Bhutto & the bomb (Kissinger and Bhutto Standoff)

 The Secretary: "Bhutto knows the technological details and he knows what he wants." 

Mr. Habib: "That’s right. And what he wants is to build a bomb." 

 Mr. Habib: How do you feel about the A-7? 

The Secretary: NEA wants to kill the A-7 on its own merits. 

Mr. Habib: Does the A-7 give us credible leverage?

Mr. Atherton: I don’t think using the A-7’s alone will work. We need to put in balance the total military supply relationship. Bhutto can go elsewhere for aircraft.

 

The Secretary: To whom? 

Mr. Atherton: To the British or to the French for Mirages.

  

Amid intense pressure, sanctions, and vilification campaign, Kissinger came to Pakistan not once but twice. First to offer a good deal & second to threaten to abandon the nuclear program or face the consequences. In August 1976, Kissinger flew to Pakistan and offered Pakistani Prime Minister Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto continued annual aid of “$100m plus 100 A-7 military aircraft and additional military aid”. The offer was refused.

Henry Kissinger offered Bhutto 100 A7 aircrafts in exchange to quit the plan of acquiring reprocessing plant.[3] Gerald Feuerstein, deputy chief of US mission in Islamabad, admitted that Bhutto had rejected Kissinger’s warning to disband Pakistan’s nuclear program. “I was the protocol officer when Kissinger came to Pakistan and met Bhutto in Lahore. Kissinger came with a carrot and stick policy. The carrots were A-7 bombers, while the stick was not a direct threat, but since the US elections were near and the Democrats were set to win they wanted a tougher non-proliferation approach and might have made Pakistan an example. Pakistan did face sanctions,” [4] Interestingly in the same month US signed a $100 billion arms deal with Iran.

It is evident US offered a similar deal to Pakistan. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto refused twice. But whatever the offer was, ZAB knew that improving conventional war capabilities won't fix the disturbed balance of Power that's why despite the threats he was keen to pursue the program. 

References:

1. Memorandum of Conversation, Washington, July 9, 1976. Sub: Pakistani Reprocessing Issue. Top-level State Deptt 

2. Kissinger the Negotiator (2018) 

3. Iran And Pakistan authored by Alex Vatanka 

4.  Gerald Feuerstein Interview