09-29-2006, 12:47 AM
FT
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Why begrudge General Musharraf a couple of million dollars? </b>
Najam Sethiâs E d i t o r i a lÂ
"Pakistanis are happy with me and unhappy with the USâ, declared President-General Pervez Musharraf in America last week. He told Fox TV, that he was âso popular back home that he would win elections for President âhands downââ. He then weighed in with National Public Radio and claimed that âthe massively moderate people of Pakistan are massively in my personal supportâ and âwill never come out on the streets against me.â Then he expanded into international relations and lectured America on its unjust and failed policies in Iraq, Palestine and Afghanistan which have provoked a Muslim backlash.
Whoâs he kidding? Except for his American publisher, many people are pissed off with his utterances in print. In the Line of Fire is a world bestseller already because General Musharraf has taken a nasty dig at anyone whoâs anyone at home and abroad and cunningly exploited his official position to beef up sales of his book.
General Musharraf writes that Richard Armitage, who was US deputy secretary of state on 9/11, ârudelyâ threatened to âbomb Pakistan into the Stone Ageâ if it didnât comply with US demands. But Mr Armitage has denied this: âI didnât have authority to make such a threatâ. The former Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has been roused from semi-retirement by General Musharrafâs charge that âsomeone above the two of us with the power to overrule usâ sabotaged the Agra summit in July 2001. âI told him we had both been humiliated. He just sat there, speechlessâ. Mr Vajpaee has retorted that there was no insult or humiliation and the summit failed because General Musharraf insisted on calling the âterrorists in Kashmir freedom fightersâ. The general blithely claims the Pakistan army had the better of the Indians in the Kargil conflict in 1999. To add salt to Indian wounds, he adds the âIndians blinked and quite ignominiously agreed to a mutual withdrawal of forcesâ from the border in 2003. Later in the book he patronizes Manmohan Singh, the current Indian prime minister, as seeming âsincereâ but being âinflexibleâ in resolving conflict with Pakistan because of the weight of the Indian establishment. This has stirred ultra-patriotic Indian commentators to damn the book as âchest thumping machismo and self-aggrandisementâ by an author with a âsick mindâ.
At home, the reaction has been even more negative. The mullahs are bristling at his âcowardiceâ in bending to American threats after 9/11 and admitting to taking CIA money to fund the war against terror in Pakistan. The media is indignant that he used a state-paid visit to the US to flog his book and reveal âstate secretsâ that could harm Pakistan. The Peoples Party is annoyed because he holds Zulfikar Ali Bhutto responsible for the dismemberment of Pakistan in 1971. And Nawaz Sharif has called him a liar and a cheat.
But the general should be more worried about the disquiet on the Pakistani street following his disparaging remarks against Dr A Q Khan, the rogue scientist who remains a âheroâ in the Pakistani imagination. âDr AQ Khan was not the sole scientist in charge of the entire effort; yet he had a great talent for self-promotion and publicityâ¦he was such a self-centered and abrasive man that he could not be a team playerâ¦he had a huge egoâ¦he did it all for moneyâ. Only a week ago, Dr Khan hit the news when he underwent cancer surgery in Karachi and was flooded with good wishes from Pakistanis. âHe is no fall guy for anyoneâ writes General Musharraf in a futile effort to deflect the widespread perception that the military establishment has sacrificed Khan to protect its own involvement in the sordid saga of Pakistanâs nuclear proliferation. Last Sunday, Pakistan was swept by a wave of rumours during an unprecedented national power outage that General Musharraf had had a heart attack in America and a coup had been carried out against him. Some Pakistanis distributed âsweetsâ upon hearing the ânewsâ. But in America, General Musharraf thundered no coup could take place against him because âPakistan isnât a banana republicâ.
Clearly, General Musharrafâs aim is to woo the US with tall claims and feigned confidence. He explains the rationale for the book in the preface. âWhat happens to Pakistan in the coming years will not only decide the outcome of the global war against terror, it will also shape what the future will look like for both Islam and the West...I am determined that that future be peaceful and prosperous â not just for Pakistan but for the entire international community. That vision is possible only if the Muslim world and the West, led by the United States, strive together toward resolving the issues before us.â In other words, he is saying that the US needs to stay engaged with Pakistan and Pakistan needs to stay engaged with President-General Musharraf.
The bad news is that there cannot be a more self-serving agenda or book. The good news is that it will not have any good or bad impact on friends or foes alike because he is quite transparent in word and deed. So why begrudge the general a couple of million dollars in book sales?
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Why begrudge General Musharraf a couple of million dollars? </b>
Najam Sethiâs E d i t o r i a lÂ
"Pakistanis are happy with me and unhappy with the USâ, declared President-General Pervez Musharraf in America last week. He told Fox TV, that he was âso popular back home that he would win elections for President âhands downââ. He then weighed in with National Public Radio and claimed that âthe massively moderate people of Pakistan are massively in my personal supportâ and âwill never come out on the streets against me.â Then he expanded into international relations and lectured America on its unjust and failed policies in Iraq, Palestine and Afghanistan which have provoked a Muslim backlash.
Whoâs he kidding? Except for his American publisher, many people are pissed off with his utterances in print. In the Line of Fire is a world bestseller already because General Musharraf has taken a nasty dig at anyone whoâs anyone at home and abroad and cunningly exploited his official position to beef up sales of his book.
General Musharraf writes that Richard Armitage, who was US deputy secretary of state on 9/11, ârudelyâ threatened to âbomb Pakistan into the Stone Ageâ if it didnât comply with US demands. But Mr Armitage has denied this: âI didnât have authority to make such a threatâ. The former Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has been roused from semi-retirement by General Musharrafâs charge that âsomeone above the two of us with the power to overrule usâ sabotaged the Agra summit in July 2001. âI told him we had both been humiliated. He just sat there, speechlessâ. Mr Vajpaee has retorted that there was no insult or humiliation and the summit failed because General Musharraf insisted on calling the âterrorists in Kashmir freedom fightersâ. The general blithely claims the Pakistan army had the better of the Indians in the Kargil conflict in 1999. To add salt to Indian wounds, he adds the âIndians blinked and quite ignominiously agreed to a mutual withdrawal of forcesâ from the border in 2003. Later in the book he patronizes Manmohan Singh, the current Indian prime minister, as seeming âsincereâ but being âinflexibleâ in resolving conflict with Pakistan because of the weight of the Indian establishment. This has stirred ultra-patriotic Indian commentators to damn the book as âchest thumping machismo and self-aggrandisementâ by an author with a âsick mindâ.
At home, the reaction has been even more negative. The mullahs are bristling at his âcowardiceâ in bending to American threats after 9/11 and admitting to taking CIA money to fund the war against terror in Pakistan. The media is indignant that he used a state-paid visit to the US to flog his book and reveal âstate secretsâ that could harm Pakistan. The Peoples Party is annoyed because he holds Zulfikar Ali Bhutto responsible for the dismemberment of Pakistan in 1971. And Nawaz Sharif has called him a liar and a cheat.
But the general should be more worried about the disquiet on the Pakistani street following his disparaging remarks against Dr A Q Khan, the rogue scientist who remains a âheroâ in the Pakistani imagination. âDr AQ Khan was not the sole scientist in charge of the entire effort; yet he had a great talent for self-promotion and publicityâ¦he was such a self-centered and abrasive man that he could not be a team playerâ¦he had a huge egoâ¦he did it all for moneyâ. Only a week ago, Dr Khan hit the news when he underwent cancer surgery in Karachi and was flooded with good wishes from Pakistanis. âHe is no fall guy for anyoneâ writes General Musharraf in a futile effort to deflect the widespread perception that the military establishment has sacrificed Khan to protect its own involvement in the sordid saga of Pakistanâs nuclear proliferation. Last Sunday, Pakistan was swept by a wave of rumours during an unprecedented national power outage that General Musharraf had had a heart attack in America and a coup had been carried out against him. Some Pakistanis distributed âsweetsâ upon hearing the ânewsâ. But in America, General Musharraf thundered no coup could take place against him because âPakistan isnât a banana republicâ.
Clearly, General Musharrafâs aim is to woo the US with tall claims and feigned confidence. He explains the rationale for the book in the preface. âWhat happens to Pakistan in the coming years will not only decide the outcome of the global war against terror, it will also shape what the future will look like for both Islam and the West...I am determined that that future be peaceful and prosperous â not just for Pakistan but for the entire international community. That vision is possible only if the Muslim world and the West, led by the United States, strive together toward resolving the issues before us.â In other words, he is saying that the US needs to stay engaged with Pakistan and Pakistan needs to stay engaged with President-General Musharraf.
The bad news is that there cannot be a more self-serving agenda or book. The good news is that it will not have any good or bad impact on friends or foes alike because he is quite transparent in word and deed. So why begrudge the general a couple of million dollars in book sales?
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