Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

US has secret plans to safeguard Pakistan's nukes
AFP on Yahoo ^ | 11/11/07 | AFP

Posted on 11/11/2007 2:25:10 PM PST by NormsRevenge

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States reportedly has secret contingency plans to safeguard Pakistani nuclear weapons if they risk falling into the wrong hands.

But US officials worry their limited knowledge about the location of the arsenal could pose a problem, the Washington Post said, a week after Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency.

"We can't say with absolute certainty that we know where they all are," one unidentified former US official told the newspaper, adding that any US effort to secure Pakistan's nuclear arsenal "could be very messy."

Under a more optimistic scenario, the Pakistani military would help the United States in any intervention, the Post said. In other cases, that assistance might not be forthcoming, it cautioned.

The report said US officials would not discuss details of the classified plans, "but several former officials said the plans envision efforts to remove a nuclear weapon at imminent risk of falling into terrorists' hands."

US officials and lawmakers have voiced alarm that the Musharraf government could lose control over its nuclear arsenal amid the mounting political crisis there.

"I'm very concerned about it. Not immediately, but over the next year to two years," Senator Joseph Biden, a Democratic presidential contender, said on CNN.

Biden, chairman of the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee, said the United States needed to shore up anti-Musharraf moderates or risk seeing Pakistan go the way of Iran three decades ago.

"The Shah got overthrown and moderates got crushed by extremists," he said.

But Richard Armitage, who as deputy secretary of state led the US effort to get Musharraf on board the anti-terror struggle after the September 11 attacks of 2001, dismissed fears over the safety of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.

"You know as well as I do that that nuclear arsenal is one, dispersed, and second, carefully guarded by the army," he told CNN.

"Now we have had, historically, discussions with the Pakistani army about the safeguarding of those nuclear weapons," the former official said.

"So I think in the short or even medium term, should things turn badly, we are not going to worry about nuclear weapons in the first instance."

Lieutenant General Carter Ham, director of operations with the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday that the Pentagon was keeping a close eye on Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.

"Any time there is a regime that has nuclear weapons and that experiences a situation like in Pakistan, of course there is a primary concern," he told reporters.

Islamabad, Washington's key ally in the fight against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, has amassed about 50 nuclear weapons since detonating its first atomic devices in May 1998 in a series of tit-for-tat tests with India.

Pakistan also is suspected of selling atomic secrets on a global black market headed by its disgraced chief nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan.

The Post recalled US allegations that two retired Pakistani nuclear scientists traveled to Afghanistan in August 2001 to brief Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden about how to make nuclear weapons.

Among US intelligence agencies, there is particular concern now over the cohesion of Pakistan's army if extremist violence and opposition protests against Musharraf escalate, the report said.

"If there is a collapse in the command-and-control structure -- or if the armed forces fragment -- that's a nightmare scenario," said John Brennan, a retired CIA official and ex-director of the National Counterterrorism Center.

"If there are different power centers within the army, they will each see the strategic (nuclear) arsenal as a real prize," he told the Post.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Government; Politics/Elections; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: enemedia; nukes; pakistan; pakistaninukes; safeguard; secretplans
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-47 next last

1 posted on 11/11/2007 2:25:13 PM PST by NormsRevenge
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge
... adding that any US effort to secure Pakistan's nuclear arsenal "could be very messy."

Ya think? ;-)

2 posted on 11/11/2007 2:26:23 PM PST by glorgau
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Somebody call Chuck Norris and Lee Marvin.......


3 posted on 11/11/2007 2:26:31 PM PST by cmsgop (Hillary's Milkshake is better than Your's, She could teach you, but you would rather go blind.......)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: glorgau

And a military attack on Iran could be the fuse that sets off the Pakistan powder keg.


4 posted on 11/11/2007 2:28:23 PM PST by canuck_conservative
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Hopefully, it is a plan to seize the nukes and arrest the nuclear scientists.

But in any event, it is much like all of our other “secret” plans. It’s not really a secret.


5 posted on 11/11/2007 2:30:26 PM PST by Brilliant
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: cmsgop
Lee Marvin is no longer with us.

Once upon a time, Marvin and Woody Strode, a noted black stunt man turned actor, made annual trips to Las Vegas where they took turns shooting out the neon lights of Vegas using a pair of old rifles.

I'm not sure what they could do to Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.

But it would sure be entertaining.

6 posted on 11/11/2007 2:30:55 PM PST by Publius (A = A)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge
This world is getting to be awfully messy. I would like some good news.
7 posted on 11/11/2007 2:32:31 PM PST by Uncle Hal
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Biden says “moderates.” What planet is he living on? And he apparently thinks that we can engineer the result we want too. Maybe he’s just been off his meds lately.


8 posted on 11/11/2007 2:33:03 PM PST by Brilliant
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Whatever you do, remember, IT’S A SECRET!!!


9 posted on 11/11/2007 2:35:05 PM PST by JRios1968 (Faith is not believing that God can. It is knowing that God will. - Ben Stein)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge
US has secret plans to safeguard Pakistan's nukes

Not any more you seditious pieces of s***

10 posted on 11/11/2007 2:37:15 PM PST by KenHorse (I have the heart of a Liberal. I keep it in a jar on my desk.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Sure glad these plans are secret!

Ruefully


11 posted on 11/11/2007 2:37:49 PM PST by petro45acp (NO good endeavor survives an excess of "adult supervision" (read bureaucracy)!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Not any more......


12 posted on 11/11/2007 2:39:23 PM PST by mad_as_he$$ (Illegal Immigration, a Clear and Present Danger.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

The big time player in all this is India...India will not tolerate N weapons in the hands of radical Muslims...it will be the race of our times, between India, the US, and the radicals....


13 posted on 11/11/2007 2:41:27 PM PST by thinking
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

“.....secret contingency plans to safeguard Pakistani nuclear weapons if they risk falling into the wrong hands.”

Followed by: “But US officials worry their limited knowledge about the location of the arsenal could pose a problem,...”

We’re screwed if this is the best we can do!


14 posted on 11/11/2007 2:42:56 PM PST by panaxanax (Ronald Reagan would vote for Duncan Hunter!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge
Biden, chairman of the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee, said the United States needed to shore up anti-Musharraf moderates or risk seeing Pakistan go the way of Iran three decades ago.

"The Shah got overthrown and moderates got crushed by extremists," he said.

I've got news for Biden. It was that dolt, Jimmuh Carter and the Democrats who supervised the overthrow of the Shah. And about the only moderates in Iran were the Shah and his supporters.

15 posted on 11/11/2007 2:44:09 PM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: thinking

India needs to be prepared internally if they launch an operation into Pakistan. It has more Muslims than Pakistan. :(


16 posted on 11/11/2007 2:47:33 PM PST by Romneyfor President2008
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: NormsRevenge

Under a more optimistic scenario, the Pakistani military would help the United States in any intervention, the Post said. In other cases, that assistance might not be forthcoming, it cautioned.

Some article, in one paragraph we have plans, in the next we don’t know where they are. Another says the military will help us then another says maybe not.

Sounds like a plan to me.


17 posted on 11/11/2007 2:51:45 PM PST by Recon Dad (Marine Spec Ops Dad)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Publius

Superman owns a pair of Chuck Norris pajamas.


18 posted on 11/11/2007 2:53:10 PM PST by Whitebread
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: panaxanax

Maybe thats why they are working on a plan....?

Perhaps we need to work a little harder.


19 posted on 11/11/2007 2:57:08 PM PST by Vermont Lt (I am not from Vermont. I lived there for four years and that was enough.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: Uncle Hal

The news from Iraq has been nothing BUT good recently; not that you’d ever know that reading our commie rat mainstream media. Put the same clown collection in charge of media in 1945 and the American people would have had to buy foreign newspapers to learn that the allies had won WW-II.


20 posted on 11/11/2007 2:57:41 PM PST by damondonion
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-47 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson