In the early 1980s, Richard Barlow, a former CIA officer, revealed to a news organization that India and Israel contemplated a joint clandestine operation to destroy Pakistan’s clandestine nuclear facility at Kahuta, which was dismissed after Prime Minister Indira Gandhi would not authorize an attack.
In his conversations with the news organization, Barlow said Gandhi’s decision was a “shame” and that the operation “could have settled lots of problems” regarding Pakistan’s nuclear ambitions. Barlow is a counterproliferation officer who worked during the time of Pakistan’s secret development of nuclear weapons. He stated he heard chatter through intelligence channels and did not take part in planning the air strike. “I heard about it at one point. But I didn’t sink my teeth into it, because it didn’t happen,” Barlow said.
He noted that the purpose of the operation was to thwart Pakistan’s program to develop atomic bombs, and to block any transfer of technology that might yield an eventual atomic military capability to other regional states, like Iran, which were a concern to Israel.
Barlow made his comments soon after President Donald Trump said in a CBS News 60 Minutes interview, while the U.S. had not conducted a nuclear test in over thirty years, some were testing in the world including Pakistan.
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