Title: U.S. plans warm greeting for Musharraf
Author: Bill Nichols
Publication: USA Today
Date: Feb 10, 2002
URL: http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2002/02/11/musharraf-usat.htm

WASHINGTON — When Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf arrives here Tuesday, he'll be warmly saluted as the leader of a country that has become a key U.S. ally in the war against terrorism.

In his first Washington visit as president, Musharraf will receive praise from members of Congress. On Wednesday, he'll meet with President Bush. Think tanks have been jockeying to try to get him to make a personal appearance. Embassy aides are swamped by interview requests.

What a difference a few months makes. When the Bush administration took office last year, they viewed Musharraf, 58, as a questionable former general who took power in a 1999 military coup.

When Bush was running for president in 2000, he couldn't remember who the leader of Pakistan was. "The new Pakistani general, he's just been elected — not elected, this guy took over the office," Bush said.

On Sept. 11, all that changed. From the moment that U.S. officials concluded that Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda terrorist network were behind the terrorist attacks, Pakistan's help became crucial in any military operation against its neighbor, Afghanistan.

Musharraf, at great risk to the stability of own regime, responded with intelligence data and by allowing U.S. forces to operate on Pakistani soil. In return, U.S. Officials are not only praising him — they are touting his pledges to crack down on extremists and terrorists as a model for the Islamic world.

CIA Director George Tenet told Congress last week that the past five months have marked the most important turning point in Pakistan in two decades. Tenet said a Jan. 12 speech in which Musharraf outlined an "inclusive, tolerant and peace-oriented vision of the future" has energized "debate across the Muslim world about which vision of Islam is the right one for the future."

Musharraf's stock has rocketed within the inner circles of the administration. Washington has lifted virtually all of the sanctions placed on Pakistan after it conducted nuclear tests in 1998 as well as sending Islamabad roughly $1 billion in aid since the Sept. 11 attacks.

That new level of support is striking, not only because Musharraf was on the administration's bad side just a few months ago. Many senior officials also were not sure he would sign onto a war against the Taliban, a regime he often supported and helped create.

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, in a recent interview, said he felt it was "65-35" that Musharraf would comply to a list of demands Armitage gave to Pakxistani intelligence chief Mahmoud Ahmed just after the attacks.

"I had some confidence that he would take it, but I did think the demands were so onerous that we basically said ... leave the keys on the table," Armitage said.

Doubts about Musharraf's intentions have not vanished. U.S. Officials are not certain that Musharraf has decided which road to take in the future.

His speech last month was made only after enormous U.S. and British pressure urging him to try to defuse a dangerous crisis between India and Pakistan, in which the two nuclear neighbors had massed thousands of troops on their respective borders.

A Dec. 13 attack on the Indian Parliament by terrorists with ties to Pakistani-based groups prompted the tensions.

Musharraf vowed to end any government tolerance for terrorism or groups that use violent means to fight for an end to Indian control of part of the Himalayan region of Kashmir — a disputed territory that has prompted three wars between Pakistan and India in the past half-century.

That speech delighted U.S. Officials But they say they will use Musharraf's visit here to continue to urge him, both publically and privately, to take more concrete actions to move Pakistan toward becoming a more moderate society that will not tolerate internal terrorism or extremism.

The Bush administration continues to have concerns "about how far Musharraf's reforms will go," says Radha Kumar, a South Asia expert at the Council on Foreign Relations. "Over there, what we haven't yet seen is a step by step set of actions ... a concerted follow-up action."

There is also concern about the effect the kidnapping of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan last month will have on Musharraf's U.S. visit.

State Department officials initially praised Musharraf's assistance in looking for Pearl. But Musharraf's recent comments alleging that India might have played a role in Pearl's disappearance have deeply irritated U.S. Officials

Washington believes India had no role in Pearl's kidnapping and also worries that Musharraf's comments could re-ignite India-Pakistan tensions.

On relations between India and Pakistan, "It's important for the United States to tell Musharraf that this isn't a game," said David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Policy and a leading authority on Pakistan's nuclear program.

"I think he's done remarkable things. But I don't see it as finished by any means."