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As Crisis Deepens, White House Endures Diminished Power to Influence EventsBy  Glenn Kessler Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, November 4, 2007; Page A01

In August, a 2 a.m. phone call from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice helped pull Gen.Pervez Musharraf from the brink of declaring a state of emergency in Pakistan. Two daysago, Rice made a similar plea. This time, the Pakistani president was not swayed.

Musharraf's decision to suspend his nation's constitution and declare emergency ruleyesterday poses a sharp setback for U.S. efforts to push Pakistan toward democracy, andit calls into question President Bush's unstinting support for Musharraf despite thegeneral's growing unpopularity and inability to counter hard-line militants, analysts said.

The United States now finds itself with few good options and dwindling power to

influence events in the nuclear-armed state, particularly because experts believeMusharraf's actions may have ensured his demise as a national leader. The Bushadministration has given Pakistan $10 billion in aid since 2001 -- much of it militaryassistance -- and U.S. officials had warned that Congress may balk at continuing aid if emergency powers were invoked. But some analysts cautioned that if the United States is perceived as withdrawing support for Musharraf, it may increase the risk of a civil war and the shattering of Pakistan.

Rice, who called Musharraf on Friday and warned him against taking this step, saidyesterday that Musharraf's actions are "highly regrettable," telling reporters traveling withher that "the United States has made clear it does not support extra-constitutionalmeasures, because those measures would take Pakistan away from the path of democracyand civilian rule."

U.S. officials appeared taken aback by Musharraf's move but quickly shifted yesterdayfrom expressions of dismay to resignation, insisting that any "extra-constitutionalmeasures" be brief. There was no suggestion of immediate cuts in aid, and Rice indicatedthat she had told Musharraf that, even if he imposed emergency rule, he nonethelessshould move quickly to elections.

The Bush administration must now start "from the premise that he's gone, whether the people chuck him out or the military chucks him out," said Xenia Dormandy, who untillast year was the National Security Council's director for South Asia. "I would be verysurprised if he lasts even six months."

Dormandy faulted the Bush administration for sending "mixed messages" to Musharraf inrecent months, allowing him to believe he could weather the fallout from a declaration of emergency powers. She emphasized the State Department's statement yesterday that theUnited States stands "with the people of Pakistan in supporting a democratic process and

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in countering violent extremism," and noted that it did not mention support for Musharraf.

"The train is derailed and off the tracks," said Stephen P. Cohen, author of "The Idea of Pakistan." "We have to give ourselves a share of the responsibility for this. We placed all

of our chips on Musharraf."

At this point, Cohen added: "I don't think there is anything we can do. We are not big players in this anymore."

Bush has long been a firm supporter of Musharraf, believing he was a "strong partner" inthe fight against terrorism who put his life at risk after he dramatically switched sides andopposed the Taliban in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.

Musharraf's democratic credentials have been less than ideal for an administration that publicly champions the cause of freedom. He seized power in a bloodless coup in 1999

and has never fulfilled a pledge to give up his position as army chief while serving as president. But the administration rarely challenged him openly to support more rapiddemocratization.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) saidMusharraf's action requires the United States "to move from a Musharraf policy to aPakistan policy," building "a new relationship with the Pakistani people, with morenonmilitary aid, sustained over a long period of time, so that the moderate majority inPakistan has a chance to succeed."

Even on countering terrorism, Musharraf has proven to be a disappointment. Despite

years of effort, only a handful of top al-Qaeda figures have been captured in the unruly border areas between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Negotiated settlements Musharraf reached last year with armed Islamic groups and tribal leaders in North and SouthWaziristan, in which he pledged to pull back troops from the border areas if the tribeskept al-Qaeda and foreign fighters out, turned into a bad bet that instead allowedinsurgents to gather strength and to begin challenging the government in other parts of the country.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman called Musharraf's declaration "unfortunate" butsaid "close coordination with the Pakistani military on operations continues."

The administration continued to back Musharraf, even as he began to hint at invokingemergency powers after a confrontation with Pakistan's Supreme Court. In August,during a late-night phone call, Rice managed to deter the Pakistani president fromsuspending the constitution. In the intervening weeks, the United States, along withBritain, worked out a deal that allowed opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, a former primeminister, to return to Pakistan last month for the first time in eight years. Under thearrangement, Musharraf was to remain president, but Bhutto could take part in

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 parliamentary elections planned for early next year. But the U.S. efforts to supportopposition parties came too late, experts said.

"The coup in Pakistan is a body blow to the administration's efforts to arrange a shotgunmarriage between Musharraf and Bhutto that would have given the appearance of a

 broadening of Pakistani politics," said Bruce Riedel, a former  CIA analyst and NationalSecurity Council staff member now at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center. "Insteadof a more democratic Pakistan, we will have a more authoritarian Pakistan. Instead of amore stable Pakistan fighting al-Qaeda, we will have a military regime fighting for itssurvival."

A number of Pakistan experts said the situation is too fluid for predictions. "I don't knowwhat's going to happen," Cohen said. "I don't think any Pakistan expert knows what willhappen even tomorrow."

Rice was in Istanbul, Turkey, attending an international conference on Iraq when her 

attention was shifted to the upheaval in Pakistan. One adviser traveling with Rice saw asilver lining in the rapid turn of events. "Thank heavens for small favors," the officialsaid. Compared to Pakistan, "Iraq looks pretty good."

Staff writers Karen DeYoung, traveling with Rice, Robin Wright and Ann Scott Tyson inWashington contributed to this report. 

Where the Jihad Lives Now

Islamic militants have spread beyond their tribal bases, and

have the run of an unstable, nuclear-armed nation.

 

GALLERY

'The Ultimate Sacrifice'  A photographic record of the days surrounding the suicide strikes at Bhutto's return Photo: Carlde Souza /AFP-Getty Images

 

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By Ron Moreau and Michael Hirsh | NEWSWEEKOct 29, 2007 Issue

was worried she would not survive the day. It was, for her, to be a moment of  joyous return after eight years of exile, but also an hour of great peril. Just beforeshe left Dubai for Pakistan on Thursday, Oct. 18, Bhutto directed that a letter behand-delivered to Pervez Musharraf , the embattled Pakistani autocrat with whomshe had negotiated a tenuous political alliance. If anything happens to me,please investigate the following individuals in your government, she wrote,according to an account given to NEWSWEEK by her husband, Asif Ali Zardari.Bhutto, Pakistan's former prime minister, then proceeded to name several senior security officials she considered to be enemies, Zardari said. Principal amongthose she identified, according to another supporter who works for her PakistanPeople's Party, was Ejaz Shah, the head of Pakistan's shadowy IntelligenceBureau, which runs domestic surveillance in somewhat the way M.I.5 does inBritain. Shah, a longtime associate of Musharraf's, is believed by Bhuttosupporters to have Islamist sympathies. And Bhutto had boldly challengedPakistan's Muslim extremists, declaring before her arrival that "the terrorists aretrying to take over my country, and we have to stop them."

Bhutto was certainly prescient about the threat. On Thursday, as her motorcadeinched along a parade route guarded by roughly 20,000 Pakistani security forces,one or more suicide bombers set off twin explosions that killed at least 134bystanders and police, and injured 450 others. The bombs narrowly missedBhutto, who had ducked into her armored truck minutes before. Shaken butuninjured, she was rushed to safety. Musharraf's government quickly fingeredBaitullah Mehsud, a longtime Taliban supporter and director of some of the most

lethal training facilities for suicide bombers in the far-off mountains of Waziristan.Mehsud had reportedly threatened Bhutto. She and her husband, however,pointed much closer to home. "We do not buy that it was Mehsud," Zardari toldNEWSWEEK. There was no immediate evidence that Shah was connected tothe bombing. At a news conference the next day, though, Bhutto noted that thestreetlights had mysteriously been turned off on her parade route and said: "I amnot accusing the government. I am accusing people, certain individuals whoabuse their positions. Who abuse their powers."

Whoever the real culprits turn out to be, the truth is that Pakistan's governmenthas only itself to blame for the carnage in Karachi. Pakistani leaders created the

Islamist monster that now operates with near impunity throughout the country.Militant Islamist groups that were originally recruited, trained and armed byPakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) have since becomeIslamabad's deadliest enemies. Twice they have nearly succeeded inassassinating Musharraf, who was once among their strongest supporters. In thelast six years extremists have killed more than 1,000 Pakistani troops.

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Today no other country on earth is arguably more dangerous than Pakistan. Ithas everything Osama bin Laden could ask for: political instability, a trustednetwork of radical Islamists, an abundance of angry young anti-Western recruits,secluded training areas, access to state-of-the-art electronic technology, regular air service to the West and security services that don't always do what they're

supposed to do. (Unlike in Iraq or Afghanistan, there also aren't thousands of American troops hunting down would-be terrorists.) Then there's the country'slarge and growing nuclear program. "If you were to look around the world for where Al Qaeda is going to find its bomb, it's right in their backyard," says BruceRiedel, the former senior director for South Asia on the National Security Council.

The conventional story about Pakistan has been that it is an unstable nuclear power, with distant tribal areas in terrorist hands. What is new, and morefrightening, is the extent to which Taliban and Qaeda elements have now turnedmuch of the country, including some cities, into a base that gives jihadists moreroom to maneuver, both in Pakistan and beyond.

In recent months, as Musharraf has grown more and more unpopular after eightyears of rule, Islamists have been emboldened. The homegrown militants whohave hidden Al Qaeda's leaders since the end of 2001 are no longer restricted tountamed mountain villages along the border. These Islamist fighters now operaterelatively freely in cities like Karachi—a process the U.S. and Pakistanigovernments call "Talibanization." Hammered by suicide bombers and Iraq-styleIEDs and reluctant to make war on its countrymen, Pakistan's demoralizedmilitary seems incapable of stopping the jihadists even in the cities. "Until I returnto fight, I'll feel safe and relaxed here," Abdul Majadd, a Taliban commander whowas badly wounded this summer during a fire fight against British troops in

Afghanistan, told NEWSWEEK recently after he was evacuated to Karachi for emergency care.

Militancy is woven into the fabric of Pakistani society. At independence in 1947,the country's whisky-swilling founder, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, used Islam to forgea sense of national identity. Since then the various military dictators who haveperiodically ruled the country have found jihad to be a convenient means of distracting their citizens and furthering their foreign-policy aims. Gen. Zia ul-Haqturned Pakistan into a base for the mujahedin waging war on the Soviets inAfghanistan—and won billions in American aid in the process. In the 1990s, after the Soviet defeat, generals like Musharraf dispatched thousands of those fightersto wage a guerrilla campaign in Kashmir. Many trained across the border inAfghanistan, in the same camps that Al Qaeda had set up under the Taliban.

After 9/11 Musharraf promised Washington that he would cut off support for suchgroups, including the Taliban. Early on, he authorized the arrests of several topQaeda leaders in Pakistani cities, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, themastermind of the 9/11 attacks, and Abu Zubaydah, a top Qaeda organizer. ButMusharraf's efforts have always been somewhat halfhearted, constrained by the

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deep sympathies that many of his countrymen have for jihadists. For decadesPakistanis were taught that the guerrillas were Muslim heroes, fighting for national honor and security. Such loyalties cannot be turned off like a tap.Several of the militants' onetime spymasters, both inside and outside thegovernment, maintain links to their former charges. The security services will go

after certain figures—particularly foreign Qaeda fighters—but ask others simplyto lie low. Many officials—even many ordinary citizens—still think the jihadistsshould be preserved for future use as a strategic weapon, especially againstIndia, long after America's War on Terror is over.

The safe haven provided by Pakistan has already had dire effects on U.S. andNATO efforts to fight the resurgent Taliban next door in Afghanistan. Talibanfighters now pretty much come and go as they please inside Pakistan. Their sickand injured get patched up in private hospitals there. Guns and supplies arereadily available, and in the winter, when fighting traditionally dies down inAfghanistan, thousands retire to the country's thriving madrassas to study the

Qur'an. Some of the brainier operatives attend courses in computer technology,video production and even English. Far from keeping a low profile, the visitingfighters attend services at local mosques, where after prayers they speak to thecongregation, soliciting donations to support the war against the West. "Pakistanis like your shoulder that supports your RPG," Taliban commander Mullah MominAhmed told NEWSWEEK, barely a month before a U.S. airstrike killed him lastSeptember in Afghanistan's eastern Ghazni province. "Without it you couldn'tfight. Thank God Pakistan is not against us."

Dozens of Taliban commanders have moved their wives and children toPakistan, where they live in the suburbs of cities like Peshawar and Islamabad.

This keeps them out of the reach of Afghan authorities, who have been known toarrest relatives in order to track down guerrilla fighters. Mullah Shabir Ahmad is amember of the Taliban's 30-man ruling council, or shura. He's moved his familyto a modest neighborhood of nearly identical brick and mud-brick houses inQuetta. Inside his home he shows a visiting NEWSWEEK reporter a room filledwith new bolts of cloth, Ramadan gifts from the city's Taliban sympathizers. Hespends roughly half the year inside Pakistan, shuttling between Quetta, Karachi,Peshawar and the tribal belt to raise funds, recruit new fighters and plot strategywith other commanders.

The insurgents have no centralized supply system. Instead, each senior provincial commander operates his own network. Din Mohammad, a tall, portlyman in his mid-30s, looks after the needs of insurgents who fight for commander Gul Agha in southern Helmand province. With cash from Afghanistan and fromhis own fund-raising efforts he buys shoes and warm clothes for Taliban fighters,walkie-talkies and satellite phones—even weapons, explosives and remote-control devices. The benign stuff he trucks into Afghanistan openly. The lethalitems are hidden in shipments of clothes and food or under the baggage of Afghan refugees on their way home. Some Taliban chiefs prefer to shop for 

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themselves. Earlier this month Mullah Rehmat, a Taliban commander, rested at ayouth hostel in Peshawar while he waited for the master gunsmiths of DeraAdam Khel village to finish a $750 sniper rifle he'd ordered.

The contrast to 2002 is striking. Back then, in the first flush of Musharraf's

crackdown on extremists, a NEWSWEEK reporter met Agha Jan, a former senior Taliban Defense Ministry official, in an orchard outside the city of Quetta. Anervous Jan recounted how he had to change homes every two nights for fear of capture, and he fled when some local villagers approached. Jan now has ahouse outside Quetta, where he lives when he's not fighting with Taliban forcesacross the border in his native Zabul province. Reporters in Peshawar, astrategic Pakistani border city some 50 miles east of the historic Khyber Passand the Afghan border, say it's not unusual these days to receive phone callsfrom visiting Taliban commanders offering interviews, or asking where to find acheap hotel, a good restaurant or a new cell phone.

Last August, a NEWSWEEK reporter received a phone call from the spokesmanfor a senior Taliban leader, inviting him for dinner at a popular restaurant inPeshawar. The reporter replied that he was already there. As he looked around,he saw the smiling jihadist sitting a few tables away. They shared a kilo of Afghan barbecue as the spokesman confidently talked about the Taliban'sresurgence in Afghanistan and how comfortable they felt operating insidePakistani cities and in the frontier tribal area. "The biggest chink in Musharraf'sarmor is his failure to move against the Taliban, particularly in the cities," saysSamina Ahmed, the South Asia director of the International Crisis Group inIslamabad. "The brains, the ones who plan the operations, are not necessarily inthe boonies or in the sticks, they're in cities like Quetta. Can he pick them up?

Easily."

Taliban fighters say they are careful not to antagonize their hosts; the attacksagainst Pakistani troops have generally been conducted by Pakistani tribals,sometimes with the support of Qaeda operatives. But that's a fine distinction. "If you take away that support the Taliban are getting from across the border inPakistan, it would be much easier for U.S., NATO and Afghan government forcesto confront the Taliban inside Afghanistan," says Ahmed. Each group may haveits own agenda, but they all share a visceral hatred of America and its regionalallies—including Musharraf. The Taliban also work closely with Qaeda leaders inthe tribal regions, planning attacks together and pooling their skills.

The Taliban presence began to grow out of control after Musharraf, his Armybloodied by incursions into South Wa-ziristan, cut a peace deal with the tribalregion's Mehsud clan in 2005. He made another such truce with tribal militants inNorth Waziristan in 2006. The ceasefire agreements were publicly announced astreaties with tribal elders. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The deals weremade directly with the militant leaders, their frontmen or terrified tribal elders whodid the militants' bidding. As a result they were worthless: the militants had no

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intention of keeping their promise to stop the passage of arms and fightersacross the Afghan border. While the Army halted offensive operations anddismantled checkpoints, the militants helped the Taliban and Al Qaeda regroupand reinfiltrate back into Afghanistan.

Those forces, all working together, have brought the Afghan jihad home toPakistan. Within the tribes' ancient mud-walled fortresses they run trainingcourses for insurgent recruits and suicide bombers. Some graduates travel toAfghanistan to fight beside the Taliban. Others will stay in the tribal area to fightthe Pakistani Army, while others are sent out to hit targets in places like Karachi.Several terrorist plots in Britain have been traced back to the tribal areas.

Now the Pakistani government is bearing the brunt of the attacks. The threatturned critical in July, when more than 100 militants died in a weeklong shoot-outwith government forces at Islamabad's Red Mosque. In retaliation, tribal suicidebombers have managed to penetrate highly guarded military facilities in the

capital, the Army headquarters at Rawalpindi and elsewhere, killing scores.Authorities say that until the showdown, the Red Mosque had served as a waystation and munitions depot for hundreds of fighters shuttling between Pakistan'scities and the tribal areas. It reopened Oct. 3, and preachers there are onceagain denouncing Musharraf and his partnership with the West. A similar message was delivered to Bhutto before she came home. Last week, speakingby satellite phone from the South Waziristan tribal area, a senior militantcommander named Haji Muhamad Omar called Bhutto an agent of Washington."She doesn't come back by her own choice. The United States and Britain arebringing her back to fight against the mujahedin," he said.

The militants dominate in areas beyond the tribal areas as well. Armed groupshave effectively seized control in places like the picturesque Swat Valley, wherea jihadi leader named Mullah Fazlullah rides a black horse and commandshundreds of men under the noses of a nearby Pakistani Army division thatseldom leaves its barracks. Peshawar is perhaps the most important productionand distribution center for Taliban and other Islamist material. Jihadi CD andDVD shops abound. One small shop features large posters of the notoriousTaliban commander Mullah Dadullah Akhund, who was killed in Helmand earlier this year, and pictures of Guant?namo inmates in their orange jumpsuits behindbarbed wire.

The Afghan refugee camps around Peshawar, meanwhile, have become vast jihadist sanctuaries. The Jalozai and Shamshatu camps, each housing some100,000 Afghan refugees, date back to the war against the Soviets. Complaintsfrom the Afghan government have forced Islamabad and the U.N. HighCommissioner for Refugees to begin the long process of emptying Jalozai, a jobthat's supposed to be completed by next spring. Many of the camp's high-walledcompounds are already abandoned. But few Jalozai residents are returning toAfghanistan when they leave the camps. Most are settling in Peshawar or other 

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towns in the vicinity, which will allow the Taliban more space to operate in. Alocal mullah was arrested in Jalozai earlier this year after three Pakistani militantsblew themselves up while using his house as a bomb factory.

The Shamshatu camp, just south of Peshawar, is the personal fiefdom of the

notorious Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. His guerrillas, the Hizb-i-Islami("Party of Islam"), operate mainly in Afghanistan's Kunar province, butShamshatu is their power base, in effect an autonomous enclave within Pakistan.Like Jalozai, the place resembles a sprawling, labyrinthine Afghan village of mud-brick houses surrounded by high mud walls, and it's ruled by strict, Taliban-styleIslamic law. Music is forbidden—even musical ringtones on cell phones. So istobacco. Women are banned from venturing outside except in the company of amale relative. (There are girls' schools, though: unlike his Taliban allies,Hekmatyar believes in women's education.) en they confiscated theshopkeeper's goods and threw him out of the camp.

Shamshatu contains high-security areas that are out of bounds even to campresidents. Camp residents say Hekmatyar's men run private jails in these off-limits areas. Recently a woman who lived in the camp dared to go shoppingalone. When she entered a small electronics shop, gunmen followed her. Theyforced the shopkeeper to close his store, detained the woman and telephonedher husband. "If you won't kill her, we will," they told him, before handing her over with a warning that if they caught her again without an escort, they would kill her.ThMusharraf says his forces are doing everything possible to halt the jihadists'spread. Pakistan's president has shown he can deliver when he must. Late lastFebruary, just as Vice President Dick Cheney arrived in Islamabad to pressureMusharraf to fight harder against the Islamists, Pakistani military-intelligence

agents in Quetta suddenly captured Mullah Obaidullah Akhund. As the Taliban'sDefense minister and one of Mullah Omar's key deputies, he was the highest-ranking Taliban official the Pakistanis had ever taken into custody. A couple of months earlier, Pakistan reportedly informed U.S. forces in Afghanistan thatanother senior Taliban leader, Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani, was headinginto Afghanistan from Quetta. A U.S. airstrike promptly killed him, just insideAfghanistan. But those cases remain exceptional.

U.S. government officials say that Musharraf's government still has tight controlover the nation's nuclear-weapons program. Still, radicals would not need to steala whole bomb in order to create havoc. Pakistan has never made a publicaccounting of its nuclear materials, and last year its Atomic Energy Agencybegan publishing ads in newspapers instructing the public about how torecognize radioactive materials and their symbols. The ads were quicklywithdrawn after they incited fears that fissile material had gone missing. ButPervez Hoodbhoy, a noted nuclear physicist at Quaid-i-Azam University inIslamabad, says outside experts don't really know how much highly enricheduranium Pakistan has produced in the past and how much remains in existing

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stocks. "No one has a real idea about that," he says. "That means that stuff couldhave gotten out. Little bits here or there. But we really don't know."

In Washington, a senior administration official involved in counterterrorism saidU.S. intelligence is chronically fearful that Islamists might get hold of nuclear 

material, equipment or know-how in Pakistan. He recalled that after 9/11, a groupof rogue Pakistani nuclear scientists met with Osama bin Laden. "Given thathistory, we continue to look at this issue very closely," he said, speaking oncondition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

It's not surprising that Pakistani authorities might give the Taliban specialtreatment. The country's intelligence officers and military men have maintainedclose personal relations with senior Taliban leaders ever since the Sovietoccupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s. Western military and diplomatic officialssay they doubt that Pakistan is still actively assisting Afghan insurgents—but theydon't think it's trying very hard to stop them, either. "I'm not delusional," says a

Western military official in Islamabad, not wishing to be quoted by name on sucha sensitive topic. "Their [the Pakistani government's] guys are in contact with theTalibs. They may not be assisting them, but they aren't busting them, either." AWestern diplomat, speaking off the record because he is not authorized torepresent his government's views to the media, says, "I'm sure there areintelligence officials, active and retired, who have dealt with the Taliban in thepast and still support their cause. That's the power of personal relationships over time. You don't cut those off abruptly."

The Taliban war effort is also greatly aided by dozens of "retired" former officialsin Mullah Omar's defunct Taliban government who now reside in Pakistan, some

armed with Pakistani national identity cards. The Taliban don't think they'reputting anything past the ISI—"the black snake," as they call the agency. MullahShabir Ahmad, a provincial commander, spends upwards of six months of theyear inside Pakistan. "The Pakistanis know what we eat for lunch and dinner," hesays. Mullah Momin Ahmed, visiting his family in Quetta shortly before his deathin September, agreed: "Pakistan knows everything about us, but it seems toignore us." Maj. Gen. Waheed Arshad, the military's chief spokesman, says thatPakistani forces have arrested and deported 1,500 Taliban to Afghanistan, "butmany somehow return."

Until now, most Pakistanis seem to have remained impervious to the jihadistthreat, despite the evidence around them. Musharraf himself has seemedpreoccupied with other matters. "He has failed to understand the danger of insurgency on both sides of the border, and how to bring the Pakistani peoplealong with him to counter that threat," says retired Pakistani Army Lt. Gen. TalatMasood. "He has been too obsessed with perpetuating his power." Instead,according to Masood and other observers, the president has allowed Pakistanisto lull themselves into thinking that the battle against the jihadists is Musharraf'sand America's problem, not theirs. "The greatest danger is that the whole

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Pakistani nation, including senior politicians, seems to be saying that this is notour watch, this is not our war," says Masood. "Even the Taliban presence in thecities seems to have an acceptance."

Few Pakistanis have any desire to live under the militants' rule. The trouble is,

the country's moderate alternatives have become almost as unpopular.Musharraf won a third term as president by a unanimous Electoral Assembly voteon Oct. 6 (heavily boycotted by the opposition). In a recent nationwide poll by theInternational Republican Institute, however, he earned a dismal 21 percentapproval rating. Bhutto fared little better, scoring a pitiful 28 percent. ManyPakistanis were appalled by her willingness to cut a deal with Musharraf so thathe would allow her to return from exile.

True, the survey was taken before last week's attack. In the wake of the deadliestterrorist bombing in Pakistan's history, the public might rally once again to her support. "She won't be deterred," her husband told NEWSWEEK, describing

Bhutto as "composed" in a phone call after the attack. "She won't be takenhostage by a small minority of people." But that minority of Islamists isn't so smallany longer—and it's ready for a long war.

With Mark Hosenball in Washington, Zahid Hussain in Islamabad and staff reports