Maverick's World

The Great American Flip Flop

Some of you were pleasantly surprised to see that President Cheney openly admitted to putting pressure on Musharraf. The pressure appeared to have been motivated in my opinion by a desire to check the growth of negative views about the Bush adminstration in influential sections of the US military. I addressed this issue sufficiently in my previous post and in the replies from readers, so I will not dwell on it much here.

I note with considerable amusement that General Ahsan Saleem Hayat's name has cropped up as a possible successor to Gen. Musharraf in the NYT. I suppose I should be sorry for you Gen. Hayat, everyone hates to be publicly told that they is certainly not in the running to succeed Musharraf but if I were you I would thank my Allah and count up the balance in my Swiss bank account and put in for long leave pending retirement.

Now some of you may find it surprising to see people like Michael Schuer, who strongly opposed the Bush Adminstration's handling of the post 9-11 situation are now rallying to General Musharraf's rescue.

Some questions probably naturally come to mind:

Are Schuer and company being reflexively opposed to any actions by the Bush Administration? or

Do the Democrats now eying the White House in 2008 seek to dispel any notion that it is their presence in the American parliament that is likely to cause Pakistan discomfort and are they communicating this via mouthpieces like ...? or

Is this the overt part of some internal American intelligence community drama, a struggle between factions in the NSC over the fate of Musharraf's Pakistan as Sri. Raman alludes in his recent article on differing views in the CIA and DIA about Musharraf?

To be honest I don't know which of these are the exact motivating factors behind people in the US rallying to Musharraf's rescue.

I do know however whoever rallies to Musharraf's support will do so under the banner that Musharraf's incompetence has something to do with Pakistan's peculiar situation with India. You see if America gets angry with Pakistan for what it is doing to American troops in Afghanistan, then it has to become suddenly much more tolerant of Pakistan's activities vis-a-vis India. Otherwise a delicate state of balance is altered.

After all if America says it is not happy with what Pakistan is doing in Afghanistan and in India, then what will be the difference between India's point of view and America's point of view? such an event would be the kiss of death for Pakistan.

Now you all know that a rather large arms sale to Pakistan is in the works in the US parliament. If America gets publicly angry with what Pakistan is not doing about the Taliban and Al Qaida, then it can afford to say that only way to elicit Pakistani cooperation is to accomodate their desire for arms to use on India. A win-win for Pakistan and for those defense industries that are seeking to palm off old outdated equipment to Pakistan.

Needless to say (but I say it anyway) what kind of a politician would I be if I didn't somehow shake down the defense industrial groups that seek to profit from this transaction? After all I am giving Pakistan money to buy the arms from American companies? what is the point of it if I don't get a cut? please understand I want American companies to get this deal through so that I can do all manner of "pork-barrel" spending under the guise of fighting international terrorism? and I want the Pakistanis to cough up some of the good stuff to me so that I am compensated for any "pork-barrel" spending I might have done with the money being given to Pakistan for buying American arms. Am I greedy? Heck no - bhai no personal feelings here, its all business. If I don't sell you arms, how will I justify sending banks to invest in your enterprises? Jaanam samjha karo...

You Indians and probably even Pakistanis understand what I am saying? the hand that gives also takes? You scratch my back and I scratch my back too? right?

With such refreshing new thoughts I leave you with my question:

Okay so now that we see the flip flop, is this all part of some scheme to generate the necessary political grease for ensuring the smooth passage of Pakistan's arms purchases through the US parliament?

posted by maverick @ 1:11 PM