Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

US-India nuclear deal and Pakistan —Ijaz Hussain

If the US refuses to extend to Pakistan concessions similar to those accorded to India, Islamabad’s best bet will be China. Given the stake that the latter has in maintaining balance of power in South Asia, rectifying the imbalance in the region resulting from the US-India nuclear agreement will be in China’s interest

Portrayed as “a historic bargain, which could transform the global balance of power in as significant a manner as Richard Nixon’s opening to China”, the US-India nuclear agreement was indeed a crowning achievement of the Indian prime minister’s visit to the United States.

According to the communiqué issued by the White House, President George Bush agreed that “India should acquire the same benefits and advantages” as other states with advanced nuclear technology. He vowed to “work to achieve full nuclear energy cooperation with India”.

As a quid pro quo, India promised to separate its civilian and military nuclear programmes, continue a moratorium on nuclear testing and open its civilian nuclear facilities to IAEA inspections. The agreement reportedly has the backing of Britain, France and Russia. Besides, prior to the agreement the Bush Administration had three rounds of consultation with key members of the Congress.

The agreement has drawn severe criticism from a number of quarters, particularly the champions of nuclear non-proliferation, the BJP and the Indian leftist parties and, of course, Pakistan. The non-proliferationists believe that the agreement defeats the very purpose of the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The BJP and the leftist parties in India see the hallowed principle of “self-reliance” compromised. They also resent the fact that US is not supporting India’s quest for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. But how do we explain Pakistan’s hostility to a purely civilian deal?

Pakistan has its own reasons for being upset with the agreement. First, in its view, the agreement implicitly recognises India as a nuclear weapons state, the American protestation to the contrary notwithstanding. This interpretation derives from the statement in the agreement according to which India would “assume the same responsibilities and acquire the same benefits and advantages as other leading countries with advanced nuclear technology” which could only refer to nuclear weapons states. This development is quite worrying for Pakistan because out of the three non-parties to the NPT (India, Israel and Pakistan), it is now the only one denied some sort of recognition as a nuclear weapons state.

Second, since the line between civilian and military uses of nuclear technology is very thin, the agreement though relating to civilian cooperation has implications for military uses. Ashley Tellis, a specialist on US-India relations at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who, along with Robert Blackwill, former ambassador to India and currently deputy national security adviser to Condoleezza Rice, conceived the present agreement earlier this year, has laid out a broad vision for India-US relations in a paper entitled “India as a New Global Power”.

In it, he advocated geo-strategic cooperation between the US and India through sale of American defence and military equipment to New Delhi and support for its growing nuclear arsenal. Without mincing words, Tellis wrote: “If the US is serious about advancing its geopolitical objectives in Asia, it would almost by definition help New Delhi develop strategic capabilities such that India’s nuclear weaponry and associated delivery systems could deter against the growing and utterly more capable nuclear forces Beijing is likely to possess by 2025”.

Conscious of the agreement’s potential to cause uproar, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice telephoned President Pervez Musharraf to assure him that it was not directed against Pakistan. She also tried to convince him that it was meant to help India’s civilian nuclear power generation capacity and that there was no secret nuclear agreement between the two countries. According to Nicholas Burns, the US undersecretary of state, Musharraf’s response was “constructive and not overly problematic”. True to his temperament, Musharraf reacted to the development with sang-froid. However, given the seriousness that the matter deserves, he held a meeting of the National Command Authority on July 24 in which it was reportedly decided, among other things, that the government initiate talks with the US for a similar arrangement with Pakistan.

Will the effort bear fruit? Burns has categorically ruled out the possibility of a similar concession to Pakistan. Given that this agreement and the 10-year US-India defence pact signed earlier are meant to project India as a counterweight to China, it does not make sense to expect that Pakistan will be treated at par with India. However, one needs to keep in mind that at present Pakistan has, in the words of Condoleezza Rice, “a central position in the US foreign policy”.

For one thing, the US will need Pakistan’s support for quite some time in the war against terrorism. This gives Pakistan an important card to wangle concessions from the US in the nuclear field. The present situation may not be much different from that which obtained following the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan when the US decided to ignore Pakistan’s nuclear programme.

Also, let us not forget that the US may need Pakistan as a counterweight to India. In other words, since India will be looking — by temperament and tradition — for “strategic equipoise” in its relations with China and the US rather than get sucked into the latter’s orbit, Pakistan’s support may be vital to pressuring India. It may not therefore be wise for the US to put all its eggs in the Indian basket. Consequently, the American government’s refusal to extend nuclear cooperation to Pakistan may not have been the last word on the subject. Let us not forget that the US has relented on F16s sales to Pakistan after the matter appeared to be taboo for a long time.

The American objection to extending a concession similar to the one accorded to India relates to the AQ Khan network’s role in nuclear proliferation. But extending the culpability from individuals acting in their private capacity to the state of Pakistan, which some circles in the US are bent upon insinuating, is utterly unwarranted. It is noteworthy that Mr Bolton, undersecretary of state at the time the proliferation scandal came into the open, cleared the Pakistan government of any wrongdoing.

In testimony before the US Congress he categorically stated: “We have no reason to believe that President Musharraf or the top echelons of the Pakistan government were in any way involved with Khan”. Still, Pakistan will have a gargantuan task convincing the US that the proliferation scandal is history and that Pakistan is a responsible nuclear state deserving of cooperation in the nuclear field.

The gratuitously malicious observations made by the Indian prime minister have certainly not helped the matter. The passage from “greater control” of Pakistan’s nuclear programme that Senator Kerry wanted to cooperation in the civilian field — if it comes about — will be nothing short of a miracle.

If the US refuses to extend to Pakistan concessions similar to those accorded to India, Islamabad’s best bet will be China. Given the stake that the latter has in maintaining balance of power in South Asia, rectifying the imbalance in the region resulting from the US-India nuclear agreement will be in China’s interest. The American breach of the NPT regime will certainly help China do so without any qualms.

The writer, a former dean of social sciences at the Quaid-i-Azam University, is an independent political and legal analyst

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_3-8-2005_pg3_2