On a day clouded by growing VP speculation, Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf has finally stepped down. With Iraq beginning to settle, foreign policy concerns will shift to Russia’s newfound aggression and the delicate state of Pakistan and its neighbor, Afghanistan.

This news comes at a time when the United States may need a Petraeus-esque surge to counter the advances of resurgent Taliban and Al-Qaeda factions in the border areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Despite our concerns about Iran, I continue to believe that Pakistan is the more menacing national security threat, ready at any moment to boil over. With a confirmed nuclear weapons stockpile and indisputable links to Al-Qaeda, Pakistan can now add widespread political instability to its long list of troubles.

Regardless of President Bush’s (too late in coming) attempts to veto lavish spending bills from Congress, I am fairly certain this type of foreign aid is neither fiscally responsible nor strategically wise. $227 million to Pakistan for repairs to F-16 fighter jets? I have a few squabbles with this expenditure:

• Has Musharraf and the Pakistani military adequately demonstrated that our aid is wisely spent?… NO:

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — After the United States has spent more than $5 billion in a largely failed effort to bolster the Pakistani military effort against Al Qaeda and the Taliban, some American officials now acknowledge that there were too few controls over the money. The strategy to improve the Pakistani military, they said, needs to be completely revamped.

In interviews in Islamabad and Washington, Bush administration and military officials said they believed that much of the American money was not making its way to frontline Pakistani units. Money has been diverted to help finance weapons systems designed to counter India, not Al Qaeda or the Taliban, the officials said, adding that the United States has paid tens of millions of dollars in inflated Pakistani reimbursement claims for fuel, ammunition and other costs.

• Who says some elements of Pakistan’s leadership and key Al-Qaeda figures are not cooperating? We have our suspicions:

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - The United States has accused members of Pakistan’s main spy agency of tipping off al Qaeda-linked militants before U.S. missile attacks on targets in Pakistani tribal lands, Pakistan’s defense minister said.

Defense Minister Ahmed Mukhtar openly acknowledged American mistrust of Pakistan’s main military spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), in remarks aired on Thursday on Pakistani television.

“They think that there are some elements in the ISI at some level that when the government of Pakistan is informed of targets, then leak it to them (militants) at some level,” Mukhtar told Geo in Washington, having accompanied Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on a maiden visit to the United States.

• If Gen. Petraeus’s success in Iraq taught us anything, handing Pakistan wads of cash for military jets is not the way to fight counterinsurgencies:

In January 2007, as part of his overhauled Iraq strategy, President George W. Bush announced that Petraeus would succeed Gen. George Casey as commanding general of MNF-I to lead all U.S. troops in Iraq. On January 23, the Senate Armed Services Committee held Petraeus’s nomination hearing, during which he testified on his ideas for Iraq, particularly the strategy underpinning the ” surge” of forces. During his opening statement, Petraeus stated that “security of the population, especially in Baghdad, and in partnership with the Iraqi Security Forces, will be the focus of the military effort.” He went on to state that security will require establishing a persistent presence, especially in Iraq’s most threatened neighborhoods. He also noted the critical importance of helping Iraq increase its governmental capacity, develop employment programs, and improve daily life for its citizens.

The struggle to secure and stabilize Pakistan is an issue I had the opportunity to study extensively last year during a freshman comparative politics course. In a term paper that discussed the future of Pakistani politics, I was not optimistic of the prospects for a bright future:

The lack of a united and determined political center has opened a power vacuum that military professionals and radical fundamentalists have come to control. The constant shift in governing bodies has not allowed for political stabilization. Both the center–left Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the center-right Pakistan Muslim League (PML) governed as the leading factions in the decade lasting from elections in 1988 to the military coup in 1999. The resulting military takeover and suppression of popular parties does not allow for the process of contestation to take hold. Contestation is the existence of legitimate competition for the voting electorate. Inclusion is the desired effect of contestation in which the majority of the adult population is able to vote. Ideally, the most stable political systems will see a gradual rise contestation and a resulting increase in inclusion.

A more realistic and attainable route for Pakistan’s political system is not the purifying process of democratization, but the modification and liberalization of its authoritarian establishment. Democratization replaces a regime not chosen in contested elections with a ruling government that represents the voting electorate. Liberalization occurs when an authoritarian regime loosens media restrictions, holds elections for offices with little clout, and increases personal freedoms to once suppressed political dissidents. These steps give the look of democratic progress without guaranteeing the electoral turnover of top autocrats and decision makers. Pakistan seems destined to go no further than the liberalization of their autocratic rule, since top officials are so allergic to democratic change and empowerment.

As 2007 and 2008 are the years we’ll remember as decisive in our victory in Iraq, let us hope and pray that 2009 and beyond will produce similar results in Afghanistan and Pakistan.