Talk:Syed Ali Nawab

Personal admission

In my spare time, I tried looking for the sources that would justified the claims with evidence:

In a couple of articles, Khan revealed that one of two KRL procurement officers was a former POF engineer deputed via Gen Ali Nawab, chairman POF.

According to another couple of articles by Dr. A.Q. Khan, in early 1976, the Army office of DG EME (Director General EME) began assisting Khan in establishing KRL after Gen Zia became COAS. DG EME was a strategic post as it was held by one of two EME generals at the time and in the normal course of duty, was also involved in selecting and deputing EME personnel to the office of Military procurement (PATLO) used by KRL in London. So, DG EME was able to help KRL in several ways without attracting too much attention. Although, Dr. Khan does not mention Gen Nawab by name in these articles, army records clearly indicate that Nawab was in fact DG EME after General Zia became COAS. Gen Nawab was transferred from the Ministry of Defense to the Army office of DG EME by Secretary General of Defense, Ghulam Ishaq Khan, so Nawab could make these strategic logistical and staffing decisions for KRL and then be transferred back to the Ministry of Defense. However, Director of KRL, A.Q. Khan, was kept in the dark about the process.

In December 1976 after assisting KRL establish its basic infrastructure as DG EME, Nawab moved back to the Ministry of Defense and began running the military industrial complex known as POF from where he could continue assisting KRL, such that, main structures were in place by middle of 1977 and moderate uranium enrichment was achieved by April 1978. During his stay at POF, Nawab also began working on a project to develop, monitoring and advisory systems, for the domestic engineering and manufacturing sectors of the economy, so they could support the country's newly developing advanced nuclear capabilities.

After retirement from the Army in 1981 Nawab became chief of Experts Advisory Cell (EAC) from where he continued to advise and monitor state owned enterprises. EAC was affiliated with the Ministry of Industries & Production as well as the powerful Ministry of Finance headed by Mr. Ghulam Ishaq Khan who had moved to the Ministry of Finance after Gen Zia became president. As chief of EAC, Nawab co-authored the article, "Evaluating Public Manufacturing Enterprises: An experimental monitoring system". In addition, during Nawab's tenure EAC's contributions to industrialization of Pakistan were recognized by the World Bank and IMF in the 1983 World Development Report. Coincidentally a few months after Dr. A.Q. Khan declared that he had finally developed the ability to detonate a nuclear device in December 1984, Nawab retired from the government as chief of EAC.

As a related anecdote, in 1984, A.Q. Khan wrote that President Zia had appointed two Major Generals, Zahid Ali Akbar Khan and Anis Nawab, whom Peter Griffin had met in London in 1977 over dinner at the Kundan Restaurant, to oversee all operations. Khan's reference was to a dinner meeting in which Peter Griffin says he met a Brigadier General Anis Nawab who was described as running a project on industrializing Pakistan. However, Brigadier General Anis Nawab was obviously a fictitious name, for Brigadier General is not even a rank in the Pakistan Army and there was no Brigadier or General by the name of Anis Nawab at the time. Khan has been unwilling to reveal the true identity of the mystery Brigadier General. In addition, Peter's account also has its problems. For example, why would any general travel all the way from Pakistan to meet Griffin, then jeopardize his operation by introducing himself with a fake rank that didn't even exist in his own army? Also why did he make up a rank that suggested he wasn't a general, yet allow his team to address him as a general? Also, why would Peter go ahead with the deal after it was obvious that the man had a fake rank and name? It is a very odd story and requires clarification. In addition, it is unclear how Khan knew which Generals and how many were appointed by Zia to oversee operations. After all, if General Zia had managed to conceal the identity of EME's Director General who was running the show and allowed Khan to think Director ITD was Director General EME what does it say about Khan's knowledge of who was overseeing operations? Khan was a director (rather than a director general) at the time, the equivalent of a Brigadier in the army or a middle management executive at a large corporation. In addition he had just moved from Europe. So, it is quite unlikely that Gen Zia or anyone else would have shared with Khan how many generals were overseeing the operation or their identities. Essentially, both A.Q. Khan and Peter Griffin were misled into thinking they were dealing with a Brigadier / Brigadier General rather than a general officer with a different name.

It seems like someone knew personally because there's nothing mentioning of these claims made by someone....There's should be evidence somewhere. Until then it is found, it's likely to be removed.

References

Citation needed

Citation was requested for Nawab being superseded.

I have tried to provide historical background for why Nawab was superseded. Basically, Nawab was promoted to Major General by Bhutto and the Army Chief, General Tikka when the nuclear project under Ghulam Ishaq Khan at the Ministry of Defence. Nawab at that time was to directly report to the Secretary of Defense, Ghulam Ishaq Khan and not the Army Chief. Gen Tikka was fine with this arrangement. At that time General Zia was a 3 Star General who was not involved with the project. However, after Tikka retired and Zia became chief of the Army in 1976, Zia wanted to promote and appoint one of his own officers to Nawab’s position. However, although Nawab was a Major General in the Army, he was no longer reporting to the Army Chief. Nawab was now directly reporting to the secretary of defense and the President. So Zia could do little about it.

All of this changed dramatically after Zia launched a military coup, overthrew Bhutto and became President in 1978. One of the things Zia did was promote several junior officers who superseded Nawab. Similarly, Ghulam Ishaq Khan was transferred to the Ministry of Finance, Tikka was jailed and Bhutto was jailed and later hanged. So the fact that Nawab was superseded should not surprise us, considering the dramatic shift in political power that occurred at the time. Bob chasm (talk) 00:09, 28 March 2018 (UTC)