WASHINGTON: The United States sought ‘some control, some insight’ into Pakistan’s nuclear command and control system as a means to encourage India to reduce troops at the eastern border, journalist Seymour Hersh told Dawn.
In an interview in Washington, Mr Hersh said that such an arrangement was needed to allow Islamabad to focus on the fight against the extremists along the Afghan border.
In his article in The New Yorker magazine, Mr Hersh claimed that the United States had a covert team ready to fly into Pakistan at a moment’s notice and defend nuclear installations from possible militant attacks.
Mr Hersh’s claims caused an angry reaction in Islamabad where Pakistani officials and the US Ambassador, Anne Patterson, rejected his report as ‘false and baseless’.
Mr Hersh also wrote that he had evidence the US administration had been working on ‘highly sensitive understandings’ with Pakistan’s military that would let the US military provide ‘added security for the Pakistani arsenal in case of a crisis’.
Mr Hersh claimed that a ‘highly classified’ emergency response team had already been activated within the past few months in response to a report that a Pakistani nuclear component had ‘gone astray’.
He pointed out that a good look at the US military chief Admiral Mike Mullen’s recent testimonies at Congress showed that the US and Pakistan had had three years of contacts on this issue.
‘We were given access, a computer look. I am not saying Americans were running around with cameras and were checking out things with their eyes.’
Mr Hersh claimed that this computer access was given in March or April, after the Obama administration finalised its Af-Pak policy.
The policy required Pakistan to deploy more troops at the Afghan border to go after the Taliban.
The Americans, he said, wanted the Indians to pull away first, so that Pakistan could focus on the Afghan border. ‘The Indians said, no. We have 80 nuke weapons pointed at us, we cannot pull back.’
The Americans thought they could encourage the Indians to do so if somehow they had ‘some control or insight into Pakistan’s nuclear command and control system,’ Mr Hersh said.
‘The idea is to reassure the Indians that we are in a position to prevent someone from doing something crazy,’ he said. ‘If the Indians are satisfied, it will allow Pakistan to focus on the Afghan border.’
To enable the Indians to reach that point of comfort, the Americans needed to ‘reassure India that nothing crazy will not happen. After all only target of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons is India, not America,’ said Mr Hersh.
The new arrangement would also allow Pakistani military commanders to ‘call us if they are worried about the loyalty of some their troops’ deployed at the nuclear installations, he said.
The Americans also told the Pakistani commanders that ‘if a group of crazies gets hold of a warhead, you can call us’.
Mr Hersh admitted that from the American point of view, it would be better if Pakistan had no nuclear bombs, but this arrangement was not about disarming Pakistan.
Mr Hersh rejected the suggestion that he was anti-Pakistan and that’s why he was writing such articles.
‘I am not anti-Pakistan. There’s a difference between policy and people. The Pakistanis are unhappy with American policies. American people are always welcomed in Pakistan.’
Asked about his claim that a Pakistani nuclear component had recently ‘gone astray’, Mr Hersh said he heard ‘about something going missing, a loose nuke, a trigger missing’.
He said there’s a special US team which provided guidance to the US ambassador in Islamabad and used a highly classified code. ‘But they are no shooters. They just provide guidance.’
Mr Hersh said he met President Asif Ali Zardari twice while he was in Islamabad working on his article, ‘once for a background talk, then at a dinner. Both meetings took place at the presidential palace in Islamabad’.
At the dinner, ‘we talked about a lot of stuff’, he said. ‘Did he confirm your findings on Pakistan’s nuclear installations?’ he was asked.
‘Obviously, at some point I discussed exactly what I was doing and what I learned. He said what he said. We have to please the big brother.’
‘But the government later rejected your story as baseless?’ ‘I understand that a story like this gets denied,’ said Mr Hersh.
The journalist, who also interviewed Gen Pervez Musharraf for the article, said he believed the former Pakistani president was ‘a disarming fellow, very direct. I liked him, liked him a lot. He is a very likeable man, straightforward. More than I thought’.
‘Did Mr Musharraf say he allowed Washington access to Pakistan’s nuclear installations?’ ‘I wrote what I wrote. Are the words that came out are the words I meant? Yes, of course.’
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