Whodunnit from Hell: The Attack on Benazir Bhutto

By Aaron Mannes

This morning National Review Online ran my article on the suicide bombing attack on Benazir Bhutto.

October 23, 2007, 9:50 a.m.

The Bhutto Attacks
Cold comfort is the best we can hope for.

By Aaron Mannes

The question of who was behind Friday’s assassination attempt on Benazir Bhutto is the whodunit from hell and, instead of a pistol, the drawing room dénouement will feature Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.

Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s October 18 return from a decade of exile was bound to be a pivotal moment in Pakistani politics, and thus, also will likely to be a violent one. Frustrated with President Musharraf’s unending military dictatorship and stagnating living conditions, the people of Karachi turned out in huge numbers to greet Bhutto as their potential savior.

The attack, which struck as Bhutto’s convoy slowly made its way through the city of Karachi, did not injure Bhutto. It did, however, kill 140 people, half of whom were members of Bhutto’s security detail. So far details remain unclear, although security services claim to have identified the heads of two suicide bombers.

At the best of times Pakistan is a society with a penchant for conspiracy theories, and the circumstances of the attack can only fuel this speculation. The full article is posted here.

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