Left Flank

I've read about four chapters of The Nuclear Jihadist, mostly about A.Q. Khan's early life in India, Pakistan, and Europe. The author spices the tale of Khan's remarkable turn from the charming man with a Dutch wife to a patriotic Pakistani spy with Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's nuclear ambitions, Pakistan's early attempts to manufacture a plutonium-based nuclear device, and Khan's early work on centrifuges used for uranium enrichment.

Not only did Khan keep copies of his own work, but, after contacting Pakistani intelligence, he acquired access to other projects vital to Pakistan's uranium program. Khan also ordered equipment identical in specification to equipment he himself developed for Dutch laboratories, which tipped off Dutch authorities. Before that, no one suspected that Khan was spying, and security conditions were negligent. A Dutch friend, who had tutored Khan on photography (which Khan used to copy documents, along with his ability to translate Dutch and German into Urdu), failed to intervene earlier, because he wanted to retain Khan's friendship. But, finally, in 1975, on the eve of Khan's final departure for Pakistan (of which no one knew), there was a real opportunity to stop him.

In 1975, the Dutch national security agency, BVD, and FDO, a Dutch company where A.Q. Khan worked on centrifuges, sought his arrest for espionage.  Then economics minister (later, prime minister), Ruud Lubbers, did not want to undermine the reputation of burgeoning Dutch companies with a scandal. Enter the CIA:

Lubbers and a former CIA division chief who monitored the Pakistani nuclear program at the time said the solution met the Dutch goal of maintaining the economic status quo and satisfying the Americans. In fact, the CIA was exultant because the Khan episode opened a new window onto Pakistan's procurement operation at a critical moment. A few weeks earlier, a Pakistani nuclear scientist who had been providing the CIA with intelligence from inside the [Pakistan Atomic Energy Comission] PAEC had been exposed and arrested. The CIA feared that its spotlight on Pakistani nuclear work would go dark at a critical moment. Said the former CIA official, "We were nervous about rebuilding our espionage networks, so it makes sense that the agency would not have asked the Dutch to arrest Khan. We were rebuilding, and we would have wanted to see a lot more."

The decision to recommend against arresting Khan marked the first time that American intelligence agencies could have stopped Khan. The decision was understandable in light of the agency's culture and worldview - the CIA is not a law enforcement agency, and its responsibility is to gather intelligence and pass it on the American policymakers. Looking back, however, current and former proliferation experts and intelligence officers questioned the decision. What if Khan had been stopped before he really got started? He had kept the centrifuge designs to himself to ensure a triumphal return, and his arrest would almost certainly have stopped the transfer of key information to Pakistan and delayed its nuclear program for years, perhaps decades.