Two important developments that took place during the month of May, (the infamous Abbottabad raid of May 2, in which Osama bin Laden was killed in Abbottabad by US forces, & secondly, a Taliban raid on PNS Mehran on May 23, that destroyed P-3C Orion surveillance planes) have provided an ideal opportunity for the vested interests to grind their respective axe. For Western leaders, it served as a nightmare about militants acquiring nuclear materials or worse, an entire weapon. For Pakistan, it is taken as Pakistan military’s failure to detect the entry of US helicopter-borne commandos, as they flew 150 kilometers (90 miles) into the country to kill bin Laden.
More importantly, it also led to a plethora of scaremongering over Pakistan’s nuclear weapon security. Interestingly, it’s not a new discussion. Since the 1970s, identical suspicions and fears have been expressed – criticizing that Pakistan’s nuclear programme was infact working for the ‘Islamic Bomb’. After 9/11, anti-Pakistan nuclear programme lobbies alleged that al Qaeda would get hold of these weapons.
Hypothetical threat scenarios have been formulated, doubting that the militants raiding PNS Mehran had help from friends in Pakistan’s military or intelligence agencies – suggesting that militants might try to snatch a nuclear weapon in transit or insert sympathisers into laboratories or fuel-production facilities. Professor Shaun Gregory, director of the Pakistan Security Research Unit at Bradford University, wrote in an email. “This is a blueprint for an attack on a nuclear facility.”
I think most of the musing is due to lack of factual information. Pakistan has very robust, multilayered command and control systems and such fears over the security of its nuclear weapons are “misplaced and unfounded”. The Pakistan military controls the nuclear weapons, and has instituted a range of measures to tighten controls over the nuclear weapons complex. The multi-layered system of security over these nuclear installments includes fences, towers, guards, and bunkers, CCTV facilities, sophisticated sensors and communication equipment, state of art equipment, etc. Pakistan has 10,000 soldiers guarding its facilities and the SPD has its own independent intelligence section where key people are screened including families and relatives.
Military men of lower ranks involved with nuclear operations are professionally selected by Inter Service Selection Bureau and screened by professional psychiatrists. The Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine calls for the warheads and their triggers to be stored separately from each other, and from their delivery devices. Pakistan has its own Permissive Action Link (PAL) system to electronically lock nuclear weapons. Little is known of the transportation arrangements for sensitive nuclear items in Pakistan. In presence of these checks, there appear to be a general consensus that all nuclear weapons are under strict control.
FARHAT IQBAL
Rawalpindi