Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

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Kuttan
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

ramana: Thanks. I agree with most of that timeline, except for the "proximate security" part.

It is my firm belief that the notion of American soldiers standing guard over Paki nuclear weapons inside a Paki military base is inconsistent with what American commanders would do. Its just WAY too dangerous, because when someone decides to use nukes, killing a few American soldiers will pose no conscience problems to them - even if it costs an entire battalion of Pakis to knock over the Americans.

All the Carrier Task Forces 600 miles away are not going to do any good under this situation. The nuke will be grabbed and used before anyone can do anything about it.

IMHO, no American commander would risk this, when its so easy, once you have enough temporary control to keep Pakis away from the weapons, to fly the warheads out to a carrier with a heavy fighter escort.

Of course there may be scary-looking Americans duly standing guard over locked concrete bunkers with big nuke hazard symbols at Jacobabad and Sargodha and Kahuta - but I think those bunkers contain painted shell casings - with maybe concrete warheads inside. Perhaps even a couple of grams of radioactive stuff inside to keep the Geiger counter-wielding ISI snoops happy.

Just stands to reason.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Prateek »

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/US/01/06/pakistan.korea.nukes/

Officials: Pakistan aided Libya nuke program
Wednesday, January 7, 2004 Posted: 0037 GMT ( 8:37 AM HKT)


Musharraf has promised to tighten control over Pakistani nuclear scientists.


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Libya obtained key nuclear weapons technology and assistance from Pakistan, including critical centrifuge technology, U.S. officials have told CNN.

But two Bush administration officials told CNN on Tuesday that so far the U.S. had not seen any evidence that Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf was aware of the Libyan connection. :mad: :whine:
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by shiv »

cross post
http://www.satribune.com/archives/jan4_10_04/P1_nyt.htm
Issue No 73, January 4-10, 2004 | ISSN:1684-2057 |

A Revealing New New York Times Report

Is the Trail of Nuclear Transfers to Rogue Nations Leading towards Pakistan

By David E. Sanger & William J. Broad

THE PAKISTANI leaders who denied for years that scientists at the country's secret A. Q. Khan Research Laboratories were peddling advanced nuclear technology must have been averting their eyes from a most conspicuous piece of evidence: the laboratory's own sales brochure, quietly circulated to aspiring nuclear weapons states and a network of nuclear middlemen around the world.

The cover bears an official-looking seal that says "Government of Pakistan" and a photograph of the father of the Pakistani bomb, Abdul Qadeer Khan. It promotes components that were spinoffs from Pakistan's three-decade-long project to build a nuclear stockpile of enriched uranium, set in a drawing that bears a striking resemblance to a mushroom cloud.

In other nations, such sales would be strictly controlled. But Pakistan has always played by its own rules.

As investigators unravel the mysteries of the North Korean, Iranian and now the Libyan nuclear projects, Pakistan - and those it empowered with knowledge and technology they are now selling on their own - has emerged as the intellectual and trading hub of a loose network of hidden nuclear proliferators.

That network is global, stretching from Germany to Dubai and from China to South Asia, and involves many middlemen and suppliers. But what is striking about a string of recent disclosures, experts say, is how many roads appear ultimately to lead back to the Khan Research Laboratories in Kahuta, where Pakistan's own bomb was developed.

In 2002 the United States was surprised to discover how North Korea had turned to the Khan laboratory for an alternative way to manufacture nuclear fuel, after the reactors and reprocessing facilities it had relied on for years were "frozen" under a now shattered agreement with the Clinton administration. Last year, international inspectors and Western intelligence agencies were surprised again, this time by the central role Pakistan played in the initial technology that enabled Iran to pursue a secret uranium enrichment program for 18 years.

The sources of Libya's enrichment program are still under investigation, but those who have had an early glance say they see "interconnections" with both Pakistan and Iran's programs - and Libyan financial support for the Pakistani program that stretches back three decades.

Until two weeks ago, Pakistani officials had long denied that any nuclear technology was transferred from their laboratories. But now that story has begun to change, after the Pakistani authorities, under pressure, began interrogating scientists from the laboratory about their assistance to other nuclear aspirants. Two weeks ago, Dr. Khan himself was called in for what appears to have been a respectful, and still inconclusive, questioning.

Responding to requests relayed through associates, Dr. Khan has recently denied that he aided atomic hopefuls. But American and European officials note that in the 1980's he repeatedly denied that Pakistan was at work on an atomic bomb, which it finally tested in 1998.

While American intelligence officials have gathered details on the activities of the creator of the Pakistani bomb and his compatriots for decades, four successive American presidents have dealt with the issue extremely delicately, turning modest sanctions against Pakistan on and off, for fear of destabilizing the country when it was needed to counter the Soviets in the 1980's, much as it is needed to battle terrorism today.

President Bush, who regularly talks about nuclear dangers, has never mentioned Pakistan's laboratories or their proliferation in public - probably out of concern of destabilizing President Pervez Musharraf, who has survived two assassination attempts in December.

"He's been a stand-up guy when it comes to dealing with the terrorists," Mr. Bush said of General Musharraf on Thursday. "We are making progress against Al Qaeda because of his cooperation." He dismissed a question about the vulnerability of Pakistan's own nuclear weapons, saying, "Yes, they are secure," then changed the subject.

Yet when President Bush talks about the horrors that could unfold if a nuclear weapon fell into the hands of terrorists, it is Pakistan's combustible mix of expertise, components, fuel and fully assembled weapons that springs to the minds of American and European intelligence experts. In public, the White House says it has received "assurances" from Pakistan that if there ever were nuclear exports they are finished.

"There is this almost empty-headed recitation of assurances that whatever Pakistan did in the past it's over, it's no longer a problem," said one senior European diplomat with access to much of the intelligence about proliferation. "But there's is no evidence that it has ever stopped."

Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations organization charged with monitoring nuclear energy worldwide, contends that the recent nuclear disclosures show that the system put in place at the height of the cold war to contain nuclear weapons technology has ruptured and can no longer control the new nuclear trade.

"The information is now all over the place, and that's what makes it more dangerous than in the 1960's," Dr. ElBaradei said.

The Crucial Ingredient

The biggest hurdle in making a nuclear weapon is not designing the warhead, but getting the right fuel to create an atomic explosion. One route is to extract plutonium from nuclear reactors and reprocess it to produce more fuel, known as creating a fuel cycle. The other is to extract uranium from the ground and enrich it.

The 1970 treaty on the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons was devised to control which countries could possess and pursue nuclear arms. It allowed the United States, Britain, France, the Soviet Union and China to keep all their weapons but required all other signatories to forswear nuclear arms. North Korea, Iran and Libya all signed, allowing I.A.E.A. inspectors limited visits to verify that countries producing nuclear fuel were truly using "atoms for peace." Pakistan and India never signed, nor did Israel.

Aside from inspections, spy satellites and airborne "sniffers" can usually pick out the huge complexes needed to extract spent fuel from nuclear reactors and turn it into bomb fuel. But after North Korea was caught cheating by the United States in the early 1990's and was forced into an agreement to "freeze" its reactor-and-reprocessing complex at Yongbyon, the lesson was clear: to produce bomb fuel, countries needed to take a more surreptitious route.

Uranium enrichment was the most promising, because it could take place in hidden facilities, emitting few traces. And that was the technology that Dr. Khan perfected as his laboratory raced to produce a nuclear bomb to keep up with its rival, India.

The key to the technology is the development of centrifuges. These hollow tubes spin fast to separate a gaseous form of natural uranium into U-238, a heavy isotope, and U-235, a light one. The rare U-235 isotope is the holy grail: it can easily split in two, releasing bursts of nuclear energy.

But making centrifuges is no easy trick. The rotors of centrifuges, spinning at the speed of sound or faster, must be very strong and perfectly balanced or they fly apart catastrophically.

To produce bomb-grade fuel, uranium must pass through hundreds or thousands of centrifuges linked in a cascade, until impurities are spun away and what remains is mainly U-235 . The result is known as highly enriched uranium.

Dr. Khan returned to Pakistan in 1976 after working in the Netherlands, carrying extremely secret centrifuge designs - a Dutch one that featured an aluminum rotor, and a German one made of maraging steel, a superhard alloy. He was charged with stealing the designs from a European consortium where he worked.

"The designs for the machines," said a secret State Department memo at the time, "were stolen by a Pakistani national."

The steel rotor in the German design turned out to be particularly difficult to make, but it could spin twice as fast, meaning it produced more fuel.

Dr. Khan's accomplishments turned him into a national hero. In 1981, as a tribute, the president of Pakistan, Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq, renamed the enrichment plant the A. Q. Khan Research Laboratories.

Dr. Khan, a fervent nationalist, has condemned the system that limits legal nuclear knowledge to the five major nuclear powers, or that has ignored Israel's nuclear weapon while focusing on the fear of an Islamic bomb. "All Western countries," he was once quoted as saying, "are not only the enemies of Pakistan but in fact of Islam."

In the years before Pakistan's first test in 1998, Dr. Khan and his team began publishing papers in the global scientific literature on how to make and test its uranium centrifuges. In the West, these publications would have been classified secret or top secret.

But Dr. Khan made no secret of his motive: he boasted in print of circumventing the restrictions of the Western nuclear powers, declaring in a 1987 paper that he sought to pierce "the clouds of the so-called secrecy." Papers in 1987 and 1988 detailed how to take the next, difficult steps in the construction of centrifuges - reaching beyond first-generation aluminum rotors to produce more efficient centrifuges out of maraging steel.

David Albright, a former weapons inspector for the I.A.E.A, said the American intelligence community viewed Dr. Khan's papers as a boast. They proved that Pakistan "knew how to build the G-2," a particularly complex design of German origin.

A 1991 paper by his colleagues at the laboratory gave more details away, revealing how to etch special grooves on a centrifuge's bottom bearing, a crucial part for aiding the flow of lubricants in machines spinning at blindingly fast speeds.

A Pentagon program that tracks foreign scientific publications has uncovered dozens of reports, scientific papers and conference proceedings on uranium enrichment that Dr. Khan and his colleagues published. While federal and private experts agree that the blitz left much confidential - including some crucial dimensions, ingredients, manufacturing tricks and design secrets - Pakistan was clearly proclaiming that it had mastered the black art.

"It was a signal to India and the West saying, `Look, we're not the backward people you think we are,' " said Mark Gorwitz, a nonproliferation expert who tracks the Pakistani literature.

The scientific papers were soon followed by sales brochures. Much of the gear marketed by the Khan laboratory was critical for anyone eager to make Dr. Khan's kind of centrifuges. It included vacuum devices that attached to a centrifuge casing and sucked out virtually all the air, reducing friction around the spinning rotors.

In 2000, the Pakistani government ran its own advertisement announcing procedures for commercial exports of many types of nuclear gear, including gas centrifuges and their parts, according to a Congressional Research Service report published in May. Many of the items, it noted, "would be useful in a nuclear weapons program."

Former American intelligence and nonproliferation experts said the CIA was aware of some, but not all, of these activities, and began tracking scientists at the Khan laboratory.

But at every turn, overt pressure was weighed against strategic interests. In the 1980's, Washington viewed Pakistan as a critical ally in the covert war it was waging against the Soviets in Afghanistan. By 1986, American intelligence agencies concluded that Pakistan had succeeded in making weapon-grade uranium, the sure sign that the centrifuges worked. But that same year, Mr. Reagan announced an aid package to Pakistan of more than $4 billion.

The First Nuclear Deals

What American intelligence agencies apparently did not understand at the time was the pace at which Dr. Khan's team was beginning to help other nations.

It started as a quid pro quo with an old patron: China. A declassified State Department memo, obtained by the National Security Archive in Washington, concluded that China, sometime after its first bomb tests in the mid-1960's, had provided Pakistan technology for "fissile material production and possibly also nuclear device design."

Years later, the flow reversed. Mr. Albright, who is the president of the Institute for Science and International Security, an arms control group in Washington, has concluded that China was an early recipient of Pakistan's designs for centrifuges. China had used an antiquated, expensive process for enriching uranium, and the technology Dr. Khan held promised a faster, cheaper, more efficient path to bomb-making.

But that was just the start. Evidence uncovered in recent months shows that around 1987 Pakistan struck a deal with Iran, which had tried unsuccessfully to master enrichment technology on its own during its war with Iraq. The outlines of the deal - pieced together from limited inspections and documents turned over to the I.A.E.A. in October - show that a centrifuge of Pakistani design finally solved Iran's technological problems. That deal was "a tremendous boost," Mr. Albright and his colleague, Corey Hinderstein, said in a draft report on the Iranian program. "The possession of detailed designs could allow Iran to skip many difficult research steps," they added.

The Iranian documents turned over to the I.A.E.A. make no reference to Pakistan itself; they only point to its signature technologies.

"We have middlemen and suspicions," said a Western diplomat with access to the documents. "There is a Pakistani tie for sure, but we don't know the details."

Iran's program fooled the I.A.E.A., which caught no whiff of it during 18 years of inspections. But Pakistan's role was also well hidden from American intelligence agencies.

"We had some intelligence successes with Iran, we knew about some of their enrichment efforts," said Gary Samore, who headed up nonproliferation efforts in the Clinton administration's National Security Council. "What we didn't know was the Pakistan connection - that was a surprise. And the extent of Pakistan's ties was, in retrospect, the surprise of the 1990's."

The Iranians were hardly satisfied customers. They had gotten Pakistan's older models and were forced to slog ahead slowly for two decades, foraging around the world for parts, building experimental facilities involving a few hundred centrifuges, but apparently failing to produce enough fissile material for a bomb.

If the Iranians were the turtle, the North Koreans proved the hare. Around 1997, a decade after the Pakistani deal with Iran, Dr. Khan made inroads with the government of Kim Jong Il, as it sought a way to make nuclear fuel away from the Yongbyon plant and the prying eyes of American satellites. Dr. Khan began traveling to North Korea, visiting 13 times, American intelligence officials said.

During those visits, North Korea offered to exchange centrifuge technology for North Korean missile technology, enabling Pakistan to extend the reach of its nuclear weapons across India.

Again, American intelligence agencies missed many of the signals. They knew of an experimental program, but it took evidence from South Korea to demonstrate that North Korea was moving toward industrial-level production. Then in the summer of 2001, American spy satellites spotted missile parts being loaded into a Pakistani cargo plane near Pyongyang, the North Korean capital. The parts were assumed to be the quid pro quo for the nuclear technology.

Last spring, a few months after the deal was revealed in The New York Times, the State Department announced some sanctions against the Khan laboratory but cited the illegal missile transactions. The State Department said it had insufficient evidence to issue sanctions for a nuclear transfer, a move some dissenting officials suspected was a concession to avoid embarrassing General Musharraf, who had denied that any nuclear transfers ever occurred.

A Congressional report on the Pakistan-North Korea trade notes that over the years "Pakistan has been sanctioned in what some observers deem, an `on again, off again' fashion," mostly for importing technology for unconventional weapons, and later for its 1998 nuclear tests. Those sanctions, which were also issued against India, were waived shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, when the United States suddenly needed Pakistan's cooperation.

It is unclear whether the Pakistan-North Korea connection has been cut off. But new evidence suggests that North Korea is still racing ahead. In April, a ship carrying a large cargo of superstrong aluminum tubing was stopped in the Suez Canal after the German authorities determined that it was destined for North Korea. The precise size of the tubes, according to Western diplomats and industry reports, suggested that they were intended for making the outer casings of G-2 centrifuges, the kind whose rotors are made of steel, and that Dr. Khan wrote about.

The CIA estimates that by 2005, if unchecked, North Korea will begin large-scale production of enriched uranium.

But so far, American intelligence agencies say they are uncertain where North Korea's centrifuge operations are. On Friday, North Korea said it would allow a delegation of American experts into the country this week.

Halting Nuclear Trades

Early in 2003, Mr. Bush established a coordinating group inside the White House to oversee the interception of shipments of unconventional weapons around the world. So far, Washington has drawn more than a dozen nations into a loose posse to track and stop shipments, and Germany, Italy, Taiwan and Japan have executed seizures.

But the first interceptions - and the trail of parts and agreements they reveal - have only pointed to the mushrooming size of the secondary market in parts.

Even more worrisome are the kinds of exchanges that do not move on ships and planes, what Ashton B. Carter, who worked in the Clinton administration on North Korean issues, calls "substantial technical cooperation among all members of the brotherhood of rogues."

North Korean engineers have been sighted living in Iran, ostensibly to help the country build medium- and long-range missiles. But the growing suspicion is that the relationship has now expanded beyond missiles, and that the two nations are warily dealing in the nuclear arena as well.

"We're debating the evidence," said one administration official.

The latest nuclear disclosures came after the United States spotted a German-registered ship headed for Libya through the Suez Canal, with thousands of parts for uranium centrifuges. The interception in October of that shipment, American officials say, tipped the balance for the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, forcing him to agree in December to disclose and dismantle his own nuclear program.

Inspectors are still investigating where Libya's components came from, focusing on manufacturers in Europe and what Dr. ElBaradei calls "interconnections" between the Libyan program and Iran's.

The intercepted shipment came from Dubai, a place of great importance in Dr. Khan's secretive world. It was a Dubai middleman claiming to represent Dr. Khan who in 1990, on the eve of the Persian Gulf war, offered Dr. Khan's aid to Iraq in building an atom bomb. And it was a Dubai middleman whom Dr. Khan blamed for supplying centrifuge parts to Iran, said a European confidante of Dr. Khan's who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Ties between Libya and Pakistan go back years. In 1973, when Pakistan was just starting its nuclear program, Libya signed a deal to help finance its atomic efforts in exchange for knowledge about how to make nuclear fuel, said Leonard S. Spector of the Monterey Institute of International Studies' Center for Nonproliferation Studies. From 1978 to 1980, he added, Libya appears to have supplied Pakistan with uranium ore. But Libya appears to have made much less progress than the Iranians had.

Dr. ElBaradei estimates that 35 to 40 nations now have the knowledge to build an atomic weapon. In place of the nonproliferation treaty, which he calls obsolete, he proposes revising the world's system to place any facilities that can manufacture fissile material under multinational control.

"Unless you are able to control the actual acquisition of weapon-usable material, you are not able to control proliferation," he said in recent interview. But Mr. Bush and the leaders of the other established nuclear states are reluctant to renegotiate a stronger treaty because it will reopen the question of why some states are permitted to hold nuclear weapons and others are not.

For now the world is left watching a terrifying race - one that pits scientists, middlemen and extremists against Western powers trying to intercept, shipload by shipload, the technology as it spreads through the clandestine network. Mr. Bush remains wary of cracking down on a fragile Pakistan, for fear pressure could tip the situation toward the radicals.

Some in the administration say they think other nations may follow Libya's calculations and abandon their programs voluntarily. But there are doubters.

"Its a fine theory," a top nonproliferation strategist in the administration said recently. "The question for 2004 is whether the mullahs or Kim Jong Il buy into it."

David Rohde contributed reporting from Pakistan for this article.

Copyright © 2003 South Asia Tribune Publications, L.L.C. All rights reserved.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Amber G. »

Powell uvach:
"I don't have enough information at hand to answer a question quite as specific as that. We know that there have been cases where individuals in Pakistan have worked in these areas and we have called it to the attention of the Pakistanis in the past."
when Sheik Rashid Ahmed told the agency.
"This is total madness, The report is absolutely false, and there is no truth in it."
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/07/international/asia/07REAX.html
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by kgoan »

BTW: For all the "shock-horror" tripe in the west about the Libyan connection, check out what Seymour Hersh said back in Feb 2003 in an NPR interview.
SY HERSH: Absolutely. But you know, let me give you another-- theory. Why do you think Pakistan has only helped North Korea with nuclear weapons? Why haven't they helped other countries?

JANE WALLACE: I don't know why.

SY HERSH: Well, the answer is, they probably have. They're interested in spreading it to the Third World. How much control does Musharraf have?

JANE WALLACE: Do you have any evidence?

SY HERSH: No, no. I'm just telling you-- heuristically, I'm just telling you-- I'm telling what I-- my instinct tells me that in a perfect world, if our editor of the world's newspaper, I would-- I would want to look at our-- is Pakistan-- I'd look at Pakistan and Iran, look at Pakistan and-- and Indonesia. Look at Pakistan even and Lebanon. There's a lot of ties that I'm interested in. Are they gonna be spreading nuclear technology into the Muslim world above and beyond their own country?
From: http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_hersh.html
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Sam »

kgoan: BTW: For all the "shock-horror" tripe in the west about the Libyan connection, check out what Seymour Hersh said back in Feb 2003 in an NPR interview.
SY HERSH: Are they gonna be spreading nuclear technology into the Muslim world above and beyond their own country?
From: http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_hersh.html
This hints of Pakistan attempting to wage a war of civilizations (if Islamic nations can be called one) using nukes.

Questions

Will Pakistan stop proliferation any time soon? For them it is an addiction which cannot be easily shaken off.

Since setting up nuke fuel reprocessing plants with centrifuges etc. is too risky and can be easily detected, will Pakistan resort to selling some sort of CKD nukes? Nukes that can be smuggled in bits and pieces and assembled on site?

I know previous question is not as simple as it sounds but how to stop Pakistan from even attempting such things? Their desperation knows no bound.

Why is China the original proliferator to Pakistan so silent?
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Rangudu »

Heh Heh.

I found an interesting report on the 2000 story on Paki govt advertising sale of nuclear components.

Pakistan to sell nuclear material
The military regime in Pakistan is to allow the export of radioactive material and equipment for nuclear reactors, in apparent breach of recently drafted guidelines.
The news surprised and confused US officials, who said it appeared to undermine much of the recent progress made in talks on introducing greater controls on nuclear materials.

In a full-page newspaper advertisement the Pakistani commerce ministry has published an application form for the export of 11 radioactive substances, including depleted uranium, enriched uranium, plutonium and tritium, and 17 types of equipment, including nuclear power reactors, nuclear research reactors and reactor control systems.

It is the first time Pakistan has openly authorised the sale of nuclear materials since it became the world's newest acknowledged nuclear power in May 1998, when it conducted six bomb tests in direct response to tests in India.

Would-be exporters, who have to pay up to £1,400 in application fees, must declare that the sale is for peaceful purposes only and the material will not be re-exported.

They must reveal the source of the material or equipment, supply an end-user certificate, and obtain a "no-objection certificate" from the government. Although almost all nuclear material is held by the government, there are some private contractors.

"This is a fulfilment of our commitment to transparency," Javed Jabbar, the information minister, said yesterday. "There is absolutely no scope left for any kind of misuse or pilferage or illegal export of any substance. We are doing it only in order to be a good nuclear citizen."

He said Pakistan had exported no nuclear material in the past and had no immediate plans for exports now.

Ishfaq Ahmed, the head of the Pakistani atomic energy commission, said the export of fissionable material, including enriched uranium and plu tonium, was banned but other nuclear material exports would be considered. His statement contradicted the advertisment's suggestion that enriched uranium and plutonium could be exported.

"We made a commitment to the international community that we would put in a place a system to exercise controls on nuclear exports and that is what this is," he said.

A US state department official said: "This is not exactly what the US had in mind when we talked to them about nuclear controls." :cool: , said. "It shows we have enough material to maintain our low-level nuclear deterrence and so much in surplus that we can sell it in the open market. It is a respectable way of earning money." [/b]
Ain't Google wonderful?
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by ramana »

Mohan Raju, Yes China proliferated nuke technology way back in the 70s. It was probably for the centrifuge technology freshly purloined by AQK and it was before the Soviet incrusion into Afghanistan. It also proliferated missile delivery systems post 1988 ie end of Cold War. What can one say thats their modus operandi. I have a fairly good hunch that two of the A's that rule TSP got together and got rid of ZAB for this.

Sam, TSP stuff isnt any good. Thats why the Chinese had to provide real patakas in 1998. And it is these that are coralled etc. Whats loose is the centrifuge technology and its bye products.

One thing remarkable is that even if its Chinese design and European technology the components/hardware and dealers are German. If scratch a TSP proliferation episode one finds German gnomes at work.
And early on there was lot of US components leaked via Canada.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

Ain't Google wonderful?
Ranguduji, thanks agan. THAT's the first of the articles I remember. Now there's a follow-up to that about a week later. It says that the Govt. hurriedly withdrew the ad claiming it was all some error. That's even funnier - obvious result of some Amirtharaj soccer practice on mushtush.

OK, now there are at least 3 newspaper articles documenting the deliberate, advertised policy by the Pakistani dictatorship of Pervaiz Musharraf to proliferate nuclear technology.

Remember, in 2000 there was no Jamali govt. etc.

Also, Mush is on record multiple times (I had the early references in the TSP911 paper) saying that the ISI is an arm of the GOTSP, and definitely does NOT act without Govt. (meaning HIS) authorization.

Enough fodder to ask why the GOTUS claims there is no evidence to tie Mushtush to these sales?
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

Unlike Ranguduji here, my letters never get read except here. :whine: so here it is

Dear Editors:

NukeHawkistan or Pinocchiostan?

Mr. Javed Akhtar of the Pakistani High Commission asks (6 January): "who can believe that Pakistan.. would publish a brochure to sell nuclear technology..?"

Well, for starters, try those who read reports in top newspapers in 2000, announcing Pakistani government advertisements for such components and materials.

From DAWN of Karachi, July 24, 2000 http://www.dawn.com/2000/07/24/latest.htm

"..An advertisement placed by the Ministry of Commerce in newspapers said prospective exporters would need a "no objection certificate" from the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission in order to export specified nuclear substances and equipment.

The ad listed nuclear substances as: natural uranium, depleted uranium, enriched uranium, thorium, plutonium, ..."

2. http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,349793,00.html
Pakistan to sell nuclear material

Thursday, August 3, 2000. Filed by Rory McCarthy in Islamabd and Julian Borger in Philadelphia

Excerpt: "It is the first time Pakistan has openly authorised the sale of nuclear materials since it became the world's newest acknowledged nuclear power in May 1998 ..
Would-be exporters, who have to pay up to £1,400 in application fees, must declare that the sale is for peaceful purposes only and the material will not be re-exported. "

My question to Mr. Akhtar: Who will believe that Pakistani diplomats are ignorant of such reports when they write letters to newspapers?

Best regards

>....
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

The above illustrates a home truth.

We spend so much time jumping up and down in frustration that GOTUS policy has turned pro-Mush since 9/11. This ignores what is made obvious above.

GOTUS has known all along about the TSP role in blatant proliferation of nukes to countries like NoKo, KSA, and now Libya. TSP was so arrogant about this that they even published a brochure and advertised the procedure to streamline such sales - in 2000.

If it weren't for 9/11, these things would NOT EVEN HAVE caught the attention of the US mainstream media.

IOW, what we should wonder is that DESPITE 9/11, there has neen little change in GOTUS / SD carte blanche to TSP, ISI, Dictator etc.

This speaks of institutionalized obstruction of policy, rather than any deliberation. A far cry from such theories as "blackmail".
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by jrjrao »

Hmmm.... wonder what the US govt. thought could have been The Source of "dirty" in these dirty bombs. Washington Post reveals today:


'Dirty Bomb' Was Major New Year's Worry
With huge New Year's Eve celebrations and college football bowl games only days away, the U.S. government last month dispatched scores of casually dressed nuclear scientists with sophisticated radiation detection equipment hidden in briefcases and golf bags to scour five major U.S. cities for radiological, or "dirty," bombs, according to officials involved in the emergency effort.

The new details of the government's search for a dirty bomb help explain why officials have used dire terms to describe the reasons for the nation's fifth "code orange" alert, issued on Dec. 21 ....

Even now, hundreds of nuclear and bioweapons scientists remain on high alert at several military bases around the country, ready to fly to any trouble spot. Pharmaceutical stockpiles for responding to biological attacks are on transportable trucks at key U.S. military bases.


Officials said one of their key challenges is determining whether al Qaeda is planting provocative but false clues as a diversion or as deliberate disinformation to test the U.S. response.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by arun »

Secretary Powell, in two different places on the issue of Pakistani proliferation in this link.

First Part :


QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, given the importance of Pakistan to the United States in the war against terror, is there a reluctance on the part of the Administration to pursue all leads as to how Pakistani design for centrifuges got to Libya including AQ Kahn and other leaders who could not have operated without the support of the government there. Is there reluctance because of our reliance on Pakistan and because of the assassination attempts against Musharraf?

SECRETARY POWELL: No, I don't -- I don't know of any reluctance. We have been interested in proliferation -- proliferating activities on the part of any nation that would create instability or allow rogue nations to develop nuclear weapons.
I have discussed this issue on a number of occasions with President Musharraf and other Pakistani leaders. And as you know, President Musharraf has announced that he will be looking into it himself very thoroughly. And to the extent that we can help him with information, we will.

But we haven't been reluctant. I can assure you of that because I've been the one who's been talking to him about it over these years.
And the Second Part :


QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, do you believe that Pakistan was, indeed, the source of some of the technology designs that may have helped Libya in its nuclear program?

SECRETARY POWELL: I don't have enough information at hand to answer a question quite as specific as that. We know that there have been cases where individuals in Pakistan have worked in these areas and we have called it to the attention of the Pakistanis in the past. And I'm, I'm very pleased now that President Musharraf is aggressively moving to investigate all of that.

Last one and then I --

QUESTION: Just a follow-up on that, Mr. Secretary. If you are going to work with the Pakistanis to find out, how far are you willing to follow this trail, and what if you find out that some of these technologies were transferred to Libya or to other countries while President Musharraf was in office, even after September 11th, when the U.S. and Pakistan pledged their allegiance?

SECRETARY POWELL: Now, that's just much too hypothetical to draw an answer. We will be examining all of this. We have a lot of information that, that we've held for a long time and have shared with people over the years to say that proliferation is a problem. And that's why we've recently started the proliferation initiative, to get more members of the international community involved in halting the flow of knowledge, equipment, technology and materials that could lead to nuclear weapons. And we've had a breakthrough now with Libya. A great deal of pressure has been put on Iran so that Iran has now signed the additional protocol of the NPT and has made certain other commitments to the international community.

Iraq is no longer going to be a source of weapons of mass destruction. And I hope our colleagues in Pyongyang are watching all of this and realizing that they're wasting a lot of money for weapons and technologies and other kinds of programs that will not gain them anything politically.

Thank you.
Apparently Secretary Powell has not had the time to read Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi’s interview.

Meanwhile Daily Jung journalist desperately seeks to know the US’s reaction, among other matters, that sanctions would be less if it was “individuals” rather than the “state” that was involved and gets a brush off from Richard Boucher.


QUESTION: Yes, Nayyar Zaidi, Daily Jang. There was a very long story in New York Times Sunday about Pakistan's alleged, you know, violation of nonproliferation or getting involved with different other countries and helping them. And there is a spate of stories, you know, in both the electronic and print media about this alleged involvement. So in that context, are you in touch? Are there any formal contacts on this issue or expression of concern? And what is the position of the State Department, I mean, how serious it is?

MR. BOUCHER: Well, the position of the State Department is that which the Secretary just expressed outside and which he has expressed many times before; that we have appreciated the commitments made by the Government of Pakistan, President Musharraf specifically; that Pakistan will not be involved in trade involving weapons of mass destruction. President Musharraf made that commitment a little more than a year ago now.

And we also note that Pakistan has begun investigating and debriefing of individuals who may have valuable information on some of the activities that are being reported and discussed. We think that, again, demonstrates that President Musharraf attaches a high priority to meeting his commitment. So we'll continue to discuss this, follow it and work with the Pakistani Government.

QUESTION: What is the -- like, if it is only found that this alleged help was not as a matter of policy at the state level, but an act of individuals, what would be the difference in the U.S. reaction? Obviously, if the state was involved --

MR. BOUCHER: I'm not in a position to speculate at this point.

QUESTION: No, but there will be legal parameters in which you say if the state did it as a matter of policy, there is a different level of sanctions. If it was done by some misguided individuals for money or whatever, then there is a different level of sanctions.

MR. BOUCHER: I'm not prepared to speculate at this point.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by svinayak »

Musharraf's death might see nukes in dangerous hands: US analyst

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Washington, Jan 7 (ANI): A former US Defence Department official has expressed apprehensions that in case Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf was killed, their nuclear arsenals might fall in the hands of dangerous people.

Frank Gaffney, who now works with the Center for Security Policy (CSP), said this in an exclusive interview with ANI TV while referring to the two successive assassination bids on Musharraf in Rawalpindi.

He said: "As recent events have indicated, we're one heartbeat away from probably chaos in Pakistan. General Musharraf has dodged two assassination attempts within the past month. And, I think it's pretty clear, when you move beyond him, most of the people in positions of influence certainly in the intelligence services, probably in the military and in many parts of the country, are in the sway of the radicals. And, it would stand to reason, as frightening as a prospect as this is, that if a guy who does want to work with the West and has made a commitment to stop proliferation, is no longer able to exercise whatever control he currently exercises, we're going to see more than just technology migrating into the hands of dangerous people, we're probably going to see Pakistani nuclear weapons making that same trip."

"We often hear, when some government is doing something we'd just as soon they'd not do, that there are rogue elements in their countries, whether companies, scientists or bureaucrats, who are acting without permission. I guess that's possible, but my guess is, that's unlikely, that all of this was taking place, without, at least, at a minimum, the Pakistani intelligence services knowing what was going on and more likely, the government itself being aware and turning a blind eye towards it, if it wasn't authorizing the transfer of this technology in the first place."

Gaffney also castigated the Pakistan administration for extending nuclear know how to Libya.

The defence expert said: "Unfortunately, its no surprise that we're finding, now that we're getting insights into the Libyan program that it had ties to the Pakistani program. This is in fact a piece with obvious connections, with Pakistani scientists and I suspect, with the Pakistani government."

He added: "Evidently, Pakistan turned to Libya, early on for funding for its own nuclear weapons program. So, its entirely understandable that Libya would wish to cash in on what it basically invested in early on would now pay dividends in actual nuclear weapons capability for Libya."

Coming down heavily on Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf for not keeping a tab on nuclear export to Libya, he said: "Unfortunately, the evidence of Libya's access to Pakistan's nuclear technology does not reflect well on President Musharraf, who has been, a remarkably courageous and stand-up guy in the war against terror. But, whether he knew and he allowed that transfer of technology or he didn't know, it suggests that he is not entirely reliable in this war on terror."

Frank Gaffney said the knowledge that Libya's nuclear technology likely came from Pakistan raises another ugly question, who else may have gotten their hands on it?

While the U.S. waits for official confirmation as the investigation of Libya's nuclear capabilities continues, the Bush administration is refusing to answer what it terms are hypothetical questions on the scope of proliferation, instead emphasizing its efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons.

Pakistan was the likely source of Libya's nuclear technology. Libya decided in late 2003 to disclose its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, including biological, chemical and nuclear. The confirmation, by unnamed American officials in the New York Times, has raised concerns about Pakistan's proliferation of nuclear technology.

"Evidently, Pakistan turned to Libya, early on for funding for its own nuclear weapons program. So, its entirely understandable that Libya would wish to cash in on what it basically invested in early on would now pay dividends in actual nuclear weapons capability for Libya," he added. (ANI)
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by jrjrao »

Pakistan's arsenal
http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20040106-094002-1346r.htm
Pakistan's record on the nuclear proliferation front is worrisome. U.S. officials stated Monday that Pakistani nuclear experts appear to have supplied Libya with its centrifuge design technology. Most disconcerting is the timing of these transfers, which apparently took place after September 11, while Mr. Musharraf was in charge of Pakistan, both politically and militarily, and after he had pledged to stop proliferation. :roll: Still, as head of state and of the military, Mr. Musharraf is responsible for maintaining nuclear security.

The United States can also play a key role in helping Pakistan secure its nuclear capability against theft and accidental launch. Any such assistance must include India as well, <u>since India also needs help in bolstering security.</u> :lol: More importantly, including India would help to neutralize the political fallout of U.S. assistance to Pakistan.</font> :lol:

...Thanks to Mr. Musharraf's efforts, the top rungs of Pakistan's military and intelligence community are widely believed to be solidly moderate and responsible. :lol: Furthermore, an elite and presumably trustworthy corps of commandos guard nuclear sites.

...the United States could take a leading role in working with both Pakistan and India. If Pakistan's weapons system is based on the Chinese model, as is widely believed, then Pakistan probably lacks technological barriers to prevent inadvertent or unauthorized use. U.S. officials could help both Pakistan and India establish electronic locks on weapons (which would make a stolen device useless) and provide sensors, alarms, tamper-indicating seals, armored rail cars and polygraph testing of nuclear security personnel.
Better to laugh, than to get mad, at these idiots.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by jrjrao »

The Times (London)
January 8, 2004, Thursday
HEADLINE: Rogue scientists hold key to Pakistan's nuclear trade
BYLINE: Bronwen Maddox
ALL ROADS lead to Pakistan. :roll: That is how it has seemed in the past two months, as first Iran and then Libya named Pakistani scientists as the source of help for their nuclear research programmes.

The United States has also long regarded Pakistan as the source of North Korea's expertise in enriching uranium, a crucial part of its nuclear weapons programme.

North Korea, Iran and Libya are the three countries that the US most fears will acquire nuclear weapons (although Iran denies that its nuclear power projects conceal that goal). Washington is now confronting the uncomfortable fact that Pakistan, one of its most important allies in the fight against terrorism, may have been responsible for the three most worrying threats of nuclear proliferation. :roll: We are, in any case, dealing with a trail that stretches back to the late 1980s, the end of President Zia's tenure, which hampers any investigation.

Bush Administration officials do not suggest that General Musharraf's Government was involved in any way. Nor, it should be said, is Pakistan the only country whose scientists are implicated, just one that comes up most often, in the most serious contexts.

But, as it happens, in the case of Iran and Libya, there are reasons why the "rogue scientist" account holds water. The peculiarly personalised nature of Pakistan's nuclear programme, owing much to AQ Khan's experience, suggests a trail that investigators are now trying to pursue.

AQ Khan gained much of his experience at a Dutch subcontractor for Urenco, the Anglo-Dutch-German consortium to enrich uranium. A metallurgist, he studied how metals behaved under the extreme stresses of the centrifuges that are used to enrich uranium. That is a crucial step in making either fuel for reactors or nuclear explosives.

Through that work, he became familiar with blueprints for three types of centrifuge: one based on aluminium rotors and two based on "maraging steel", a very hard alloy, which are harder to manufacture but spin much more quickly and are more efficient.

The distinction is signifi-cant because Pakistan's programme first employed the aluminium design, but then shifted to maraging steel. The centrifuges in Iran and Libya are the aluminium version.

Gary Samore, research director at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think tank, and a former adviser to the Clinton Administration on proliferation, argues that one plausible account is that as Pakistan made this transition, scientists familiar with AQ Khan's work sold off the designs for the aluminium version, together with suddenly redundant technology.

However, it is true, too, that part of AQ Khan's expertise was in buying the individual components for centrifuges through many different channels around the world. When bought separately, they are often not considered sensitive technology and slip under the curbs designed to prevent proliferation. Scientists may have helped Iran and Libya to acquire contacts such as these.

Such questions are the focus of the investigation by the United States and the IAEA in Iran, and will be their main question in Libya. But officials now feel more confident than they did two months ago that the help emanating from Pakistan was rather more than just blueprints and included either actual components, or information about how to buy them.

The "rogue scientist" account does not fit the North Korean picture so well.

Despite Pakistan's steady and fervent denials of state help, the US does suspect that this took place. Samore, who was a US negotiator in the 1993-95 talks with North Korea and who is about to publish a dossier on the country's weapons programme, s<u>ays unequivocally that "Pakistan was the prime source for North Korea's enrichment programme".</u>

American officials believe that Pakistan may have given North Korea help with its maraging steel centrifuges in return for the valuable Ghauri missile technology that it received,which gave it a missile capable of delivering a nuclear warhead.

Pakistan has denied that such a deal took place. It has steadily argued that it has no interest in furthering proliferation and that every country that gets the bomb wants to be the last to do so.

However, given that the US believes that these narratives are at least plausible, what should it do? Clearly, the most urgent task is to make sure that it does not happen again.

President Bush has raised American concerns directly with General Musharraf.

Pakistan's openness in announcing an investigation may be partly to distance itself from the embarrassment. But it may also show that it recognises the growing diplomatic cost of these unanswered questions.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by abrahavt »

Nuclear Resolution - Washington Post Article

As if to emphasize that new years bring new hopes, Libya, Iran, North Korea and Pakistan have in recent weeks altered their defiant or deceitful behavior on nuclear weapons. Pushing these four atomic miscreants to clean up their acts should be a top American priority in 2004.
It is too early to proclaim that things are spinning into control on the nonproliferation front. But visible progress has been made through international pressure that relies on both multilateral diplomacy and the shadow of U.S. power abroad. It would be a mistake to underestimate the force of either of those factors in what has happened and in what is still to come.
The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq seems to have sobered up some states that had concluded they could, without risk, secretly acquire nuclear weapons in defiance of international agreements. Unilateralists will trumpet that undeniable development.
But the clandestine drive toward nuclear weapons has also been slowed and shaped by global nonproliferation accords, U.N. inspections, world opinion and the kind of neighborly pressure that China has recently exerted on North Korea.
Imperfect as these outside influences are, they are important in denying legitimacy and protection to a state that covets a nuclear arsenal as an attribute of sovereignty or for other purposes. These guardrails should be strengthened, not abandoned, as part of a new balance in the efforts to halt the spread of nuclear and other unconventional weapons.
Exposure is important. Key to the recent progress has been a new official U.S. willingness to identify, publicize and deal with Pakistan as the world's most determined proliferator of illegal nuclear weapons technology and design. Pakistani help has been instrumental to the ambitions of Libya and Iran to acquire such weapons and in North Korea's development of them.
Washington has long known this but has been reluctant to confront Islamabad. When I wrote in 1995 about the evidence that U.S. intelligence had gathered of Pakistan's help to Iran, a State Department spokesman denied that account. As recently as a few months ago, Pakistani spokesmen were denouncing columns here spotlighting the North Korean connection. The blanket denials have stopped, and U.S. officials speaking on background are now spelling out details of Pakistan's involvement in Iran, North Korea and Libya.
President Pervez Musharraf's regime has reluctantly begun an "investigation" into whether Pakistani scientists did what Musharraf has always denied happened. This "rogue scientist" version ignores the official help that the nuclear transfers needed and received from Pakistan's military and intelligence services. The Bush administration must not buy into a new coverup from Islamabad out of a misplaced sense of loyalty to Musharraf.
Pakistan continues to be the most dangerous place on Earth because of its mix of nuclear weapons, unstable politics, religious fanaticism and the involvement of senior military and intelligence officials in terrorist networks, including al Qaeda and the Taliban. Two recent assassination attempts against Musharraf underline the fragility of his rule.
It is unclear whether Musharraf is acting out of a sense of internal strength or weakness in moving to account for Pakistan's terrible record on proliferation and to improve relations with India by promising to stop terrorism in Kashmir, as he did this week. If he pursues these efforts seriously, he will provoke the showdown at home that he has long sought to avoid but that must come if Pakistan is to cease its international criminality.
In this quartet of infamy only Libya seems to have decided to come clean and make a fresh start without weapons of mass destruction. North Korea and Iran, while holding out promises of nuclear reprocessing freezes, leave the impression of buying time until attention turns elsewhere and they can get on with developing nuclear arsenals.
Past interviews with Libya's erratic ruler, Moammar Gaddafi, suggest to me that we are unlikely ever to know fully why he decided to reveal at this moment that he was much closer to a nuclear weapon than the world's intelligence and inspection agencies realized. The colonel did not strike me as a linear thinker or talker.
British-U.S. diplomacy and Operation Iraqi Freedom were no doubt factors in Gaddafi's announced decision to defang himself through verifiable and intrusive inspections. I would guess that his desire to pass on power to his son in the next few years -- and the need to obtain international support for that succession -- also played a role.
Wars change the strategic landscape. It is then up to the politicians and diplomats to seize opportunities. They have made a good start in Libya, and will have their hands full in Pakistan in this brand new year.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by jrjrao »

Jim Hoagland in the Washington Post:

Nuclear Resolution
As if to emphasize that new years bring new hopes, Libya, Iran, North Korea and Pakistan have in recent weeks altered their defiant or deceitful behavior on nuclear weapons. Pushing these four atomic miscreants to clean up their acts should be a top American priority in 2004.

Key to the recent progress has been a new official U.S. willingness to identify, publicize and deal with Pakistan as the world's most determined proliferator of illegal nuclear weapons technology and design. Pakistani help has been instrumental to the ambitions of Libya and Iran to acquire such weapons and in North Korea's development of them.

Washington has long known this but has been reluctant to confront Islamabad. When I wrote in 1995 about the evidence that U.S. intelligence had gathered of Pakistan's help to Iran, a State Department spokesman denied that account. As recently as a few months ago, Pakistani spokesmen were denouncing columns here spotlighting the North Korean connection. The blanket denials have stopped, and U.S. officials speaking on background are now spelling out details of Pakistan's involvement in Iran, North Korea and Libya.

President Pervez Musharraf's regime has reluctantly begun an "investigation" into whether Pakistani scientists did what Musharraf has always denied happened. <u>This "rogue scientist" version ignores the official help that the nuclear transfers needed and received from Pakistan's military and intelligence services. The Bush administration must not buy into a new coverup from Islamabad out of a misplaced sense of loyalty to Musharraf.

Pakistan continues to be the most dangerous place on Earth because of its mix of nuclear weapons, unstable politics, religious fanaticism and the involvement of senior military and intelligence officials in terrorist networks, including al Qaeda and the Taliban. </u>
</font>


It is unclear whether Musharraf is acting out of a sense of internal strength or weakness in moving to account for Pakistan's terrible record on proliferation and to improve relations with India by promising to stop terrorism in Kashmir, as he did this week. If he pursues these efforts seriously, he will provoke the showdown at home that he has long sought to avoid but that must come if Pakistan is to cease its international criminality. :eek: :eek:
Hmmm... "PakiSatan is a proven International Criminal." Now expect the infernal Ashraf Jehangir Qazi of the Paki embassy to write back some whiny little rejoinder...
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Vivek_A »

neocon wannabe Mansoor Ijaz

Pakistan's Nuclear Metastasis: How Widespread is the Cancer?

The time has come to find out how much damage Pakistan's nuclear program has done--and how many rogue countries are closing in on the bomb.

Unfortunately, the plethora of revelations about Pakistan's activities is only the tip of the iceberg of a decade-long clandestine effort by unregulated elements within the country's nuclear, intelligence and military establishments to sell the "Islamic bomb" to other Muslim nations. At the heart of the effort was a dangerously motivated clique of former Pakistani intelligence chiefs, corrupt politicians, and Islamized Pakistani scientists, including Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, who believed it was their moral duty to offer weapons of mass destruction to embattled Muslim states in the global Ummah (community of Islamic nations).
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by ramana »

Rangudu, Need to rebut the equal-equal linkage in the WashTimes article. No need to drag India into the Paki mud. It is guilt by assosication and the reference to Pak H&D is silly as spank the other child too lest the Pakis feel singled out. Also the writer should be asked how come if the design is Chinese how come the Pakis were smuggling US components among other items?
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Vivek_A »

Originally posted by ramana:
Rangudu, Need to rebut the equal-equal linkage in the WashTimes article.
The chances of the US government exerting the kind of pressure on India like it does on TSP are zero. If you make a big issue of one line in a WT editorial and write letters, we automatically play along with the equal equal game.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Umrao »

ramana garu>> This bringing India into the topic when talking about Pakistan has become a malaise of epic proportions.

Be it Talk of The Nation, or PBS dicussion of Perkovich & Kreepon , some how they find a way to inject India into the dicussion.

We must do something to let these so called experts know the mention of India is not required and is irrelavant to the discussion on hand when it is about TSP proliferation.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

From the horse's (other animal's) mouth (other end):
http://www.newscorp.com/
The Weekly Standard (daily online edition)
Jan. 8, 2003
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/575nerhn.asp

Pakistan's Nuclear Metastasis: Is the Cancer Still Growing?

The time has come to find out how much damage Pakistan's nuclear program
has done--and how many rogue countries are closing in on the bomb.

by Mansoor Ijaz

INDIA'S PRIME MINISTER, Atal Behari Vajpayee ....... (blah-blah-blither..)

..The conduct of the Pakistani state, ruled for over half its existence by military governments, is under a microscope as nuclear watchdogs try to
unravel the extent of damage done by Pakistani nuclear scientists assisting rogue regimes from Tripoli to Tehran to Pyongyang in building sophisticated uranium enrichment facilities.

Questions raised by Pakistan's nuclear conduct relegate the future of Kashmir to the sidelines. The burning question is whether Pakistan has
morphed into a rogue nuclear state, or is the unwitting victim of ahandful of deranged army generals, intelligence officers, and mad nuclear scientists run amok.

RECENT REVELATIONS about the extent to which Islamabad proliferated its nuclear technology during the past two decades paint a deeply troubling picture of not just what was happening without detection of international nuclear monitors, but what may still be going on--and what must now be stopped if the civilized world is to prevent tyrannical regimes from developing the capacity to build and deliver nuclear
weapons into the hands of terrorists.


The Bush and Blair successes .. But these victories have come at the price of negligently looking the other way while Islamabad continued an aggressive program to spread its nuclear expertise to Muslim countries.

With Pakistan's nuclear genie out of the bottle, Bush administration officials need to focus on getting Musharraf to quickly identify the
extent of the metastasis, to fully disclose it, and to prosecute those officials involved no matter who they are or how high they are in the
system. Musharraf must then agree to put verifiable measures in place to insure there is no possibility Pakistani nuclear technology will show up next in Jakarta, Riyadh, Cairo, or Beirut.

Chronicling the Evidence

The evidence of Pakistan's complicity in spreading its nuclear know-how is increasingly undeniable. Saif al-Islam Ghaddafi, son of Libyan
strongman Muammar Ghaddafi, almost gleefully admitted to London's Sunday Times this weekend that Tripoli had paid $40 million (western
intelligence believes the number could be as high as $100 million) to middlemen for a "full bomb dossier" from Pakistan detailing how to build
an atomic weapon. Libya's candor comes as part of its deal with the United States and Britain to abandon its quest for nuclear weapons in
return for readmission to the community of nations, and western promises to help rebuild its decrepit oil industry. Intercepting a
German-registered ship in October with thousands of parts for uranium centrifuges also helped bring the Libyan leader to his senses about his
ongoing nuclear cooperation with Pakistan.


To add to Islamabad's woes, the New York Times this Sunday posted on its website a sales brochure for nuclear components available to qualified buyers from Pakistan's top-secret A.Q. Khan Research Laboratories ... The
technologies offered were critical for building high quality uranium enrichment facilities, and the glossy brochure presented Pakistan's best
nuclear wares with Madison Avenue pizzazz.


The same lab stands accused of providing gas centrifuges to Iranian scientists through a vast network of secret procurement channels,
largely run through the Middle East port of Dubai. Those centrifuges, when tested by International Atomic Energy Agency scientists visiting Iran's key nuclear installations last summer, were found to have traces
of bomb-grade enriched uranium identical to that known to have originated from Pakistani centrifuges. The findings made it all but
impossible for the parts to have come from anywhere else.


Unfortunately, the plethora of revelations about Pakistan's activities is only the tip of the iceberg of a decade-long clandestine effort by
unregulated elements within the country's nuclear, intelligence and military establishments to sell the "Islamic bomb" to other Muslim
nations.
At the heart of the effort was a dangerously motivated clique of former Pakistani intelligence chiefs, corrupt politicians, and
Islamized Pakistani scientists, including Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, who believed it was their moral duty to offer weapons of mass destruction to
embattled Muslim states in the global Ummah (community of Islamic nations).


Their activities, in various stages of planning and implementation since the late 1980s, reached a zenith in the months leading up to the
September 11 attacks.
Key military and intelligence officials in Islamabad, later fired or laterally moved to less sensitive posts by
Musharraf at Washington's urging, had come to the conclusion that the West, led by the United States, was hell-bent on the economic
destruction of Pakistan for its robust nuclear weapons program, lack of democracy, military support for militants in Kashmir, and supply lines
to the extremist Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

These ambitious Islamists (wrongly) perceived that spreading Pakistan's nuclear wealth throughout the Ummah would secure both its economic future and place in history as the hub of the Muslim world's intellectual and scientific power. Their vision had multiple dimensions,
including the sharing of knowledge, materials, and technologies to build ultra-sophisticated research facilities in other countries, and that is precisely what they repeatedly and aggressively did for over 15 years.

Spreading the Cancer to other Muslim Countries

The evidence is now compelling that they succeeded in Iran and North Korea, and were far enough along in Libya to show their fingerprints.

But where else was Pakistan's nuclear brain trust plying its trade and for what purpose?

Nuclear cooperation with Iran was initially intended during the Cold War to provide strategic depth in military planning against arch-nemesis and former Soviet ally, India (now a key ally of both Iran and Afghanistan).

But the strategy evolved early on into a derivative assistance plan that would enable Iranian-backed Hezbollah guerrillas based in Lebanon to eventually obtain tactical nuclear weapons from Tehran--weapons that could be deployed in the Bekaa Valley once Iran's nuclear fuel cycles had been established. Israel's reaction time to launch strikes or
counterstrikes would drop to zero.

Pakistan would maintain plausible deniability of any involvement in Middle East affairs (no one would believe Shia Iran was depending on
Sunni Pakistan for nuclear assistance), but its proxy play to clandestinely help equalize the playing field with nuclear Israel would give it deep respect, and lots of free oil, from the Arab world.

Saudi Arabia toyed with the idea of obtaining Pakistani nuclear weapons as well. But Islamabad's intelligence mavens vetoed the effort because of the heavy American military presence at that time, fearing their larger designs to spread Pakistani expertise and technology might get exposed. The alternative put up for consideration was building a secret facility in one of the sheikdoms bordering Saudi Arabia--as long as the money, or enough free oil, was there for Pakistan's benefit, and the
sheikdom agreed to provide regional cover in the event of any Israeli, or even Iranian, malfeasance.


To this day, the March 1999 visit by Saudi Arabia's Defense Minister, Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, to Pakistan's nuclear facilities at Kahuta
remains unexplained.
It is the only non-Pakistani entry ever allowed inside the top-secret installation. Similarly unexplained are the
"retirement" activities of Dr. A. Q. Khan, now living in Dubai where the Iranian and Libyan technology transfers allegedly changed hands. He's
ostensibly building schools for disaffected Muslim youth there, but one wonders what else is being built underneath those desert sands. The
magnitude of Khan's hypocrisy
in using the Muslim world's forlorn as props to camouflage his unholy war to spread nuclear weapons into the
hands of the very regimes that suppressed their people into oblivion is incomprehensible.

( Pause while I :p at Ijaz's hippos too..

Even Malaysia's Mahathir Mohamed was considered a hero of sorts in extremist Pakistani circles, having built a modern society with a
vibrant open-market economy while never compromising the Islam phobias (anti-Semitism, etc.) that made him anathema to Western leaders in his waning years. It appears Mahathir never accepted the open invitation to join the Muslim nuclear club, but Malaysia played the game at the
fringes. Components of Libya's nascent uranium enrichment facilities, for example, were manufactured in Malaysia as recently as 2001.

Leading the Drive for Transparency in Pakistan's Nuclear Affairs

What to do? Simply interrogating a handful of senior nuclear scientists
resident at Kahuta Labs cannot stop the quest by ungovernable elements
in Pakistan's military-intelligence establishment from spreading the
country's nuclear know-how. Even questioning Dr. A. Q. Khan himself, as
Musharraf recently allowed under intense international pressure, will
not be enough. Disinformation that insured the success of Khan's
clandestine effort to build Pakistan's bomb, after all, was the hallmark
of his entire tenure as Islamabad's nuclear chief.

Nor will it be sufficient that another Muslim country "outs" Pakistan's
nuclear complicity when faced with irrefutable evidence, as Iran and
Libya have apparently done. Waiting for admissions of guilt in matters
of nuclear commerce after the fact is a dangerous policy for preventing
proliferation in unstable, autocratic regimes that dominate the Muslim
world's political landscape.

The conscientious objectors in Pakistan's scientific, military, and
intelligence establishments have a moral responsibility to come clean
about what has been done, wittingly or not, to assist other nations in
developing to whatever extent they could meaningful nuclear weapons
research programs. Sooner or later, the evidence will emerge. But the
world cannot wait until that evidence is a rogue state's North
Korean-made missile armed with a Chinese-made nuclear device assembled
in Islamabad's nuclear labs whose fuel came from gas centrifuges sold by
Pakistan's rogue Islamists.

Musharraf has to publicly and verifiably put an end to the speculation
that Pakistan's nuclear assets are for sale to nations rich enough to
buy from or barter with his scientists. This means, among other things,
taking steps to offer more transparency in independently monitoring
Pakistan's nuclear sites, and keeping track of the movements of
Pakistan's scientists in ways that neither humiliate the country nor
compromise its sovereignty.

As a first step, President George W. Bush needs to ascertain that
Musharraf had no knowledge of the transactions in question. Bush White
House officials have indicated that at least in the Libyan case, where
the transfers of technology took place largely after the September 11
terrorist attacks, Musharraf appears to have had no knowledge of the
transfers. If he genuinely did not, President Bush needs to help
distance the Pakistani president in the minds of the American public
from the crazies who want to destroy Pakistan by sharing its nuclear
secrets with rogue states.

By building such a political argument at home, Bush can take important
legislative steps that will free up technology to assist Musharraf in
holding his scientists and military-intelligence complex accountable for
future actions. The previous U.S. policy of economic and military
sanctions is outdated and irrelevant in the context of Pakistan's
cooperation on post 9/11 terrorism issues.

Since 1990, U.S. sanctions have blocked technologies from being sent to
Pakistan that could improve nuclear security there. These sanctions,
along with U.S. export license controls and, where needed, global
non-proliferation regime compliance rules, should be waived to insure
Islamabad gets the needed technology to protect its nuclear labs,
weapons and materials from unauthorized use.

Pakistan: Model Nuclear Citizen or Loose Atomic Cannon?

There is another reason for pursuing this course. Having come
dangerously close to falling under the U.S. definition of a "rogue"
state, Pakistan could now become a beacon for how to responsibly deal
with rogue elements inside the state without compromising its
sovereignty or dealing a blow to an important cornerstone of the
national psyche. Other states (Georgia, for example) with nuclear weapons programs that may also be in the market for selling their secrets might take notice and change course.

To emphasize U.S. concerns, the president (and Congress) should condition all U.S. aid to Pakistan on Islamabad's acceptance of nuclear
safekeeping vaults, sensors, alarms, closed-circuit cameras, and other technologies that give Musharraf and his like-minded aides the ability
to internally monitor and track Pakistan's nuclear technologies. Simply
excusing leakage as the work of "greedy" individuals with their own
agendas, as Pakistan's foreign ministry spokesman did when the Iranian
revelations were made, is neither believable nor an acceptable risk to
the safety and security of civilized nations.

Furthermore, a new formula for giving U.S. aid should be devised that is
inversely proportional to Pakistan's spending on military and nuclear
budgets. The less Islamabad spends of its national wealth on building
nuclear bombs that protect no one, the more America should spend on
helping Pakistan build schools and hospitals that educate and protect
the masses.

Pakistan has the right to maintain its nuclear arsenal for deterrence
against regional threats, and perhaps as importantly, for its national
dignity. It does not have the right, whether sanctioned officially or
not, to assist in the creation of nuclear monsters that seek Armageddon
itself. Nor does it have the right to misappropriate American taxpayer
dollars in support of actions by the very elements that seek our death
and destruction on their misguided path to eternity.

- - - - -

Mansoor Ijaz, a New York financier and chairman of Crescent Investment
Management, jointly authored the blueprint for the cease-fire of
hostilities between Muslim militants and Indian security forces in
Kashmir in July 2000. He also negotiated Sudan's offer of
counter-terrorism assistance on al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden to the
Clinton administration in 1996 and 1997. His personal views, expressed
here, are based on firsthand accounts from meetings, private discussions
and correspondences with Pakistani nuclear scientists as well as senior
military and intelligence officials over the past decade. His father,
Dr. Mujaddid Ijaz (deceased), a nuclear physicist who retired Professor
Emeritus at Virginia Tech, brought over 100 students from Pakistan and
other parts of the Muslim world to the United States during his 26 year
tenure for training and degree programs at U.S. colleges and
universities. Some of those students now run sensitive parts of
Pakistan's top-secret nuclear facilities.

© Copyright 2004, News Corporation <http://www.newscorp.com/>, Weekly
Standard, All Rights Reserved
Isn't this like Osama bin Laden condemning Al Qaida?
Kuttan
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

I conclude that the stage is now being set to "explain" why TSP is nook-nood.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Rangudu »

Originally posted by ramana:
Rangudu, Need to rebut the equal-equal linkage in the WashTimes article. No need to drag India into the Paki mud. It is guilt by assosication and the reference to Pak H&D is silly as spank the other child too lest the Pakis feel singled out. Also the writer should be asked how come if the design is Chinese how come the Pakis were smuggling US components among other items?
Done. WTimes Editorial page editor is Tony Blankley, who I think is plugged into the Bush admin.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by ramana »

From the horse's other end
The same lab stands accused of providing gas centrifuges to Iranian scientists through a vast network of secret procurement channels,largely run through the Middle East port of Dubai. Those centrifuges, when tested by International Atomic Energy Agency scientists visiting Iran's key nuclear installations last summer, were found to have traces
of bomb-grade enriched uranium identical to that known to have originated from Pakistani centrifuges.
The findings made it all but
impossible for the parts to have come from anywhere else.
Could these centrifuges be from the TSP inventory no longer needed as it is now based on China's stocks? AQK might be disposing of the now useless scrap with refurbished Malaysian parts? That could explain the Dubai point of origin where he is now based per Ijaz in above article.
Also wonder how does the IAEA and or Ijaz know the signature of HEU from Pakistan? From the coralled stuff? Or from Shaukat Aziz visit to Kahuta?
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

The other magic which is now explained is the Dubai connection to the miraculous jump in TSP's foreign exchange reserves. As I noted at the time, the explanation of "couriers with suitcases full of rupees" did not hold water, because of the sheer weight, volume and number of suitcases needed to exchange enough Pakirupees for $6B.

But enriched uranium and plutonium are pretty compact. And apparently these "centrifuges" are pretty small things individually (but they use hundreds of them). A report from NoKo spoke of a wall behind which some 400 of the centrifuges were stored.

I think the centrifuges were sold off when the "strategic assets" were removed, as a "We'll show'em" gesture - and as Mush told his "nook scientists" that the weapons program was all in the past, it was now time to look forward to peaceful applictions (like dirty bombs and shaped-charge shoes).
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by ramana »

N^3 If Dubai is point of origin for this trade could Dawood Ibrahim and the underworld be not in the loop? Wait for NYT to pick up on this soon. No wonder LKA is going to TSP to negotiate the extradition treaty for the US will want to take the Company gang to G'Bay.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Umrao »

As usual our man Mansore Ijaz, is bowling his doosra here to bamboozle the US audience.

In this regard Mansore is spinner par excllence, what ever be the pitch conditions (viz, Foreign Affairs expert, Counter terror expert, Diplomatic expert, wheeler dealer expert, recall his escapdes in Sudan handing over Osama during BC regin).

consider this sharp leg spin from the middle stick ( ie the crime of proliferation) to the off stump (ie Paki regime is responsible, aka the military Junta and ISI), he makes it go away.

"By building such a political argument at home, Bush can take important legislative steps that will free up technology to assist Musharraf in holding his scientists and military-intelligence complex accountable for future actions. The previous U.S. policy of economic and military sanctions is outdated and irrelevant in the context of Pakistan's cooperation on post 9/11 terrorism issues.

Since 1990, U.S. sanctions have blocked technologies from being sent to Pakistan that could improve nuclear security there. These sanctions,along with U.S. export license controls and, where needed, global non-proliferation regime compliance rules, should be waived to insure Islamabad gets the needed technology to protect its nuclear labs, weapons and materials from unauthorized use.


Now let us look at his off spin

"Pakistan: Model Nuclear Citizen or Loose Atomic Cannon?

There is another reason for pursuing this course. Having come dangerously close to falling under the U.S. definition of a "rogue" state, Pakistan could now become a beacon for how to responsibly deal with rogue elements inside the state without compromising its sovereignty or dealing a blow to an important cornerstone of the national psyche. <small>(H&D argument)</small> Other states (Georgia, for example) with nuclear weapons programs that may also be in the market for selling their secrets might take notice and change course. <small> from outside the off stick he brings Georgia to come to middle stump Pakistan</small>


Now the doosra with off break action he bowls a ball to drift away from the middle stump (which is Pakistan is proven rogue nation) to Reward PTS Pakistan to become a better nation.

" To emphasize U.S. concerns, the president (and Congress) should condition all U.S. aid to Pakistan on Islamabad's acceptance of nuclear
safekeeping vaults, sensors, alarms, closed-circuit cameras, and other technologies that give Musharraf and his like-minded aides the ability
to internally monitor and track Pakistan's nuclear technologies. Simply excusing leakage as the work of "greedy" individuals with their own
agendas, as Pakistan's foreign ministry spokesman did when the Iranian revelations were made, is neither believable nor an acceptable risk to
the safety and security of civilized nations.

Furthermore, a new formula for giving U.S. aid should be devised that is inversely proportional to Pakistan's spending on military and nuclear
budgets. The less Islamabad spends of its national wealth on building nuclear bombs that protect no one, the more America should spend on
helping Pakistan build schools and hospitals that educate and protect the masses. <small> In one stroke he wants America finance the economic upliftment and at the same time make Pakistan a vibrant Nooklear power</small>

Pakistan has the right to maintain its nuclear arsenal for deterrence against regional threats, and perhaps as importantly, for its national
dignity. It does not have the right, whether sanctioned officially or not, to assist in the creation of nuclear monsters that seek Armageddon
itself. Nor does it have the right to misappropriate American taxpayer dollars in support of actions by the very elements that seek our death and destruction on their misguided path to eternity."


Wah wah wah Janab aadab, Lagtha hai aakhir app ki khena hai ki
'Agar billi Andha hota to chuvaa l*nD dikahtha'
Kuttan
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

The strange GOTUS behavior is becoming clearer.

All the cover for the mush-tush since June 2002 was based on the "sensitivity" of mush-tush after the Amirtaraj soccer session and losing his "assets". GOTUS was stonewalling all questions and criticism of Mush as "consolation" and to keep the nook-noodity from coming out.

However, the Pakis as usual played "lets-see-how-far-we-can-push" and sold off their remaining stuff for hard cash in a spectacular bratty tantrum.

When the GOTUS slowly realized WHERE the stuff had gone, I am sure tempers did a slow boil in the NSC, CIA etc. and in the Oval Office.

The "retribution" started slowly.

First, the money trail - Al Rashid Trust etc. Jaish-e-Mohammed "charity work" got slammed.

Then Congress started asking Rocca & Co about the nooks.

Then - the sell-out of Dawood - a clear show of American rage (they knew he was Mush's neighbor since 1993, and at least since Kamran Khan exposed that situation..)

Then the Ambassadora's angry blast.

Then the banning of the New Improved L-e-T, J-e-M etc.

And then, eventually, when the Libyan confession came out, the blasts.

Shows why mush so meekly "signed on the dotted line".

The Indian rage about Dawood and L-e-T is nothing compared to the pressure that must have come from the Israel lobby. Tactical nukes in the Bekaa, in the hands of the Hezbollah! Secret facilities for KSA to build nuclear-tipped IRBMS! Bomb plants in Libya! :eek:
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Rangudu »

Originally posted by jrjrao:
Letter to the Telegraph, UK:
6 January 2004
A Weapons smear on Pakistan


From:
Javed Akhtar, Obviously Fake High Commission for Pakistan, London SW1
Heh Heh.

My letter smashmouthing this Low commissioner's letter has been published
Sir - The Pakistani High Commissioner claims that the nuclear sales brochure referred to in your report (News, Jan 5) is "obviously fake" (Letters, Jan 6).

In fact, Pakistan's government published advertisements in Pakistani newspapers in July 2000 that were identical to what the brochure referred to. The veracity of that advertisement was acknowledged by Ishfaq Ahmed, the head of Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission, as well as by Javed Jabbar, the then information minister.

Asked to comment, the US State Department acknowledged that it noted the advertisements with concern, and that the Pakistani government had assured it that the advertisements did not signal an intent to sell nuclear material. The end results speak for themselves, in the recent revelations from Iran, North Korea and Libya.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Manu »

N^3, with all due respect, I think not.

Please refer to Spinster's post above:

"Be it Talk of The Nation, or PBS dicussion of Perkovich & Kreepon , some how they find a way to inject India into the dicussion."

The above also applies to people like David Frum and Richard Perle of the American Enterprise Institute (saw proof yesterday on Charlie Rose). These guys would Nuke Iran, Libya and Syria if the leaders of these countries so much as farted inappropriately. Their book ("How to win the war on Terror") concentrates more on Iran and less on Pakistan, can you believe that?

The reasons for GOTUS looking away at every Paki "move" is obvious to anyone who is not living in a make-believe world.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Rich »

Originally posted by Rangudu:
Originally posted by jrjrao:
Letter to the Telegraph, UK:
6 January 2004
A Weapons smear on Pakistan


From:
Javed Akhtar, Obviously Fake High Commission for Pakistan, London SW1


My letter smashmouthing this Low commissioner's letter has been published

In just a few words, you are able to cause such a huge impact. Way to go R.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Tim »

Ramana,

Regarding the centrifuges, at least one report states that the centrifuges Iran received were an earlier version of the ones Pakistan reportedly uses. I can't remember all the details.

Drop me an e-mail, if you have time.

Tim
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by ramana »

Tim, The technology that AQK purloined was of two categories.
1) Sub critical speed centrifuge. This is the plain vanilla version of the centrifuge. The rotor whirls below the critical speed of the shaft so is less efficient.
2) Supercritical speed ultra high speed centrifuge. Here the rotor whirls above the critical speed and the rotor is suspended with magntostatic bearings(ring magnets fame) so that it can bend/deform as it moves through the critical speed. Obviously its more high tech and is also more efficient. This was give pro quid quo from TSP to China for its generosity.

Seriously one should look into seeing if the rotors were old stuff already used at Kahuta with Malaysian refurbished parts. If they were first gen rotors than Malayasia could be source for the high speed bearings etc which are definitely less high tech than ring magnets.
If the above is true offcourse it will have traces of HEU similar to that from Kahuta! BTW how did they confirm this 'signature' that Mansoor bhai says?
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Kuttan »

Mansoor Ijaz's column is remarkable for its tone as much as for its content. Its the closest I've seen to a "plea bargain" or confession, and the smell of fear comes through clearly. He seems utterly desperate to be seen as American (which he is - but most Pakis were unaware of that) - and put big distance between himself and the TSP.

Seems extremely worried about continued access to parts of the US establishment...

Most of his previous columns, OpEds etc. are also written at a pretty low level, explaining things as to 5-year-olds. This article, OTOH, makes such ultra-sophisticated (for an American audience) points as "no one would suspect TSP of funding shiite Iran".

The last part of the article, about TSP intent to kill Americans in America, is chilling, and the statement about his Dad having trained many of the nookulear fundoos is equally interesting as a statement of "qualifications".

This from the guy who argued in Sep. 2001 that Osama should be gently gassed to sleep by US Special Forces and "renditioned" instead of a US attack on Afghanistan.

As Tim says, the word I find most descriptive of TSP "aid" to NoKo and Iran is "old" - as in throw-away items no longer needed at Kahuta.

The REAL sponsors of the Islamic Bum were apparently Libya / KSA. Through Dubai.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by Vivek_A »

This is a virtual admission of guilt..

N-scientists may be booked under Secrets Act

ISLAMABAD: A case under the Official Secrets Act may be registered against some nuclear scientists, who are alleged to have passed on sensitive nuclear secrets to a third country.

Legal experts are currently examining the evidence to arraign these scientists on the charge of passing on secrets to other countries, an official told The News on Thursday.

The government agencies have intensely "debriefed" certain scientists of the Khan Research Laboratories (KRL). The government has already made it clear that any scientist found involved in selling or disclosing nuclear secrets would be made accountable.
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Re: Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 25 Dec 2003

Post by arun »

Libya denies nuclear links with Pakistan.

Saiful Islam Qadhafi’s statement is a lot more tepid that the headline suggests :


"It is possible that the Libyan and Pakistani traders may have made some contacts, but this does not at all mean that Pakistan as a state or its scientists were involved."
Given the gravity of the allegations made, I would have expected nothing less than an outright repudiation. Saiful Islam Qadhafi clearly could not bring himself to issue such a robust denial.

The tepidity of the “denial” is made up by this H & D assuaging statement, which given Pakistani predilections will be loudly trumpeted :


"Pakistan's nuclear programme was a source of pride for the entire Ummah."
No matter, to “Rogue Army” and “Rogue Scientists” we get to add the further appellation of “Rogue Traders”.
Locked