The Hindu Business Line : Double standards in nuclear proliferation

The West sermonises to others including India about the virtues of the non-proliferation treaty and nuclear export controls, yet remains silent about its own laxity on export control that allows Pakistan to purloin designs of nuclear enrichment facilities and become the mother of all proliferators. Nor does the West utter a word about China, says G. Parthasarathy, questioning the double standards.

SHORTLY before leaving for Islamabad on my assignment as High Commissioner to Pakistan, I called on Dr Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam, then Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister. I had expected that Dr Kalam would be glowing with pride about the Pokhran nuclear tests and our missile programme.

What transpired instead was a discussion in which Dr Kalam made it clear that what he wanted was peace and amity with Pakistan. He indicated that while nuclear weapons and missiles were essential for India's security, the fundamental aim of diplomacy was to see that mutual confidence was enhanced and missiles and nuclear weapons never used.

It was precisely such thinking that lay behind the decision in the Lahore Summit that India and Pakistan would devote considerable attention to nuclear and conventional CBMs and agree on advance notification of all missile tests.

What surprised me most on reaching Pakistan was the total absence of knowledge there about the destructive potential of nuclear weapons and a juvenile belief that the threat of use of nuclear weapons should be freely used to attain political objectives by constantly harping on the theme that Kashmir was a "nuclear flashpoint".

I was fascinated to read a recent analysis by Abdullah el Madani, an Arab scholar resident in Bahrain, describing how Dr Kalam had risen to fame in India, while Pakistan's "Father of the Islamic Bomb" Abdul Qadeer Khan had brought his country to the verge of disaster by his involvement in providing nuclear weapons technology and design to countries like Libya and Iran.

Madani recalls that Dr Kalam came from humble origins and "sold newspapers for buying books". He mentions that apart from a visit to the US in 1963, Dr Kalam gained his knowledge entirely from India's educational and scientific institutions. He was a product of "India's well-established secular, democratic system, in which opportunities to climb to the top are ensured to every citizen".

It is in this context that Dr Kalam "dedicated his knowledge and efforts to his country and people, rather than being prejudiced towards the Muslim minority in India or towards other Muslim countries".

Madani pays tribute to Dr A. Q. Khan's burning desire to succeed in a country that lacked educational institutions of excellence, necessitating his proceeding to Germany for higher education. It was his specialisation in metallurgy that led him to gain easy access to the URENCO enrichment facilities in the Netherlands — a plant set up by the UK, France and Netherlands to end American monopoly on uranium enrichment.

It was Dr Khan's burning hatred for India that led him to join Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in a quest to develop the "Islamic Bomb" in Pakistan, by stealing designs and manufacturing data from the URENCO plant, in what was undoubtedly the most audacious exercise in theft and smuggling of components for nuclear enrichment.

Madani characterises Dr Khan as an opportunist and egotist, obsessed with personal publicity. He concludes that Dr Khan's behaviour and actions are attributable to the "system and ideology" of his country. He adds: "Under Zia, Pakistan witnessed an unprecedented drive towards Islamisation and Islamic solidarity.

Dr Khan's proliferation activities thrived in an atmosphere wherein fundamentalism and corruption found their way into the military establishment, the apparatus controlling Pakistan's nuclear programmes, leading to the prominence of Generals linked to extremist groups".

While Israel and India have been circumspect about their nuclear weapons and India has a clearly enunciated and transparent nuclear doctrine, Pakistan made the cardinal mistake of using nuclear weapons as an instrument of political blackmail, by repeatedly harping on the theme that unless India and the world community met its demands on the Kashmir issue, Kashmir would remain a "nuclear flashpoint".

This combined with its proliferation activities and the contacts that its nuclear scientists had with Osama bin Laden and the al Qaeda have frightened the international community into believing that not only is Pakistan prone to irresponsible use of nuclear weapons, but is also bent on passing nuclear know-how to "rogue states" and terrorist organisations.

Pakistan is thus set to face growing international pressure to make its nuclear activities more transparent. Ironically, no one in India has been unduly impressed by Pakistan's nuclear bluster. There is recognition here that the Pakistan army is not suicidal and will resort to nuclear weapons only if the very existence of Pakistan is threatened.

This, in fact, has been made clear by the Head of Pakistan's Strategic Forces Command, Lt. General Khalid Kidwai. As India and Pakistan prepare to hold talks on nuclear-related issues, New Delhi should insist that before we talk of "nuclear restraint", Pakistan should enunciate publicly what its nuclear doctrine is. We should also insist that Pakistan eschews irresponsible threats about Kashmir being a "nuclear flashpoint".

Pakistan's transgressions on nuclear proliferation are now largely out in the open. It sold nuclear technology and materials for uranium enrichment to Iran. It peddled the designs and materials for manufacturing nukes to Libya. It engaged in a transfer of missiles for uranium enrichment capabilities with North Korea.

There are also credible reasons to infer the existence of a "nukes-for-oil" deal between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Middlemen from the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Germany and a host of other countries were involved in these deals.

But perhaps the mother of all proliferators has been China, which supplied Pakistan with nuclear weapons designs, ring magnets to sustain its enrichment programme and a wide range of missiles, violating every provision of the so-called Missile Technology Control Regime.

The design that A. Q. Khan delivered in a shopping bag of his Islamabad tailor to the Libyans was obviously that of the nuclear weapon that was mounted on a missile and tested by China in October 27, 1966. It is also obvious from an analysis of Pakistan's May 1998 nuclear tests that China has subsequently supplied more advanced nuclear weapon designs to Pakistan.

How does the so-called international community deal with these transgressions? The Netherlands bases its security on a NATO nuclear umbrella provided by the US, France and the UK.

Living under this nuclear umbrella it then proceeds to pontificate and sermonise to others, including India, about the virtues of nuclear abstinence and the non-proliferation treaty. It allows Dr Khan to purloin the designs of its nuclear enrichment facilities and then acquits him of charges of theft.

The Americans pontificate to India about nuclear export controls, using this as a pretext to prevent hi-tech transfers. They then remain silent about the laxity of Dutch, German, British and Swiss export controls.

American non-proliferation warriors like the Under-Secretary of State, Mr John Bolton, and his predecessors in the Clinton Administration roar like lions when charging Libya, Iran and North Korea with violating non-proliferation norms, but become silent when the name of Gen Pervez Musharraf comes up and finally squeak like a mouse when dealing with China.

Does not the phrase "double standards" aptly describe such behaviour? Being fair-minded people, most Americans themselves acknowledge this.

(The author is former High Commissioner to Pakistan.)

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