60 Years of American DogHood

Graffiti in Karachi proclaims that General Musharraf is an American Dog who must be shot dead. (General Amriki Kutta, Tthaa!!). It’s an idea, problem is that not much of Pakistan will remain if we shoot all the American

Dogs.

Today is 14th August, 2007, Pakistan celebrates its freedom from the British and the Hindus, its name, its religion and its passport but it is sad and confused about the American Doghood of its President. Many want to bite the hand that proverbially feeds it. America did not strike Pakistan physically after 9/11, but its actions and reactions have had great consequences. In politico dialogue America said, ‘Are you harboring Terrorists? It answered ‘Yes’ itself. In fact what we overwhelmingly heard was, ‘Are you Muslim? If Yes, then Don’t Be Like That.’

Since Muslims themselves can spend centuries arguing over the right Islam vs. the wrong Islam, the question ‘Are you Muslim?’ first led to a debate (the local press was full of opinions on whether the Terrorists were representing Islam/Muslims or not), then like other debates in Islamic history, it has descended into violence. The people have figured out the most urgent message, “before USA gets to kill us, the Militant Fundamentalists will.” For Pakistanis, the militants are here and now. Nothing can be mightier than the militants, not even America.

It is hard to stand adamant before death. I’d like to challenge Mr Bush about how urgently he’d go after the fundamentalists if they’d tried to kill him not once or twice but a full 10 times. Any rational person would think, ‘let me try to talk to them.’ However, the luxury of being the White House President is that one can be sadistic and stupid without consequences other than a drop in a meaningless popularity poll. Sadly, other people pay for Bush’s mistakes. So it is that the ordinary person, the idiot struggling to make living, is the one who pays the price for Mr Bush’s angry moments. It took a few strategic bomb blasts in Karachi to teach the moderates that America will switch the channel while they die. It’s our problem, we have to fix it, they tell us, but they don’t let us.

Musharaff, Pakistan’s progressive reformer took the brunt of Mr Bush’s hasty invasions. He has slowly lost his credibility, especially over the last six months. Pakistanis feel that they are paying too big a price for what they perceived as being America’s war. People caught on that Iraq and Afghanistan have no hope of restoration and that the invasions are without end in sight. Yet, to the jealous Pakistani politicians, sidelined by Musharraf’s independent style, the stepping back of the moderates from supporting Musharaff looks like the opportunity of a lifetime and they are eager to share the glory, but not the risks of living Mr Musharraf’s life. The eagerness with which the Imran Khans, the Sharifs, the Bhuttos et al., criticize Musharraff shows that they underestimate the power of rising Militant Fundamentalism. This is the elephant in the room that no politician is even acknowledging, other than Benazir (maybe the Harvard degree was of some use).

Popular journalism in North America subtly blames the Muslim world for harboring and creating terrorists who want to enforce a utopian code of life. Those who don’t blame the Muslim world, aren’t so fashionable. Ironically in the heart of the distorted catechism, ‘Muslim World’, this one-sidedness is not so apparent. Opinions embrace progressive ideals and the West is seen positively, contrary to how the ‘Muslim world’ consistently is pictured negatively in North America. The unequal nature of the interchange is frustrating, because anyone defending the good and just West loses credibility because the West’s invasions lack a coherent argument other than imperialism.

Currently, Pakistani writers, lost in the massive confusion that relations between the West and the Muslim world have descended into, tend to do one of two things: Blame Musharraff for being too soft on the fundamentalists (ok, Mr Arm Chair Reformist, face 10 attempts on your life and then tell me?) or Blame Musharaff for being pro America (or as the Jamaat e Islami has put in graffiti all over Karachi, ‘General Amriki Kuta; Tha!, The General is an American Dog, Shoot Him). The General has become the reluctant victim of his own success, since he appears more powerful than he may be. The tendency to hunt for neat conspiracy theories to fit contradictory facts e.g., the Government funded the Lal Masjid and that means Musharraff personally sends off an ISI guy to instigate militancy in mosques. It appears after reading a few writers that Musharraff is the cause, the end result and everything in between as to why there is Militant Fundamentalism in Pakistan. Looks like a frustrated America bought this line.

Pakistan has been on the horns of a dilemma for 6 times 10 years. An analogy:

An entity, man or woman in a burqa, robs a house where everyone is wearing burqas. Nobody can identify the robber unless one of two things happens:

1. Everybody takes off their burqa and is identified. The thief is the one who can’t be identified or
2. The thief stands up and says I am the one.

America tried both approaches. Muslims were identified, recorded and videos of Osama released. However, us Pakistani Muslims, the people who inspire a multitude of bored fiction writers to write, we have an incredible ability to get upset and conclude that it is anti-Islamic to ask people to take off their veil to identify the thief among them. A Burqa and Beard wearer has to be a good Muslim, anyone else is fake.

Using the unique logic known only to the insecure, Muslims rounded up against the pressure as it were to metaphorically to take off the veil and show their real beliefs – initially the reaction was very supportive of America, over time when America did not succeed, it has shifted to deep distrust. Nobody believes America any more in Pakistan. After the never ending invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, there is an attitude of complete defiance: ‘We will act, live and breathe as the bad Muslims you accuse us of Being. Do what you will.’ This unassailable logic means that the Muslim world will continue to be imperially oppressed because even though it can resist imperialism using crude methods (if you can call violence against its own people a sort of resistance) it cannot create an alternate political state that defines itself positively (what it is rather than what it is not) rather than as antithesis of the West. Unless it uses some of the Western ideals and ideas that it disdains. In common discussions of what defines Islam, we use terms that tell what we don’t do, what must not happen, but there is little in terms of what we should do as moral people. The state of Islam is always seen to be in some terrible crisis of morality, victimization or oppression. To rise out of the victim theory requires immense courage and patience.

The Burqa and the Beard are the new age symbols of Defiance Against Imperialism. People in Pakistan do not believe that Osama Bin Laden lives, they don’t believe that Muslims carried out the attacks on the two towers and they don’t believe that Saddam was guilty. In other words, America instead of hunting a few will have to hunt hundreds of thousands.

The more USA points its guns at us, the more angry we become. The Burqa had gone the way of the dodos, it was a very rare sight, but today women in all walks of life wear burqas with aplomb and gusto. The public space is full of black gowns and shops for just burqas are doing a roaring business. The post modern Muslim women is one better than the Muslim woman of post 1947, they don’t even need a slit for the eyes, lest some wayward poet write a line or two. Barely a fraction of Karachi is without a beard or a Burqa. (yes, I mean Karachi, not Peshawar). So, Mr Bush, a human shield could not stop Iraq or Afghanistan from happening, but is ready to blow up fellow Muslims to prevent you killing Muslims (I never said Pakistanis were very logical).

What will you do now that your best friend turned out to be not such a best friend? Not only did Mr Musharaff find terrorists, thereby ensuring that Pakistanis continued to roam the world, actually helping change world opinion about Muslims and the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, Mr Musharraff did the second unthinkable act, he wrote a book in which he openly told the world that Mr Bush is a bully. Of-course he said it nicely. Finally it seems some political strategist woke up and said, ‘Duh, how come we like Mr Musharraff so much?’

It looks like the strategists in the State Department have decided to give Ms Bhutto a chance. At the worst, people of Pakistan will suffer the corruption and the hypocrisy of the Bhuttos who tend to rule us like we are their slaves, but the majority will calm down because their precious version of sanctimonious religiosity will be saved from the onslaught of sleeveless women. Part 2 of the plan would be that if the fundamentalists defeat Ms Bhutto, the 2nd best friend India will do America’s job of going in and controlling ‘fundamentalism’ in Pakistan. There must be some on-going debate about what to do to protect Pakistan’s nuclear assets from falling into the Islamic Utopia Today crowd.

Ms Bhutto, going by the ample evidence of the Bhutto Way in the 3 times that this family has ruled Pakistan, will most likely implement the second phase of Islamization, in which the Shariah code will be implemented along with a dress code for women (the father implemented the first phase, which Pakistan is dealing with to this day). These measures will silence the enraged Muslims among us and the dual standards that have kept the fundamentalists happy in Pakistan will come back. By squashing press freedom, by confining the liberals to a few hotels and homes, by censoring Indian TV, Pakistan will be sent back to the little oasis of self-delusion that keeps the fundamentalists happy, the liberals apolitical and the moderates silently struggling for a living, while we are kidnapped and our entrepreneurs are held to the gun in broad daylight (that was Ms. Bhutto’s last government’s performance). Ms Bhutto will rule us like the Queen that she is, looting us as we speak. Our misery however, should make a charming story in Newsweek. Next to a photo shoot with her children, a write-up will appear about how she enforced the people’s choice—the Shariah code, but look, she is a woman, so it can’t be all that bad.

America, however, cannot take the risk of letting Pakistan become the next Iran if Ms Bhutto is ousted by the Fundamentalist Militants (a possibility), therefore Pakistan does not even have the luxury of Fundamentalism. The only feasible alternative for America is to use India to fight America’s war, and invade Pakistan in case Musharraf or Benazir are unable to curb the rising tide of militant fundamentalism in the event of a hostile takeover.

Perhaps it is true we, the idiots could rise above our destiny. A nation that mounts mass protests because the religion category is struck off our passports, a nation who does not have the rationality to find murderers hiding amongst our midst, a nation whose morality begins and ends with women’s clothing, indeed we deserve Ms Bhutto. (A popular program called Marina Mornings in which the TV personality along with a local exercise guru, teach women exercises is interrupted by a voice in Urdu, saying ‘this is the class that wants to strike out the Hudood Ordinance). The central cable company could interrupt the program.

Nobody, neither Ms Bhutto, nor a possible Indian invasion may ever find the terrorists (who have inconveniently multiplied from a few idiots to countries). If the terrorists are found, then America would have to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan. For America, the terrorists, 6 years after 9-11 are still lucrative investments, they must not be cashed just yet and for the overly dramatic Muslims of Pakistan, militancy is a wonderful distraction from the more difficult task of living as an ordinary person.

Musharraf, ironically is a victim of his own success. Will he finally give up reforming Pakistan? The job is thankless and death is but a heartbeat away for all hardworking dogs.