Why is Musharraf, a retired four-star General who was elevated as Army Chief of Staff superseding many seniors, interested in politics, which an American scholar renounced thus:-‘I am not a politician and my other habits are good”? The answer lies here: having once tasted—and enjoyed—the power and the panoply of political power, one longs for it ever and ever, till the Day of Judgment.

General (ret) Pervez Musharraf has expressed his desire to enter politics. He said this the other day from England, where he has been mostly since vacating the post of the President of Pakistan.

For properly assessing the intentions of Musharraf, a peek into his background is necessary. Born in Delhi in 1943 and taken to Pakistan by his father, a civil servant, Musharraf was commissioned into the Regiment of Artillery; later, he qualified as a member of the elite Special Services Group (better known as ‘Commandos’). Dubbed as “a reactionary, not a visionary” and also “trigger-happy” by one of his batchmates who retired as Adjutant-General, he escaped courtmartial in 1965 because of the (second major) war with India when India’s political leadership was to deny its armed forces the chance to overrun Lahore.

Musharraf is credited with the planning and execution of the Kargil war/incursion of May 1999. Very few know that as Director-General of Military Operations, he presented the earlier version in 1989 to the then Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. The goal of the operation, he briefed her, was to hoist the Pakistan flag atop the Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir. When she inquired whether the Indians would not retaliate, he replied that Indians were “cowards”. To her final question on possible international fall-out, he replied it was a political matter, outside the purview of the military.

Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto commended the plan and advised him to pigeonhole it. In the skirmish, Pakistan got a bloody nose, both militarily and diplomatically. The then Prime to this day, neither Sharif nor Musharraf gave out the political aims of the clash, and whether these were achieved….because, ultimately, to quote Von Clausewitz, “war is an extension of politics by other means.” Musharraf has many similarities with another Army Chief and usurper of power and pelf, Gen. Zia-ul-Haq. Both were from India and were out-of-turn appointees; and, both turned against those who appointed them. While Zia got Zulfikar Ali Bhutto hanged on a charge of murder, Musharraf blinked, allowing Sharif to go into exile (Saudi Arabia, one of the economic props of Pakistan) to, politically speaking, fight another day, which he successfully did.

By ordinary count, Musharraf would not have vacated the presidential palace, but the American pressure is something no one in Pakistan can resist… more so, when the Yanks transpose their political values on Pakistan. One of them is the supremacy of the judiciary over the executive, especially, over those in uniform; the other was not wearing more than one hat at a time…our hero was concurrently both the President and the Chief of the Army Staff.

Ostensibly, it was the agitation by lawyers which did him in, but the real pressure came from across the Atlantic.

Electoral results for political parties floated by military men have not been encouraging, even in Myanmar (Burma). Thus, candidates of the first real military dictator of Pakistan, Ayub Khan, fared poorly. Ditto for those fielded by Musharraf’s political extensions. Politics is a different kettle of fish from getting things done because of the pips one sports on one’s shoulders. The available information is that the immediate past president of Pakistan had got his (prospective) political party registered with the relevant authorities. Reports say that he is not choosy about becoming either the Prime Minister (the real power-wielder) or the President (whose powers were recently trimmed by Parliament).

To become either, this excellent P.R. handler needs to have support from members of his political party starting with wards …a long drawn-out process, unless one is born into the right ruling family of the subcontinent. One should be hailing from the Bhutto dynasty in Pakistan, the Indira Gandhi family in India, the Bangabandhu clan in Bangladesh or the Bandaranaike group across the Pak Straits, till Mahenda Rajapaksa hit it for a sixer.

So, barring a fresh miracle, bookies may not be willing to take bets on Musharraf moving into either the Prime Minister’s seat or the presidential palace of Islamabad.

By GP Rao