Eating grass E at i ng gr a s s The Making of the Pakistani Bomb FEROZ HASSAN KHAN stanford security studies An Imprint of Stanford University Press Stanford, California Stanford University Press Stanford, California © 2012 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Jr. University. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system without the prior written permission of Stanford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Khan, Feroz Hassan, author. Eating grass : the making of the Pakistani bomb / Feroz Hassan Khan. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-0-8047-7600-4 (cloth : alk. paper) — isbn 978-0-8047-7601-1 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Nuclear weapons—Pakistan—History. 2. Pakistan—Military policy. I. Title. u264.5.p18k43 2012 623.4'5119095491—dc23 2012015835 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality paper. Typeset at Stanford University Press in 10/14 Minion. Special discounts for bulk quantities of Stanford Security Studies are available to corporations, professional associations, and other organizations. For details and discount information, contact the special sales department of Stanford University Press. Contents Preface ix Pakistan: Key Characters xv Abbreviations xix 1 Introduction 1 PART I: THE RELUCTANT PHASE 2 Atoms for Peace at the Crossroads of History 17 3 Ayub’s Non-Decision and the Nuclear Bomb Option 32 4 Never Again 68 PART II: THE SECRET NUCLEAR R&D PROgRAM 5 The Route to Nuclear Ambition 95 6 Punishing Pakistan 124 7 Mastery of Uranium Enrichment 139 8 Procurement Network in the grey Market 162 9 Building the Bomb 174 10 Mastery of Plutonium Production 191 PART III: COvERT ARSENAL AND DELIvERy MEANS 11 Military Crises and Nuclear Signaling 207 12 Pakistan’s Missile Quest 234 13 The grazing Horse in the Meadows 252 14 The Nuclear Test Decision 269 Contents PART Iv: TOwARD AN OPERATIONAL DETERRENT 15 The Dawn of a Nuclear Power 287 16 A Shaky Beginning: Kargil and Its Aftermath 306 17 Establishment of Robust Command and Control 321 18 Testing the Deterrent 338 PART v: MEETINg NEw CHALLENgES 19 The Unraveling of the Khan Network 359 20 Nuclear Pakistan and the world 377 Epilogue 393 Notes 399 Index 493 vi Map, tables, and Figures MAP Map of Pakistan xxvi TABLES 5.1 Pakistan Nuclear Infrastructure 122 7.1 Development of Enriched Uranium Route 159 9.1 Bomb Design 187 10.1 Development of Plutonium Route 203 12.1 Missile Inventory 250 FIgURES 17.1 Organizational Chart: Combat Development Directorate (CD Directorate, 1985–1998) 327 17.2 Organization of Strategic Plans Division (SPD) 330 17.3 Organization of National Command Authority (NCA) 336 vii Preface This book took six years to compile. what began as a simple quest to com- press a holistic account of the Pakistani nuclear program turned into a Rubik’s cube. As a first-time writer setting out to pull together a balanced and objective account on a subject considered taboo for decades, I ran into the proverbial Clauswitzian “fog of war,” where a maze of claims and counterclaims made the research difficult. Like many aspects of Pakistan’s politics and history, its nuclear story is awash with controversies and competing narratives. yet, the most intriguing aspect during the course of this research was facing the challenge of the relentless disinformation campaign unleashed on the Pakistani nuclear program. gore vidal’s famous quotation emphasizing that a “[d]isinformation campaign has metastasized to a level where myth threatens to overthrow history” aptly ap- plies to the case study of Pakistan. This was one reason that galvanized my efforts in telling the story of the Pakistani nuclear program and my interest in writing this book. In the case of new nuclear states—such as India, Israel, and Pakistan—the necessity to keep the nuclear weapons program covert in order to resist inter- national proliferation pressures has added another layer of opacity. The hab- its that come with decades of secrecy do not disappear overnight just because the country has conducted a declared nuclear test. Furthermore, as with many developing countries, the Pakistan government does not open its national ar- chives to outside scrutiny, especially on matters of national security. Even non- official accounts, such as newspaper and journal articles, are difficult to access with collections often incomplete. On top of these challenges, reconstructing the Pakistani case is vexing be- cause its nuclear history is still contested by those who took part in the pro- gram. As this study will show, the establishment of two rival organizations—the ix