WASHINGTON – President Bush said Friday that if a U.S. official tried to strong-arm Pakistan into fighting the war on terror after the Sept. 11 attacks, he didn’t know about it.
Standing beside Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, Bush brushed off any idea of disagreement, praising Musharraf for pursuing terrorists, including Osama bin Laden.
“We’re on the hunt together,” Bush said after an Oval Office meeting with the general who is leader of the world’s second-largest Islamic nation.
Musharraf has contended that after the Sept. 11 attacks, then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told Pakistan’s intelligence director that the United States would bomb the country if it didn’t become a partner in the war against terrorism.
“The intelligence director told me that (Armitage) said, “Be prepared to go back to the Stone Age,’” Musharraf told CBS’ “60 Minutes” in a report to air on Sunday.
The president said he first learned of the purported conversation from news reports. “I just don’t know about it,” he said. “I guess I was taken aback by the harshness of the words.”
Musharraf declined to comment further, citing a book deal.
“Buy the book,” Bush quipped.
Armitage said he never threatened a military strike but did tell Pakistan firmly that “you are either for us or against us.”
Armitage, who met with Musharraf on Thursday, said concerning the bombing quote: “I was not authorized to say something like that. I did not say it.”
In Pakistan, Ameer ul-Azeem, a spokesman for the hard-line opposition Islamic coalition Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal, said Musharraf’s contention would anger Pakistani people who have long believed that they were forced “at gunpoint” into supporting the war on terror.
The Pakistani president later told students at The George Washington University that Pakistan “joined the war not so much for the world but for ourselves.”
He described his government as moderate and progressive and said, “I am the greatest believer in democracy.” Musharraf seized power in a 1999 coup.
Human rights activists are asking Bush to press Musharraf to restore civilian rule in Pakistan, end discrimination against women and stop using torture and arbitrary detention in counterterrorism operations.
Bush is playing the role of middle man between Pakistan and Afghanistan – two U.S. allies in the war on terror who accuse each other of not doing enough to crack down on extremism. Bush will follow his meeting with Musharraf with one next Tuesday with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Then the three will have a sit-down and working dinner at the White House on Wednesday.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
