Nuclear Thread - 2

ramana · 08-20-2007, 10:14 PM

I disagree with Athale's contention that just because the NDA started the deal they have to support this. The version they started is far from this version. Its ridiculous for the commentators to insist that NDA support the deal in any form. THis deal has to be decfided on its merits of how it advances and holdbacks India's interests.

Acharya you should take some time to highlight the post as folks wont have time to read the whole thing.

Now from Deccan Chronicle, 20 August 2007.

QUOTECurious Silence on Hyde
By Pran Chopra

Like all his earlier statements on the subject, Prime Minister Manmohan Singhâs statement in Lok Sabha on August 13 on the 123 Agreement was a model of firmness, precision and clarity. It would have done credit to a top level nuclear scientist for its grasp of intricate technicalities. But it does that all the more to him, because it comes from a lifelong economist, who has been additionally wrapped up for years now in the political intricacies of governance in his kind of circumstances.

But that only adds to the mystery of the absence of any reference by him to a key element in Indiaâs nuclear relations with America, namely the Hyde Act, which, in most Indian comments in recent months, has been held to be the villain of the piece and chief cause of all the doubts which have lately arisen in India regarding the viability of the Indo-US nuclear "deal." It also makes one wonder whether and how far America considers itself to be bound by the 123 Agreement.

Correspondingly, it also raises the question whether India would be better off without the Agreement, that is, whether the shortcomings of the Agreement outweigh all of its advantages, of which it certainly has some.

This question had always existed. But now it has been underscored by the Prime Minister himself in his statement of August 13, in which he has mentioned some of the circumstances in which the Agreement could collapse. Some of them are rooted in the Agreement.

Some more, and more serious ones, have been added by the Hyde Act.

For a reason which is better considered later, the Prime Ministerâs statement is silent on the Hyde Act. Regarding 123, the statement is heavily weighted in favour of the Agreement. The points he has picked up from the Agreement are not only the centre, but the substance of his statement in Lok Sabha.

The Agreement admits that it may collapse under the weight of the disagreements between the two countries over some of its provisions. It explains that therefore an "elaborate and multi-layered consultation process" has been included with regard to any "future events" that may be cited by either party for seeking "termination of cooperation under the Agreement" or termination of the Agreement itself.

That is probably an amplification of the elegant remark by the Prime Minister in another context regarding what would happen if India carried out a nuclear explosion for testing a nuclear weapon.

He said, "We have the right to test. They have the right to protest." That means either side will take such a step, whether it be "testing" or "protesting," only after considering the balance between the advantages of taking that step or foregoing the right to take it.

In other words, each country will have to consider the balance of advantage between its reasons for terminating the Agreement and the reasons why it has come thus far for reaching it. Of course, that will depend less upon the wording of the text of any agreement than upon the difference between the bargaining power of each country today and what that difference might be at the time when either country may think that the time has come for it to reassess the usefulness of the other country to it.

That distant measure of the difference at that time between the power status of either country in the eyes of the other will depend upon how well each country has, in the intervening period, utilised the power assets that it has today for maximising them by the time it reaches that critical date.

{Kicking the can downstream.}

So, an added question before India today turns out to be whether its efforts to maximise its bargaining power by that future date will be helped or hindered by India agreeing to the 123 Agreement today, or alternatively by carving out such alternatives to the Agreement as it may, today or tomorrow, forge with its present bargaining power.

Compared with that, it is relatively easy to speculate why he decided to remain silent on the Hyde Act. It could be a tactical reason, that he might as well take advantage of the absence of the Left opposition from the House to confine the debate to the Agreement, because the remaining opposition in the House was not too greatly opposed to it.

Or it could be the broader reason that it would be better to conserve its firepower on the Hyde Act for the fuller debate on nuclear and other foreign policy issues which would materialise not too far hence.

Or it could be a still broader consideration. Indiaâs contention has all along been that it considers itself bound only by the bilateral agreement between the two countries, and not by any domestic legislation, such as the Hyde Act, which America may cite as justification for considering itself empowered to act against India for any act which America may unilaterally consider to be culpable. Silence on the Hyde Act would be a sufficient reiteration of that position, without getting into a war of words with the opposition which may involve the government in verbalisations which would embarrass the governments of both countries at a time when both are jointly dealing with very sensitive issues. That would be a sufficient if silent reiteration of his position that, as quoted earlier, "We have the right to test. They have the right to protest."

{I think this is the reason.}

But that makes it all the more necessary for India, and that without any avoidable waste of time, to draw the worldâs attention to the many respects in which the Hyde Act goes beyond the limits of the Agreement. India must insist that before America begins to cross those limits it must clarify whether it is willing to comply with the 123 Agreement itself, and to sort out any gaps in interpretation which could be an embarrassment later to either country.

This responsibility devolves individually upon each member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group. A decision by the group as a whole but equally binding upon every member can fudge the judgment of each member on the many-sided issue before us. The issue is whether India is violating the 123 Agreement or America is by insisting that the Hyde Act must take precedence over the Agreement. That issue must decide how much of the responsibility, and the penalty, for a breakdown of the 123 Agreement, if it were to occur, should fall upon India, as a joint custodian of that Agreement along with America, and how much upon America as the unilateral author of the Hyde Act.



Pran Chopra is the doyen of op-ed writers in India. He always wries in Indian interests. I would take his views quite seriously.

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