Author: Rahul Bedi
Publication: Rediff.com
Date: June 9, 2011
URL: http://www.rediff.com/news/special/osama-killed-why-america-is-willing-to-strike-but-afraid-to-wound-pakistan/20110509.htm
Security experts say that after publicly condemning
Pakistan for its role in the bin Laden debacle, threatening it with sanctions
and cutting off crucial aid, the US would quietly re-calibrate its security
ties with Islamabad over the next few weeks as it could ill-afford to alienate
it. Rahul Bedi reports
Osama bin Laden's killing by American commandoes
in a Pakistani cantonment earlier last week, has once more inflamed tensions
between Islamabad and Washington but it was highly unlikely that their tempestuous
relationship, bordering at times on the bizarre, faced imminent breakdown.
Indian and Western analysts said Pakistan's
strategic weapons cache made it impossible for the US to impose any long-term
or crippling punitive measures on Islamabad for reportedly harbouring bin
Laden or for its perceived duplicity in participating in the war on terrorism
on the one hand and covertly aiding Islamist jihadists on the other.
"The US and indeed the world remain terrified
by the apocalyptic prospect of Pakistani nuclear weapons falling into jihadi
hands," former Indian Lt General Vijay Kapur said.
Therefore, the US cannot push Pakistan too
far, however displeased it may be with it over the bin Laden episode. It wants
to ensure the safety of its strategic assets by remaining closely engaged
with Islamabad, he added.
Senior Pakistani military officials recently
warned against US moves to try and 'seize' their country's atomic weapons
in a raid similar to the one executed on Monday against bin Laden's hideout
in the garrison town of Abbottabad, 100 km north of the capital Islamabad.
Other security experts said after publicly
condemning Pakistan for its role in the bin Laden debacle, threatening it
with sanctions and cutting off crucial aid, the US would quietly re-calibrate
its security ties with Islamabad over the next few weeks as it could ill-afford
to alienate it.
Besides, as long as US troops remain in landlocked
Afghanistan, dependent on Pakistan's port and road network to ship supplies,
Islamabad remains confident that Washington would never dare cut the purse
strings.
"There is no option (for the US) but
to cooperate (with Pakistan)," warned Taliban expert Rahimullah Yusufzai.
Others said that Pakistan's crucial geographical
location bordering Afghanistan made its strategic importance to the US and
its NATO partners "unassailable".
The raid by US Navy SEALs on bin Laden's Abbottabad
hideout, arguably America's biggest victory in the war on the Al Qaeda, came
at a time when intelligence cooperation with Pakistan was at an all-time low.
In a highly public and damning indictment
of the loyalty of an official ally, the head of the Central Intelligence Agency
Leon Panetta said Islamabad was not informed of the strike because it agents
-- primarily the army and the country's omnipotent Inter Services Intelligence
directorate -- could have tipped bin Laden off.
US-Pakistan ties remain mired in suspicion
10 years after their hastily stitched together alliance following the 9/11
attacks after Islamabad reportedly abandoned the Taliban it helped create
and install in Kabul.
But over the years a beleaguered Pakistan
has cleverly played on US fears of its nuclear assets falling into Islamist
hands and managed to extract vast treasure and materiel from Washington to
prevent this from happening.
And in January an emboldened Pakistan announced
it would expand its nuclear deterrence against neighbouring rival India by
producing additional strategic weapons of which it is believed to have between
80 and 100 and a robust missile arsenal to deliver them to extended distances.
And though Pakistan has repeatedly assured
the US and the rest of the world that its nuclear assets are in safe hands,
serious doubts persist among its detractors.
Pakistan is the sole Islamic state with nuclear
weapons and one where the atomic arsenal is controlled almost exclusively
by an increasingly "Islamised" military that remains the country's
most powerful institution.
The arsenals' location remains a closely guarded
secret but Western intelligence sources believe they are secreted in Islamabad's
'proximity', with the warheads and delivery systems separated.
Islamabad's record in nuclear proliferation
too is, at best, dubious.
Its top atomic scientist Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan
was exposed in 2004 as the head of an international black market operation
in nuclear technology working reportedly in collusion with the military, leaking
lethal secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea in exchange for large sums of
money and long range missile designs.
Pakistani nuclear scientists are even believed
to have travelled to Afghanistan to meet with the Al Qaeda leadership when
the Taliban controlled Kabul before being ousted by the US-led coalition in
2001.
Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is managed by the
National Command Authority that includes the associated Employment Control
Committee, the Development Control Committee and the Strategic Plans Division
all overseen by a select group of military-dominated officials.
In past years Pakistan has confirmed that
the US was helping to ensure the security of its nuclear weapons but declined
to elaborate.
It reiterated that the security of Pakistan's
nuclear assets was 'foolproof' and advised against creating irresponsible
alarm.
It has also repeatedly declared that it was
capable of defending its nuclear interests and cautioned those "contemplating
misadventures".
US media reports some time ago revealed that
Washington had spent $100 million in helping secure Pakistan's nuclear weapons
against theft and accidents, a claim Islamabad denies.
