Dealing With Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons During the Afghanistan Withdrawal

Now that President Obama has decided to end the surge in Afghanistan by late next year, and to bring the troops home by 2014, a clear vision about the American military presence in the region has begun to emerge. Yet paradoxically, the most stunning success of our operations in the region – the killing of Osama bin Laden – has exposed an even more serious potential menace: the insecurity of Pakistan’s nuclear program.


This insecurity, starkly illustrated by this morning’s Washington Post expose on A.Q. Khan’s transfer of nuclear technology to North Korea in the late 1990’s, makes it essential for the United States to have an effective strategy for pulling our troops out of Afghanistan that simultaneously prevents an increase nuclear insecurity in South and Central Asia.

This is going to be a steep challenge, as many of the underlying sources of conflict and tension in South and Central Asia will remain after an American withdrawal. In a region that has deep experience on nuclear matters — with nuclear aspirant Iran bordering Afghanistan on one side and nuclear-armed Pakistan and India on the other — the United States must take all of these complexities into account.

Specifically, the United States must take care to leave stable systems and relationships in place during the Afghanistan drawdown; failure to do so could exacerbate historic regional tensions and potentially create new national security risks. Full article >>>

Location: Islamabad