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Summary If the Nov. 26 attacks in Mumbai were carried out by Islamist militants as it appears, the Indian government will have little choice, politically speaking, but to blame them on Pakistan. That will in turn spark a crisis between the two nuclear rivals that will draw the United States into the fray. Analysis At this point the situation on the ground in Mumbai remains unclear following the militant attacks of Nov. 26. But in order to understand the geopolitical significance of what is going on, it is necessary to begin looking beyond this event at what will follow. Though...

Pak will not use N-weapons against India first: Zardari New Delhi (PTI): In a significant confidence building statement, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari on Saturday declared that his country will not be the first to use nuclear weapons against India and proposed that South Asia should have a "non-nuclear (weapon) treaty". Asserting that Pakistan does not "feel threatened" from India and the latter should also not feel so, he vowed to take the relations with the "great" neighbour to new levels despite "disputes". He said India and Pakistan have a great future together despite "problems" and favoured enhanced trade, particularly...

Will US physical entry in to Pakistan actually help in suppressing the resistance to occupation of Afghanistan and bring peace to the region? If yes, let's do it. However, it will only radicalize the population, leaving no other option with Washington but to declare Pakistan a 'rogue state'. The premise for US entry is that Pakistan Army is either incapable or unwilling to 'clean up the mess'. Then, does the US Army plan to do this in conjunction with Pakistan Army or in spite of it? It should now be abundantly clear that joint US-Pakistan ground operations in side our...

  Cleric’s chilling warning to UK   Threat ... Sun man Harvey meets Imam Rehamn   By OLIVER HARVEY Chief Feature Writer in Kahuta, Pakistan Published: Today   A FANATICAL Pakistani cleric told The Sun yesterday of his chilling dream to turn the world Muslim – by force if necessary. Qari Hifzur Rehamn, 60, spoke openly of imposing Islamic law’s stoning and beheading on Britain – as Pakistan was rocked by unrest over the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. He warned: “We want Islamic law for all Pakistan and then the world. “We would like to do this by preaching....

ANALYSIS-"Failed state" Pakistan raises nuclear threat Fri Dec 28, 2007 11:41am EST By Luke Baker LONDON, Dec 28 (Reuters) - Security experts fear Pakistan's nuclear materials could fall into the hands of Islamic militants as the country's instability deepens in the wake of Benazir Bhutto's assassination. In early 2005, a joint security assessment by the CIA and the U.S. National Intelligence Council predicted Pakistan would become "a failed state, ripe with civil war, bloodshed, inter-provincial rivalries and a struggle for control of its nuclear weapons and complete Talibanisation" by 2015. Following Bhutto's death in Rawalpindi on Thursday, some experts believe...

Pakistan's nuclear weapons arsenal is secure despite political turmoil after the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, the Pentagon said on Friday. "Our assessment is that the Pakistani nuclear arsenal is under control," said Pentagon spokesman Col. Gary Keck. "At this time, we have no need for concern."

Pakistan's Peril   By Jacob LaksinFrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, December 28, 2007 http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=0A9A3F55-517C-4190-AE12-90586DFF9B8F Benazir Bhutto always insisted that she was ready to risk her life for democracy in Pakistan. Now the leader of Pakistan’s People Party (PPP) has been held to her word in a singularly tragic way. On Thursday, Bhutto was assassinated in an apparent suicide attack that claimed the lives of 20 bystanders and ended the iconic politician’s campaign for democratic rule. For good and ill, Bhutto’s career recalled that of her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. As the founder of the nominally socialist PPP, the elder Bhutto demonstrated...

"In Pakistan there are two fault lines. One is dictatorship versus democracy. And one is moderation versus extremism." Thus did Benazir Bhutto describe the politics of her country during an August visit to The Wall Street Journal's offices in New York. She was assassinated yesterday for standing courageously, perhaps fatalistically, on the right side of both lines. We will learn more in coming days about the circumstances of Bhutto's death, apparently a combined shooting and suicide bombing at a political rally in Rawalpindi in which more than 20 others were also murdered. But there's little question the attack, which had...

Anyone know how secure the nuclear weapons in Pakistan will be if anarchy reigns there?

The man who devised the Bush administration's Iraq troop surge has urged the US to consider sending elite troops to Pakistan to seize its nuclear weapons if the country descends into chaos. In a series of scenarios drawn up for Pakistan, Frederick Kagan, a former West Point military historian, has called for the White House to consider various options for an unstable Pakistan. These include: sending elite British or US troops to secure nuclear weapons capable of being transported out of the country and take them to a secret storage depot in New Mexico or a "remote redoubt" inside Pakistan;...

Can Pakistan’s nukes get loose? Seema Guha Wednesday, November 21, 2007 Unlikely, say Indian strategic experts. The army is still in control NEW DELHI: Alarm bells about Pakistan’s nuclear weapons falling into the hands of jihadi elements in that country have been ringing for quite sometime now. In fact, with the growing Talibanisation of the frontier region of Pakistan, the US and the rest of the Western world have been worried. The New York Times’ recent report about the Bush administration spending up to $1 million to keep Pakistan’s nuclear weapons secure created quite a stir in India. The government...

WASHINGTON: Pakistan's nuclear weapons are already under American control even as analysts are working themselves into a lather on the subject, a well-regarded intelligence journal has said. In a stunning disclosure certain to stir up things in Washington's (and in Islamabad and New Delhi's) strategic community, the journal Stratfor reported on Monday that the "United States delivered a very clear ultimatum to Musharraf in the wake of 9/11: Unless Pakistan allowed US forces to take control of Pakistani nuclear facilities, the United States would be left with no choice but to destroy those facilities, possibly with India's help." "This was...

The United States is helping Pakistan keep its nuclear weapons secure in a top-secret program that has cost Washington almost 100 million dollars since 2001, The New York Times reported Sunday. But Pakistan still refuses to allow US experts into its nuclear sites, the newspaper said, revealing information it first obtained three years ago but, due to a White House request, had not reported until now.

When the United States learned in 2001 that Pakistani scientists had shared nuclear secrets with members of al-Qaeda, an alarmed Bush administration responded with tens of millions of dollars worth of equipment such as intrusion detectors and ID systems to safeguard Pakistan's nuclear weapons. But Pakistan remained suspicious of U.S. aims and declined to give U.S. experts direct access to the half-dozen or so bunkers where the components of its arsenal of about 50 nuclear weapons are stored. For the officials in Washington now monitoring Pakistan's deepening political crisis, the experience offered both reassurance and grounds for concern. Protection for...

AFX News Limited Pakistan warns against nuclear weapons grab ISLAMABAD Thomson Financial) - Pakistan warned Monday it had sufficient 'retaliatory capacity' to defend its nuclear weapons, after a report the United States had made contingency plans to stop them falling into the wrong hands. Denouncing 'irresponsible conjecture,' the foreign ministry said Pakistan was ready and able to defend its nuclear arsenal and there was no risk of the arms being taken. Its reaction followed a Washington Post (nyse: WPO - news - people ) report that with Pakistan in the throes of a political crisis, the US has drawn up...

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan said Monday its nuclear weapons were secure and that there was no risk they would be seized by Taliban or al-Qaida-linked militants who have expanded their control beyond northwestern border regions. Responding to comments by former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton and others in Washington, Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Sadiq said ``there are multiple layers of command and control and the weapons are not in danger of falling into any hands. ``Pakistan's nuclear program is very well guarded,'' he said, adding that he ``would be very dismissive'' of anyone who claims otherwise. Washington has...

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...

From The Sunday Times September 2, 2007 How the West summoned up a nuclear nightmare in Pakistan Adrian Levy and Catherine Scott-Clark reveal how misguided deals with Pakistan have created a terrifying threat of nuclear terrorism General Pervez Musharraf was surprised. Visiting New York for a session of the UN, the last thing the Pakistani president expected was to be confronted with evidence of his country’s secret sales of nuclear bomb technology and equipment to members of the “axis of evil”. Yet here on the polished wooden table of Musharraf’s hotel suite, George Tenet, director of the CIA, was laying...

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Pakistan on Saturday successfully test-fired a new air-launched cruise missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, the military said. The missile, named Hatf-8 or Ra'ad, has a range of 350 kilometres, an army statement said. The missile gives the air force a "strategic standoff capability" - the ability to strike over a long distance - and could be fitted with any type of warhead, the army said. President Gen. Pervez Musharraf congratulated the scientists and engineers who developed the weapon, it added, Pakistan routinely tests various nuclear-capable missiles in its arsenal, believed to be designed mainly...

Pakistan on Saturday ''successfully'' test fired a new air-launched cruise missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead upto 350 kilometres, the military said. The missile named Hatf-8 (Raad) ''can carry all types of warheads and has an accuracy comparable to Pakistans longer Babur cruise missile,'' a statement from the army's Inter-Services Public Relations said. ''The indigenously developed Ra'ad (meaning 'Thunder' in Arabic), with a range of 350 km for now, has been designed exclusively for launch from a variety of Pakistan's air platforms, providing these with a strategic stand off capability on land and at sea,'' the statement said. It...