Pakistan's Pathway to the Bomb

Ambitions, Politics, and Rivalries

De: Mansoor Ahmed

Narrado por: Tom Perkins

Pakistan's pathway to developing nuclear weapons remains shrouded in mystery and surrounded by misconceptions. While it is no secret why Pakistan became a nuclear power, how Pakistan became a nuclear state has been obscured by mythmaking.

In Pakistan's Pathway to the Bomb, Mansoor Ahmed offers a revisionist history of Pakistan's nuclear program and the bureaucratic politics that shaped its development from its inception in 1956 until the 1998 nuclear tests. Drawing on elite interviews and previously untapped primary sources, Ahmed offers a fresh assessment of the actual and perceived roles and contributions of the scientists and engineers who led the nuclear program. He shows how personal ambitions and politics within Pakistan's strategic enclave generated inter-laboratory competition in the nuclear establishment, which determined nuclear choices for the country for more than two decades. It also produced unexpected consequences such as illicit proliferation to other countries largely outside of the Pakistani state's control.

As Pakistan's nuclear deterrent program continues to grow, Pakistan's Pathway to the Bomb provides fresh insights into how this nuclear power has evolved in the past and where it stands today.

©2022 Georgetown University Press (P)2022 Kalorama

Hard listen

Struggling to finish. Gave up. Not as interesting as expected. Writing could’ve been made more intriguing. A bit academic.

Good Investigation.

Provides a good historical background on development of the entire program. Presents a case for Pak nukes being indigenous rather then stolen from URENCO, but at the same time the author is critical of Dr. Khan.