US Senate Passes Nuke Deal With India: A nonproliferation disaster

Senate Passes Nuke Deal Over Escalation Fears published on October 3, 2008
by Jim Lobe Posted on Antiwar

In case you don't read this in full--here are several clinchers--quoting from the beginning of the article: "weapons experts warned that it dealt a serious blow to more than 30 years of US and international nonproliferation efforts"

And here's the end of the article: "Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who travels to India Friday, told lawmakers last week that Washington will make its "highest priority" at the next NSG meeting a ban on the export of enrichment and reprocessing technology to states that do not sign the NPT.--Ironically, the chief commercial beneficiaries of both the NSG's decision and Congressional approval of the deal, according to some experts, will be French, Japanese, and Russian nuclear suppliers."

(Inter Press Service)

Article here:
While the US Senate's approval of a controversial nuclear deal with India was hailed by the White House Thursday as a major advance in Washington's "strategic relationship" with the South Asian giant, weapons experts warned that it dealt a serious blow to more than 30 years of US and international nonproliferation efforts.

"This is a nonproliferation disaster," said Daryl Kimball, the executive director of the Washington-based Arms Control Association (ACA), who noted that it effectively exempts India from the global nonproliferation regime and will likely "promote further nuclear competition with Pakistan."

"(W)e are taking apart the basic architecture of nuclear nonproliferation that has served us for many decades," warned Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan just before the measure passed by a 86-13 margin Wednesday evening. ''We are saying to India it is okay if you produce additional nuclear weapons if we cannot see them.''

The deal, a top priority of the George W. Bush administration since it was concluded after nearly two years of negotiations in July 2007, was rushed through the House of Representatives on a 298-117 vote Saturday, so it will become law when Bush signs the legislation.

Bush had hoped to have signed it by last week, when he hosted Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the White House, but the turmoil created by the three-week-old financial crisis – and frantic lobbying to push the administration's 700-billion-dollar bailout package through Congress – put that goal out of reach. Indeed, the Senate voted on the nuclear deal minutes before it approved the latest version of the bailout.

Ratification of the nuclear deal represents a major victory for powerful business interests, particularly in the nuclear and military industries, who have been eager to penetrate a fast-growing multi-billion-dollar market, as well as for an increasingly powerful and well-financed Indian-American lobby.

With a population of well over one billion, a burgeoning middle class, and an annual economic growth rate of nearly nine percent over the past five years, the Indian market has become a major target for US exporters, which lobbied hard for the deal.

In the lead have been major US producers of nuclear plants and technology, notably General Electric (GE) and Westinghouse...

Find full article here

Copyright 2008 Antiwar.com


The Times of India October 3, 2008
NEW DELHI: The BJP on Thursday said India had entered into a “blind trap” and had finally acceded to the nuclear non-proliferation regime with the
India-US nuclear deal.

The party, which has been opposing the deal, said the government had gone for a blind trap knowingly and couldn’t get out of it. “We have acceded to the nuclear non-proliferation regime with the India-US nuclear deal,” BJP spokesperson Rajiv Pratap Rudy told reporters.

“The deal has been done at the cost of the country’s sovereignty and nuclear independence. It’s a time to worry but the Congress bosses are tom-tomming their sense of pseudo achievement,” he added.

It’s total surrender to US: Karat

NEW DELHI: Continuing its relentless attacks on nuclear deal, CPM on Thursday said that what has been adopted by US Congress to approve the 123 Agreement is a “Hyde Act plus version which has key provisions of the Hyde Act and much more”.

Stating that if the government still goes ahead and signs the 123 agreement “it will be a complete surrender to the US and a betrayal of India’s vital interests