From the Trends Journal®

Summer 2009

Pakistan — Target for Terror

PAKISTAN: Nuclear armed, irremediably poor, politically corrupt, always tribally frac-
tious, Pakistan was further destabilized by President Obama’s escalation of the Afghan
War, which drove increased numbers of Taliban deeper into Pakistan.
Preemptive American air strikes into sovereign Pakistan, in conjunction with a
Pakistani combat campaign to destroy Taliban forces, resulted in a humanitarian catas-
trophe. Apart from death and destruction, in the worst refugee crisis since the Rwan-
dan genocide of 1994, millions of civilians were driven from their homes and forced
to seek refuge in areas unprepared, unwilling, and/or unable to accommodate them.
The combination of a refugee crisis, local animosity toward the Pakistani military and
its Western allies — and ceaseless domestic political strife — would push the country
toward civil war.
The stated objective of the US and the UK governments was to increase search-and-
destroy missions against Al Qaeda and to stop the cross-border flow of Taliban. A stra-
tegic fear was that if the Taliban were not stopped, they could take control of Pakistan’s
nuclear arsenal.
Seldom referred to in the US press was the reality of Pakistani history and politics:
An unending sequence of coups, assassinations, hangings and financial scandals. With-
out such an understanding, no real assessment of US policy or aims was possible. The life
story of the current Pakistani president provided insights into who he was, what could
be expected from him, and why US-led support and strategies were doomed to fail and
destined to further spread violence and encourage terrorism.
As Trends Journal® readers know, the procedure for tracking trends is to: 1). Under-
stand where we are. 2). Know how we got there. 3). See where we’re going.
Without a firm grasp of 1 and 2, you can’t forecast 3.
Regarding Pakistan, our understanding of 1 and 2 told us this was a globally threaten-
ing conflict meriting careful attention. Beyond the internal implications of pending civil
war and increased terror threats against the US, a warring and chaotic Pakistan could in-
flame already tense relations with its nuclear-armed neighbor, India.
Current events form future trends. The following analysis, excerpted from the Spring
2008 Trends Journal®, provides a summary of what led up to the events occurring during
Spring 2009:

Wild Card Event

Trends Journal®, Spring 2008 — At year’s end, former Pakistani Prime Minister,
Benazir Bhutto, who was campaigning against Pakistan’s president Pervez Mush-
arraf in parliamentary elections, was assassinated.
Having ruled as both General and President, Musharraf, who had taken con-
trol of Pakistan in a 1999 military coup, was running behind Bhutto in the
polls. The country had been in turmoil since March when Musharraf fired the
Supreme Court justice, locked up thousands of lawyers, disbanded the Su-
preme Court in November in anticipation of their ruling that he was ineligible
for a third term, and declared a state of emergency.
 THE POWERFULLY SHALLOW
“The United States strongly condemns this cowardly act by murderous extrem-
ists who are trying to undermine Pakistan’s democracy,” President Bush said,
calling the Musharraf dictatorship a democracy.
The presidential candidates weighed in on the assassination with positions that
reflected who they are, what they’re selling, and what lies and hate they would
spread to get votes.
Rudy “9/11” Giuliani (who spent scant time at ground zero but claimed he was
there more than first responders and rescue workers) tied Bhutto’s assassination
to an attack against the US. “We must redouble our efforts to win the terrorists’
war on us,” repeating his oft-repeated “terrorists war on us” refrain.
Barack Obama played the terrorist card with his line that we “… stand with
them in their quest for democracy and against the terrorists, who threaten the
common security of the world” … as if the Pakistani dictatorship was a democ-
racy.
One after another, pandering to American’s fear, the presidential candidates
tied the assassination of Bhutto to the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well
as to 9/11.
“For those who think Iraq is the sole front in the ‘War on Terror,’ one must
look no further than what has happened today … and together face the defin-
ing challenge of our generation — the struggle against violent, radical jihadists,”
railed Mitt Romney.
“The death of Benazir Bhutto underscores yet again the grave dangers we face
in the world today and particularly in countries like Pakistan, where the forces
of moderation are arrayed in a fierce battle against those who embrace violent
Islamic extremism,” proclaimed John McCain.
There were no “forces of moderation.” Bhutto’s assassination had nothing to do
with “the grave dangers we face.” Her killing provided no lesson “For those who
think Iraq is the sole front in the War on Terror.” Nor did it apply to “… terrorists
who threaten the common security of the world.” It had absolutely nothing to do
with “the quest for democracy.”
Like her father who’d been hanged, a brother who’d been poisoned and an-
other brother who’d been shot, Benazir Bhutto was killed for various reasons
— principally money, power, and control. Simply put, a lot of people hated the
Bhutto’s and wanted them dead.
The history of the Bhutto clan and Pakistani politics is an ugly tale. Benazir’s
father, Ali Bhutto, who was president and Prime Minister from 1971 to 1977, was
executed for the murder of a political opponent by General Zia-ul Hag who, like
General Musharraf, had taken over the country in a military coup.
As for Benazir Bhutto, she was Prime Minister of Pakistan twice between 1988
and 1996 and was thrown out of office twice — on charges of rampant corruption
and rigging the judiciary. Ms. Bhutto’s husband, known as “Mr. 10 Percent” for
taking his cut from deals made during Benazir’s stint, spent eight years in prison
for kidnapping, extortion, the murder of Benazir’s estranged brother, Murtaza,
and for stealing more than $5 billion from the treasury.
So scandal-plagued was her government that even Benazir’s mother, Nusrat,
declared her daughter’s government “ruthless” and “worse than the days of the
dictator.” (Washington Post Foreign Service, 28 December 2007.)
But none of this was taken into account by American politicians or the media.
St. Benazir, proclaimed a martyr for democracy, was instantly beatified. Her as-
sassination was an act of terrorism attributed to Al Qaeda.
 Publisher’s Note: Immediately after Benazir Bhutto was buried, her husband,
Ali “Mr. 10 Percent” Zardari took control of the political party she had headed.
Using Benazir and Ali’s son, Bilawal Bhutto, as the front for the takeover, the
party crowned the 19-year old boy as chairman and announced that his father
will “assist” him as co-chairman of the party until he is old enough to assume
control.
Possessing no credentials other than sharing the gene pool of the entrenched
Pakistani dynasty, heir apparent Bilawal, a college freshman, proclaimed, “The
party’s long struggle for democracy will continue with renewed vigor … my
mother always said democracy is the best revenge.”
Further promoting the illusion of democracy, the White House weighed in with
the statement that, “We believe it is important for Pakistan to confront extremists
and continue on the path to democracy.”
THE FUTURE
Despite incontrovertible proof of its policy failures, the United States will contin-
ue to spend countless billions to fund intractable and corrupt Pakistan regimes in
the name of waging “The War on Terror” … or war on whatever else Washington
can exploit, invent or promote.

Target For Terror A year later, in the Spring of 2009, though President Obama
cited Pakistan among the most pressing challenges facing his Presidency, the general
public still knew next to nothing about the country, what had led to the escalating war …
and especially what justified increased US involvement.
Twenty-one thousand additional troops and a tough new military commander were
sent by Obama to fight the Afghan war more vigorously. The consequences were predict-
able: the war spread beyond the borders into Pakistan and civilian casualties mounted.
In May 2009, at the behest of Washington, the Pakistani military launched a massive
offensive in the Swat Valley to rid it of Taliban forces … as if such a feat were feasible.
What had been achieved was that three million civilians were forced to flee their homes,
creating a humanitarian crisis which refugees blamed on the US for pressuring Pakistan
to launch the campaign.
Suffering Pakistanis now added to the already swelled ranks of Muslims seeking to
avenge the tens of thousands dead and hundreds of thousands mutilated by America in
the ongoing Afghan and Iraq Wars.
But when promises to retaliate were fulfilled, the media and politicians would at-
tribute the attacks to “militants” and “insurgents,” rather than call them acts of revenge
by angry people who had lost everything … including the lives of loved ones: “Pakistani
militants launch bomb raid on hotel.” Financial Times, 10 June 2009.
Back then, as in 2012, bombing innocent people staying in hotels was called an “act
of terror,” while bombing innocent people staying in their homes was called a “surgical
strike.”

Trend Forecast: The stage was being set for another 9/11-scale terror attack within the
US or a foreign US facility. And when terror strikes, as with 9/11, rather than acknowl-
edge that its foreign policy provoked the act of revenge, Washington will again blame it
on Islamic extremists attacking America because they “hate our freedom and way of life.”
With 63 percent of Americans supporting President Obama’s Afghan strategy — and
the vast majority uninformed of Pakistani motives, history and its proxy role in carrying
out US interests — the public would again accept the government’s explanation and sup-
port whatever doomed course of action it took.
Editor’s Note: What was never acknowledged by the government and rarely by the media
was the unspoken US goal of the Afghan War. It was not just the pursuit of “Al Qaeda and
the Taliban” as originally claimed by President Bush and restated by President Obama
in his June 2009 Cairo address. It was also about oil … and America’s determination to
control supplies of oil and gas from the Caspian Basin.
The Iraq War was also about oil. Long forgotten by 2009 was Washington’s promise to
Americans that victory in Iraq would bring on a multifaceted oil bonanza. Oil profits would
cover all war costs. With America in control, the price of oil would be driven down and
supplies guaranteed. Oil was held out as a bargaining carrot to entice nations to join the
“coalition of the willing.” The unwilling, such as France, would be excluded from reaping
the riches derived from rebuilding Iraq’s decrepit oil infrastructure.
Not one of these promises was fulfilled. Yet, seven years and a few trillion dollars
later, President Obama was restating the Bush rationale for invading and occupying Iraq
even after it was proven that Saddam Hussein had no ties to Al Qaeda, no connection to
9/11, and no weapons of mass destruction. Like his predecessor, President Obama would
justify America’s invasion: “I believe,” said Obama, “that the Iraqi people are ultimately
better off without the tyranny of Saddam Hussein.”

Trend Forecast: Should terror strike, it would drive the United States and much of the
world swiftly into Depression. Unlike in 2001, urgent exhortations to keep shopping, like
those made by President Bush following 9/11, would not work. This was not 2001. These
were very different economic times. Now there was no room left to lower interest rates. By
2009, the unemployment rate was nearly double the 2001 rate. Americans were working
an average of just 33.3 hours a week, the fewest hours since the Bureau of Labor Statistics
began counting in 1964. Part-time work was at a record high, overtime was at a record
low. In the first quarter of 2009, US businesses cut total wages a staggering 6.2 percent.
Median household income was below 1999 levels, millions of homes were being foreclosed,
states were going bankrupt, deficits were skyrocketing. Facing the worst employment con-
ditions since the Great Depression, US workers had neither the will nor the way to keep
shopping.
But there would also be similarities. Washington would close down Wall Street to
forestall stampedes on equity markets. Not only would stockholders be prevented from
redeeming equities, CDs and other financial instruments would also be frozen.
With economic conditions much worse than in 2001, the President would call a bank
“holiday” following a panicked public’s run on the banks. Still functioning ATMs would
dispense paltry subsistence sums.
Back in 2009, though an impending terror attack was among the wild cards in our
trend deck, polls showed “terror” was not a public panic button issue. But the prescient
knew that if not terror, then one or another of those wild cards would be dealt, and sooner
rather than later. The prepared had both the funds on hand and the strategies in place to
ride out the financial havoc.
There weren’t a lot of options. Investing in gold, storing it in a safe place other than a
bank safety deposit box, or even in the US, was a strategy embraced by those who feared
the government would again confiscate it as it had done in 1933. Others would be short
on stocks, heavy on silver and long on currencies … a basket of them, so that when some
went down, others would rise, thus hedging losses.

By mid year 2009, the financial world was broken down into essentially two camps: risk-
taking speculators and wealth preservers. Preserving what they had rather than gambling on
stocks in the hope of making more, was the considered strategy for those who saw the game
for what it was.