Jeffrey Goldberg – Marc Ambinder’s report for The Atlantic’s December issue disputes the Pakistani officials’ contention that the country’s N- warheads are safe and secure. “Like many statements made by Pakistan’s current leaders, this one contained large elements of deceit”, the report says and goes on to give the following details.  

At least six facilities widely believed to be associated with Pakistan’s nuclear program have already been targeted by militants. In November 2007, a suicide bomber attacked a bus carrying workers to the Sargodha air base, which is believed to house nuclear weapons; the following month, a school bus was attacked outside Kamra air base, which may also serve as a nuclear storage site; in August 2008, Pakistani Taliban suicide bombers attacked what experts believe to be the country’s main nuclear-weapons-assembly depot in Wah cantonment. If jihadists are looking to raid a nuclear facility, they have a wide selection of targets: Pakistan is very secretive about the locations of its nuclear facilities, but satellite imagery and other sources suggest that there are at least 15 sites across Pakistan at which jihadists could find warheads or other nuclear materials. (See map)

Yes, General Pervez Musharraf as President created a Strategic Plans Division (SPD), to secure the warheads. A retired lieutenant general Khalid Kidwai is heading the set up and in that capacity he has the finger on the nuclear trigger. Theoretically at least, the Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani should have that privilege since he is the chairman of the Nuclear Command Authority (NCA) which handles the command and control of Pakistan’s strategic nuclear forces and organizations. Put differently the all-powerful army chief Gen Kayani and his Rawalpindi Shura calls the shots in matters nuclear as always and doesn’t trust the civilian leadership. But the way Kidwai ensured the arsenals safety after the Americans smoked out Osama bin Laden borders on the absurd and exposed the utter bankruptcy of ideas for strategic planning.

Pakistan’s nuclear control and command system is a three-tier structure- National Command Authority (NCA), the Strategic Plans Division (SPD), and the Services’ Strategic Forces Command (SSFC). While the NCA is the apex policy body, and entrusted with the task of coordination, the SPD is tasked to oversees the security matters and also guard the N-Weapons.  SSFC is responsible for daily and tactical operational control of nuclear weapon delivery systems.

One method of protection, the SPD adopts, according to the investigations carried out by The Atlantic journalist duo, is to move the nuclear weapon among the 15 or more facilities that handle them in civilian style vehicles without any security paraphernalia in the regular flow of traffic.  The powers that be in SPD have obviously convinced themselves that civilian camouflage is the best subterfuge to minimize the threat of an Entebbe style attack or Abbotabad type midnight operation. But what about the likes of al-Qaeda, HuT, Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Haqqani network. Pakistan government has reverted back to its denial mode and has simply rubbished the Atlantic story. Pakistani Foreign Office spokesperson simply dismissed the apprehensions voiced in the magazine as pure fiction, baseless and motivated, adding that the Pakistani nuclear arsenal was absolutely safe under multi-layered custodial controls.

The denial and the claim however do not minimize the vulnerability of Pakistan Nuclear war heads to theft by jihadists, and this danger has been created by the authorities in the first place.

Viewed against this bleak backdrop, Pakistan’s reported plans to train 8,000 additional people to protect the country’s nuclear arsenal are a welcome development. On November 6, the first passing out parade was held and a group of 700 men graduated graduates. The military spokesman said these officers and men were hand-picked. ‘They are physically robust, mentally sharp and equipped with modern weapons and equipment’. A day later on Nov 7, the US Embassy in Islamabad gave a certificate of trust worthiness for Pakistan’s efforts. ‘The US government’s views have not changed about nuclear security in Pakistan. We have confidence that the Pakistan government is well aware of the range of potential threats to its nuclear arsenal and has accordingly given very high priority to securing its nuclear weapons and materials effectively’, the American embassy said in a statement.

Given the on-going spat between Rawalpindi and Washington since the Mullen outburst in September, the embassy statement comes as a surprise. And as a reader who identified himself as Omar Ali wrote in the Atlantic, it is hard to believe that the Americans are that naive or that easily fooled.