Tidbits from mushy book "In the Line of Fire"

[Skeptic786]

By Rahimullah Yusufzai

PESHAWAR: In his book, In the Line of Fire, President Pervez Musharraf writes that Pakistani forces captured 689 members of al-Qaeda and turned over 369 of them to the US to earn millions of dollars in “prize money” for his government from the CIA.

This and other interesting tidbits have appeared in a section of the US media before the launch of the keenly awaited book. The book would be launched today in New York. The president chose not to disclose contents of his book before its launch because he said he was honour-bound to his publisher. At the joint press conference with President George W Bush at the White House, he declined to answer questions regarding his earlier disclosure in a television interview with CBS News that top US official Richard Armitage threatened to bomb Pakistan back to the Stone Age if it didn’t cooperate with Washington in the war against terror after 9/11.

Referring to President Musharraf’s refusal to answer questions on the subject, Paul D Colford writing in the Daily News newspaper in the US had this to say about the episode: “That was a first. A dictator was told what to do - by his publisher.” His story was titled, Talk to my publisher, he says.

The newspaper said it independently obtained a copy of the book. Excerpts from the book have also appeared in the Indian daily, The Hindu. The Indian media in particular was interested in President Musharraf’s version of events during the Kargil war and the Agra summit. On both occasions, Atal Behari Vajpayee was prime minister of India.

According to newspaper reports, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also got hold of an advance copy of the book. It is interesting to note that the parent company of the book’s publisher, Simon & Schuster, is Viacom, which also owns the CBS News. The popular “60 Minutes” programme of CBS carried the president’s interview in which he mentioned the provocative remark by Armitage. The reference to Armitage, who has denied having hurled the threat to the then ISI head Lt-Gen Mahmood during a meeting after 9/11 in the US, would surely boost the sale of the book and benefit not only President Musharraf but also the publisher.

According to the story in the American newspaper Daily News, the alleged threat to bomb Pakistan back into the Stone Age took less than a page in the 337-page volume. It states that President Musharraf wrote in the book that it was easy for him to conclude that Pakistan was in no position to resist US demands after 9/11.

“I war-gamed the United States as an adversary,” the president wrote. “There would be a violent and angry reaction if we didn’t support the United States. Thus the question was: if we do not join them, can we confront them and withstand the onslaught? The answer is no, we could not.”

According to the president, he first sought to negotiate “a surrender or extradition” of Osama bin Laden, but dealing with the hot-headed Omar “was like banging one’s head against a wall.” Referring again to the Taliban leader Mulla Muhammad Omar, he wrote: “Omar thinks that death and destruction are inconsequential details in a just war.”

Regarding al-Qaeda leadership’s methods of communicating with each other, President Musharraf had this to say in the book: “Bin Laden communicates with his followers through a ‘very well-established’ four-tiered network of couriers. Top leaders of al-Qaeda try not to pass messages in writing .... Normally, the leaders make their best, most trusted, diehard couriers memorize messages to al-Qaeda’s operational hierarchy, and then convey them verbatim.”


http://www.thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=3248

 

[Skeptic786]

Pak troops were involved in Kargil, says Musharraf

Islamabad, September 24
In the first official acknowledgement of involvement of Pakistan’s regular troops in the Kargil conflict, President Pervez Musharraf has described it as “a landmark in the history of the Pakistani army”.

“Considered purely on military terms, the Kargil operations were a landmark in the history of the Pakistani army,” he writes in his book ‘In the Line of Fire’ scheduled to be released in New York tomorrow.

For long Pakistan has maintained that the 1999 conflict in Kargil involved “freedom fighters”, but the General says that five units of his army had supported the “freedom fighter groups” to compel the Indians to employ more than four divisions.

He insists that Kargil was a tactical victory for his men trying to “undo Indian adventurism”, according to extracts of the book carried by The Nation which in turn quoted BBC.

The President rubbishes speculation that Pakistan was preparing for a nuclear attack on India at the time of the conflict.

“I can say with authority that in 1999 our nuclear capability was not yet operational.....Any talk of preparing for nuclear strikes is preposterous,” he says.


http://www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20060925/world.htm#1

 

[Skeptic786]

Sehba a wonderful human being'

NEWSDESK
LAHORE-President Pervez Musharraf has described his wife Sehba as a wonderful human being, a terrific mother and a perfect home-maker.
While talking about his marriage in his book ‘In the Line of Fire’, he said that he was hitched in the traditional fashion in an arranged marriage.
‘An aunt of mine knew the parents of an eligible girl named Sehba Farid and suggested that we would be a good match. My parents initiated the proposal.On the day that I was supposed to go to Sehba’s house and meet her family, I arrived in a shirt and trousers wearing a pair of open-toed sandals called Peshawari chappals, the kind favoured by Pathans and army personnel when they are in civilian clothes.
Our salaries were hardly enough to buy designer shoes’, he wrote.
‘Not being an Army girl, Sehba was appalled that a fashion disaster had come for her hand.
She had received many proposals before and rejected them all for one reason or another,either the suitor’s hair was not good or his dress sense was wanting, or whatever. She certainly didn’t like mustaches. Yet for some reason, she didn’t reject me, despite my mustache (which I refused to shave off) and my attire. At least she approved of my hair and face.’
Sehba was extremely beautiful, and I fell for her immediately.Any man of that age who tells you he has anything except looks on his mind is not being truthful, he wrote.
‘She smoothed my rough edges and managed to mellow me, little by little’. ‘Quarrelling with superiors, even if they are being stupid, will affect your career’, she would chide me. Gradually, her advice started sinking in, but it took me some time to calm down’.
Sehba told me later that of all her family, it was her father, Ghulam Ghaus Farid, who worked in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, who was the most enthusiastic about me, he wrote.
‘He is a very good officer and will go places’, he told her, though I’m sure that he had no idea of the places I would go. Neither had I, nor anyone else.
He further writes:’Love came gradually, because after we were formally engaged I was posted for two years to Chittagong in East Pakistan.We exchanged letters.I would correct her spelling mistakes (this was neither very romantic nor very chivalrous of me, considering that Sehba’s English is far better than mine) and in retaliation she would correct my mistakes’.
‘Whenever I was in Karachi we would go out on dates,innocent little forays to parties or to a movie or to the disco at the old Metropole Hotel
Sehba Farid and I were married on December 27, 1968. I was then a Captain. Immediately afterward, I was posted to Cherat, high up in the mountains.
A day or two after we got there, I was due to make a parachute jump with about 64 other men, as part of a training exercise. I decided to be romantic and asked a friend to take Sehba to the place where we would drop.
I told Sehba I would wave a white handkerchief as I came down, so that she could identify me. I suppose there was an element of machismo too, as I wanted to show off my bravery to my new wife.
The whole scheme was well coordinated and executed. I carried my largest handkerchief and waved it vigorously, Sehba did see me, and I loved seeing her wave back at me, he further writes.
‘Cherat is on a ridge. The tin-roofed houses and buildings on the ridge are 50 to 100 yards (45 to 90 meters) apart from each other. It is full of snakes and wild animals-hardly a place for a new bride to begin a married life. But that is what young army wives have to suffer.
I had to go out one evening, and returned at about one in the morning to find the front door locked. I knocked and knocked, but Sehba wouldn’t open the door. I became worried, and broke a window to enter.
Our bedroom door was locked too. I started banging on it. Finally, she opened it, with a petrified expression on her face. There had been all sorts of scary noises coming from the tin roof creaking in the wind, so she had switched on the radio at full volume. Unfortunately, there was a horror programme going on, which terrified her even more.
At the time I was probably not as sensitive to her fears as I should have been. Becoming a father changed my happy-go-lucky attitude towards life.
Suddenly I was responsible for a little human being-our first child, our daughter Ayla, born on February 18, 1970. Our son, Bilal, was born a year and a half later, on October 17, 1971. Having two children so close together made sleepless nights and disturbed routines. You can imagine how busy they kept us, particularly their mother’, he further writes.
‘They say that behind every successful man is a greater woman. In my case I happily married Sehba because I was attracted by her beauty, dignity, and poise.
She deserves the credit for sobering my outlook towards life in general and my profession in particular. She significantly helped transform me from a carefree, brash and abrasive officer to a more balanced and responsible individual.
She developed in me the urge to do my best.I certainly owe the improvement in my written and spoken English to her, She has always been more articulate than me. Even now, whenever I get stuck for a word or a sentence, I approach her instead of spending time with a thesaurus.
Sehba has taken on the role of First Lady admirably and has created a positive impact on everyone with whom she has come in contact. She has been a wonderful wife.
Both children, from a very early age, have given us great comfort and have been a very real source of satisfaction. Their cooperation and focus in matters of academics, diet, and even sleeping patterns were amazing.
They seemed to have an innate sense of the commitment and devotion that their parents felt towards them. They have never let us down. As adults, Bilal and Ayla have well-rounded, wholesome personalities. Their hallmark is humility and poise, coupled with maturity and a good sense of humour’.
Bilal’s name carries a special significance for me. He was originally named Sheharyar, but when my best friend, Bilal, was killed in the war of 1971 against India, I was so distraught that I phoned Sehba and told her to change our son’s name to Bilal in memory of my martyred friend.
Bilal and I were coursemates, we had fought the war of 1965 together and then joined the SSG together. We were extremely close. I can never think of my friend Bilal without a pang of pain, but then I can never think of my son Bilal without a surge of joy, he writes.
‘President Zia, in the 1980s, completed what Bhutto had started in the dying phase of his regime-the total appeasement of the religious lobby. Zia did not have a political base or lobby. By hanging Bhutto, he turned Bhutto into a martyr and his political party-the PPP-into a greater force.
Zia found it convenient to align himself with the religious right and create a supportive constituency for himself.
He started overemphasising and overparticipating in religious rituals to show his alignment with the religious lobby. Even music and entertainment became officially taboo, whereas I am told that in private he personally enjoyed good semi-classical music’.

http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/sep-2006/26/index5.php

 

[Skeptic786]

Pak weighed options

NEW YORK (AFP) - Pakistan weighed up its chances of surviving a US military assault before joining the “war on terror” after the September 11, 2001 attacks, President Pervez Musharraf says in a book published Monday.
In the collection of memoirs, “In the Line of Fire,” Musharraf relates how he was told by then US secretary of state Colin Powell after the attacks: “You are either with us or against us,” and that it was quickly obvious his decision was academic.
“I wargamed the United States as an adversary,” Musharraf writes. “The question was: if we do not join them, can we confront them and withstand the onslaught? The answer was no... Our military forces would be destroyed.”
“The Americans would undoubtedly have taken the opportunity of an invasion to destroy (Pakistan’s nuclear) weapons... Our economic infrastructure, built over half a century, would have been decimated,” he says.
“We could not endure a military confrontation with the United States from any point of view,” he adds.
In an interview conducted last week, Musharraf alleged that former US deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage had threatened to bomb Pakistan “back to the Stone Age” if it did not join the “war on terror.
Armitage has denied using such strong language, which Musharraf describes in his book as “a shockingly barefaced threat” and “the most undiplomatic statement ever made.”
But “Richard Armitage’s undiplomatic language, regrettable as it was, had nothing to do with my decision ... Self-interest and self-preservation were the basis of this decision” to support the US, he says.
“I have to say, though, that later I found Armitage to be a wonderful person and a good friend of Pakistan,” he adds.
The disagreement over Armitage’s alleged remarks were just one of the cracks to have emerged in the US-Pakistan relationship, with Musharraf and President George W Bush publicly disagreeing last week over the hunt for Osama bin Laden.
Just days before the two met in Washington, Bush said in an interview last week he would send troops into Pakistan if he knew bin Laden were there, while Musharraf later said he would want Islamabad to be given the option to act first.
Musharraf’s references in his new book to Bush are mostly factual, with the only hint of criticism coming from the Pakistani leader saying Bush only knew the names of three Al-Qaeda leaders.
Musharraf personally called Bush in May 2005 to tell him that then Al-Qaeda number three Abu Faraj al-Libbi had been arrested in Pakistan.
“‘You’ve got Libbi?’ he exclaimed with excitement,” Musharraf writes.
“The one Al-Qaeda operative whose name Bush knew, apart from Osama bin Laden and Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri - the one man he had asked me to arrest if I could - was Abu Faraj al-Libbi,” Musharraf adds.
Pakistan’s role in the hunt for Osama bin Laden has come under increasing scrutiny in recent weeks, partly fuelled by suggestions the Al-Qaeda kingpin is hiding somewhere in the harsh mountainous region on the Pakistan-Afghan border.
There has also been concern about spats between Afghanistan and Pakistan over claims Taliban use Pakistani territory to launch attacks on NATO and Afghan troops.

http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/sep-2006/26/index3.php

 

[Jay_]

Musharraf backtracks on CIA claims

WASHINGTON: Backtracking on the claims made in his just-released memoirs, President Pervez Musharraf has said the American Central Intelligence Agency did not pay money to the Pakistan government for handing over al-Qaida suspects.

In an interview with a US television channel, Musharraf was read out a passage from his book In The Line of Fire that said, "Those who habitually accuse us of not doing enough in the war on terror should simply ask the CIA how much prize money it has paid to the government of Pakistan."

CNN pointed out to Gen Musharraf that it had broached the CIA with how much prize money it has paid to the government of Pakistan.On this the Pakistan President said, "You know, I don't know whether this is to the government of Pakistan. I don't think I wrote 'the government of Pakistan'."

But when pointed out that on Page 237 of his book he has in fact said this and asked if he wanted to revise the Pakistani President said, "Yes. I think that if it is written "government of Pakistan," yes," he said. "Certainly not the government, not the government... no, government of Pakistan hasn't received anything," he said.

On Iran, Musharraf argued that Pakistan's development of the bomb was based on a security perspective, that Iran did not face this situation and hence should not go forward in getting one.

"We developed it because of our security perspective, because of our threat perception. We don't believe that there should be any more nuclear proliferation. And we don't think that Iran suffers from a threat perception that we suffered" Musharraf said.

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It has already started, lets see how it goes

 

[Bull]

Mushraff looked like a acaged cat on CNN.He just wanted to get out of there and not at all comfrtable.

 

[Skeptic786]

Mushraff looked like a acaged cat on CNN.He just wanted to get out of there and not at all comfrtable.

which program is that ???? one with wolf blitzer or one with jonnathan mann?

i seen jonnathan mann one.....he lashed out at hamid karzai in that one.

 

[MastanKhan]

Hi,

There was nothing wrong with Musharraf. Publishers have been known to make mistakes. Musharraf's reaction was genuine and his surprise was true---it is not the first time that publishers make errors and not the last time either.

You can also read my comments on amazon.com 'in line of fire'. Boy do the indians want to have go at it and me.

 

[Bull]

which program is that ???? one with wolf blitzer or one with jonnathan mann?

i seen jonnathan mann one.....he lashed out at hamid karzai in that one.

Karzai is a whipping iy for Mushraff,Karzai is muhraffs saviour in all interviews.

The interview where he was asked abt the prize money and "whether the pres knew Osama needed dialasis to be alive",i think it ias Jonathan.

Did u see the comedy program that mushraff attended,that was hilarous.

 

[Skeptic786]

Karzai is a whipping iy for Mushraff,Karzai is muhraffs saviour in all interviews.

The interview where he was asked abt the prize money and "whether the pres knew Osama needed dialasis to be alive",i think it ias Jonathan.

Did u see the comedy program that mushraff attended,that was hilarous.

yes i did see mushy appearance on the daily show with jon stewart...it was good fun.

If anyone missed it....you can see it via the link Neo gave in another thread;

http://today.reuters.com/tv/videoCha...22cff145814db4



as far as him being like a caged cat in the interview with jonnathan mann...i will have to see it again to form an opinion...i didnot sit through it all first time round...i have it recorded on my satalite system and we'll see it again later on today.