Former CIA Officer Reveals US Knew Pakistan’s F-16s Were Nuclear-Capable But Continued Arms Supply

He defined that regardless of the CIA’s unease, elected officers determined to push ahead with arms deliveries for geopolitical causes. “All we will do is current the intelligence to the elected leaders… what they select to do after that isn’t our place,” Barlow famous.

Seymour Hersh’s 1993 report in The New Yorker corroborated these considerations, documenting how US satellites detected Pakistan shifting nuclear weapons to airbases the place F-16s have been stationed. These findings contradicted US authorities certifications on the time.

The 1987 Brasstacks Disaster

The episode coincided with one among South Asia’s most harmful nuclear standoffs. Throughout India’s large navy train, Operation Brasstacks (1986–87), Pakistan perceived the manoeuvre as an invasion rehearsal. Barlow recounted that in this disaster, Islamabad had already efficiently assembled nuclear weapons. Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan even confirmed as a lot in a 1987 media interview, stating that the bomb existed as a deterrent in opposition to India.

Barlow insisted that the intelligence neighborhood noticed the motion of nuclear weapons and supply platforms throughout that interval. “The nuclear weapons that Pakistan was mentioned to not possess have been being mated with F-16s,” he added.

The 1990 Nuclear Disaster

US authorities finally halted the certification course of in 1990 after Soviet forces withdrew from Afghanistan. By then, Washington’s strategic priorities had modified, and officers may not deny Islamabad’s nuclear standing. President George H. W. Bush dispatched Defence Secretary Robert Gates to defuse the rising pressure between India and Pakistan, which Barlow termed “probably the most harmful disaster because the Cuban missile disaster.”

Evaluating that standoff to latest tensions throughout Operation Sindoor, he remarked that the 1990 state of affairs was much more risky resulting from weak command and management methods and the restricted variety of warheads, rising the chance of miscalculation.

Barlow additionally mentioned that on the time, US intelligence assessments discovered that the Pakistani Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, had little management over the nuclear programme, which was dominated by the navy management beneath Basic Mirza Aslam Beg and President Ghulam Ishaq Khan.

Coverage Deception And Suppression

Barlow claimed that in his tenure on the CIA and later the Pentagon, he found senior officers in each the State Division and the CIA had misled Congress about Pakistan’s nuclear procurement actions. When he refused to change his assessments to downplay Islamabad’s progress or soften the findings in his stories to the Nationwide Safety Council, he confronted retaliation, the suspension of his safety clearance, and finally termination.

He revealed that his Pentagon superior, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defence Edward Gnehm (nicknamed “Skip”), had tasked him with compiling a complete evaluate of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme, together with its supply capabilities and aerospace diversifications for the F-16s. Nonetheless, regional officers tried to strain him into revising his findings. “They needed me to vary my report, however my evaluation was in step with the CIA’s conclusions,” he acknowledged.

Fallout And Aftermath

Within the aftermath of his whistleblowing, Barlow’s allegations have been later investigated and deemed credible by the State Division’s Inspector Basic. His case symbolised institutional efforts to suppress intelligence that contradicted Washington’s international coverage pursuits throughout the Chilly Struggle.

Reflecting on that interval, Barlow mentioned that the deception continued even after the Soviet withdrawal as a result of vested pursuits have been reluctant to terminate assist and navy collaboration with Pakistan. “There have been nonetheless folks within the US authorities who needed to certify beneath the Pressler Modification, even after nuclear weapons had been fielded. They have been having collective panic as a result of they knew the help would finish,” he recalled.

Barlow concluded that whereas Pakistan has since developed extra superior supply methods and expanded its arsenal, the sooner a long time have been far riskier. The absence of sturdy nuclear command constructions and the secrecy enveloping the arsenal made the Nineteen Eighties and early Nineteen Nineties probably the most precarious eras for South Asian nuclear stability.

Based mostly On ANI Report