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COMMENTARY
Pakistan as proliferator: A view
from Washington
By Ehsan Ahrari
As if Pakistan does not already have enough
domestic and regional problems of its own, it is being
accused by the United States as a nuclear proliferator.
Islamabad denies the charges; however, that old adage,
where there is smoke there is fire, is quite apt here.
Washington has ample evidence to conclude that
Pakistan's nuclear proliferation policy is in urgent
need for a change. In an era when nonproliferation is an
issue of high urgency for the US, the cost of seemingly
reckless behavior on the part of Pakistan might be too
high. More to the point, this development calls for
serious understanding on both sides about each other's
strategic priorities and ways of accommodating them
before they become unmanageable.
Only last July,
US satellites spotted Pakistani cargo planes picking up
missile parts from North Korea. After Pyongyang's
confession to the US last fall that it has resumed
weapons program, the US Secretary of State Colin Powell
confronted President General Pervez Musharraf about his
country's illegal assistance to North Korea. Apparently,
Musharraf assured Powell that Pakistan was not involved
in such activities.
Then there were reports that
the "father" of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, Dr A
Q Khan, has been involved in offering nuclear
assistance, in addition to North Korea, to Iran and
Iraq. Robert Einhorn, former assistant secretary of
state for nonproliferation during the Bill Clinton
years, departed from his usual restrained tone by
observing, "If the international community had a
proliferation most-wanted list, A Q Khan would be most
wanted on the list."
Pakistan and Iran signed a
nuclear cooperation agreement in 1986. Subsequently,
Khan visited the Iranian nuclear plant in Bushehr. He is
also regarded as the person behind the training of
Iranian scientists in Pakistan in 1988. Pakistan is also
reported to have cooperated with Iran in building a
nuclear reactor in 1990.
Khan's alleged
involvement in supplying the nuclear know-how to Iraq is
one of the greatest mysteries thus far, however.
According to a report from the Los Angeles Times, a
"middleman" has named him as the person who offered to
help Iraq "establish a project to enrich uranium and
manufacture a nuclear weapon". A memo to that effect has
been uncovered during the 1998 UN inspection of Iraq;
however, the name of the person who made such an offer
was not part of that document. Thus far, the government
of Iraq has not confirmed that Khan was, indeed, the
person who allegedly made such an offer.
Undoubtedly, Khan is only the human face of
Islamabad's policy of nuclear proliferation. Regarding
North Korea, Pakistan's reported willingness to
cooperate was purely of a quid pro quo nature: transfer
of nuclear know-how, and even technology, for long-range
ballistic missiles. Islamabad's motives for supplying
the nuclear know-how to Iran deserve a systematic
attention, considering that the latter has an active
nuclear program, its declared peaceful intentions
notwithstanding.
It is worth noting that
Pakistan-Iran cooperation took place during the
pre-Taliban era. After the capture of power by the
Taliban, those ties first became frosty, and then
outright tense. However, no one knows for sure whether
the deterioration of ties also brought about the
cessation of nuclear cooperation between the two
neighbors. If Pakistan and Iran continued to cooperate
on nuclear issues even during the Taliban rule, then the
US has a major worry at hand.
At least for now,
Washington seems to have opted to rely on back-channel
diplomacy to put pressure on Islamabad. There is little
doubt that the US does not want to make Pakistan's
involvement in nuclear proliferation a major issue at a
time when its global war against terrorism is not going
well in the Pakistan-Afghanistan border areas around
South Waziristan and the North West Frontier Province
(NWFP). The province is now governed by the Muttahida
Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), which is a coalition of six
staunchly anti-American Islamist parties.
Under
the MMA rule, Sharia (Islamic) laws are being vigorously
implemented. There are reports that some MMA members
also wish to ban coeducation of boys and girls in
colleges and universities. Even hiring practices are
likely to discriminate against female employment in the
coming months. Measures of this nature, if implemented,
would make the NWFP a smaller slice of Afghanistan under
the Taliban rule. But that is not the complete story. If
the NWFP were to become Islamized, it is anyone's guess
as to how much longer before the contagion of
Taliban-style governance would widen its scope to other
provinces of Pakistan.
Then there is another
variable that favors Pakistan, at least for now. As the
Bush administration increases its attention on invading
Iraq, and as the US-North Korea tensions continue over
the latter's declaration to proceed with its nuclear
weapons program, Afghanistan seems to have fallen
through the cracks of inattention. In the meantime, the
rising popularity of al-Qaeda in the NWFP is also
becoming a source of concern for the US. As disingenuous
as Musharraf has been about democratizing his country,
even he cannot take any precipitous actions, such as
dissolving the MMA government, in order to forestall the
rising influence of Islamists. Such an action would make
Pakistan even more explosive and anti-American (if
that's even possible) than it is right now.
As
serious as Pakistan's palpable nuclear proliferation has
been, given its significance to the US in the post
September 11 era, there is an urgent need for a
systematic security dialogue between the two for the
purpose of evolving a strategic framework, along the
same line that is already in place between the US and
India.
It is imperative that the Bush
administration understand that the stakes for Pakistan
are indeed high. Its economy, though getting somewhat
better, is not out of the woods by any stretch of the
imagination. The United States must also keep in mind
that the overall zero-sum perspectives regarding their
respective security policy that motivates India and
Pakistan, at times forces the smaller of the two to take
myopic actions, such as indulging in nuclear
proliferation for short-term payoffs. As the US
contemplates long-range economic assistance for
Afghanistan, it should also consider broadening its
scope by developing similar types of assistance for
Pakistan. Brightening its economic future may be the
only means for eradicating the jihadi culture of that
country.
Pakistan, on its part, must understand
that - especially after the reported boasting by the
al-Qaeda terrorists that they have acquired "dirty
bombs" - the US is especially edgy about any aspects of
nuclear proliferation. That reality is only underscored
by the fact that the substantial focus of present crises
involving North Korea and Iraq is the proliferation of
weapons of mass destruction. In the case of North Korea,
it is the potential nuclearization of the last bastion
of Stalinist government that is grabbing the world's
attention. Neither the international community, nor its
chief gendarme, the US, will tolerate such a
happenstance. For Pakistan to continue to have any ties
with it, no matter how genuine its own security concerns
happen to be, has a tremendous potential of driving a
wedge between Islamabad and Washington. Pakistan
certainly would not want that to happen, given that the
strategic balance in South Asia continues to favor India
significantly.
Ehsan Ahrari, PhD, is
an Alexandria, Virginia, US-based independent strategic
analyst.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd.
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