After trying for a year, and failing, to let tribal leaders deal with al-Qaeda and to negotiate with Islamist forces, a senior administration official contended, General Musharraf “learned you can’t appease these people, and they have to go after them. So there is room to be hopeful.”

But critics of the American policy say both General Musharraf and the Bush administration were slow to sense the gathering of new threats. Zalmay Khalilzad, the American ambassador to Afghanistan from 2003 to 2005, began warning senior administration officials that Pakistan had become the new sanctuary in 2004, according to a senior administration official. But some officials warned against placing too much pressure on Musharraf.

Help probe Karachi attack: Bhutto to US

KARACHI: Former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto made her first public appearance Sunday since narrowly escaping a suicide assassination attempt that killed 136 people and called for the US and Britain to help investigate the Karachi attack.