President-turned-Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who was, among other things, the father of Benazir Bhutto and leader of a country coming out of the losing end of a war with India, the loss of a region (Bangaladesh) and pulling itself out of one military dictatorship before falling into another in the later 70s.

Prime Minister Bhutto tried to establish a democratic form of government and did his level best to sell that idea to the rest of the world, including the U.S.

Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto: “If I may put it briefly, the Pakistan of today has little resemblance to the pre-1971 Pakistan. We call it a New Pakistan. Let me tell you why. Geographically it is no doubt a Pakistan reduced in size by the separation of its eastern part, but it is also far more cohesive and united. Far more confident of its future. Politically, it is a Pakistan which is determined to nurture democratic institutions. As you know, Pakistan was ruled by a military dictatorship for more than a decade. It is my country’s pride that, after twelve years of military rule, which inevitably devitalized our political life, we are firmly established civilian supremacy and a government accountable to the people.”

The attempt was short lived, as history has documented so well. But for those of you who think Pakistan's problems are a thing of recent vintage and that a country in a state of perpetual turmoil is something that happened since 2001, it just ain't so.