The "dangerous person" in the eyes of the West, the "savior" in the heart of Pakistani, he is gone

To this mixed-ranking figure, pakistani media wrote: "Thank you, Pakistan's savior." ”

In 1999, then-President of Pakistan, Mohammed Rafik Talal, wore Pakistan's Highest Citizen Medal for Qadir Khan

He led the manufacture of Pakistan's first nuclear weapon, but was placed under house arrest for five years on charges of smuggling nuclear technology, namely Abdul Qadir-Khan, Pakistan's "father of the atomic bomb.". On October 10, 2021, he died of complications caused by the new crown virus infection. To this mixed-ranking figure, pakistani media wrote: "Thank you, Pakistan's savior." ”

Hero or "smuggler"?

Qadir Khan, then 85, had been living in a government apartment north of Islamabad. On 26 August, he was admitted to the local Dr. Kadir-Khan Laboratory Hospital on suspicion of contracting the coronavirus. On October 9, due to the aggravation of lung infection, Qadir Khan fell into a coma, and after all efforts to rescue him, he died on the morning of the 10th. In the afternoon, Pakistan held a grand state funeral for him. At islamabad's magnificent Faisal Mosque, thousands of people, including Pakistani Army Chief of Staff Bajewa, braved heavy rain to attend the funeral. This in itself means that the West's long-standing label of "nuclear smuggler" on Qadir Khan is no longer accepted, and Pakistanis have redefined the scientist as a national hero.

Pakistani President Arif Alvi, who is also a scientist by training, tweeted: "I have known him since 1982. He has been scrambling to save the country, and a grateful nation will not forget its loyal son. Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan called Qadir Khan a national icon. Abdel Bashit, the former High Commissioner of Pakistan to India, put it more bluntly, saying that when he was director of the Disarmament Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan, "[India] did not care about my anger, but never dared to offend Qadir Khan because he had the power to fight back aggression".

However, the West and India have been one-sided in criticizing Qadir Khan's "nuclear misdeeds", even though he himself has completely rejected these allegations. Kathy Gannon, a los Angeles Times reporter, quoted the State Department as saying that in the 1990s, Qadir Khan provided a "one-stop shopping service" for nuclearly armed countries. India's "Print" is even more schadenfreude, saying that Qadir Khan can only listen to the praises of his own people in heaven, "and in his last years, he was either confined to his own country in the house, or deliberately isolated from society, as if the world had disappeared".

"Throw away the gun, life is heavier"

Praise and ridicule have nothing to do with Qadir Khan. However, this very different evaluation is a true portrayal of the vicissitudes of international relations.

Kadir Khan was born on 1 April 1936 to a Muslim family in Bhopal, British India. The religious vendetta that took place during the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 left Qadir Khan's family witnessing too much bloodshed and violence. Realizing that they could no longer survive in their homeland, the Qadir-Khan family emigrated to Pakistan in 1952. It was at that moment that he understood a truth: "Although the gun is heavy, but throw it away, life will only be heavier." ”

In the 1960s, Kadir Khan graduated from the University of Karachi and later received his Ph.D. in Metallurgical Engineering from the University of Bruges in Belgium and entered the Netherlands Physical Dynamics Research Laboratory. It is a subcontractor serving the European Uranium Enrichment Corporation and specializes in the development of key materials for centrifuge rotors. It was also there that he had a lot of information about nuclear material and drawings, and knew where to get the source of nuclear technology.

In 1971, Pakistan was split in two by the Indian invasion and 90,000 soldiers were captured. In 1974, India held another "peaceful nuclear explosion", which made the whole country worry about its future. At this time, Qadir Khan expressed to the then Prime Minister of Pakistan, A. Ributo, that he was willing to contribute to his country's nuclear program.

Since then, Pakistan has relentlessly engaged in nuclear competition with India. Kadir Khan personally established the country's first nuclear materials factory in Kahuta, spearheaded the design of the atomic bomb and completed the detonation experiment. Just two weeks after India brazenly conducted five nuclear tests in the Bokron Desert in May 1998, Pakistan responded with six nuclear tests in the Jagai Mountains, declaring itself the seventh country in the world to possess nuclear weapons and the first in the Islamic world.

The "Lifelong Question" of Nuclear Characters

It should be emphasized that the United States has long known about Pakistan's nuclear research, but throughout the seventies and eighties, Washington has been silent. Because the United States at that time needed Pakistan to contain the Soviet Union, the most typical was that the United States did not interfere with Qadir Khan's acquisition of the key materials needed for centrifuges from Western Europe and Japan. However, when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the United States kicked Pakistan away and went all out to contain and sanction it. At the same time, the United States is "deaf and dumb" to India's nuclear activities.

In 2003, the United States suddenly attacked Pakistan, claiming to have "evidence" that Qadir Khan exported nuclear technology for Iran, Libya and East Asian countries, especially that he sold technology to East Asian countries to refine nuclear materials in exchange for the latter to provide medium-range ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads, thereby building an "effective nuclear deterrent" against India. After the United States, other Western countries have also put pressure on Pakistan, and even the International Atomic Energy Agency has made a tendentious conclusion that there may be a Khadir-Khan nuclear smuggling network. To avoid "catastrophic damage" to the country's credibility, Qadir Khan gave a public address to the nation in early 2004, acknowledging that he had leaked nuclear technology to several countries without the consent of the Pakistani government. He was pardoned by then-President Musharraf, but was placed under house arrest. In 2009, Pakistan's Supreme Court lifted him from house arrest, but his actions remain under surveillance.

Qadir Khan, who had been granted limited freedom, began to fight for fame. He complained to the German weekly Der Spiegel that the so-called "Qadir-Khan nuclear smuggling network" was all fabricated. "International suppliers are willing to supply to any buyer who can afford it, they don't need me to go to nuclear proliferation, libya and Iran use nuclear materials and nuclear processes that are fundamentally different from us, why do they always love to have anything to do with me?" As for why the "nuclear deal" was acknowledged on television, Qadir Khan replied: "I am nothing more than a political 'sacrifice'." ”

To this day, the West and India still do not forget to characterize Qadir Khan as a "dangerous person" in international nuclear proliferation, and consider it a "great pity" that he was not brought to the International Court of Justice. But in the eyes of the vast number of Pakistanis, Qadir Khan helped the motherland resist the strategic blackmail of its neighbors. As Samar Mubarak, a Pakistani nuclear scientist who worked with Qadir Khan, put it, he and his compatriots want to be clear: "Why are Western countries allowed to possess nuclear weapons and proliferate nuclear weapons for their own security (such as the transfer of nuclear submarine technology from the United States and Britain to Australia), while refusing to allow countries that are under real existential threat to do the same?" This is also Qadir Khan's "lifelong question".

Produced by Deep Sea Studio

Written by Jian Wu

Edited by Deep Sea Shell