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The Bomb, the Bank, the Mullah and the Poppies: A Tale of Deception
When and why did Pakistani prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto decide to build a nuclear weapon? Did he mandate Agha Hassan Abedi to launch the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) to fund Pakistan's nuclear programme? Why did the BCCI become privileged bankers to Pablo Escobar's Medellin Cartel, General Manuel Noriega of Panama and Pakistani president General Zia-ul-Haq? Was George H.W. Bush embarrassed by his ties to General Noriega, General Zia-ul-Haq and the BCCI when he decided to run for presidency in 1988? Did Pervez Musharraf, as Director General of Military Operations, select Mullah Omar to head the Taliban?
The Bomb, the Bank, the Mullah and the Poppies is a historical account from a forensic perspective of how the Pakistani state innovatively used a dodgy bank, poppy cultivation and trade as a means to finance its nuclear programme. It reveals the convoluted psyche of the men in charge of Pakistan who clandestinely transformed Pakistan into a state where a premium was placed on thuggery, deceit and deception. This enabled Pakistan to grow from being a US pawn in the Reagan administration's war against the erstwhile Soviet Union to a narco-nuclear state with an independent nuclear deterrent. In the process, the patrons of the Pakistani deep state enriched themselves with drug money at the expense of the citizens mired in abject poverty.
This is a story of a succession of powerful men who cleverly fooled the world into believing their innocence and helplessness when in fact the opposite was true at every juncture in the history of their nation.
The Bomb, the Bank, the Mullah and the Poppies is a historical account from a forensic perspective of how the Pakistani state innovatively used a dodgy bank, poppy cultivation and trade as a means to finance its nuclear programme. It reveals the convoluted psyche of the men in charge of Pakistan who clandestinely transformed Pakistan into a state where a premium was placed on thuggery, deceit and deception. This enabled Pakistan to grow from being a US pawn in the Reagan administration's war against the erstwhile Soviet Union to a narco-nuclear state with an independent nuclear deterrent. In the process, the patrons of the Pakistani deep state enriched themselves with drug money at the expense of the citizens mired in abject poverty.
This is a story of a succession of powerful men who cleverly fooled the world into believing their innocence and helplessness when in fact the opposite was true at every juncture in the history of their nation.
302 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 18, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 7, 2023
Great revelations on Pakistan’s convert nuclear programme post 1971, financed through drug trafficking from Afghanistan and nuclear proliferation to North Korea, Iran & Libya. Rips apart the double and duplicitous game Pak has mastered over the years. A must read for all Pak watchers.
May 11, 2025
Interesting book about BCCI Bank, how it started and the links between the heroin trade originating in Afghanistan, Pakistan's nuclear programme, the civil war in Afghanistan and most importantly, all the realpolitik behind all this. BCCI Bank's original capital was provided by the UAE, and the author posits that this was set up to fund Pakistan's nascent nuclear aspirations in a way that would not draw attention. One of the ways of funding it was getting involved with the potentially very lucrative heroin trade in Afghanistan, and the book describes the setting up and funding of that infrastructure and logistics, with the bank being involved in it as well. The book also explores Pakistan's complex politics and leadership, and their foreign backers, apart from tracing the course of the civil war in Afghanistan, and events all the way to 2006. There are sources quotes throughout, contemporaneous news reports, Senate hearings, documentaries, and it's an interesting narrative crafted by tying together all this information. There are so many parties complicit in major events of the 2000s and it makes for compelling, if distressing reading
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 26, 2025
Pakistan is an ever-interesting country that forever seems to teeter on the edge of a precipice and blunders ahead from one self-inflicted crisis to another. It is a fascinating country, home to unpredictable politicians, unprofessional military personnel, and a gullible population that passionately believes in the infallibility and imagined greatness of their nation-state. Added to this heady mixture is the potentially destructive belief in the superiority of Islam, which, according to the Pakistanis, would help them tide over any wanton action they might collectively take as a nation.
Malhotra has authored a seminal work on the Pakistani state, revealing all the blemishes in the country's polity. Misplaced priorities and blind hatred for India have led Pakistan into a quagmire from which deliverance seems well nigh impossible. Military defeat in the Bangladesh liberation war of 1971 dealt a body blow to the psyche of the Pakistani nation. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto famously took a vow promising that Pakistan would go on to become a nuclear state “even if the Pakistani nation has to eat grass.”
The policymakers in Pakistan were aware that they could achieve the goal of becoming a nuclear state only through covert means. Sourcing finances for the enterprise was a major obstacle, the solution to which was to prop up a financial institution that could covertly divert funds to the Pakistani state. Thus, the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, headed by a shadowy banker named Agha Hassan Abedi, was set up. Abedi was tasked to create obscure money trails across the international financial banking system to route finances into Pakistan.
The most important player in the drama was the Pakistani nuclear physicist, A Q Khan. Khan had worked for long years in the nuclear industry in Europe. He was a duplicitous character who was adept at stealing technology and smuggling it into Pakistan. Bhutto assigned the task of developing a nuclear device for Pakistan to A Q Khan, who was more than happy to take on the job. The first step was enrichment of uranium, which Khan planned to do with the help of centrifuges, the designs of which he surreptitiously managed to smuggle out of Germany.
Developing a nuclear device does not come cheap, and garnering funds for that task was an onerous undertaking. As luck would have it, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan offered the Pakistanis a rare opportunity to leverage support from Western nations, acting as a bulwark to Russian designs in South Asia. This happened in the era of superpower rivalry between the United States and the erstwhile USSR, and the Americans were more than happy to ignore attempts at nuclear proliferation by the Pakistani state. The Pakistanis used the religion card to garner support to fight the Russian occupation in Afghanistan. They were actively involved in setting up a terror infrastructure and laying the groundwork for a dreaded militant force, the Taliban, to come into being. The master stroke was the tacit support they provided to the Taliban to harvest Poppies on a large scale in Afghanistan. The Taliban quickly recognised the potential of the immense wealth that could be generated through the drug trade, and it was just a matter of time before most of the drugs that moved into Europe and the Americas were sourced from Afghanistan. The Afghan drug trade went on to develop into a large-scale international operation, so much so that the Pakistani bank, BCCI, was involved in money laundering involving big players like Pablo Escobar’s Medellin cartel and the Panamanian dictator, Manuel Noriega. BCCI facilitated the movement of funds into Pakistan, which lined the coffers of Pakistani military officers as well as provided much-needed clandestine funds for the nascent nuclear programme of that country.
Malhotra’s account clearly delineates how the Americans used the Pakistanis to further their own interests. However, in the bargain, the Pakistanis shrewdly played a double game. After the horrendous twin tower bombing by Al Qaeda in September 2001, the Americans proclaimed an all-out war against Al Qaeda and their protectors, the Taliban. General Musharraf, who was at the helm of affairs in Pakistan, played a very shrewd game in balancing his loyalties with the Americans and the Taliban at the same time. The Pakistanis played a dangerous, duplicitous game of running with the hares and hunting with the hounds. They are masters at this game, and in recent history, there have been numerous instances where they have repeatedly used this skill with uncanny finesse.
This book is as much an exposition of the unprincipled and hypocritical stand taken by the American state in its narrow national interest and for geopolitical expediency. Analysis of the effect of these actions unequivocally proves that the world has become a more dangerous place.
The role played by Pakistan in nuclear proliferation is beyond doubt. It is even more galling that Western democracies, for narrow geopolitical interests, tended to look the other way while that rogue nation laid the seeds for enduring unrest across the globe.
Iqbal Chand Malhotra’s volume makes for interesting reading, although I had a lingering feeling that he could have embellished the narrative with the usual tropes on clandestine operations happening across continents. However, it is to the author’s credit that the narrative sticks to its message in a straightforward manner. This book will interest anyone with a lingering interest in geopolitics and recent world history.
Malhotra has authored a seminal work on the Pakistani state, revealing all the blemishes in the country's polity. Misplaced priorities and blind hatred for India have led Pakistan into a quagmire from which deliverance seems well nigh impossible. Military defeat in the Bangladesh liberation war of 1971 dealt a body blow to the psyche of the Pakistani nation. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto famously took a vow promising that Pakistan would go on to become a nuclear state “even if the Pakistani nation has to eat grass.”
The policymakers in Pakistan were aware that they could achieve the goal of becoming a nuclear state only through covert means. Sourcing finances for the enterprise was a major obstacle, the solution to which was to prop up a financial institution that could covertly divert funds to the Pakistani state. Thus, the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, headed by a shadowy banker named Agha Hassan Abedi, was set up. Abedi was tasked to create obscure money trails across the international financial banking system to route finances into Pakistan.
The most important player in the drama was the Pakistani nuclear physicist, A Q Khan. Khan had worked for long years in the nuclear industry in Europe. He was a duplicitous character who was adept at stealing technology and smuggling it into Pakistan. Bhutto assigned the task of developing a nuclear device for Pakistan to A Q Khan, who was more than happy to take on the job. The first step was enrichment of uranium, which Khan planned to do with the help of centrifuges, the designs of which he surreptitiously managed to smuggle out of Germany.
Developing a nuclear device does not come cheap, and garnering funds for that task was an onerous undertaking. As luck would have it, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan offered the Pakistanis a rare opportunity to leverage support from Western nations, acting as a bulwark to Russian designs in South Asia. This happened in the era of superpower rivalry between the United States and the erstwhile USSR, and the Americans were more than happy to ignore attempts at nuclear proliferation by the Pakistani state. The Pakistanis used the religion card to garner support to fight the Russian occupation in Afghanistan. They were actively involved in setting up a terror infrastructure and laying the groundwork for a dreaded militant force, the Taliban, to come into being. The master stroke was the tacit support they provided to the Taliban to harvest Poppies on a large scale in Afghanistan. The Taliban quickly recognised the potential of the immense wealth that could be generated through the drug trade, and it was just a matter of time before most of the drugs that moved into Europe and the Americas were sourced from Afghanistan. The Afghan drug trade went on to develop into a large-scale international operation, so much so that the Pakistani bank, BCCI, was involved in money laundering involving big players like Pablo Escobar’s Medellin cartel and the Panamanian dictator, Manuel Noriega. BCCI facilitated the movement of funds into Pakistan, which lined the coffers of Pakistani military officers as well as provided much-needed clandestine funds for the nascent nuclear programme of that country.
Malhotra’s account clearly delineates how the Americans used the Pakistanis to further their own interests. However, in the bargain, the Pakistanis shrewdly played a double game. After the horrendous twin tower bombing by Al Qaeda in September 2001, the Americans proclaimed an all-out war against Al Qaeda and their protectors, the Taliban. General Musharraf, who was at the helm of affairs in Pakistan, played a very shrewd game in balancing his loyalties with the Americans and the Taliban at the same time. The Pakistanis played a dangerous, duplicitous game of running with the hares and hunting with the hounds. They are masters at this game, and in recent history, there have been numerous instances where they have repeatedly used this skill with uncanny finesse.
This book is as much an exposition of the unprincipled and hypocritical stand taken by the American state in its narrow national interest and for geopolitical expediency. Analysis of the effect of these actions unequivocally proves that the world has become a more dangerous place.
The role played by Pakistan in nuclear proliferation is beyond doubt. It is even more galling that Western democracies, for narrow geopolitical interests, tended to look the other way while that rogue nation laid the seeds for enduring unrest across the globe.
Iqbal Chand Malhotra’s volume makes for interesting reading, although I had a lingering feeling that he could have embellished the narrative with the usual tropes on clandestine operations happening across continents. However, it is to the author’s credit that the narrative sticks to its message in a straightforward manner. This book will interest anyone with a lingering interest in geopolitics and recent world history.
September 21, 2023
The book covers the missing links between the Bomb and the Poppy trade, how it was financed and two countries entwined & beholden to this murky world of narcotics & terror. An open secret that the world knew but were too disgusted to speak about, was this direct link to the Heroin business, financed protected and managed by Heads of state & Organizations that were supposed to contain it. The amazing consistency of deception, duplicity & deceit that the successive rulers practiced with elan to further this nefarious trade and dangerous terror is a testimony to the double standards of the western world, in particular the US, under whose patronage they thrived on. A sorry state of affairs of a country devastated by Terror, Narcotics, warfare & Medieval fundamentalism, completely fueled by its neighbor who, if it were a person, would've been sentenced by criminal courts on several charges. The author has narrated this sordid but engaging tale, in an engaging prose that makes this book a must read for those who wish to know, How could rulers of country, of opposing political spectrum, all turn out to be so evil.
December 6, 2024
Detailed and gutsy history of Pakistan's political mix-up with the US and UK and everything that contributed to the success and failure towards the country's nuclear programme and of course the damning hand of the superpowers to create chaos in that geographical territory. Definitely worth a read, however convoluted that it may make you feel.
September 6, 2023
Super fun! Reads like a spy novel! It’s incredible how black money from all over the world is channeled into illegal weapons, humans and drug trafficking and how each of these industries feeds off each other.
May 1, 2025
An interesting perspective on nexus of Opium trade development of nuke for Pakistan and business overtures. Rise of Taliban and how US remained blind to developments which has had far reaching implications in geo pol of world.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews