Reading The Pictures: Who Killed Benazir Bhutto? Is Anybody Looking At Condi?

Looking at this photo, which was included in TIME's 2007 Images Of The Year, you immediately think of Iraq, don't you?

The photo was taken just before Condi Rice testified before the House Foreign Relations Committee last October. As she prepares to sit down, she is confronted -- in a stark act of protest theatre -- by a member of the group Code Pink. I thought Iraq, too, at least up till December 27th, when Benazir Bhutto was assassinated.

If you read through a series of investigatory articles published in late December by Newsweek and its sister publication, The Washington Post, the context surrounding Bhutto's assassination takes on a disturbing political light -- one which the media has failed to draw conclusions from.

At this point, Benazir Bhutto's death has been chalked up as a fateful tragedy or a kind of cruel inevitability for "that part of the world." It's as if Bhutto survived to the age of fifty-four simply out of sheer luck. The reality, however, is that Bhutto was nothing if not shrewdly tactical in her decisions and highly circumspect when it involved her safety.

Of course, there is no question she was terrifically interested in returning to Pakistan, and resuming power. What has somehow escaped attention as a central factor in her death, however, is the pressure applied by Condi Rice for Bhutto to return to Pakistan, and, particularly, the representation Rice made to Bhutto -- against Bhutto's own intuition -- that President Musharraf was in support.

Writes Robin Wright and Glenn Kessler in WAPO on December 27th:

For Benazir Bhutto, the decision to return to Pakistan was sealed during a telephone call from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice just a week before Bhutto flew home in October. The call culminated more than a year of secret diplomacy -- and came only when it became clear that the heir to Pakistan's most powerful political dynasty was the only one who could bail out Washington's key ally in the battle against terrorism.

It was a stunning turnaround for Bhutto, a former prime minister who was forced from power in 1996 amid corruption charges. She was suddenly visiting with top State Department officials, dining with U.N. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and conferring with members of the National Security Council. As President Pervez Musharraf's political future began to unravel this year, Bhutto became the only politician who might help keep him in power.

"The U.S. came to understand that Bhutto was not a threat to stability but was instead the only possible way that we could guarantee stability and keep the presidency of Musharraf intact," said Mark Siegel, who lobbied for Bhutto in Washington and witnessed much of the behind-the-scenes diplomacy.

If you read the Newsweek account, you'll see how Condi imagined a Bhutto-Musharraf dream team. It was Rice who convinced Bhutto to return to Pakistan and team up with Musharraf, even though Musharraf's actions, Bhutto's instincts, and the facts on the ground once Bhutto returned demonstrated -- as consistent with the "fantasy mind" of the Bush Administration -- that Rice's actions were mostly guided by wishful thinking.

Wright and Kessler continue:

The turning point to get Musharraf on board was a September trip by Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte to Islamabad. "He basically delivered a message to Musharraf that we would stand by him, but he needed a democratic facade on the government, and we thought Benazir was the right choice for that face," said Bruce Riedel, former CIA and national security council staffer now at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center for Middle East Policy.

"Musharraf still detested her and he came around reluctantly as he began to recognize this fall that his position was untenable," Riedel said. The Pakistani leader had two choices: Bhutto or former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, who Musharraf had overthrown in a 1999 military coup. "Musharraf took what he thought was the lesser of two evils," Riedel said.

Many career foreign policy officials were skeptical of the U.S. plan. "There were many inside the administration, at the State and Defense Departments and in intelligence, who thought this was a bad idea from the beginning because the prospects that the two could work together to run the country effectively were nil," said Riedel.

As part of the deal, Bhutto's party agreed not to protest against Musharraf's reelection in September to his third term. In return, Musharraf agreed to lift the corruption charges against Bhutto. But Bhutto sought one particular guarantee -- that Washington would ensure Musharraf followed through on free and fair elections producing a civilian government.

Rice, who became engaged in the final stages of brokering a deal, called Bhutto in Dubai and pledged that Washington would see the process through, according to Siegel. A week later, on Oct. 18, Bhutto returned.

Ten weeks later, she was dead.

Like a one trick pony, Rice's idea was that the symbolism of an election would demonstrate to the world that democracy had taken hold in Pakistan. (Not like we haven't seen the scenario backfire in Iraq several times already.) The problem, however, is that Condi sold herself on the idea that Musharraf would play ball, and then proceeded to ignore all signals that didn't conform to that belief.

Reality was, however, that Musharraf -- as evidenced by his long-standing propensity toward lip service --was never fully committed to partnering with Bhutto, even though his telling Condi what she wanted to hear is what ultimately led Bhutto to return, and play things out.

As Michael Hersh wrote in Newsweek on December 28th:

At Rice's urging, Bhutto earlier this year agreed to take part in the parliamentary elections, with the understanding that the Pakistani president would keep his part of the bargain by permitting her, a twice-elected prime minister, to serve for a third term (which was banned by a technical rule). Instead, Musharraf did nothing to change the law and instead declared emergency rule--a decision that President Bush did not immediately denounce. Nor did the Americans push Musharraf on the other aspects of the deal that would have allowed her to be a three-time prime minister. "The Americans left her high and dry," says a close Bhutto ally who requested anonymity when discussing diplomatic issues. "They did not keep their word."

According to this report, Condi was, again, personally involved in providing assurances regarding Bhutto's security, taking Musharraf at his word that he had Bhutto's safety in mind. For Bhutto's part, after she arrived home, she did everything she could to telegraph that she was not just at risk, but being hung out to dry. You'll recall how Bhutto was nearly killed by a suicide bomber in October, the very day she returned to Pakistan. That instance, too, involved a bomber trying to push through the crowd to her car.

As John Barry writes in Newsweek on December 27th:

After the Karachi carnage in October, Bhutto accused Musharraf's government of failing to provide proper security. Administration sources in Washington say that Rice personally urged Musharraf to provide Bhutto with at least the same security as that given to his own prime minister.

Although there was no turning back once she re-entered Pakistan and launched her campaign to regain power, it was pretty obvious to Bhutto from mid-October that she was in a death trap. The signs and signals were everywhere. Carlotta Gall, writing in the NYT on December 29th cited an October 26 email Bhutto sent to friend and associate Mark Siegel complaining about Musharraf, and the inadequate security associated with her public appearances. She couldn't have been more specific. She wrote:

"I have been made to feel insecure by his minions and there is no way what is happening in terms of stopping me from taking private cars or using tinted windows or giving jammers or four police mobiles to cover all sides could happen without him."

On October 26th, Wolf Blitzer also received a now highly publicized message from Bhutto, via Siegel, to be disclose only upon her death. It detailed the basic security requirements above, and asked that the reporter make it known that the four police vehicles she had requested to surround her vehicle while traveling were never supplied. ...If you haven't seen the video footage of the assassination, by the way, you might notice that not only was there no escort, but three nearby policemen supposedly tasked to protect Bhutto's car at the moment of the attack where simply idling around.

Giving the impotency of the State Department in the face of Bhutto's protection, no wonder the agency was so keen to be part of the murder investigation following Bhutto's murder. Surely, Condi and her team had a special interest in throwing as much suspicion on al Qaeda or other "evil doers" to direct attention away from the Administration for committing Bhutto to the wolves den.

According to the piece by Eric Schmitt in the January 2nd NYT, the sniping between the State Department and Bhutto's husband and widower, Asif Ali Zardari, publicly drew a circle of responsibility that pulled in Washington.

According to Schmitt's piece, titled U.S. Isn't Ready to Accept Pakistan's Initial Findings, unnamed U.S. officials revealed on New Years Day, of all days, that Bush Administration officials "had differed" with Ms. Bhutto's people over her security arrangements.

Schmitt fills in the story as follows:

The elder Mr. Zardari ... complained that the Bush administration failed to press Mr. Musharraf's government hard enough to provide adequate security for his wife during her campaign.

On Tuesday, however, American officials fired back, saying they had provided a constant flow of threat reports to Ms. Bhutto and her political advisers, even before she returned to Pakistan on Oct. 18 after a self-imposed exile.

American intelligence officials said they never received a credible threat of an attack with a specific date, time or place. Short of that, they said, Ms. Bhutto, a strongly opinionated, two-time prime minister, decided she would mount an aggressive political campaign.

"U.S. officials repeatedly met with and spoke with former Prime Minister Bhutto and members of her party -- including Zardari -- to discuss her security concerns," the State Department official said. "It was general advice, not what route to take or which rally to attend."

The official said that each time Ms. Bhutto or her advisers requested the administration's help in getting increased security for her from the Musharraf government, administration or embassy officials pressed her case with Pakistani authorities. On the day she was killed, Ms. Bhutto was riding in an armored car after a political rally in Rawalpindi.

The State Department official said diplomats at the United States Embassy in Islamabad, including Ambassador Anne W. Patterson, were in daily contact with officials from Ms. Bhutto's party. The Americans passed along information and specific advice on private security contractors to hire...

...

But Ms. Bhutto and her husband rejected that suggestion, the official said, apparently fearing that even the reputable Pakistani firms might be infiltrated by extremists.

This is quite a telling passage, illuminating -- among other things -- how much the State Department went into full CYA mode after the assassination, implementing a strategy of blaming the victim. More specifically, the fact that Team Condi was left to push for private security confirms, in a rather definitive way, how the U.S. lacked the leverage or hope of forcing its supposed client, Musharraf, to provide Benazir Bhutto, his supposed election partner, with any protection at all.

Going back to the photograph, one week after 136 loyalists died in the first suicide attack on Bhutto, and the same day the NYT reported that Bhutto has been barred by the Pakistan Foreign Ministry from leaving the country, Condi -- appearing before Congress to hype an attack on Iran based on allegations that would be thoroughly discredited five weeks later -- turns her back on a dark haired woman confronting her with blood on her hands.

I wonder, because TIME's year-end feature came out just before Bhutto's assassination, what the Western-minded leader might have made of this image of the year.

The Year In Images (TIME)
U.S. brokered Bhutto's return to Pakistan By Robin Wright and Glenn Kessler, Dec. 27, 2007
(WAPO via MSNBC)
U.S. Fears Greater Turmoil In Region: Pakistan's Crisis Could Affect War In Afghanistan (WAPO)
Is Rice Rushing to Elections? Washington moves to anoint a Bhutto 'successor' and push for an immediate vote after the assassination By Michael Hirsh (Newsweek)
Scrambling for a Response: Rice's regional strategy may have died with Bhutto, endangering U.S. interests. By John Barry. Dec 27, 2007 (Newsweek)
Pakistan Asserts Link to Al Qaeda in Bhutto Death By Carlotta Gall. December 29, 2007
Bhutto Sent Blitzer Security E-Mail By DAVID BAUDER (AP via breitbart.com)
Footage of Bhutto's death Dec 30, 2007 (Video - Channel 4 News/England via YouTube)
U.S. Isn't Ready to Accept Pakistan's Initial Findings January 2, 2007 by ERIC SCHMITT (NYT)
Iraqi blood is 'on your hands,' anti-war protester tells Condi October 24, 2007 (Raw Story w/ video)
Bhutto Receives New Death Threat, Aide Says (NYT - October 24, 2007)

For more of the visual, visit BAGnewsNotes.com.

(image: YURI GRIPAS / LANDOV / UPI. Washington. October 2007. TIME.com.)

Comments

[section9]

What a pantload of unmitigated garbage.

Firstly, no one wanted Bhutto dead except Bhutto's Islamist enemies in the ISI.

Secondly, Bhutto wanted back into Pakistani politics as soon as possible. She saw Rice's efforts to get her back into the swing of things as a means to gain back the power her family had lost when the Army had run her out of the country on not-so trumped up corruption charges.

Bhutto had a host of enemies in Pakistan who had nothing to do with the Islamist movement. In her first incarnation as PM, she was deeply corrupt and treacherous, as were most Pakistani politicians. Everyone's corrupt in Pakistan, with the exception of the Army, whose officers have a reputation of being the only people in that society who care about the working people of that nation.

Benazir's saving grace was that she had cleaned up her act enough so that Rice and the Administration wouldn't be embarrassed by her past business dealings and squalid thuggery, in addition to long-standing rumors of the political murder of her estranged brother.

The notion that Rice is responsible for her death is childish nonsense. Like her father before her, Zulfikar Ali-Bhutto (who met the hangman's noose courtesy of General Zia ul-Haq), Benazir chose the death-dealing life of Pakistani politics in an age of Islamic Extremism. She understood exactly what she was getting into, as did Condi Rice, by the way. Bhutto understood the risks and the rewards of the strategy she undertook. She proceeded as she did because she wanted power more than she feared death.

There's a point at which a successful Islamist assassination stops being the fault of Condoleezza Rice, and starts being the responsibility of the Islamic Fascist killers who actually plotted to take her down. Someday liberals will get this, but I'm not holding my breath.

[curioustorquemada]

If Buhtto had secured Blackwater for her security service she would probably be alive today.

[shedances]

It's quite possible that Benazir Bhutto had key governmental support in place from those in the current U.S. administration, before returning to her home-country. I recall such reports circulating at the time that discussed her being allowed to re-enter Pakistani politics, after years of exile & despite such outspoken, critical views of (the former general) Musharraf's leadership.

Still, in her writings, Bhutto described how much she missed Pakistan & longed to return there (it was her home) ~ and the former prime minister was far stronger in her attitudes & approach to both politics and life than Condoleeza Rice, IMO.

So, I highly doubt that anyone ~ even someone with the high status of Ms. Rice ~ could have successfully persuaded the former prime minister to go back ... unless she really wanted to.

[Jen326]

I'm surprised that Mr. Shaw failed to mention that Benazir Bhutto told us who was going to assassinate her and couldn't have been more clear. In a November 2, 2007 interview with David Frost of Al-Jazeera English, Benazir Bhutto said that she wrote a letter to Musharraf fingering "a key figure in security...a former General". There is ample evidence to suggest that she was pointing to General Mahmood Ahmad, the former director of Pakistani intelligence agency ISI.

This video has not been shown on national television in the United States because one of the hints she provides that leads us to General Mahmood Ahmad is that her assassin had "dealings" with "Omar Sheikh, the man who murdered Osama bin-Laden".

By the way, those "dealings" included General Mahmood Ahmad ordering Omar Sheikh to wire $100,000 to Mohammad Atta before 9/11.

Omar Sheikh is also the person currently in a Pakistani prison for murdering Daniel Pearl.

To watch the interview and learn a bit more, start here:
http://littlecountrylost.blogspot.com/2008/01/benazir-bhutto-omar-shiekh-murdered.html

[deminmo]

When Bhutto died I wrote something was fishy
about the whole thing but we might never know
the truth. Musharraf has been playing Bush
for a fool, and for some reason our President
is ok with that. Bush gives him money to fight
al Qaeda, and Musharraf protects them. And then
threatens anyone who decides to take their own
inititive to go after al Qaeda. The nukes in
Pakistan are protected. But the one doing the
protecting is deporting American reporters who
try to tell the truth about what goes on or
doesn't in Pakistan, and we believe Mushaaraf
when he says the nukes are protected. Geez.

[realpolitic]

Condi was reportedly caught very surprised when elections in Gaza produced Hamas as the winner. She also lobbied to give Israel more time in its bombing campaign in southern Lebanon to clear out Hezbollah, a move later seen as a victory for Hezbollah. As Secretary of State, she did not cooperate with the investigations into Blackwater after their mass murders in Iraq. She was, as well, a propagandist for the WMD claims of the administration. Her instincts are repeatedly wrong and partisan.

It seems typical Condi that she encouraged Bhutto to go back to Pakistan and then once there deserted her. When she arrived Bhutto became another pawn in some grand geo-political chess game. Rice should have used her podium to demand that Bhutto be guarded with necessary manpower or Rice should have provided it. Then Rice did not have the courage to even speak to Bhutto's husband on the issue. And Rice must be very literal minded, as well, given that she needed a specific piece of intelligence with a credible threat to kill Bhutto that included a date and time before she would act. Wishful thinking!

Given her obvious intlligence, Rice must be blinded by some deep current of ideology to the unforeseen nature of world events. She and Bush perceive democracy in a much too limited fashion. They think of democracy solely as elections. They encourage elections anywhere and everywhere. They are blind to a broader prescription of democracy which includes democratic institutions, the rule of law, a free and vigorous press, etc. In fact, at home they work against those very elements of democracy from functioning.

[ragged]

it was interesting to see that the government had the same response to bhutto's death that they had to 9/11: if only we had know of a specific threat we would have done everything we could to stop it. we are apparently the most clueless country in the world. too bad we couldn't have seen that one coming. if only musharref had provided us with a ticking time bomb, we could have bauered the information out of him. the pakistanis have been managing us since reagan gave them the money to create a nuclear device under the guise of fighting the soviets in afghanistan. musharref is an old hand at saying what we want to hear, taking the money and doing whatever he wants. aren't we the biggest rubes on the face of the planet?

[bobh]

Roger Cohen in the NYT reported that Benazir's husband came to DC to plead the case for more security, but could not get meetings at State Department. Condi could not be bothered.

Her fatal mistake was in not understanding that everything Bush and Rice touch turns to ****.

[AbstractImp]

My, Killer Condi sure has a long list of foreign policy failures. Her resume of disaster now rivals that of Henry Kissinger, advisor to the last great treasonous crook to hold that misguided office.

You remember Henry, architect of the "secret plan" to mass murder 750,000 Cambodians as a way to "win" the Vietnam Civil War.

Henry was also behind the assassination of Allende, helping to put that good old boy Pinochet into power. Republicans do not like real populists, that's for sure, and they sure don't like people rising up to change their world!

One telling line among many in Shaw's story, is that Musharraf "still detested Bhutto". Hm. that leaves us few words to use in our description of him.

This "administration" is the beacon for the anti-progressives world-wide, giving the light to all those who want to roll back rights and freedom all round the world.

None of these people have one percent of the nobility of purpose and love of her people that Bhutto had. It should come as no surprise that they had a large role in her murder. There are some magnificent principles that these fools who lead simply could not understand. Principles get in the way of profits. They are hungry for short term gain and for selfish "ideals", while the rest of us can just be thrown to the alligators.

Did they try to get her killed? Or is this just one more flaming example of their out-of-control incompetence? My guess is that stupidity rules these jerks.

And now the world is much the poorer because one grand woman is dead, while the hundred or so rats that run this "administration" and the governments of their friends - all enemies of the people - yet have their way in the world.

Water finds its own level, and so will the Bush legacy. In fact, this is just one big runoff into the sewers.

Let's just hope Condi doesn't invite Suu Kyi to lunch!

[raptor]

Looks like Rice is in the wrong room, or at the wrong time.

[gator]

I love conspiracy theories. They dont need evidence. Just as long as they match your preconceived notions.

Hey Mike, where were you on the morning of the assasination?

[willo]

What's one more death on your plate for a person like Condaleeza Rice. Her count by know is something over a million Iraqi's.

[willyloman]

I wrote about this possibility on Dec. 29th.

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2007/12/29/rice-scripted-bhuttos-return-then-left-her-unprotected/

I am glad you and HuffPo are looking at this and bringing it to the attention of your readers. Yes, they set her up to be whacked so that they could justify supporting the illegal Musharraf regime.

[nikto]

And so, yet another 5 pints of blood are added to the crimson oceans already soiling Condi's and BU$HCO's hands.

Same dogs;Same old tricks.

[sollosi]

I knew it all along- Condi killed Bhutto. Put her in handcuffs, waterboard her to confess, and keep her in Gitmo.