Musings on the U.S.-India ‘Nuke-for-Mangoes’ deal passed by the U.S. Congress on Dec. 9, 2006
India should have little reason to cheer
Watch for reaction from the winners of the ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal: China, Russia, Pakistan & six Arab Gulf states
Washington, D.C., Wednesday, December 13, 2006 - Despite the heroic lobbying effort of the Sikh-American community which sees grave danger from a nuclear-armed India (and the U.S.-India ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal) to their sacred Homeland of Punjab, Khalistan, (sandwiched between two nuclear powers, India and Pakistan, in South Asia) the U.S. Congress in its majesty voted last week, on December 9, 2006,. in favor of the, “The Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006”, which will be sent to President George W Bush, this week to be signed into law. (Please see Khalistan Calling dated November 15, 2006, headlined, “Khalistan Affairs Center launches advocacy campaign against U.S.-India ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal,” by clicking at:- > http://khalistan-affairs.org/home/khalistancalling/2006/november15.aspx <)It is interesting that no one during the debates on the HILL has mentioned the tough U.S. Proliferation Law called the "Sanctions for Nuclear Detonation or Transfer of Nuclear Explosive Devices Act 1994, " drafted by Senator John Glenn of (D-Ohio) now retired. A staff director of the Senate Government Affairs Committee, Len Weiss, describing the Glenn Law said in a May 15, 1998 interview, that, “the 1994 Glenn Sanctions Law is America's most sweeping, unambiguous non- proliferation law”. The export license ban, under that law, obviously involves all forms of defense cooperation and technology transfer. It pertains not just to the supply of government to government assistance, but to commercial sales of arms, munitions, and dual use technologies and know-how. Way back in the May 27, 1998, Khalistan Calling, quoted an aide to Senator John Glenn (D-Ohio), the author of the 1994 non-Proliferation law, (> http://khalistan-affairs.org/home/khalistancalling/1998/may27.aspx <) as having told a prestigious American weekly, Defense News (of May 18-24, 1998) that; "We intended to ensure that these sanctions have teeth. It cannot be interpreted as having teeth that are in a glass on the bedside table." Does this 1994 non-proliferation Glenn Law now stand retired to “a glass on the bedside table,” following the passage of the Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006?
Last time when the House version of the Nukes-for-Mangoes U.S.-India deal was put to vote on the Hill, some weeks ago, it passed with 369 Congressmen for it. On Friday December 8, 2006, when the House voted again, the vote was reduced a bit and stood at 330 members voting for it - some Congressmen probably had second thoughts after being lobbied by opponents of the bill like Congressman Edward J. Markey (D-7th -MA) and others. The “Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006”, offers India, US nuclear technology in exchange for inspectors' access to some Indian civilian reactors – the military reactors are not covered by this deal just as its nuclear weapons sites will also remain off-limits. The accord is being hailed by some jingoists in India today, just like these jingoists hailed the May 11, 1998, nuclear tests by India (which tests were exposed by this column on May 8, 1998, three days prior to the tests; see report, by Elaine Sciolino, in the New York Times of Saturday May 16, 1998, headlined, ‘Scooped on Tests - U.S. Scorns a Sikh Journal’) before Pakistan bared its ‘nuclear fangs’ on May 28, 1998, when every Indian jingoist ‘Hawk’ scurried for cover with his tail between his legs. Eye witness accounts from New Delhi, at that point in time (May 28, 1998) spoke of the dead silence which descended on the usually noisy British-built Indian Parliament building, (which incidentally was built by the Colonial British on stolen Sikh Gurdawara land) after news came of Pakistan’s May 28, 1998, nuclear tit for tat tests at Chagai in its Baluchistan province. Some experienced Diplomatic and Nuclear experts predict that the ‘Henry Hyde’ bill will damage Nuclear non-proliferation efforts worldwide specially in the Middle East and Asia.
As a result of the grave prediction of the Nuclear experts mentioned above, this column has been monitoring the South Asian and Middle Eastern media for reaction to the ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal (read Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006) passed on the Hill in the early morning of December 9, 2006 – which is about noon Saturday December 9 Pakistan Standard time. By a strange coincidence the strategic missile group of the Pakistan Army Strategic Force Command (ASFC) successfully test-fired its latest short-range, nuclear-capable, solid-fuel, ballistic missile, Hatf-III (Ghaznavi), at about 3 PM on Saturday December 9, 2006. The Hatf –III missile (named Ghaznavi) has a 290-kilometre range which can cover every nook and corner of the Sikh Homeland of Punjab where India has massed over a thousand tanks, over eleven divisions of Infantry, twelve squadrons of Indian Air Force warplanes and a dozen batteries of nuclear capable but obsolete liquid fuel (300 Kilometer range) Prithvi missiles among other support units of the Indian Army and Airforce. Read details of the December 9 Pakistan nuclear missile test (which obviously was meant as a loud and clear ‘message’ for the twenty two million Sikhs, living in Indian Occupied Sikh Punjab) by clicking at: > http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006\12\10\story_10-12-2006_pg7_14 <
In another coincidence a BBC report, published on Sunday December 10, 2006, at 16.59 PM, GMT, (or Noon Washington Time Sunday December 10, 2006) the six member Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), a grouping of oil-rich extremely wealthy Arab countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE) which had been meeting in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, has for the first time ever, in an official statement served notice to the world that the six Arab states, of the region, have a right to possess nuclear technology for ‘peaceful purposes.’ Prince Saud al-Faisal the suave Saudi Arabian Foreign minister (he has been foreign minister for over thirty years) also told reporters, according to the BBC, that, "It is not a threat... It is an announcement so that there will be no misinterpretation for what we are doing." For details of the BBC report please click at the following link:- > http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/6167041.stm <
In a yet another coincidence the Khaleej Times, a UAE Dubai based newspaper, published a Reuters Islamabad-datelined report that, for the first time ever a contingent of China’s People’s Liberation Army arrived in the Pakistani garrison city of Rawalpindi, adjoining Islamabad, on Sunday (December 10, 2006, 24 hours after the signing of the ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ U.S.-India deal) to take part in the exercises, named “Friendship - 2006”. (For details of the report please click at the following link:- > http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2006/December/subcontinent_December342.xml§ion=subcontinent&col= <) Lahore-based Daily Times, a widely-read English language Pakistani newspaper, also reported on December 12, 2006 that the Chinese troops have left for Pakistan’s mountainous Northern areas, probably Pakistan-held Kashmir (a ‘message’ for India?) for exercises. (> http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006\12\12\story_12-12-2006_pg7_15 <)
In a yet another coincidence the Chinese State Media, which like the Chinese government, was maintaining a ‘studied silence’ about the U.S. India ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal (read “The Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006”) has, according to India’s leading Chennai-based HINDU newspaper (of December 11, 2006) broken its silence. The Hindu has published a Bejing-datelined report which accuses the United States of contradicting its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The Chinese state-owned Xinhua News Agency has said that, “The legislation is also in contradiction to the obligations of Washington as a lead signatory to the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty. The treaty obligates its signatories not to provide assistance to the nuclear programs of states that did not sign the NPT. The U.S. Atomic Energy Act also prohibits nuclear sales to non-NPT countries. There are still several legal hurdles to be removed before the U.S. and India start civil nuclear cooperation, including a comprehensive agreement on technical elements of the bill, which again needs Congressional approval.” End Quote. For details of the report in India’s prestigious English language Chennai-based newspaper, THE HINDU, please click at:- > http://www.hindu.com/2006/12/11/stories/2006121105521200.htm <
The above reports remind one of an old and very popular saying. “Once is a chance. Twice is a coincidence. Third time is a certainty.” The above four remarkable and synchronized occurrences, it is obvious are not coincidental; they are directly related to the passage in the U.S. Congress, on December 9, 06, of the Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006 - Nukes-for-Mangoes deal. A deal the Chinese Hsinhua News Agency has correctly pointed out, ‘is in contradiction to the obligations of Washington as a lead signatory to the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty.’
In a related News Analysis of the Nuclear deal, by Siddharth Varadarajan, headlined, “India has very little to cheer’ published in the HINDU newspaper of December 12, 2006, needs to be studied closely by the readers and everybody else, specially the Indian jingoists. (> http://www.thehindu.com/2006/12/09/stories/2006120908401100.htm <) The Hindu’s correspondent has put forward arguments that point out that, out of the 10 concerns raised by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the final U.S. law, on U.S.-India nuclear cooperation addresses little more than two-and-a-half points. Siddharth Varadarajan further points out that, “It is a measure of the American legislature's indifference to the assurances conveyed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to the Indian Parliament, on August 17, that most of the objections he raised about the legislative shape, given to the U.S.-India nuclear agreement, have largely been ignored.”
It is obvious that history is repeating itself on the subcontinent as the Indian jingoists are again thumping their chests about the ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes; deal, a la the BJP thugs, who also beat their chests, after the May 11, 1998 nuclear test by India. That May 11 1998 nuclear test by India was a Himalayan blunder, which turned out to be in Pakistan’s interest, not India’s, as Delhi had already tested a nuclear device in 1974. Three weeks later, on May 28, 1998, Pakistan, a Muslim majority country, which could never have dared to test its nukes (‘hidden in the cellar’) carried out tit for tat nuclear tests in Chagai and joined the Nuclear ‘Club’ with a bang and thus neutralized the Indian Army’s conventional superiority in one stroke.
In view of the four synchronized coincidentals, mentioned above, it will be worth repeating, in the conclusion of this column, the two questions asked a week ago in the last paragraph of the Khalistan Calling, dated December 6, 2006, (> http://khalistan-affairs.org/home/khalistancalling/2006/december06.aspx <) which were:- Firstly, what is going to stop China from signing, tomorrow, a similar ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal with its ‘all-weather’ time-tested friend, Pakistan where it is building an energy corridor from the seaport of Gwadar to Urumchi in its Sinkiang province? Secondly, why would China or Russia or even France, after this brazen U.S.-India ‘nukes-for-mangoes’ deal, refuse, or hesitate to sell ‘peaceful’ Nuclear reactors to the wealthy, but parched, Arab Gulf states (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Qatar and Oman) for their sea water desalination plants, who have the money, (and now also have the political will) about acquiring nuclear energy for peaceful purposes? It will not be too outlandish to also conclude that history might repeat itself on the subcontinent again. Pakistan could easily become the biggest gainer from the Henry J Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006, (read U.S.-India ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes deal) and is probably the reason why Pakistan did not oppose publicly the nuclear proliferation inherent in the U.S. legislation. Would not Pakistan be justified now to sign a similar long term ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal with beleaguered (energy-short) Bangladesh, formerly its province of East Pakistan, in order to undo the 1971 split and bring it back into the confederation as an equal for after all it was the Bengal Muslims who were the standard bearers of the Pakistan movement in the 1940’s. In the short term Islamabad could simply and quickly bring Bangladesh, (with or without Dacca’s OK) under its nuclear umbrella by hurling a missile in a ‘friendly and peaceful’ test off Bangladesh’s seaport of Chittagong in the Bay of Bengal.
As far as the world’s 25 million Sikhs (3 million free in the diaspora and 22 million captive in India) are concerned they are ALL opposed to any influx of nuclear technology into South Asia (the Henry J Hyde United States-India ‘Peaceful’ Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006 is an example) which allows nuclear weapons on the side. They all want – they want to survive - a South Asia free of missiles and Nuclear weapons. That is why the Washington-based Khalistan Affairs Center made a heroic effort to lobby against the U.S.-India ‘Nukes-for-Mangoes’ deal as the half million strong Sikh-American community senses grave dangers in the current situation, where India and Pakistan, have nuclear missiles pointed at each other with the Sikh Homeland of Punjab, Khalistan, (with its 22 million Sikhs and numerous holy shrines) sandwiched between the two.