More on Benazir Bhutto's assassination

More information is emerging with regard to what actually killed Benazir Bhutto. Yesterday, it was reported that she was shot in the neck and chest by various outlets, and I posted so as well here. Today, the Pakistani Interior Ministry has reported that former Prime Minister Bhutto died from a skull fracture, and not from bullet wounds as initially reported (the WAPO has a story today detailing wounds it now appears never happened). According to the Interior Ministry, the three shots fired at her missed their mark. The shock waves from the suicide bomber exploding knocked her back, as she tried to duck the shots and she hit her head against a lever attached to the sun-roof. The whole thing is strange, since the Prime Minister acknowledged that Bhutto's husband refused to allow an autopsy.

Additionally, the government has also released a transcript of a conversation between Baitullah Mehsud and another militant, where the former is heard boasting about the success of the mission.

According to the Interior Ministry, in addition to Bhutto, Sharif, "Fazlur Rehman, the leader of an Islamist opposition party; former Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, a close ally of President Pervez Musharraf; and former Interior Minister Aftab Sherpao," are also all under threat of militant attack.

In other news, caretaker Prime Minister Mohammadmian Soomro has indicated that elections will proceed as planned on January 8th.

It still remains to be seen whether President Musharraf will be able to weather this crisis or if his days are numbered. It seems as if he has either determined that postponing the elections, rather than help him find a new partner, would instead erode his legitimacy further or given the fact that Nawaz Sharif has indicated his party will boycott the elections, moving forward would leave Musharraf's party as the main beneficiary of the turmoil. That will likely not sit well with many Pakistanis, since Musharraf would seem to be benefiting from Bhutto's demise, and would likely add to speculation that he either had a hand in the assassination, or at the very least allowed it to occur through an opportune lapse in security. Such a move would also provide some leeway for him to claim that democracy had triumphed, even in the face of this terrorist attack. The international community, which has been calling for these elections, would be hard pressed to condemn the move because the elections would have proceeded as planned, and the boycott could be chalked up to a result of the attack, and not willful intent on the part of Musharraf and the military.

Moreover, the release of the transcript of Mehsud's conversation also raises questions as to how the Pakistani government got it so fast. If they were that efficient in tracking his phone calls after the fact, why didn't they get to him prior to the attack. There's a lot of anger in Pakistan right now, and these events are likely to add fuel to the fire. In some ways for Musharraf, he'd damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. Had they not released the transcript, or said that elections would be postponed, people would cast doubt on the "sham" investigation, or in the case of the election say that he was using the tragedy to retard the return to democracy, if Pakistan's system qualifies as such.

For now, everything is conjecture as there are too many unknowns in the air. Though, given recent trends, Bhutto's death does seem to benefit the general in such a way that he remains blameless; thereby consolidating his power (through boycotted elections) and easing some of the pressure being exerted on him by the international community (having had elections). The only thing that would change that is if a considerable portion of the Pakistani electorate followed Sharif, and if the PPP joined as well, in boycotting said election.

I'm not saying that Musharraf planned this, and still think it highly likely that al Qaeda or some of its offshoots were involved, but some of these reports are beginning to make me wonder.

Update

I just wanted to update this post to reflect the 6 week delay of parliamentary elections in Pakistan. It is interesting to note the many contradictory reports that emerged from Pakistan, following Bhutto's assassination. At first Sharif wanted everyone to boycott the election, now that they've been postponed he says that they should have gone through. I imagine that part of this is political posturing on his part. It will be interesting to see how Bhutto's son, Bilawal, fares in the upcoming contest, and whether any more politicians lose their lives in Pakistan in the run-up to the February 18 electoral contest, after all, Sharif was reportedly also on the list of targets, not just Bhutto. It will also be interesting to see whether the faction of the Pakistan Muslim League loyal to Musharraf will remain so if they lose a lot of ground against both Sharif's smaller Pakistan Muslim League faction, and Bhutto's PPP. There have been rumors in the US that it is planning to expand covert operations within Pakistan following the recent turmoil (h/t Soob). It remains to be seen whether Pakistan's military will cooperate and to what extent.