Review: The Nuclear Jihadist: The True Story of the Man Who Sold the World's Most Dangerous Secrets...And How We Could Have Stopped Him

The Nuclear Jihadist: The True Story of the Man Who Sold the World's Most Dangerous Secrets...And How We Could Have Stopped Him by Douglas Frantz
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This a fascinating look at the career of A. Q. Khan, the Pakistani father of "the Islamic bomb" (uranium a-bomb) and the mastermind behind a vast clandestine enterprise that proliferated nuclear capabilities to North Korea, Libya, Iran, etc. This very detailed study of Khan's network includes


suggests ways it could have been prevented or stopped by a more vigilant West
Trust and lax controls in Holland allowed Khan's career as an engineer to veer into the clandestine
India going nuclear and Israel not being stopped from going nuclear was the justification Pakistan required
How far South Africa went, including several actual nukes, as part of the corruption possible of the Eisenhower-era U.S.-sanctioned Atoms for Peace program
How little progress and even hope Libya had of pulling off nuclear capability even after spending $80M with Khan's network
How Reagan's desire for Pakistani support in derailing the USSR in Afghanistan seemed to begin his lying to Congress in order to pull ahead in the Cold War with a Pakistan going nuclear while receiving extensive U.S. aid perhaps an inevitable result of that set of priorities.


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