US fear of terrorists grabbing Pak nukes overlooks bigger threat of nuclear war with India

Washington, Mar 9(ANI): The United States' anticipation that terrorists may acquire nuclear weaponry from Pakistan overlooks the greater threat of a nuclear conflict with India, the panelists of the event "Nuclear Security in Pakistan: Issues and Implications" have said.

"The point that all three panelists expressed was simple but important: U.S. fears of terrorists acquiring a nuclear weapon from Pakistan, while valid, overlook the greater threat of a nuclear conflict with India," J. Dana Stuster, an intern at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), wrote in Foreign Policy.

"The fuse to ignite a war has been lit before-at Kargil in 1999, after the attack on the Indian Parliament in 2001, and most recently, after the Mumbai attacks in 2008 -- but a nuclear exchange has been prevented each time. With each of these incidents, though, the fuse has been cut shorter," he added.

Stuster pointed out the possibility that a Pakistan-based militant group with ties to the nation's premier spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence could launch 'another' terror attack on India.

"The greatest risk for nuclear war in our time is the scenario in which a Pakistan-based terror group with ties to Inter-Services Intelligence launches another attack on India ("another Mumbai" is the catchphrase, but it won't necessarily have to be of that scale or spectacle and is widely considered a matter of when, not if) and this touches off a sequence of escalation that results in a nuclear strike and response," he said.

The bad news is that Pakistan's nuclear program is expanding, and the country is set to become the fourth largest nuclear power- it is developing smaller, more mobile bombs, and building more nuclear reactors to churn out bulk supplies of weapons-grade uranium, said Stuster.

Though the bombs are under the purview of the military, the most stable and competent institution in the country, and are guarded by thousands of troops being watched by a meticulous internal affairs bureau to screen out extremists, it "might be sufficient if Pakistan were not one of the most threatening and most threatened countries in the world," he added.tuster noted that infiltration remains the greatest tactical threat to Pakistan's nuclear security.

"There will always be a way to slip through a screening process-in 2009, members of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan attacked the Pakistani Army headquarters in military uniforms carrying forged IDs, and previously at least two men affiliated with al Qaeda infiltrated then President Pervez Musharraf's security detail and attempted to assassinate him," he added. (ANI)