Club Nuke’s poorest member

As lousy as the economy is here, at least we’re not as messed up as Pakistan is. Pakistan is the poorest member of Club Nuke, and on the heels of yesterday’s miliary coup d’etat, I took a look at some basic information about the country. They have a colorful political history of military rulers, corrupt and inept civilian rulers, and wars and scraps with neighboring India.

And there sure are a lot of them. The country is teeming with a population of 137 million. And they sure are poor: per-capita Gross Domestic Product–the average person’s yearly slice of the economic pie–is about $465.

It’s not a place I’d recommend opening a book store, by the way. Only a third of the population can read and write.

Little wonder, then, that economically Pakistan is a big nothing.

Politically, it’s a big circus. The country was formed in 1956, carved out of India, and had a coup and military government installed in 1958. Since then, the military has seized power for roughly half of the country’s brief life. The last prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, is hunkered down as an ex-patriot, since she’s facing a felony wrap in Pakistan for corruption. Uh, make that the “second to last” prime minister. The last one, Nawaz Sherif, was taken into custody by the Army yesterday.

The military is notoriously lousy at running economies, but there’s not much evidence that civilian rule in Pakistan was any more productive. When all you’ve got is a per-capita GDP of $465, there’s nowhere to go but up.

How did these guys wind up with the Bomb? It doesn’t sound like they could successfully manage a one-car funeral procession.

India, Pakistan’s arch enemy, has the Bomb also, and there must be a lot of itchy fingers on the trigger today. When grinding poor countries join club Nuke, who knows what kind of weirdness will crop up?

It’s no threat to us in the CNMI or to the United States. Having a nuclear bomb is one thing, but being able to deliver it to the target is quite another. Still, on the heels of the scandals surrounding China’s nuclear program, Asia appears to be a candidate for powder keg status.

Although I haven’t heard any speculation on the matter, might Pakistan be faced with the temptation to sell their nuclear technology to Iran, which borders on Pakistan? I’m sure the spooks and spies are keeping quite the vigil on that front.

How far the nuclear genie get out of the bottle is going to be a major story, as the U.S. and its allies try to keep the lid things. Uncle Sam can kick sand in the face of Haiti and Somalia, but when fringe countries have nukes, it adds a new dimension to the deal. It’s a recipe for weirdness, and a compelling side show to distract us from our economic woes here on our peaceful shores.