Pak Red Button (update) (update)

This is getting more interesting than the Christmas for me. I have updated the original stuff about the Pakistan Nuclear arsenal; and who is in charge of it. Now there is a bit more to it than that. I say, I am getting the hang of this now to put back links and all.

Last month when I was fingering about it in me blog, it came out of Washington Post article. But when it was published New York Times has said that they (NYT)knew about the US helping Pak Government AKA Musharaff, for atleast 3 years. Then it comes out that US for the last 6 years has been spending almost $100 million for equipment and training, for the security of Nuclear Arsenal in Pakistan. Well the article is good and comes out with things like how much security US has in its own nuclear arsenal.

"Zero locks

A concern about nuclear weapons security in Pakistan is that Islamists in the military may seize control of the weapons and try to use them. Pakistan claims to have followed the US example and installed coded combination-lock switches, known as Permissive Action Links, on its weapons.

Since the 1960s, most US nuclear weapons are supposed to have been protected against unauthorized use by coded combination-lock switches that could only be activated by someone who knew that proper sequence of characters. These switches were introduced in 1962 by Robert McNamara when he was secretary of defense to ensure control over the use of US nuclear weapons.

According to Bruce Blair, a former missile launch control officer, Strategic Air Command, which was responsible for the nuclear-armed missiles and bombers, installed the switches but set the combinations of all the locks to a string of zeros. The codes for launching US nuclear missiles apparently stayed set at 00000000 until the late 1970s. The reason? Strategic Air Command did not want there to be any problems or delays in launching the nuclear missiles caused by a more complex set of numbers.

McNamara apparently did not know that the locks he had ordered to be installed on nuclear weapons were largely worthless, and that the military with direct control of the weapons were evading official instructions for securing nuclear missiles. He only learned of this from Blair in January 2004. McNamara was outraged. But, as Blair observed, this is but "one of a long litany of items pointing to the ignorance of presidents and defense secretaries and other nuclear security officials about the true state of nuclear affairs". "

Further proof of the US military in Pakistan soil can be found here.

"Musharraf has allowed for a contingent of US Special Forces said to be several hundred strong to begin operating in Pakistan, where they are to take the leading role in efforts to stamp out support within Pakistan for those fighting against the US occupation regime in Afghanistan."
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