Pakistan Is Going Down the Road of the Shah’s Iran By Ivan Eland Price of Liberty

June 04, 2007

The Bush administration has failed to capture or kill Osama bin Laden or to win the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now, the administration has also missed the chance to maintain a stable nuclear-armed Pakistan. Like the U.S. policy toward the Shah’s Iran in the 1960s and 1970s, the Bush administration, despite a rhetorical commitment to spread democracy around the world, has put all of its eggs in the basket of an autocrat unlikely to survive—in this case, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. Although Musharraf has used the U.S. war on terror to play the United States like a fiddle, the Bush administration believes there is no better alternative. Unfortunately, backing Musharraf could create a nuclear-armed Pakistan controlled by radical Islamists.

Unfortunately, Pakistan probably has already been “lost,” and U.S. policy has played an important role in its demise. U.S. policymakers have repeatedly underestimated the consequences of the deep unpopularity engendered by profligate U.S. government meddling in the affairs of other countries. In Iran, although the Shah’s government was brutal, the regime also became so identified with its unpopular U.S. benefactor that the United States became a major contributing factor in its collapse and replacement with a militant and enduring Islamist substitute.

The Bush administration, with its macho bravado, has had a tin ear for the ramifications of anti-U.S hatred. After 9/11, instead of using the attacks as a justification to go after Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, the Bush administration had the opportunity to eliminate the Taliban in Afghanistan, take full advantage of Musharraf’s limited-time offer to give the U.S. military free reign in Pakistan to hunt down bin Laden and al Qaeda, and then withdraw from the region.

Instead, the Bush administration allowed mission creep to take its eyes off the prize of taking down al Qaeda. The U.S. mission in Afghanistan turned to nation-building, counterinsurgency, and cutting off the drug trade. The continued occupation of Afghanistan by non-Muslim forces and the close U.S. support for the dictator Musharraf in neighboring Pakistan, predictably revved up Pakistani Islamic militants and gradually turned them against his regime. In an attempt to discreetly court these militants to support his government and to maintain the flow of U.S. military aid to ostensibly fight them, Musharraf allowed these groups to operate in the wild tribal regions of western Pakistan on the Afghan border and even reached a truce with them to withdraw the Pakistani government’s military forces from these areas. This wink and nod policy has allowed both al Qaeda and the militant Taliban to recover and step up attacks from these safe havens.

Given Musharraf’s unenthusiastic pursuit of al Qaeda in Pakistan, why does the United States continue to support him? The answer is mainly a fear of “instability”—read, any change of leadership in a nuclear weapons state. The United States fears that the only alternative to Musharraf in a nuclear-armed Pakistan is the Islamic militants; but this outcome is actually more likely if the unpopular United States continues to zealously back Musharraf. At the same time Musharraf’s popularity has faded. He has faced mass protests across Pakistan for his increased despotism and his suspension of the country’s chief justice. Musharraf feared that the judge, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, might issue rulings that would interfere with his attempt to have the parliament elect him to another five-year term. In addition, several former Pakistani generals have talked openly about overthrowing him in a coup. But it may be too late to control a coup and reestablish military rule. The Islamists have been strengthened by Musharraf’s suppression of alternative non-Islamic opposition parties; Musharraf has said that their leaders—exiled former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawa Sharif—will not be allowed to return for upcoming parliamentary elections.

The Bush administration should change policy and end the occupation of Afghanistan, which would cool the Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan and the Islamic militancy in Pakistan. In addition, the United States should threaten to cut off aid to Pakistan unless Musharraf and his intelligence services make a genuine attempt to capture or kill bin Laden. With a cooling of militant Islam in the region, Musharraf should have more leeway to pursue bin Laden without an Islamist backlash. Finally, the United States should press Musharraf to genuinely open Pakistani elections to non-Islamist parties and allow their leaders to return from exile. These actions would further erode support from the Islamist radicals.

Unfortunately, keeping the Islamists around, but contained, has been good for the autocratic Musharraf regime. The problem is that the instability caused by this policy can no longer be contained. Like the Shah of Iran, Musharraf must use increased violence to put down popular protests, thus further fueling the spreading uprisings. The Shah’s Iran and Pakistan have one important difference, however: Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Tragically, the Bush administration may eventually give the world an Islamist bomb.

Ivan Eland is Director of the Center on Peace & Liberty at The Independent Institute and Assistant Editor of The Independent Review. Dr. Eland is a graduate of Iowa State University and received an M.B.A. in applied economics and Ph.D. in national security policy from George Washington University. He has been Director of Defense Policy Studies at the Cato Institute, Principal Defense Analyst at the Congressional Budget Office, Evaluator-in-Charge (national security and intelligence) for the U.S. General Accounting Office, and Investigator for the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Full Biography and Recent Publications

Jonathan J. Bean is Research Fellow at the Independent Institute, Professor of History at Southern Illinois University, and editor of the forthcoming book, Race and Liberty: The Classical Liberal Tradition of Civil Rights.

Anthony Gregory is a Research Analyst at The Independent Institute. He earned his bachelor's degree in American history from the University of California at Berkeley and gave the undergraduate history commencement speech in 2003. In addition to his work with the Independent Institute, he regularly writes for numerous news and commentary web sites, including LewRockwell.com, Future of Freedom Foundation, and the Rational Review.
Full Biography and Recent Publications

Dominick T. Armentano is professor emeritus in economics at the University of Hartford (Connecticut) and a research fellow at The Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif. He is author of Antitrust & Monopoly (Independent Institute, 1998).

Alvaro Vargas Llosa is director of The Center on Global Prosperity at The Independent Institute. He is a native of Peru and received his B.S.C. in international history from the London School of Economics. He is widely published and has lectured on world economic and political issues including at the Mont Pelerin Society, Naumann Foundation (Germany), FAES Foundation (Spain), Brazilian Institute of Business Studies, Fundación Libertad (Argentina), CEDICE Foundation (Venezuela), Florida International University, and the Ecuadorian Chamber of Commerce. He is the author of the Independent Institute books The Che Guevara Myth and Liberty for Latin America. Full biography and recent publications.

Pierre Lemieux is an economist and co-director of the Economics and Liberty Research Group at the Université du Québec en Outaouais and a Research Fellow at The Independent Institute in Oakland, California.

Alexander Tabarrok is research director at The Independent Institute, associate professor of economics at George Mason University, editor of the Independent Institute books, Entrepreneurial Economics, The Voluntary City (with D. Beito and P. Gordon), and Changing the Guard: Private Prisons and the Control of Crime.

Robert Higgs is Senior Fellow in Political Economy at The Independent Institute, author of Against Leviathan and Crisis and Leviathan, and editor of the scholarly quarterly journal, The Independent Review. Click here for a bio on Dr. Higgs, the noted economist and historian.

William Marina is Research Fellow at the Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif., and Professor Emeritus of History at Florida Atlantic University.

David T. Beito is a Research Fellow at The Independent Institute, Associate Professor of History at the University of Alabama, and co-editor of the book, The Voluntary City: Choice, Community and Civil Society.

William Marina and David T. Beito belong to "Liberty and Power," a group blog at the History News Network.

For further articles and studies, see the Center on Peace & Liberty and OnPower.org.

Nicolas Heidorn is a public policy intern at The Independent Institute in Oakland, California.

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