Pakistan in Media

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights was told on Thursday that American nationals were purchasing land in the suburbs of the capital, which could be a conspiracy to besiege the country’s nuclear assets.

MNA Javed Hashmi, who also heads the NA human rights body’s sub-committee on American private security firm Blackwater’s alleged presence in the country, said the US was purchasing land in the city’s suburbs, including Malpur, Sihala and the Simly Dam area.

“Influential people in Islamabad are renting out their houses to Americans,” he added. Talking to Daily Times, Hashmi said the sub-committee had not finalised its report, “but as per preliminary information, it is an established fact that Inter-Risk and DynCorp are training recruits in Peshawar”.

ISLAMABAD: Pulitzer prize winning American journalist Seymour Hersh has claimed that an elite US special forces squad which operates covertly and includes terrorism and non-proliferation experts from the US intelligence community — the Pentagon, the FBI, and the DOE — is already present in Pakistan and could well be housed in the US embassy in Islamabad.

The startling disclosure was made in Hersh’s candid interview with Pakistan’s most popular TV channel Geo News’ widely viewed current affairs programme ‘Meray Mutabiq’, hosted by Dr Shahid Masood. The programme was aired on Saturday late evening.

Seymour Hersh said that the Americans had been constituting such crack teams for various purposes and the team in question here was to deal with any eventuality including any fear of takeover by Taliban or any other ‘development’ with regard to Pakistani nukes.

Group Editor of The News Shaheen Sehbai taking part in the programme expressed the view that Musharraf’s remarks about President Asif Zardari, as attributed by Hersh, could not be casually ignored. He said it must be investigated why Musharraf accused Zardari of not being a patriot, because, according to Sehbai, Hersh had some inside information given to him in interviews with Musharraf and Zardari which he did not reveal in his report. But Sehbai said journalists always attribute information given to them by responsible people to “reliable sources” if these people ask them to refrain from quoting them directly.

ISLAMABAD: In response to allegations published in the press that the United States has been negotiating “understandings” with the Pakistani military about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, US Ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson issued the following statement: “These allegations are completely false. The United States has no intention to seize Pakistani nuclear weapons or material. Pakistan is a key ally in our common effort to fight violent extremists and foster regional security. We work cooperatively on a wide range of security assistance initiatives, including significant efforts focused on strengthening counterinsurgency capacities to foster stability. The United States has confidence in Pakistan’s ability to protect its nuclear programmes and materials, as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said during her recent visit to Pakistan.”

NEW YORK: The Obama administration has been negotiating highly sensitive understandings with the Pakistani military, the influential magazine ‘The New Yorker’ says in a detailed report by world famous Pulitzer prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh, published in its latest issue.

“The Pakistanis gave us a virtual look at the number of warheads, some of their locations, and their command-and-control system,” Hersh quotes a former senior US intelligence official. “We saw their target list and their mobilization plans. We got their security plans, so we could augment them in case of a breach of security,” he said.

“We’re there to help the Pakistanis, but we’re also there to extend our own axis of security to their nuclear stockpile.”The secret understandings between the US and Pakistan would allow specially trained American units to provide added security for the Pakistani nuclear arsenal in case of a crisis, the report said.

The News International, Pakistan
Monday, June 08, 2009

However, there is a direct and objective threat that is less visible or obvious; and one that we need to monitor carefully. The threat comes from inside, from radicals amongst the educated who are in a position to purloin nuclear material (as has happened elsewhere in the world it should be remembered, with radioactive material occasionally showing up on the black market) and have the skill-sets to weaponise it. It is long and well-enough known that Al Qaeda would like to obtain nuclear materials, the makings of a ‘dirty bomb’. The risk is that they have sympathizers and collaborators within both the offices of state and within wider society, people who are engineers, scientists, technicians and perhaps even those in high office who could and would support or facilitate Al Qaeda in its goals. Al Qaeda has the capacity to mount sophisticated infiltration operations. The radicalization of our youth in universities, some of them training for entry into the various fields of nuclear science is natural hunting-ground for extremists. They may not have the skills themselves to create a weapon, or easy access to the materials – but would like to become the new best friend of somebody who can. Close monitoring and inspection as well as regular security screenings will help to mitigate the threat, but it is unlikely to disappear. The longer that the radical agenda remain embedded in our society, the better the chances of a collaboration between it and present or future technocrats and scientists. The Taliban present no threat to our nuclear assets in purely military terms – but their ideas do.

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Daily Times, Pakistan
Wednesday, June 03, 2009
ANALYSIS: Ijaz Hussain

The US should forthwith stop the media blitz about Pakistan’s nukes falling into terrorist hands. If the Americans have any concerns on this count, they should agree to communicate them to the Pakistani government through diplomatic channels

American officials, civilian and military, are working overtime these days to create a scare about the safety of Pakistan’s nukes by claiming that these could fall into the hands of terrorists.

(They formulate their statements quite ingeniously: affirm in the first part absolute faith in Pakistan’s ability to protect them but in the second cunningly cast aspersions on it.)

They are not alone in doing so; the American media has joined them by claiming that the US has contingency plans to secure Pakistani nukes if things get out of hand.

This is driving Pakistanis nuts. They believe that the Americans, in concert with the Israelis and the Indians, are out to deprive them of their nuclear assets. This raises a number of questions.

First, is there a real threat of these weapons falling into the hands of terrorists? Second, if the threat is not palpable, what is the US up to through this fear mongering? Third, what should be done to raise the comfort level of Pakistanis?

Before addressing these questions, a word about the American Ambassador to Islamabad Anne W Patterson’s comment on media reports about the US contingency plans. Strongly contradicting these reports, the other day she observed: “I have seen this in media. I will say that it is all nonsense. It is not technically possible.”

Ambassador Patterson’s denial is understandable because, as a diplomat, she has to say certain things for the good of her country. Otherwise, how could she explain President Obama’s statement in which he publicly confessed that all options were open in case of a threat to Pakistan’s nukes? The ‘all options’ formulation obviously also includes a military option which requires the existence of a contingency plan for its execution.

As to the possibility of these weapons falling into terrorists’ hands, experts categorically rule it out for the simple reason that the nuclear set-up enjoys multi-layered protection. To begin with, these weapons are not available in assembled form as their components are scattered. So even if terrorists were to occupy a site or two where these weapons are located, it would be inconsequential because they could at best get hold of some components but not the assembled devices.

Next, even if terrorists get hold of assembled devices these are useless unless they also get hold of the codes without which the weapons cannot be triggered. It signifies that the American hullabaloo about terrorists’ ability to grab Pakistan’s nuclear assets by storming weapon sites is utterly unfounded.

Given this backdrop, what is the Obama administration up to by relentlessly talking up the possibility of these weapons falling into terrorists’ hands? America’s apologists contend that through these statements it is simply trying to bring home to the Pakistani government the gravity of threat that terrorists pose to Pakistan.

However, the frequency with which the administration (in tandem with the American media and think tanks, which, like their Indian counterparts, are always ready to play along with the American administration) is churning out these statements and the medium (i.e. the media as opposed to diplomatic channels) that it has wittingly chosen to do so give the impression that its intentions go much beyond that. It seems to be preparing international opinion for military action to take out these nukes for “safe international custody” on the ground that the Pakistani government is too fragile and helpless to take care of them.

This media blitz is not all. There are other American acts of omission and commission that heighten misgivings about US intentions regarding Pakistan’s nukes. For example, terrorists are getting latest and highly sophisticated weapons from across the Afghan border. The question arises: who is supplying weapons to terrorists?

Many in Pakistan see a US hand in it. It is noteworthy that whenever the Pakistan Army spokesperson is quizzed about the specific source of these weapons, he prefers to remain silent. To many critics this silence is meaningful. In their view, it points towards the US because had it been India or Afghanistan, the spokesperson would have denounced them without mincing words.

Similarly, it is intriguing that the US didn’t target Baitullah Mehsud, who is the cause of present instability and mayhem in Pakistan when the Pakistan Army pointed out his specific location on two occasions. Again, it is baffling why the US didn’t help the Pakistan Army in intercepting the Taliban during the recent Bajaur operation.

The cumulative effect of the US media campaign about Pakistan’s nukes falling into terrorists’ hands and the mysterious American acts of omission and commission as mentioned above is nothing but a feeling of destabilisation, confusion and uncertainty among Pakistanis. This feeling worsens in the backdrop of almost daily suicide bombings and seemingly overwhelming challenge of handling the internally displaced persons. It may not be wrong to say that the nation these days seems to be feeling increasingly helpless and hopeless.

Many critics, including Pakistan’s intelligentsia, believe that the US is deliberately doing what it is doing in order to trigger the collapse of Pakistan. These suspicions on the face of it look utterly unwarranted because if Pakistan collapses, the consequences for the US are too dangerous to even contemplate. But then Shakespeare said that there are more things in heaven and earth than our philosophy can dream of.

Despite these apprehensions, many in Pakistan rule out the possibility of the US getting hold of these weapons even if it wanted to on the ground that it does not know the exact locations where the components are stored. However, that does not mean that the US absolutely cannot mount a military operation. If Pakistan is on the verge of collapse (which many Pakistanis believe is the US agenda), it may take the issue to the Security Council for a resolution to take out these weapons.

To ward off such an eventuality, Pakistan will have to rely on its all-weather friend China. If the US fails to achieve its objective through the Security Council (as happened in 2003 in the Iraq case because of the threat of the impending French veto), let us not rule out US-led action of the kind undertaken against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.

Finally, the question arises as to what the US should do to remove Pakistanis’ apprehensions about its intentions for Pakistan’s nukes. To begin with, it should forthwith stop the media blitz about Pakistan’s nukes falling into terrorist hands. If the Americans have any concerns on this count, they should agree to communicate them to the Pakistani government through diplomatic channels.

Second, the US should issue an unambiguous statement renouncing any intention to have control over Pakistan’s nukes, which American leaders sometimes issue. Finally, it should help stem the flow of weapons from Afghanistan into Pakistan.

If the US undertakes these CBMs, they will go a long way in allaying Pakistanis’ apprehensions about American intentions regarding their nukes.

The writer is a former dean of social sciences at the Quaid-i-Azam University. He can be reached at hussain_ijaz@hotmail.com

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Editorial, Daily Times, Pakistan
Saturday, May 30, 2009

The world (read the West and Japan) is worried over the weapons of mass destruction accumulating in South Asia where India and Pakistan cannot give up their conflictual relationship and are ramping up their nuclear programmes. As the Washington Post wrote on Thursday, Pakistan is supposed to start “churning out plutonium for its nuclear arsenal, which will eventually include warheads for ballistic missiles and cruise missiles capable of being launched from ships, submarines or aircraft. India is designing cruise missiles to carry nuclear warheads; it is also trying to equip its Agni missiles with such warheads and to deploy them on submarines”.

On the other hand, Pakistan was celebrating the anniversary of its nuclear test of 1998 the same day, calling its programme “the safest in the world” which had provided the nation with “an unshakeable defence against any enemy”. Both Indian and Pakistani experts have debunked the fear expressed in the US and other capitals that the two programmes in South Asia are vulnerable to “theft” by “a rogue scientist or a military officer”. It is argued that any rollback of their programmes is not possible because of the national consensus behind them. Therefore it would not be wrong to say that in part their mutually hostile nationalisms are driven by their “collective pride” in these nuclear weapons.

India and Pakistan have been gradually accepted as non-Non Proliferation Treaty signatory nuclear powers. Last year the United States concluded a nuclear cooperation treaty with India allowing it to import uranium and allowing the military to draw on enriched uranium produced by eight reactors that might otherwise be needed for civil power. The world cried “foul” half-heartedly before accepting it as part of the new global reality. Another step towards the regularisation of the status of the two nuclear South Asia powers was taken this month when France agreed to supply Pakistan with civilian nuclear technology “the same way America had done to India” (that’s not possible because the Nuclear Suppliers Group is not involved in the France-Pakistan deal in the way it is solidly behind the US-India deal).

Pakistan stands to gain from this new development, which has gone without much comment internationally. The US-India nuclear deal was finalised after the 45-strong Nuclear Suppliers Group declared its approval of it. One must note here that assent to the deal was given both by China and France. China has always been in favour of treating Pakistan at par with India on the provision of civilian nuclear technology. In other words, if India is to be exempted from the NPT conditionality of signing it before buying this technology, then Pakistan should also qualify. Now France too has adopted this point of view. It is also possible that France has moved forward after realising that China will ultimately come forth for Pakistan. On the other hand, there is no bar on Pakistan signing a nuclear treaty with more than one state provided the Nuclear Suppliers Group okays it. All this goes in favour of “equalising” Pakistan with India as a recognised nuclear power.

Pakistan’s non-reconciliation with India and its reluctance to allow the freezing of the status quo delays the process of “equalising the unequals” which lies at the core of nuclear possession. India’s unwillingness to return to peace talks in 2009 is adding to the problems of an unstable deterrence which scares the world. Pakistan has been politically unstable over the past thirty years because of its efforts at living up to its status of a revisionist state. In the new millennium it has been destabilised internally by uprisings and territorial losses to terrorist militias that contain men from as near as the Gulf and as far as Algeria, to say nothing of the Uzbeks and Chechens from areas nearer the region.

But a nuclear bomb is the best bargain counter for an agreement on peace and related economic arrangements that consolidate and perpetuate normal relations with perceived enemy states. In that sense the bomb is a weapon of peace, not of war. Today, the only unchanging element in Pakistan’s strategy is the perception of India as a permanent enemy. At the same time it is accepted on all hands that India cannot attack Pakistan because of the latter’s nuclear deterrence. This deterrence, however, will not be stable as long as the two countries remain daggers drawn against each other. That is why Pakistan wants the United States and its allies to persuade India to come to the negotiating table, because that is the only way forward to achieving stability in the region. *

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Daily Times, Pakistan
Comment, Shahzad Chaudhry
Monday, May 25, 2009

Pakistan can be more secure socio-politically only if it is included in regional and global linkages as a trusted partner and equal player. It is imperative to understand the psychosocial make up of the Pakistani mind and its likely responses to emotive issues

The affable Hillary Clinton needs to play close attention to the second and more serious gaping hole in her president’s AfPak strategy: the absence of a cooperative geo-political security regime in the larger Af-Pak-Ind region — a direct interest of the Secretary’s own department.

The United States is in a unique and a historical position in terms of its influence with all three countries. Pakistan holds the key to the long-term stability of South and West Asia; an unstable or socially fragmented Pakistan could mean an entirely unstable Afghanistan, regardless of the quality and expanse of the democratic dispensation there, such is the interacting dynamic of social integration on both sides.

Also, the 28 million Pashtuns in Pakistan form the critical mass of Pashtun sentiment. Simply the neutralisation of Al Qaeda or the mitigation of the Taliban problem through on-going efforts alone will never be sufficient to leave a sustaining sense of either stability or security. And without stability there never will be security.

Inalienably, there is a need to provide a sense of assurance to the Pashtuns. To achieve so, Pakistan itself needs to be secure, stable and assured; this realisation is entirely missing from the proposed political construct of how the US wishes to deal with the region. The US emphasis continues to be on a transactional relationship for the returns that it seeks from Pakistan; this irks the Pakistani sense of self-respect, national pride and dignity.

Pakistan’s nuclear status haunts the western world mostly for the wrong reasons. It is not the command and control mechanisms that should be of any serious concern, since those are as good as any — and this statement is based on well founded knowledge of the structure. It is the insidious aspersions on the quality and character of the human resource engaged in the strategic programmes that betray a transparent and unsavoury attempt to demean Pakistan’s credentials as a nuclear power.

The US does not understand the very strong sense of nationalism that the nuclear programme evokes in the Pakistani people, which in a strange paradox becomes a shield against any attempt to retrench, dislodge or dismantle the capability. Such a reaction is practically embedded in the Pakistani character. Similarly, any effort to attach religious definition to Pakistan’s nuclear capability is mala fide and a figment of the western imagination. Pakistanis neither give the capability any religious association, nor do they accept such a classification.

For the much larger majority, Pakistani nationalistic pride will still override religious identification, something that the West, especially US, has failed to register; and something anyone wishing to do business with Pakistan should exploit to their advantage. More than the nuclear arsenal, it is the socio-political and economic instability of Pakistan that should haunt the world.

If there is anything that triggers Pakistan’s nationalistic sentiment even greater than the nuclear capability, it is events in the Indo-Pakistan context. That testifies to the shared history and socio-cultural commonalities, interspersed with significant variations, that became the driving force for the two-nation theory. This love-hate relationship is mutual and the basis of a psychotic infatuation between Indian and Pakistani societies. Neither is complete without the other; such is the compulsive nature of this relationship, whether in love or war.

This is not going to change soon. Better to acknowledge it and tie in the inextricability and mutuality through an inclusive and all-encompassing engagement than to deny it.

By excluding India from the larger mosaic of the declared American intent in the AfPak policy, the Americans have denied themselves the assurance of a sustainable secure and stable region. This is the missing kernel in the political stability equation for South Asia, seen as the major omission in the new strategy.

Socio-political stability, lying at the heart of regional stability, is the key to forging a cooperative regional mechanism built around shared stakes and progressive, prosperous futures. Trade, food safety nets, energy corridors and enhanced connectivity can weave threads of interdependence in the entire region that can only augur a better tomorrow.

To reach that end though, the prescriptive methodology will need to be replaced with an inclusive, cooperative framework, far different than what the new American establishment is currently willing to entertain. For necessary modifications to the geo-political design for South and West Asia, the US will have to view the region more carefully and not base its understanding around the Indian read of the situation alone.

Necessary modifications in the revised strategy should include resolution of age-old issues and the trust issues between the three neighbours. But for America to be the honest broker, it is imperative that its own credibility within the larger region too is established without doubt.

Two things can be done by the Americans straight away: one, provide a de facto acceptance to Pakistan’s nuclear status by concluding a treaty similar to the one signed with India, allowing Pakistan a level playing field. This would lay to rest the bogey that American ambivalence to Pakistan is intended to bring into dispute Pakistan’s nuclear assets, and that the US somehow wants to de-fang Pakistan of her nuclear capability.

Second, the US should use newly gained influence with India to encourage it to work with Pakistan to resolve long-standing issues. Since a Kashmir solution was almost ready about two years ago, it may need just a little more attention. With a resurgent Congress and a reassured and more confident Manmohan Singh, perhaps the time to remove the biggest strategic roadblock in the Indo-Pak relationship has arrived.

Without these two nations evolving their relationship on a more cooperative and even keel, a better future for South Asia can never be ensured; history stands witness to this reality. But, if that proves too sensitive as a triggering platform, the US could do well in arbitrating the more recent and pervasive issue of the management of shared water resources.

This could be a tough ask, only if the proposals do not agree with the US agenda in the region. And if these two or three cannot be a part of the US agenda, there is precious little that the US can ever hope for beyond the transactional objectives. There too, the credibility of intent will always be seriously questioned on both sides.

Even more disconcerting, the post-American environment will be greatly more fractious and unstable with newer issues coming to the fore. The American effort to expand, enlarge, re-equip and re-train the Afghan military, which may in future establish even deeper links with India, will place Pakistan in a crunch. This in turn is likely to push Pakistan into a corner.

Pakistan can be more secure socio-politically only if it is included in regional and global linkages as a trusted partner and equal player. Prescriptive hierarchies will be the anti-thesis of a stable end-state that should be the prime international objective. It is imperative to understand the psychosocial make up of the Pakistani mind and its likely responses to emotive issues. What may appear clever can only have countervailing consequences. Transparency and cooperative engagement alone could move the region forward smoothly.

Editorial, Dawn, Pakistan
By Moazzam Husain
Sunday, 24 May, 2009

ON the eve of September 11, 2001, the country was a pariah state under a military ruler — impoverished, bankrupt, a source of proliferating nuclear technology and a state using jihadis to further its regional territorial interests.

The 1990s had ended as what many termed a “lost decade” in which a population bomb had exploded. Seven years and $10bn after 9/11, there is enormous international goodwill. There is noise and chaos of a democracy.

Following the inflating and bursting of a real estate and stock market asset bubble, the economy is again in despair. A double game has ended as a political consensus appears to be developing against Islamic militancy. Large parts of the NWFP are still outside government control.

Since 9/11, 30 million people have been born — a generation that risks a strong probability of witnessing in their lifetimes cataclysmic events of a type only their ancestors would have seen a century earlier, that fateful summer of 1947 when “…violence spread from one part of Lahore to another like a plague. There must have been trained gangs of thugs moving from one place to another. It was hard to reconcile these bloody events with the nature of our life in pre-partition Lahore,” writes celebrated Indian painter Krishen Khanna in a piece for the book Beloved City: Writings on Lahore edited by Bapsi Sidhwa.

“No one could have imagined that entire populations would be bludgeoned out and rendered homeless and such cruelty and barbarity would prevail amongst Punjabis,” Khanna, a blue-blooded Lahori who studied at Government College and spent many childhood days in the shadow of Kim’s Gun in front of the Lahore Museum, tells us. No one probably imagined it on the eve of partition in 1947, and no one can today imagine the possibility of such a scenario erupting again in, say, 2047. Luckily for Khanna, the process of partition ended. He was able to revisit Lahore in 1988 during the First International Biennale of Arts and sketch the cannon in drawings and abstract paintings. On the other hand, the crisis towards which we are now headed does not have a happy ending.

A regional scramble for water is set to begin — with the Himalayan glacial melt — that begins in as little as 10 years from now. The country will have yet another 30 million people by that time. A predicted deluge, followed by water shortages, desertification, and climate refugees are only some of the expected outcomes. Pakistan is going to be hit hard. By some accounts the Cholistan desert is expected to expand — reaching to the outskirts of Sahiwal.

In the interest of its people, Pakistan will need to enter this very challenging era as a significant economic and military power. After losing the last two decades, the next 10 years probably represent the last window of opportunity. Pakistan will need to urgently build on four of its existing strengths if it is to stand a fighting chance of survival in the several difficult decades beginning as early as 2020.

The first of these strengths is the mountain of international goodwill that presently exists for Pakistan. This will not last for ever. This is an opportunity for Pakistan to harness this tide in its own favour to position itself as a significant player for the power politics of the water scramble that lies ahead. Put bluntly, Pakistan needs to look beyond seeking handouts that barely keep its head above the water. Regardless of assurances that “we wronged you and we will not walk away” this window is open only for a while. In a fast-changing world, no US administration can guarantee what future US interests and priorities will be.

In the larger scheme of things, a Pakistan that is unable to take back control of its territory from non-state actors and deny its soil for their activities will find this goodwill beginning to evaporate. It will find it hard to justify possessing and holding on to its nuclear weapons. In time the world may well find a solution to resolve this dilemma. A Pakistan without nuclear weapons in which Islamic militant and other vigilante groups and warlords control dwindling water resources will not be a worry for the United States. It will not be a worry for a powerful next-door India that will be able to trample on the Indus water treaty in the absence of a credible state.

The military is conscious of the fact that the activities of militant Islamists can degrade the capacity of the state to function; it can injure society and impose unacceptable costs on the economy. This ultimately depletes the nation’s economic and war potential. It is also conscious that Pakistan’s perception as a declining power would make it a less attractive partner for the US, France, Iran and even China.

A wise old man who lives on top of a mountain once said: “Carry a big stick, but speak softly.” In this sense, our nuclear arsenal (together with a powerful military) represents the second strength. In terms of a packing list for the future, we will need this big stick when the water scramble begins. We will not need the Taliban. Clearly, therefore, Pakistan had to make a choice between its Islamists and its nuclear arsenal. At last week’s APC, it chose correctly.

The third strength is this country’s energy, agriculture and trade corridor potential — representing an opportunity to develop the economic elements of national power. Pakistan has to get to work on developing its Thar coal assets — using clean coal technologies. Seawater agriculture is an emerging technology that needs to be explored. In agriculture, high-value crops, improvement of soil carbon content, efficient irrigation technologies and forestation along canals should be priority areas when asking our friends to help.

Our fourth strength is a nascent, imperfect and chaotic democracy, one that is dominated by flawed but still, relatively secular parties. Pakistan must consolidate its present gains and evolve its imperfect political system and culture into democratic institutions that are able to deliver what Political Science 101 says a political system should: determine who gets what, when, where, how and why. Impressively Pakistan’s “fragile” democracy has addressed at least one question correctly, when it built a consensus for Pakistan to fight back.

For the two riparian neighbours — both military and economic powers — water wars will be averted by domestic economic factors as much as the strength of their democracies. Domestic conflict will be averted by strengthening, particularly last-mile delivery, of governance and the distribution of public goods. This window is open for a while only. The post Taliban era must soon begin. There is a lot of work ahead.

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Editorial, Dawn, Pakistan
Saturday, 23 May, 2009

AS the economic assistance package for Pakistan winds its way through the House and Senate committees of the US Congress, the talk of ‘aid with strings’ has not gone away. For reasons to do largely with the relative influence of the non-proliferation and Indian lobbies in the US Congress versus the weaker Pakistani lobby there, issues such as the safety of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, the case of Dr A.Q. Khan and Pakistan’s alleged support for terrorist acts on Indian soil keep being linked to the authorisation of the centrepiece of the US economic strategy on Pakistan: the $1.5bn-a-year non-military assistance floated first in the form of the Biden-Lugar Senate bill and now known as the Pakistan Enduring Assistance and Cooperation Enhancement (PEACE) Act 2009 in the US House of Representatives. Furthermore, there is still debate about ‘benchmarks’ and ‘verification processes’ and the ‘need for transparency’ whenever the aid bill comes up for discussion.

Clearly, the debate in US circles is tone-deaf. Linking economic aid to Pakistan’s perceived past sins on the nuclear front and to its relations with India are a red flag to the uber-nationalists here and make the promise of an end to the era of a ‘transactional’ relationship between the US and Pakistan ring hollow. And the continuing talk of onerous conditions on how the money is to be spent makes it appear less like a mature relationship between two states and more akin to a parent giving her child money with pedantic warnings of responsibility ringing in the child’s ear. Nevertheless, there is a need here to understand the US legislative process and the intent of the Obama administration. The final bill that the president will eventually sign will be a compromise between the House, Senate and the Obama administration. Leaving aside the criticisms and conditionalities raised by some members of Congress at the moment, the central idea of the assistance is to help Pakistan improve the delivery of basic services to its people — that is not likely to change in the final analysis and the path to doing so with a minimum of fuss will be found, or else it will defeat the purpose of the assistance. So what will the final bill look like in all likelihood? Something that hews closely to Adm Mike Mullen’s sensible advice: “I would only ask as we condition things we create as much flexibility as we can and then look at it over time, as opposed to heavy conditions up front that almost make it impossible to get started.”

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Daily Times, Pakistan
Friday, May 22, 2009
INSIGHT:Ejaz Haider

Any discussion of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, what the country needs and whether it should be augmenting its capability has to unfold in the backdrop of the global security environment and what the “leaders” intend to do

Is it a coincidence that this month of May, in the run-up to the 11th anniversary of Pakistan’s nuclear tests, has seen a spate of negative articles and views in the US and Indian press about Pakistan’s nuclear capability, the danger to the country’s nuclear arsenal from extremists “about to take over” and Pakistan’s efforts to enhance its capability? Maybe; maybe not.

While we shall return in a subsequent piece to the theme of why Pakistan is being singled out for special treatment, let us for now cast a cursory glance at the global non-proliferation regime to see where matters stand.

Mohamed ElBaradei, the outgoing director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in a recent interview to The Guardian, has “warned of a new nuclear age”.

Mr ElBaradei, who headed the Agency for 11 years, has said that the current non-proliferation regime is in danger of falling apart because “Any regime...has to have a sense of fairness and equity and it is not there”. According to him, “We still live in a world where if you have nuclear weapons, you are buying power, you are buying insurance against attack. That is not lost on those who do not have nuclear weapons, particularly in [conflict] regions.”

His prediction: the coming years will see what he calls “virtual nuclear weapons states” or “virtual wannabe nuclear weapons states”. These states will develop nuclear-weapons know-how while remaining technically compliant with the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. How?

They will develop the expertise to “produce plutonium or highly enriched uranium and possess the know-how to make warheads, but...stop just short of assembling a weapon”. Without crossing the line, they would not be in breach of the NPT and yet could develop, deploy and use a nuclear weapon within a couple of months.

“This is the phenomenon we see now and what people worry about in Iran. And this phenomenon goes much beyond Iran. Pretty soon...you will have nine weapons states and probably another 10 or 20 virtual weapons states.”

Why is this so?

He makes plain in the interview that the regime is not fair. And he wants the United States and Russia, that possess 95 percent of the world’s arsenal (27,000 weapons) between them, to take the lead before the April 2010 RevCon (NPT review conference) by going for deep strategic cuts, reaffirming the internationally agreed ban on tests and on the production of weapons-grade fissile material — and these as first, immediate steps towards full disarmament.

“If some of this concrete action is taken before the NPT [conference], you would have a completely different environment. All these so-called virtual weapons states, or virtual wannabe weapons states, will think twice...because then the major powers will have the moral authority to go after them and say: ‘We are doing our part of the bargain. Now it is up to you.’”

The “fairness” argument is important. The NPT was discriminatory from the word go. But its discriminatory nature was diluted through a three-pronged strategy: non-proliferation; disarmament; and the right to fuel cycle.

Those who had not tested until 1967 would not cross the line; those who already had nuclear weapons would negotiate in good faith and move towards total disarmament; those who did not possess nuclear weapons would, nonetheless, have the right to peaceful uses of nuclear energy under IAEA inspections and safeguards.

Most importantly, however, a nuclear weapons state in a conflict will NEVER use nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear weapons state.

But Article VI of the NPT (disarmament) has remained a dead letter even though there have been bilateral SALT (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) and START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties) treaties between the US and the USSR/Russia. START III, promising deep cuts, got stalled because of differences over NATO’s eastward expansion and US plans to build a missile defence shield. When the US, under President George W Bush, pulled out of the ABM Treaty (anti-ballistic missile) in 2002, START III was superseded by SORT (strategic offensive reductions). SORT, much weaker in intent and purpose, has been criticised on various counts.

The bilateral process for all practical purposes is stalled and Russia is seriously into modernising its arsenal.

In 2002, the US also came out with its NPR (nuclear posture review) which talked about TNWs (tactical nuclear weapons) and, more disturbingly, using them for operational purposes against elusive enemies. The term employed was “forward deterrence”. The two roles envisaged for these weapons were bunker-busting and earth penetration. The most important step in this regard was the decision by the US Congress to revoke the (then) 10-year-old Spratt-Furse ban on the research and development of weapons below a 5 kiloton yield and the allocation of funds for R&D.

During his campaign and after he took office, President Obama has talked about tightening the non-proliferation regime while referring to the long-term goal of banning the bomb. But the emphasis is again on Iran and North Korea without any reference to changing the global security paradigm that continues to suffer from the concepts of pre-emption and preventive wars or pulling in Israel which stays totally outside any scrutiny.

Similarly, while Obama talked about ratifying the CTBT (Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty), no visible movement has been made to that end. The pledge to stop the development of new nuclear weapons has not overtly ruled out the RRW (reliable replacement warhead) programme. The RRW is supposed to replace the LEP (life extension programme), which is part of the larger SSP (stockpile stewardship programme), and meant to replace weapons components without testing (for details, see CRS Report dated September 12, 2008).

The efforts to tighten the regime are unlikely to work without, as Mr ElBaradei has pointed out, reducing global insecurity, which stems, specifically, from developments since 2001.

Interestingly, in January this year, a taskforce set up by Robert Gates, who Obama has retained as his defence secretary, and headed by James Schlesinger, a former defence secretary, recommended upgrading the US nuclear arsenal. Many US experts and officials agree and recommend modernising weapons and even resuming testing. The CRS report itself, after referring to an article in the Wall Street Journal, jointly authored by George Schultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn (“A World Free of Nuclear Weapons”; January 4, 2007; p.15), rejects that view and supports funding for RRW.

Mr ElBaradei himself, in June 2006, wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post supporting the US-India civil nuclear deal and while denying that the NPT bestowed any “legitimacy” on the five first-generation NWSs, argued that some framework was needed to also pull in Pakistan and Israel into the non-proliferation regime. He seems to have rethought his position with the interview cited above. Equally, however, he is clear that the initiative towards a nuclear zero is in the hands of the US and Russia.

Any discussion of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, what the country needs and whether it should be augmenting its capability has to unfold in the backdrop of the global security environment and what the “leaders” intend to do. Pakistan does not exist in a vacuum.

To that we shall return subsequently.

Source

By Syed Shoaib Hasan
BBC News, Islamabad

Pakistan has denied that it is expanding its nuclear arsenal after the US said that it has unearthed new evidence that it has done so.

The denial was issued by Pakistan's information minister a week after US Adm Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made the disclosure.

The response comes amid fears that the country's nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of the Taleban.

There are also concerns about Islamabad's weak proliferation record.

Pakistan, along with neighbour India, joined the club of declared nuclear weapons states in 1998.

'No compromises'

"Pakistan does not need to expand its nuclear arsenal," Qamaruz Zaman Kaira, Pakistan's information minister, told the Associated Press on Monday.

But we want to make it clear that we will maintain a minimum nuclear deterrence that is essential for our defence and stability.

"We will not make any compromise."

The comments came in the wake of a statement by Adm Mullen in front of a congressional committee last week.

He had replied with a simple "Yes", when asked if Pakistan was expanding its nuclear arsenal.

The statement came as international concerns were voiced over the security of Pakistani nuclear weapons.

Western countries, especially the US, have expressed fears that the weapons could fall into the hands of Taleban militants as they expand their control across northern Pakistan.

But government and military officials have rubbished these statements.

They say Pakistan's nuclear assets are well-guarded and beyond the reach of the militants.

In a recent statement, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani also tried to scotch these fears.

"I want to tell the world in categorical terms that, with the blessing of God, Pakistan's nuclear assets are safe and will remain safe.

"No one, no matter how powerful and influential, [who is] eyeing our national assets will succeed."

Meanwhile, the US state department has denied that Pakistan is using US aid in its goal to expand its nuclear arsenal.

"We shouldn't connect these dots, we shouldn't make this connection because this assistance package is for very specific purposes and we're going to work very closely with the government of Pakistan to meet our joint goals," Ian Kelly, spokesman for the US state department, said at a news briefing in Washington on Monday.

"We have complete faith in the command and control structure of Pakistan's nuclear programme."

Mr Kelly said that "one of the highest priorities" of the government in Islamabad was to make sure that the weapons "do not fall into the wrong hands".

His comments follow a report in the New York Times which said that Pakistan is rapidly expanding its nuclear arsenal.

The report says this was despite an expanding insurgency which could threaten the security of the weapons.

Source

Washington Post
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, May 19, 2009

In 1947, a British lawyer with no experience in the region arrived in India to draw lines on a map. Within several weeks, Cyril Radcliffe had severed the future Pakistan from India, helping to create the conditions that have since resulted in three wars and the arming of both nations with nuclear weapons. People ask what America would do if Pakistan lost control of its nukes. Wrong question. Ask instead what India might do.

That country has as many as 100 nuclear weapons and the missiles, as well as the airplanes, submarines and surface ships, to launch them. Pakistan also has around 100 nuclear weapons but lacks India's extensive delivery systems. Nonetheless, the two countries have what it takes to blow each other to kingdom come. They also have the reason. They hate each other.

The stakes in this part of the world are worth reciting because they are both terrifying and virtually unprecedented. Yet in Congress, the comparison is made to the Vietnam War. Rep. David Obey, the House Appropriations Committee chairman, has suggested that the war in Afghanistan and the effort to stabilize Pakistan have an open-ended and futile Vietnam quality to them. He wants to give the Obama administration one year to show progress -- or get out.

Others make the argument that we can only make matters worse. First "do no harm," counsels Andrew Bacevich, a former Army colonel and the author of the best-seller "The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism." It is his view that the problems of Afghanistan and Pakistan are beyond us, that America has neither the power nor the know-how to do much in this vast, complex region. The trick, he says, is merely to have a plan to secure Pakistan's nuclear weapons if and when the time comes.

If there is a Vietnam analogy, it may be this: Containment can be impossible. The war in Vietnam became the war in Cambodia and the war in Laos. In the end, it meant a bloodbath for the entire region. Cambodia simply went berserk, a horror that is still hard to comprehend. So, too, the unintended consequences of the war in Afghanistan. Pakistan has now been drawn into the fighting with the Taliban. The country is even less stable than it used to be. Once again, we hear that term "collateral damage." This means that the wrong people are being killed

The challenge for President Obama is to explain to the American people why Afghanistan and potentially Pakistan are worth the lives of yet more Americans. So far, Obama has stuck pretty close to the message that he is determined to eliminate al-Qaeda -- and more power to him. But that is too little, too late. The Taliban has already spilled over the border. A bit of nation-building is what Pakistan needs. That will take time -- considerably more than the year Obey and others are willing to grant.

The relevant history here may not be Vietnam at all. It could be World War I. The assassination of a single man somehow set off a chain reaction in which millions were killed and, after a pause, it all resumed under a different name: World War II. (Books are still being written about the cause of World War I.) Now, though, the stakes are so much greater. The region is a nuclear neighborhood, a pharmacy for nuclear addicts with Pakistan choosing to add even more weapons instead of -- just an idea -- opening some schools. The region is roiled. The only constant is enmity.

The critics of Obama's policy for the region are not easily dismissed. Vietnam has its lessons; Iraq, too. What's more, they have their cumulative effect. A kind of national weariness has set in. Why us? Why is it that Americans are always asked to risk their lives? Where the hell is everyone else?

These are hard questions to answer. But an even harder question could someday come after a nuclear catastrophe when people demand to know why nothing much was done to head it off. The answer cannot be that our year was up.

To the Indians, last year's Mumbai terrorist attacks seemed ominously like the sort of sea-land operation only a government -- or a rogue element -- could pull off. They look at Pakistan, which in turn looks back at India across a line drawn long ago by an Englishman. He went home after a brief stay. It will take us much longer.

The New York Times
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: May 18, 2009

Pakistani officials responded Monday to an assertion by the top United States military officer that the country was expanding its nuclear arsenal. At a Congressional panel last week, Adm. Mike Mullen, left, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yes when asked whether there was evidence that Pakistan was adding to its nuclear weapons systems and warheads. On Monday, Pakistan’s information minister, Qamar Zaman Kaira, said: “Pakistan does not need to expand its nuclear arsenal, but we want to make it clear that we will maintain a minimum nuclear deterrence that is essential for our defense and stability.”

In comments at a forum in Los Angeles, the Central Intelligence Agency director, Leon E. Panetta, said that the United States did not know the location of all of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, but he was confident that there were “pretty secure” measures to keep them out of the hands of terrorists.

The New York Times
By THOM SHANKER and DAVID E. SANGER
Published: May 17, 2009

WASHINGTON — Members of Congress have been told in confidential briefings that Pakistan is rapidly adding to its nuclear arsenal even while racked by insurgency, raising questions on Capitol Hill about whether billions of dollars in proposed military aid might be diverted to Pakistan’s nuclear program.

Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed the assessment of the expanded arsenal in a one-word answer to a question on Thursday in the midst of lengthy Senate testimony. Sitting beside Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, he was asked whether he had seen evidence of an increase in the size of the Pakistani nuclear arsenal.

“Yes,” he said quickly, adding nothing, clearly cognizant of Pakistan’s sensitivity to any discussion about the country’s nuclear strategy or security.

Inside the Obama administration, some officials say, Pakistan’s drive to spend heavily on new nuclear arms has been a source of growing concern, because the country is producing more nuclear material at a time when Washington is increasingly focused on trying to assure the security of an arsenal of 80 to 100 weapons so that they will never fall into the hands of Islamic insurgents.

The administration’s effort is complicated by the fact that Pakistan is producing an unknown amount of new bomb-grade uranium and, once a series of new reactors is completed, bomb-grade plutonium for a new generation of weapons. President Obama has called for passage of a treaty that would stop all nations from producing more fissile material — the hardest part of making a nuclear weapon — but so far has said nothing in public about Pakistan’s activities.

Bruce Riedel, the Brookings Institution scholar who served as the co-author of Mr. Obama’s review of Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy, reflected the administration’s concern in a recent interview, saying that Pakistan “has more terrorists per square mile than anyplace else on earth, and it has a nuclear weapons program that is growing faster than anyplace else on earth.”

Obama administration officials said that they had communicated to Congress that their intent was to assure that military aid to Pakistan was directed toward counterterrorism and not diverted. But Admiral Mullen’s public confirmation that the arsenal is increasing — a view widely held in both classified and unclassified analyses — seems certain to aggravate Congress’s discomfort.

Whether that discomfort might result in a delay or reduction in aid to Pakistan is still unclear.

The Congressional briefings have taken place in recent weeks as Pakistan has descended into further chaos and as Congress has considered proposals to spend $3 billion over the next five years to train and equip Pakistan’s military for counterinsurgency warfare. That aid would come on top of $7.5 billion in civilian assistance.

None of the proposed military assistance is directed at the nuclear program. So far, America’s aid to Pakistan’s nuclear infrastructure has been limited to a $100 million classified program to help Pakistan secure its weapons and materials from seizure by Al Qaeda, the Taliban or “insiders” with insurgent loyalties.

But the billions in new proposed American aid, officials acknowledge, could free other money for Pakistan’s nuclear infrastructure, at a time when Pakistani officials have expressed concern that their nuclear program is facing a budget crunch for the first time, worsened by the global economic downturn. The program employs tens of thousands of Pakistanis, including about 2,000 believed to possess “critical knowledge” about how to produce a weapon.

The dimensions of the Pakistani buildup are not fully understood. “We see them scaling up their centrifuge facilities,” said David Albright, the president of the Institute for Science and International Security, which has been monitoring Pakistan’s continued efforts to buy materials on the black market, and analyzing satellite photographs of two new plutonium reactors less than 100 miles from where Pakistani forces are currently fighting the Taliban.

“The Bush administration turned a blind eye to how this is being ramped up,” he said. “And of course, with enough pressure, all this could be preventable.”

As a matter of diplomacy, however, the buildup presents Mr. Obama with a potential conflict between two national security priorities, some aides concede. One is to win passage of a global agreement to stop the production of fissile material — the uranium or plutonium used to produce weapons. Pakistan has never agreed to any limits and is one of three countries, along with India and Israel, that never signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Yet the other imperative is a huge infusion of financial assistance into Afghanistan and Pakistan, money considered crucial to helping stabilize governments with tenuous holds on power in the face of terrorist and insurgent violence.

Senior members of Congress were already pressing for assurances from Pakistan that the American military assistance would be used to fight the insurgency, and not be siphoned off for more conventional military programs to counter Pakistan’s historic adversary, India. Official confirmation that Pakistan has accelerated expansion of its nuclear program only added to the consternation of those in Congress who were already voicing serious concern about the security of those warheads.

During a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday, Senator Jim Webb, a Virginia Democrat, veered from the budget proposal under debate to ask Admiral Mullen about public reports “that Pakistan is, at the moment, increasing its nuclear program — that it may be actually adding on to weapons systems and warheads. Do you have any evidence of that?”

It was then that Admiral Mullen responded with his one-word confirmation. Mr. Webb said Pakistan’s decision was a matter of “enormous concern,” and he added, “Do we have any type of control factors that would be built in, in terms of where future American money would be going, as it addresses what I just asked about?”

Similar concerns about seeking guarantees that American military assistance to Pakistan would be focused on battling insurgents also were expressed by Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, the committee chairman.

“Unless Pakistan’s leaders commit, in deeds and words, their country’s armed forces and security personnel to eliminating the threat from militant extremists, and unless they make it clear that they are doing so, for the sake of their own future, then no amount of assistance will be effective,” Mr. Levin said.

A spokesman for the Pakistani government contacted Friday declined to comment on whether his nation was expanding its nuclear weapons program, but said the government was “maintaining the minimum, credible deterrence capability.” He warned against linking American financial assistance to Pakistan’s actions on its weapons program.

“Conditions or sanctions on this issue did not work in the past, and this will not send a positive message to the people of Pakistan,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because his country’s nuclear program is classified.

The New York Times
Editorial
Published: May 18, 2009

The Indian National Congress party cannot afford a prolonged celebration after its overwhelming election victory. Much of the postvote analysis has focused on the daunting domestic agenda. But now that Congress has a stable mandate — and can shuck a fractious coalition — it is time for India to exercise the kind of regional and global leadership expected of a rising power.

It can start with neighboring Pakistan, arguably the most dangerous country on earth. A report in The Times on Monday reminds us just how dangerous: The United States believes Islamabad is rapidly expanding a nuclear arsenal thought to already contain 80 to 100 weapons.

We have consistently supported appropriate military aid and increased economic aid to help Pakistan fight the Taliban and Al Qaeda, strengthen democratic institutions and improve the life of its people. Squandering precious resources on nuclear bombs is disgraceful when Pakistan is troubled by economic crisis and facing an insurgency that threatens its very existence.

Trying to keep up to 100 bombs from extremists is hard enough; expanding the nuclear stockpile makes the challenge worse. Officials in Washington are legitimately asking whether billions of dollars in proposed new assistance might be diverted to Pakistan’s nuclear program. They should demand assurances it will not be.

India is essential to what Pakistan will do. New Delhi exercised welcome restraint when it did not attack Pakistan after the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai by Pakistani-based extremists. But tensions remain high, and the Pakistani Army continues to view India as its main adversary. India should take the lead in initiating arms control talks with Pakistan and China. It should also declare its intention to stop producing nuclear weapons fuel, even before a proposed multinational treaty is negotiated. That would provide leverage for Washington and others to exhort Pakistan to do the same.

It is past time for India — stronger both economically and in international stature — to find a way to resolve tensions with Pakistan over Kashmir. If that festering sore cannot be addressed directly, then — as Stephen P. Cohen, a South Asia expert at the Brookings Institution, suggests — broader regional talks on environmental and water issues might be an interim way to find common ground. Ignoring Kashmir is no longer an option.

India has played a constructive role in helping rebuild Afghanistan, but it must take steps to allay Islamabad’s concerns that this is a plan to encircle Pakistan. It should foster regional trade with Pakistan and Afghanistan. More broadly, India must help to revive world trade talks by opening its markets. It could use its considerable trade clout with Iran, Sudan and Myanmar to curb Tehran’s nuclear program, end the genocide in Darfur and press Myanmar’s junta to expand human rights.

India is the dominant power in South Asia, but it has been hesitant to assume its responsibilities. The Congress Party has to do better — starting with Pakistan

The New York Times
By THOM SHANKER and DAVID E. SANGER
Published: May 17, 2009

WASHINGTON — Members of Congress have been told in confidential briefings that Pakistan is rapidly adding to its nuclear arsenal even while racked by insurgency, raising questions on Capitol Hill about whether billions of dollars in proposed military aid might be diverted to Pakistan’s nuclear program.

Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed the assessment of the expanded arsenal in a one-word answer to a question on Thursday in the midst of lengthy Senate testimony. Sitting beside Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, he was asked whether he had seen evidence of an increase in the size of the Pakistani nuclear arsenal.

“Yes,” he said quickly, adding nothing, clearly cognizant of Pakistan’s sensitivity to any discussion about the country’s nuclear strategy or security.

Inside the Obama administration, some officials say, Pakistan’s drive to spend heavily on new nuclear arms has been a source of growing concern, because the country is producing more nuclear material at a time when Washington is increasingly focused on trying to assure the security of an arsenal of 80 to 100 weapons so that they will never fall into the hands of Islamic insurgents.

The administration’s effort is complicated by the fact that Pakistan is producing an unknown amount of new bomb-grade uranium and, once a series of new reactors is completed, bomb-grade plutonium for a new generation of weapons. President Obama has called for passage of a treaty that would stop all nations from producing more fissile material — the hardest part of making a nuclear weapon — but so far has said nothing in public about Pakistan’s activities.

Bruce Riedel, the Brookings Institution scholar who served as the co-author of Mr. Obama’s review of Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy, reflected the administration’s concern in a recent interview, saying that Pakistan “has more terrorists per square mile than anyplace else on earth, and it has a nuclear weapons program that is growing faster than anyplace else on earth.”

Obama administration officials said that they had communicated to Congress that their intent was to assure that military aid to Pakistan was directed toward counterterrorism and not diverted. But Admiral Mullen’s public confirmation that the arsenal is increasing — a view widely held in both classified and unclassified analyses — seems certain to aggravate Congress’s discomfort.

Whether that discomfort might result in a delay or reduction in aid to Pakistan is still unclear.

The Congressional briefings have taken place in recent weeks as Pakistan has descended into further chaos and as Congress has considered proposals to spend $3 billion over the next five years to train and equip Pakistan’s military for counterinsurgency warfare. That aid would come on top of $7.5 billion in civilian assistance.

None of the proposed military assistance is directed at the nuclear program. So far, America’s aid to Pakistan’s nuclear infrastructure has been limited to a $100 million classified program to help Pakistan secure its weapons and materials from seizure by Al Qaeda, the Taliban or “insiders” with insurgent loyalties.

But the billions in new proposed American aid, officials acknowledge, could free other money for Pakistan’s nuclear infrastructure, at a time when Pakistani officials have expressed concern that their nuclear program is facing a budget crunch for the first time, worsened by the global economic downturn. The program employs tens of thousands of Pakistanis, including about 2,000 believed to possess “critical knowledge” about how to produce a weapon.

The dimensions of the Pakistani buildup are not fully understood. “We see them scaling up their centrifuge facilities,” said David Albright, the president of the Institute for Science and International Security, which has been monitoring Pakistan’s continued efforts to buy materials on the black market, and analyzing satellite photographs of two new plutonium reactors less than 100 miles from where Pakistani forces are currently fighting the Taliban.

“The Bush administration turned a blind eye to how this is being ramped up,” he said. “And of course, with enough pressure, all this could be preventable.”

As a matter of diplomacy, however, the buildup presents Mr. Obama with a potential conflict between two national security priorities, some aides concede. One is to win passage of a global agreement to stop the production of fissile material — the uranium or plutonium used to produce weapons. Pakistan has never agreed to any limits and is one of three countries, along with India and Israel, that never signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Yet the other imperative is a huge infusion of financial assistance into Afghanistan and Pakistan, money considered crucial to helping stabilize governments with tenuous holds on power in the face of terrorist and insurgent violence.

Senior members of Congress were already pressing for assurances from Pakistan that the American military assistance would be used to fight the insurgency, and not be siphoned off for more conventional military programs to counter Pakistan’s historic adversary, India. Official confirmation that Pakistan has accelerated expansion of its nuclear program only added to the consternation of those in Congress who were already voicing serious concern about the security of those warheads.

During a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday, Senator Jim Webb, a Virginia Democrat, veered from the budget proposal under debate to ask Admiral Mullen about public reports “that Pakistan is, at the moment, increasing its nuclear program — that it may be actually adding on to weapons systems and warheads. Do you have any evidence of that?”

It was then that Admiral Mullen responded with his one-word confirmation. Mr. Webb said Pakistan’s decision was a matter of “enormous concern,” and he added, “Do we have any type of control factors that would be built in, in terms of where future American money would be going, as it addresses what I just asked about?”

Similar concerns about seeking guarantees that American military assistance to Pakistan would be focused on battling insurgents also were expressed by Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, the committee chairman.

“Unless Pakistan’s leaders commit, in deeds and words, their country’s armed forces and security personnel to eliminating the threat from militant extremists, and unless they make it clear that they are doing so, for the sake of their own future, then no amount of assistance will be effective,” Mr. Levin said.

A spokesman for the Pakistani government contacted Friday declined to comment on whether his nation was expanding its nuclear weapons program, but said the government was “maintaining the minimum, credible deterrence capability.” He warned against linking American financial assistance to Pakistan’s actions on its weapons program.

“Conditions or sanctions on this issue did not work in the past, and this will not send a positive message to the people of Pakistan,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because his country’s nuclear program is classified.

Yitzhak Benhorin
Published: 05.18.09, 09:33 / Israel News

WASHINGTON - The United States has a detailed plan for infiltrating Pakistan and securing its mobile arsenal of nuclear warheads if it appears the country is about to fall under the control of the Taliban, al-Qaeda or other Islamic extremists, American intelligence sources told Fox News.

According to the sources, the operation would be carried out by Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), the "super-secret" commando unit headquartered at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

The unit, which was instrumental in the assassination of al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab Zarqawi in Iraq, is the military's chief terrorists hunting squad and has units now operating in Afghanistan on Pakistan's western border. But a secondary mission is to secure foreign nuclear arsenals - a role for which JSOC operatives have trained in Nevada, the sources said.

Fox News said in its report, published Friday, that the mission "has taken on added importance in recent months, as Islamic extremists have taken territory close to the capital of Islamabad and could destabilize Pakistan's shaky democracy."

One of the sources told the news network, "We have plans to secure them (nuclear warheads) ourselves if things get out of hand; small units could seize them, disable them and then centralize them in a secure location."

According to Fox News, a secret Defense Intelligence Agency document first disclosed in 2004 said Pakistan has a nuclear arsenal of 35 weapons. The document said it plans to more than double the arsenal by 2020.

"What makes the Pakistan mission especially difficult is that the military has its missiles on Soviet-style mobile launchers and rail lines. US intelligence agencies, using satellite photos and communication intercepts, are constantly monitoring their whereabouts. Other warheads are kept in storage. US technical experts have visited Pakistan to advise the government on how to maintain and protect its arsenal," the report said.

Also, there are rogue elements inside Pakistan's military and intelligence service who could quickly side with the extremists and make JSOC's mission all the more difficult, Fox News said.

Pakistan rejected the report as "mere fiction."

"Pakistan's multi-tiered and robust command and control structure is operational and we are also fully capable of safeguarding our nuclear assets against any kind of threat," Pakistan's foreign ministry spokesman Abdul Basit said.

Daily Times Monitor
Monday, May 18, 2009

LAHORE: The “decided shift” in the Pakistan Army’s recognition that the threat from the Taliban is a more immediate and serious one than the threat from India is a very encouraging sign, US President Barack Obama has said.

During an interview with Newsweek magazine, he said the US was confident that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal was safe, adding the Pakistani military is equipped to prevent the Taliban from taking over these assets. He said the US was trying to strengthen Pakistan as a partner, adding that he believed Pakistan’s sovereignty must be respected.

The US president said he had decided to send an additional 17,000 troops to Afghanistan after recognising the Taliban were destabilising Pakistan in addition to Afghanistan.