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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 world has entered a second nuclear age. For the first time since the end of the Cold War, the threat of nuclear annihilation is on the rise. Should such an assault occur, there is a strong likelihood that the trail of devastation will lead back to Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani father of the Islamic bomb and the mastermind behind a vast clandestine enterprise that has sold nuclear secrets to Iran, North Korea, and Libya. Khan's loose-knit organization was and still may be a nuclear Wal-Mart, selling weapons blueprints, parts, and the expertise to assemble the works into a do-it-yourself bomb kit. Amazingly, American authorities could have halted his operation, but they chose instead to watch and wait. Khan proved that the international safeguards the world relied on no longer worked.
Journalists Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins tell this alarming tale of international intrigue through the eyes of the European and American officials who suspected Khan, tracked him, and ultimately shut him down, but only after the nuclear genie was long out of the bottle.
Journalists Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins tell this alarming tale of international intrigue through the eyes of the European and American officials who suspected Khan, tracked him, and ultimately shut him down, but only after the nuclear genie was long out of the bottle.
432 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews
January 6, 2015
Brilliantly written but quite detailed and anecdotal so the reader does seem to get lost towards the end ... It's worth a read despite this because it's factual. Sent chills up my spine when I read something that was true about nuclear proliferation and AQ Khan's role in it. Chilling.
April 2, 2008
This is a great book for someone looking for an interesting read that still teaches you something about global nuclear non-proliferation efforts. There is a good description of how nuclear weapons are made and how that technology is developed (although intermediate level detail is left out, which is probably not what most people picking up this book are interested in anyway). Key historical events are identified that led to dangerous distribution of nuclear technologies give the book a nice historical context. One slight problem I have is that the title and some parts of the book try to attribute Khan's driving force to his hatred for Western civilization, while it appears that his greed for wealth and power were more integral.
April 7, 2008
Good book with a troubling storyline. The authors let their bias come in late, and actually undermined the book somewhat with some rather poorly executed logic (i.e. the IAEA, which they show to be completely inept throughout the book is, in their opinion the only hope to counter nuclear proliferation)
Other than that, it was a well researched and fascinating look at the how secrets are stolen and shared in this dangerous field.
Other than that, it was a well researched and fascinating look at the how secrets are stolen and shared in this dangerous field.
August 31, 2021
The initial chapters of the book feel like you are watching an action packed fast paced mystery movie. The books goes into elaborate historical details of how events may have evolved on the world stage.
Towards the end though, i felt the books dragged on a bit with details not pertinent to the main story.
Nevertheless, absolutely worth a read for those interested in geo-political historical events in the recent past.
Towards the end though, i felt the books dragged on a bit with details not pertinent to the main story.
Nevertheless, absolutely worth a read for those interested in geo-political historical events in the recent past.
June 10, 2017
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.
* 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.
April 9, 2011
Quests and Ambitions: Non-Proliferation Gone Wrong
"When you get down to fundamentals-things like nuclear weapons-you must treat your friends and enemies the same. Only then can you have a nonproliferation policy." -Leonard Weiss
It's difficult to know who is most responsible for the world's first so-called ‘Islamic’ bomb. Being that the warheads actually reside in Pakistan, the Pakistani’s might be the obvious choice, but as Doug Frantz and Catherine Collins, authors of The Nuclear Jihadist, make clear, it's anything but clear.
Beginning in 1972, Pakistan devoted massive amounts of resources to developing a nuclear weapons program. As other nuclear aspirants have done, Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto initially pursued two parallel tracks, one based on using plutonium from spent fuel sources and the other based on the process of enriching uranium. The best Pakistani nuclear scientists from around the world were invited back to join the patriotic effort. Initially absent from the group was AQ Khan, a little known Pakistani scientist working for a subsidiary of the Dutch nuclear technologies firm Urenco. In the end, his story would not only be at the center of Pakistan's quest to assemble an atomic arsenal, but also at the center of an international proliferation ring whose scope and complexity has still not been completely sorted out.
Khan and his fellow scientists alone could not have built the Pakistani nuclear program from scratch. In the early 1970's Pakistan had very little industrial infrastructure and few skilled workers, let alone the ability to design and fabricate an indigenous nuclear program. Instead, it would have to be bought and stolen. Khan, a strident nationalist owing to his family's departure from India after partition, was a willing agent. A junior level scientist needing credentials to prove his commitment, he soon began to exploit the lax security controls at Urenco. During his three year tenure with the firm, he stole numerous designs for the latest centrifuge technology being produced in Europe at the time. When BVD, the Dutch intelligence agency, and the CIA became aware of the security breach, Khan quickly returned to Pakistan and began work on producing the highly enriched uranium that could lead to a nuclear weapons program.
Through the network of suppliers that he had worked with in Europe, Khan and Pakistan went on a buying spree of epic proportions. While Frantz and Collins do not attempt to calculate precise numbers, it's likely that the program amounted to a significant percentage of Pakistan's GDP throughout the early 1980s. Among the goods purchased were detailed plans for a Chinese nuclear warhead, North Korean missile technology, and the latest high tech machinery from Western Europe and North America. The authors specifically singled out the ineffective regulatory controls in Germany and Switzerland, as both countries sought to increase their share of high tech exports on the global market. In some cases authorities were able to curtail and stop this burgeoning trade, but in just as many cases, dual-use technology supplied by both legitimate and front companies, provided critical components for the Pakistani program. In the end, it would take Pakistan 15 years to go from zero to nuclear, an alarmingly small amount of time.
The blame can't be entirely assigned to business interests looking for lucrative profits in a black or gray market. A good portion of the book tells the story of the divide between the politics of counter-proliferation and the politics of intelligence gathering, with the latter generally holding sway. While there is little treatment of non-Western intelligence, it was very clear that the CIA and MI6, from a very early stage, knew of Khan's activities and the Pakistani procurement efforts. Despite a concerted effort on the part of the U.S. Congress to sanction those states with aspirations to join the nuclear club, the executive branch and its short term strategic imperatives (most prominently fighting a covert proxy war against the Soviets in Afghanistan) consistently won out.
On its face, a political realist could rationalize that a nuclear armed Pakistan was a small price to pay for stalling the Soviets in Afghanistan and keeping a manageable ally in a part of the world where US efforts have not always gone according to plans. But the next turn in the AQ Khan story makes clear that there is a lot more to add to the equation. Once Pakistan had its own nuclear deterrent, Khan undertook a mission to spread nuclear technology to any and all willing buyers on the black market. While the book's title would suggest there was an underlying ideological motivation, namely radical Islam, the evidence seems to be thin. Indeed, Khan may have become more devout with age and from dealing with impediments laid in place by Western governments, but in the end personal enrichment, an obsession with power, and political ambition seems to have been behind his supplying centrifuge technology and weapons plans to diverse countries like North Korea, Iraq, Libya, and Iran.
Frantz and Collins have done a great job of weaving together many elements in a complex story. Written in the tone of a journalistic expose, they introduced a number of tangential players whose stories, though only loosely related, were just as intriguing as the larger narrative. I was disappointed at the lack of better citations and sourcing. More detailed sources are promised in the text, but the link where readers are sent for a more detailed bibliography does not seem to be running nearly ten months after the book's initial publication. Those minor flaws aside, this would be an excellent book worth reading for any student of international politics, espionage, and how diplomacy really works. © Jeffrey L. Otto September 9, 2008
"When you get down to fundamentals-things like nuclear weapons-you must treat your friends and enemies the same. Only then can you have a nonproliferation policy." -Leonard Weiss
It's difficult to know who is most responsible for the world's first so-called ‘Islamic’ bomb. Being that the warheads actually reside in Pakistan, the Pakistani’s might be the obvious choice, but as Doug Frantz and Catherine Collins, authors of The Nuclear Jihadist, make clear, it's anything but clear.
Beginning in 1972, Pakistan devoted massive amounts of resources to developing a nuclear weapons program. As other nuclear aspirants have done, Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto initially pursued two parallel tracks, one based on using plutonium from spent fuel sources and the other based on the process of enriching uranium. The best Pakistani nuclear scientists from around the world were invited back to join the patriotic effort. Initially absent from the group was AQ Khan, a little known Pakistani scientist working for a subsidiary of the Dutch nuclear technologies firm Urenco. In the end, his story would not only be at the center of Pakistan's quest to assemble an atomic arsenal, but also at the center of an international proliferation ring whose scope and complexity has still not been completely sorted out.
Khan and his fellow scientists alone could not have built the Pakistani nuclear program from scratch. In the early 1970's Pakistan had very little industrial infrastructure and few skilled workers, let alone the ability to design and fabricate an indigenous nuclear program. Instead, it would have to be bought and stolen. Khan, a strident nationalist owing to his family's departure from India after partition, was a willing agent. A junior level scientist needing credentials to prove his commitment, he soon began to exploit the lax security controls at Urenco. During his three year tenure with the firm, he stole numerous designs for the latest centrifuge technology being produced in Europe at the time. When BVD, the Dutch intelligence agency, and the CIA became aware of the security breach, Khan quickly returned to Pakistan and began work on producing the highly enriched uranium that could lead to a nuclear weapons program.
Through the network of suppliers that he had worked with in Europe, Khan and Pakistan went on a buying spree of epic proportions. While Frantz and Collins do not attempt to calculate precise numbers, it's likely that the program amounted to a significant percentage of Pakistan's GDP throughout the early 1980s. Among the goods purchased were detailed plans for a Chinese nuclear warhead, North Korean missile technology, and the latest high tech machinery from Western Europe and North America. The authors specifically singled out the ineffective regulatory controls in Germany and Switzerland, as both countries sought to increase their share of high tech exports on the global market. In some cases authorities were able to curtail and stop this burgeoning trade, but in just as many cases, dual-use technology supplied by both legitimate and front companies, provided critical components for the Pakistani program. In the end, it would take Pakistan 15 years to go from zero to nuclear, an alarmingly small amount of time.
The blame can't be entirely assigned to business interests looking for lucrative profits in a black or gray market. A good portion of the book tells the story of the divide between the politics of counter-proliferation and the politics of intelligence gathering, with the latter generally holding sway. While there is little treatment of non-Western intelligence, it was very clear that the CIA and MI6, from a very early stage, knew of Khan's activities and the Pakistani procurement efforts. Despite a concerted effort on the part of the U.S. Congress to sanction those states with aspirations to join the nuclear club, the executive branch and its short term strategic imperatives (most prominently fighting a covert proxy war against the Soviets in Afghanistan) consistently won out.
On its face, a political realist could rationalize that a nuclear armed Pakistan was a small price to pay for stalling the Soviets in Afghanistan and keeping a manageable ally in a part of the world where US efforts have not always gone according to plans. But the next turn in the AQ Khan story makes clear that there is a lot more to add to the equation. Once Pakistan had its own nuclear deterrent, Khan undertook a mission to spread nuclear technology to any and all willing buyers on the black market. While the book's title would suggest there was an underlying ideological motivation, namely radical Islam, the evidence seems to be thin. Indeed, Khan may have become more devout with age and from dealing with impediments laid in place by Western governments, but in the end personal enrichment, an obsession with power, and political ambition seems to have been behind his supplying centrifuge technology and weapons plans to diverse countries like North Korea, Iraq, Libya, and Iran.
Frantz and Collins have done a great job of weaving together many elements in a complex story. Written in the tone of a journalistic expose, they introduced a number of tangential players whose stories, though only loosely related, were just as intriguing as the larger narrative. I was disappointed at the lack of better citations and sourcing. More detailed sources are promised in the text, but the link where readers are sent for a more detailed bibliography does not seem to be running nearly ten months after the book's initial publication. Those minor flaws aside, this would be an excellent book worth reading for any student of international politics, espionage, and how diplomacy really works. © Jeffrey L. Otto September 9, 2008
September 22, 2018
It gives detailed account of nuclear proliferation and work of rogue scientist. It takes you through rise and fall of black market empire build by Khan which has larger significance in present and future power equation. Its mind boggling and sometimes feels like work of fiction. Only to be true, i suggest this book to give yourself background on topic.
January 30, 2019
A terrifying account of a man who proliferated nuclear weapons to the highest bidders. It is an eye-opening account of how close some nations came to completing their nuclear program.
June 4, 2022
Good and important content, but after the halfway point, becomes less compelling. Still worth the read, but could have been done better
August 21, 2025
Very good and extremely detailed however took me months to finish as couldnt take in too much at once!
November 2, 2024
All in all good book so far as the story is concerned, however the pace was pretty fast at the inception and kind of becomes jumbled up in the middle. It felt little more elaborative in the end however, if that's what was the aim of the writers then its fairly executed. Must read for people who have interest in the subject and would like to expand their knowledge.
December 31, 2007
An incredibly pertinent look into horizontal nuclear proliferation and the amount of damage that just one renegade nuclear scientist can cause. Frantz and Collins offer an in-depth look at how Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan (often referred to as the "Father of the Islamic Bomb") managed to spread nuclear technology to Libya, North Korea, and Iran. As they point out, these are the three countries that we actually know about, and after taking into account the extremely secret nature of Pakistan's own development of the bomb alongside the network Khan later used to arrange nuclear deals around the globe, the number of countries that he influenced could be more.
Nuclear proliferation, once thought of as individual governments building up their arms in efforts to both deter and intimidate rival countries (i.e. the arms buildup between the U.S. and the USSR during the Cold War), has taken an increasingly secretive and dangerous turn. The authors do an incredible job demonstrating the dangers posed by just one scientist who operated outside the limits of government control. While The Nuclear Jihadist will most likely be found in the Politics section of the bookstore, it could easily be moved to the Horror shelves of the same bookstore as it demonstrates just how irrelevant "international law" has been in the fight to stop nuclear proliferation.
After the smoke had cleared from September 11th, administration officials trumpeted the threat that "terrorists with weapons of mass destruction" posed national and worldwide stability. One of the infamous justifications for the US-led invasion of Iraq was because Saddam Hussein supposedly had these weapons at his disposal. Given the context of the current geopolitical climate, Frantz and Collins' The Nuclear Jihadist will certainly raise some hairs on the back of your neck.
Nuclear proliferation, once thought of as individual governments building up their arms in efforts to both deter and intimidate rival countries (i.e. the arms buildup between the U.S. and the USSR during the Cold War), has taken an increasingly secretive and dangerous turn. The authors do an incredible job demonstrating the dangers posed by just one scientist who operated outside the limits of government control. While The Nuclear Jihadist will most likely be found in the Politics section of the bookstore, it could easily be moved to the Horror shelves of the same bookstore as it demonstrates just how irrelevant "international law" has been in the fight to stop nuclear proliferation.
After the smoke had cleared from September 11th, administration officials trumpeted the threat that "terrorists with weapons of mass destruction" posed national and worldwide stability. One of the infamous justifications for the US-led invasion of Iraq was because Saddam Hussein supposedly had these weapons at his disposal. Given the context of the current geopolitical climate, Frantz and Collins' The Nuclear Jihadist will certainly raise some hairs on the back of your neck.
August 15, 2015
This is the story of one man deadly legacy that spread around the world, how he manage to get away with it for so long and how nuclear seeds he plant could explode anytime, anywhere.
There is no secret about this. Pakistan's nuclear program is based on borrowing, stealing, smuggling, and American money.....Khan;s bomb was for a nation and its military scatter by the humiliation of 1971 war by its hated neighbor and worse enemy.
This book go to all extend narrating the level of ignorance shown by CIA which was aware of what s happening in Kahuta Nuclear Facility yet CIA told the World year after year that Pakistan is not making any bomb.
There is no secret about this. Pakistan's nuclear program is based on borrowing, stealing, smuggling, and American money.....Khan;s bomb was for a nation and its military scatter by the humiliation of 1971 war by its hated neighbor and worse enemy.
This book go to all extend narrating the level of ignorance shown by CIA which was aware of what s happening in Kahuta Nuclear Facility yet CIA told the World year after year that Pakistan is not making any bomb.
January 21, 2015
The inside story of nuclear assets falling in hands of terrorists or their aka is there to be found in great details in this work.
Simply pick it up to know the inside story of this murky world, where many roam around; where there are sellers of nuclear secrets; where the buyers are willing to cough millions of dollar.
World has never been a safe heaven, though continue to be a safe planet for some years. Pick this work to know inside out!
Simply pick it up to know the inside story of this murky world, where many roam around; where there are sellers of nuclear secrets; where the buyers are willing to cough millions of dollar.
World has never been a safe heaven, though continue to be a safe planet for some years. Pick this work to know inside out!
April 14, 2008
Great book. If you know anything about current world politics, the end won't be a shocker really, but it's incredibly suspenseful. It reads like a real life James Bond novel, except the villains win at the end. Some of the more technical aspects get a little laborious to read, but these are not very long. Highly recommended.
September 13, 2016
A frightening account of how the nuclear weapon was let loose on the world by a mix of patriotism/ greed/ incompetence/ realpolitik/ hypocrisy - of the main protaganist, his network around the world, the intelligence and enforcement agencies, and the international state actors. The consequences are far reaching and we have still yet to see the inevitable conclusion. Chilling.
January 2, 2015
Fascinating, incredibly detailed and researched and a topic that every one should be educated on. Certainly adds new light to our modern nuclear world and the decisions and consequences of strategic policy.
My only complaint was the constant repetition and the feeling that after the first two hundred pages, I had heard it all before. Still, a crucial addition to our history books.
My only complaint was the constant repetition and the feeling that after the first two hundred pages, I had heard it all before. Still, a crucial addition to our history books.
May 8, 2014
If you want to be incredibly frustrated, read this book. Not because the book is bad but because we could be living in a much safer world with almost no nuclear proliferation if it hadn't been for vast amounts of greed and questionable political decisions in the US and Europe. Great explanation of how we got to where we are today regarding nuclear proliferation.
Read
January 3, 2008Good and comprehensive book on A.Q. Khan's nuclear proliferation. Critical of US policy towards Pakistan, of Pakistan itself, and, of course, paints Khan in an unflattering light.
Reads like a detective novel from time to time.
Reads like a detective novel from time to time.
August 27, 2016
This book is an insite to the horse trading that our government does with our security. It also points out how easily government secrets can be aquired by anyone with the will and money to build a nuclear wepon can get it done.
September 13, 2008
This book tells the story of A.Q. Khan, his proliferation network, and Western attempts to stop him. The book is well-written and interesting, and I have found it to be the most interesting book on the subject to date.
June 27, 2015
An interesting book detailing how A.Q. Khan stole nuclear technology and spread it around the world. Topical right now as the book details how he spread it to countries like North Korea and Iran, and also has describes the complexity of the U.S. - Pakistan relationship.
March 22, 2013
Not for the weak of heart. It spells out very clearly the facts surrounding just who, what, where and why every country that should NOT have nuclear capability HAS in fact the ability to blow up the world. This was a very eye opening book that will stay with me forever.
August 3, 2013
Interesting insight into nuclear proliferation and A Q Khan's role. One wonders the unintended consequences that started this whole journey. What would have happened if only India did not go nuclear, Khan did not have grudge against India, US did not initiate the atoms for peace program etc etc....
June 2, 2015
Could've been a great book, but it wasn't. The author frequently goes on diatribes and inserts WAY too much of his own political idealogy. 4 or 5 stars if the author could have stuck to telling the story. Portrays the IAEA as competent, yet all evidence (in the book) to the contrary. Meh
February 12, 2009
well-researched and completely scary. excellent investigative reporting. Highly recommended, but warning: this is an intense, political read.
March 10, 2010
A bit drab by the end of it.
Currently reading
June 9, 2009We are in deeeeeeeep doo doo.
September 10, 2009
A Q Khan and the pakistan nuclear programmer and how they helped the iran jordan north korea to get the nuclear knowledge ...
Nice piece of collection
Nice piece of collection
April 15, 2012
Yeah, turns out I already read this. Thought maybe. It apparently made an impact in that I didn't remember the book, but I remembered every detail of what it recapped.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews