McCain’t Get The Facts Straight
Count me as less than enthralled with McCain’s foreign policy agenda. For one thing, he typifies the kind of badly-reasoned Cold War realism that is all-too-eager to embrace foreign dictators. Consider, for example, what he had to say about Pervez Musharraf back in December of 2007:
Prior to Musharraf, Pakistan was a failed state. They had corrupt governments and they would rotate back and forth and there was corruption, and Musharraf basically restored order. So you’re going to hear a lot of criticism about Musharraf that he hasn’t done everything we wanted him to do, but he did agree to step down as head of the military and he did get the elections.
Earth to John: time to dig in to the history books. The fact is, if it weren’t for the likes of Musharraf, Pakistan would be on a much more stable and democratic path. The country’s constitution stipulates a parliamentary democracy, and elections have repeatedly resulted in wins for mainstream and relatively moderate parties like the PPP and PML. Extremist parties have never received more than 12% of the vote; nor is the trend going in their favor. With these latest elections, for instance, support for conservative Islamic parties showed a considerable decline.
While the civilian leadership has been far from perfect, the military has only further undercut the possibility of stability and democracy. Under the rule of Zia ul-Huq in the 1980s, civil liberties were restricted, elections were repeatedly promised but not delivered upon, considerable money was poured into the Afghani mujahideen, and efforts were ramped up to develop a nuclear bomb. Hell of a legacy, no? As Juan Cole — who gets a big hat tip for giving John McCain a historical reality check of his own — notes, Zia’s ending finale was a slate of 16 democracy-gutting martial law amendments that included granting the president the ability to dismiss the parliament and the prime minister. Perhaps more than anything, these amendments have set back the cause of Pakistani stability.
Indeed, those provisions have been used numerous times to sack civilian governments. Ghulam Ishaq Khan, the military president who took over after Zia, cited the amendments in order to kick out the administrations of both Sharif and Bhutto. As Cole points out, “it was not the fault of the civilian political parties that the governments would ‘rotate back and forth,’ in McCain’s words.” It was the fault of the military elite.
How about the claim that Musharraf has brought order to a failed state? Also wrong, by almost every account. Musharraf has pushed the country towards greater authoritarianism – a legacy that most observers consider to be a highly destabilizing factor. By failing to grant civilian parties a viable place in the political process, extremism and a general climate of frustration have grown. Indeed, it’s hard to argue that the siege of the Red Mosque, the sacking of Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudry, the broad-based popular protests that followed, and the failure to protect Benazir Bhutto from assassination have done anything but put the country on more wobbly ground.
McCain swings and misses on the corruption issue as well. Although there are few concrete statistics, it is likely that military control and manipulation of the economy has actually increased during Musharraf’s tenure. The military owns five large conglomerates, known as “welfare foundations,” that run thousands of businesses. “The main street of any Pakistani town bears testament to their economic power, with military-owned bakeries, banks, insurance companies and universities, usually fronted by civilian employees,” according to The Guardian. Although all of the profits from these businesses are supposed to go back into schools and health care facilities, there is little transparency. (Of the 96 businesses run by the four largest foundations, for example, only nine file public accounts.)The book Military Inc. suggests that the military controls 70 percent of the gas stations in Lahore, and that it runs as much as 7% of the country’s private-sector assets.
McCain either needs to start reading the paper, or stop distorting issues — and sticking up for dictators — that he knows little about.
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9 Responses to “McCain’t Get The Facts Straight”
“if it weren’t for the likes of Musharraf, Pakistan would be on a much more stable and democratic path”
???
Even a lot of Democrats who used to say that in the 1980s about allied nations aren't as likely to claim this any longer.
I hope for a long series of debates in our general election to educate all of us on some of the subtleties of these foreign affairs.
Mr. Koogler,
Thanks, I needed to hear that, for I often wondered out loud why hasn't our media taken this administration to task for their policies concerning Musharraf. They've thrown so many billions at him and this is what we get for our efforts? Especially after the recent assassination of Bhutto and all the nonsense that followed. I mean this is too ridiculous for a believable movie script. You'd be saying 'nobody's that stupid to give this guy a blank check!
When, during those upcoming debates previously mentioned, Obama faults McCain for continuing Bush's failed policies I hope he brings this up. I think i'll send them the link right now, thanks.
How dare we discuss McCain's policies, don't you guys know there is a good sex scandal going on?
Please reconcile these two statements for me: “Extremist parties have never received more than 12% of the vote; nor is the trend going in their favor.” and “By failing to grant civilian parties a viable place in the political process, extremism and a general climate of frustration have grown.”
seems to me that one of those has to be false, has extremist appeal grown or shrunk under Musharraf?
khill, there is no contradiction. The corruption of Musharraf and those like him increase the appeal of extremism but when there is an honest choice in an election extremist religious parties don't do well. What happens outside the voting booth is different than what happens when people can vote and have their vote count.
“seems to me that one of those has to be false, has extremist appeal grown or shrunk under Musharraf?”
Extremists lose in a voting situation, and Musharraf doesn't allow voting situations, at least not legit ones, hence extremism against him and his gov't grows. If he was less authoritarian according to the author, democracy would have a better hand in weeding out extremists.
Well Mr. Koobler, McCain's statement is not so far from the truth though he obviously glosses over much. The situation had gotten so bad that a majority welcomed Musharraf's coup and he was actually quite popular during his first couple of years in office. Since 9/11 however, he has been largely a disaster. Circumstance plays a role here since the US essentially forced him to completely reverse over two decades of Afghanistan policy. The assertion that Pakistan would be on a more stable democratic path is just that – an unsupported assertion. Sharif's government wasn't exactly a model democracy and suggesting that Pakistan would somehow have gotten more stable is to ignore the situation in Pakistan during the 1990's as well as all of Pakistan's history which has been consistent in its instability.
And you know, serving government officials, particularly those running for President, typically don't criticize allied heads of state too much since such statements will come back to haunt them should they become President. We haven't heard must excoriating of Musharraf from Hillary or Obama either.
The problem with Pakistan is the same as with Saudi Arabia, another nation run by a regime that deals with the USA (though far from honestly, as is true with the Musharraf regime, too). In both cases the alternative is widely seen to be much worse (a much greater rise to power of terrorists and sponsors of terrorism, and a risk of complete collapse).