Well he does raise some serious allegations, any idea how true they are ? I would much rather a person from the hawkish right side raise allegations than a leftist cry bohoo nukes violation of world peace.
We should address the concerns he has raised unless they are fear mongering
It is more of a vengeance article then a thoughtful one. It seems he has got some kind of issue with S Jaishankar the way he has lambasted him. Look at his ranting here :
But the George W Bush Administration ensured during Manmohan Singh’s tenure via the 2008 nuclear civilian cooperation deal negotiated — need I repeat again — by the current foreign minister, S Jaishankar, who was then Joint Secretary (Americas) in MEA. It guaranteed that India would not become a thermonuclear power.
But lets have a look at what is written in the agreement.
As part of the overall initiative, India will expand international safeguards, adhere to international nuclear and missile export guidelines, continue its voluntary moratorium on nuclear testing, and ensure that all civil nuclear trade will be used only for peaceful purposes. Because India will place a greater number of its reactors under safeguards, it reduces the nuclear infrastructure available for its weapons program. These commitments constitute significant gains for global nonproliferation efforts.
It says that maximum of our reactors would be under IAEA safety guidelines, not all the reactors. To have weapons grade Uranium or Plutonium, a couple of functional reactors are good enough. As of now we have 8 reactors which are not under IAEA safeguard policy and for which we don't have to submit audit documents to them. Means we have eight working reactors for having enriched weapon grade fuel.
Second point being, what has changed in the agreement from 2009 to 2024? Nothing.
S Jaishankar was a diplomat during signing of the agreement and today he is FM when we tested MIRV. Then he was taking order from Government of India and today also he is taking order from Government of India. Then too India didn't agree to sign CTBT, now also India has not signed CTBT. So we have self imposed a ban on testing rather then getting ourselves sold out for an agreement as BK is implying.
A leftist is a hawk in disguise for me. None of them do talk of balance. But for a nation to thrive, you need to have a centerline approach. At that time it was important for us to have a stable nation rather then having a TN weapon or test. It was important for us at that time to think about the economic aspect of the deal rather then going grass eating way of our hawkish neighbor.
I've already said in some other thread that, if you can build something, it doesn't mean you have to build it.
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