DECEPTION: Pakistan, the United States and the Global Nuclear Weapons Conspiracy
DECEPTION: Pakistan, the United States and the Global Nuclear Weapons Conspiracy Reviewed by Christina Lamb Times Online In the mid-1990s, I was at a wedding in Islamabad when a buzz went round about a very special guest. None of the ministers and generals present was causing the stir. Instead, holding court under an awning, was a tall man in a suit with greying hair, undistinguished yet with a superior air. “It’s AQ Khan,” somebody whispered. “The father of our bomb.” At that time, Pakistan had not yet exploded its first nuclear bomb (that came in 1998), but most Pakistanis believed they had the technology to do so. For a country with a huge inferiority complex, the idea of matching India, its far larger neighbour and rival, made Abdul Qadeer Khan eclipse even its cricket stars as a hero. Yet, since 2004, Khan has been under house arrest, forced to confess to selling nuclear know-how and parts to rogue states. Nobody seriously believed President Musharraf’s claim that Khan was ...