06-25-2004, 08:04 PM
<b>A Blind Eye to the Islamic Bomb </b>
According to the world's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, it's now just a matter of time before terrorists strike with a nuclear weapon. Earlier this week, the agency's head, Mohamed ElBaradei, announced that the danger of terrorists acquiring nuclear capability was now imminent. If ElBaradei's horror scenario unfolds it may be thanks to Pakistan. Earlier this year, it was revealed that Pakistan had been leaking nuclear technology and expertise to some of the world's most unstable and dangerous regimes for years. As Nick Lazaredes reveals, the West, consumed as it was with Iraq, largely turned a blind eye to this trade and is still showing remarkable patience in uncovering how much damage was done.
Transcript
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Pakistan's nuclear proliferation was finally revealed earlier this year. It stands accused of establishing a virtual pan-Islamic nuclear supermarket, with clients like Libya and Iran and an underground network that spread from the Middle East to Malaysia and Europe.
But in a remarkable feat of blame-shifting, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has managed to deflect any punishment for what is clearly a shocking development in heightening nuclear tensions. Content with looking the other way while Pakistan helps them in the war on terror, the United States has rewarded Musharraf with even more money and military hardware.
Before the nuclear proliferation scandal stole the headlines, monuments to Pakistan's atomic might were scattered throughout the capital, Islamabad. Now only this one - a replica of the mountain where the country detonated its first nuclear device - remains intact. It's all part of a drive by President Musharraf to sweep the whole proliferation affair under the carpet.
But despite his best efforts to conceal the truth - efforts condoned by the US government - intriguing new details about this dangerous black market in nuclear technology are coming to the surface.
This is the man blamed for letting Pakistan's nuclear cat out of the bag. In Pakistan, Abdul Qadeer Khan was not just any national hero. He was an icon, a living treasure. True, without him, Pakistan would never have been able to build the bomb. But is he the Dr Strangelove character that the authorities suggest he is - a rogue scientist heading his own private underground network trading in nuclear technology around the world?
Certainly, the Pakistani military want the world to believe that Dr Khan acted alone. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->To allow Pakistan and Saudi Arabia access to nuclear material seems particularly foolhardy. Despite both governments' friendly relations with the United States, their deeply Muslim populations see America as waging war on Islam.
Fundamentalist political parties in Pakistan have a mindset that is ominously close to that of Osama bin Laden.
PROFESSOR PERVEZ HOODBHOY, NUCLEAR PHYSICIST: <b>The religious parties in Pakistan, they call it with great pride, an "Islamic bomb". They say this is a bomb that should be used for the defence of the entire Muslim ummah, for the collective defence of Islam everywhere.
Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy is a Pakistani nuclear physicist who has spoken out against his country's proliferation abroad. He believes the situation in Pakistan is dangerously unstable</b>.
PROFESSOR PERVEZ HOODBHOY: There is a lot of hatred for the United States, especially after what it has done in Iraq and what it is continuing to do in Israel. I fear that if Musharraf is assassinated, that there could be a dangerous situation in the country and that the nuclear weapons then would possibly be hijacked.
By turning a blind eye to Pakistan's bomb and the efforts to set up a worldwide Islamic nuclear network, has America seriously misread the real threat?
Could short-term strategic expediency have blinded them to what could turn out to be the ultimate case of blow-back?
MICHAEL WILDES: The American Government supported bin Laden only to find him to be the greatest risk to our national security years later. The government supported the likes of Pakistan now. Are we going to be at war two months, five years from now with Pakistan?
The glue that holds the Pakistan-US alliance together is President Musharraf himself. And he has already narrowly escaped two assassination attempts. Senior figures in Pakistan think it's time to re-evaluate the relationship with America.
GENERAL HAMID GUL: So what is it that Pakistan has not done? And yet they are not satisfied with us. It only shows that it is very dangerous to be friends of America. Sometimes it's good to be their enemy.
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
According to the world's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, it's now just a matter of time before terrorists strike with a nuclear weapon. Earlier this week, the agency's head, Mohamed ElBaradei, announced that the danger of terrorists acquiring nuclear capability was now imminent. If ElBaradei's horror scenario unfolds it may be thanks to Pakistan. Earlier this year, it was revealed that Pakistan had been leaking nuclear technology and expertise to some of the world's most unstable and dangerous regimes for years. As Nick Lazaredes reveals, the West, consumed as it was with Iraq, largely turned a blind eye to this trade and is still showing remarkable patience in uncovering how much damage was done.
Transcript
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Pakistan's nuclear proliferation was finally revealed earlier this year. It stands accused of establishing a virtual pan-Islamic nuclear supermarket, with clients like Libya and Iran and an underground network that spread from the Middle East to Malaysia and Europe.
But in a remarkable feat of blame-shifting, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has managed to deflect any punishment for what is clearly a shocking development in heightening nuclear tensions. Content with looking the other way while Pakistan helps them in the war on terror, the United States has rewarded Musharraf with even more money and military hardware.
Before the nuclear proliferation scandal stole the headlines, monuments to Pakistan's atomic might were scattered throughout the capital, Islamabad. Now only this one - a replica of the mountain where the country detonated its first nuclear device - remains intact. It's all part of a drive by President Musharraf to sweep the whole proliferation affair under the carpet.
But despite his best efforts to conceal the truth - efforts condoned by the US government - intriguing new details about this dangerous black market in nuclear technology are coming to the surface.
This is the man blamed for letting Pakistan's nuclear cat out of the bag. In Pakistan, Abdul Qadeer Khan was not just any national hero. He was an icon, a living treasure. True, without him, Pakistan would never have been able to build the bomb. But is he the Dr Strangelove character that the authorities suggest he is - a rogue scientist heading his own private underground network trading in nuclear technology around the world?
Certainly, the Pakistani military want the world to believe that Dr Khan acted alone. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->To allow Pakistan and Saudi Arabia access to nuclear material seems particularly foolhardy. Despite both governments' friendly relations with the United States, their deeply Muslim populations see America as waging war on Islam.
Fundamentalist political parties in Pakistan have a mindset that is ominously close to that of Osama bin Laden.
PROFESSOR PERVEZ HOODBHOY, NUCLEAR PHYSICIST: <b>The religious parties in Pakistan, they call it with great pride, an "Islamic bomb". They say this is a bomb that should be used for the defence of the entire Muslim ummah, for the collective defence of Islam everywhere.
Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy is a Pakistani nuclear physicist who has spoken out against his country's proliferation abroad. He believes the situation in Pakistan is dangerously unstable</b>.
PROFESSOR PERVEZ HOODBHOY: There is a lot of hatred for the United States, especially after what it has done in Iraq and what it is continuing to do in Israel. I fear that if Musharraf is assassinated, that there could be a dangerous situation in the country and that the nuclear weapons then would possibly be hijacked.
By turning a blind eye to Pakistan's bomb and the efforts to set up a worldwide Islamic nuclear network, has America seriously misread the real threat?
Could short-term strategic expediency have blinded them to what could turn out to be the ultimate case of blow-back?
MICHAEL WILDES: The American Government supported bin Laden only to find him to be the greatest risk to our national security years later. The government supported the likes of Pakistan now. Are we going to be at war two months, five years from now with Pakistan?
The glue that holds the Pakistan-US alliance together is President Musharraf himself. And he has already narrowly escaped two assassination attempts. Senior figures in Pakistan think it's time to re-evaluate the relationship with America.
GENERAL HAMID GUL: So what is it that Pakistan has not done? And yet they are not satisfied with us. It only shows that it is very dangerous to be friends of America. Sometimes it's good to be their enemy.
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->