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Murder in Pakistan's nuclear establishment
It is among the world\'s greatest fears - Pakistan\'s nuclear weapons slipping into hands of jihadis, or command over them with someone who shares their outlook. The country\'s establishment asserts there is no danger of this with stringent measures in place to ensure the safety of their arsenal and monitor those who have authority over them. But are these effective enough?
The book is quite timely and relevant; there are many resonances with Pakistan's recent real-life polity
It is among the world's greatest fears - Pakistan's nuclear weapons slipping into hands of jihadis, or command over them with someone who shares their outlook. The country's establishment asserts there is no danger of this with stringent measures in place to ensure the safety of their arsenal and monitor those who have authority over them. But are these effective enough?
As it happens, an assassination bid is made on a top Pakistani general but foiled and the assailant shot - and has time to utter one enigmatic word before dying. The next assassination bid however, manages to claim another general's life. Then the psychiatrist tasked with ensuring the well-being of those in the nuclear command loop goes missing, and is later found murdered with the cryptic equation "A2 MC Badmas" written in blood next to his body.
Meanwhile, the CIA seeks the Pakistani Army's help to collar an American convert to Islam hiding in the Pakhtun heartland and purportedly involved in a plot to destabilise Pakistan but the agent on the case is soon found murdered in her hotel room. Meanwhile, the foreign minister is mulling drastic measures to counter US drone attacks but her own life is set to witness upheavals and betrayals.
Capt. Gul Khan of the Pakistan Army, who is serving as ADC to foreign minister Sadia Sharif when he foils the assassination, is taken off and put on to probe and solve the conspiracy, with the help of CIA agent Eve who has her own motivations and objectives. But can he, or rather, will he be allowed to succeed and avert a nuclear holocaust?
The book set in a volatile and restive region in an unsettled time but also going back a few decades to underscore how some wounds never heal - and can infect the present too!
A young woman foreign minister, a president hailing from Sindh, who exerts final political control on government matters, and so on - which provide the story a certain verisimilitude, and the depiction of the military and diplomatic component bears hallmark of someone with experience.
What doesn't work are a tad too excessive use of pop culture to highlight discoveries, the gratuitous sex, which is somewhat distracting from the taut narrative, a few implausibilities in the buildup to and the denouement itself, and a rather theatrical, unresolved ending.
But on the other hand, the author shows quite some initiative in forsaking predictable plot devices for something new, even if it does not mesh perfectly, or seems a little unbelievable.
By:Vikas Datta
