Expanding the nuclear arsenal

Pakistan's nuclear programme has been under attack right from its inception. The decade of seventies saw conspiracy theories of Pakistan's acquisition of nuclear technology clandestinely. The decades of 80s and 90s saw an orchestrated campaign to malign its programme. After being forced to cross the nuclear threshold in May 1998, Pakistan established its Nuclear Command Authority three years before India; put in place, its Strategic Plans Division (SPD) to perform functions relating to planning, coordination, and establishment of a reliable command, control, communication, and intelligence network; yet Pakistan faces a concerted campaign to instil fears regarding the security of its nuclear assets. Frederick Kagan, former West Point military historian, who devised the Bush administration's Iraq troop surge, called for the White House to consider various options for an unstable Pakistan, including the US to consider sending elite troops to Pakistan to seize its nuclear weapons if the country descends into chaos.
The Washington Post carried a detailed report on war-games to take out Pakistan's nukes. Bruce Riedel, former CIA officer, senior advisor to three US presidents including President Obama on Middle East and South Asian issues came up with an Op-Ed Pakistan and the bomb: How the US can divert a crisis in WSJ (May 30, 09) based on half truths, conjectures and apparent twisting of facts in pursuit of an agenda. It has been refuted by various analysts including this scribe so let it rest at that though because of Mr Bruce Riedel's position in the US government, it may be construed that his views are reflective of the Obama administration.
Earlier, the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS)'s David Albright's presented sleuth-work: 'Update on Khushab Plutonium Production Reactor Construction Projects in Pakistan' and ISIS report implying "the Pakistani nuclear programme is outta control." In the former he provides "evidence" of a second Plutonium reactor at Khushab and in the latter, commercial satellite images "revealing a major expansion of a chemical plant complex near Dera Ghazi Khan that produces uranium hexafluoride and uranium metal, materials used to produce nuclear weapons." Independent US analyst Peter Lee has already retorted to it through 'The world doesn't have a Pakistan nukes problem ... it has a David Albright problem'; quoting Scott Ritter's "devastating rip job on Albright" in "Truthdig" titled The Nuclear Expert Who Never Was. Characterising Albright as a dilettante wannabe nuclear weapons guy, who has self-promoted himself, his honorary doctorate, and his institute (ISIS) using the flimsiest of pretexts. Ritter identifies Albright's key credential as "a willingness to offer up uninformed and tendentious alarmism when the situation demands it." I rest my case!