رد: كيف سيكون المأزق السعوذي اذا اصبحت ايران نووية
Saudi Arabia and Pakistan
It was recently reported that there is an agreement between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to share
nuclear bombs to deter a rising Iran.5 The details of the deal are not fully known and difficult to
confirm. However, according to reports, Pakistan may “lease” nuclear weapons to Saudi Arabia.
The nuclear weapons are secured at a Pakistan airfield where two Saudi Arabian aircraft standby
to load them onto Saudi planes for deployment should a crisis occur. This has several
implications.
First, such “rent-a-nuke” agreements are a new deterrent strategy. For countries without access
to nuclear weapons, the ability to deter an enemy with borrowed nuclear weapons is a highly cost
effective and politically inexpensive way to get in the game. For instance, a Saudi Arabian
nuclear lease would allow it to bypass a tricky diplomatic issue: a declared nuclear equipped
Saudi Arabia would undermine the U.S. diplomatic effort to block Iran’s nuclear weapons
program by altering the regional balance of power. Consequently, Saudi Arabia can achieve an
effective defensive nuclear posture towards Iran without raising a number of international red
flags.
Second, so long as great powers (U.S., China, Russia, etc.) have nuclear weapons, smaller
countries will continue to reach for them as a deterrent. This brings with it a troubling question.
If Pakistan can rent out such weapons, to whom might Iran or North Korea make their nuclear
weapons available?
Third, the regional balancing of power in the Middle East is a natural geopolitical response to a
rising Iran. The fact that Saudi Arabia is diversifying its allied network to include Pakistan is a
troubling issue that may indicate a decline of U.S. power projection in the region. Is the U.S.
loosing credibility as a regional guarantor of peace? Is the U.S. nuclear umbrella loosing its
appeal in the face of rising challenges around the globe?