The Foreign Service Journal, February 2012

58 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 2 B O O K S are following orders. Similarly, after U.S. commandos killed Osama bin Laden last May, dis- trust between Islamabad and Wash- ington threatened to disrupt U.S. economic assistance programs and de- livery via Pakistani roads of materiel for U.S. forces in Afghanistan. President (and General) Pervez Musharraf’s decision to cast Pakistan’s lot with the U.S. after 9/11 revealed the underlying contradictions in ISI ma- nipulation of the militants. Schmidt recounts how jihadi groups, motivated by religious zeal, not Pakistani patriot- ism, turned on the government. They descended from the Waziristan moun- tains to threaten Islamabad, killed sev- eral thousand soldiers, terrorized the Shia and Ahmadi minorities, and al- most assassinated Musharraf. The Lashkar-i-Taiba group further flaunted its disdain for his government by mounting a 2008 terrorist assault in Mumbai that almost led to war. Schmidt rightly discounts some of the more neuralgic possible denoue- ments: another army coup, jihadi con- trol of the nuclear arsenal and ethnic or linguistic conflict (although he under- estimates Sindhi, Baluchi and Pushtun resentment of Punjabi hegemony). Even so, Pakistan remains the South Asian state with the greatest capacity to harmU.S. interests, while India, to the Pakistanis’ annoyance, offers the U.S. the greatest prospective benefits. Authoritative and valuable as Sch- midt’s analysis is, he does not attempt to delve into Pakistanis’ unresolved identity issues. So I recommend the insightful analysis in Bangladesh and Pakistan: Flirting with Failure in South Asia by Ambassador William Milam, who was his boss in Islamabad, as sup- plemental reading. That lacuna aside, I cannot recom- mend this book highly enough to any- one seeking insights into Pakistan’s complexity. Retired FSO Richard McKee served as a political officer in Karachi, Pakistan desk officer, and consul general in La- hore. He is a member of the Foreign Service Journal Editorial Board. Breaking Bad The Pirates of Somalia: Inside Their Hidden World Jay Bahadur, Pantheon Books, 2011, $26.95, hardcover, 320 pages. R EVIEWED BY D AVID D RINKARD How The Pirates of Somalia came to be a book is almost as fascinating as its subject matter. In 2009 Jay Ba- hadur, 24, had just graduated from col- lege and dreamed of becoming a journalist. But viewing the prospect of three years of journalism school as a “waste,” he quit his market research job to fly to Somalia. There he started to interview pirates, Somali govern- ment officials and former hostages. While fascinating, Bahadur’s first- hand account makes clear that there is nothing exotic or entertaining about piracy. In fact, it is all about the bot- tom line — yet it’s not a well-run busi- ness. Only profitable for a select few, it has accelerated Somalia’s long descent into poverty and anarchy, and in- creased demand for qat, a narcotic leaf, and Toyota trucks. What makes The Pirates of Somalia much more valuable than an extended blog entry is Bahadur’s in-depth history and analysis. As he explains, the pi- rates do not see themselves as brig- ands, but as “saviors of the sea.” And it is certainly true that Somali pirates started out trying to protect their tra- ditional fishing areas from foreign fish- ermen, who came equipped with artillery to steal catches from local fish- ermen. When those intruders began using fishing techniques that destroyed the reefs in the Puntland area of the coun- try, the Somalis struck back. Follow- ing the collapse of President Moham- med Siad Barre’s regime and his exile in 1991, Badahur notes, “The hodge- podge of rebel groups, militias and warlords that had inherited chunks of the Somali state began to arrest foreign fishing vessels and extort ‘fines’ for their release.” In 2003 Somali piracy underwent a metamorphosis when Mohamed Abdi Hassan, known as Afweney (“Big Mouth”), a former civil servant turned crime lord, became the first participant to realize the full potential of piracy as a business model. From 2003 to 2006, he and other pirates gradually accumu- lated capital and experience, continu- ally reinvesting their ransom money in ongoing operations. The situation deteriorated further in 2008, when the Puntland government ran out of money to pay its security forces. After that, Bahadur reports, “Many members of the police and army naturally sought alternative em- ployment, and there was hardly a more lucrative career than piracy for a young man possessing nothing but a gun and a desperate disregard for his own life.” In order to establish a rapport with his interviewees, Bahadur gave them qat, and even chewed the “flower of paradise” with them. That decision has led to understandable questions about his methods and integrity, but his analysis is spot on. My favorite chapter of the book is