Alencar (2003–11) made controversial remarks in 2009, telling the press that Brazil should have nuclear weapons as a means to protect itself. According to Alencar, nuclear weapons were useful as a means of dissuasion, particularly in the case of a vast country with valuable natural resources such as Brazil. Additionally, Alencar linked the possession of a nuclear bomb to higher international relevance, stating that a poor country like Pakistan had its voice heard in international affairs because of its nuclear arsenal. Once his observations were mass-produced, Brasília affirmed that Alencar had expressed his own personal views, which did not reflect Brazil's official position. In that same year, a leaked U.S. diplomatic cable revealed Argentine concerns related to Brazilian nuclear ambitions. It stated that the Argentine foreign ministry was thinking about what Argentina's reaction should be in case Brazil backed out of ABACC or developed a nuclear weapon. According to the document, one of the responses under consideration by Buenos Aires could be the development and deployment of advanced peaceful nuclear technology—such as a nuclear-powered icebreaker—to demonstrate capacity. ABACC did not comment, but one of its Brazilian officials stated that the information expressed in the leaked cable was contrary to the Brazilian–Argentine experience, which was enshrined in mutual trust. International experts have also weighed in on the controversies surrounding Brazil's nuclear program. Hans Rühle, a former official from the German defense ministry who also worked with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) wrote an article in 2010 in which he indicated that Brazil might be on the path toward getting the bomb. He based his argument on the submarine project, which may involve the production of highly enriched uranium, and the fact that Brazil seeks to develop capacity to conduct all phases of the nuclear fuel cycle indigenously. While Rühle affirms that there is no hard proof of a nuclear weapons program in Brazil, he suggests that Brazil's relations with Iran and defense of the Iranian nuclear program should be seen as a clue of the path Brazil wants to tread. Commenting on Rühle's article, the Argentine scholars Federico Merke and Florencia Montal said that Brazil might develop the capacity to manufacture a bomb but that it didn't seem to have the intention to do so. The most recent White Book of National Defense (Livro Branco de Defesa Nacional), issued in 2012 and published by the ministry of defense, reaffirms Latin