India: An Imagined Enemy?

There’s a bit of Indian in every Pakistani: Zardari

For the first time, a Pakistani head of state promised a “no-first nuclear-strike” against India, talked of change and reconciliation, of shared bloodlines and the possibility of doing away with passports.

Zardari borrowed a quote from his late wife, who once said that there’s a “little bit of India in every Pakistani and a little bit of Pakistan in every Indian.”

“I do not know whether it is the Indian or the Pakistani in me that is talking to you today,” Zardari said, amid applause from his high-profile audience, which included diplomats, politicians and industrialists.

Asif Zardari's address at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit.
23 November 2008

Boastful AQ Khan

A.Q. Khan, father of Pakistan's nuclear program (and midwife to a few others), likes to point out what a feat it was that a country "where we can't even make a bicycle chain" could succeed at such an immense technological task. He exaggerates somewhat: Pakistan got its bomb largely through a combination of industrial theft, systematic violation of Western export controls, and a blueprint of a weapon courtesy of Beijing [China].

Let's Buy Pakistan's Nukes by Bret Stephens
December 16, 2008.

Excerpts from AQ Khan's Letter

About China: "We put up a centrifuge plant at Hanzhong (250 km southwest of Xian). The Chinese gave us drawings of the nuclear weapon, gave us 50 kg of enriched uranium, gave us 10 tons of UF6 (natural) and 5 tons of UF6 (3%)."

About Iran: "Probably with the blessings of BB [Benazir Bhutto, who became prime minister in 1988] and [a now-retired general]… General Imtiaz [Benazir’s defence adviser, now dead] asked… me to give a set of drawings and some components to the Iranians…The names and addresses of suppliers were also given to the Iranians."

About North Korea: "[A now-retired general] took $3 million through me from the N. Koreans and asked me to give some drawings and machines."

Investigation: Nuclear scandal - Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan by Simon Henderson

September 20, 2009

A.Q. Khan boasts of Paki proliferation

The creator of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program boasted in a recent television interview that he and other senior Pakistani officials, eager to see Iran develop nuclear weapons, years ago guided that country to a proven network of suppliers and helped advance its covert efforts.

A.Q. Khan, whom Washington considers the world's most ambitious proliferator of nuclear weapons technology, told a television interviewer in Karachi, Pakistan, that if Iran succeeds in "acquiring nuclear technology, we will be a strong bloc in the region to counter international pressure. Iran's nuclear capability will neutralize Israel's power."

Although Khan has previously claimed nationalist and religious justifications for helping to spread sensitive technology, several experts said his latest statement was an unusually direct claim of broad, official Pakistani support for an Iranian nuclear weapon.

Pakistani Scientist Cites Help to Iran by R. Jeffrey Smith
September 9, 2009

Musharraf admits: US aid used against India

"Wherever there is a threat to Pakistan, we will use it [equipment provided by the US] there. If the threat comes from al-Qaeda or Taliban, it will be used there. If the threat comes from India, we will most surely use it there," Mr Musharraf told Pakistan's Express News television channel.

"There is nothing like this equipment has come from the US and must only be used against Taliban, or that equipment has come from China and must be used against this or that," he added.

Mr Musharraf confirmed that the weapons were indeed used against India.

Musharraf admits US aid diverted, BBC News
September 14, 2009

Nothing achieved from Indo-Pak wars

Former national security adviser Mahmood Ali Durrani has said that the Indian Army crossed the international border to launch full-fledged war against Pakistan in 1965 because “low-level skirmishes were started from this side”.

“We started the intrusions on the borders, and I think we should think about the Indian response at that time,” said Durrani while talking to Daily Times Editor-in-Chief Najam Sethi on his Dunya News programme on Sunday. He said the high-level military command was not involved in “a strategy to disturb India”, but politicians knew about what was happening along the border. He said then foreign affairs minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto also had no idea that India would cross the international border.

Durrani said he had participated in two wars, and “I now think Pakistan did not achieve anything from these wars”.

“We should extend [a hand of] friendship towards India, and start peace talks to settle disputes,” he said.

Pakistan started war with India in 1965: Durrani
September 14, 2009

Terrorist Sanctuaries in Pakistan

AQ Khan should be sentenced for life

Abdul Qadeer Khan has a special place in the pantheon of international outlaws. In 2004, he confessed that over a 15-year period he provided some of the world’s most nefarious and dangerous governments — Iran, North Korea and Libya — with the designs and technology to produce the fuel for nuclear weapons.

The Pakistani metallurgist deserved to be imprisoned for life. But he caught a scandalous break. As the father of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program, he is a national hero. And despite the tearful, televised confession in which Mr. Khan insisted that he alone was guilty, it is widely believed that Pakistan’s powerful military, including Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who was then president and is a former army chief of staff, was complicit in this exceedingly vile trade.

No Freedom for Mr. Khan, The New York Times, page A16
September 6, 2009