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The German intelligence services have credible information according to which “Turkey is headed towards its own nuclear bomb”. This is revealed in an interview former senior German defense ministry official Hans Rühle gave to the important German-speaking weekly Die Welt. Rühle, who served in the ministry between 1982 and 1988 in a high-ranking position, claims “we have reliable information that Erdogan’s nuclear ambitions are real, and that while the world is endlessly talking about Iran’s and North Korea’s nuclear programs, we might be witnessing the nuclear experiment in the Middle East which will be carried out by Turkey rather than by Iran.”
Rühle further reveals, that German intelligence passed the information on “to our friends in the West, who, surprisingly, had a great deal of intelligence material on this issue.” According to Rühle, the Turks are definitely busy secretly developing nuclear arms under the guise of a civilian nuclear program. In 2011, Turkey concluded a deal with Russia to build a nuclear power plant 300 kilometers from Anatolia, at a cost of 15 billion Euro. The technological information required to produce nuclear arms came from Pakistan, and the planned Turkish bomb is identical to the Pakistani one.
In the course of his interview, Rühle explained that for the time being, work on the plant had ceased due to Turkey’s demand to take an active part in the building works and to have control over the materials used in the plant. Turkey refuses to part with plutonium, which, after being enriched to a level of 90%, can be sued as a fissile material. According to the information German intelligence has, Erdogan ordered, as early as 2010, to establish secret installations, some of which are subterranean, on Turkish soil. Also in 2010, Pakistan sent Turkey numerous centrifuges.
In tandem with its nuclear program, Turkey is also busy developing long-range missiles. During the interview, Rühle explained that in 2012, Turkey conducted an experiment on a 1500 km range missile. Another experiment is planned for 2015, to test a 2500 km range missile. According to Rühle, the Turkish missiles are quite inaccurate, and their payload is low compared with similar missiles as well as with nuclear warheads. Nevertheless, “the missiles’ payload is enough to carry a compact nuclear warhead.”
Following the publication in Die Welt, intelligence experts in the West claim that should Turkey ultimately acquire nuclear arms, then this could mark the start of a nuclear arms race, and eventually, all or most Middle Eastern countries will have either developed nuclear arms or acquired them, rendering the region riddled with nuclear countries.
