Consider this: Saddam Hussein was hanged and Iraq nearly obliterated by the US for the alleged link with the al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. There are no prizes for guessing the manner in which way the U.S. engineered the disintegration of the former state of Yugoslavia and executed it to perfection by breaking it up in its constituent units Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia and now Kosovo. While the U.S. Under Secretary of State calls the democratically elected ruling party of Serbia (Serbian Radical Party) a party of criminals, the U.S. has no qualms in having deals with other such perpetrators, if it makes business sense.
So while the former Yugoslavian President was charged with war crimes, the U.S. and its coteries don’t hesitate to deal with the likes of Musharraf, who has not only systematically destroyed all the democratic and autonomous institutions of Pakistan but has over years pampered some of the world’s most dangerous terrorist organisations like LeT and Jaish-e-Mohammad, whose allegiance to the ideology of al-Qaeda and being their frontline operatives is well known.
The Federation of American Scientists states that, ‘Since 1990, the United States has exported more than $152b worth of weapons to states around the world. Many of these sales have been to repressive and/or unstable governments’. Post 9/11, in the name of waging a war against terrorism, the U.S. has sold arms worth around $7.5b to Pakistan, which among others includes the recently concluded sale of 36 F-16 aircraft along with thousands of air-to-air missiles, guided bombs, submarine launched Harpoon missiles, 155mm self propelled howitzers, P-3C Orion reconnaissance aircrafts, Bell 407 helicopters, C-130 transport aircrafts to name a few. This practice continues even though a renowned think tank like the International Crisis Group has warned that ‘Offering tacit support for quasi-military rule into the indefinite future may make it more difficult to tackle the foundations of Pakistan’s insecurity.’ For the U.S., as long as the cash flow remains positive, evil is not evil enough.The regime of the virtuous continues fighting, while surprisingly supporting the evil. Saddam’s death made business sense just as Musharraf’s existence. Alas . . .