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Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani nuclear scientist under house arrest after confessing in 2004 to assisting the nuclear weapons programs of Iran, Libya and North Korea, will soon be released, according to Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid Secretary General Syed Mushahid Hussain. The Asian News International reports Hussain’s remarks were made on the BBC Urdu’s program Talking Point.

The next day, according to Pak Tribune, S.M. Zafar, Khan’s former lawyer and a Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid senator, reported that President Pervez Musharraf has lifted some restrictions on Khan, who is now permitted to meet with some close friends and colleagues.

In his memoir In the Line of the Fire and in subsequent interviews, Musharraf alleged that Khan provided nearly two dozen prototype centrifuges suitable for uranium enrichment to North Korea. The alleged existence of a secret DPRK weapons-grade uranium-enrichment program has been a key argument of former U. N. ambassador John Bolton against the denuclearization agreement reached nearly one year ago with Pyongyang.

North Korea’s U.N. representative Kim Myong Gil’s response to these allegations was reported (in "What A. Q. Khan Knows", Washington Post, January 31, 2008) to be: "Why don’t you invite A. Q. Khan to join the negotiations?" If Musharaff’s purpose for Khan's house arrest was to shield him from foreign interrogation, it is imperative, as Khan's restrictions are loosened, that the U.S. press Islamabad for more access to the man. Answers from A. Q. Khan, however unlikely, are long overdue.

Labels: A. Q. Khan, DPRK, North Korea, nuclear weapons, Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf

Last Thursday, considerable media attention was given to the leaking of a report, to be published in Foreign Affairs by Selig Harrison, that claimed the U.S. was exaggerating the nuclear capability of North Korea. In today's Defense & Foreign Affairs, Gregory R. Copley, Editor, Global Information System, claims that Harrison's conclusion is incorrect and that if the Bush Administration has misstated North Korea's nuclear capabilities, the error has been to substantially understate the progress of the regime's nuclear programs.

Harrison claimed that the Bush Administration had presented a worst-case scenario as a certainty and distorted its intelligence to exaggerate the danger that Pyongyang is secretly making uranium-based nuclear weapons. Harrison also stated that there was no evidence to support the CIA's claim in 2002 that the DPRK had acquired large quantities of fissile materials.

GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs points to the exercises the DPRK ran in September 2004 to test its national command authority capabilities and claims they demonstrate that the regime has more nuclear weapons than the minimum required for a first-strike capability. The exercises showed that the DPRK was preparing for an ongoing nuclear conflict by testing its national-level command and control system under operational conditions.

In previous operations, the DPRK's approach was to test a launch that would be an absolute first-strike, using all available systems at the initiation of a conflict. Such an exercise only requires a coordinated launch order. Now, the command and control being exercised involves dispersed elements of strategic missile battalions, each battalion equipped with 12 mobile launchers, and each launcher supported by a reload vehicle with two additional No-Dong missiles. This exercise showed that the DPRK was preparing for a second-strike and follow-on strike operations, and had the capability of carry out a coordinated and extended operation from random launch sites. The evidence of irregular activity was noted at 10 bases, each of which could support launches from nearby positions, thereby evading preemptive enemy destruction of the bases and thwarting the prevention of the launch.

By GIS estimates, the DPRK now probably has as many as 18 deployed or deployable warhead for its No-Dong strategic missiles and its Taepo-Dong longer-range series of ballistic missiles. This means that the DPRK has at least one fully-operational, nuclear equipped No-Dong battalion ready for operations against South Korea and Japan, and at least half a battalion of nuclear equipped Taepo-Dong missiles that can reach U.S. targets in Guam, Hawaii and Alaska.

Labels: Defense and Foreign Affairs Daily, DPRK, No-Dong missiles, North Korea, nuclear weapons, Pyongyang

Did Mohamed El-Baradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, remove mention of Tehran's work with beryllium, a strategically important metal useful in constructing a nuclear weapon, in an early draft of the IAEA's September report on inspections in Iran? On December 3, Reuters claimed that a non-U.S. diplomat gave the news agency a three-page memorandum claiming that El-Baradei made the excision after objections were lodged by the Iranians.

Reuters reported that Iran had purchased large quantities of the metal from a number of countries. Together with Polonium-230, an isotope Iran is known to have worked with, beryllium can initiate the chain reaction in a nuclear bomb.

El-Baradei angrily denied the accusation of collaboration with Iran. "We never show a report to any single member" of the International Atomic energy Agency (IAEA), "not the least of course an inspected country." El-Baradei is well-aware that the Bush Administration is opposed to his gaining a third term in 2005 as IAEA chief.

The IAEA conceded that the agency had removed any mention of beryllium purchase from its report, but claimed that the change was insignificant.

Meanwhile, on Monday, Defense & Foreign Affairs Daily ("US Belatedly Attempts to Stem Movement of US Strategic Technology Via PRC to Iran, Others" Gregory R. Copley, December 6, 2004) reported that Global Information System had amassed "strong circumstantial evidence" that El-Baradei was "centrally and personally responsible for an attempt to derail U.S. investigations of the Iraqi nuclear weapons research program and its links with the Libyan nuclear program by 'revealing' that documentation held by the U.S. on the shipment of uranium from Niger to Iraq was forged."

The GIS report continued: "There is strong, ongoing evidence that Dr. El-Baradei has attempted on numerous occasions to oppose whatever actions the U.S. has taken to uncover military-related nuclear research program undertaken by Iran, Iraq and Libya, and, with the deliberate manipulation of the issue of Niger-supplied yellowcake for the Iraqi nuclear research program which was being undertaken in Libya, took steps to attempt to impact the U.S. domestic political climate with the apparent purpose of helping to remove incumbent U.S. Pres. George W. Bush, who was then running for re-election."

El-Baradei failed to shorten Bush's term, but he appears to have successfully shortened his own.

Labels: Defense and Foreign Affairs Daily, IAEA, International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran, Mohamed El-Baradei, nuclear weapons

In "Will Iran Be Next?" James Fallows (The Atlantic Monthly, December 2004) describes a war game conducted by The Atlantic involving soldiers, spies, and diplomats, to determine how an American President could respond to Iran's push to obtain nuclear weapons.

The game's participants, first determining that an Osirak-type preemptive strike would be too demanding for Israel, then focused on the military options available to the U.S. In the role of commander of CENTCOM, Sam Gardiner, a retired Air Force colonel in charge of running the simulated war game, presented a three-stage military option. The first level would be a punitive raid on key Iranian Revolutionary Guard units. At the second level, a 5-day pre-emptive air strike -- deemed a low-risk military option if the U.S were to do it -- could be launched against possible nuclear facilities. At the third level of involvement, a "regime change" invasion would be mounted.

The overall plan of attack was this: a "deception" effort from the south, to distract Iranian troops; a main-force assault across the long border with Iraq; airborne and Special Forces attacks from Afghanistan and Azerbaijan; and cruise missiles from ships at sea.The overall plan of attack was this: a "deception" effort from the south, to distract Iranian troops; a main-force assault across the long border with Iraq; airborne and Special Forces attacks from Afghanistan and Azerbaijan; and cruise missiles from ships at sea.

All five of the game's participants voted to nix the regime-change plan as too risky.

The lessons of the game, according to Fallows? The United States cannot tolerate a radical regime like Iran getting its hands on nuclear weapons. Yet, it has no military option to stop Iran from getting those nuclear weapons. Nonetheless, diplomatic methods, absent a military threat, will not deter Iran from developing the weapons it seeks. So, a U.S. president can only bluff, pretending he has a military solution, when he does not, in the hope that Iran will be fooled.

Fallows wonders aloud whether this is a message that should be published as a cover story in a major periodical: "Is it therefore irresponsible to say in public, as our participants did and we do here, that the United States has no military solution to the Iran problem?" Fallows looks for assurance from Thomas Hammes, a Marine expert in counterinsurgency, who maintains that a government can never assume its enemy will not do something that is "unviable." "History shows," Hammes insists, "that countries make very serious mistakes."

To say that the only strategic option of the U.S. is a bluff is to misunderstand the possibility of mixed strategies in a sequential game of moves, in which the dynamics of play are similar to those that were present in the Cuban missile crisis. (See Steven J. Brams, Game theory and the Cuban missile crisis.) A policy of brinksmanship, ever maintaining a non-negligible probability of invasion, would plainly carry great risks, but may be more likely to produce a better outcome for the U.S. and the West than the unacceptable result of acquiescing to the emergence of Iran as a nuclear power.

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Note: The Adventures of Chester promises another critique of the Atlantic's cover story on Tuesday evening.

Labels: Atlantic Monthly, CENTCOM, Iran, James Fallows, nuclear weapons, war games

Hans Blix is urging Western nations to offer concessions to Iran in order to entice Tehran to relinquish its program of uranium enrichment. Blix reasoned that if the West asked the Iranians to abandon enrichment, "Then you are asking them to give something up they have a right to be doing. Then you have to accept that they will make demands."

Meanwhile, the Iranians appear to agree with Blix that they have every right to pursue uranium enrichment, having turned down the European Union's offer of nuclear technology in exchange for an unlimited suspension of enrichment.

Blix warned against air attacks against Iran's nuclear facilities, saying there were no nuclear weapons being developed there.

Hans Blix offered no explanation for how he is able to determine what Iran is doing -- or not doing -- at its nuclear facilities. One wonders why John Kerry laments (e.g., in the second presidential debate) the President's unwillingness to let "Hans Blix do his job and thoroughly go through the inspections," when Hans Blix can find that there is nothing to find, without even looking.

Labels: Hans Blix, Iran, nuclear weapons, United Nations, uranium enrichment

John Kerry: But if and when you do it, Jim, you have to do it in a way that passes the test, that passes the global test where your countrymen, your people understand fully why you're doing what you're doing and you can prove to the world that you did it for legitimate reasons.

In the debate last night, President Bush pursued his campaign's primary strategy of portraying his opponent as a flip-flopper. On the evening's central topic of Iraq, the charge was not difficult to establish.

In his toughest question to Senator Kerry, the moderator Jim Lehrer reminded him of his 1971 congressional testimony in which he famously asked a rhetorical question: "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" Lehrer pointedly asked whether the Iraq war was a mistake. Kerry quickly responded "No," but then neglected to explain how he could reconcile this response with his new "wrong war, wrong place, wrong time" position.

Kerry was intent, of course, to deny that he had been inconsistent on Iraq: "I've had one position, one consistent position, that Saddam Hussein was a threat." The line had been carefully crafted: he later uttered it again, verbatim. His defense of his own consistency reached record levels of risibility when he made a categorically absolute declaration: "I've never wavered in my life." There is irony in repeated and sweeping avowals of one's own consistency. A central result of mathematical logic, proven by Kurt Gödel, establishes that a sure way to guarantee the inconsistency of a rich deductive logical system of propositions is to have that system assert its own consistency!

That Kerry has been conspicuously inconsistent on the question of Iraq raises the question of whether the man has any core beliefs or whether he is simply afraid to share them. The debate provided reason to accept the second alternative.

In response to an excellent question by Jim Lehrer regarding America's right of preemptive action against terror, a question that this space had openly hoped would be put to Kerry at the debate, Kerry responded: "But if and when you do it, Jim, you have to do it in a way that passes the test, that passes the global test where your countrymen, your people understand fully why you're doing what you're doing and you can prove to the world that you did it for legitimate reasons."

Bush took the opportunity to seize on Kerry's response, and made a rare but effective counter-punch:

"I'm not exactly sure what you mean, 'passes the global test,' you take preemptive action if you pass a global test. My attitude is you take preemptive action in order to protect the American people, that you act in order to make this country secure."

Kerry showed himself to be deeply skeptical of Bush's certain faith that America has the high moral ground. Kerry complained: "We're telling other people, 'You can't have nuclear weapons,' but we're pursuing a new nuclear weapon that we might even contemplate using." It apparently does not dawn on Kerry that America can be trusted to do what is right and to accomplish good in the world, but that North Korea and Iran cannot be similarly trusted. That possibility does not even rise to the level of being acknowledged by Kerry. Why not? The doubts expressed in his closing worry that certainty can "get you into trouble" suggests that he adopts the moral skepticism, if not cynicism, characteristic of the civilization-weary sophisticates on the left and of those who regard moral certainty as naive at best and dangerous at worst.

How then is a U.S. President to lead in a world in which jihadists drive passenger jets into buildings and carry out gruesome beheadings? Kerry's plan: have a summit, share our reasons, listen to the objections of the other side. In the post-modern world of Kerry, what passes for moral objectivity is no more than the notion of truth propounded by philosopher Richard Rorty: what others "will let us get away with" in a conversation. The global test is consensus and Kerry's plan to reach it is this: just talk.

Labels: George W. Bush, Iraq, jihadists, John Kerry, nuclear weapons, Saddam Hussein

News of Thursday’s huge blast and “mushroom cloud” in North Korea reached the worldwide press just hours ago. South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo reports that the blast occurred around the town of Yongjo-ri, in Kim Hyong-jik County, Ryanggang province. The explosion occurred just six miles southwest of Yongjo-ri base for Rodong 1 and 2 missiles and 18 miles from the Sino-Korean border.

South Korean officials deny that the explosion was caused by a nuclear test, and this opinion was reaffirmed this morning by Secretary of State Colin Powell:

"We have seen reports of this explosion, but based on all the information that we have, it was not any type of nuclear event," he said. "We are trying to find out more about it, and what exactly it was, if anything, but it does not appear to be a nuclear event." ( VOA News)

There were hints of the possibility of sabotage in the Chosun Ilbo story, which noted that the blast in the vicinity of the missile base occurred on a national holiday, September 9, North Korea’s foundation day.

“When I activated a huge switching gear in the mountainside, the ground split open, and a missile appeared.”

The Rodong missiles based in Yongjo-ri and elsewhere carry a smaller payload than the larger Taepodong, but the Rodong can be carried on a mobile transporter-erector from tunnels, where they can be hidden from U.S. satellites. The Daily Yomiuri suggests an explanation for the location of the Yongjo-ri tunnels: its proximity to the Sino border makes it difficult for U.S. forces to attack the facilities, since cruise missiles or bombers would have to fly over Chinese air space.

The Daily Yomiuri quotes a North Korean defector:

”When I activated a huge switching gear in the mountainside, the ground split open, and a missile appeared.”

Recent success in wooing North Korean defectors was reported last May in The Weekend Australia to be the result of a highly secret plan nicknamed “Operation Weasel.”

Another [defector] is a military officer, Park Young-soo. His debriefing notes are marked "then I asked through intermediary to elaborate on his involvement in the nuclear/missile part on his initial request".

The [debriefing notes prepared on the preliminary interrogations of the four defecting senior military officers] say Park's response was: "Worked for the unit No583 under the Military Construction Bureau to build a missile launch base in Woltan-ri, Kimhyungjik-gun Ryanggando. Also for the unit No740, 4th corp as a special instructor in military martial arts."

The four men have all been targeted as part of a plan codenamed Operation Weasel, a smuggling plot ostensibly run by private citizens from 11 countries but with inspirations that stem from one of the Pentagon's most secretive and self-contained units.

"What you have in the US, more than ever before, is a factional Government.... You have the State Department that does one thing and you have the Pentagon that does the other."

The existence of Operation Weasel, revealed by Inquirer last month, was denied by the US State Department. However, no component of the operation fell under the State Department's ambit. "What you have in the US, more than ever before, is a factional Government," says a source intimately involved with the plan.

"You have the State Department that does one thing and you have the Pentagon that does the other."

In Washington this week, the leader of a key South Korea-based humanitarian organisation, Norbert Vollersten, sat down for lunch at the Mayflower Hotel with two of the biggest fish in the Bush administration, Vice-President Dick Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

What was discussed is not known but what is clear is that an advocate for North Korean refugees with a track record for helping defectors is considered important enough to join their table.

“North's 'weasels' go West”, Martin Chulov, Inquirer Feature Column, The Weekend Australian, May 17, 2003, Pg. 23.

Alas, no one from the Pentagon appeared on the Sunday talk shows this morning.

Labels: Colin Powell, DPRK, North Korea, nuclear weapons, Rodong missiles, South Korea