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TechnoratiIndia never joined the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Instead, it developed and tested nuclear weapons. It is a known nuclear proliferator. India is now thought to have an arsenal of some 60 nuclear weapons, and India's first nuclear test in 1974 led Pakistan to also develop and later test nuclear weapons. India's 1974 nuclear test also led to the formation of a Nuclear Suppliers Group, a group of 45 countries that agreed to ban nuclear technology transfers that would make nuclear proliferation more likely, particularly to countries such as India and Pakistan that were outside the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Despite the obvious implications for nuclear proliferation, George W. Bush put forward a plan in 2005 to transfer nuclear technology and materials to India. For this plan, which is best characterized as the US-India Nuclear Proliferation Deal, a special waiver was needed from the Nuclear Suppliers Group, requiring the consent of all members. This deal ran into trouble when Austria, Ireland and New Zealand initially sought to uphold the obligations of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and held out for tighter proliferation controls, at a minimum a commitment by India that it would conduct no further nuclear tests. Although India would not make this commitment - only going so far as to say it would engage in a voluntary moratorium on testing - arm-twisting diplomatic pressure from the US caused these last hold-outs against proliferation to capitulate. The only barrier remaining to this Nuclear Proliferation Deal going through is the US Congress.
The Bush administration has given three justifications for pursuing this deal with India. First, it will forge a strategic partnership with the world's largest democracy. Second, it will help India meet its increasing energy demand in an "environmentally friendly" way. Third, it will open a market for the sale of billions of dollars of nuclear technology to India.
Forging a strategic partnership with India is fine, but why do it on a foundation of nuclear weapons proliferation? Surely, other countries will be looking at this Nuclear Proliferation Deal as a model that will serve their own interests as well. If the US can do it with India, why not China with Pakistan? Or Russia with Iran? Or Pakistan with Syria? The possibilities for nuclear proliferation are endless, and this deal makes them more likely.
It is also fine for the US to help India to meet its growing energy demand in an environmentally friendly way, but it is absolute hypocrisy to classify nuclear energy "environmentally friendly." No one knows what to do with the long-lived radioactive wastes from nuclear power plants - not the US, not anyone. And these wastes are truly long-lived. In the case of the highly toxic and leukemia causing by-product of nuclear power production, plutonium 239, the wastes will gradually decline in danger over a period of 240,000 years. Not the best gift to bestow on future generations.
There are other reasons as well to be skeptical of nuclear power plants. They are capital intensive, subject to accidents and tempting targets for terrorists. They also require large societal subsidies, such as the underwriting of liability insurance. The uranium used in these plants, if highly enriched, not a technologically difficult feat, provides the basic ingredients for nuclear weapons. The plutonium generated in these plants, if reprocessed, also not difficult technologically, provides another fissionable material for nuclear weapons. Why not support India to produce truly environmentally friendly energy sources, such as wind or solar energy?
The third reason for the US-India Nuclear Proliferation Deal sounds to me like the real one - that it will open a market to sell billions of dollars of nuclear technology to India. There will be a small number of corporations and their chief executives that will profit big-time from this deal, but they will be doing so at a heavy cost to the people of the world. This Nuclear Proliferation Deal has "double standards" written all over it. Can you imagine the US pushing the same deal with Iran, Iraq or North Korea? Of course not! This deal puts a hole the size of a nuclear explosion through the heart of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Very soon the US-India Nuclear Proliferation Deal will be back before the US Congress for a final vote. If the Congress approves the deal as it stands, it goes through. If Congress votes it down, it doesn't go through. This deal, initiated and promoted heavily by the Bush administration, will undermine the security of the American people and people everywhere, if Congress allows it to go through.
The Bush administration was able to pressure the members of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, but the American people should not allow Mr. Bush to proceed with this final cynical act to enrich the few at the expense of national and global security. If you care about the dangers of nuclear weapons proliferation, it's time for action. Let your representative in Washington know that you expect a No vote on the US-India Nuclear Proliferation Deal.
10 Comments so far
Show AllIf I may, briefly; refer to my comment of Aug. 21: 6:14PM, under "US-India Nuclear Deal a Non-Proliferation Disaster" by Anthony Salloum, pointing out that the American Jewish Committee took some credit for facilitating the Indo-US exemption from the Non-Proliferation Treaty. The batting average of the AJC, AIPAC, etc. is about 95% in lobbying Congress. Ex-Congress people voting against these interests include: Cynthia McKinney, Earl Hilliard, Robert Livingston, Paul Findley - and Senator Charles Percy. A Presidents who fell out of favor was George H. W. Bush.
RON: Thank you for your response. I am well aware of the spent fuel problem, but I also believe that India has major water problems as contributing factors to potential safety risks.
Perhaps someone with nuclear tech expertise can correct me, but don't these plants require water as an essential basis for their cooling systems? If so, consider that water is already scarce in many parts of India, and the water relied upon in many regions of the world through seasonal climate changes can less and less BE relied upon.
Also, when I think of India I think of the lack of indoor plumbing in many places, the lack of what in the west is considered hygiene, and the way the Bhopal incident came about due to a lack of enforced environmental provisions, in other words little in the way of regulation. Putting together water scarcity, scant SAFE environmental regulations, and nuclear energy is a LETHAL combination, but for the small percentage that profits from these gigantic deals.
The water use depends upon the site. Many Nuclear (or fossil-fueled plants) are at the edge of some adequate body of water where the cooling water is taken and returned - warmer. That was a factor in France last summer when the Rhone River became too warm for the plant cycle and the electrical output had to be reduced. Away from a useable body of water, cooling towers are employed, with an evaporative loss that would occur - but even then we can suppose that it comes back eventually, somewhere, as rain. Relative to nuclear, I imagine that the water usage is a very minor problem vis-a-vis the safety question of what to do with the spent fuel. The spent fuel outcome in the US is certainly not a good example. Here, spent fuel is accumulating in water pools at the plant sites, which has become the permanent temporary practice, while the fuel rods continue to oxidize. We have been politically unable to resolve: how to reprocess the fuel to recover the energy content, what method to stabilize the permanently radioactive residue - whether to entrain it in glass or polymer "logs", or even the approval of the US nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain Nevada - which has been dragging on since about 1970. The reprocessing in the US is shut down over concerns of how to secure the plutonium component of the extracted usable energy content. As an aside, it is just ridiculous for John McCain to declare that his political opposition is obstructing the development of more nuclear power. Further aside, the nuclear industry of the US, excepting GE with the less practical boiling water reactor, has simply migrated to Europe, Britain, and Japan. We cannot regard nuclear as a domestic industry, anymore. It s another foreign dependency.
Am I the only one who can't make sense of the first paragraph? I understand what the article is saying, but the first paragraph must have a key word left out or it must have one of the words, "proliferation" or "non-proliferation", misused.
As to the subject of the article ... surely this has to be the point where our cowardly sellout Congress will finally draw the line. But I'm not counting on it.
Okay, here is yet another opportunity for the Pelosi-Reid team to show some backbone, spunk, and political leadership. Here is yet another issue to corner your elecxted federal representatives on as far as what their position is on this vital matter.
Forget about all the smoke and mirror posturing going on right now by the media and political campaigns--demand an answer!
Poet
If you google: Iran Pakistan India "peace Pipeline" opposed by the US - - you will have several references to the fact that the nuclear special deal for India includes a promise by India to scuttle the proposeded natural gas pipeline to bring Iranian natural gas to India and Pakistan, and to create a cooperative atmosphere between India and Pakistan. It is an effort to isolate Iran. Heaven forbid that something good be done for Iran - even, for India, at the cost of a faustian bargain for nuclear instead of natural gas energy. It further puts India in the category of permitted atom bomb holders in violation of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, to render the treaty a dead letter.
A further reference is "The Indian Left and the Indo-US Nuclear Deal", by Vijay Prashod, 09/03/08 in "Counterpunch". Mr. Prashod gives more detail of the US interaction with India.
Like this administration gives a crap about any treaty. Especially one that could help prevent millions of Americans from becoming radioactive ash.
Before my elected officials even think of aproving this they had better damn well provide
fallout shelters for every citizen. Something that will promote life for many half lives...
Do you have the bill #'s in the house & senate?
I'm not lazy, just on dial-up.