Seymour Hersh Pakistan-US nuclear security plan

[AstanoshKhan]

Hang on a minute... who the f is America or American journalist to worry about the security of our nukes or tell us that our nukes are not safe. They should keep an eye on their back door as well. Bunch of idiots and retard journalists...

Look for the links below when American nukes went missing back in 2007. Talking of our nukes huh.

Voices - Is a Second More Deadly 9/11 Now In the Works? There Are Good Reasons to Believe This Is So

Missing Nukes: Treason of the Highest Order

 

[XYON]

Instead of Seymour Hersh and after reading this hookah article I cannot help but comment.............DO NOT SAY-MORE HERSH! PLEASE!

 

[Spring Onion]

Gen Tariq Majid calls Hersh article ‘mischievous’ Monday, 09 Nov, 2009

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s military chief said that his country did not need any foreign help in guarding its nuclear facilities because they were already well protected.

Islamabad angrily rejected a media report in the United States that raised fears of a militant seizure of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and suggested that the US had a hand in protecting the arsenal.

Pakistan’s Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee General Tariq Majid in a statement called the report ‘absurd and plain mischievous.’

‘We have operationalised a very effective nuclear security regime which incorporates very stringent custodial and access controls,’ Majid said, adding that: ‘As overall custodian of the development of our strategic programme, I reiterate in very unambiguous terms that there is absolutely no question of sharing or allowing any foreign individual, entity or a state, any access to sensitive information about our nuclear assets.’

In the latest issue of The New Yorker magazine, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh wrote that US officials had negotiated pacts with Pakistan to provide security for the nuclear arsenal in extreme circumstances.

Majid clarified that Pakistan’s engagement with other countries directly or through the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was meant only to learn more about best practices for security of such assets.

The general said that these engagements were based on ‘two clearly spelt-out red lines – non intrusiveness and our right to pick and choose.’ He added: ‘Also, our security apparatus has the capacity and is fully geared to meet all conceivable challenges, therefore we do not need to negotiate with any other country to physically augment our security forces, which in any case, we believe, are more capable than their forces.’

Larry Schwartz, a spokesman at the US embassy in Islamabad, told AFP that ‘the United States has no intention to seize Pakistani nuclear weapons or material. ‘Pakistan is a key ally in our common effort to fight violent extremists and foster regional security,’ said Schwartz.

Commenting on the question raised through an article captioned ‘Pakistan Nuclear Security Plan: How much does US really know?’ which appeared in ‘The News’, Islamabad on 9 November 2009, General Tariq responded, ‘only that much as they can guess and nothing more’—AFP/DawnNews

 

[deathfromabove]

Nuclear Doubts: Pakistani Weakness Is Eroding Internal Morale, Fast

Seymour Hersh might have come up with some absurd findings, like concluding that religious extremism has multiplied in Pakistan because no one offered him Johnny Walker Black during his recent visit. But apart from that, Pakistan's national security managers should sit up and take notice of one glaring fact: The US media and some circles in the Washington establishment are behind the worst global demonization campaign against Pakistan. Now this is denting national morale and forcing Pakistanis to question if their military is capable of defending the nation, since politicians have proven to be a disaster.



By AHMED QURAISHI

Tuesday, 10 November 2009.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—Two curious aspects of the New Yorker story on Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is that the report singles out the Pakistani military – and not the civilian government – as partner in alleged secret negotiations with the Obama administration to secure Pakistan's nuclear weapons. The other is the objective behind leaking the story – if indeed some US officials helped in leaking details – since the story only serves to make it more difficult for Pakistani officials cooperating with Washington on the nuclear question.

In May, when Boston Globe published a similar story quoting unnamed and unverifiable sources revealing that Pakistani officials have accepted a proposal to ship some highly enriched uranium to the United States for disposal, there was no reference whatsoever to Pakistani military. The Globe depicted the talks as a government-to-government exercise.

For all intents, the latest story seeks to embarrass the Pakistani military. This probably explains the immediate reaction of the US Ambassador to Pakistan Anne W. Patterson. Not that she actually denied the alleged talks. Her written statement was carefully worded to deny her government's "intention to seize Pakistani nuclear weapons or material."

The element of embarrassment also explains the statement of Pakistan’s Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee General Tariq Majid, who made it a point to respond to the question, 'How much does US really know about Pakistan's nuclear program?' In a sharp public retort uncommon to Pakistan's top military brass, Gen. Majeed answered, ‘Only that much as they can guess and nothing more’.

Important parts of Mr. Seymour Hersh's investigative story remain unaddressed. No government or military official has confirmed or denied the revelation in the New Yorker that former President Pervez Musharraf shared with US officials information about the number of warheads, their locations and their security plan. Considering the embarrassing concessions that he gave the Americans [he allowed US diplomats, officials and military personnel unprecedented privileges at Pakistani airports at a time when Pakistani officials were humiliated on entry to US. Pakistan has withdrawn those concessions.]

[It is also important to question some of Mr. Hersh's findings, which border on the ridiculous. The last time Mr. Hersh visited Pakistan was five years ago by his own statement. Yet he concluded that since the few politicians, journalists and retired generals he met this time did not offer him Johnny Walker Black this must be a sign of growing religious extremism in Pakistan and in the ranks of Pakistan military. At other places, he has exaggerated the impact of two retired army officers that he interviewed on soldiers and middle rank officers. Mr. Hersh appeared to have made little effort to use his visit to the country to try to understand the real Pakistan. Instead, he felt comfortable regurgitating media stereotypes. Which is fine since his report fits in with the overall US political and military policy thrust with regards to Pakistan.]

Mr. Hersh's report comes six months after the Boston Globe story that broke the news on behind-the-scenes talks between Islamabad and Washington on US proposals to secure Pakistan's nuclear weapons, including a US suggestion to ship out Pakistani uranium. No one in Islamabad denied the story at the time. The fixed Pakistani response to such stories has not changed much in recent years: that Pakistan has an excellent command and control regime and that Pakistan does not need outside help to secure its arsenal.

So, is the Pakistani government or military really talking secretly with the Americans on how to secure Pakistani nukes?

One explanation that retired military officers are giving is that Pakistani officers may be talking nukes to the Americans but not giving them the right information. If true, this policy line seeks to keep the Americans engaged with Pakistan without allowing Washington any real access.

This is not farfetched. Pakistani civilian and military governments have perfected a uniquely Pakistani version of the American idiom, 'to roll with the punches and survive to fight another day.' Only that Pakistan never really fights even for what is its legitimate right. Under this policy, Islamabad has accepted on several occasions to play along, live with the accusations and insinuations about its nuclear program, and hope to stall, engage, and win over the antagonistic elements of the Washington establishment, both political and military.

But the latest report takes the debate to a new level. Pakistani officials grappling with the PR aspect of this story need to consider the following:

1. The latest report is particularly demoralizing for ordinary Pakistanis, in the backdrop of an overall deteriorating strategic environment for Pakistani interests, internal and external. Pakistan's national security managers, civilian and military, need to pay attention to the hypothetical threshold of national morale. Dangerously low levels of national morale could prove fatal in case of war with India or a US-led military invasion of Pakistani territory from Afghanistan.

2. Is there someone in Washington, within its political, military and intelligence communities that might have an interest in embarrassing Pakistani officials who are allegedly engaged in secret nuclear talks with Washington? Is someone trying to sabotage policy initiatives of the Obama administration? In such a case, Pakistani officials – especially in the Pakistani intelligence community – need to give more weight to reports that anti-Pakistan activities orchestrated on Afghan soil cannot happen without some level of American involvement.

3. That the US media continues to cause tremendous damage to Pakistan's reputation and standing in the international community. Pakistan is receiving enemy treatment from the US media. Pakistani officials must understand that US media cannot mount similar attacks on other countries such as Turkey and Egypt because leaderships in those countries generally keep US officials on a leash and leverage Washington's strategic needs to their favor. In Pakistan, we have a ruling elite that is micromanaged from Washington, thanks to a deal that former President Musharraf signed with Washington and London.

4. The New Yorker report harms the image of the Pakistani military leadership in the eyes of the soldiers and officers in middle and lower ranks. This is especially relevant to the debate raging in official US circles about a mutiny within the Pakistan army. Some American policymakers are deliberately using Afghanistan to push Pakistan to the wall in the hope that instability in Pakistan would reach a level where it could trigger a mutiny inside the Pakistani military against both the military leadership and the government. Anyone who knows Pakistan will instantly understand that this notion is exaggerated, but this US debate should tell Pakistan's military leadership and people something about the destructive line of policy thinking that Washington is pursuing in Pakistan's neighborhood.

Common wisdom in both the Pakistani political elite and some parts of the military bureaucracy says that 'engaging' the Americans on the subject of the security of Pakistani nukes can be beneficial to Pakistan. It would keep Washington engaged. It would provide opportunities to milk the Americans of more aid money.

But no one in the policymaking circles is apparently weighing the downside: The 'engagement' is emboldening the Americans. The 'engagement' – or secret talks, call them whatever you want – are sending the wrong signals to ordinary Pakistanis at a time when more of our people are convinced that Pakistan's troubles stem from American failures in Afghanistan.

Pakistani schools and colleges are under attack when those in Iraq and Afghanistan are safe. This is happening because of American policy blunders and not just because of extremism inside Pakistan. Our problems are also the result of Islamabad refusing to submit completely to the US military strategy that wants to give India a larger role in Afghanistan. Pakistan, with a strong military and intelligence setup, is an obstacle in this strategy.

 

[Windjammer]

We have all heard stories of Americans can determine the temperature of Sun's surface, find water on Mars, able to read a car's number plate from space etc.
Well a little closer to home they still haven't recovered Iraqi WMD, nor have they located the likes of OBL or been able to contain the rag tag Talibans and when their media rants stories about Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, it's easy to skip the extra strong headache tablets.

 

[asq]

Oh Pakistanis, did we forget the instance of East Pakistan, we were being prepared for it to separate by dates and time on one hand and on the other our enemies were being given all the assistance they needed to do the dirty work,

so it is the policy of some of the enemies of Pakistan to predict the time and date and covertly help our enemies to do the job by set date and than they tell us, see we told you so. seymore may be one of those who is planting seed for adversaries working inside and out side Pakistan.

Is his name is seemore butt(seymore butt) Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha

Pakistan beware

 

[ejaz007]

Report on Pak nukes ‘absurd, mischievous’: No foreign entity allowed to cross ‘red lines’: CJCSC

* Pakistan has very effective nuclear security regime
* Rules out sharing any information about nuclear assets with anyone

By Sajjad Malik

RAWALPINDI: No foreign entity is allowed to cross the “red lines” and gain intrusive access to strategic assets, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) General Tariq Majid said on Monday.

Commenting on an article about Pakistan’s nukes by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Seymour M Hersh, which was published in ‘The New Yorker’ – Gen Majid said Pakistan had operationalised a very effective nuclear security regime, which had incorporated “very stringent custodial and access controls”.

No sharing: “I reiterate in very unambiguous terms that there is absolutely no question of sharing or allowing any foreign individual, entity or state any access to sensitive information about our nuclear assets,” said Majid, who is also the overall custodian of the development of the country’s strategic programme. The CJCSC rejected Hersh’s 7,000 words article, branding it “absurd and plain mischief”.

“Our engagement with other countries ... to learn more about international best practices for security of such assets is based on two clearly spelt out red lines – non intrusiveness and our right to pick and choose,” he said.

Majid said Pakistan’s security apparatus had the capacity to meet all conceivable challenges. “Therefore, we do not need to negotiate with any other country to physically augment our security forces, which in any case, we believe, are more capable than their forces,” he said.

Commenting on an article titled ‘Pakistan Nuclear Security Plan: How Much Does US Really Know?’, which was published in a local English daily on Monday, he said, “Only that much as they can guess and nothing more.” In the latest issue of The New Yorker magazine, Hersh wrote that US officials had negotiated pacts with Pakistan to provide security for the nuclear arsenal in extreme circumstances.


Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan

 

[fatman17]

i bracket seymour hersh with the likes of bill roggio et al - they have a anti-pakistan bent - ignorance is the best policy for the likes of such!

 

[fatman17]

Editorial: Nuclear fables

An article published in the latest issue of The New Yorker has created quite a buzz in Pakistan. The subject of the article by Seymour Hersh is extremely sensitive, i.e. Pakistan’s nuclear weapons. According to Mr Hersh, the Obama administration is negotiating with the Pakistan government to help secure Pakistan’s nuclear weapons in case of a crisis. The article alleges that the Americans have a covert team ready to fly into Pakistan at a moment’s notice and defend our nuclear installations from attack and/or prevent them falling into the ‘wrong’ hands. Pakistan’s Foreign Office (FO) has denied these allegations and termed the article as “utterly misleading and totally baseless”, calling it “nothing more than a concoction to tarnish Pakistan’s image and create misgivings among its people.” The FO has also accused Hersh of making “several false and highly irresponsible claims by quoting anonymous and unverifiable sources.” Meanwhile, US Ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson has said that the US has no intention of seizing Pakistan’s nuclear weapons or material. Responding to reports published in the article that the Americans have been negotiating “understandings” with the Pakistani military about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, she said that these allegations are completely false.

It is quite surprising that a credible journalist like Seymour Hersh could come up with something so inconceivable. Pakistan cannot contemplate such an agreement and neither should the US. Pakistan has already taken proper measures to secure its nuclear weapons. The US did help Pakistan in formulating an accidental use risk reduction plan, but that is as far as the Americans were allowed to go.

The West, especially the US, has on numerous occasions voiced its ‘concern’ over the extremist threat to Pakistan and consequently, its nuclear weapons falling into the ‘wrong hands’ (jihadis). There is no denying the extremist threat but to think that the nuclear weapons might end up with the Taliban or al Qaeda is too far-fetched to be dignified with serious consideration. To extrapolate this fairy story scenario from the fact that the terrorists have launched a major offensive against the security agencies, which was expected in the face of the military operations against the militants in Swat and now South Waziristan, is to live in cloud cuckoo land. The Americans should know how difficult it is to fight militancy. The US has been unsuccessful in rooting out the Taliban from Afghanistan despite the presence of the world’s most powerful armed forces in the country for the past eight years. Pakistan has been quite successful in rolling back the militant tide and taking out notable jihadi leaders and will continue to battle them till the terrorist threat is completely eliminated.

On a separate note, the double standards of the US vis-à-vis Pakistan’s nuclear programme are glaring when it comes to India. A country that is known to have diverted its civilian nuclear programme to develop nuclear weapons, thereby sparking off a nuclear arms race in the Subcontinent, was ‘rewarded’ by the Americans in the shape of an Indo-US civilian nuclear agreement that leaves at least eight reactors outside the purview of IAEA inspections. India and Pakistan are both not signatories of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), but only India is still allowed to carry on nuclear commerce with the rest of the world. Pakistan, on the other hand, has taken steps to stop the nuclear proliferation network headed by Dr A Q Khan in its tracks.

The Obama administration has repeatedly expressed confidence in the security of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons. It is time the Western press too starts acknowledging this instead of continuously trying to create doubts about nuclear programme.

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan

 

[S-2]

Seymour likes provocation.

I'm sure most here remember and applauded these unfounded accusations from him even as you now toss him under the bus.

Well, for the record, so would I but...

...be wary as what I'm about to remind you of may strike an appealing and resonant chord in your hearts...

...if not your heads-

Investigative Reporter Hersch Describes Executive Assassination Ring-Minneapolis Post March 11, 2009

Replied Hersh:

“Yuh. After 9/11, I haven’t written about this yet, but the Central Intelligence Agency was very deeply involved in domestic activities against people they thought to be enemies of the state. Without any legal authority for it. They haven’t been called on it yet. That does happen.

"Right now, today, there was a story in the New York Times that if you read it carefully mentioned something known as the Joint Special Operations Command -- JSOC it’s called. It is a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently. They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. They did not report to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff or to Mr. [Robert] Gates, the secretary of defense. They reported directly to him. ...

"Congress has no oversight of it. It’s an executive assassination ring essentially, and it’s been going on and on and on. Just today in the Times there was a story that its leaders, a three star admiral named [William H.] McRaven, ordered a stop to it because there were so many collateral deaths.

"Under President Bush’s authority, they’ve been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. That’s been going on, in the name of all of us.

"It’s complicated because the guys doing it are not murderers, and yet they are committing what we would normally call murder. It’s a very complicated issue. Because they are young men that went into the Special Forces. The Delta Forces you’ve heard about. Navy Seal teams. Highly specialized.

"In many cases, they were the best and the brightest. Really, no exaggerations. Really fine guys that went in to do the kind of necessary jobs that they think you need to do to protect America. And then they find themselves torturing people.

"I’ve had people say to me -- five years ago, I had one say: ‘What do you call it when you interrogate somebody and you leave them bleeding and they don’t get any medical committee and two days later he dies. Is that murder? What happens if I get before a committee?’

"But they’re not gonna get before a committee.”

Can we now debunk this crap too along the way?

 

[Patriot]

I appreciate the fact that our generals only talk what Americans already know when speaking to Americans.. and rightfully so.t's not like the US shares every covert op that goes down in the world. Sovereignty is important to everyone. Keep your noses out of it. If there's an issue and we can't figure it, we'll contact you and vice versa. I love the naivety of American generals thinking that we're going to openly tell you what we have, etc. Seriously, we may be "backwards", "extremist", etc to the world, but we're certainly not that retarded.

 

[H2O3C4Nitrogen]

Report on N-assets mischievous and absurd: Gen Majid




Dawn Report
Tuesday, 10 Nov, 2009

ISLAMABAD: Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee Gen Tariq Majid has dismissed as ‘absurd and plain mischievous’ a report by American journalist Seymour Hersh published in The New Yorker about alleged vulnerability of Pakistan’s nuclear assets and facilities.

He said Pakistan did not need any foreign help to guard its nuclear facilities because they were already well protected.

On Sunday, Foreign Office rejected the report and said it amounted to ‘nothing more than a concoction to tarnish the image of Pakistan and create misgivings among its people’.

General Tariq Majid said in a statement issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations: ‘We have operationalised a very effective nuclear security regime which incorporates very stringent custodial and access controls’.

The statement said: ‘As overall custodian of the development of our strategic programme, I reiterate in very unambiguous terms that there is absolutely no question of sharing or allowing any foreign individual, entity or a state, any access to sensitive information about our nuclear assets. Our engagement with other countries through the International Atomic Energy Agency or bilaterally is to learn more about best practices for security of such assets and are based on two clearly spelt-out red lines —non intrusiveness and our right to pick and choose.’

Gen Majid added: ‘Also, our security apparatus has the capacity and is fully geared to meet all conceivable challenges, therefore we do not need to negotiate with any other country to physically augment our security forces, which in any case, we believe, are more capable than their forces.’

Commenting on the question raised through an article headlined ‘Pakistan nuclear security plan: How much does US really know?’, Gen Majid said: ‘Only as much as they can guess and nothing more’.

Another senior security official said there should be no doubt about the security of nuclear assets. ‘Our nuclear assets are not lying in a showcase that somebody will come and take it away.’

He said the foolproof mechanism was capable of thwarting any internal or external threat to the nuclear assets.

AFP adds: Larry Schwartz, a spokesman at the US embassy in Islamabad, said on Sunday that ‘the United States had no intention to seize Pakistani nuclear weapons or material.

‘Pakistan is a key ally in our common effort to fight violent extremists and foster regional security.’

DAWN.COM | Pakistan | Report on N-assets mischievous and absurd: Gen Majid

 

[H2O3C4Nitrogen]

'Unfazed' Hersh backs his report on nuke details




Washington Pulitzer award winning journalist Seymour Hersh, whose report in a foreign magazine regarding Pakistan sharing its nuclear programme details with America has created a huge furore, has backed his report, saying the Obama administration wants Islamabad to let Washington help secure its nuclear weapons in a crisis.

During an interview with CNN, Hersh rejected all accusations being levelled against him and said that the ‘highly sensitive’ understandings now being sought by Washington with the Pakistani military were completely different from the previous administration’s tough position.

“There was an ‘enormous difference’ between what the Obama administration was trying to do and what had been considered before. They’re now saying, we’re going to help you,” Hersh said in his report in The New Yorker.

Pakistan, however, has vehemently denied entering into any such agreement with the US.

“Pakistan’s nuclear assets are safe and secure. We, as a sovereign state, will never allow any country to have direct or indirect access to our nuclear and strategic facilities,” Foreign Office (FO) spokesman Abdul Basit had said just after Hersh’s report was splashed in media world over.

Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) General Tariq Majid also rejected the report terming is as ‘absurd and plain mischief.’

“I reiterate in very unambiguous terms that there is absolutely no question of sharing or allowing any foreign individual, entity or state any access to sensitive information about our nuclear assets,” General Majid said.

'Unfazed' Hersh backs his report on nuke details - Express India

 

[H2O3C4Nitrogen]

If there are some understandings being reached out btw Qashington and PA over the Nuclear assets then why they are not being publicized ...
How ever i dont believe that weather such an understanding is really possible . But you never know wats coming out of pedora's box .

 

[Naradmuni]

"http://thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=25453" says...

"Hersh quoted former President Musharraf, after an interview with him in London recently, saying that his government had held extensive discussions with the Bush Administration after 9/11 attacks, and had given State Department non-proliferation experts insight into the command and control of the Pakistani arsenal and its on-site safety and security procedures.

Musharraf also confirmed that Pakistan had constructed a huge tunnel system for the transport and storage of nuclear weaponry. “The tunnels are so deep that a nuclear attack will not touch them,” Musharraf told me, with obvious pride. The tunnels would make it impossible for the American intelligence community—“Big Uncle,” as a Pakistani nuclear-weapons expert called it — to monitor the movements of nuclear components by satellite."



Maybe in a knee jerk reaction following 9/11, establishment may have ceded to American pressure and revealed some of its nuke secrets. Musharraf acknowledges this. Additionally, the establishment could have been possibly intimidated by the threat of being bombed back to stone ages, that pakistan shared the structure, number and command and control of its N assets to the US. The retired bush regime intel officials may have gone a long to far in revealing such classified business to Mr Hersh here. So it cannot just beignored out of embarressment and rubbished in prejudice.

It cant be denied that in past too pakistan has bowed down to US pressure. First and foremost example being parting ways from taliban that was created by pak and only acknowledged by it and Saudi Arab. Pakistan lost its strategic depth against India, to appease US in WOT which was primarily never a war of pakistan. Visibly, pakistan here acted against its own national interest in the region. And the latest example in this trend being the drone attacks.

My point here is simply that, American pressure works wonder in this part of the world, particularly in pakistan. So I am not surprised if such kind of dealing may have taken place.