Pakistan's State of Emergency

By Simon Robinson, Aryn Baker/Islamabad

American support for president Pervez Musharraf has always come with a cover story to gloss over the awkward fact that one of the U.S.'s most important allies happens to be a military dictator. General Musharraf may have seized power in a coup, say his defenders in Washington, but he's our sort of guy, the kind of man we need in the fight against terrorism--and, by the way, he has always said he will return his country to democracy. In other words, the Pakistani strongman is crucial to both of the U.S.'s key goals in the Muslim world: fighting terrorism and spreading freedom.

But in the past year, that optimistic tale has seemed less and less credible. As terrorist groups in Pakistan have grown stronger and bolder, the general has spent a great deal of time battling institutions of a democratic society, such as the judiciary. On Nov. 3, Musharraf went the whole hog, suspending the constitution, muzzling the independent media, sacking several top judges, jailing many secular politicians and sending his troops into the streets, where they bludgeoned protesting lawyers, human-rights activists and frustrated citizens. Calling the state of emergency, said Musharraf, was vital to fighting rising extremism and ending the paralysis of government by "judicial interference."

Having written the Musharraf story, the Bush Administration now appears captive to it. The White House could only wag a disapproving finger at the Pakistani dictator, urging him to give up his military uniform and hold elections. "I certainly hope he does take my advice," Bush said. What little reproach there was in the President's comments was undermined by his description of Musharraf as a "strong fighter against extremists and radicals"--and by swift reassurances from Administration officials that there would be no slowing in the flow of American aid to the Pakistani military. Stronger opprobrium and sanctions are out of the question because the Administration believes there are no alternatives to the dictator. Paul R. Pillar, a former CIA counterterrorism official and now a visiting professor of security studies at Georgetown University, says, "Musharraf is really the only horse in the race."

Whether that is true or not (and many neutral observers would say the latter), the Administration has known for some months that its horse was heading for the knacker's yard: Musharraf's popularity at home has plummeted since March, when he suspended the independent-minded Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. That sparked massive protests by moderate Pakistanis, the people who had once backed the general against al-Qaeda terrorists and Taliban militants. With a general election looming in Pakistan, the Bush Administration began to write a new cover story, giving its hero an unlikely sidekick: exiled opposition leader and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, whom Musharraf had long accused of corruption and misrule. The new script called for Musharraf to step down as head of the army but stay on as President, with Bhutto returning home to become Prime Minister. The power-sharing plan played to the U.S. line that Pakistan was working to restore democracy--never mind that another exiled former Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, was kept out of the deal.

The one big hurdle was the Supreme Court, which had begun to challenge the government's extrajudicial detentions and examine potentially corrupt privatization schemes. In July it reinstated Chaudhry, and when the Musharraf-Bhutto deal was announced, the court questioned the general's right to drop a slew of corruption charges against Bhutto and to keep Sharif in exile. In early October, after Musharraf was re-elected President by the Parliament and state assemblies--the opposition parties all boycotted the process--the court began hearing challenges as to whether the vote and Musharraf's candidacy were constitutional. The decision was meant to be handed down before Nov. 13, but Musharraf took no chances: one of his first acts after declaring the emergency was to depose the Chief Justice and ask 16 other judges to sign an oath supporting the emergency. Seven refused immediately and were placed under house arrest, as was Chaudhry.

Then Musharraf unveiled a cover story of his own. In a rambling, hour-long speech to the nation, he invoked Abraham Lincoln and claimed he had been forced to act because of a rise in extremism in the country. And he accused the Supreme Court of "weakening the government's resolve" to fight terrorism by ordering the release of 61 suspected terrorists in the government's custody. But it wasn't the extremists who bore the brunt of Musharraf's wrath. Indeed, even as his regime cracked down on lawyers, journalists and human-rights activists, it agreed to a cease-fire with a powerful militant leader who had taken 213 soldiers hostage in the lawless northwestern region. The irony was not lost on Asma Jahangir, Pakistan's best-known human-rights activist, who wrote in an e-mail from house arrest, "Those [Musharraf] has arrested are progressive, secular-minded people, while the terrorists are offered negotiations and cease-fires."

Bhutto, meanwhile, tried to have it both ways. She criticized the general and called for demonstrations against him but carefully kept open the possibility that their deal might still be on. Speaking with TIME, she said she wanted an immediate return to the constitution, for Musharraf to step down as army chief, and for elections to go ahead in January as planned. "My faith has certainly been shaken," Bhutto told TIME. But if her main demands are met, she continued, "then we can say that all that has occurred, we will let it drop."

For Musharraf's supporters Washington, there may be some relief that his survival, regarded as an absolute good for American policy, is assured--for the short term, at least. But what that means for the war on terrorism is unclear. Pakistan's commitment to taking on militants has always been uncertain. After the terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington in September 2001, Bush gave Musharraf a stark choice: he was either with the U.S. or against it. Musharraf chose to help, and Pakistan played an important part in tracking down key terrorist leaders as well as fighting al-Qaeda and the Taliban in the rugged mountains and lawless tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan. But whether through lack of will or lack of ability, Pakistan's army has struggled to keep up the fight--despite massive injections of cash and weapons from the U.S.

In 2006 Musharraf agreed to a cease-fire in the mountains, which has allowed religious extremists and militants to regroup. They have since spread into more moderate parts of the country. A U.S. National Intelligence Estimate in July found that over the past two years, al-Qaeda had made a comeback in Pakistan, re-established training camps and begun plotting fresh attacks against the U.S. When the cease-fire ended nearly a year later, suicide bombings suspected of being linked to al-Qaeda had become a regular feature of Pakistani life.

In many ways the declaration of an emergency plays into the militants' hands. Pakistan's army and intelligence forces must now devote time, energy and resources to stamping out opposition protests in the cities rather than fighting militants in their rural redoubts. With the majority of Pakistanis opposed to Musharraf, the government's struggle to establish control in places like the traditionally moderate Swat Valley, where an Islamist militia is waging a bloody campaign to establish Shari'a law, will become even harder. "Pakistan is very religious, but it is not extremist," says Ahsan Iqbal, information secretary for the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz, the party led by Nawaz Sharif. By making this a battle between secular values and extremism, Iqbal says, Musharraf is seeking to justify his actions and appeal to moderate Pakistanis. But Iqbal doubts it will work, as even moderate Muslims have had enough of military rule. "Musharraf is pushing a large chunk of moderate but religious Pakistanis to side with the extremists, even if unwillingly," he says.

Can the U.S. get Musharraf to change course? President Bush called the general on Nov. 7, again urging him to restore democracy. But Bush has little leverage with the dictator, even though the U.S. has given Pakistan more than $10 billion in aid since 9/11, with most of the money going directly to the military. Turning off the money tap is not seen as an option. "We are mindful not to do anything that would undermine counterterrorism efforts," Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said to reporters during a trip to China. Washington's Pakistan nightmare is that a weakened Musharraf may be ousted by extremist groups, leaving the country's nuclear arsenal in the hands of America-hating wackos. Anthony Zinni, a retired Marine general who headed the U.S. Central Command when Musharraf became army chief in 1998, points out that the U.S. ban on military exchanges with Pakistan during the 1990s--because of Islamabad's push for nuclear weapons--helped radicalize many in the officer corps. Musharraf flagged this as a potential problem in his first meeting with Zinni. "You were beginning to see beards in the officer corps, which may signify more religious conservatism," Zinni recalls. Now that those officers are moving into senior positions, "it could very easily become a problem," he says.

But there's little real danger of extremists coming to power, no matter what happens to Musharraf. The Pakistani army is still largely secular. The main political parties--Bhutto's PPP and Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League--are moderate. But continued U.S. support for an unpopular Musharraf may complicate Washington's relations with any future civilian government. Pakistanis see Musharraf as America's man and regard U.S. calls for democracy as insincere. "Musharraf is an enemy of Pakistan," says Akhtar Qazi, a 71-year-old retired schoolteacher with anger to match her brightly hennaed hair. "We sacrificed our lives for Pakistan, and he wants to sell it to the Americans." Like many Pakistanis, Qazi figures the U.S. wants Musharraf in power no matter what he does. There are even growing rumbles of discontent within the Pakistani military; some officers worry that increasing public anger at Musharraf may rub off on them. "Over the last few months, morale has folded like a tent," says retired Lieut. General Talat Masood. "[The troops] are not trained for this insurgency, they don't have the equipment, and they don't have the support of the populace."

With the Supreme Court now brought to heel, Musharraf may feel secure enough to find a face-saving way to give up his military command. His regime is already promising that elections will go ahead in January, by which time a Musharraf-Bhutto alliance may be firmly in place. If Musharraf lasts that long, that is. Indeed, within days of the declaration of emergency, rumors began to spread of a coup backed by Pakistan's new vice chief of army staff, General Ashfaq Kyani, Musharraf's heir apparent. Rumors are commonplace in Pakistani politics, and Kyani is a loyalist. Still, for many Pakistanis--even those fed up with military dictators--the rumors brought a glimmer of hope. Abida Hussain, a former ambassador to the U.S., got a phone call about a possible coup while being interviewed by TIME. "If only," she responded. "If there were a coup, it would be the best day for Pakistan." That a diplomat should wish for another military coup in her own country is a measure of just how low Pakistan has sunk.

With reporting by Brian Bennett, Mark Thompson/Washington