New America Foundation National Security Studies Program Policy Paper Managing the Danger from Pakistan’s Nuclear Stockpile Jeffrey Lewis November 2010 Pakistan has a large and growing nuclear arsenal. The United States has provided substantial assistance to improve the security of Pakistan’s arsenal, such that today it is largely safe and secure during peacetime. Pakistan has a large and growing nuclear arsenal. The Moving forward, a sensible agenda for US-Pakistan nuclear United States has provided substantial assistance to security cooperation would focus on defining an end-game improve the security of Pakistan’s arsenal, such that today it for US security assistance to the Pakistani nuclear program, is largely safe and secure during peacetime. The greater respect for Pakistani “red lines’ regarding intrusiveness, danger, however, is Pakistan might place its nuclear forces and a renewed emphasis on building strategic stability in on alert during a crisis with India. Such a move would South Asia. disrupt many carefully designed security procedures and expose Pakistan’s nuclear weapons to much greater risks of Pakistan’s Nuclear Arsenal theft or unauthorized use. We know relatively little about the precise size and Perversely, US security assistance to Pakistan’s nuclear composition of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. Probably the program could exacerbate the very fears that would push best that can be said is that Pakistan has enough fissile Islamabad, in a crisis, to alert its forces. material for a small nuclear arsenal numbering in the hundreds – as opposed to tens or thousands – of nuclear As a result, the United States should take care to ensure weapons. that security assistance does not reinforce Pakistani fears that such assistance is a “Trojan horse” intended to It is an open secret in Washington that the United States compromise the security of Pakistan’s arsenal. Moreover, intelligence community believes that Pakistan’s nuclear Washington should avoid creating the impression that it arsenal is larger than that of India. Open-source estimates cares more about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal usually simply take the size of Pakistan and India’s large – than does Islamabad. and growing – stockpiles of fissile material and divide by the amount of plutonium or highly enriched uranium necessary to make a nuclear weapon. Such a method is Jeffrey Lewis is the Director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. crude – the number of weapons inferred by this method It is important to understand the United States intelligence can vary by a factor of three or four depending on community probably does not know with great confidence assumptions about the production of enriched uranium or precision the number and location of Pakistan’s nuclear and plutonium, as well as how much material is required weapons. And for good reason: Pakistan relies on secrecy for each nuclear device. This almost certainly overstates surrounding the number, status and location of its nuclear the size India’s arsenal. weapons to enhance survivability. Pakistan almost certainly engages in concealment and deception regarding the What it says about Pakistan’s is less clear. Unlike India, number and location of its strategic forces. Pakistan does appear to fabricate most or all of its fissile material into the form of weapons. Estimates of the Pakistan is now dramatically increasing its capabilities to amount of fissile material in each nuclear weapon can vary produce fissile material. In essence, Pakistan has two dramatically, and Pakistan appears to have investigated nuclear weapons programs that exist as bureaucratic rivals significant effort in reducing the amount of fissile material – one centered on the use of enriched uranium (initially needed for each device. By most measures, Pakistan has under the leadership of AQ Khan) and another enough fissile material for a hundred or more nuclear emphasizing the production of plutonium under the weapons. Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission. So, for example, despite commonly cited open source Khan’s enrichment program was first and remains the estimates that Pakistan has approximately 60 deployed larger of the two. Although the size of Pakistan’s centrifuge nuclear warheads 1, other plausible sources suggest Pakistan facility at Kahuta is usually given as 3,000 centrifuges, the could have twice that number. Feroz Khan, a retired facility itself could house more than 10,000 centrifuges. brigadier general from Pakistan’s Strategic Plans Division, Pakistan also continues to improve the performance of the estimated that Pakistan's current arsenal “now contains centrifuges. It is difficult to know how much enriched about 80 to 120 genuine warheads, roughly double the uranium Pakistan is actually producing at Kahuta, but it figure usually cited by outside experts.” 2 appears more than capable of producing enough material for dozens of nuclear weapons a year if Pakistan chose to do so. It is important to understand the United States intelligence community probably does At the same time Pakistan has completed two, and has constructed a third, nuclear reactor near Khushab to not know with great confidence or precision produce plutonium for Pakistan’s nuclear weapons the number and location of Pakistan’s nuclear stockpile. 4 weapons. The size of the third reactor is disputed, but taking into account the range of possibilities for the third reactor, Pakistan’s three reactors are capable of producing enough Khan’s higher estimate should be treated with caution, but plutonium for a dozen weapons per year, possibly many it is plausible in light of Pakistan’s inventory of nuclear- more. capable aircraft and ballistic missiles, which would suggest a force of roughly one hundred warheads. 3 Whether this augers a significant increase in the size of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal is anyone’s guess, but this much new america foundation – counterterrorism.newamerica.net page 2 is clear: There is a nuclear arms race in South Asia, and Training: The Departments of State and Energy developed Pakistan is winning it. a training program that is modeled on US-Russia Cooperative Threat Reduction Program. 8 Sandia National U.S. Nuclear Security Assistance to Pakistan Since Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico conducts the 2001 majority of such training. Since 2001, Sandia has trained approximately 200 Pakistanis, who, in turn, return to Following the terrorist attacks on New York and Pakistan and train local personnel. According to some Washington on September 11, 2001, the United States reports, Sandia is also assisting Pakistan in standing up a undertook a significant program to assist Pakistan in training facility in Pakistan, probably similar to the CTR improving the safety and security of its nuclear arsenal program’s joint Security Assessment Training Center against theft or terrorism. (SATC) at Sergiev Posad, Russia. 9 However, the Pakistani center is not yet operational. US training also helped Although US law and Pakistani sensitivities constrain the Pakistan to develop a personnel reliability program (PRP) scope of this cooperation, the United States has provided similar to the one the United States uses for persons with approximately $100 million to Pakistan in the form of duties associated with nuclear weapons and critical 5 training and equipment. Overall, the classified program of components. It seems like that Sandia provided assistance US nuclear security assistance to Pakistan accounts for similar to that provided through the SATC to Russia in the about one percent of the total US assistance to Pakistan late 1990s. 10 over the same period. Public descriptions of this effort are fragmentary and, on Although US law and Pakistani sensitivities occasional sensationalistic, but the broad outlines of the US constrain the scope of this cooperation, the effort since 2001 is clear. U.S. assistance to Pakistan largely takes the form of security equipment and training of United States has provided approximately personnel – what is often called guns, guards and gates. $100 million to Pakistan in the form of Equipment :::::: Some of the U.S. assistance takes the form of training and equipment. equipment to improve the physical security of sites, including intrusion detectors, portal monitors, and material-accounting equipment. The Strategic Plans Pakistan does not provide the United States direct access to Division (SPD) is reportedly the end-user for US-supplied either the actual sites in Pakistan or personnel who work in 11 equipment, meaning that the United States does not know them. the ultimate destination of equipment provided under this program. 6 Many press reports also mention equipment The United States did not provide Pakistan with so-called such as night-vision goggles and helicopters that the United “permissive actions links” or other technical safeguards that States provides openly. 7 It is unclear whether the would be integrated into the warheads. The reasons for approximately $100 million figure cited in press reports withholding such assistance are numerous. Some accounts includes material that has provided openly, or only material suggest that the Bush Administration concluded that such for which the SPD is the end-user. assistance would violate US obligations under the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty , as well as the 1954 Atomic Energy Act . 12 Although the legal restrictions appear daunting, willful Administrations have successfully evaded new america