New Republic Slams U.S.-India Nuclear Deal

The Editors of The New Republic penned an exceptional op-ed detailing the mine field that is the U.S.-India nuclear deal last week. (You might recall that PSR and The Economist also denounced the deal not long ago). The full piece requires a subscription, so I’m including the key portions below and the full text in the comments section.

Be careful what you wish for. That is the lesson of the Bush administration's newly unveiled deal to provide India with nuclear fuel and technology. For years, opponents of the White House's foreign policy have called for more diplomacy--for further inspections in Iraq, for direct talks with North Korea, for any talks whatsoever on Iran's nuclear program. Now it appears that, in eschewing negotiation, the Bush administration was doing the United States a favor. Because, when the Bushies negotiate, they're extremely dangerous.

Let's start with the very purpose of the agreement. Although U.S. assistance will be intended only for India's civilian power program, it can't avoid helping India's nuclear weapons program. India has limited uranium supplies, which constrain its civilian and military nuclear programs. With its reactors now guaranteed a steady supply of fuel, India's indigenous uranium can be devoted to making weapons. Given that India is a friend, one might argue that this isn't a problem. But India's enemy is an unstable, nuclear-armed nation rife with Islamic extremism. If India expands its atomic cache, Pakistan will almost certainly follow suit, and any growth of Pakistan's nuclear industry exacerbates the threat of nuclear terrorism.

[snip]

In other words, if India has not broken the rules, it is only because it has ignored them altogether. And, although its record is far better than Pakistan's, its behavior has hardly been exemplary. Even putting aside India's illicit use of U.S. technology in the '70s, the Bush administration itself has sanctioned nine different Indian "entities" for proliferating WMD technology, mostly to Iran. In fact, the Indian government maintains that Iran has an "inalienable right" to enrich uranium.

[snip]

So, in mid-2005, the president tried to buy India's friendship. Skipping over less radioactive carrots (like arms sales or G-8 membership), Bush offered India nuclear fuel and technology, in effect signaling acceptance of India's atomic arsenal. All that remained was to hammer out the terms of a "123 agreement," named for the section of U.S. code governing nuclear sales. But it took five rounds of negotiations before the agreement was finalized, as diplomats haggled over whether the Indians would allow us to restrict how they might use our technology. Yes, the administration that doesn't negotiate negotiated the terms of its own gift--and lost.

Now we have even less leverage with which to encourage India (and therefore Pakistan) to join the nonproliferation regime. Burns has claimed that the deal itself ties India to the regime, but the 123 agreement does no such thing. It does not, for example, require India to eschew nuclear testing. It does not forbid India from producing further fissile material for weapons (in fact, it will facilitate the production of plutonium). It does not require India to place all its nuclear facilities under international safeguards. It does not commit India to pursuing eventual nuclear disarmament. What it does is reward bad behavior.