Al Qaeda is being used by Presidents Musharraf and Bush to distract everyone from domestic problems that plague both countries. Pakistan does not know who to blame for Benazir Bhutto’s death and the US has not yet been able to catch Osama Bin Laden. The al Qaeda can thus be used as a scapegoat. It is possible that al Qaeda has a role to play in Benazir’s killing; yet that does not exonerate Musharraf. It has emerged that Benazir had requested President Musharraf for increased and foreign security for herself. Musharraf had declined both requests. Now he is in a fix. Benazir was a key US ally and her death needs to be explained to the world. So the ever elusive al Qaeda is being blamed. The more sinister possibility is that the blame may be true; in case it later emerges that Musharraf’s regime wanted Benazir Bhutto assassinated.
Reuters reports ex-US internal security advisor Fran Townsend remarking that Osama had been rendered powerless by the US. Thus his terrorist group did not matter anymore. A former CIA agent, Michael Scheuer, thinks that the US has all along underestimated the strength of the al Qaeda. This has led to the swelling in numbers of al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists in North-West Pakistan, especially in the Pashtun region. The Taliban and the al Qaeda have regrouped forces, Scheuer points out. Then why on earth is the US or Pakistan not cracking down on these menaces?
The answers are deceptively simple. The US just cannot find Osama because the regions where the latter is hiding may be inaccessible for US troops. The rugged mountain ranges of Afghanistan and North West Frontier Province in Pakistan have only unfriendly foes. They will never help the US. And President Musharraf knows that once al Qaeda leaders are caught, every unsavoury truth about his regime will be public. All his misdeeds will be in the open. I believe al Qaeda operatives have more honor amongst themselves than Musharraf and his cohorts can ever have. For expediency’s sake Musharraf chooses not to hunt down terrorists in Pakistan. We may never know who killed Benazir Bhutto.
Via: Reuters
Image: Business Innovation
