Well, that could have gone either way

Nowhere was the gap between US rhetoric and the demands of policy realism more starkly drawn than in Pakistan where President/General Pervez Musharraf was hailed as a great ally in the war on terror. Of course, one of the theoretical aims of our diplomacy has been to democratize Middle Eastern tyrannies, thereby drawing the venom of Islamist militancy. But “our man in Pakistan” had come to power through an anti-democratic coup (of an admittedly corrupt regime) and ruled through extra-judicial means. A conundrum whose ironies were not lost on those who tend to view American influence and actions in the world through a lens of profound suspicion.

A triumphant return of Harvard-educated Benazir Bhutto has been much bruited about, with one of her faction’s conditions being that Musharraf either drop out of the presidential race or hang the uniform up – she will not contemplate a return to Pakistan to run at parliament’s premiership with a uniformed head of the army also serving as president.

Looks like she made a persuasive argument, gaining at least a conditional acquiescence:

Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf will give up his post of army chief if he is re-elected for another term of office, his chief lawyer has said.

In a statement to the Supreme Court, the lawyer said that if Gen Musharraf won the election, he would be sworn in for a new term as a civilian.

He is seeking re-election by parliament before its term expires in mid-October.

On Monday, the Supreme Court began debating his right to remain army chief if he stood for president again.

“If elected for a second term as president, General Pervez Musharraf shall relinquish charge of office of chief of army staff soon after election and before taking oath of office as president,” his chief lawyer, Sharifuddin Pirzada, told the court.

It’s not all beer and skittles in South Asia, of course: Nawaz Sharif (Musharraf’s predecessor until unceremoniously dumped to the curb for alleged corruption of his own) attempted a little unscheduled triumph of his own earlier this month, flying back to Islamabad only to be rudely bundled back off to his expatriate lodgings in Saudi Arabia by state security forces without being allowed to debark from the plane.

This could have gone either way: It took high pressure intervention by State to prevent Musharraf from chucking the constitution entirely last month and imposing martial law after his attempt to oust a Supreme Court justice blew up in his face. The General is finding out what dictators have always learned – the hardest part about riding the tiger is climbing down.

Some will fear that a weak democracy in Pakistan may be worse than a military dictatorship – what if one of the many angry Islamist political groups manages to win a “one man, one vote, one time” victory, imposes sharia and gains control of the Islamic Bomb?

That’s a risk certainly, but no worse than maintaining a mask of placid hypocrisy in the face of an increasingly sceptical secular Pakistan elite that might serve to push them into the arms of the perpetually dissatisfied Islamist mobs just for the change that’s in it. In any case, it is a risk we must in time be prepared to take if we’re to be on even glancingly familiar terms with our own value system. There’s no time like the present.

The independence of Pakistan’s judiciary – a prerequisite democratic institution, it appears – has now been demonstrated. Islamic societies will either demonstrate the political maturity to elect responsible governments to rule over themselves or they will not. If they will, all to the good and we can each of us hope to deliver unto our children a better world.

If they will not, well: We might as well get that out in the open.