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Updated February 2007
In many cases, less advanced states obtain what they need
for their illicit WMD
programs through spying or smuggling goods from
more advanced countries. Often times, the less advanced state secretly
misuses items that it received openly and that it probably pledged in good
faith to use for non-military purposes. For example, the Soviet Union spied extensively on the U.S. nuclear program during World
War II. Its first nuclear weapon was basically a
duplicate
of the one that the United States dropped on Nagasaki.
It should be noted, however, that the Soviet Union did have its own design and
eventually would have succeeded in developing a nuclear weapon on its own. Soviet espionage
of the U.S. program only served to speed things up.
Non-state suppliers such Pakistan's
Dr. A.Q.
Khan have used a variety of unorthodox channels, effectively bypassing
national export controls.
Cases Involving Nuclear Weapons
India's
first nuclear device in 1974 contained plutonium produced in a
Canadian-supplied reactor, which had a key component supplied by the United
States. India had assured the two supplier countries that their exports would be used only for
peaceful purposes, but India made a nuclear explosive instead. India called the
test a peaceful nuclear
explosion, but the world recognized that it had become a nuclear power.
In the 1970s and 1980s,
Pakistan
smuggled plans and equipment for nuclear weapon facilities out of the Netherlands,
West Germany, and other Western European countries.
North Korea also appears
to have advanced its nuclear weapons program by misusing (or diverting) a
reactor supplied by Russia for peaceful purposes.
In December 2003,
Libya admitted to pursuing nuclear weapons by importing
enrichment equipment from the
Khan network. In exchange for the lifting of
some international sanctions,
Libya agreed to halt and dismantle its weapons of mass destruction programs.
Cases Involving Chemical and
Biological Weapons
The best-known cases of
countries relying on foreign suppliers for help developing chemical
weapons (CW) or biological weapons (BW) are
Egypt
and
Syria. Both
countries benefited from assistance from the Soviet Union and other
countries. In
addition, during the 1980s and 1990s,
Iraq,
Iran, and,
Libya
imported extensive CW equipment and CW-related chemicals (precursor
chemicals) from Western Europe.
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Further Reading:
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ISIS, David Albright,
"Preventing
Illegal Exports: Learning from Case Studies, Part I" |
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ISIS, David Albright,
"Preventing
Illegal Exports: Learning from Case Studies, Part II" |
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Arms Control Today, Leonard Weiss,
"Turning a Blind Eye Again? The Khan Network's History and Lesson for
U.S. Policy" |
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Arms Control Association,
Nuclear Black Markets/Khan Network: News and Analysis |
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NTI, Sammy Salama & Lydia Hansell,
"Companies Reported to Have Sold or Attempted to Sell Libya Gas
Centrifuge Components" |
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The Nonproliferation Review,
Dany Shoham,
"Chemical and Biological Weapons in Egypt" |
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The Middle East Quarterly,
Dany Shoham,
"Guile,
Gas and Germs: Syria's Ultimate Weapons" |
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