force the issue, the main opposition parties (Sharif’s and Bhutto’s) might have boycotted the elections. Musharraf would thus win a sham election, which then forces the U.S. to either support an outright dictator (a la Cold War) or get even more involved in Middle East politics (forcing a new election).