India to share US nuclear secrets

Bush just made a complete about-face in US geopolitics by agreeing to share nuclear technology, reactors and fuel with India.

Bush has promised to "seek agreement from Congress to adjust US laws and policies, and [to] work with friends and allies to adjust international regimes to enable full civil nuclear energy cooperation and trade with India".

India, remember, is a regional power armed with nuclear weapons which refuses to allow UN weapons inspectors or the IAEA full access to it's facilities. It is, however, a democracy and has a majority of Hindu believers.

The Indian Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, promised Congress that India would not spread its nuclear technologies in an obvious reference to long-term antagonist Pakistan. However, India has never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and it seems it still doesn't intend to, although India did give assurances that its military and civilian nuclear programmes will be separate, it will place its civilian reactors under international safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency and continue it's moratorium on nuclear testing

India also said it will maintain strict controls on all nuclear technology and observe guidelines of the Missile Technology Control Regime and other guidelines observed by nuclear powers.

That, of course, is why Bush needs to get Congress to change the rules. As Defense Tech points out:

The Bush Administration is prohibited by US law and its international obligations from providing civil nuclear assistance to India, because New Delhi refuses to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. In fact, the international obligation in question -- the voluntary Nuclear Suppliers Group -- was created as a response to India's 1974 "peaceful" nuclear explosion.

Pakistan, a close ally of the US in it's war on terror but a nation run by a dictator and with a vast number of Islamic extremists, has been at war with India or close to war on several occasions over the last three decades - mostly over the disputed Kashmir region. both nations have nuclear-tipped missiles which could reach as far as Baghdad.

It is possible that the Bush administration might also think of India as a bulwark against possible Chinese expansionism. However, as has been reported in Newshog before now, India and China have an already close relationship in many matters including energy resources, military co-operation and mutual economic agreements with Russia, Brazil and others.