LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
Reply With QuoteYeah blah blah again....
If USA could afford to deal with proven proliferators like China and Pakistan, then what's wrong with India....
Weapons experts warn US lawmakers on Indian nuclear deal
(AFP)
21 June 2006
WASHINGTON - Arms experts cautioned US lawmakers on Tuesday against backing a civilian nuclear deal with India that they said violated a global atomic agreement and dampened efforts to reign in nuclear renegades Iran and North Korea.
“The main point is that our strategic interest dictates that we should not discard our nonproliferation policy and our Treaty obligations,” the experts said in a joint letter, citing the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
“To do so would only enfeeble our case against NPT violators,” the 10 experts said, referring to Iran and North Korea.
By paving the way for the United States and other nuclear supplier states to provide nuclear fuel to India, the deal would free up the Asian giant’s “limited domestic nuclear fuel making capacity to produce highly enriched uranium and plutonium for weapons,” they said.
Enriched uranium can be used as fuel for nuclear power reactors but can also be employed to manufacture the explosive core of atom bombs.
The NPT requires the five acknowledged nuclear-weapon states, the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China, not to transfer nuclear weapons technology to any non-nuclear-weapon state.
India comes under this category as the treaty defines a non-nuclear weapons state as one which did not explode a nuclear device before 1967. India, a non-NPT member, launched its first nuclear test in 1974.
“It’s hardly credible for the United States to demand that Iran give up its nuclear enrichment program when Iran hasn’t made any bombs and shower India with nuclear fuel supply when it broke its pledge not to make bombs back in 1974,” Henry Sokolski, a former Pentagon non-proliferation official, told reporters.
“It isn’t that we can’t fix that by asking India to do more to limit its nuclear weapons efforts but we haven’t,” said Sokolski, among those who penned the letter.
The United States has led a global push for NPT member Iran to suspend uranium enrichment to prove it does not seek atomic weapons.
Violation of NPT
Sokolski said that the United States and its allies did not take tough action when North Korea, which is currently threatening to test a long range missile, violated the NPT and withdrew from it in 2003.
Last year, the Stalinist regime declared itself a nuclear weapons state.
“North Korea clearly undermined the NPT and now we are giving all the benefits of NPT to a country that never followed the NPT rules. This is a double insult and slap in the face of nuclear restraint,” Sokolski said.
Other signatories of the letter included ex-US nuclear regulatory commissioner Victor Gilinsky, ex-director of the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency John Holum, former chairman of the National Intelligence Council Henry Rowen and US Arms Control Association executive director Daryl Kimball.
The letter to Congress came ahead of meetings next week by the foreign relations committees of the House of Representatives and Senate that would decide whether to endorse the nuclear deal clinched by President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in March.
The panels’ findings on the deal, which requires mandatory backing fromlegislators, would then be submitted to the full Houses for consideration.
The Bush administration wants to secure passage of the deal before the November mid-term Congressional elections but it apparently lacks wide and bipartisan backing.
The Congress has to amend the US Atomic Energy Act, which currently prohibits nuclear sales to non NPT signatories.
Some legislators want to first study a set of international safeguards under which India and the United States would implement the deal. The safeguards are still being drafted by the two governments.
“I do have serious concerns about the deal negotiated by the administration,” Democratic lawmaker Howard Berman told reporters Tuesday.
He has proposed a bill that instead of authorizing a specific exception in US law for India, would set conditions to be met by non-NPT members before gaining access to US nuclear technology.
He supported a halt in Indian production of fissile material for nuclear weapons and a guarantee that Congress could amend any final bilateral nuclear agreement.
Berman also wanted the safeguards to be consistent with standard International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) practices and a provision to terminate the pact if India tested nuclear weapons or violated the safeguards.
Yeah blah blah again....
If USA could afford to deal with proven proliferators like China and Pakistan, then what's wrong with India....
Seek Save Serve Medic
and plus, if we wanted to increase our nuclear arsenal, we can still do it with other means... I mean, i'm sure Russians would have no problems providing fuel for these reactors... so this deal is not to build more nuclear weapons, it is to cement ties with the US...
Nabha Sparasham Deeptam
-Touch The Sky With Glory
oh yes and a flaw in that article is that you can't compare Iranian nuclear program with the Indian nuclear program... simply because ours is not run by Mullahs... but more importantly, we're not a NPT signatory while Iran is... so we're not breaking any rules, Iran is... so it just goes to show these people know sh!t they're talking about...
Nabha Sparasham Deeptam
-Touch The Sky With Glory
The US doesn't provide nuclear help to Pakistan, and any dealings with China are done within the framework of the NPT.Originally Posted by 667medic
"We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008
China and Pak actively proliferated WMD and yet USA deals with them.
India has been a Nuke state for more than 25years, so far we haven't heard of any proliferation, so USA can definitely afford do help India.....
Seek Save Serve Medic
As I said, we do not deal with them wrt nuclear tech. Outside that, we have offered India the same basic things we offer Pakistan (aircraft, some defensive systems, etc). It's always been US policy that we do not introduce a capability into a region if it is not already available from other sources.
This thread is about the US-India deal anyway. Why must you guys always drag Pakistan into it? Christ, it's like a bunch of kids..."hey, he got more ice cream than I did...waaaa"
Why can't you just accept the fact that the US is not going to take sides in your dispute with Pakistan?
Whether you like to recognize it or not, the US is still bound by our treaty obligations. And India did break her agreement to the US and Canada wrt diversion of nuclear tech to weapons programs- specifically the use of the Canadian reactor and diversion of heavy water supplied by the US to make bombs.
Just because India is not signatory to the NPT, that doesn't relieve the US of our own obligations under the treaty.
Tell me, why doesn't India go to the UN and lobby to be recognized as a nuclear state under the NPT? That's something that the US would support, and we could sidestep this whole issue.
"We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008
So did you by vertically proliferating and breaking the agreements.
Btw, thread is not about China or Pakistan...
well, considering it was started by a pakistani, I guess the boys figured Ms. Jana wanted an insight as to why India gets the deal, where else "others" don't...
Nabha Sparasham Deeptam
-Touch The Sky With Glory
Neo, in all fairness, what India did pales in comparison to what Pakistan did.So did you by vertically proliferating and breaking the agreements.
But that's not the issue for the US, and that's not what the thread is about. It's whether or not we toss out our NPT obligations just to please India, and what effect this will have on the other major players, who could easily feel justified to aid Iran and North Korea outside existing guidelines. If that happens, there isn't a damn thing the US could do to protest.
That's my concern, I could care less what India does. They have the bomb already, and they will have to learn to live with it, just as Pakistan will.
Bullsh*t. Jana posted an article in the US Politics forum, about the comments by American weapons control people to the American Congress.
The article is about their concerns and the effect the deal would have on US policy and our treaty obligations.
Jana could be a Martian, for all I care. If she wanted to know why Pakistan doesn't get the deal, she would have asked the question herself.
"We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008
Agreed on all points!
Back to the topic.
Judging by the reactions we got after the 1998 tests, do you think its plausible for other nations, especially China a P5 member to accept it??
And tell me, why should India lobby everybody for that status? heck, India did those tests already which is clear enough for a brain dead to understand she is already a nuclear state.
And for the complaints that NPT will be violated by this deal, China has consistently flouted NPT rules, India, Pakistan tested their devices, NK is in the process and Iran is also getting there. If NPT was so successfull none of this wouldve happened.
India is a nuclear weapon state and NPt has to live with it. Rest of the nations are tired with the hegemony of P-5 nations and this exclusive NPT club. Indias bomb will do the same killings as China's bomb, it does not have any preference, it will not check whether its from a P-5 nation, it just kills . Its time to disband P-5, coz they outlived the sole purpose of its existance.
Its up to the US to help India in this, no one forced the US Govt for the deal. They took the decision based on their future needs.
A grain of wheat eclipsed the sun of Adam !!
India hasn't even tried. With US support, you would probably have Britain. Russia would probably go along, both as an ally of India, and for the opportunity to make money off her. France could be bought easily enough, so the only sticking point would be China, who could probably be persuaded easily enough just because it meant IAEA compliance for India. Even if China refused to go along, she would be isolated in the SC over it, which would mean loss of face for China and a political victory for India.
But you're not even willing to try. Why not? What does that say about India?
Because she wants the International recognition as such, and the benefits of recognition, and that's how to go about getting it within the existing International framework.
The US is not China, or any of the other states you mentioned. We are supposed to be the ones that set the good example, at least in theory.
First you complain about the world reaction to the 1988 tests, and now you say that the rest of nations are sick of the NPT. Which is it? India wants the access offered by the NSG to signatory nations, but you think you don't have to abide by the same standards that everyone else does. I just can't figure out why you think India is entitled to it when no one else is.
And what "rest of nations" are you referring to? The 193 signatories, or India, NorK, and Iran? Like it or not, more nations are signatory to the NPT than any other International treaty in history. This deal decimates the NPT in one stroke, and we all know it. So I can understand why India is hot for it, can you understand why there are some who are not so convinced it's a wise move? Why have so many members of the NSG, like Australia and Canada been so vocal against it? Remember, these are two of the US's closest allies. Let's face it, India is not.The decision hasn't been made yet, my friend. The Pres can agree to it, but the Congress has to approve it, which is looking more and more unlikely all the time.
The US isn't India's (or anyone else's) nanny. Without exception, I hear Indian posters constantly gripe about the US and rant on as if the US owes India something. What I have yet to hear is just how this deal is supposed to benefit the US. What "future needs" will this satisfy? (please don't tell me about all the reactors India is going to buy, pleasing Westinghouse is not the same thing as protecting America's strategic interests)
In business, you need mutual benefit for relationships to work. So far, all I hear is ME ME ME from the Indian side...
"We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008
tan tana tan!!! i'm cooked... rolling out...
Nabha Sparasham Deeptam
-Touch The Sky With Glory
i dont need to ask for that insight becuase i think every country has the right to act according to her own intrests and thats what all countries do.
i just wanted to know the opinion of the members on some reservations on the deal by Americans.
So tronic please dont get chronic every time just by seeing "India"
highsea thanks for the sensble post
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
Share this thread with friends: