The Bhutto Dynasty: The Struggle for Power in Pakistan by Owen Bennett-Jones (review)

The Bhutto Dynasty is a scholarly attempt to write the history and politics of the Bhutto family in Pakistan. Unlike a book of history, it uses the specific lens of the good and bad fortunes of the Bhuttos to look at political developments in the country. Unlike a biography, however, this book covers a larger scope of time and scale than is usually covered by the story of a single political leader. For example, it casts its net across three generations of the Bhutto family and on the ebb and flow of their charismatic appeal. Similarly, it seeks to analyze the intricacies of civil-military relations. The basic tone of the book is more tragic than epic. It describes the Bhuttos' quest for power along with its cost, and their capacity for providing leadership along with their potential for creating controversy in the cases of both the father (Zulfikar 'Ali Bhutto) and the daughter (Benazir Bhutto). Author Owen Bennett-Jones describes the provincial politics of Sindh at the time of the family's ancestor, Sehto Bhutto, as defined by the trio of tribes, religious leaders, and landowners. Several generations later, the political stage among Sindhis presents the same dramatis personae. While describing the rise and fall of another ancestor, Doda Khan Bhutto, the author draws a picture of Muslim landowners' indebtedness to Hindu moneylenders. He also brings in the role of the British government in India as a shaper and maker of the landed elite and eventually the local political leadership. The author tends to challenge some of the findings of Zulfikar's biographer, Stanley Wolpert, for example about Shahnawaz Bhutto's role as champion of the cause of separation of Sindh in the 1930s.¹

Bennett-Jones has traced Zulfikar's "ascent" through his talent, political ambitions, legal practice, and connections with the higher echelons of the army. As President Muhammad Ayub Khan's foreign minister, he earned the profile of a pro-China hawk, a hard-liner on the Kashmir issue, and a selfserving public figure deeply imbued with sensitivity about the response of the crowd, especially after the Tashkent Agreement in 1966, which ended the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965. The author's narrative about Zulfikar in power reveals that: he was no leftist; he cherished great men in history, ranging from Alexander the Great to Napoleon Bonaparte, Otto von Bismarck, Vladimir Lenin, Benito Mussolini, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Gamal 'Abd al-Nasser; he was arrogant; he was surrounded by sycophants; he was haunted by the prospects of an army comeback; he controlled media; he sought to manage the "left" in his party; he tamed the bureaucracy; he compromised with clerics on the Islamic content of the 1973 constitution and, later, on the issue of declaring members of the Ahmadi community as infidels; and he picked a fight with the province of Balochistan. The story of Zulfikar's downfall revolves around his awkward relations with the army, be it sacking 43 top generals after taking over, removing General Gul Hassan Khan and Air Marshal 'Abdur Rahim Khan, establishing the paramilitary Federal Security Force (FSF), or co-opting the army's senior leadership in the protracted negotiations of the government with the oppositional Pakistan National Alliance (PNA) in 1977, which exposed his weakness.

Bennett-Jones has drawn a picture of the interregnum between the execution of Bhutto the father in 1979 and the rise of the daughter Benazir as prime minister in 1988. During this period, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leadership moved from Zulfikar to his widow, Nusrat, and then to Benazir. The latter got rid of the "old guard" at one end and the "left" at the other. These years saw the militant organization al-Zulfikar rise and fall, Benazir's triumphant return to Pakistan in 1986, and her marriage to Asif Zardari in 1987. The author has superbly analyzed Benazir's first terms in office (1988–90). In his...