Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

DATE=11-25-02

TYPE=FOCUS

NUMBER=8-037

TITLE= ENDANGERED PAKISTAN

BYLINE=ED WARNER

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

CONTENT=

VOICED AT:

INTRO: Analysts warn a U-S war with Iraq could have unforeseen consequences in the region. One possibility is an angry popular explosion in Pakistan that might jeopardize President Musharraf's rule and his U-S alliance. How serious is this threat and what is the potential for terrorism in the country? VOA's Ed Warner asked some close observers of Pakistan for their opinion.

TEXT: If the United States attacks Iraq, says veteran American correspondent Arnaud de Borchgrave, Pakistan could go the way of Yugoslavia. It might fracture into four deadly parts with the nation's nuclear arsenal divided among them.

A senior adviser to the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, Mr. De Borchgrave writes in the Washington Times that Pakistan's recent elections indicate rising anti-Americanism and support for U-S enemies:

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We now have privileged sanctuaries once again for al-Qaeda and Taleban elements, and these are virulently anti-American regional governments that we now have to cope with. President Musharraf has survived six assassination plots in the last year, and if he does not survive the seventh or eighth, one could be faced with the situation where an Islamist general would be in charge of a nuclear power.

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Mr. De Borchgrave says Pakistan has 35 to 50 nuclear weapons in contrast to Iraq, which is thought to have none. This being the case, he does not understand why Iraq is singled out by the United States:

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I think it is fairly well established that Iraq is not a nuclear power, whereas Pakistan is a nuclear power and is a country that we are relying on almost totally for conducting our operations in Afghanistan, and Afghanistan seems to be unraveling as well. We seem to be totally focused on Iraq to the exclusion of far more dangerous situations.

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While Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein is trumpeted as the most dangerous U-S enemy, Mr. De Borchgrave cites a Pakistani antagonist who tends to be overlooked:

General Hamid Gul, a top adviser to the religious parties that made substantial gains in the recent Pakistani elections:

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General Gul, former head of the Inter-Service Intelligence agency, is also a fundamentalist extremist and has been advising these parties. So he has become a very powerful man, and almost immediately prior to 9/11, he spent two weeks in Afghanistan, where he knows Mullah Omar and met with Osama bin Laden.

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But don't exaggerate his power, cautions

Mumtaz Ahmed, professor of political science at Hampton University in Virginia. General Gul is considered an outsider and is not taken all that seriously in Pakistan. His bark may be worse than his bite.

Professor Ahmed does not expect a popular explosion if the United States invades Iraq. There will be some ritual American flag burning, he believes, but protests will be subdued.

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They will not be as widespread and as intensive as the ones we saw during the U-S operation against the Taleban. One of the reasons is that the Islamic political parties that organized these protests last year now want to project a moderate image of themselves in order to be accepted as partners in power at the federal and provincial levels.

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President Musharraf will probably not be as accommodating to the United States as in the past, says Professor Ahmed. But he is not likely to be in any serious danger.

Distinctions have to be made among his opponents, says Professor Ahmed. The newly empowered Islamists may not like him, but they differ on how to deal with him and with his American allies.

Professor Ahmed thinks most members of the religious parties will operate within the system:

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They want some Islamic changes in their society. They are not necessarily radical. They are not militant. They are not terrorists. They do not necessarily want to isolate and alienate Pakistan from the rest of the world - people we can sit down and talk to.

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Then there are those who will not sit down and talk under any circumstances:

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There is a very small fringe group of extremist radicals who are probably bound in common cause either with the Taleban or with some elements of al-Qaida. They are a different breed of people. Obviously, their differences with the United States are defined at a cosmological level. In other words, there is no possibility of any reconciliation or any compromise.

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Unfortunately, these extremist groups are spreading, says Nafisa Hoodbhoy, a longtime correspondent for the Pakistani newspaper "Dawn:"

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More people are willing to hide people like al-Qaida, which is why we had Osama bin Laden give his message so brazenly in Peshawar to a person from al-Jazeera. It could only happen if bin Laden had support from the people, and therefore he has found it easy not only for himself but for al-Qaida members to live quite openly in cities like Peshawar and other tribal areas.

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By a narrow vote in parliament, President Musharraf managed to put together a governing coalition that excludes the religious parties. But they control two of four provincial assemblies and will have a prominent role in parliament.

That means trouble for the president, says correspondent Hoodbhoy:

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What seems likely is that Musharraf's government may not receive the same amount of support that it has in the past in terms of its pro-U-S policies because there will be an Islamist group in parliament now challenging anything that Musharraf plans to do regarding its alliance with the United States.

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Nafisa Hoodbhoy notes an additional problem for the president. He does not fully control his powerful generals, some of whom are under Islamist influence:

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The army and its generals have very strong links with the Islamist parties, and therefore they do remain under their control. It is not an accident that the parties had this big win. After all, there were generals in the army who were supporting them. This is not something that is directly under Musharraf's control.

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Conditions in Pakistan also favor extremism, says Nafisa Hoodbhoy. Take Karachi with its 14 million people jammed together in grinding poverty. They must cope with ever increasing traffic and lawlessness with a mere 7000 policemen trying to keep order. The city is bursting at the seams, she says, and its authorities have basically given up.

Karachi is thus a perfect breeding ground for terrorism:

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The way the administration is dealing with things which seem to be spinning out of control does not leave a lot of hope for the manner in which it will control terrorism. A number of terrorist incidents have occurred in Karachi in the last one year, and the conditions lend themselves to these types of incidents.

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Consider Pakistan as a whole, says Nafisa Hoodhboy. Fourteen thousand children are born each day. Among them, given Pakistani conditions, terrorists are bound to emerge, whatever the United States accomplishes in Iraq.

For Focus, this is Ed Warner