Don’t Bomb Iran

New books are suggesting that not only did the US keep silent in the 1980s and 90s as Pakistan built uranium and plutonium bombs, but it actually encouraged Pakistan’s nuclear proliferation and covered up for it. It is even alleged that presidential appointees “tipped off the Pakistani government so as to prevent its agents getting caught in US Customs Service sting operations”. The US need Pakistani help in to run its proxy war in Afghanistan, arming anti-soviet rebels (and helping Osama Bin Laden set up training camps).

It has long been known that US intelligence and government for decades kept silent about Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program and AQ Khan’s nuclear smuggling ring, but this recent review of new books at the Nonproliferation Review by Mark Hibbs has much more information…

By the end of 1994, it was apparent that for about ten years US intelligence agencies, national laboratory analysts and three executive branch departments had all kept their knowledge of Khushab project [to produce plutonium weapons] secret. That was, I though then, astonishing.

Tags: Khan, nuclear weapons, Pakistan