Washington typically takes double standards into the US-India nuclear relations, writes Emad Mekay from Washington The United States-India nuclear energy deal agreed on during a visit by US President George W Bush to New Delhi this week undermines the US moral position against the Iranian nuclear program and takes the notorious US double standards towards the Arab and Islamic world to new heights. President Bush met with Indian Prime Minister Singh on Thursday and agreed to share nuclear energy technology and provide the country with nuclear fuel in return for cosmetic monitoring of the country's military nuclear programme. The deal has been criticized by some experts who are worried about the message it sends to the world and spread of atomic weapons. "It's now going to be tough to argue that Iran and North Korea should be denied nuclear technology while India--which has failed to even join the Non-Proliferation Treaty--is given the same technology on a silver platter," said Christopher Flavin president of Worldwatch, a Washington-based global affairs research institute. The US and other major nuclear powers have all pledged under nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) "not in any way to assist" the acquisition of nuclear arms by non- nuclear-weapon states. Nuclear experts here in Washington are in agreement that India is a non-nuclear-weapon state by the treaty's definition. "In the rush to meet an artificial summit deadline, the White House sold out core American nonproliferation values and positions," said Daryl G Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, one US group skeptical of the agreement. But while India had pledged to open India's largely closed nuclear establishment to international oversight in return for the deal, critics say that the agreement Bush approved allows India to in fact keep major existing, and future, facilities of its nuclear sector engulfed in secrecy and devoted to manufacturing nuclear weapons. The Asian giant is also designating its fast breeder reactors, which can produce large quantities of the nuclear bomb material plutonium, as military facilities that will be outside the IAEA's mandate. According to experts close to the deal, India will only subject 14 of its 20-some nuclear power reactors to international supervision by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). "The so-called civil-military separation plan announced is clearly not 'credible' from a nonproliferation standpoint as the Bush administration had promised it would be," Kimball said. "By opening up the spigot for foreign nuclear fuel supplies to India, this deal would also free up India's limited domestic reserve of uranium for both energy and weapons to be singularly devoted to arms production in the future," he added. This US generosity has its motives but it clearly contradicts the country's near hysterical opposition to Iran's nuclear program, although Tehran says it needs the program for civilian purposes. Yet, the right-wing Bush administration, which has a tendency to be cozy to other right wing governments and administrations, has countered that the deal is important because India was a rising and influential global player. As such India could counter-balance US rivals in Asia like China. George Perkovich an expert with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington argues that the nuclear deal is based on administration's "desire to balance Chinese military power in Asia and the Indian government's obsession with nuclear energy." Another reason for warming up to India on the nuclear front is that Washington wants New Delhi's support in its self-styled war on terror, an expansive term that now includes an euphuism for pre-empting rising powers in the Islamic world especially after the 9/11 attack on U.S. landmarks. During the visit President Bush talked about the need to share intelligence with India in order to defeat terrorists. "One way we work together on terrorism is to make sure intelligence services share information," Bush said. Singh concurred. "I was particularly pleased that we agreed on the need to root out terrorism, of which India has been a major victim," he said. "We must fight terrorism wherever it exists, because terrorism anywhere threatens democracy everywhere." "Obviously, the US right and the Hindutva right like the idea of a joint war on Islam, but it even predates 9-11," said Neil Tangri the Center for Economic Justice. To the right-wing strategists in the US, many of them often keep an eye on Israeli interests in the Middle East while crafting US policies; this war includes an energy component. They hope by giving India, an energy thirsty country that seeks to fuel its surging economy, with nuclear energy they may eat away at any future influence energy-rich Arab countries may have. Bush has pledged to cut his country's reliance on Arab oil by 75 per cent over the coming years. But energy experts say the dent in the need for Arab oil may be too small. India will in fact gain little from the deal on the side of energy security. According to Worldwatch, nuclear power provides only three per cent of the electricity produced today in India. The research organisation also finds that even if the 30 new nuclear plants the Indian government hopes to build are actually completed over the next two decades, nuclear would still provide only five per cent of the country's electricity and two per cent of its total energy. But there are more reasons for the deal too. The agreement was cheered here by business groups and corporations many of them are drooling at the size of the Indian market, with the world's second largest population of 1.1 billion people. US corporations say India boasts the world's largest middle class, approaching the size of the entire US population. These well educated consumers have an increasing buying power and present many opportunities for US business. The country is already one of the US' fastest growing export markets. "US and Indian businesses have long seen the value in working together and the President's determination to cement the relationship with this critical partner should be commended," said Harold McGraw III of the Businesses Roundtable, a leading US lobbying business group. One heftily lucrative area for US businesses is defense trade. During the visit Bush pledged to help meet India's defense needs and to provide the important technologies and capabilities that India seeks. Given that the powerful US businesses and the hawkish anti-Islamic mood in the US congress, initial hopes by critics of the deal that the US law makers will stop the deal may soon be dashed as the Bush administration and its friends in right-wing circles market the deal as a necessary step for the country's security and the war on terror.
