Abdul Qadeer Khan, Pakistan's "Father" Of Nuclear Bomb, Released From House Arrest

Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani nuclear scientist at the centre of the world's largest proliferation scandal, has been freed from five years of house arrest by a court in Islamabad.

Khan, lionised as the "father" of Pakistan's atomic bomb, confessed in 2004 to selling nuclear secrets to Iran, North Korea and Libya. He was immediately pardoned but detained in his home.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[Joethepauper]

He may be 72, and claiming that his nuclear proliferation days are behind him, but it wasn't just him. He had a network of "helpers", and probably still has a fat nuclear rolodex. Pakistan security forces are providing security for him. If it's the ISI providing protection, and the ISI has Taliban/A.­Q. sympathizers who have infiltrated, how long before they kidnap him and take him to the places we can't find UBL for some help with their plans? This Af/Pak situation is getting scarier by the second. We can't extradict him because he's already been tried. Getting rid of him is nearly impossible because he's guarded, and he's a hero to the Pakistani people. What a mess! On UBL's wish list, I'm sure getting AQ Khan's help is #1 or 2, and his un-indicted co-conspirators could supply the materials and expertise for our worst nightmares. I can't even think straight, and nobody around me even knows who he is. I've asked three people today if they heard about AQ Khan, their reply:....­.."Who?"

[Nazz]

Pakistan is the main culprit in this terror & terrorism since the last 10-12 years....T­aliban/AlQ­uida are all supported by them & live there.... Before the 911 attack Taliban with the help of pakistan intelligence overtook Afghanistan ...& made it into hell for its citizens & provided safe heaven for Al Quida ...
After 911 attacks all the main culprits were caught in Pakistan ... Most of the attacks on foriegn interests happen in Pakistan ...
All these years Pakistan did nothing against the madraasas who supply insurgents to Taliban ... All Talibans live in Pakistan & hide there ...The pakistan military & intelligence help Taliban on the side to keep Afghanistan in turmoil ..They will never tolerate Afghanistan run by a strong independent goverment ...that has been the case all these years ..
Pakistan has become a terror state & should be declared as such...

[Simbalay]

A belligerent state with nuclear weapons that extols/exports terror while using its geostrategic location to blackmail free nations into turning the other eye. Its seem like fool proof way to wage terr0r w/o consequences. If they can play the Ind`ans for suckers after a horrific act like Bombay....­just imagine.

[jsarets]

It was America's responsibility, as the only power to ever use these weapons in anger, to put the nuclear pandora back in its box, and we chose not to do so. It's not a matter of whether or not there will be an Islamic bomb but when. All we can do now is expend a bunch of resources to delay the inevitable by perhaps 5-7 years.

Soon we must live in a world where just about anybody can obtain nuclear weapons. Hopefully a universal nuclear deterrent will render warfare obsolete. Otherwise, it's just matter of time before human civilization self-annihilates.

We have the power to destroy everything, and we have the power to choose not to do so. But we don't have the power to return to the good old days when we didn't have this terrible power and awesome responsibility.

As societies grow more sophisticated and interdependent, it's increasingly obvious that our civilization runs on trust, and when that trust breaks down, the things we take for granted stop working. We're going to have to trust each other to a much greater extent than we ever have before.

If we can't trust each other, we're all going to die, and there's not much we can do about that.

[blowhard]

blame albert einstein

[Joethepauper]

Einstein only came-up with the understanding that it could be done, not the final product. Without Einstein, much of the world as we know it, and science as we know it wouldn't exist. If Einstein hadn't have come up with the theory of relativity, someone else would have....ev­entually. Oppenheimer is more to blame, but even he later regretted the monster he helped create. Who's most to blame is the Pentagon: 1. For wanting that destructive power in the first place (can't you just kill people normally). 2. For using that technology on two civilian populations needlessly (Or because they could). 3. For wanting as many nukes as could be made and maintained. 4. For allowing defense contracting companies to spread it around the world. 5. For upgrading the bloated nuclear arsenal from many low-yield to many high-yield warheads. 6. For creating a huge mess in Afghanistan and Iraq. 7. For "leading by example" the wrong way. Sun Tzu said in "The Art Of War": If you're weak, you shoukl appear strong. If you're strong, you should appear weak. We're doing it wrong.

[pewty]

As the Terminator said "It is your nature to destroy yourself"

[Voodude]

Is that the sound of a Predator? Bye Bye

[mesmorize3]

INDIA: NUCLEAR HELPERS

Western companies have supplied India's controversial nuclear program for more than three decades. All of India's plutonium-making reactors and heavy water production plants are based on foreign designs.

Canada
Supplied the Cirus reactor, which produced plutonium for India's 1974 nuclear weapon test
Supplied India's first two power reactors at Rajasthan, which India copied to build unsafeguarded reactors

China
Sold at least 130 tons of heavy water to a German broker who smuggled the material to India for use in unsafeguarded nuclear reactors

France
..

Germany
Supplied unsafeguarded Nangal and Talcher heavy water plants; sold teleperm process control system to Hazira heavy water plant
German firm was fined $800,000 by the U.S. for illegally re-exporting U.S.-origi­n beryllium
German broker arranged illicit sales of more than 200 tons of heavy water to India
Supplied natural lithium for making tritium to boost Nbombs


Norway
More than 26 tons of Norwegian heavy water was diverted to India through Romania and Switzerland

Soviet Union/Russia
Secretly sold at least 80 tons of heavy water to run unsafeguarded reactors

Sweden
Sold flash X-ray devices, which can be used for nuclear weapon development

Switzerland
Helped build the unsafeguarded Baroda and Tuticorin heavy water plants

United Kingdom
Supplied turbine generator designs used at several unsafeguarded reactors
Repaired damaged heavy water equipment at Madras reactor

United States
Supplied heavy water for Cirus reactor that made plutonium for India's first nuclear bomb

http://www.wisconsinproject.org/countries/india/india-nuclear-helpers.html

[DoesItMatter]

At least India did not go and steal like Pakistan and Xerox Khan did :-)

[mesmorize3]

Espionage/stealing is done by every country for their national interest.

[SenecaV]

Dr. Khan added: “I would be more worried about what you say about me, not what Bush says or what Dick Cheney says,” he said, addressing the crowd of Pakistani reporters. “I don’t damn care.”

Dr. Khan also made clear that the decision would not have been made without the support of the Zardari government, with which the Obama administration hopes to build a more productive relationship as it seeks to fight the Taliban and Qaeda networks that have roosted in Pakistan.

“All this happened because of the keen interest taken by the president, the prime minister and especially Rehman Malik, who has looked into the case, reviewed it, discussed it with the government, discussed it with the concerned authorities,” Dr. Khan said. Mr. Malik is the senior official in the Pakistani Interior Ministry.

If Dr. Khan is allowed to speak of all he knows, or chooses to do so, he could cause considerable embarrassment to previous Pakistani government and the military.

In July 2008, he told Pakistani reporters that Pakistan had transported uranium enrichment equipment to North Korea in 2000 with the full knowledge of the country’s army, then headed by Mr. Musharraf.

[mesmorize3]

PAKISTAN : NUCLEAR HELPERS

Belgium
Supplied New Labs plutonium extraction plant

Canada
Supplied Kanupp power reactor including fuel and spare parts until 1976

China
Supplied a tested bomb design and high-enriched uranium fuel
Supplied special magnets to help gas centrifuges enrich uranium
Building a power reactor and training technicians at Chashma despite de facto international nuclear supply embargo
Helping to build a secret plutonium producing reactor at Khusab
Supplied tritium that could help increase bomb yields

France
Designed Chashma plutonium extraction plant
Contracted to renovate controls at Kanupp

Germany
Supplied nuclear fuel fabrication equipment and technology, including high-powered welding and drilling lasers
Supplied factory to make uranium hexafluoride used at Kahuta enrichment plant
Sold electronic components to control gas centrifuges
Exported "preforms" for gas centrifuge scoops for Kahuta enrichment plant
Supplied natural lithium, useful in making tritium for boosted nuclear weapons
Set up tritium gas purification plant and provided a small amount of tritium for testing
Supplied information for design and construction of secret research reactor

Netherlands
Source of centrifuge design, materials and manufacturing equipment secretly procured by Dr. A.Q. Khan

Norway
Sold computers and software useful in nuclear weapon design

Sweden
Supplied flash X-ray machines, useful in nuclear weapon development

Switzerland
Supplied components for centrifuge enrichment plant
Supplied high vacuum valves and gasification and solidification units

United States
Supplied Pakistan's first research reactor and fuel which Pakistan used for secret experiments in tritium production


http://www.wisconsinproject.org/countries/pakistan/nukehelpers.htm

[SenecaV]

Oshama will just pretend this didn't happen.

[Joethepauper]

WTF? While Bushco were making sure Pakistan treated Khan with kid gloves, Obama was sponsoring legislation to secure loose nukes. While Bushco was stepping right into UBL's trap, the graveyard of empires, Afghanistan (after Reagan and Bush Sr. funded, armed, and trained the Mujeheddin {future Al Qaeda}), and stepping into another trap that wasn't even there, Iraq, Obama was doing something we wouldn't have to fix in the future. Blowback is a B**ch, and Republicans are the kings of blowback. What would you prefer Obama do? How do you know there's not a covert CIA squad on their way to clean up this mess already? Bush was in office for 8 years and nothing was done. If you gathered 1000 of the smartest foreign policy wonks together right now to deal with the Af/Pak situation, they would all immediately throw up their hands and go home with migraines. Unless yoiu have solutions or something productive to add, why don't you post on a right-wing blog?

[LilPuppy]

how long before m.o.s.s.a.­d. gets rid of him

[blowhard]

the m o s s a d is now i m p o t en t

[Ergon]

Lots of Kumars posting from their mom's basements today. Can we disarm India too, please?

[SenecaV]

No need.. India is a good country and a responsible country

[kimskams80]

Ha Ha Ha .. yes where Serving Colonel provide RDX to Hindu Talibans ... yes its a responsible country hmmmmmmmmm­mm... Update your knowledge

[Simbalay]

It's unclear how the U.S. government will react to Khan's release. Cirincione, who runs the Ploughshares Fund, a grantmaking foundation focused on issues of security and peace, points out that Khan's release comes just days after the U.S. imposed sanctions against Khan, 12 of his associates and three firms tied to his network. "Was this a reaction to our move? If so, it is a direct challenge to our efforts to stop the network," he says

This is message to Obama from the real people who run that country and not the ones who run that joke of a 'fledgling democracy'.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1877636,00.html

[TXfemmom]

This guy sold nuclear technology to rogue regimes and anyone who had the money. Pakistan's nuclear arsenal was and is the clear and present danger to our safety and that of the world, but Bush went after Iraq and bankrupted us doing it. Now, Pakistan let's the man go, even though it is symbolic.

We need to face the prospect that Pakistan's nukes may have to be neutralized, and its' facilities rendered useless, to protect us and the future of the entire world. That should have been Bush's goal, but instead he coddled them. A friend who is a nuclear expert says that they could be taken out or rendered useless by conventional means, and the world may need to do just that.

[elcojonu]

What's the big deal, the recipe on how to make the Bomb has been around since the 60's, it's the materials and the facilities necessary to build it that's a b...i...t.­..c...h .

[Joethepauper]

And thanks to the nuclear power industry, and rampant capitalistic greed, the materials are much easier to obtain. Sure, anyone can google the basic diagrams (I saw it on Nat. Geo. once), but this guy and 100 others like him provide everything. Let's say that he's not sympathetic to the Taliban/AQ: if UBL called him and asked for a "package", A.Q. Khan would probably just hike-up the price a little and strike a deal. The scariest part of all of this is the fact that nobody I've talked to even knows who this guy is. A.Q. Who??? SAD!! And the nuclear power industry thinks they're doing nothing wrong.

[Ares1]

The Pakistani government is out of control, even more so than the last guy, now they decide to let him go, it's time to get the predator aircraft and take AQ out, he is going to do it again.

[Simbalay]

They've always been out of control. Their nation was founded on failed idea and powers their realized that to exist they need a perpetual enemy. !ndia has absorbed their rabid neighbors murderous temper for the better part of 60yrs till 9/11 and then the world woke up.

[TXfemmom]

It is not just Khan who would need to be destroyed. We need to face up to the fact that the United States and all other free nations may have to destroy Pakistan's nuclear facilities and weapons, through conventional methods, but that would require a sustained, overwhelming bombing campaign, and the country would be in turmoil. It is, however better to destroy their nuclear capabilities and then continue to neutralize them through conventional military things than to permit those bombs and their technology to spread to Islamic fundamentalists who would not hesitate to use those bombs on us and the rest of the Western world.