Democratic Palestine : 19 (ص 28)
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- Democratic Palestine : 19 (ص 28)
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crisis’ as stretching from Pakistan to
Turkey, the US has focused on drawing
Pakistan into its plans for extending its
own military presence in the Gulf and
Indian Ocean region. The Pakistani
regime has innumerable attributes
which qualify it as a main promoter of
the US imperialist plans: «Pakistan’s
military missions in 22 countries in the
Middle East and Africa make it the
largest exporter of military manpower
in the Third World (and especially to
the Gulf states’ armed forces). Its role
in the Gulf has a direct bearing on
Washington’s strategy in the region, on
the future security role of the Gulf
Cooperation Council and on Pakistan’s
own internal dynamic. Pakistan has
consistently placed among the top five
recipients of US military and economic
aid over the past three decades.»
Pakistan is also pivotal in the Reagan
Administration’s anti-communist cru-
sade. With the fall of the Shah, the US
lost direct access to the Soviet borders,
but now depends on Pakistan for access
to Afghanistan’s borders, in order to
arm the counterrevolutionaries fighting
the progressive government in Kabul.
«Washington would like to enhance the
agreement it has with Islamabad for
full access to all new Soviet weapons
captured by the rebels in Afghanistan.»
Pakistan also provides the US with
access to Iran’s borders. «Reliable
sources claim that at present Quetta,
the capital of Baluchistan province
(Pakistan), and Erzerum in eastern
Turkey have become the major listen-
ing posts and operational bases for
intelligence on Iran. Washington is
trying to rebuild its intelligence gather-
ing network in Iran before. Ayatollah
Khomeini dies.»
No less important, the US wants
Pakistan as a staging base for the Rapid
Deployment Force, called the Central
Command. Incentive for this has esca-
lated in line with the escalation of
Reagan’s war on ‘terrorism’, used as a
cover for the US’s extending its own
global military network. After the early
September highjacking in Karachi, the
media revealed that the US had made
an early decision to mobilize the Delta
force (the so-called anti-terrorist unit
stationed in North Carolina), but that it
was unable to arrive on time. The US
administration released these stories
partly to chide its western European
allies for not yet accepting Delta being
based on their territory, but also to
remind Pakistan that it could ‘benefit’
from more US military presence.
Crucial to all the imperialist plans are
Baluchistan and the North-West Fron-
tier Province, both bordering on Af-
ghanistan.Zia’s government is coopera-
ting with US projects for equipping
these remote areas with a military
infrastructure in the name of ‘deve-
lopment’. For Zia, this serves the pur-
pose of getting financial aid to lessen
the country’s economic woes, and
enacting a passification program
against the Baluchi people, whose
recurrent uprisings have threatened the
central government’s control. Balu-
chistan’s ports on the Arabian Sea are
ideal «for the pre-positioning of Cen-
tral Command’s roll-on/roll-off
ships,» according to US experts. (All
the above quotes are from Jamal
Rashid, «Pakistan and the Central
Command,» MERIP — Middle East
Report, no. 141, July-: August 1986.)
These plans show what is at stake if
Zia’s dictatorship were to be toppled.
While Benazir Bhutto has yet to articu-
late clear opposition to the US military
plans for her country, the Reagan
administration is unlikely to trust her to
collaborate so eagerly as does Zia’s
regime. Moreover, the US has good
reason to fear that continuation of
mass revolt against the dictatorship will
bring more radical forces to the fore. If
the mass struggle intensifies and the
leadership is radicalized, the US might
well be on the market for alternatives to
Zia, as it was forced to seek in other
places.
Police vs. the people in Pakistan
26
CHILE
General Pinochet’s pretense at libe-
ralization is just as transparent as Zia ul
Haq’s. On September 8th, the Chilean
dictator reimposed the state of siege
(which had been lifted for a bit over a
year), arrested opposition leaders and
closed a number of newspapers; five
citizens were abducted and later found
dead in the same number of days.
Again the regime can legally tap
phones, open mail, hold prisoners in
secret locations, ban public gatherings
and censor the press, without any pos-
sibility of judicial review of its arrest
and banishment orders.. All this
occurred after an attempt on Pinochet’s
life, but the real reason for reimposing
the state of siege is that the regime has
simply been unable to halt the opposi-
tion which has been steadily and visibly
mounting over the last three years, to
the point of raising concern in Wash-
ington D.C.
The latest state of siege is simply a
reinstitutionalization of ongoing pro-
cedures. A recent Amnesty Interna-
tional report noted that in the last few
years the regime has_ increasingly
reverted to the use of death squads and
mass arrests - its original hallmarks
which cost 30,000 Chilean lives. In
early May, security forces besieged
thirty different poor neighborhoods,
cutting off water, electricity, telephones
and gas, and detaining 15,000 people.
Such raids have been weekly fare ever
since. Also since the spring, soldiers are
daily patrolling the streets, their faces
blackened to avoid indentification as
they commit crimes against Chilean
citizens.
Despite this, protests have been
constant since March, uniting broader
and broader sectors of the population.
This was clearly seen on July 2nd and
3rd, in the first nation-wide general
strike since 1973, demanding
Pinochet’s immediate resignation and
the restoration of human and demo-
cratic rights. Added to this is the
increasing efficiency of attacks on the
regime’s forces carried out by the
Manuel Rodriquez Patriotic Front
(FPMR), formed in late 1983 by mem-
bers of the left parties, most signifi-
cantly the Communist Party of Chile
and MIR, as well as independents and
Christian patriots.
It is these factors which prompted the
Reagan Administration to discover the
human rights problem in Chile, gal-
lantly forgetting the CIA’s role in
fomenting Pinochet’s coup and tea-
ching his henchmen the ‘fine points’ of
torture. The US administration’s ‘con-
cern’ is part of a double-dealing tactic
to keep the Chilean masses from attai-
ning freedom from imperialist exploi-
tation. The initial idea is to get Pino-
chet to liberalize his rule just enough to
split, confuse and absorb the opposi-
tion. Failing in that, the US aims to
court a bourgeois alternative - or a new
general? - to ensure imperialist control
in a milder form if Pinochet is toppled. - هو جزء من
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