Posted on 12/06/2001 9:10:13 AM PST by HAL9000
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Dec. 6 (UPI) -- Pakistani nuclear scientists, in collaboration with former Pakistani intelligence officers, were assisting Osama bin Laden's al Qaida organization development a "dirty" nuclear weapons capability, U.S. and Pakistani intelligence agencies concluded, United Press International learned Thursday.Speaking not for attribution, intelligence officers in Washington and Islamabad are convinced documents uncovered in Kabul and the interrogation of nuclear scientists, who were frequent visitors to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan ostensibly involved in humanitarian work, are conclusive evidence al Qaida was attempting to put together a "nuclear device in the 'dirty-bomb' category." One Pakistani general who has seen the evidence described the device as a "dirty nuclear weapon," i.e., radioactive materials wrapped around conventional explosives. He also believes bin Laden obtained such materials on Russia's nuclear black market.
The International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, Austria, is aware of 175 cases of trafficking in nuclear materials since 1993, including 18 that involved highly enriched uranium and plutonium pellets the size of a U.S. silver dollar. There are 18 million potential delivery vehicles to covertly introduce a nuclear device in the United States. That's the number of cargo containers that arrive in the United States annually. Only 3 percent of them are inspected by U.S. Customs, and bills of lading do not have to be produced until they arrive at their final destination, according to current rules and regulations.
Radioactivity is invisible, as was the case with the Chernobyl disaster in 1985, but not undetectable. There is no way of knowing the future impact on people exposed, although prolonged radiation exposure can cause genetic alterations resulting in birth defects, health problems and even death. Since most of the long-term effects of radiation are unknown, "dirty" nuclear devices are more weapons of mass disruption than mass destruction.
An unidentified former chief of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency is believed to be the man who coordinated bin Laden's nuclear ambitions. One local intelligence source speculated a dirty bomb could have been smuggled out before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon. It would have been transported in a truck all the way to Karachi, in southern Pakistan and then shipped in a cargo container.
That could be the weapon Taliban chief Mullah Mohammad Omar was referring to when he said after the U.S. bombing started Oct. 7 that America would soon have to face extinction. Allowing for hyperbole, he may have known what bin Laden was planning next.
Another ex-ISI chief, retired Gen. Hameed Gul, predicted to UPI after Sept. 11 that one day there would be a single Islamic state that would stretch from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan and it would have nuclear weapons and would then control the oil resources of the Gulf.
The general is an ISI legend and still popular among the agency's present crop of leaders, who were his junior officers in the late 1980s. Gul is vehemently anti-American and a Muslim fundamentalist. He acts as "strategic adviser" to Pakistan's extremist religious parties and spent two weeks in Afghanistan immediately prior to Sept. 11.
Gul slowly is emerging as the spokesman for the combined opposition of Islamist fundamentalists. In Thursday's Urdu-language newspapers, he is quoted as saying: "No one can tell us how to run our nuclear facilities and nuclear programs. This is being done in the interest of Pakistan, not the United States. The Taliban will always remain in Afghanistan and Pakistan will always support them."
He presumably was referring to Taliban intentions to launch a guerrilla campaign once they had lost Kandahar, their last outpost.
Gul's only daughter runs VARAN, the public transportation bus company that enjoys a monopoly in Islamabad and its twin military garrison city of Rawalpindi. Gul himself lives in "Pindi" in an army housing development earmarked for retired generals.
Officially, the Pakistani government has accepted the explanation of three nuclear scientists about their "innocuous" relationship to Taliban. Privately, however, some Pakistani officials, working closely with U.S. colleagues, told UPI their activities "cannot be described as innocuous by any stretch of the imagination."
Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, on a brief visit to Islamabad last weekend, conferred with President Pervez Musharraf on what was described as the need for "more and better intelligence" from ISI.
The CIA has reportedly submitted a list of six more nuclear scientists it wants to probe on suspicion of having links with al Qaida. Two of the six -- Dr. Suleiman Asad and Dr. Muhammad Ali Muktar -- have been working in Kahora Research Laboratories. They are in Myanmar doing undisclosed research with Burmese scientists.
Dr. Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmud, the former director of the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission, and Chief Engineer Dr. Chaudry Abdul Majeed have been questioned by a joint FBI-ISI team.
Apparently anxious to avoid further U.S. probes into Pakistan's ultra-secret nuclear weapons program, these two scientists have been advised by the government to remain in Myanmar until further notice.
The CIA, according to PAEC sources, wishes to conduct a separate interrogation based on documents seized in Kabul. Mahmud is a close associate of Gul. They were colleagues when Gul ran ISI.
Mahmud is one of three scientists who befriended Taliban leaders. He is an expert in enriched uranium and plutonium. He has lectured all over Pakistan and praised the Taliban as "the wave of the future for Pakistan."
Mahmud and two of his colleagues were detained in late October as a result of U.S. questions about Pakistani "relief" organizations active in Taliban-run Afghanistan, including an agricultural project near Kandahar.
They admitted to meeting with al Qaida associates of bin Laden and were officially cleared of passing on nuclear secrets. Mahmud says publicly that plutonium production is not a state secret and advocates increasing plutonium output to help other Islamic nations build nuclear weapons.
After the start of the U.S. bombing campaign Oct. 7, Musharraf ordered an immediate redeployment of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal to six new secret locations, including separate storage facilities for uranium and plutonium cores and their detonation mechanisms.
Army colleagues now say privately Musharraf was fearful of assassination by extremists who were already accusing him of betraying Islam and selling out to the United States. There also were rumors of a coup by hard-lining military Islamists.
The officer corps is 20 percent fundamentalist, according to a post Sept. 11 confidential survey by military intelligence, which operates separately from ISI.
Pakistan's community of nuclear scientists is known as "profoundly fundamentalist" and anti-American. They are particularly resentful of America's economic and military sanctions against Pakistan as punishment for their country's nuclear weapons program.
The community's guru is Abdul Qadir Khan, the scientist who devised Pakistan's first nuclear weapon. Pakistan now has an estimated 20 such weapons in its arsenal.
ISI is still widely distrusted by western intelligence agencies and by all levels of Pakistani society, from people in the street to top political leaders. An ISI general who is regional director in one of the tribal areas told an important tribal leader known to this reporter that, "After Afghanistan, Pakistan is next on America's list of countries to be conquered, and after Pakistan, Iran will be next. All that war talk about Iraq being next is just a smokescreen."
The tribal leader said "such silly statements are typical of the Islamist state of paranoia." Gul has been touring federally administered tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan with much the same message about Washington's plans for conquest in the region.
ISI is undergoing a traumatic shock in the wake of the Taliban's defeat, according to knowledgeable secular political party leaders.
"They have lost thousands of operatives in Afghanistan," said one key politician who did not wish to be named. ISI also facilitated the transfer to Afghanistan in the past two months of thousands of young religious school students who had been proselytized by their clerical teachers to volunteer to fight with Taliban.
Musharraf had a dangerous precedent in mind. Six years ago, a group of Pakistani army officers was arrested for plotting to kill Army Chief of Staff Gen. Abdul Waheed. He had fired the ISI chief for secretly assisting Muslim rebels in several countries.
This is bin Laden's vision, and what he and al Qaeda and other related groups are fighting for.
They want to create a what can be called the Unholy Islamic Empire under the authority of a pope figure they call the Caliph.
I dunno about those other places but it is IMPOSSIBLE to look at every truck that comes into LA.
KARACHI, December 06 (PNS): The CIA has given a list of six more nuclear scientists to the Pakistani government whom it wants to probe on suspicion of having links with Osama Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda Network or Ummah Reconstruction of Dr Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmud who has been already under detention, well-placed intelligence sources told PNS on Wednesday.
The issue was also discussed between President General Pervez Musharaff and the CIA's Director John Tenet during latter's recent visit to Pakistan. Details are lacking about the Musharaff's response to Tenet in this regard.
Two of the six scientists, Dr Suleiman Asad and Dr Muhammad Ali Mukhtar are directly related to the country's nuclear programme, and has been working in Kahota Research Laboratories (KRL) for last few years, sources added.
Currently, the two scientists are in Myanmar, where they went a few months back to assist the local scientists in " some kind of research work", a spokesman of Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) said. However, he refused to elaborate on the kind of research work.
The two scientists have prolonged their stay in Myanmar on the Pakistani government's directives, which virtually does not want them to be probed by the US secret agencies fearing that they might leak some information as regards its nuclear program to them, the PAEC and foreign office sources confirmed.
Yes, this is true that FBI wants to probe them, but they have nothing to do with nuclear issue. They (the duo) are busy in some kind of research work in Myanmar and we don't want to divert their attention.Therefore, we have asked them to prolong their stay there", a PAEC spokesman said.
Dr Suleiman Asad and Dr Muhammad Ali Mukhtar, have been flown to Sagaing Division of Myanmar, after the authorities in Yangon acceded to their request, the sources said.
The request made by Foreign Office was promptly accepted after Islamabad gave an assurance that the duo were not involved in any terrorist activity, the sources said
To a question, the PAEC spokesman said that the two scientists had not been granted any asylum by the Myanmar authorities but they have prolonged their stay on the directives of Pakistani government.
The list, given by the CIA also does not include the names of Dr Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmud, the former Director of PAEC and Chief Engineer Dr Chaudry Abdul Majeed, who are already being interrogated by a joint team of FBI and the ISI. Sources are unaware of the six remaining names.
Dr Muhammad Ali Mukhtar, who is PHD in nuclear physics and has worked in Khushab and Islamabad offices of the PAEC.
Sources say the scientist joined the PAEC in early 80s. He is known as a close friend of Dr Mahmud. He has been working in classified section of the KRL which deals with the Defense production.
Therefore, the Pakistani government who is closely cooperating with the USA against it so-called war against terrorism does not want him to be probed fearing any leakage of country's defense capability.
Dr Suleiman Asad is also considered one of the senior and professional scientists of Pakistan. End.
Yes, and radiometric techniques are probably among the most accurate in science. I seem to recall in my undergraduate course in nuclear physics that the most precise measurement made in experimental physics is a nuclear measurement, Mossbauer spectroscopy, with a precision in the range of one part in 1E21, or something like that.
There is no way of knowing the future impact on people exposed, ...
True for individual persons, but not for statistically large sample populations. Quite accurate predictions can be made if reasonably precise dose information is available for an exposed group, and you set up the epidemiological study with appropriate cohort groups.
... although prolonged radiation exposure can cause genetic alterations resulting in birth defects, health problems and even death. Since most of the long-term effects of radiation are unknown, "dirty" nuclear devices are more weapons of mass disruption than mass destruction.
Here is where the author seems to get a little flaky. In one sentence he states what the potential long-term effects are (assuming his reference to "death" means fatalities induced by cancer), and in the next he says that we don't know was most of the long-term effects of radiation are. Well, he just listed them in the previous sentence, using pretty broad terms! "Health problems" covers a lot of ground, IMO.
You're not the only one who has thought this. We probably have the capability of locating OBL within a fraction of an inch and nailing him. Perhaps he is using this threat as his insurance policy.
Guls' operating in Pakistan like a couple of demorats are here. The parallels are striking.
Chuckie Schumer and Dascholes wives also run public transportation entities in NYC and Washington respectively. And, even though this guys daughter runs one in Pakistan, my guess is that in addition to being his daughter, she's probably also his wife.
;-)
As for OBL & Associates having any type of radiation devices, I myself think that if they did have them they would have wanted to get them in the United States before 9-11.
I've no doubt that if they don't now possess them, they're actively seeking them, but one can only speculate on if they'd use them, especially now that they know we've a man in the Oval Office and at D.O.D. who wouldn't take too kindly to that.
With our open borders I'd find that fairly hard to beleive, but it stil may be true.
This good ol boy Khan is implicated in dealing with N. Korea as part of a deal of missiles for bombs.
From the Far Eastern Economic review, Issue cover-dated December 06, 2001
U.S. Sees Korean Nuclear ThreatU.S. President George W. Bush's recent warning to Pyongyang to allow international inspection of its nuclear activities reflects a suspicion that North Korea may still be trying to develop nuclear weapons. The U.S. intelligence services are particularly concerned by repeated visits to North Korea by Abdul Qadir Khan, the architect of Pakistan's nuclear programme, say officials in Washington. While the visits were related to North Korea's sale of Nodong intermediate-range ballistic missiles to the A.Q. Khan Research Laboratory in Kahuta, the Americans are suspicious about the Pakistani part of the deal. Did Khan, who is accused of stealing gas centrifuge technology from Europe to build a uranium enrichment plant in Kahuta and who provided the fissile material for the Pakistani bomb, help North Korea develop the same in exchange for the missiles? Experts say a uranium enrichment facility built deep inside a cave would be difficult to detect.
Do-what?
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