Bhutto Assassination Expected to Keep U.S. Glued to Musharraf

WASHINGTON — The assassination Thursday of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, less than two weeks before scheduled elections there, has thrown into chaos the political future - and perhaps stability - of a country that is critical to U.S. security interests in the Muslim world.

A graduate of Harvard and Oxford universities, daughter of former Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, and a two-time prime minister of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto was widely seen as a bridge between her country and the West, the kind of political moderate who could govern her country and remain a U.S. ally in the campaign against global terrorism.

"She was, in some ways, a victim of that," said former Pakistani diplomat Akbar Ahmed, now head of Islamic studies at American University in Washington. "She was very much seen as a pro-western person, and that hurt her in Pakistan."

In Washington, however, Bhutto's return to Pakistan in October, after years of self-imposed exile in Dubai and London, raised hopes that she might be able to help spur a democratic transition after eight years of rule by former Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup in 1999.

National parliamentary elections scheduled for Jan. 8 had been expected to restore Bhutto to national influence, whether as prime minister or political horse-trader.

With her Pakistan People's Party in disarray, however, and no obvious heir apparent to lead the opposition to Musharraf, the country's political future is unclear. Her political rival, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, who returned from his own exile in November, said his party would boycott the elections.

And while Bhutto's assassination has further undermined domestic support for Musharraf, it has also underscored the threat Pakistan faces from Islamic militants. That means the White House, State Department and Pentagon are likely stuck with Musharraf, for the short term at least.

"If anything, this latest tragedy is likely to reinforce beliefs within those offices that Pakistan is a dangerous, messy place, potentially very unstable and fragile, and that they need to cling to Musharraf more even than they did in the past," said Daniel Markey, a former U.S. diplomat who is now a Pakistan expert with the Council on Foreign Relations. "The weight of the administration is still very much convinced that Musharraf is a helpful, rather than harmful, figure, and they're likely to stick with him pretty much until the bitter end."

A nation of 165 million people, Pakistan is the world's only Islamic power known to possess nuclear weapons - about 60 of them, the U.S. intelligence community estimates.

Pakistan shares a border with three regional superpowers - China, India and Iran - and with Afghanistan, where U.S. forces have spent six years battling al-Qaida and their Taliban patrons.

And Americans currently provide Pakistan with nearly $1.2 billion a year in military and civilian assistance, making that country the third-largest recipient of U.S. aid, behind only Israel and Egypt.

The aid is meant to help Pakistan combat terrorist groups and expand its reach into tribal areas along the mountainous Afghan border. Those areas are believed to be the hideout for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, who was behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Since reversing its support for the Taliban after the Sept. 11 attacks, Pakistan has lost nearly 1,000 security forces in efforts to combat Taliban, al-Qaida and affiliated militants within Pakistan and along the Afghan border.

The Bush administration has given those efforts mixed reviews. Specifically, Musharraf has been ineffective at bringing to heel extremists in the tribal region in Pakistan's remote northwest, where the government exerts only limited control. That region has been used as a base for recruiting, organizing and training extremists and was the scene just last week of a suicide attack that killed 48 Islamic worshippers in a mosque.

Extremist groups enjoy varying degrees of support across much of Pakistan and even within some quarters of the country's military and intelligence structure. Musharraf has been targeted by these groups himself, narrowly escaping at least two assassination attempts.

While Bhutto's supporters were quick to blame the government for not providing her with adequate security - even in Rawalpindi, a heavily militarized cantonment outside of the capital of Islamabad - Musharraf said the assassination underscores the security challenge Pakistan faces.

"This is the work of those terrorists with whom we are engaged in war," Musharraf said in a televised address. "The nation faces the greatest threats from these terrorists."

Bush concurred, blaming the assassination on "murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan's democracy."

Analysts said the assassination could mean that Taliban, al-Qaida and affiliated militants have rebuilt since the 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan to a greater degree than had been previously thought.

"If al-Qaida was indeed responsible, this is another stark reminder of the group's regeneration in Pakistan's tribal areas," wrote Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, vice president of research for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a nonpartisan Washington policy group. Al-Qaida's senior leadership "has returned to the levels of power they enjoyed in Afghanistan before U.S. forces toppled the Taliban, and Bhutto's death has to be considered a major victory for them."

That would be a worrisome development in Pakistan.

Nuclear Power

In May 1998, following India's announced plans to expand its nuclear arsenal, Pakistan shocked the world by announcing that it had successfully tested a nuclear weapon. It now has about 60 nuclear warheads and is expanding both its arsenal and its ability to deliver such weapons aboard missiles and aircraft, including F-16 fighter jets bought from the United States, ostensibly as a deterrent against attack by neighboring India.

Musharraf contends that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, deployed to secret locations around the country, is under the control of the country's military - the eighth largest in the world - and the National Command Authority, a ten-member panel chaired by the president.

Bhutto and others have warned that control of the arsenal could break down in the face of political chaos or a government overthrown by radicals, a fear Ahmed downplayed.

"No radical is coming to power, no mullah is coming, no one with a beard is coming."

Three years ago, however, it was discovered that Pakistan's leading nuclear physicist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, had secretly provided nuclear technology to Libya, North Korea and Iran. That heightened concerns that Pakistani security officials sympathetic to extremists elements could help enable terrorist groups to get their hands on a nuclear bomb.

U.S. Aid

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the United States has provided Pakistan with roughly $10 billion in military aid, as the Bush administration has relied on Musharraf to help combat the Taliban and al-Qaida.

Much of the money has been squandered, however, not making its way to the Pakistani forces taking the lead in the fight, or fallen prey to corruption and ineptitude. Last week, Congress attached a provision to withhold $50 million in aid next year unless the State Department affirms that Pakistan is using the resources to effectively combat terrorist groups.

Congress will continue to insist on such scrutiny. Thursday's assassination, though, may make lawmakers less assertive.

"I would imagine that a number of people who have been really pressuring the administration to be harsher toward Musharraf, to be more demanding of him, may step back after this tragedy and recognize the level of fragility and instability within Pakistan," Markey said during a telephone interview with reporters. "If anything, this probably makes them more inclined to tread lightly on these issues."

Musharraf's waning popularity, however, has taken a hit, along with his legitimacy.

"It will be difficult - if not impossible - for Musharraf to shake the pale of illegitimacy that lingers over his regime," Christine Fair, a senior political scientist with RAND, a private think tank based in Santa Monica, Calif., wrote Thursday. "There will be those who hold him accountable even if he and his services are innocent. ... Demands for Musharraf's departure will increase."

U.S. policymakers now face a dilemma: how to work with a man newly discredited at home and widely mistrusted abroad, at a time when Pakistan appears to be courting chaos.

"It would be folly for the United States, for the Bush administration, to take this opportunity to pull away from Musharraf or to introduce an added complexity into the situation because there's nothing to be gained from it in the short term," said Markey.

In the long term, though, "the United States needs to gradually pivot," he said, and align itself with a new generation of Pakistani democrats. "That's why these elections were going to be so important ... and that's why this (assassination) is such a huge setback."