Messenger of Death does what he does best

In case you missed it with all of the Hugo Chavez excitement (smelling sulphur at the UN!  calling Bush the devil! shilling books for Noam Chomsky!) over the last few days, the President of Pakistan Pervez Musharraf has revealed that Armitage threatened to "bomb [Pakistan] back to the Stone Age," presumably if they didn't help with the war in Afghanistan. End result: Pakistan helped with the war nextdoor. Pakistan wasn't bombed (much). Sounds rather successful.


Musharraf says U.S. threatened to bomb Pakistan
(Reuters) Thu Sep 21, 2006 10:59 PM BST, Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss

NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan said that after the September 11 attacks the United States threatened to bomb his country if it did not cooperate with America's campaign against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Musharraf, in an interview with CBS news magazine show "60 Minutes" that will air on Sunday, said the threat came from Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and was given to Musharraf's intelligence director.

"The intelligence director told me that (Armitage) said, 'Be prepared to be bombed. Be prepared to go back to the Stone Age,'" Musharraf said. "I think it was a very rude remark."

Armitage was not immediately available to comment. A Bush administration official said there would be no comment on a "reported conversation between Mr. Armitage and a Pakistani official."

But the official said: "After 9/11, Pakistan made a strategic decision to join the war on terror and has since been

a steadfast partner in that effort. Pakistan's commitment to this important endeavour has not wavered and our partnership has widened as a result."

Musharraf is now in Washington and is due to meet President George W. Bush in the White House on Friday.

The Pakistani leader, whose remarks were distributed to the media by CBS, said he reacted to the threat in a responsible way. "One has to think and take actions in the interest of the nation, and that's what I did," Musharraf said.