Left Flank

Hendrina Khan's account of A.Q. Khan's, her husband's, innocence is a patently opportunistic attempt to capitalize on General Pervez Musharraf's downfall, to exonerate her family's name.

In her dossier, Hendrina Khan denies that her husband made millions with his black market deals and used the money to buy expensive real estate in Islamabad, Dubai, London and Timbuktu, as the Pakistani government has claimed. She also denies that there was an Iranian connection, which Western experts believe is certain, and admits to only two North Korea trips, whereas insiders have counted no fewer than 12. As clearly and understandably partisan as the scientist's wife is, and as rosy the picture she seeks to paint of him and his endeavors is, this does not detract from the credibility of her central accusation that her husband only ever «executed the instructions he was given» by the government.

(...)

It cannot be ruled out that a dossier from Islamabad will be the political nail in his coffin, a document written by a woman who fears for the life of her husband, one of the fathers of the Pakistani bomb.

It's all very dramatic, and beside the point. Both Khan and Musharraf are guilty.

The love of a woman is a rotten thing.

In an account given to SPIEGEL, the wife of Pakistani nuclear scientist
Abdul Qadir Khan lodges serious accusations against President Pervez
Musharraf. She claims her husband, currently under house arrest, was
not a nuclear dealer, and that he only ever «executed the instructions
he was given» by the government. A trip to North Korea, she alleges,
was carried out «at the specific request» of Musharraf.

In his 2006 memoir, «In the Line of Fire,» Musharraf claimed «with
confidence» that neither he nor his government nor any member of
Pakistan's Army had any prior knowledge of A.Q. Khan's alleged nuclear
network. «On the basis of the thorough probe that we conducted in
2003-2004,» Musharraf wrote, «I can say with confidence that neither
the Pakistan Army nor any of the past governments of Pakistan was ever
involved or had any knowledge of A.Q.'s proliferation activities. The
show was completely A.Q.'s.»

Khan's perfidy predates Musharraf's stewardship, buts it's a toss-up which scumbag smells worse in this regard. But, throwing an accomplice under the bus never seemed so romantic.

The Economist explores the role of A.Q. Khan's in Iran's and DPRK's nuclear programs.

The network's customers for other nuclear technologies and equipment were Libya, Iran and North Korea, though suspicion has at times attached to Algeria, Saudi Arabia and Syria too. But Libya has been out of the bomb business since 2003. Jaws dropped when among the haul of equipment and documents it handed to inspectors was an Islamabad dry-cleaner's bag containing most (not all) of the drawings for a clunky Chinese-designed nuclear weapon from the 1960s, given to Pakistan before China decided that spreading the bomb was a dumb idea.

Unlike the Maoist model, the modern, computerised bomb design would fit easily on Pakistan's Ghauri missiles. Pakistan denies it, but these are a knock-off of North Korea's 1,300km-range Nodong rockets. Pakistan appears to have paid for its Ghauris with some nuclear assistance. Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, denies this too. But in his autobiography he admitted that the Khan network had supplied Kim Jong Il's regime with some 20 uranium-enriching centrifuges.

Whatever the truth behind their missile deal, Pakistani officials were genuinely shocked to be told recently that Mr Khan was selling their most closely guarded weapons secrets too, according to Mr Albright. North Korea did test a nuclear device, in 2006. But its bomb used home-produced plutonium from Mr Kim's Yongbyon nuclear reactor for its fissile core; the Pakistani design touted by Mr Khan and his partners uses uranium.

Despite other evidence to the contrary, North Korea insists it got no uranium help from Pakistan or anywhere else. Recently (or so America and Israel say) it was caught out helping Syria to build a nuclear reactor (which Israel later flattened) that could produce plutonium for weapons, just like Yongbyon did. America seems ready to let both these matters go for now, so long as Mr Kim furnishes an accurate and verifiable inventory of his plutonium production. The gamble is that this would be a big step towards a six-party deal, to include South Korea, Japan, China and Russia, that could lead eventually to the dismantling of all North Korea's nuclear programmes.

Unlike Libya and North Korea, Iran flatly denies any weapons intent. It bought uranium-spinning equipment from Mr Khan, but says its nuclear work is entirely peaceful. Yet it has defied a string of UN Security Council resolutions demanding that the work be halted until inspectors can be sure of that. The trouble is that uranium enriched a little can be used in nuclear-power reactors, but when enriched a lot can be abused for bomb-building.

Iran's determination to enrich on regardless looks like dooming the latest offer of negotiations from America, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China. The six have promised Iran assistance with other, less proliferation-prone nuclear technology, and direct talks on a whole range of economic, trade and security issues that Iran itself raised in a set of counter-proposals last month. A crucial difference between the two offers is that Iran wants to enrich on regardless, on its own territory, whereas the six insist the work be suspended before negotiations start.

Unless Iran shows willing, says Britain's prime minister, Gordon Brown, European governments are prepared to extend their sanctions on Iran, for example by freezing the overseas assets of Bank Melli, Iran's largest commercial bank. (That move is not quite a done deal, but Mr Brown is confident it soon will be.) Despite record world energy prices, the Europeans may consider blocking investment in Iran's oil and gas industries too. America already has tough sanctions in place, though Russia and China do not.

Iran's insistence on enriching, whatever the cost, deepens suspicion of its motives. Now there are more worries. Like Pakistan's Ghauri missiles, Iran's Shahab-3 rockets are clones of Mr Kim's Nodongs. So the Khan network's modern warhead design would fit them just as nicely.

There is no evidence of any such transaction, but American and other intelligence agencies recently showed nuclear inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN's nuclear guardian, evidence pointing to Iranian weapons work which America thinks may have stopped in 2003—though others believe it continues. This includes both high-explosive testing for possible nuclear triggers and work on a Shahab-3 missile cone to accommodate a nuclear warhead. Iran has dismissed the material as fabricated. But it has yet to give a convincing explanation of why it had a document, supplied by Mr Khan and his associates, on shaping uranium into spheres—a technique useful only in weapons building.

ACW's jeffrey offers technical observations: «What does seem likely is that the device is small enough for the Nodong family, which includes Pakistan's Ghauri and Iran's Shahab.»

Yet, again, it's the politics that worries and infuriates me. The Bush administration is still coddling Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf, an approach CFR's Charles D. Ferguson would prefer to see replaced with a different diplomatic process. Ferguson rightly admits there are Washington officials, notwithstanding how the Tinners allegedly fooled the CIA after 2003 (via Danger Room's «Nuke Smuggler Peddled Missile-Ready Bomb Designs (Updated Again)», who have known about Khan's illicit activities for decades.

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Both conservatives and progressives are criticizing the Bush administration for its continued support of Pakistan's embattled president, Pervez Musharraf, and the same could be directed at Republican presidential candidate, John McCain.

Cato Institute advises the Bush administration to stop the personal touch.

Politically, the United States will have to branch out to civilian leaders other than Musharraf in order to maintain some semblance of political stability. Militarily, to prevent the army's gradual erosion, the United States must continue giving aid to Islamabad with strict oversight and the assurance that such funding is being used against insurgents and not against long-time rival India.

The Center for American Progress is slightly less diplomatic.

The Bush administration continues to demonstrate a shocking tone deafness and incompetence when it comes to U.S. policy toward Pakistan. Just recently, the White House press secretary stated that it was too early to tell whether elections had weakened Musharraf's power. In even more disturbing remarks, she continued: "I think what President Musharraf has shown is an ability to provide for the country a chance to be confident in their government."

Furthermore, sources in Islamabad tell us that the administration is asking the PPP to explore forming a coalition government with PML-Q rather than to reach out to former prime minister Sharif's PML-N. In short, the Bush administration may be trying to keep Musharraf in the game and sideline Sharif. The Bush administration has been nervous about Sharif because of his historical closeness to the religious parties in Pakistan, yet sidelining the PML-N could be potentially destabilizing for Pakistan as it controls the heartland of Pakistan through control of the Provincial Assembly in Punjab.

The Bush administration needs to let Pakistan's political parties do their own parliamentary horse-trading without U.S. pressure, but we worry that the administration has refused to learn the lessons of its failed policies in Pakistan. Its efforts to negotiate a deal between President Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto prior to her assassination served to delegitimize her for many Pakistanis, making her a greater target for anti-American extremists in Pakistan.

The administration's consistent over-reliance on President Musharraf emboldened an authoritarian figure who has weakened the nation's independent judiciary and media, making the United States appear to be a force against democracy and the Pakistani people. What's more, U.S. policy has done little to counter the strengthening militant groups in Pakistan. If anything, the administration's ham-handed policies have only inflamed a fragile political and security environment in the country.

Meanwhile, Juan Cole warns that a McCain administration will do no better with Pakistan (as well as defending Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama).

And, let's just consider the shaky dictator Pervez Musharraf, who just suffered a sharp rebuke from the Pakistani electorate, as I wrote about today in Salon.com. McCain appears never to have met a rightwing dictator he didn't like. McCain defends the dictator. Here is what McCain said about Musharraf late last December:

"Prior to Musharraf, Pakistan was a failed state," McCain said. "They had corrupt governments and they would rotate back and forth and there was corruption, and Musharraf basically restored order. So you're going to hear a lot of criticism about Musharraf that he hasn't done everything we wanted him to do, but he did agree to step down as head of the military and he did get the elections."

There's much more in this blog, so make it a priority!

I'm sure this will never be good enough for the Pakistan's People's Party or Ms. Bhutto's family—and damn it, if the lone gunman is still out there for conspiracy theorists to search for—but it was just a distraction from the larger issues.

Western diplomats warned that the findings in Scotland Yard's report will not help president Pervez Musharraf's government tackle the political fallout from Ms Bhutto's killing, as Pakistan heads towards parliamentary elections which are now due on February 18th. Earlier, the elections were due on January 8th but were delayed after nationwide riots occurred following Ms Bhutto's killing.

«The PPP will keep on arguing that this was a conspiracy hatched possibly with support of people in Pakistan's ruling structure» said one western diplomat. «They will keep on rejecting Scotland Yard's outcome».

The Pakistani government this week announced the arrest of two suspects in Ms Bhutto's killing. A third was arrested last month, when Pakistani officials accused Baitullah Mehsud, the pro-Taliban Islamic militant, of backing Ms Bhutto's assassins. But the official position has been thrown into fresh controversy after officials on Wednesday confirmed a ceasefire between Mr Mehsud and Pakistani government troops in the region bordering Afghanistan.

Now, excuse me while I stick a finger down my throat to purge my reaction to the "creeping convenient canonization of Benazir Bhutto." Individual Count strikes just the right chord.

Normally I wouldn't ordinarily give Imran Khan a second look, but, along with his support for Pakistan's judiciary, I found this insight striking.

Khan argued a different perspective from that of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, who is wrapping up a tour through Europe. In an interview with the Monitor, Khan said he came to challenge conventional wisdom in the US. His argument: An election in Pakistan could do more harm than good. Restoring an independent judiciary, rather than holding elections, should be the first goal. The US "should back the democratic process, by insisting on the reinstatement of the judges, rather than back any individual in an election," Khan said.

But, why bother about that, when it seems the Bush administration is sold on some sort of acceptable way to boot out Musharraf?

By way of responding to Blake Hounshell's comment earlier this week about Albright's and Shire's argument, that "Slowly, but Surely, Pyongyang Is Moving", I have to second DPRK Studies' Richardson's skepticism about DPRK's motivations and the extent of its HEU program. However, there are broader issues that go beyond DPRK, and the arid Clintonian-Neo-Con debates of the early 2000's.

Firstly, there is no hard evidence for ascertaining Pyongyang's HEU program.

The roots of cooperation are deep. North Korea and Pakistan have been engaged in conventional arms trade for over thirty years. In the 1980s, as North Korea began successfully exporting ballistic missiles and technology, Pakistan began producing highly enriched uranium (HEU) at the Khan Research Laboratory. Benazir Bhutto's 1993 visit to Pyongyang seems to have kicked off serious missile cooperation, but it is harder to pinpoint the genesis of Pakistan's nuclear cooperation with North Korea. By the time Pakistan probably needed to pay North Korea for its purchases of medium-range No Dong missiles in the mid-1990s (upon which its Ghauri missiles are based), Pakistan's cash reserves were low. Pakistan could offer North Korea a route to nuclear weapons using HEU that could circumvent the plutonium-focused 1994 Agreed Framework and be difficult to detect.

Here again, the absence of proof leads not to verifiable fact, but a flash of temperament: is one a giddy optimist, or one who keeps his knickers firmly upright? I have to say, I would join the latter group.

Yet, secondly, as that same 2004 Global Security essay concludes, and Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins would concur, the Bush administration is not soft on Pyongyang, it's criminally negligent on nonproliferation. From the 2004 Global Security paper again:

Combating terrorism and weapons of mass destruction, however, are both important objectives for the United States and Congress may consider, in its oversight role, how we can successfully balance both. Pakistan is clearly a key ally in the global war on terror, but the considerable uncertainty about the Pakistani government's involvement in Khan's activities, particularly with respect to North Korea, raises questions about its past, but also future, cooperation in combating the spread of weapons of mass destruction.

On one hand, according to Frantz and Collins, the CIA could have halted AQ Khan in his tracks as early as the 1970's, but chose to gather intelligence, rather than share information with the Dutch intelligence services or law enforcement. Both before and after 9/11, Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf resented his divided obligations, to protect Khan and, perhaps, the ISI and his own military colleagues from further questioning about his nuclear network's activities, and to the United States for military aid conditional upon backing the fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan. President Clinton shelved prosecuting Khan, for Pakistan's participation in a commando raid on al-Qaeda in 1998. In July, 2001, the Bush administration had another opportunity to stop Khan. Finally, in December, 2001, George Tenet visited Islamabad personally, but not to ascertain Khan's activities, rather to secure the arrest of two Pakistani generals alleged to have negotiated with al-Qaeda for nuclear materials. Tenet studiously avoided mention of Khan so as not to embarrass Musharraf. American presidents from Eisenhower to Carter to Bush have routinely subordinated the strategic question of halting proliferation to the exigencies of the day.

Thirdly, there's the Libya gambit:

There is a superficially plausible model - Libya. Disarm, don't worry about a U.S. attack, and enjoy normalized relations, etc. But that doesn't take into account the cult of personality surrounding the Kims, and thus the need to maintain isolation.

Libya's capitulation is the result of decades of comprehensive sanctions and the intelligence on the AQ Khan nuclear network the CIA decided it could reliably turn over. However, such a wealth of intelligence on the DPRK doesn't seem to exist, and sanctions against Pyongyang have proven unsuccessful.

Finally, there's the "Beijing Miracle", the view that PRC will apply the requisite diplomatic, and if not successful, economic and military, pressure on Pyongyang to see the Six-Party process through to finish. That feeble hope died, if it ever really did have legs, when Beijing advised calm over Pyongyong's missed deadline. Beijing is simply more competent than Washington's elected politicians at crafting and sticking to a foreign policy agenda.

And, that's where the problem lies. It's the incremental errors in successive administrations' foreign policies, from Atoms for Peace, to the Brzezinski response to the Soviet-Afghan War, and finally to the Clinton and Bush administration's support for Pakistan at any cost. It's the marginalization of the International Atomic Energy Agency because of half-baked fears of international organizations (and simple tight-fistedness). It's the incestuous need to support certain states, due to previous errors in policy, but instead calling it "friendship". It might even be the simple-minded belief that nukes don't kill, only bad guys in authoritarian states do. It's the result of a well-meaning, yet hypocritical hegemon losing track of its global responsibilities due to interest-group lobbying, error, and bad intelligence, instead of committing itself to limited, well-articulated, universal goals, like non-proliferation, globalization, and sharing resources equitably.

DPRK has played the seam between all these mistakes. The only way to beat Pyongyang is to undo the major damage decades of minor errors have wrought.