Bharat Rakshak

Tim

Acharya, Osirak was in 1981 - before the Kahuta rumors. Perkovich has some discussion on this, and on the apparent 1983-84 crisis. So do Hagerty and Ganguly in "Fearful Symmetry". Sum - In the early 1980s, India had very poor relations with Israel, and was working very hard to maintain goo...

Tim

Hibbs, according to Langewiesche, was the first person in the media to really zero in on AQ Khan. He's been reporting on the civilian nuclear energy sector for 25 years. Two other sources - one mentioned earlier in the thread (the Fitzpatrick monograph published by IISS) and Gordon Corera's book on ...

Tim

This may or may not be the best thread to ask this question, but... I'm trying to get a current ORBAT (including rough geographic locations) for the Pakistani Army. I know Ravi Rikhye used to keep one up online somewhere. Does anyone know if it's still up (and, more importantly, current)? Alternativ...

Tim

Ramana, As the one person on the forum I'm aware of who was at the Monterey conference, I can only give you my recollection. I do not believe the issue of Chiense troop movements was a prominent one - in fact, I don't remember it being mentioned at all, but it's been four years and my recollection c...

Tim

Cobra II by Michael Gordon and Gen. (rtd). Bernard Trainor is worth a read, for those interested in the Iraq War. Andrew Krepinevich recently had an interesting book review of it, that you can get through google.

Tim

On the jointness issue (since I teach it for a living), it's worth noting that this is absolutely not easy for anyone. The 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act was an effort by Congress to FORCE the US armed services to behave in a joint manner. 20 years later, it is still only partially implemented - althoug...

Tim

RayC, The issue of pulling troops off the CI grid is probably a key Pakistani motive for the Kargil operation. Most Pakistani accounts or explanations stress that the attack was intended to aid the forces inside Kashmir, but aren't necessarily clear on how that would occur. I strongly suspect that's...

Tim

Jagan,

Thanks - I had a feeling you had more accurate data.

Tim

Tim

More numbers - these are squadron estimates for the IAF in 1962 (source: Lorne Kavic's "India's Quest for Security: Defence Policies 1947-1965," which is still one of the best books on this period). Four Mystere sqadrons, two Gnat squadrons (fighters) Six Hunter squadrons, 2 Ouragan Ssquad...

Tim

Rangudu, I'm not sure if that's a pre or post 9/11 phenomenon, and I wouldn't define it as starkly as you do (go to any lengths). Without 9/11, as Sanjay asked, would AQK have the current level of political invulnerability? I simply don't know - I think you can make the argument either way. Pressure...

Tim

Sanjay M, I'm not sure anyone can answer it. There's some evidence that Western intelligence agencies either didn't take AQ Khan very seriously or were letting him run (for reasons that haven't been explained) in the 1990s. Without 9/11, it's hard to tell what was going to happen. US relations with ...

Tim

Relating to Jagan's posts, there were relatively contemporary accounts stating that the IAF lacked the logistics infrastructure to support operations for any length of time, particularly in the (then) top-of-the-line Hawker Hunter force. I can find the cites if anyone's interested, but Jagan probabl...

Tim

Unsolicited.

I guess I'm going to have to look that word up again. I thought it meant something slightly different.

Tim

Tim

Rye,

I guess our main difference is that I'm not sure Khan failed.

I'll have to track down more of the Iran story.

Tim

Tim

Rye, I was unaware Iran had returned all the technology it received from Pakistan. If that's the case, why is there a crisis? I think Iran has not returned the items in question. There are an awful ot of centrifuges and other nuclear enrichment equipment in question. Libya is a different matter. It ...

Tim

Rangudu,

Drop me an e-mail. I've lost yours.

Tim

Tim

Umrao, Other reasons for the second A-bomb (Nagasaki) - 1) Convince the Japanese that we could do this often, in an effort to get them to surrender (after all - months of firebombing, blockade, and carrier-based attacks on their home ports weren't working). This was a bluff, since the stockpile of b...

Tim

This may be of some interest - a chronology of AQ Khan's network based on public sources.

http://www.CarnegieEndowment.org/static ... nology.pdf.

Tim

Crosspost from Pakistani news thread. The article posted there about the purchase of the Perry class frigate appears to specifically state that the new cruise missile is not capable of being fired from a surface warship. If that's the case, it's almost certainly not ready for firing from a submarine...

Tim

I'm lurking most of the time, Umrao old friend.

I just hate to see this thread fall off the first page of the forum.

Tim

Tim

Vivek, I had never met Shireen before the conference. It was an interesting experience. I think if people read the chapters on Pakistan, they will differ significantly from the quasi-official line that Shireen put out a couple of years ago. There's still an awful lot of grey area that hasn't been re...

Tim

Umrao, I think that virtually every American analyst would identify Kargil as a fundamental "sea-change" in Indo-US relations, and a major turning point in the relationship that led directly to the Joint Vision Statement of 2000. I think almost any American or Pakistani analyst would ident...

Tim

up. Bad idea to let this one sink to the bottom.

Tim

Vivek A, I don't think many Indian Navy officers are graduates of the Naval Academy (in Annapolis). We do have a number of Indian Navy officers (and, this year, a Coast Guard officer) at the US Naval War College in Newport, RI (where I work) - usually between 2 and 5 per year. These are substantiall...

Tim

Arun, Think for a moment about what new initiatives took place in US relations with Pakistan between March and May. My own suspicion is that this will provide a substantial portion of the explanation for Pakistan's change of heart. I'm certain that is the argument that will be made by proponents of ...

Tim

up

Bad idea to let this thread lapse on the forum.

Tim

I was just so excited... :wink: Actually, I'm not sure what happened. My interface from my home computer is always a lot more interesting, and eccentric, than from work. I'm sure there's a good reason - I just have no idea what it is. Admins, feel free to delete two of the three messages. Posterity ...

Tim

Calvin, I wouldn't go that far. I do think that a capitalist system and market forces can sometimes help explain contradictions in national policy - in this case, Germany adhering staunchly to the NPT but simultaneously undermining it. Johann clearly knows more about German export controls than I do...

Tim

Alok N, That may be the system in the US today, but it's also important to remember that the US has some of the strictest export control restrictions in the world (which date, in part, to the German-Iranian-Pakistan F086 deal, among other debacles). There's an enormous tugging and hauling that goes ...

Tim

Ramana, I'm not sure that it was a government abetted effort in West Germany. The 1970s were a period of rapid German economic expansion, as well as one of loosening trade restrictions across the board (including the natural gas pipeline from Siberia). Germany was the most prolific source of technol...

Tim

Rangudu, By the standards of the international community, I think it's freaking out. 1) Pressure from a number of countries and the IAEA to get access to AQ Khan 2) Increased concern about what the heck is actually going on in Iran 3) The brutally muddled North Korea - Libya connection (for which th...

Tim

Gents, I'm not sure we're actually disagreeing that much. My point is that the Khan evidence suggests (very strongly, to my mind) that Pakistan has imported technology and is now capable of replicating it. They may not be able to move from, for example, the Khan network's reported 10 kt weapon to a ...

Tim

kgoan, I think it became a canard on May 28, 1998. I recognize that not everyone agrees with me. But certainly it became a canard in late October or early November 2003, as knowledge of the AQ Khan network leaked into the open sources. First off, I don't think anyone is arguing that Pakistan has a &...

Tim

Sunil, The stockpile figures ISIS is using are raw estimates of total material. I don't think they're making any assumptions at all about degradation. I'm also not sure they're right - as Ramana pointed out, there are questions about Pakistani Pu production, and evidence of North Korean transfers of...

Tim

Ramana, Maybe I missed something - I only skimmed this thread. Is there a reason to suspect that Pakistan is NOT building as many nuclear weapons as it can possibly manage, whether HEU or Pu or both? I've always operated under the assumption that they'd be trying to have the components available to ...

Tim

Rangudu,

Standard form - try to MIRV your op-eds and publications so they hit multiple targets

. Also, it's on a UPI byline, so it gets picked up by lots of different publications.

I'm sure it will have enormous impact here in the US. It's very persuasive.

Tim

Tim

Johann,

That was my read on it as well. It also is an indication of how well the DPRK uranium cycle may be working, which has implications for the DPRK nuclear stockpile.

Tim

Tim

From today: New York Times February 2, 2005 Pg. 1 Tests Said To Tie Deal On Uranium To North Korea By David E. Sanger and William J. Broad WASHINGTON, Feb. 1 - Scientific tests have led American intelligence agencies and government scientists to conclude with near certainty that North Korea sold pro...

Tim

If you liked Ghost Wars, read it in parallel with the 9/11 commission report. It's amazing what Coll was able to say a year before the official report came out.

Tim

Bharat Rakshak

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Re: Pakistan arms sales, ops, doctrine, etc

Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation: 10 May 2007

Re: Pakistan arms sales, ops, doctrine, etc