'Just World News' with Helena Cobban

Washington's continued coup preparations for Pakistan

So here's the deal: The Bush administration, which until recently has been pushing Pakistan's Prez Musharraf very hard to "take off his uniform" and rule as a civilian, has become frustrated with his unwillingness to do that to order. So now they are moving a lot closer to trying to topple him-- with a military coup.

Go figure.

A gang of three NYT reporters are currently the administration's leakees of choice in this campaign. Is the goal to use these always-anonymous leaks to put additional pressure on Musharraf-- or, to encourage their chosen successor-general to him, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, to finally launch this posited coup against him? Hard to tell.

But not hard to tell that there is a concerted campaign of leaks on this subject to these NYT reporters, who use a three-headed byline on today's story-- "This article is by Helene Cooper, Mark Mazzetti and David Rohde." How's that for diluting the responsibility of the individual reporter? Just like the sleaziest practices of Time magazine, etc..

This reporting, I should note, looks a near-total reprise of some of Judith Miller's wildest days of anonymous Cheney-channeling over there at the NYT.

The story leads thus:

Almost two weeks into Pakistan’s political crisis, Bush administration officials are losing faith that the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, can survive in office and have begun discussing what might come next, according to senior administration officials...

A few grafs down, we are told that:

More than a dozen officials in Washington and Islamabad from a number of countries spoke on condition of anonymity because of the fragility of Pakistan’s current political situation.

Not a single administration source is named in the whole piece. Do I need to repeat that?

Then, there is the question of whether this tricephalous reportorial unit has its own "point of view" regarding the complex political judgments that their piece purports to "report". The NYT has a separate category of articles that, though they appear on the "news" pages also contain the authors' analytical judgments. Those pieces are clearly titled "News Analysis." This piece is not titled thus. Therefore, it is supposed to contain only reporting. (And good, thorough, reporting, too; which this piece notably does not.)

Buried one-third way down in the piece we have this:

the State Department and the Pentagon now say they recognize that the Pakistani Army remains a powerful force for stability in Pakistan, and that there is little prospect of an Islamic takeover if General Musharraf should fall.

Note that verb "recognize". It is one of those supposedly "reportorial" verbs that also carries the author's own judgment about the truth-value of the judgment being reported: namely, that it is a correct judgment. Good neutral ways to convey the same bit of reporting would be to say that these official bodies "judge", "say", or "claim" that the Pakistani Army remains a powerful force, etc etc. Not that they "recognize" that this is the case.

Well, the unintentionally revelatory writing style of these three reporters is only a secondary aspect of this story, with its main aspect being that there evidently does seem to be an increasingly strong tendency in the Bush administration that's urging a military coup in Pakistan.

Here is the scenario laid out by the Gang of Three, citing, presumably, some or all of their "dozen" anonymous administration sources:

If General Musharraf is forced from power, they say, it would most likely be in a gentle push by fellow officers, who would try to install a civilian president and push for parliamentary elections to produce the next prime minister, perhaps even Ms. Bhutto, despite past strains between her and the military.

Many Western diplomats in Islamabad said they believed that even a flawed arrangement like that one was ultimately better than an oppressive and unpopular military dictatorship under General Musharraf.

Such a scenario would be a return to the diffuse and sometimes unwieldy democracy that Pakistan had in the 1990s before General Musharraf seized power in a bloodless coup.

So now, the game plan seems to be that, instead of pushing for a Musharraf-Bhutto two-handed power-play, they are switching to an Army-Bhutto two-handed power play, with hopes for the coup pinned, for now, on Kayani, whom they describe thus:

General Kayani is a moderate, pro-American infantry commander who is widely seen as commanding respect within the army and, within Western circles, as a potential alternative to General Musharraf.

They do note, however, that Kayani has already been designated by Musharraf as his the man who will head the army after, as Musharraf still promises, he steps down as Chief of Staff within the coming weeks... No surprise, then, that the NYT Three describe him as a bit reluctant to move against Musharraf at this time.

What effect might the publication of this "news" report be expected to have on Kayani? H'mm. Maybe increase his reluctance?

Meanwhile, I'd like to also note that nearly all the US MSM is continuing to report the Pakistan crisis as one that, among non-Pakistani powers, involves only the US. Given Pakistan's lengthy history of close relations with China, and it position in Southwest Asia between Afghanistan and India, this is a very myopic view of the matter, indeed.

China Hand has had another couple of good posts on her/his blog, about Pakistan. Here and here.
Definitely always worth reading CH's non-US-centric commentary.