The Pukes must have a lot of money to pay that criminal Kissinger $50,000 for two words.Dar was dismissive of Gen Musharraf’s “enlightened moderation” and said that the phrase was coined by Dr Henry Kissinger and his consultancy company had been paid $50,000 for those two words.
Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 31 March 2005
Extracts from US Homeland Security Advisor Fran Townsend Press Briefing at the Whitehouse on June 29, 2005 :
Whitehouse
Q I know yesterday, I think Mr. Sam Nunn, the former Senator, and also Mr. Roemer, a member of the 9/11 Commission, they testified that Osama bin Laden or al Qaeda may have hands on a nuclear bomb. Pakistani scientists, including Mr. A.Q. Khan met with Osama bin Laden. Where do we stand as nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists, including Osama bin Laden --
MS. TOWNSEND: We enjoyed enormous success in bringing down the A.Q. Khan network and getting Libya to renounce its WMD program. And we've enjoyed a lot of success there. We continue to mine that information and that intelligence for additional leads, and we work against it every day. The question really, from Silberman-Robb was, how can you strengthen that capability and make it more effective, and that's really what this was focused on.
Q Madam, may I follow now my own question, please? Today we don't have access to Mr. A.Q. Khan and we are still relying only what he really told the Pakistani authorities. And also, how can we make sure that al Qaeda or Osama bin Laden doesn't have any -- these or nuclear weapons which were part of the 9/11 report?
MS. TOWNSEND: You know, we work with our Pakistani partners every single day, and we work in a very integrated and comprehensive way with them. It's the sort of vibrant relationship that we -- four years ago, three-and-a-half years ago, we could not have imagined. It's a result of the personal investment of the President; it's a result -- I mean, President Musharraf has suffered two assassination attempts -- and so it's working together with them the we found to make us most effective.
That's true around the world. It's true in terms of our relationship with Saudi Arabia; it's true in terms of our relationship with Afghanistan. All those partnerships have made us stronger. And really, the best way is to fight counterproliferation, it's the executive order -- that's the way that you fight against -- you strengthen human intelligence and penetrate networks. That's the best way to ensure that you keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorists.
Thank you, everybody.
Whitehouse
Now Unkill-MuNNA getting "vibrant" too?arun wrote:Extracts from US Homeland Security Advisor Fran Townsend Press Briefing at the Whitehouse on June 29, 2005 :
MS. TOWNSEND: You know, we work with our Pakistani partners every single day, and we work in a very integrated and comprehensive way with them. It's the sort of vibrant relationship that we -- four years ago, three-and-a-half years ago, we could not have imagined.
Whitehouse
How many more shoes to fall?
http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/sair/inde ... ssessment1
http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/sair/inde ... ssessment1
Terror and the Bomb: Dangerous Cocktail
Guest Writer: Amir Mir
Senior Pakistani journalist affiliated with Karachi-based Monthly, Newsline
Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf's June 25-26 unscheduled trip to Saudi Arabia has raised many an eye brow in Islamabad-based diplomatic circles which believe the visit was meant to seek the assistance of the Kingdom to circumvent the ongoing International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) investigations into reports that the Saudis might have purchased nuclear technology from Pakistan. And the Musharraf-King meeting was aimed at chalking out a joint strategy on what stance the two leaders should adopt to satisfy the IAEA and address its concerns.
Saudi Arabia has been under increasing pressure to open its nuclear facilities for inspection as the IAEA suspects that its nuclear programme has reached a level (with Pakistani cooperation) where it should attract international attention. The pressure has also come from Europe and the United States, who want Riyadh to permit unhindered access to its nuclear facilities.
Well before the IAEA probe began, the US had been investigating whether or not the father of Pakistan's nuclear programme, Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, sold nuclear technology to the Saudis and other Arab countries. Acting under extreme pressure of the IAEA, the Saudi Government signed the Small Quantities Protocol (SQP) on June 16, 2005, which makes inspections less problematic. However, the US, European Union and Australia want it to agree to full inspections. The Saudi stand is that they would agree to the demand only if other countries did so, including Israel.
International apprehensions that Saudi Arabia would seek to acquire nuclear weapons have arisen periodically over the last decade. The Kingdom's geopolitical situation gives it strong reasons to consider acquiring nuclear weapons: the current volatile security environment in the Middle East; the growing number of states (particularly Iran and Israel) with weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the region; and its ambition to dominate the region. International concerns intensified in 2003 in the wake of revelations about Dr. A.Q. Khan's proliferation activities. The IAEA investigations show that Khan sold or offered nuclear weapons technology to Saudi Arabia and several Middle Eastern states, including Iran, Iraq, Libya, and Syria.
Last year's unearthing of the black market nuclear technology network increased international suspicions that Khan had developed ties with Riyadh, which has the capability to pay for all kinds of nuclear-related services. Even before the revelations about Dr. Khan's activities, concerns about Saudi-Pakistani nuclear cooperation persisted, largely due to strengthened cooperation between the two countries. In particular, frequent high-level visits of Saudi and Pakistani officials over the past several years raised serious questions about the possibility of clandestine Saudi-Pakistani nuclear cooperation.
In May 1999, a Saudi Arabian defense team, headed by Defense Minister Prince Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz visited Pakistan's highly restricted uranium enrichment and missile assembly factory. The prince toured the Kahuta uranium enrichment plant and an adjacent factory where the Ghauri missile is assembled with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and was briefed by Dr. A Q Khan. A few months later, Khan traveled to Saudi Arabia [in November 1999] ostensibly to attend a symposium on "Information Sources on the Islamic World". The same month (November 1999), Dr. Saleh al-Athel, president King Abdul Aziz City for Science and Technology, visited Pakistan to work out details for cooperation in the fields of engineering, electronics, and computer science.
Interestingly, Saudi defector Mohammed Khilevi, who was first secretary of the Saudi mission to the United Nations until July 1994, testified before the IAEA that Riyadh has sought a bomb since 1975. In late June 1994, Khilevi abandoned his UN post to join the opposition. After his defection, Khilevi distributed more than 10,000 documents he obtained from the Saudi Arabian Embassy. These documents show that between 1985 and 1990, the Saudi government paid up to five billion dollars to Saddam Hussein to build a nuclear weapon. Khilevi further alleged that Saudis had provided financial contributions to the Pakistani nuclear program, and had signed a secret agreement that obligated Islamabad to respond against the aggressor with its nuclear arsenal if Saudi Arabia is attacked with nuclear weapons.
In 2003, General Musharraf paid a visit to Saudi Arabia, and former Pakistani Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali visited the Kingdom twice. But the United States had warned Pakistan for the first time in December 2003 against providing nuclear assistance to Saudi Arabia. Concerns over possible Pak-Saudi nuclear cooperation intensified after the October 22-23, 2003, visit of Saudia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz to Pakistan. The pro-US Saudi Defence Minister Prince Sultan, who is next in line to succeed to the throne after Abdullah, was not part of the delegation. During that visit, American intelligence circles allege, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia concluded a secret agreement on nuclear cooperation that was meant to provide the Saudis with nuclear-weapons technology in exchange for cheap oil.
However, in 2005, the US claims to have acquired fresh evidence that suggests a broader government-to-government Pak-Saudi atomic collaboration that could be continuing. According to well-placed diplomatic sources, chartered Saudi C-130 Hercules transporters made scores of trips between the Dhahran military base and several Pakistani cities, including Lahore and Karachi, between October 2003 and October 2004, and thereafter, considerable contacts were reported between Pakistani and Saudi nuclear scientists. Between October 2004 and January 2005, under cover of Haj, several Pakistani scientists allegedly visited Riyadh, and remained "missing" from their designated hotels for fifteen to twenty days.
The closeness between Islamabad and Riyadh has been phenomenal and it is not without significance that the first foreign tour of General Pervez Musharraf, who ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in October 1999, was to Saudi Arabia. Moreover, Sharif himself, his younger brother, Shehbaz Sharif and their families live in Saudi Arabia after a secret exile deal between Musharraf and Sharif, in which Riyadh had played a key role. During Sharif's prime ministerial tenure, the Americans believe, Saudi Arabia had been involved in funding Islamabad's missile and nuclear programme purchases from China, as a result of which Pakistan became a nuclear weapon-producing and proliferating state. There are also apprehensions that Riyadh was buying nuclear-capability from China through a proxy state, with Pakistan serving as the cut-out.
Following Khan's first admission of proliferation to Iran, Libya and North Korea in January 2004, the Saudi authorities pulled out more than eighty ambassador-rank and senior diplomats from its missions around the world, mainly in Europe and Asia. The pull out is widely thought to have been meant to plug any likely leak of the Pak-Saudi nuclear link.
Before 9/11, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Pakistan were the only countries that recognized and aided Afghanistan's Taliban regime, which had been educated in Pakistan's religious schools. Despite the fall of the Taliban regime, the Saudis continue to fund these seminaries that are a substitute for Pakistan's non-existent national education system and largely produce Wahhabi extremists and Islamist terrorists. Also, a substantial proportion of their curricula, including the sections which preach hatred, has also emerged from that country.
Pakistan, with a crushing defence burden, only spends 1.7 per cent of GDP on education (compared to 4.3 per cent in India and 5 per cent in the United States). An estimated 15,000 religious schools provide free room and board to some 700,000 Pakistani boys (ages 6 to 16) where they are taught to read and write in Urdu and Arabic and recite the Holy Koran by heart. No other disciplines are taught, but students are indoctrinated with anti-American, anti-Israeli and anti-Indian propaganda, and encouraged to engage in jehad to defeat a 'global conspiracy to destroy Islam'. These schools supplied thousands of recruits for the Taliban militia in Afghanistan and are still being used to recruit militants to fight the US-led Allied Forces and the Afghan troops in that country.
While Saudi Arabia actively uses charities to promote Wahhabi extremism across the world, Pakistan has been the recipient of huge direct economic assistance from the desert kingdom. The Saudis have bailed out Islamabad over the past decade by supplying Pakistan with an estimated $ 1.2 billion of oil products annually, virtually free of cost. Just after the visit of Dr. A.Q. Khan to Saudi Arabia in November 1999, a Saudi nuclear expert, Dr. Al Arfaj, stated in Riyadh that "Saudi Arabia must make plans aimed at making a quick response to face the possibilities of nuclear warfare agents being used against the Saudi population, cities or armed forces."
Following the departure of American troops from its soil, the biggest problem for the Saudi Kingdom is how to deal with such nuclear contingencies. More recently, Saudi officials have discussed the procurement of new Pakistani intermediate-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Some concern remains that Saudi Arabia, like its neighbours, might be seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, apparently by purchase rather than indigenous development. The 2,700-kilometres range CSS-2 missiles the Kingdom obtained from China in 1987 are useless if fitted only with conventional warheads. One cannot, therefore, avoid the inference that, like the Pak-North Korean "nukes for missiles deal", Dr. Khan might have struck an "oil for nukes" deal with Saudi Arabia on behalf of Islamabad at a time when there is a growing homogeneity of strong Pan Islamic affiliations worldwide. If Dr. Khan's interaction with the scientists of Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Libya were similar to those during his reported visits to North Korea, norms of the nonproliferation regimes can be expected to have been more brazenly violated.
While the aspirations of a few Islamic countries to acquire nuclear weapons are wedded to the idea of the 'Islamic Bomb', the al-Qaeda's quest for components and know-how relating to weapons of mass destruction reflect on the potential rise of nuclear terror throughout the world. The role of wealthy and politically connected Saudi Arabian families in secretly funding al-Qaeda and other Islamist terror organizations has, till now, been kept deliberately in the background by Washington, largely out of sensitivity to the precarious internal situation in Saudi Arabia itself. King Fahd is near death, and his designated successor, Crown Prince Abdullah, is known to be more actively hostile to American foreign policy, and more sympathetic to militant Wahhabi Sunni currents in the Islamic world. Washington knows well that a head-on clash with the Saudi Royal House at present would serve the interests only of the radical faction inside the Royal family. A major strategic goal of the al-Qaeda's terror attacks within Saudi Arabia in recent years has been to escalate the pressure what are regarded as Western westernized corrupt elements of the Saudi Royal House, with the aim of replacing them with fanatical feudal Wahhabi elements - a kind of Talibanization of the Saudi Kingdom. The internal Saudi situation is complicated by the fact that many powerful Saudi families financially support the al-Qaeda effort as part of a strategy to purge the Kingdom of 'infidels and Western corruption'. In many cases these influential Saudis reach into the extended Royal family, including the murky figure of the former Saudi intelligence chief, Turki al-Faisal, son of the late King Faisal. The Americans had accused Turki's Faisal Islamic Bank of involvement in running accounts for Osama and his associates. Turki himself maintained ongoing ties with bin Laden even after the latter fled Saudi Arabia in the mid-1990's, after imprisonment by order of the King. Considered close to both Osama as well as A.Q. Khan, it was Prince Turki who had persuaded King Fahd to grant diplomatic recognition to the Taliban. The possibility of Turki having played a role in a nuclear deal between Osama and Khan cannot, consequently, be ruled out, especially when many members of the Pakistani military and nuclear establishments have been found involved in holding meetings with the al-Qaeda leader. The first indications of the presence of pro-jehadi scientists in Pakistan's nuclear establishment came to notice during the US-led allied forces' military operations in Afghanistan against al-Qaeda and the Taliban, when documents recovered by the troops reportedly spoke of the visits of Pakistani nuclear scientists, Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, to Kandahar when Osama was operating from there before 9/11. Bashiruddin was the first head of the Kahuta Uranium Enrichment project before Dr. A Q Khan, who replaced Bashiruddin in the 1970s.
Subsequent investigations carried out by American intelligence discovered that Osama had contacted these scientists for assistance in making a small nuclear device. On February 12, 2004, Dr. Khan appeared on Pakistan's state run Television after holding a lengthy meeting with General Musharraf and confessed to having been 'solely responsible' for operating an international black market in nuclear-weapons' materials. The next day, on television again, Musharraf, who claimed to be shocked by Khan's misdeeds, nonetheless pardoned him, citing his service to Pakistan (he called Khan 'my hero').
For two decades, the western media and their intelligence agencies have linked Dr. Khan and the Pakistani Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), to nuclear-technology transfers, and it was hard to credit the idea that the successive governments Dr. Khan served had been oblivious of these activities. In the post-9/11 period, analysts continue to express fears about the possibility of extremist Islamic groups like al-Qaeda gaining access to Pakistan's nuclear weapons or fissile or radioactive materials. Secret deals with Saudi Arabia can only aggravate such risks and concerns.
Many here will remember that there the US first approached Musharraf in Sep/Oct of 2003, a visit that was followed by a visit to Pakistan by Saudi Royals, and then followed by the deployment of some 3-4000 Pakistani troops in Saudi. At the time we wondered if those troops carried nukes with them.
The one thing that this C-130 business should teach our babus is that any american equipment must be expected to have its own location transmitter.
The one thing that this C-130 business should teach our babus is that any american equipment must be expected to have its own location transmitter.
MMS' remarks set paki pants on fire...Out comes the lifafa and BR lurker declares TS Nuclear plants safer...how did he arrive at this conclusion you might ask? Because, according to him and paki experts "Similarly Pakistan has developed an impressive command, control, computers and information (C4I) system for its weapons programme under a very professional and well-regulated Nuclear Command Authority."
http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/july-2005/23/index5.php
Indian reactors un-safeguarded
BY FARRUKH KHAN PITAFI
LAHORE - While India claims to have officially been anointed as a responsible nuclear state by the US, facts indicate that Pakistan’s civilian nuclear safety standards are much superior to that of India. To bolster the prevailing security measures further Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) has instituted a Directorate of Safety (DOS) recently focused at conducting safety audits of all PAEC establishments.
The directorate, which was created during the previous fiscal year will coordinate interaction between Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) and the relevant projects and establishment of PAEC.
During the last year DOS personnel performed preliminary inspection and audit of KANUPP Radiation Protection and Waste Management Systems. In addition, CENUM, INMOL Lahore, AEMC, KIRAN Karachi and PINUM Faisalabad projects were also visited to evaluate medical emergencies response standards.
Meanwhile 11 out of 15 Indian nuclear reactors remain unsafeguarded, most prominent among them remains the nuclear reactor at Tarapur. The said nuclear power plant was build by the US company General Electric after an agreement reached in 1962 and completed 25 years of safe operational life. For last the 15 years it continues to operate teetering at the brink of a nuclear catastrophe. And since India is not a signatory of the NPT, which grants immunity only to five countries from the IAEA inspections this site and several others despite being serious international concerns have not been inspected thus far.
Another horrible example of India’s nuclear instability is its Kalpakkam complex which located at the coast of the Indian Ocean was virtually swept away by the Asian Tsunami last year and 61 lives perished only in the complex’s residential area. The complex, only 16 to 20 feet above the sea level, was flooded by waves 30 to 40 feet high above the sea level. One of the reactors operational at the time was fortunately shut down by the emergency power outage and hence averted a nuclear disaster of great magnitude.
Incidentally, Indian nuclear weapon’s programme in itself was a breach of its promise to continue its civilian nuclear programme as the fuel used was procured from Canada for carrying out peaceful and civilian activities. A clear act of nuclear proliferation allegation of which India so vociferously tries to frame Pakistan with.
In 1974 the then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi acting on the recommendation of the then head of Indian Atomic Energy Commission Raja Ramana ordered to conduct detonation of a nuclear device which India ironically dubbed as “smiling Buddha”. The same act was repeated in 1998, which unnecessarily dragged Pakistan out of its nuclear ambiguity due to post-Pokharan Indian bullying-yet another example of psychological nuclear proliferation.
Meanwhile, PAEC’s DOS has also developed a Site Coordination Centre at CHASNUPP to continuously monitor the plant events. The team of IAEA International Regulatory Review Team (IRRT) comprising Richard Wessman of USNRC and Lyn Bevington was also granted access to CHASNUPP between 4-5 December, 2003 to observe the inspection and emergency planning and preparedness activities of PNRA. The IAEA Operational Safety Review Team (OSART) also visited CHASNUPP1 at the invitation of Pakistan from January 12, 2004 to January 30, 2004 to conduct operational safety review of Chashma Nuclear Power Plant.
DOS’s other responsibilities and achievements include the development and maintenance of the database of Heavy Electrical and Mechanical Equipment (HEME), advisory services to PAEC establishments, observation of the refuelling outage and developing PAEC’s responses to the international legal documents and concepts like the IAEA draft documents. DOS’s performance thus far, has been lauded by numerous international groups.
Similarly Pakistan has developed an impressive command, control, computers and information (C4I) system for its weapons programme under a very professional and well-regulated Nuclear Command Authority. Experts believe that even if after taking such tough precautions and steps the world considers an actual nuclear proliferator like India with such an unstable civilian nuclear programme more responsible than India then this Indian success should be attributed not to its quality control but to the propaganda establishment.
During the recent visit of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Washington the US president announced the willingness of the US to cooperate with India in its civilian nuclear programme subject to the Congress’ approval. If carried out this cooperation would imply a direct breach of the NPT and the agreements of the nuclear supplier groups which prohibit any of the supplier country from extending nuclear commerce to the countries which are not ready to open their civilian sites to the inspection of IAEA. The provision of nuclear fuel to India would also be tantamount to the creation of more fissile material so ripe to the access of international terror network in view of India’s crumbling nuclear edifice. This one exception may later become a rule in itself.
India also has not been able to make any exceptional cases of nuclear corruption public. While India crows about it as a proof of its nuclear safety standards, experts believe
that given the shabby condition the Indian programme is in and the rampant corruption in the country, this is nothing but papering over the cracks already visible through the propaganda. Some of the experts also believe that the discrepancy of the West’s attitude towards India and Pakistan might be due to the latter’s being a Muslim country against which an unspoken international apartheid exists. Pakistan, however, has vowed to continue to struggle to block any developments, which can make the region more ripe for proliferation.
http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/july-2005/23/index5.php
Indian reactors un-safeguarded
BY FARRUKH KHAN PITAFI
LAHORE - While India claims to have officially been anointed as a responsible nuclear state by the US, facts indicate that Pakistan’s civilian nuclear safety standards are much superior to that of India. To bolster the prevailing security measures further Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) has instituted a Directorate of Safety (DOS) recently focused at conducting safety audits of all PAEC establishments.
The directorate, which was created during the previous fiscal year will coordinate interaction between Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) and the relevant projects and establishment of PAEC.
During the last year DOS personnel performed preliminary inspection and audit of KANUPP Radiation Protection and Waste Management Systems. In addition, CENUM, INMOL Lahore, AEMC, KIRAN Karachi and PINUM Faisalabad projects were also visited to evaluate medical emergencies response standards.
Meanwhile 11 out of 15 Indian nuclear reactors remain unsafeguarded, most prominent among them remains the nuclear reactor at Tarapur. The said nuclear power plant was build by the US company General Electric after an agreement reached in 1962 and completed 25 years of safe operational life. For last the 15 years it continues to operate teetering at the brink of a nuclear catastrophe. And since India is not a signatory of the NPT, which grants immunity only to five countries from the IAEA inspections this site and several others despite being serious international concerns have not been inspected thus far.
Another horrible example of India’s nuclear instability is its Kalpakkam complex which located at the coast of the Indian Ocean was virtually swept away by the Asian Tsunami last year and 61 lives perished only in the complex’s residential area. The complex, only 16 to 20 feet above the sea level, was flooded by waves 30 to 40 feet high above the sea level. One of the reactors operational at the time was fortunately shut down by the emergency power outage and hence averted a nuclear disaster of great magnitude.
Incidentally, Indian nuclear weapon’s programme in itself was a breach of its promise to continue its civilian nuclear programme as the fuel used was procured from Canada for carrying out peaceful and civilian activities. A clear act of nuclear proliferation allegation of which India so vociferously tries to frame Pakistan with.
In 1974 the then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi acting on the recommendation of the then head of Indian Atomic Energy Commission Raja Ramana ordered to conduct detonation of a nuclear device which India ironically dubbed as “smiling Buddha”. The same act was repeated in 1998, which unnecessarily dragged Pakistan out of its nuclear ambiguity due to post-Pokharan Indian bullying-yet another example of psychological nuclear proliferation.
Meanwhile, PAEC’s DOS has also developed a Site Coordination Centre at CHASNUPP to continuously monitor the plant events. The team of IAEA International Regulatory Review Team (IRRT) comprising Richard Wessman of USNRC and Lyn Bevington was also granted access to CHASNUPP between 4-5 December, 2003 to observe the inspection and emergency planning and preparedness activities of PNRA. The IAEA Operational Safety Review Team (OSART) also visited CHASNUPP1 at the invitation of Pakistan from January 12, 2004 to January 30, 2004 to conduct operational safety review of Chashma Nuclear Power Plant.
DOS’s other responsibilities and achievements include the development and maintenance of the database of Heavy Electrical and Mechanical Equipment (HEME), advisory services to PAEC establishments, observation of the refuelling outage and developing PAEC’s responses to the international legal documents and concepts like the IAEA draft documents. DOS’s performance thus far, has been lauded by numerous international groups.
Similarly Pakistan has developed an impressive command, control, computers and information (C4I) system for its weapons programme under a very professional and well-regulated Nuclear Command Authority. Experts believe that even if after taking such tough precautions and steps the world considers an actual nuclear proliferator like India with such an unstable civilian nuclear programme more responsible than India then this Indian success should be attributed not to its quality control but to the propaganda establishment.
During the recent visit of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Washington the US president announced the willingness of the US to cooperate with India in its civilian nuclear programme subject to the Congress’ approval. If carried out this cooperation would imply a direct breach of the NPT and the agreements of the nuclear supplier groups which prohibit any of the supplier country from extending nuclear commerce to the countries which are not ready to open their civilian sites to the inspection of IAEA. The provision of nuclear fuel to India would also be tantamount to the creation of more fissile material so ripe to the access of international terror network in view of India’s crumbling nuclear edifice. This one exception may later become a rule in itself.
India also has not been able to make any exceptional cases of nuclear corruption public. While India crows about it as a proof of its nuclear safety standards, experts believe
that given the shabby condition the Indian programme is in and the rampant corruption in the country, this is nothing but papering over the cracks already visible through the propaganda. Some of the experts also believe that the discrepancy of the West’s attitude towards India and Pakistan might be due to the latter’s being a Muslim country against which an unspoken international apartheid exists. Pakistan, however, has vowed to continue to struggle to block any developments, which can make the region more ripe for proliferation.shireen-lite sees an equal-equal snub
US and South Asian nuclear question
Nasim Zehra
On July 19 late night, President General Pervez Musharraf received a call from the US Secretary of State Dr Condoleezza Rice. She wanted to reassure him that advances in the US strategic partnership with India was not at the cost of Pakistan's interests. Specifically, the US-Indo nuclear cooperation raises questions regarding Washington's de facto acceptance of India as a nuclear power.
Earlier the US Undersecretary of State, Nicholas Burns, pre-empting Pakistan's concerns had said, "The fact is that India has a record of non-proliferation, which is exceptional; very strong commitment to protection of fissile material, other nuclear materials and nuclear technology; and there is a transparency about India's programme, which has been welcomed."
A similar statement from Washington on Pakistan could obviously not be forthcoming. In fact moving beyond into the broader question of US strategy in South Asia the undersecretary added: "There is no reason for us to have a hyphenated strategic framework for South Asia. There are issues where the US policy intersects and there are issues where we can have individual relationships with both countries."
On nuclear cooperation with India, he specifically said that "certainly in the case of civil nuclear cooperation, we are going to have individual relationships."
India's acquisition under the deal of missile defence capability would undermine nuclear deterrence in South Asia. In South Asia, India would be the US partner on PSI. The PSI initiative "a coalition of the willing" would work as a parallel system to the international law of the Sea. And of course the one with more "punch".
This would finally undermine the international law of the Sea. PSI partners will be mandated to be the international cops with powers for forced inspection of traffic on the high seas and in international airspace.
Any suspicion of transportation of WMD material or components would justify cop action. Now the nuclear cooperation agreement after the Manmohan visit adds a new angle to Pakistan's concerns. Is India now on the brink of being accepted as a nuclear power? India too is playing its cards on the nuclear question.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's comments during his July 20 interview on two issues in particular reveals Indian thinking on what nuclear-related issues they want internationalised from within the Pakistani context. One, extremists coming into power in Pakistan and gaining control of the nuclear bomb. Two, that some arrangements could be made to ensure the safety of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.
Manmohan Singh was not the first man to articulate these concerns. Only he must have believed repeating this would help India stand apart from Pakistan as one of the two nuclear states in South Asia. He was framing them as a risk-free versus the risky nuclear power; hence justifying Congressional clearance for US support to India by side-stepping US regulation calling for no nuclear cooperation with countries having violated US proliferation laws. Also India wants to position itself as internationally acknowledged "commanding" power in South Asia. The one that qualifies for overseeing regional security and the US now seems to be acknowledging that Indian role.
Clearly, the expectation in Islamabad from its US friend is more than the US is willing to "give" at this juncture. Many question marks remain in Washington on Pakistan's operational policies on the nuclear, Taliban and broader terrorism issues. Often Washington uses Pakistan's weak democratic credentials to explain the limits to strategic cooperation.
Pak-Indian "cold and hot wars" had previously pinned down India to South Asia. Pakistan despite being granted the status of a Major Non-Nato Ally by the US has yet not been offered such a comprehensive package. While Pakistan remains Washington's key ally in the ongoing war on terrorism, it is with India that in substance of its long-term strategic partnership has grown.
Pakistan as yet has not been offered a comprehensive strategic package despite being granted the status of a Major Non-Nato Ally. Only some planes, joint exercises coupled with relentless discussion in the media, often through inspired leaks, if Pakistan can really be "trusted". The current reading is unmistakable ... relationship of limited utility? Yes. Of broader strategic engagement? ... Not yet.
US and South Asian nuclear question
Nasim Zehra
On July 19 late night, President General Pervez Musharraf received a call from the US Secretary of State Dr Condoleezza Rice. She wanted to reassure him that advances in the US strategic partnership with India was not at the cost of Pakistan's interests. Specifically, the US-Indo nuclear cooperation raises questions regarding Washington's de facto acceptance of India as a nuclear power.
Earlier the US Undersecretary of State, Nicholas Burns, pre-empting Pakistan's concerns had said, "The fact is that India has a record of non-proliferation, which is exceptional; very strong commitment to protection of fissile material, other nuclear materials and nuclear technology; and there is a transparency about India's programme, which has been welcomed."
A similar statement from Washington on Pakistan could obviously not be forthcoming. In fact moving beyond into the broader question of US strategy in South Asia the undersecretary added: "There is no reason for us to have a hyphenated strategic framework for South Asia. There are issues where the US policy intersects and there are issues where we can have individual relationships with both countries."
On nuclear cooperation with India, he specifically said that "certainly in the case of civil nuclear cooperation, we are going to have individual relationships."
India's acquisition under the deal of missile defence capability would undermine nuclear deterrence in South Asia. In South Asia, India would be the US partner on PSI. The PSI initiative "a coalition of the willing" would work as a parallel system to the international law of the Sea. And of course the one with more "punch".
This would finally undermine the international law of the Sea. PSI partners will be mandated to be the international cops with powers for forced inspection of traffic on the high seas and in international airspace.
Any suspicion of transportation of WMD material or components would justify cop action. Now the nuclear cooperation agreement after the Manmohan visit adds a new angle to Pakistan's concerns. Is India now on the brink of being accepted as a nuclear power? India too is playing its cards on the nuclear question.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's comments during his July 20 interview on two issues in particular reveals Indian thinking on what nuclear-related issues they want internationalised from within the Pakistani context. One, extremists coming into power in Pakistan and gaining control of the nuclear bomb. Two, that some arrangements could be made to ensure the safety of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.
Manmohan Singh was not the first man to articulate these concerns. Only he must have believed repeating this would help India stand apart from Pakistan as one of the two nuclear states in South Asia. He was framing them as a risk-free versus the risky nuclear power; hence justifying Congressional clearance for US support to India by side-stepping US regulation calling for no nuclear cooperation with countries having violated US proliferation laws. Also India wants to position itself as internationally acknowledged "commanding" power in South Asia. The one that qualifies for overseeing regional security and the US now seems to be acknowledging that Indian role.
Clearly, the expectation in Islamabad from its US friend is more than the US is willing to "give" at this juncture. Many question marks remain in Washington on Pakistan's operational policies on the nuclear, Taliban and broader terrorism issues. Often Washington uses Pakistan's weak democratic credentials to explain the limits to strategic cooperation.
Pak-Indian "cold and hot wars" had previously pinned down India to South Asia. Pakistan despite being granted the status of a Major Non-Nato Ally by the US has yet not been offered such a comprehensive package. While Pakistan remains Washington's key ally in the ongoing war on terrorism, it is with India that in substance of its long-term strategic partnership has grown.
Pakistan as yet has not been offered a comprehensive strategic package despite being granted the status of a Major Non-Nato Ally. Only some planes, joint exercises coupled with relentless discussion in the media, often through inspired leaks, if Pakistan can really be "trusted". The current reading is unmistakable ... relationship of limited utility? Yes. Of broader strategic engagement? ... Not yet.
Meanwhile the rewards for proliferating :
‘Pakistan top recipient of IAEA technical assistance’
Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has become the top recipient of the IAEA’s technical assistance among the member states because of its active participation in the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) technical co-operation programme and training to IAEA fellows at the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC).
Parvez Butt, PAEC chairman, said this at the opening of a one-week PAEC/IAEA research coordination workshop on irradiation of fruits and vegetables to ensure hygienic quality and enhancing their shelf life, on Monday, says a press release.
He said that 20 IAEA funded projects were being carried out at various PAEC institutes and the PAEC’s labs at PINSTECH had been declared regional resource units of the IAEA. ………..
Link
Nothingnew here, but interesting stuff for party-talk and next BR meet:
Part 1 :: Nuclear Underground
Part 2 :: Nuclear Underground
Part 3 :: Nuclear Underground
Transcript of interview with the Pakistani (Khan) (Ironically named the Guru!!!!!):
Part 1 :: Nuclear Underground
Part 2 :: Nuclear Underground
Part 3 :: Nuclear Underground
Transcript of interview with the Pakistani (Khan) (Ironically named the Guru!!!!!):
"Nuclear Underground" - FRONTLINE/World Investigation: JUNE 2005 - The Guru
Transcript: Humayun Khan audio interview
IT WAS NEARLY MIDNIGHT IN CALIFORNIA, MORNING IN PAKISTAN. I'D BEEN TRYING TO CATCH UP WITH HUMAYUN KHAN FOR WEEKS...
Humayun Khan: Hello.
Mark Schapiro: Good morning, Mr. Khan?
Khan: Good morning, yes.
KHAN WAS THE PAKISTANI BUSINESSMAN INDICTED BY THE U.S. GOVERNMENT IN ONE OF THE BIGGEST NUCLEAR SMUGGLING CASES IN YEARS. FOR STARTERS, I WANTED TO KNOW HOW KHAN, A MUSLIM IN ISLAMABAD, HAD EVER TEAMED UP IN THIS DEAL WITH ASHER KARNI, AN ORTHODOX JEW WHO OPERATED A HIGH-TECH TRADING FIRM IN SOUTH AFRICA.
Schapiro: How did you find Mr. Karni? How did you end up working with him?
Khan: Surfing through the Web, we came across Eagle Corporation in South Africa...It was very unfortunate that he introduced himself as a Muslim.
Schapiro: Aha, he told you he was a Muslim man?
Khan: Yes, because you see, Mark, I'm sure you must have heard that Asher Karni is a Muslim name. In Pakistan also, I know a few people whose names are "Asher" and "Karni."
I TRIED TO GET HIM TO EXPLAIN HOW THE DEAL WITH KARNI HAD GONE DOWN...
Schapiro: And then you asked him for the triggered spark gaps at that stage?
Khan: No, actually, we did not. We were not dealing in such equipments and we did not ask him for any of such things because you see...if we had wanted such items, and if we had wanted to buy, we would not jeopardize our name, and company name and such a brand name, to go ask in the market openly that we want these things, you know?
HE OFFERED VARIOUS EXPLANATIONS -- AMONG THEM, NOT EVEN BEING IN THE OFFICE WHEN THE NUCLEAR DEAL WAS BROKERED.
Khan: Actually Mark at that period of time when these transactions took place, I mean when my people investigated, I was on leave for about a year and a half. I was not in Islamabad and not in my office because my wife was terminally ill and we were trying to actually save her life. And for a whole one year and a half I was out of my office.
THE EMAIL TRAFFIC BETWEEN KARNI AND KHAN STRETCHED OVER NEARLY SIX MONTHS. THEY WERE ALTERNATELY PURE BUSINESS; SOMETIMES URGENT; OCCASIONALLY EXHIBITING A TWIST OF HUMOR. IN ONE, WHILE OFFERING ADVICE TO KARNI ON HOW TO AVOID EXPORT CONTROLS, KHAN CALLS HIMSELF "THE GURU."
Schapiro: You do sound like quite an expert in the technology. I remember in one of the emails, I think it was in May 2003, you told Mr. Karni that you were the guru. You signed it "guru." Do people call you the guru in Pakistan?
Khan: [laughs] No, I don't, I never write such things. I'm just honored to learn that. I don't, you know, OK, I'm expert in what I sell in my equipment that was electronics. OK, if you sell equipment for such a long time, of course you're an expert on your own product. So, I never ... I don't think I ever wrote such words or things like that.
Schapiro: That's not what it looks like in the correspondence between you...
THE PROBLEM IS THAT OVER SIX MONTHS, KHAN'S NAME IS ALL OVER THOSE EMAILS. IN SOME HE EVEN SIGNS OFF, SIMPLY, "BEST REGARDS, HUMAYU..."
Khan: Yeah, I know. Everything is pointing right at me.... Everybody knew my name. We think we were there at the wrong time. I think I was made a scapegoat.
KHAN WAS ANXIOUS TO CLEAR HIS NAME: IT WASN'T HE WHO IMPORTED THE NUCLEAR TRIGGERS, IT WAS HIS EMPLOYEE, NOW LIVING IN DUBAI -- A MAN NAMED MOHAMMAD ROFFI. AS A MUSLIM, HE WOULD NEVER DO BUSINESS WITH AN ISRAELI. HIS WIFE WAS SICK, HE WAS OUT OF TOWN. THEN AT ONE POINT IN THE CONVERSATION, KHAN SHIFTS GEARS -- AND SEEMS TO ACKNOWLEGE SOME RESPONSIBILITY.
Khan: OK. It was our mistake. I mean we did not know who that person was. If we knew that person, the origin of that person, we would never have done business, let alone a small amount, or millions you know.
THE U.S. GOVERNMENT BELIVES THAT HUMAYUN KHAN, LIKE ASHER KARNI, WAS A MIDDLEMAN. TWO MIDDLEMEN CUTTING THEMSELVES IN ON A DEAL TO SUPPLY NUCLEAR TRIGGERS TO SOMEONE -- KNOW ONE KNOWS FOR SURE WHO. IT WASN'T THE HOSPITAL THAT KARNI CLAIMED WAS THE BUYER. HOSPITALS NEVER ORDER MORE THAN HALF A DOZEN OF THOSE TRIGGERS AT ANY GIVEN TIME. KARNI AND KHAN ORDERED 200. SIXTY-SIX OF THOSE TRIGGERS WERE ULTIMATELY DELIVERED TO KHAN'S OFFICE IN ISLAMABAD. FORTUNATELY THEY'D BEEN DISABLED BY U.S. AGENTS WHO UNCOVERED THE DEAL.
SPECULATION IS THAT KHAN'S CLIENT WAS THE PAKISTANI MILITARY -- WHO HE HAS WORKED WITH BEFORE -- A MILITARY, WHICH POSSESES NUCLEAR WEAPONS. KHAN SCOFFS AT THAT SUGGESTION...
Khan: Pakistan is not a rich country. Not as rich as India or things like that. We just cannot develop 200 bombs or whatever you say. You can imagine yourself that a country like Pakistan cannot develop 200 bombs.
Schapiro: Well, I don't know how many bombs Pakistan has. How many do they have?
Khan: [laughs] That is a good question.
Schapiro: Can you give me an estimate?
Khan: No. [laughs] I don't know. We actually try to stay away from such customers. And the fact...because we had...we did stay away from such customers and such government departments, that is why we survive so long. We don't touch fire [laughs].
THE CONVERSATION CONTINUED; THE DARKER IT GOT IN CALIFORNIA, THE LIGHTER IT GOT IN PAKISTAN. EXPLANATIONS KEPT COMING. FINALLY IT CAME DOWN TO THE ISRAELIS.
Khan: I think now Israel remains a lobby that has always been working against Pakistan -- U.S. relations.
Schapiro: Yes, but even if Asher Karni, excuse me...
Khan: Mark, in Pakistan we believe that Asher Karni is working with an Israeli intelligence and it was all preplanned.
ONE OF THE ODDITIES OF THIS CASE IS THAT THE ORDER FOR THE NUCLEAR TRIGGERS CAME FROM A COMPANY THAT BORE THE INITIALS "AJKMC" -- THE SAME INITIALS AS A MILITANT MUSLIM GROUP IN KASHMIR, WHERE THE TWO NUCLEAR POWERS, INDIA AND PAKISTAN, HAVE BEEN ENGAGED IN A LONG-RUNNING BORDER DISPUTE. THOSE INITIALS LED A U.S. AGENT TO SPECULATE THAT THE TRIGGERS MIGHT HAVE BEEN DESTINED FOR KASHMIRI TERRORISTS.
Schapiro: And who is AJKMC lithography? Who are they? AJKMC?
Khan: I don't know, we never heard of this company. And one very astonishing and funny thing is that I read in your article that they're saying I belong to a militant group, some Kashmir side or thing like that. If you know me, I spend a lot of time in Europe and Southeast Asia, you know. Even I don't call myself a good Muslim because I am not. [laughs] If you knew that, you would laugh at this statement. I mean my lifestyle and living standard is -- it's just European and the Far East. We don't even pray that much. And everyone was laughing that a person like myself would be considered a militant for the Kashmiris and all that. I mean that is unheard of. That is a very, very funny thing.
LAST MARCH, THE COMMERCE DEPARTMENT CUT OFF HUMAYUN KHAN'S COMPANY PAKLAND FROM ALL TRADE WITH THE UNITED STATES. THEN IN APRIL THEY INDICTED KHAN HIMSELF FOR VIOLATING U.S. EXPORT CONTROL LAWS. HE FACES UP TO 35 YEARS IN PRISON. KHAN CONTINUES TO ASSERT HIS INNOCENCE.
Khan: I am only interested in clearing my name.
Schapiro: I understand that.
Khan: I really don't care about what goes on with my country or what goes on with any other thing. I am only concerned because I have to feed my own house and I have to run my own house and my company...If I had done such a thing, or if I had done this, my own people would take such a strong action against me for putting our name out in the world that they would really shut me down and put me away, you know.
THE COMMERCE DEPARTMENT SAYS THAT KHAN'S CASE IS A SENSITIVE ONE, INVOLVING THE GOVERNMENT OF A CLOSE ALLY IN THE WAR ON TERROR. THEY SAY THEY ARE IN "DISCUSSIONS" WITH PRESIDENT MUSHARRAF. AS OF TODAY, KHAN REMAINS A FREE MAN IN PAKISTAN.
THIS IS MARK SCHAPIRO FOR FRONTLINE/WORLD.
New York Times :
July 29, 2005
U.S. Offers North Korea Evidence That Nuclear Secrets Came From Pakistani's Network
By DAVID E. SANGER and JIM YARDLEY
WASHINGTON, July 28 - In negotiations with North Korea this week, the Bush administration has for the first time presented the country with specific evidence behind American allegations that North Korea secretly obtained uranium enrichment technology from a founder of Pakistan's nuclear program, two senior administration officials said.
The decision to share the intelligence with North Korean negotiators, the officials said, was part of an effort to convince North Korea that any discussions about disarmament must cover not only the nuclear weapons program it has boasted about, but a second one that it now denies exists.
Putting on the table the evidence that North Korea obtained technology from the network built by Abdul Qadeer Khan is significant because it is an effort to break an impasse over the scope of North Korea's nuclear program.
American officials were reluctant to describe the North Korean response, but one official said that when presented with the evidence - chiefly the testimony of Mr. Khan - "they argue with us about it."
American officials have never made public the details of Mr. Khan's statements to Pakistani officials, who have declined to make him available for direct interrogation. But they have shared the information widely with Asian allies, and elements of it have leaked out, including Mr. Khan's assertion - doubted by several specialists in the American intelligence community - that the North Koreans once showed him what they said were three fully assembled nuclear weapons.
The two Bush administration officials declined to speak on the record, citing the delicacy of both the intelligence and the current negotiations. They would not describe how much detail had been given to the North Koreans. The presentation came in the first two days of talks in Beijing, which American officials said may stretch into next week. On Thursday, American negotiators, led by Christopher R. Hill, moved past generalities in talks with North Korea and focused on the specifics of their dispute over the nuclear program.
Later, Mr. Hill said he hoped the talks had advanced enough so that the six nations taking part could soon start drafting a statement that would advance the disarmament process. The other participants are China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.
Mr. Hill said North Korea and the United States found some "common understanding" in their meeting Thursday, but added that "a lot of differences" remained.
"I want to caution people not to think we are coming to the end of this," Mr. Hill told reporters.
North Korea has long admitted to turning spent plutonium fuel from its nuclear reactors into bomb fuel. That program is centered at the Yongbyon complex.
In February, North Korea declared for the first time that it was a nuclear weapons state. It said it had reprocessed 8,000 fuel rods, turning them into weapons fuel. Specialists inside and outside the government say that fuel could be used to produce six or more nuclear weapons, but there is no independent evidence to confirm that the weapons have been produced.
There has long been a dispute about a second nuclear program, one the United States alleges that North Korea began in the 1990's, when the Yongbyon plant was "frozen" under a 1994 accord. That program, the United States alleges, aims at producing enriched uranium, a process easier to hide than producing plutonium. American officials, who first told North Korea that they had evidence of the program in 2002, say North Korea initially admitted to it. Since then, North Korea has denied the program's existence.
A senior administration official told reporters Thursday evening that any agreement must include dismantling both programs. But intelligence officials have said they do not know where the uranium program is.
"We don't want to be inspecting every tunnel where it might be hidden," the senior official said. "They've got to give it up. That's how the Libyans did it," he said, a reference to Libya's decision to dismantle its program.
Mr. Hill has recently emphasized it is unlikely that this fourth round of talks will produce a breakthrough but that participants instead are hoping to agree to a statement of "shared principles." In Washington, an official said the first two principles should be a commitment to denuclearization of the Korean peninsula - which North Korea has agreed to before - and a commitment that North Korea would not transfer nuclear technology to any other state or outside group.
The regularity and length of private meetings this week between the United States and North Korea has underscored the vast difference between these and earlier talks when only short and unannounced private discussions took place. Much of the negotiating this week has centered on such diplomatic wrangling as finding a shared definition of denuclearization.
"We're pretty close on that," Mr. Hill said.
The definition has been a sticking point because North Korea has reportedly tried to use it to challenge whether the United States has nuclear weapons in South Korea, a charge the Americans deny.
Earlier this year, North Korea suggested that the focus of the talks should shift to mutual arms reduction. On Thursday, Mr. Hill took an implicit verbal slap at these tactics. "The issue for us was to try to keep these concepts with some basis in reality and not go too far away with polemical ideas or rhetorical ideas," he said.
Aleksandr Alekseyev, Russia's top envoy, met privately with both the Americans and the North Koreans on Thursday. "We got the feeling it was a very difficult, concrete talk," he said. He said the two countries moved beyond generalities and began discussing their standoff in specific details.
David E. Sanger reported from Washington for this article, and Jim Yardley from Beijing. Chris Buckley contributed reporting from Beijing.
Older Article that Surfaced on Sulekha --- Published Mar'2005.
Special Report
Sibel Edmonds' spring 2005 offensive
FBI shields Pakistan/Turkey nuclear weapons development, drug trade, Cheney, Rumsfeld
By John Stanton
Online Journal Contributing Writer
Download a .pdf file for printing.
Adobe Acrobat Reader required.
Click here to download a free copy.
March 9, 2005—With Sibel Edmonds once again in the news, and with media interest in her case increasing, it's worth speculating, again*, about her knowledge by attempting to connect some of the many dots found in a public record that stretches back into the Ford Administration and that culminates, in part, with Pakistan's nuclear tests in 1998. The story has so many dots and cross currents that it's easy to miss the more salient items.
But it's not too much of a stretch to say that the FBI's interest in asserting a "State Secrets" privilege begins way back in 1972 at which time Pakistan decided to begin development of a nuclear weapons program that would culminate in the detonation of a nuclear weapon in 1998 (Turkey can't be far behind in 2005), and successful US weapons sales of helicopters, fighter aircraft, missile guidance software, combat vehicles and parts to both Turkey and Pakistan over the same 1972 to 1998 timeframe, despite US arms strictures on sales of US weapons technology. In the seven years since 1998, matters have gotten worse.
It really is the same old story we've all read about for so many decades and features these recurring themes: the black market for nuclear weapons technology, drug trade and money laundering, lobbyists housed in powerful organization, espionage and bribes, and big political and business names. These murky matters are always classified by governments and business groups as Top Secret or Proprietary and always involve criminal activity on behalf of national security. Unfortunately, criminal, classified and business/national security interests have always managed to find their way into the same bed whether here in the USA or abroad.
It would be nice to say that the black market for nuclear weapons had its zenith in 1998. But that's not the case. It is larger and more daring with more economic clout and political cover than ever. Not a bad development for a network created on the back of a drug trafficking network established long before there was a Cold War. And with the current US administration implementing a "new" counterintelligence directorate, seemingly to trump the bad stuff that Sibel Edmonds' litigation might produce, it all seems to make some sense that in 2005 the US government and industry would be in preemptive/recreate threat mode.
Exorcise Me!
Religious types like to say that "God/Allah works in mysterious ways." Interestingly, thanks to September 11, 2001, it appears that such a God/Allah may have been at work to expose some of the demons in American government and business, and their counterparts at work around the world. Who would have thought that Sibel Edmonds would encounter a lot of archived and/or then current documentation flowing through the intelligence pipeline that exposed criminal activity across the board by an array of conniving characters. American, Turkish and Pakistani operations (and history), planned and unplanned, were, perhaps, uncovered by her in the brief but heady days of worldwide cross-intelligence agency sharing following 9-11. Imagine the treasure trove of finds!
The actors in this drama include cultural and semi-legitimate groups like the American Friends of Turkey/American Turkish Council (and affiliates and chapters); the Atlantic Council; American (CIA), Turkish (MIT) and Pakistan (ISI) intelligence agencies; Pentagon intelligence operatives like USAF Major Douglas Dickerson and Jan Malek Can Dickerson; former Turkish ministers like Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz under investigation for corruption; Turkish-run companies like Giza Technologies of New Jersey, implicated and then cleared of WMD proliferation charges**; and US officials Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
As an aside, US defense contractors—like Textron, Lockheed Martin and Halliburton–figure in this story too as they, with US government approval, have regularly exhibited at defense weapons expos in Turkey, Pakistan, and elsewhere for decades. Why China and Iran are vilified as of late for being legitimate participants in these Expos there and here in the USA remains an intriguing question. It's interesting to note that MSNBC reported that Cheney's big visit to China in 2004 included marketing Westinghouse's nuclear reactors to China. No surprise there as US nuclear technology has been marketed to the world over the years by Cheney and Rumsfeld (the latter in North Korea).
But go figure. Buying some conventional weapons capability and basic nuclear generation technology from dullard US defense contractors is one thing. The real question is this: How did Pakistan and Turkey escaped US scrutiny while developing nuclear weapons and Turkey helped pay for them with drug money and technology?
Dick and Don's Fabulous Adventure
The names Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld recur as reference points throughout American, Turkish, Pakistani relationships beginning as early as 1975 when President Gerald Ford, taking the advice of then staff members Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, vetoed the arms embargo on Pakistan. Earlier in 1974, the same two would save Turkey from a dreaded arms embargo. In 1999, with the Halliburton CEO hat on and before a crowd at the CATO Institute, a Cheney gem would surface telling the audience what the American people would never hear or understand. Cheney reminisced about Turkey and indicated, quite appropriately, that national security policy in the USA depends on lobbyists and the omnipotent organizations that house them.
"When I went to work for President Ford back in the summer of 1974, our first foreign policy crisis had to do with a dust up between the Greeks and the Turks, who had gone to war over the fate of Cyprus. The response of the Congress at that point was to impose an arms embargo on Turkey . . . we placed sanctions on Turkey and not on Greece. Why? It was not because it made sense from the standpoint of what was going on in Cyprus, or made sense from the standpoint of overall U.S. foreign policy. We sanctioned Turkey because the Greek-American lobby was significantly bigger and more effective than the Turkish-American lobby here at home. That's the sum total of why we did it. Ultimately, we were able to get it reversed. But it took numerous votes in Congress before we were able to turn it around."
Yes, indeed, and it wasn't long after 1974 that that the American Friends of Turkey/American Turkish Council (and affiliates) and the Atlantic Council would be up and running in Washington, DC, with the former featuring chapters and affiliations in Illinois, New Jersey, Texas and just about every state in the Union, plus overseas affiliations. The American Turkish groups are likely the "semi-legitimate" non-profit business and cultural groups housing the powerful lobbyists that Edmonds is referring to and that Cheney turns to for policy guidance.
But who can say?
The US has changed since Cheney and Rumsfeld appeared on the scene and it's tough to tell whether under their guidance the US government is a branch of Wall Street or some other madness. Most likely both, but that's another long story. Suffice it to say that Cheney has always believed that US business interests trump the whiney and ineffective elected US government representatives and civil servants.
In the same speech at the CATO Institute in 1999, he said, "I think it is a false dichotomy to be told that we have to choose between "commercial" interests and other interests that the United States might have in a particular country or region around the world. Oftentimes the absolute best way to advance human rights and the cause of freedom or the development of democratic institutions is through the active involvement of American businesses. Investment and trade can oftentimes do more to open up a society and to create opportunity for a society's citizens than reams of diplomatic cables from our State Department."
The Brotherhood: Pakistanis, Turks and Americans
Against the backdrop of the USA versus USSR Cold War, and the Iran versus Iraq war—US officials like Cheney and Rumsfeld—and those operating in and out of government, (and their counterparts in Pakistan and Turkey) took a Pontius Pilate approach to Pakistan's black market acquisition of nuclear weapons components, as well as Turkey's complicity in helping that cause through drug trade profits, to include the illicit manufacture of parts essential to a nuclear weapon. According to Anwar Iqbal of UPI (October 2004), Turkish workshops "made the centrifuge motor and frequency converters used to drive the motor and spin the rotor to high speeds. These workshops imported subcomponents from Europe and elsewhere, and they assembled these centrifuge items in Turkey. Under false end-user certificates, the components were then shipped to Dubai . . ."
It's 2005 and the US State Department has reported that Turkey remains one of the premier players in the world's drug trade. "Turkey remains a major route, and storage, production and staging area, for the flow of heroin to Europe. Turkish-based traffickers and brokers operate in conjunction with narcotics smugglers, laboratory operators, and money launderers in and outside Turkey . . . Turkish-based traffickers control much of the heroin marketed to Western Europe." Such a well established and efficient network has always been ideal for moving nuclear weapons components around the world and that effort continues unabated to this day.*** The high-altitude breathers in US government and industry could care less and they joke while diligent field agents around the globe follow dead ends confined in safely classified compartments.
Writing in 1997, Ertugrul Kurkcu commented that "few recall the era of military juntas in the early 1980s when Turkey's military rulers adopted a green belt strategy after the revolution in Iran and the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan. The idea, promoted in Washington circles was to construct a bulwark alliance of US-backed Muslim countries [Pakistan and Turkey] in order to confine Soviet southward expansion and to combat Radical Islamist power in Iran and elsewhere in the region."
Even with the USSR gone, US policy makers figured in the 1990s that Russia could never be trusted and "bad" Islamic regimes like Iran needed to be cut off from the rest of the world. After all, if for no reason other than spite, those nasty Iranians took a US Embassy hostage in 1978 and now in 2005 they have the audacity to try and build a nuclear weapon. One can only imagine that if the Shah of Iran had stayed in power the USA would be gloating over its wonderfully nuclear capable allies Iran and Turkey and their role in the War on Terror.
Be that as it may, through the years, the USA found alternatives to the Shah, most notably in Pakistan's current, and Western educated, President Musharaff, leader of the 1999 coup that made him president of Pakistan, and a host of other USA sponsored characters ostensibly in charge of Pakistan and Turkey since WWII. It was a perfect match made better by the fact that Musharaff—like most US supported rulers in the two countries—stated that "Pakistan and Turkey share a commonality of vision and a commonality of thought. Turks to me are brothers. Even to Pakistani children, Turks are brothers."
Add Americans and their children to all that brotherly love.
Deal of the Century
Pakistan's nuclear weapons technology acquisition program apparently piggybacked on Turkey's heroin trafficking expertise—an expertise established long before 1972. Pakistan could afford the price tag since it was being paid for by Turkish-laundered drug money with the technology invariably stolen by Pakistani and Turkish operatives working through "semi-legitimate" groups in the USA and elsewhere.
No operation of this scope or magnitude could go unnoticed by the US government, particularly since in Turkey's case, the CIA had been conducting post WWII "stay-behind" operations for at least 50 years.
If such activity was exposed, albeit indirectly through a nuclear test or a translator like Sibel Edmonds, it sure would be easy enough to blame a failure to detect it (just like 9-11) on a lack of human intelligence or the "peace dividend" that the end of the Cold War brought, or claim "State Secret" if someone like Sibel Edmonds were to see the goods and ask questions. Then again, there is the "compromising ongoing intelligence/military operations" rationale, but that moniker has been used and abused so many times that its usage is comedic.
In the end, no matter how the story is spun, it threatens to implicate the high and mighty in government and business in the USA, Turkey and Pakistan, and who knows how many assorted intelligence groups around the globe.
But that comes as no surprise to those in the governments that condone the criminal enterprises that run the show in the name of national security interests. But once and awhile, the upstarts and whistleblowers speak through intrepid journalists like Seymour Hersh of the New Yorker. Quoting former US and Pakistani diplomats in both The Deal (March 2004) and The Coming Wars (January 2005) published in the New Yorker, it's very obvious to any inquisitive person what's been going on for 33 years.
"Much of this has been known for decades to the American intelligence community. Sometimes you know things and don't want to do anything about it. Americans need to know that your government is not only downplaying this but covering it up. You go to bed with our ISI. They know how to suck up to you. You let us get away with everything. Why can't you be more honest? There's no harm in telling us the truth—'Look, you're an ally but a very disturbing ally.' You have to nip some of these things in the bud . . . The former senior American intelligence official was equally blunt. He told me, 'Khan [Father of the Pakistani bomb] was willing to sell blueprints, centrifuges, and the latest in weaponry. He was the worst nuclear-arms proliferator in the world and he's pardoned—with not a squeak from the White House.'"
To that, though, we must add the White Houses occupied by Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, and Clinton.
Preempting Sibel Edmonds' Legal Challenges
On March 5, the Associated Press reported that the Bush administration was rolling out an unclassified version of the first national U.S. counterintelligence strategy and a new organization to implement the plan. Approved by Bush II on March 1, and described as preemptive in nature, "it aims to combat intelligence services from countries hungry for U.S. military and nuclear secrets, such as China and Iran (whoops! forgot Pakistan and Turkey), both at home and abroad, US counterintelligence officials said." A couple of weeks earlier on February 16, current FBI Director, Robert Mueller, indicated his eye was on the counterintelligence ball, particularly those pesky intelligence services and semi-legitimate business groups referred to by Sibel Edmonds.
How much horrible comedy can one take? Two weeks before Edmonds went before the US Congress (March 2, 2005), Mueller and the Bush Administration stated the following.
"Of growing concern is the asymmetrical threat posed by certain intelligence services that supplement their collection capabilities in the US by using non-traditional collectors. These collectors include students, delegations, business visitors, émigrés, and retired intelligence officers [typically those who populate legal and ethical orgization conferences and exhibitions sanctioned by the US government and organized by Americans] who are collecting against targets of opportunity or responding to ad hoc requests from the intelligence services. US Government representatives participating in international conferences and exchanges, or whose duties include routine liaison with foreign intelligence representatives, frequently report that their contacts engage in elicitation, sometimes to a surprisingly aggressive level [example: Major Doug and Jan Dickerson's attempt to recruit Edmonds at her home].
"Such non-traditional collectors pose a potential threat across the US, requiring a coordinated response by all FBI field offices. Several countries appear to be exploiting their military liaison officers, who are in the US on overt, legitimate intelligence-sharing missions, to target and collect sensitive defense information that is outside the scope of their official access. Most difficult to identify and assess is the intelligence collection activity being directed and/or conducted by non-intelligence organizations, such as other foreign government agencies and/or foreign companies. The FBI sees this type of activity most frequently in the targeting and collection of Chemical, Biological Radiological, Nuclear and High Yield Explosives information and technology."
As Sibel Edmonds stated in an interview with Chris Deliso at Anitwar.com, the matter is not about 9-11 or being a savior. It's all about recovering the shattered remnants of accountability in the USA, which are as tough to find as an honest statement from Republicans and Democrats running the US government. Americans should thank the mysterious Sibel Edmonds for saying,"They're [the US government/business] afraid of information, of the truth coming out, and accountability–the whole accountability issue that will arise. But it's not as complicated as it might seem. If they were to allow the whole picture to emerge, it would just boil down to a whole lot of money and illegal activities."
Reference
* Related pieces: A Fantastic Tale: Turkey, Drugs, Faustian Alliances & Sibel Edmonds and The American Turkish Council: US Association Helps Create New EuroAsia/New World Order by John Stanton. Find them through Google. Many fine sites have posted them and I don't want to pick one over the other.
** For a good piece on the mechanics of the trade seek out Josh Myer writing in the LA Times, Case Reveals Nuts and Bolts of Nuclear Trade, May 2004. Anyone nutty enough to weather conspiracy theory accusations may want to pick up on his Nazi—1975 reference and link it to CIA stay-behind operations in Turkey.
*** United States Department of State, 2005 INCSR International Narcotics Control Strategy Report.
John Stanton is a Virginia based writer specializing in political and national security matters. This article, as promised, is a follow-up to The American Turkish Council: US Association Helps Create New EuroAsia/New World Order, one of now three speculative pieces on Sibel Edmonds and the US government. John is the author of America 2004: A Power But Not Super. Reach him at cioran123@yahoo.com.
Pakistan & Turkish Involvement in NUke Proliferation
Special Report
Sibel Edmonds' spring 2005 offensive
FBI shields Pakistan/Turkey nuclear weapons development, drug trade, Cheney, Rumsfeld
By John Stanton
Online Journal Contributing Writer
Download a .pdf file for printing.
Adobe Acrobat Reader required.
Click here to download a free copy.
March 9, 2005—With Sibel Edmonds once again in the news, and with media interest in her case increasing, it's worth speculating, again*, about her knowledge by attempting to connect some of the many dots found in a public record that stretches back into the Ford Administration and that culminates, in part, with Pakistan's nuclear tests in 1998. The story has so many dots and cross currents that it's easy to miss the more salient items.
But it's not too much of a stretch to say that the FBI's interest in asserting a "State Secrets" privilege begins way back in 1972 at which time Pakistan decided to begin development of a nuclear weapons program that would culminate in the detonation of a nuclear weapon in 1998 (Turkey can't be far behind in 2005), and successful US weapons sales of helicopters, fighter aircraft, missile guidance software, combat vehicles and parts to both Turkey and Pakistan over the same 1972 to 1998 timeframe, despite US arms strictures on sales of US weapons technology. In the seven years since 1998, matters have gotten worse.
It really is the same old story we've all read about for so many decades and features these recurring themes: the black market for nuclear weapons technology, drug trade and money laundering, lobbyists housed in powerful organization, espionage and bribes, and big political and business names. These murky matters are always classified by governments and business groups as Top Secret or Proprietary and always involve criminal activity on behalf of national security. Unfortunately, criminal, classified and business/national security interests have always managed to find their way into the same bed whether here in the USA or abroad.
It would be nice to say that the black market for nuclear weapons had its zenith in 1998. But that's not the case. It is larger and more daring with more economic clout and political cover than ever. Not a bad development for a network created on the back of a drug trafficking network established long before there was a Cold War. And with the current US administration implementing a "new" counterintelligence directorate, seemingly to trump the bad stuff that Sibel Edmonds' litigation might produce, it all seems to make some sense that in 2005 the US government and industry would be in preemptive/recreate threat mode.
Exorcise Me!
Religious types like to say that "God/Allah works in mysterious ways." Interestingly, thanks to September 11, 2001, it appears that such a God/Allah may have been at work to expose some of the demons in American government and business, and their counterparts at work around the world. Who would have thought that Sibel Edmonds would encounter a lot of archived and/or then current documentation flowing through the intelligence pipeline that exposed criminal activity across the board by an array of conniving characters. American, Turkish and Pakistani operations (and history), planned and unplanned, were, perhaps, uncovered by her in the brief but heady days of worldwide cross-intelligence agency sharing following 9-11. Imagine the treasure trove of finds!
The actors in this drama include cultural and semi-legitimate groups like the American Friends of Turkey/American Turkish Council (and affiliates and chapters); the Atlantic Council; American (CIA), Turkish (MIT) and Pakistan (ISI) intelligence agencies; Pentagon intelligence operatives like USAF Major Douglas Dickerson and Jan Malek Can Dickerson; former Turkish ministers like Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz under investigation for corruption; Turkish-run companies like Giza Technologies of New Jersey, implicated and then cleared of WMD proliferation charges**; and US officials Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
As an aside, US defense contractors—like Textron, Lockheed Martin and Halliburton–figure in this story too as they, with US government approval, have regularly exhibited at defense weapons expos in Turkey, Pakistan, and elsewhere for decades. Why China and Iran are vilified as of late for being legitimate participants in these Expos there and here in the USA remains an intriguing question. It's interesting to note that MSNBC reported that Cheney's big visit to China in 2004 included marketing Westinghouse's nuclear reactors to China. No surprise there as US nuclear technology has been marketed to the world over the years by Cheney and Rumsfeld (the latter in North Korea).
But go figure. Buying some conventional weapons capability and basic nuclear generation technology from dullard US defense contractors is one thing. The real question is this: How did Pakistan and Turkey escaped US scrutiny while developing nuclear weapons and Turkey helped pay for them with drug money and technology?
Dick and Don's Fabulous Adventure
The names Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld recur as reference points throughout American, Turkish, Pakistani relationships beginning as early as 1975 when President Gerald Ford, taking the advice of then staff members Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, vetoed the arms embargo on Pakistan. Earlier in 1974, the same two would save Turkey from a dreaded arms embargo. In 1999, with the Halliburton CEO hat on and before a crowd at the CATO Institute, a Cheney gem would surface telling the audience what the American people would never hear or understand. Cheney reminisced about Turkey and indicated, quite appropriately, that national security policy in the USA depends on lobbyists and the omnipotent organizations that house them.
"When I went to work for President Ford back in the summer of 1974, our first foreign policy crisis had to do with a dust up between the Greeks and the Turks, who had gone to war over the fate of Cyprus. The response of the Congress at that point was to impose an arms embargo on Turkey . . . we placed sanctions on Turkey and not on Greece. Why? It was not because it made sense from the standpoint of what was going on in Cyprus, or made sense from the standpoint of overall U.S. foreign policy. We sanctioned Turkey because the Greek-American lobby was significantly bigger and more effective than the Turkish-American lobby here at home. That's the sum total of why we did it. Ultimately, we were able to get it reversed. But it took numerous votes in Congress before we were able to turn it around."
Yes, indeed, and it wasn't long after 1974 that that the American Friends of Turkey/American Turkish Council (and affiliates) and the Atlantic Council would be up and running in Washington, DC, with the former featuring chapters and affiliations in Illinois, New Jersey, Texas and just about every state in the Union, plus overseas affiliations. The American Turkish groups are likely the "semi-legitimate" non-profit business and cultural groups housing the powerful lobbyists that Edmonds is referring to and that Cheney turns to for policy guidance.
But who can say?
The US has changed since Cheney and Rumsfeld appeared on the scene and it's tough to tell whether under their guidance the US government is a branch of Wall Street or some other madness. Most likely both, but that's another long story. Suffice it to say that Cheney has always believed that US business interests trump the whiney and ineffective elected US government representatives and civil servants.
In the same speech at the CATO Institute in 1999, he said, "I think it is a false dichotomy to be told that we have to choose between "commercial" interests and other interests that the United States might have in a particular country or region around the world. Oftentimes the absolute best way to advance human rights and the cause of freedom or the development of democratic institutions is through the active involvement of American businesses. Investment and trade can oftentimes do more to open up a society and to create opportunity for a society's citizens than reams of diplomatic cables from our State Department."
The Brotherhood: Pakistanis, Turks and Americans
Against the backdrop of the USA versus USSR Cold War, and the Iran versus Iraq war—US officials like Cheney and Rumsfeld—and those operating in and out of government, (and their counterparts in Pakistan and Turkey) took a Pontius Pilate approach to Pakistan's black market acquisition of nuclear weapons components, as well as Turkey's complicity in helping that cause through drug trade profits, to include the illicit manufacture of parts essential to a nuclear weapon. According to Anwar Iqbal of UPI (October 2004), Turkish workshops "made the centrifuge motor and frequency converters used to drive the motor and spin the rotor to high speeds. These workshops imported subcomponents from Europe and elsewhere, and they assembled these centrifuge items in Turkey. Under false end-user certificates, the components were then shipped to Dubai . . ."
It's 2005 and the US State Department has reported that Turkey remains one of the premier players in the world's drug trade. "Turkey remains a major route, and storage, production and staging area, for the flow of heroin to Europe. Turkish-based traffickers and brokers operate in conjunction with narcotics smugglers, laboratory operators, and money launderers in and outside Turkey . . . Turkish-based traffickers control much of the heroin marketed to Western Europe." Such a well established and efficient network has always been ideal for moving nuclear weapons components around the world and that effort continues unabated to this day.*** The high-altitude breathers in US government and industry could care less and they joke while diligent field agents around the globe follow dead ends confined in safely classified compartments.
Writing in 1997, Ertugrul Kurkcu commented that "few recall the era of military juntas in the early 1980s when Turkey's military rulers adopted a green belt strategy after the revolution in Iran and the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan. The idea, promoted in Washington circles was to construct a bulwark alliance of US-backed Muslim countries [Pakistan and Turkey] in order to confine Soviet southward expansion and to combat Radical Islamist power in Iran and elsewhere in the region."
Even with the USSR gone, US policy makers figured in the 1990s that Russia could never be trusted and "bad" Islamic regimes like Iran needed to be cut off from the rest of the world. After all, if for no reason other than spite, those nasty Iranians took a US Embassy hostage in 1978 and now in 2005 they have the audacity to try and build a nuclear weapon. One can only imagine that if the Shah of Iran had stayed in power the USA would be gloating over its wonderfully nuclear capable allies Iran and Turkey and their role in the War on Terror.
Be that as it may, through the years, the USA found alternatives to the Shah, most notably in Pakistan's current, and Western educated, President Musharaff, leader of the 1999 coup that made him president of Pakistan, and a host of other USA sponsored characters ostensibly in charge of Pakistan and Turkey since WWII. It was a perfect match made better by the fact that Musharaff—like most US supported rulers in the two countries—stated that "Pakistan and Turkey share a commonality of vision and a commonality of thought. Turks to me are brothers. Even to Pakistani children, Turks are brothers."
Add Americans and their children to all that brotherly love.
Deal of the Century
Pakistan's nuclear weapons technology acquisition program apparently piggybacked on Turkey's heroin trafficking expertise—an expertise established long before 1972. Pakistan could afford the price tag since it was being paid for by Turkish-laundered drug money with the technology invariably stolen by Pakistani and Turkish operatives working through "semi-legitimate" groups in the USA and elsewhere.
No operation of this scope or magnitude could go unnoticed by the US government, particularly since in Turkey's case, the CIA had been conducting post WWII "stay-behind" operations for at least 50 years.
If such activity was exposed, albeit indirectly through a nuclear test or a translator like Sibel Edmonds, it sure would be easy enough to blame a failure to detect it (just like 9-11) on a lack of human intelligence or the "peace dividend" that the end of the Cold War brought, or claim "State Secret" if someone like Sibel Edmonds were to see the goods and ask questions. Then again, there is the "compromising ongoing intelligence/military operations" rationale, but that moniker has been used and abused so many times that its usage is comedic.
In the end, no matter how the story is spun, it threatens to implicate the high and mighty in government and business in the USA, Turkey and Pakistan, and who knows how many assorted intelligence groups around the globe.
But that comes as no surprise to those in the governments that condone the criminal enterprises that run the show in the name of national security interests. But once and awhile, the upstarts and whistleblowers speak through intrepid journalists like Seymour Hersh of the New Yorker. Quoting former US and Pakistani diplomats in both The Deal (March 2004) and The Coming Wars (January 2005) published in the New Yorker, it's very obvious to any inquisitive person what's been going on for 33 years.
"Much of this has been known for decades to the American intelligence community. Sometimes you know things and don't want to do anything about it. Americans need to know that your government is not only downplaying this but covering it up. You go to bed with our ISI. They know how to suck up to you. You let us get away with everything. Why can't you be more honest? There's no harm in telling us the truth—'Look, you're an ally but a very disturbing ally.' You have to nip some of these things in the bud . . . The former senior American intelligence official was equally blunt. He told me, 'Khan [Father of the Pakistani bomb] was willing to sell blueprints, centrifuges, and the latest in weaponry. He was the worst nuclear-arms proliferator in the world and he's pardoned—with not a squeak from the White House.'"
To that, though, we must add the White Houses occupied by Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, and Clinton.
Preempting Sibel Edmonds' Legal Challenges
On March 5, the Associated Press reported that the Bush administration was rolling out an unclassified version of the first national U.S. counterintelligence strategy and a new organization to implement the plan. Approved by Bush II on March 1, and described as preemptive in nature, "it aims to combat intelligence services from countries hungry for U.S. military and nuclear secrets, such as China and Iran (whoops! forgot Pakistan and Turkey), both at home and abroad, US counterintelligence officials said." A couple of weeks earlier on February 16, current FBI Director, Robert Mueller, indicated his eye was on the counterintelligence ball, particularly those pesky intelligence services and semi-legitimate business groups referred to by Sibel Edmonds.
How much horrible comedy can one take? Two weeks before Edmonds went before the US Congress (March 2, 2005), Mueller and the Bush Administration stated the following.
"Of growing concern is the asymmetrical threat posed by certain intelligence services that supplement their collection capabilities in the US by using non-traditional collectors. These collectors include students, delegations, business visitors, émigrés, and retired intelligence officers [typically those who populate legal and ethical orgization conferences and exhibitions sanctioned by the US government and organized by Americans] who are collecting against targets of opportunity or responding to ad hoc requests from the intelligence services. US Government representatives participating in international conferences and exchanges, or whose duties include routine liaison with foreign intelligence representatives, frequently report that their contacts engage in elicitation, sometimes to a surprisingly aggressive level [example: Major Doug and Jan Dickerson's attempt to recruit Edmonds at her home].
"Such non-traditional collectors pose a potential threat across the US, requiring a coordinated response by all FBI field offices. Several countries appear to be exploiting their military liaison officers, who are in the US on overt, legitimate intelligence-sharing missions, to target and collect sensitive defense information that is outside the scope of their official access. Most difficult to identify and assess is the intelligence collection activity being directed and/or conducted by non-intelligence organizations, such as other foreign government agencies and/or foreign companies. The FBI sees this type of activity most frequently in the targeting and collection of Chemical, Biological Radiological, Nuclear and High Yield Explosives information and technology."
As Sibel Edmonds stated in an interview with Chris Deliso at Anitwar.com, the matter is not about 9-11 or being a savior. It's all about recovering the shattered remnants of accountability in the USA, which are as tough to find as an honest statement from Republicans and Democrats running the US government. Americans should thank the mysterious Sibel Edmonds for saying,"They're [the US government/business] afraid of information, of the truth coming out, and accountability–the whole accountability issue that will arise. But it's not as complicated as it might seem. If they were to allow the whole picture to emerge, it would just boil down to a whole lot of money and illegal activities."
Reference
* Related pieces: A Fantastic Tale: Turkey, Drugs, Faustian Alliances & Sibel Edmonds and The American Turkish Council: US Association Helps Create New EuroAsia/New World Order by John Stanton. Find them through Google. Many fine sites have posted them and I don't want to pick one over the other.
** For a good piece on the mechanics of the trade seek out Josh Myer writing in the LA Times, Case Reveals Nuts and Bolts of Nuclear Trade, May 2004. Anyone nutty enough to weather conspiracy theory accusations may want to pick up on his Nazi—1975 reference and link it to CIA stay-behind operations in Turkey.
*** United States Department of State, 2005 INCSR International Narcotics Control Strategy Report.
John Stanton is a Virginia based writer specializing in political and national security matters. This article, as promised, is a follow-up to The American Turkish Council: US Association Helps Create New EuroAsia/New World Order, one of now three speculative pieces on Sibel Edmonds and the US government. John is the author of America 2004: A Power But Not Super. Reach him at cioran123@yahoo.com.
Pakistan & Turkish Involvement in NUke Proliferation
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld ... ines-world
Man Gets 3 Years for Sales Linked to Nuclear Arms
Federal judge sentences Asher Karni, a South African, for illegally transferring high-tech U.S. products to Indian and Pakistani firms.
By Josh Meyer
Times Staff Writer
August 5, 2005
WASHINGTON — A federal judge sentenced black market trader Asher Karni to three years in prison Thursday, saying he wanted to warn others that the illegal sale of U.S. high-tech products could help foreign governments or terrorists obtain nuclear weapons.
After hearing Karni apologize for selling blacklisted U.S. electronic components to companies in Pakistan and India, U.S. District Judge Richard M. Urbina told the former Israeli army major that no amount of contrition could make up for the potential threat posed by his actions.
"I want you to know how serious I think your conduct was," Urbina told Karni, emphasizing that he was sentencing him to a prison term longer than that requested by his defense lawyers to send a message to the public.
Citing Karni's extensive cooperation in an ongoing nuclear trafficking investigation, lawyers for the South Africa-based businessman had sought a 19-month sentence. That would have freed Karni immediately because he has been in federal custody since his arrest Jan. 1, 2004, at Denver International Airport.
Urbina shaved six years off the maximum term Karni could have received under complex federal sentencing guidelines, saying he was doing so because of Karni's cooperation.
But the judge said he was deeply troubled by Karni's central role in a conspiracy to sell U.S. high-tech components to firms in Pakistan and India that Washington believes are part of those countries' nuclear-weapons and missile programs.
Assistant U.S. Atty. Jay I. Bratt told the judge that Karni sold blacklisted products to entities in Pakistan and India on at least 17 occasions, a much larger number than authorities had previously disclosed.
Bratt, a veteran prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's Office transnational/major crimes section, described the Karni case as perhaps the most serious threat to national security that he has encountered.
Urbina said he was most alarmed by Karni's admitted use in 2003 of a web of intermediaries to buy 200 precision electrical switches, known as triggered spark gaps, from a Massachusetts firm and then ship them to a business associate in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital.
At the time, Urbina said, Karni and the associate, Humayun Khan, knew that the U.S. government prohibited the sale of the components to Pakistan because of their potential use in detonating nuclear warheads. The two men went to great lengths to camouflage the end user, the judge said.
But two Commerce Department agents had received a tip from an informant in South Africa and were monitoring the shipment. They disabled the first shipment of 66 spark gaps before Karni received them and forwarded them to Khan, and later used Karni's cooperation to obtain a grand jury indictment of the Islamabad arms merchant, who had close ties to the Pakistani military.
Khan, who is no relation to Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, who operated a global network that smuggled nuclear technology, has denied wrongdoing in interviews with the Los Angeles Times. U.S. authorities would not say Thursday whether they had requested his extradition from Pakistan. Pakistani officials also have had no comment on the case, except to deny trying to illegally purchase U.S. technology for their nuclear weapons program.
Bratt said in court Thursday that the U.S. government still did not know for whom Khan was purchasing the spark gaps or where the disabled components were.
But Bratt told the judge that the buyer was either the government of Pakistan and its nuclear program, another country that Pakistan was secretly helping with its nuclear program or a Pakistani political organization that supported "jihadist elements" or other rogue groups.
"The choices for the true recipient of the triggered spark gaps are not comforting," Bratt said.
He also told Urbina that, based on wiretapped conversations with several of his employees, Karni appeared to have tried to continue his trafficking operations even while in federal custody after his arrest.
Urbina, like Bratt, stopped short of specifically identifying the Islamabad government as the end user of the components Karni sent to Pakistan.
But he said unnamed foreign governments and terrorists "have become incredibly creative in finding ways to wreak death and destruction. These are incredibly malevolent people who wish to be armed with very bad things," such as nuclear weapons.
In the courtroom for Karni's sentencing were the two Commerce Department agents who have been investigating him and his alleged co-conspirators for the last two years.
The agents, James Brigham and David Poole, said they could not comment on the case or on their continuing investigation, for which they have tried to travel to Pakistan to conduct interviews.
They and others have been unable to do so, authorities have confirmed, in part because the departments of Commerce and Homeland Security have failed to gain adequate support from within the Bush administration to pressure Pakistan into letting them in the country.
American inaction regarding Pakistani proliferation seems to have been a historic phenomena.
Khan had two let off's from the CIA, in 1975 and once again in 1986 :
Khan had two let off's from the CIA, in 1975 and once again in 1986 :
CIA told Dutch not to prosecute Pakistani nuclear scientist Khan, former premier says
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
August 9, 2005
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) - The Netherlands abandoned plans to prosecute Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan in 1975 and 1986 at the CIA's insistence, former Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers told Dutch radio Tuesday.
Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, acknowledged last year having sold nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.
Holland suspected Khan was involved in illegal transfers, but the CIA told the Dutch it wanted to delay arresting him so it could track his activities, Lubbers said in a special broadcast of the radio program Argos.
"The American intelligence applied one of their common tactics. They said: give us all the information and don't arrest him, let the man go. We'll follow him and uncover more details," said Lubbers, prime minister from 1982-1994. "I doubted it was the right course to let him go to get more information."
The CIA was not immediately available to comment on the report.
Khan, who was revered in his country for countering the nuclear threat from rival India, was granted a pardon by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.
The CIA and Pakistan's intelligence service were covert allies in the 1980s against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, and were careful to preserve good relations between the two countries. India was a military client of the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War.
Khan graduated with a metallurgical engineering degree from the Delft University in 1967 and a subsidiary of the Dutch company Urenco hired him in the early 1970s. He worked at the Physical Dynamic Research laboratory, which was developing sensitive ultra centrifuge technology used for uranium enrichment.
For years, Khan had access to confidential nuclear secrets which later became the heart of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program
Last edited by arun on 09 Aug 2005 17:00, edited 1 time in total.
Same story from Expatica.
Note continued disinterest ten years down the road :
Note continued disinterest ten years down the road :
CIA asked us to let nuclear spy go, Ruud Lubbers claims
9 August 2005
AMSTERDAM — The CIA asked the Netherlands not to detain Pakistani scientist Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan for stealing nuclear secrets from a Dutch facility, former Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers has claimed.
Speaking on Dutch radio programme Argos on Tuesday morning, Lubbers said the Dutch authorities held off from taking action against Khan in 1975 and 1986 because the US security agency wanted to gain more information about the scientist's activities.
Khan was hailed a national hero in Pakistan in 1997 when the then prime minister Nawaz Sharif announced that the country possessed nuclear weapons.
It emerged later that Khan also headed a clandestine network that sold on nuclear know-how to Libya, North Korea and Iran. Although there was mounting evidence of Khan's illicit activities by 2001, this was only made public in 2004.
Born in Bhopal, Khan trained as a metallurgist in Germany. From May 1972 to December 1975 he was employed by Physics Dynamic Research Laboratory (also known as FDO), an engineering firm based in Amsterdam and a subcontractor to the URENCO consortium specialising in the manufacture of nuclear equipment.
Urenco's primary enrichment facility was in Dutch city of Almelo, near the German border. Khan had an office there by late 1974, the website of globalsecurity.org says.
In early 1976, Khan left the Netherlands with secret Urenco blueprints for an uranium centrifuge. He was convicted in absentia by a court in the Netherlands in 1983 for stealing the designs. The conviction was later overturned on a technicality.
Lubbers was the longest serving prime minister in the Netherlands (1982 - 1994). He was appointed UN High Commissioner for Refugees in 2001 but resigned last February due to sexual harassment allegations.
He told the radio station that when Minister of Economic Affairs in 1975 he discussed the Khan case with US officials. The Americans, Lubbers said, suggested blocking Khan's access to Urenco would be sufficient.
As Prime Minister in the mid 1980s Lubbers again raised the issue as the CIA had been monitoring Khan for 10 years, without any obvious breakthrough in the investigation. Again the Americans did not want action taken against Khan, Lubbers said.
[Copyright Expatica News + ANP 2005]
US State Department Daily Press Briefing, August 9, 2005 :
:LinkQUESTION: Same subject, broadly. What can you say about the Dutch ex-prime minister's claims that the U.S. Government asked in '75 and again in the '80s not to have A.Q. Khan prosecuted and to allow him to go on so that he could be tracked?
MR. ERELI: I don't have any comment on that.
QUESTION: Is it just because you didn't prepare any or you're not going to?
MR. ERELI: Both. I saw the report, looked at it. It's not something that I feel we really have anything to say about.
QUESTION: Why not?
MR. ERELI: Because it deals with -- (a) it deals with events long in the past; (b) it deals with intelligence matters; (c) for those reasons, I don't have anything to say about it.
QUESTION: Well, I mean you're talking about consistent practices. This would seem to fall out of line a bit.
MR. ERELI: Okay.
QUESTION: Okay.
Ms. Shrileen naturally feels annoyed
As Britain finally buckles down to implement some strong anti-terrorist measures to counter its home-grown brand of Muslim extremists and its tradition of giving shelter to wanted criminals and extremists from other parts of the world, we find a British connection in another controversial international debate today -- that of non-proliferation. While it had been known in some quarters that Britain had aided Israel's early nuclear weapons development, this has now been confirmed through official British government documents. Britain exported 20 tonnes of heavy water for around 1.5 million pounds sterling, in 1958, for the production of plutonium at the Dimona reactor. The heavy water itself was of Norwegian origin, purchased by Britain in 1956, and so the deal officially was shown as a deal between Norway and Israel. It is certainly interesting to see two European states, so belligerent over Dr A. Q. Khan's role in proliferation, themselves guilty of the same crime at the official level of the state itself.
On proliferation also, in true colonial spirit, the British state has shown no regret for its actions; Pakistan has chosen to punish those of its citizens guilty of proliferation.
Reminds me of the movie The Lion King where Rafiki the baboon whacks Simba on the head and Simba yells: "what was that for?!" Rafiki replies: "It doesn't matter, it's in the past".arun wrote:US State Department Daily Press Briefing, August 9, 2005
LinkQUESTION: Same subject, broadly. What can you say about the Dutch ex-prime minister's claims that the U.S. Government asked in '75 and again in the '80s not to have A.Q. Khan prosecuted and to allow him to go on so that he could be tracked?
MR. ERELI: I don't have any comment on that.
QUESTION: Is it just because you didn't prepare any or you're not going to?
MR. ERELI: Both. I saw the report, looked at it. It's not something that I feel we really have anything to say about.
QUESTION: Why not?
MR. ERELI: Because it deals with -- (a) it deals with events long in the past; (b) it deals with intelligence matters; (c) for those reasons, I don't have anything to say about it.
QUESTION: Well, I mean you're talking about consistent practices. This would seem to fall out of line a bit.
MR. ERELI: Okay.
QUESTION: Okay.
KS's take on the Dutch claims..
LinkWhy did CIA shield A.Q. Khan?
K. Subrahmanyam
FORMER Dutch Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers in an interview to Dutch radio station on August 9 has revealed that the CIA intervened on two occasions with the Dutch authorities to persuade them not to take action against the Pakistani proliferator, Dr A.Q. Khan. The first occasion was in the mid seventies when Dr Khan was caught copying the drawings and taking URENCO centri-fuge plant away. As the Dutch authorities were about to prosecute him he was protected by the CIA which intervened to stop the action. The second time was in 1985 when the CIA dissuaded the Dutch not to go ahead with a retrial ordered by the appellate court which entertained Dr Khan’s appeal against his conviction by the trial court on his removing secret documents. According to Dr Lubbers, the CIA argued that if Dr Khan was left free they would be able to follow him and keep track of his activities in respect of the Pakistani nuclear programme.
In the light of these disclosures of the former Dutch PM it is obvious that the CIA had continued interest in Dr Khan from the mid-seventies to 1985. Since 1987 was the year when Dr Khan boasted to Indian journalist Kuldip Nayar about Pakistan having assembled the bomb it is logical to expect that the CIA’s interest in Dr Khan continued. Dr Khan has confessed that he was approached by the Iranian authorities in 1987 for transfer of nuclear technology and he started his proliferation to Iran from that period with the full approval of Gen Zia-ul-Haq. The CIA which was keeping watch over Dr Khan should therefore have known about Dr Khan’s proliferation to Iran and his black market contacts with Western European firms.
Senator Kerry’s Senate Committee report on the activities of Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) of 1992 has referred to the linkage between BCCI, Dr Khan, Iranian proliferation and the lack of cooperation on the part of the CIA in regard to its interactions with the bank.
It is now established that BCCI, which was financing the Pakistani nuclear programme was also used by the CIA in the Iran-Contra deal. The CIA which should have kept a close watch on Dr Khan according to the disclosures of Dr Lubbers should have known about Dr Khan’s repeated trips to North Korea for missiles in exchange of uranium enrichment deal after Ms Benazir Bhutto’s visit to Pyong-yang in 1994. In that case the US should have known about Dr Khan’s proliferation activity to North Korea from the very beginning.
Against this background the claims of former CIA director George Tenet about the CIA coming to know about Dr Khan’s activities from the year 2001 onwards and US communicating its doubts about Dr Khan to General Musharraf and consequently his being removed raises problems of credibility. There appears to be a high probability that the CIA was watching Dr Khan from the mid-seventies and it was fully aware of proliferation network involving Western European companies, China, North Korea, Dr Khan and the Pakistan Army. That Carter and Reagan administrations decided to look away from Pakistan-China-West European companies proliferation network has been well researched and documented by many American authors and journalists.
There is a view that Dr Khan has got away lightly because of the Pakistan Army’s involvement in his activities and his ability to spill the beans in respect of the Army’s connivance in Dr Khan’s proliferation. Now with the disclosures of Dr Lubbers it would be logical to speculate whether Dr Khan and the Pakistani leadership have not been let off lightly in spite of the proven proliferation perhaps because they are in a position to tell the world about the CIA’s long connection with the nuclear walmart run by the Pakistani army leadership and Dr Khan.
It has always been a mystery why the US administration was soft on China-Pakistan proliferation interaction in the ‘90s. It took some seven years after Pakistan officially admitted receipt of missiles from China, for the US to admit that. Till then, the Clinton administration pretended that it was still to make a determination about the receipt of Chinese missiles in Pakistan.
While North Korea and Iran are denounced as “rogue states”, the US establishment rarely refers to the original proliferators, China and its partner, Pakistan. Even as the Bush administration concludes a deal with India to lift sanctions against civil technology transfer on the ground that India has behaved as a responsible nuclear power, some former American officials who were in the decision making loop have raised the issue whether this arrangement with India with irreproachable record on proliferation should not be extended to Pakistan as well, whose chief nuclear scientist, Dr Khan, according to Dr El Baradei Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, ran a nuclear walmart black market chainstore.
Going by Dr Lubber’s disclosures of the CIA’s benign interest in Dr Khan going back three decades and the US having looked away from China-Pakistan proliferation, is the interest in extending the Indo-US nuclear arrangement to Pakistan purely a matter of principle or an attempt to prevent the roles of former US administrations and some of the prominent officials in them being exposed for their activities in regard to global proliferation.
While President George Bush and Secretary Rice may have chosen to make a clean break with the past and work out effective measures to deal with proliferation threat from non-state actors, they may face resistance from those former officials in the administration and the agencies who have been colluding with the nuclear walmart of Dr Khan, Pakistani generals, China and West European black market. Otherwise it is difficult to explain the interest of such people in demanding the same treatment for Pakistan as has been extended to India.
The new information in this report is that this clean break was supposed to have been started in the second term. Is this real thing or is it just for media only.Shishir wrote:KS's take on the Dutch claims..
Why did CIA shield A.Q. Khan?
K. Subrahmanyam
While President George Bush and Secretary Rice may have chosen to make a clean break with the past and work out effective measures to deal with proliferation threat from non-state actors, they may face resistance from those former officials in the administration and the agencies who have been colluding with the nuclear walmart of Dr Khan, Pakistani generals, China and West European black market.
I have a proposal so that we can share/search the enormous amount of information generated on BRF on such important threads.
http://myweb2.search.yahoo.com allows one to save links & pages and set tags on them so that others can search on such tags and find saved documents saved by an entire community in addition to web search.
If we save such information as a community it would ease the task of searching for information such as "Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation", but also have such links/saved pages come up when other people search on the same tags.
I have posted on this thread only to attract the attention of the more prolific postors. Admins please feel free to delete/remove this post to a more appropriate thread.
http://myweb2.search.yahoo.com allows one to save links & pages and set tags on them so that others can search on such tags and find saved documents saved by an entire community in addition to web search.
If we save such information as a community it would ease the task of searching for information such as "Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation", but also have such links/saved pages come up when other people search on the same tags.
I have posted on this thread only to attract the attention of the more prolific postors. Admins please feel free to delete/remove this post to a more appropriate thread.
recall thatthe book on Van (w)ho Lee in lost almost case of spying was intially a double agent then a PRC agent then again aquitted as innocent.
In the book reluctant spy, ther is clear indication that Culinary chefs were completely aware of PRC TSP liason which was a reverseble reaction with active (mass) transfer from both sides
US to TSP to PRC
PRC to TSP to US
in the forward reaction TSP set up a number of fake shops to actively pass on material and other equipment to PRC and PRC in turn would release piece by piece design of its bomb, which promptly would go to the chefs who were trying to know what PRC(& TSP) wanted, but in this shadow game Culinary chefs lost because shadow characters like xerox khan and lee (van clif) were exhibiting the properties as catalyst as well as reactants.
In the book reluctant spy, ther is clear indication that Culinary chefs were completely aware of PRC TSP liason which was a reverseble reaction with active (mass) transfer from both sides
US to TSP to PRC
PRC to TSP to US
in the forward reaction TSP set up a number of fake shops to actively pass on material and other equipment to PRC and PRC in turn would release piece by piece design of its bomb, which promptly would go to the chefs who were trying to know what PRC(& TSP) wanted, but in this shadow game Culinary chefs lost because shadow characters like xerox khan and lee (van clif) were exhibiting the properties as catalyst as well as reactants.
It's worldnutdaily, so take it FWIW...
How Pakistan's Dr. X sold al-Qaida Islamic bomb Khan armed bin Laden for his 'American Hiroshima' plan
Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, the "father of the Islamic bomb" and the "godfather of nuclear proliferation," provided nuclear expertise, nuclear materials, and designs for atomic weapons to Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri to assist in the realization of the "American Hiroshima."
The American Hiroshima plan represents al-Qaida's plan for the nuclear destruction of the United States. It calls for the detonation of seven tactical nuclear devices in seven U.S. cities at the same time. Each device, according to the plan, must be equipped to produce an explosive yield of 10 kilotons to equal the 1945 blast in Hiroshima that killed 242,437 Japanese civilians.
News about Dr. Khan's involvement with al-Qaida and the American Hiroshima plan first emerged with the capture of several al-Qaida operatives in Afghanistan in October 2001, during the first phase of Operation Enduring Freedom, and, later, with the arrest of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, bin Laden's military operations chief, in Karachi, Pakistan, March 2, 2003.
From Khalid Mohammad's laptop, CIA officials uncovered details of al-Qaida's plan to create a series of "nuclear hell storms" throughout the United States.
After days of interrogation coupled with severe sleep deprivation, Khalid Mohammad told U.S. intelligence officials that the chain of command for the "American Hiroshima" answered directly to bin Laden, al-Zawahiri, and a mysterious scientist whom he, at first, referred to as "Dr. X," but later identified as Dr. Khan.
Tim Burger and Tim McGirk in the May 12, 2003, edition of Time managed to confirm that at least one meeting between Dr. Khan and bin Laden occurred within a safe house in Kabul.
The Real Dr. Strangelove
Dr. A.Q. Khan spearheaded Pakistan's effort to build nuclear weapons to stabilize the nuclear threat from India. Five atomic bombs, developed by Khan, were successfully detonated beneath the scorched hills of the Baluchistan desert in 1998.
Khan, who went on to work on the successful firings of the nuclear-capable Ghaudi I and II missiles, remains a revered figure in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where his birthday is celebrated in mosques.
After gaining a place for Pakistan within the elite nuclear club of nations along with the United States, Russia, China, Great Britain, France, India and Israel, Khan proceeded to sell his centrifuge technology for the enrichment of uranium and his designs for atomic weapons to such countries as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, and Sudan, and such rogue nations as North Korea, Iran, and Libya. Abundant evidence exists that the list of Khan's customers should be expanded to include Brazil, Malaysia, Indonesia, Algeria, Kuwait, Myanmar, and Abu Dubai.
More information was squeezed out of Khalid Mohammad in subsequent months, including accounts of continuous visits by bin Laden and company to the A.Q. Khan Research Laboratories in Pakistan, where they gained the assistance of such renowned nuclear physicists, including Dr. Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, chairman of Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission.
Dr. Mahmood's Confession
Mahmood was taken into custody by Pakistani Inter Service Intelligence and CIA agents Oct. 23, 2001. After months of questioning, Mahmood at last admitted that he had met with bin Laden, al-Zawahiri and other al-Qaida officials on several occasions, including the fateful morning of Sept. 11, 2001, to discuss the means of speeding up the process of manufacturing nukes from the highly enriched uranium that al-Qaida had obtained from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and other sources.
Mahmood insisted that he had provided answers to technical questions concerning tactical nuclear weapons but declined to provide bin Laden actual hands-on help for the creation of such devices. Upon voicing this denial, Mahmood was subjected to six lie-detector tests. He failed them all.
The Nuclear Nest
Throughout 2002, CIA and ISI officials obtained more and more information concerning the involvement of scientists from the A.Q. Khan Research Laboratories in the plans for the American Hiroshima. After being threatened with seven years in prison under Pakistan's Official Secrets Act, Dr. Chaudry Abdul Majid, PAEC's chief engineer, admitted that he met with bin Laden and other al-Qaida officials on a regular basis to provide technical assistance for the construction and care of its nuclear weapons. Dr. Mirza Yusuf Baig, another PAEC engineer, made a similar confession.
Yet a host of other leading scientists and technicians from Khan's facility have managed to elude arrest and interrogation by quietly slipping out of the country. Dr. Mohammad Ali Mukhtar and Dr. Suleiman Assad, nuclear engineers and close colleagues of Khan and Mahmood, escaped to Myanmar, where they are currently engaged in building a 10-megawatt nuclear reactor for the Third World country. Others have made off for unknown destinations. The list of such "absconders" includes the names of Muhammad Zubair, Murad Qasim, Tariq Mahmood, Saeed Akhther, Imtaz Baig, Waheed Nasir, Munawar Ismail, Shaheen Fareed, and Khalid Mahmood.
The Missing Nukes
Still, the interrogations of the Pakistani scientists, coupled with findings from Dr. Mahmood's office for "charitable affairs" in Kabul, verified for the CIA that al-Qaida had produced several nuclear weapons from highly enriched uranium and plutonium pellets the size of silver dollars at Khan's facilities. At least one of these weapons was transported to Karachi where it was shipped to the United States in a cargo container.
The story of the deployed nuke was reported by Arnaud de Borchgrave of the Washington Times Dec. 10, 2001. It was carried by United Press International but received little play in the national press and garnered scant attention from such major news outlets as ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN.
The whereabouts of the weapon remains a mystery. There are more than 18 million potential delivery vehicles that could be used to bring the nuke into the U.S. This figure represents the number of cargo containers that arrive into the country every year. Of these containers, only 3 percent are inspected. Moreover, the bills of lading do not have to be produced until the containers reach their place of destination.
News about other tactical nuclear weapons developed by Khan's facilities for bin Laden came with the arrest of Sharif al Masri in Pakistan in November 2004. Al Masri, an al-Qaida operative with close ties to Ayman al-Zawahiri, informed CIA interrogators that a number of nukes had been deployed to Mexico where arrangements had been made with a Latino street gang for their safe transport into the U.S. This story, which appeared in the Nov. 17 issue of the Nation, also failed to capture widespread press attention.
Khan's 'Mea Culpa'
On Feb. 4, 2004, Khan, after being confronted with tell-tale evidence obtained by inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, issued a public statement in which he confessed that he had sold blueprints for nuclear weapons to Libya, North Korea and Iran. He expressed "the deepest sense of sorrow and anguish" that he had placed Pakistan's national security in jeopardy. "I have much to answer for," he said.
Pakistan's federal cabinet and President Pervez Musharraf responded to Khan's confession by granting the esteemed scientist a full pardon for his acts of nuclear proliferation. Musharraf said that Khan and the scientists who worked with him were motivated by "money." The pardon, according to many observers, represented an attempt by the Musharraf government to appease Islamic extremists and senior Pakistani military officials who believe that Musharraf had become a traitor to the Muslim people by providing military support and assistance to the Bush administration.
Khan remains a free and honored citizen of Pakistan, where neither U.S. military officials nor CIA agents can obtain the right to approach or question him. This situation has prompted Robert Gallucci, former U.N. weapons inspector and dean of Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, to observe: "The most dangerous country for the U.S. now is Pakistan. ... We haven't been this vulnerable since the British burned Washington in 1814."
Coda
The story of Dr. A.Q. Khan's relationship with al-Qaida comes with a coda. Acclaimed French journalist Bernard-Henri Levy amassed considerable evidence that ISI officials executed Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl after Pearl obtained inside information on the close relationship between Khan and bin Laden, the trafficking of nuclear materials from Khan's facility near Islamabad to al-Qaida cells in Afghanistan and the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan, and the plans for the American Hiroshima.
For continuing and complete coverage of Osama bin Laden's "American Hiroshima" plans, subscribe to Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium, online, intelligence newsletter published by the founder of WND.
How Pakistan's Dr. X sold al-Qaida Islamic bomb Khan armed bin Laden for his 'American Hiroshima' plan
Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, the "father of the Islamic bomb" and the "godfather of nuclear proliferation," provided nuclear expertise, nuclear materials, and designs for atomic weapons to Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri to assist in the realization of the "American Hiroshima."
The American Hiroshima plan represents al-Qaida's plan for the nuclear destruction of the United States. It calls for the detonation of seven tactical nuclear devices in seven U.S. cities at the same time. Each device, according to the plan, must be equipped to produce an explosive yield of 10 kilotons to equal the 1945 blast in Hiroshima that killed 242,437 Japanese civilians.
News about Dr. Khan's involvement with al-Qaida and the American Hiroshima plan first emerged with the capture of several al-Qaida operatives in Afghanistan in October 2001, during the first phase of Operation Enduring Freedom, and, later, with the arrest of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, bin Laden's military operations chief, in Karachi, Pakistan, March 2, 2003.
From Khalid Mohammad's laptop, CIA officials uncovered details of al-Qaida's plan to create a series of "nuclear hell storms" throughout the United States.
After days of interrogation coupled with severe sleep deprivation, Khalid Mohammad told U.S. intelligence officials that the chain of command for the "American Hiroshima" answered directly to bin Laden, al-Zawahiri, and a mysterious scientist whom he, at first, referred to as "Dr. X," but later identified as Dr. Khan.
Tim Burger and Tim McGirk in the May 12, 2003, edition of Time managed to confirm that at least one meeting between Dr. Khan and bin Laden occurred within a safe house in Kabul.
The Real Dr. Strangelove
Dr. A.Q. Khan spearheaded Pakistan's effort to build nuclear weapons to stabilize the nuclear threat from India. Five atomic bombs, developed by Khan, were successfully detonated beneath the scorched hills of the Baluchistan desert in 1998.
Khan, who went on to work on the successful firings of the nuclear-capable Ghaudi I and II missiles, remains a revered figure in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where his birthday is celebrated in mosques.
After gaining a place for Pakistan within the elite nuclear club of nations along with the United States, Russia, China, Great Britain, France, India and Israel, Khan proceeded to sell his centrifuge technology for the enrichment of uranium and his designs for atomic weapons to such countries as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, and Sudan, and such rogue nations as North Korea, Iran, and Libya. Abundant evidence exists that the list of Khan's customers should be expanded to include Brazil, Malaysia, Indonesia, Algeria, Kuwait, Myanmar, and Abu Dubai.
More information was squeezed out of Khalid Mohammad in subsequent months, including accounts of continuous visits by bin Laden and company to the A.Q. Khan Research Laboratories in Pakistan, where they gained the assistance of such renowned nuclear physicists, including Dr. Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, chairman of Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission.
Dr. Mahmood's Confession
Mahmood was taken into custody by Pakistani Inter Service Intelligence and CIA agents Oct. 23, 2001. After months of questioning, Mahmood at last admitted that he had met with bin Laden, al-Zawahiri and other al-Qaida officials on several occasions, including the fateful morning of Sept. 11, 2001, to discuss the means of speeding up the process of manufacturing nukes from the highly enriched uranium that al-Qaida had obtained from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and other sources.
Mahmood insisted that he had provided answers to technical questions concerning tactical nuclear weapons but declined to provide bin Laden actual hands-on help for the creation of such devices. Upon voicing this denial, Mahmood was subjected to six lie-detector tests. He failed them all.
The Nuclear Nest
Throughout 2002, CIA and ISI officials obtained more and more information concerning the involvement of scientists from the A.Q. Khan Research Laboratories in the plans for the American Hiroshima. After being threatened with seven years in prison under Pakistan's Official Secrets Act, Dr. Chaudry Abdul Majid, PAEC's chief engineer, admitted that he met with bin Laden and other al-Qaida officials on a regular basis to provide technical assistance for the construction and care of its nuclear weapons. Dr. Mirza Yusuf Baig, another PAEC engineer, made a similar confession.
Yet a host of other leading scientists and technicians from Khan's facility have managed to elude arrest and interrogation by quietly slipping out of the country. Dr. Mohammad Ali Mukhtar and Dr. Suleiman Assad, nuclear engineers and close colleagues of Khan and Mahmood, escaped to Myanmar, where they are currently engaged in building a 10-megawatt nuclear reactor for the Third World country. Others have made off for unknown destinations. The list of such "absconders" includes the names of Muhammad Zubair, Murad Qasim, Tariq Mahmood, Saeed Akhther, Imtaz Baig, Waheed Nasir, Munawar Ismail, Shaheen Fareed, and Khalid Mahmood.
The Missing Nukes
Still, the interrogations of the Pakistani scientists, coupled with findings from Dr. Mahmood's office for "charitable affairs" in Kabul, verified for the CIA that al-Qaida had produced several nuclear weapons from highly enriched uranium and plutonium pellets the size of silver dollars at Khan's facilities. At least one of these weapons was transported to Karachi where it was shipped to the United States in a cargo container.
The story of the deployed nuke was reported by Arnaud de Borchgrave of the Washington Times Dec. 10, 2001. It was carried by United Press International but received little play in the national press and garnered scant attention from such major news outlets as ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN.
The whereabouts of the weapon remains a mystery. There are more than 18 million potential delivery vehicles that could be used to bring the nuke into the U.S. This figure represents the number of cargo containers that arrive into the country every year. Of these containers, only 3 percent are inspected. Moreover, the bills of lading do not have to be produced until the containers reach their place of destination.
News about other tactical nuclear weapons developed by Khan's facilities for bin Laden came with the arrest of Sharif al Masri in Pakistan in November 2004. Al Masri, an al-Qaida operative with close ties to Ayman al-Zawahiri, informed CIA interrogators that a number of nukes had been deployed to Mexico where arrangements had been made with a Latino street gang for their safe transport into the U.S. This story, which appeared in the Nov. 17 issue of the Nation, also failed to capture widespread press attention.
Khan's 'Mea Culpa'
On Feb. 4, 2004, Khan, after being confronted with tell-tale evidence obtained by inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, issued a public statement in which he confessed that he had sold blueprints for nuclear weapons to Libya, North Korea and Iran. He expressed "the deepest sense of sorrow and anguish" that he had placed Pakistan's national security in jeopardy. "I have much to answer for," he said.
Pakistan's federal cabinet and President Pervez Musharraf responded to Khan's confession by granting the esteemed scientist a full pardon for his acts of nuclear proliferation. Musharraf said that Khan and the scientists who worked with him were motivated by "money." The pardon, according to many observers, represented an attempt by the Musharraf government to appease Islamic extremists and senior Pakistani military officials who believe that Musharraf had become a traitor to the Muslim people by providing military support and assistance to the Bush administration.
Khan remains a free and honored citizen of Pakistan, where neither U.S. military officials nor CIA agents can obtain the right to approach or question him. This situation has prompted Robert Gallucci, former U.N. weapons inspector and dean of Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, to observe: "The most dangerous country for the U.S. now is Pakistan. ... We haven't been this vulnerable since the British burned Washington in 1814."
Coda
The story of Dr. A.Q. Khan's relationship with al-Qaida comes with a coda. Acclaimed French journalist Bernard-Henri Levy amassed considerable evidence that ISI officials executed Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl after Pearl obtained inside information on the close relationship between Khan and bin Laden, the trafficking of nuclear materials from Khan's facility near Islamabad to al-Qaida cells in Afghanistan and the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan, and the plans for the American Hiroshima.
For continuing and complete coverage of Osama bin Laden's "American Hiroshima" plans, subscribe to Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium, online, intelligence newsletter published by the founder of WND.
xpost
UN nuke agency to clear Iran on uranium charge
UN nuke agency to clear Iran on uranium charge
The UN nuclear agency has concluded that highly enriched uranium particles found in Iran were from imported equipment and not from Iran's own activities, diplomats said Friday.
"The conclusion shows the highly enriched uranium appears to emanate from Pakistan,"
But the diplomat said the results of tests on cases of low enriched uranium (LEU) contamination, which is below weapons-grade and are also being examined by the IAEA, were "murky" and that the "LEU issue will probably never be solved."
IAEA to meet Pak officials on Iran
VIENNA (AFP) - The UN nuclear watchdog is to meet here next week with Pakistani officials as part of its efforts to determine if Iran was using smuggled Pakistani equipment to make enriched uranium that could be used for atom bombs, diplomats said Saturday. Pakistan had in May sent centrifuge parts to the watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency at its headquarters in Vienna to enable the IAEA to compare microscopic traces of uranium on them with that found on equipment in Iran believed to have been smuggled in from Pakistan.
The IAEA has concluded that “the highly enriched uranium appears to emanate from Pakistan,” from the imported equipment and not from Iranian enrichment work, a Western diplomat close to the IAEA said.
Enriched uranium, made by passing a uranium gas through a series, or cascade, of centrifuge machines, can be fuel for civilian nuclear power reactors or, in highly refined form, the raw material for atom bombs.The diplomat said Saturday that a “Pakistani delegation is coming to Vienna to begin talks Monday with IAEA safeguards officials to review the IAEA findings.”
The IAEA’s ruling out that Iran was doing work that could have produced weapons-grade uranium ‘will be seen by those in favour of Iran as another checkmark in their column’ to back up Tehran’s rebuttals of US charges that it is secretly developing nuclear weapons, the diplomat said.
Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan has admitted to running an international nuclear black market ring that supplied Iran with atomic technology and parts.
The IAEA has since February 2003 been investigating US charges that Tehran, which says its nuclear programme is a peaceful effort to generate electricity, has a covert weapons programme. The enriched uranium contamination issue was a main sticking point in the investigation, although others still remain.
The diplomat said the talks with the Pakistanis were part of a review of the IAEA findings that will later in the month also involve independent experts. Pakistan had in May insisted that the centrifuge parts it sent to the IAEA remained technically under its control and would be brought back home by Pakistani experts, a second diplomat said.The diplomat said the Pakistanis did not want anyone outside the IAEA to have access to information that could reveal Pakistani nuclear secrets.
IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozedecky refused to comment on details but said: “The corroboration process continues and we hope to report on the contamination issue in the September report” to the IAEA Board of Governors
But hey, this is no problem. He did it for personal and private gain onlee. And if we got a bunch of missiles in return at around the same time, it was just coincidence onlee. After all, Allah sends his blessings in mysterious ways onlee....
Musharraf says Khan gave centrifuges to North Korea - Kyodo
http://in.news.yahoo.com/050824/137/5zugb.html
Musharraf says Khan gave centrifuges to North Korea - Kyodo
http://in.news.yahoo.com/050824/137/5zugb.html
jrjrao wrote:But hey, this is no problem. He did it for personal and private gain onlee. And if we got a bunch of missiles in return at around the same time, it was just coincidence onlee. After all, Allah sends his blessings in mysterious ways onlee....
Musharraf says Khan gave centrifuges to North Korea - Kyodo
http://in.news.yahoo.com/050824/137/5zugb.html
Yes..Past is Past...ignorant people like yindoos do not know the PIP-PIP dance, but it is second nature to the sophisticated SD people.PIP PIP..I say, PIP PIP. Hey, PIP PIP.....
NY Times story today says the same - this Musharraf ain't believable.
Pakistan Now Says Scientist Did Send Koreans Nuclear Gear
Pakistan Now Says Scientist Did Send Koreans Nuclear Gear
Commando's Diplomacy
The president was trying his best to deflect any objection at the talks to Pakistan's possible role in North Korea's success. This sidetracking is extremely important for Pakistan after Monday's statement by the IAEA that particles of enriched uranium have been found in Iran that originated in centrifuges smuggled from Pakistan....President Musharraf should continue yielding these morsels of information at useful junctures. But he must never yield on Pakistan's position of never allowing Dr Khan to be questioned by international investigators. On that he should continue to be the commando. The diplomacy will take care of itself
AshishN wrote:MS. TOWNSEND: You know, we work with our Pakistani partners every single day, and we work in a very integrated and comprehensive way with them. It's the sort of vibrant relationship that we -- four years ago, three-and-a-half years ago, we could not have imagined.
Whitehouse
You know, Pakistan really has made a lot of progress thanks to Unkil's largesse. It's a technologically advanced condom now!Now Unkill-MuNNA getting "vibrant" too?
Jafarzadeh’s not exactly unblemished bio from the same article :Iran has nuclear missiles, says dissident
... but his allegations cannot be confirmed
August 27, 2005 Edition 1
By Sapa-AFP
………. Jafarzadeh also issued a new claim over alleged Pakistani complicity in Iran's nuclear programme, identifying a senior member of the Revolutionary Guard whom he said met Khan as far back as 1986 and 1987.
Meetings between Khan and a Brigadier General identified as Mohammad Eslami, chief of the guards' research centre, disproved claims by Iran that Khan's reported links to its nuclear programme were in a purely civilian context, he said.
"I ask the International Atomic Energy Agency to interview him (Eslami) as soon as possible," said Jafarzadeh. …………………….
....... Jafarzadeh is president of Strategic Policy Consulting Inc, a US research firm, and an analyst for the Fox News network. He was born in Iran before moving to the United States before the revolution in 1979.
He was formerly a spokesman for the National Council of Resistance of Iran, the political wing of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), which is designated as a terrorist organisation by the US government and Europe. .....
