May 17, 2010Foreign Affairsmissilesnuclear proliferationnuclear weaponsPakistanPersian GulfSaudi ArabiaSecurity

Saudi Arabia’s nuclear arsenal-on-demand

Just say the word

This is an archived blog post from The Acorn.

That Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have a secret nuclear deal is not exactly a secret. But the Guardians Julian Borger has some details:

According to western intelligence sources (the meeting was under Chatham House rules so I am not allowed to be more specific) the Saudi monarchy paid for up to 60% of the Pakistani nuclear programme, and in return has the option to buy a small nuclear arsenal (’five to six warheads) off the shelf if things got tough in the neighbourhood. [Guardian Blogs]

That’s still very fuzzy, but better than what was previously known to the public. In any case, the Pakistanis are unlikely to refuse if Saudi Arabia were to increase the size of the order.

While on the topic, do see Sean O’Connor’s very good open source intelligence analysis of Saudi Arabia’s ballistic missile force.



If you would like to share or comment on this, please discuss it on my GitHub Previous
Vijay Dinanath Chauhan and the Realist Perspective
Next
Those masterly Persians

© Copyright 2003-2024. Nitin Pai. All Rights Reserved.