Obama's pressure, Pakistan's drug trail: Funding 'Project Taimur' exposed in new book

By Anish Kumar | First Published Dec 15, 2024, 11:57 AM IST

To offset Obama hot pursuit, Pakistan backed Mullah Mansur to take control of the Taliban with "primary interest on consolidating and dominating revenue streams from both the Sinaloa and CJNG cartels" of the drug trafficking.

New Delhi: A new book has claimed that Pakistan was gripped with dread of the prospects of the US eliminating the nuclear stockpiles in covert operations. It stated that Barack Obama while being the President of the United States was pressuring Pakistan to terminate the Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM).

"Towards the end of December 2014, General (Raheel) Sharif (Army Chief) took stock of his concerns. He called in his newly appointed ISI chief, Lt General Rizwan Akhtar, and the head of SPD, Lt General Zubair Mahmood Hayat. President Obama was pressuring Pakistan intensely to terminate ICBM programme, which was named Taimur," wrote Iqbal Chand Malhotra in his book 'The Nukes, the Jihad, the Hawalas and Crystal Meth: A Tale of Treachery'.

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Malhotra said that Pakistan had accelerated the "ICBM development after the Abbottabad raid". "The Taimur programme would now have to go 'dark', requiring significant funds to sustain its pace of development. General Sharif was also greatly anxious about the growing collusion between the US and India on security matters. General Sharif did not trust Obama and feared that the US might soon be compelled to neutralize Pakistan's nuclear arsenal," added Malhotra in the book.

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He further stated that "the nuclear warheads in unmarked vans with low-security profiles along busy roads" were moved to secret locations. "There was a belief at the highest levels of the Pakistan Army that the US had the technical means to stage simultaneous raids on Pakistan's nuclear facilities," added Malhotra in the book.

The author stated that the Pakistani Army Chief "was fully focused on weeding out CIA and/or R&AW spies from Pakistan's nuclear facilities". "US attempts might also aim to disable Pakistan's entire nuclear arsenal. Such an operation would exceed the scope of a JSOC-executed action and would likely be led by US Central Command in conjunction with US Indo-Pacific Command," added Malhotra, who has written four more books on geo-politics of South Asia.

He stated that Pakistan feared that 'the US Army's 20th Support Command, which has nuclear disablement teams, would accompany JSOC detachments into Pakistan. These teams are thoroughly trained for sensitive site exploitation operations at nuclear sites and have the capability and skill to destroy a nuclear weapon without setting it off."

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"Increased revenues were needed for the Taimur project, which required comprehensively expanding the heroin and crystal meth businesses. Strengthening Abdul Ghani's new government and prevailing over the Abdullah faction were essential. Fresh peace negotiations with Kabul had to be initiated to ensure the heroin and crystal meth businesses were not jeopardized," added Malhotra in the book.

But the author argued that the Pakistani generals "fell victim to the web of illusion conjured up by Obama". "The Obama administration launched a messaging campaign to convince the American public that US forces in Afghanistan were now out of the fight, merely spectators waiting to go home," wrote Malhotra, while giving accounts that Obama on the contrary enhanced targeted actions in Afghanistan that eventually also killed Pakistan proxy Mullah Mansur in the Taliban.

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