Musharraf Resigns as President of Pakistan

[multi]

Stepping Down to Avoid a Protracted Impeachment Battle

Karin von Hippel

Bowing to pressure from Pakistan's newly-elected civilian government, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, once a top U.S. ally, said Monday that he will resign from office immediately, ending nearly nine years of largely military rule under his leadership.

Musharraf's resignation Monday signaled the end of a long and important relationship with the United States. Musharraf was one of the first Muslim leaders to declare allegiance to Washington after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. With his support, the United States was allowed to use several military bases in Pakistan, while Pakistani army troops were deployed to pursue Taliban and al-Qaeda insurgents sheltering in the country's rugged tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan.

Karin von Hippel, co-director, Post-Conflict Reconstruction Project and Senior Fellow, Center for Strategic and International Studies, was online Monday, Aug. 18, at 2 p.m. ET to what effect the Musharraf resignation will have on U.S.-Pakistan relations.


The transcript follows.

[Nicobie]

Well, this is your chance to predict what will happen now.

[albed]

Lol. He'll just copy and paste someone else's prediction.










You are slow.

[multi]

why don't give us your prediction then you dumb fucks?
I couldn't even guess what will happen.. hopefully nothing much will change
it could possibly become an Islamic republic like Iran, if the people taking over now get forcefully overthrown.

read the interview ..

For what it's worth, I posted the story not only because is it fairly important news I posted it because it is a fairly important factor for if and when the US and Israel decide to attack Iran. The Russian incursion in to Georgia is also interesting news.I think we can expect some fairly interesting power plays in that whole area in the next few years..

[albed]

So how will it be an important factor in attacking Iran then?

[multi]

Why don't you tell me why it won't?

[albed]

I didn't say it won't, I just don't see any reason it should. But since you claim it will, I thought I'd ask how.

[multi]

OK, In one fairly nasty scenario I could see is a few warheads go missing from the Pakistan nuclear arsenal .. and end up in Iran. I doesn't need to be anything that extreme for a country to be a factor though.. China with it's Olympic success might decide to play a more of 'world police' role now in this proposed next stage of the Neocon agenda and back some of the Islamic countries it has interests in. It is easy to see it is now emerging as the world's top superpower. There's quite a few factors as to why bloodsuckers like Cheney are demanding that the already heavily burdened US military put into action plans to back Israel when they attack Iran and to do it before the Republicans leave the White house ... Last time I heard,apart from a few the entire current US congress seems to be favor of this madness. So the fact that Pakistan has now become a bit of a wildcard could help a factor a decision to go in now before they could become an Iranian ally .... if you think it is impossible that could ever happen , think again ,because the politics in that area has always been fairly unpredictable.

I don't know why I bother, your reply will only be laced with insults...
so 'fuck you' in advance.

[albed]

Maybe you're finally getting bored with copy and paste posts.


So you think it might speed up a supposed attack on Iran which only has four months to happen anyway. Pretty doubtful but not absurd.


The China/Olympics nonsense and Cheney/Evil spew is more like what I'd expect from you, but calling almost the entire U.S. congress mad for wanting to prevent a nuclear war shows you're still the same brain fried nutcase with only brief moments of rationality.

[multi]

hey .. I never said he was 'evil'
That is you.. :P
deep down in your psyche you must see something deranged about him.

I just called him a bloodsucker which you can apply to most politicians ..some do it with a smile, he does it with a snarl. Nope. Nothing wrong with ol' Dick, pure as the driven snow.

YES I guess I am calling them ,mad,nuts,kooky and brain fried plum loco
Risking an attack on nuclear facilities that no one has any real proof of being used to create warheads, the Iranian government maintain it is for power generation and medical research. This is 'wanting to prevent a nuclear war ' ?

if I am the crazy one for thinking an action like this will create a nuclear conflict with consequences for everyone for years into the future ,so be it.. that sort of sanity I can live without

[albed]

So the Iranians kicked out UN inspectors and endured years of sanctions just so they can fool all the "crazies" into thinking they're developing nukes when they're not.



Makes sense to you doesn't it?

[multi]

OK there is plenty of reasons Iran shouldn't develop weapons, they say they are using it for peaceful power production and they are planning on selling energy in the region with all their new nuclear power plants (something like 5000),you can find major deals in this area seem to be happening with Turkey and Europe at the moment.

On the other hand there is also plenty of reasons why Israel shouldn't have atomic weapons .In fact there would be probably little reason for Iran to want nuclear weapons in the first place but it's not as if they could ever have them taken away at least if Israel was properly monitored by UN inspectors and the International Atomic regulators it could help..

While Israel has them.. there is no real reason why Iran should think anyone can tel them they cant have them. Israel are able to stockpile as many weapons as they like without any or very little international oversight that is mandatory for
other countries in the UN with a nuclear arsenal. I wonder just how they get away with that and nobody notices..

In 2005, Col. Lawrence Franklin was indicted alongside two executives of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) for allegedly violating the 1917 Espionage Act. Franklin later pled guilty to passing AIPAC a classified presidential directive and other secrets concerning America's Iran policy. AIPAC then allegedly forwarded the highly sensitive information to Israeli government officials and selected members of Washington's media establishment. This covert leaking appears to be just one of many AIPAC programs designed to encourage tougher U.S. policies toward Iran, from financial boycotts to naval blockades and possibly even military strikes.
http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/i...hp?q=node/6100

bad new bear..

Still, Israeli companies had been sufficiently involved in supplying specialized equipment and advanced tactical training to the Georgian military that the connection — and Russia's perception of it — created a ripple of anxiety in Israeli government circles. Israeli officials say that, in anticipation of a showdown between Georgia and Russia, Israel began to scale back the involvement of Israeli companies in Georgia as early as the end of 2007. Georgia's Yakobashvili charged this week that Israel, "at Russia's behest," had downgraded military ties with Georgia, a decision he branded a "disgrace."
http://www.time.com/time/world/artic...,00.html?imw=Y

In forecasting Russia’s potential for causing headaches, most specialists look first to Ukraine, which wants to join NATO. The nightmare scenario circulating in recent days is an attempt by Moscow to claim the strategic Crimean peninsula to secure access to the Black Sea. Ukrainian lawmakers are investigating reports that Russia has been granting passports en masse to ethnic Russians living in Crimea, a tactic Moscow used in the Georgian breakaway republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to justify intervention to protect its citizens.

Arms sales, as Mr. Assad’s visit underscored, represent another way Russia could create problems. Israeli and Western governments have already been alarmed about reports that the first elements of the Russian-built S-300 antiaircraft missile system are now being delivered to Iran, which could use them to shoot down any American or Israeli planes that seek to bomb nuclear facilities should that ever be attempted.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/22/wo.../22policy.html

and hopefully back to the original topic..

PAKISTAN: PAKISTANI PRESIDENT Pervez Musharraf's resignation earlier this week raises questions about the continuing security of the country's nuclear arsenal, over which he presided as head of the National Command Authority (NCA).

It is presumed the "nuclear button" or codes authorising the eventual release of Pakistan's atomic weapons have been passed on to acting president Mohammed Mian Soomro, the chairman of the upper house of parliament.

Technically, Mr Soomro now heads the 10-member NCA committee that Mr Musharraf established in 2000 to manage the country's stockpile of 60 to 65 atomic warheads.

Earlier this year, following a spate of suicide bombings by jihadists and the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, the Musharraf-led administration went to great lengths to reassure the international community its nuclear assets were safe from seizure by Islamic fundamentalist groups.

In an unprecedented briefing, retired Lieut Gen Khalid Kidwai, head of the crucial Strategic Plans Division, told journalists Islamabad deployed 10,000 soldiers to keep the atomic weapons safe.

He said there was "no conceivable scenario" in which al-Qaeda or associated Taliban cadres could seize power and asserted that Pakistan's nuclear weapons, fissile material and related infrastructure were "absolutely safe and secure".

The location of Pakistan's nuclear arms remains a secret, but western intelligence sources believe they are located near Islamabad, with the warheads and delivery systems separated.

But analysts and military planners are worried, as Islamabad's record on nuclear proliferation is, at best, dubious. Its top atomic scientist, Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan, was exposed in 2004 as the head of an international black market operation in nuclear technology, working reportedly in collusion with the military, which leaked nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

Pakistani nuclear scientists are even believed to have travelled to Afghanistan to meet the al-Qaeda leadership when the Taliban controlled Kabul before being ousted by the US-led coalition in 2001.

These fears have persisted as al-Qaeda and Taliban militants gained a firm foothold along the lawless northwestern frontier with Afghanistan. Pakistan has also struggled to dispel suspicions that elements in its intelligence services have extremist sympathies.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...158420952.html