How India’s New Nuke Deal Might Set Off an Arms Race

Ok to the author: I agree Israel has had an excellent non proliferation record BUT India has had an impeccable record, if not better than Israel's. Please get you facts straight as India is a responsible power which deserves this treatement.

zia mian is a muslim ***. Bush should have joined with India to nuke all the Pakis along with their friend Bin laden. instead he spent his time peeing in iraq.

To my Indian brothers; no matter how well the English you speak is, you still scare The (shlight) of me. if you can' be good to your own; how can you be (any) good to the rest of us?

The utility of this deal for India is more from bypassing the technology denial regime in place. India is unable to import so many items which many countries see as dual use. This is something holding back India in research. Energy is a big deal. India is not competing with anybody on nuclear weapons. India has never attacked any country in its thousands of years of history & has always been attacked & ruled by others. The depiction of India with Pakistan, North Korea & Iran does a great dissverice to India. India is an open & democratic society which doesnt hold any hidden designs on anybody. Why would Pakistan need more nukes? They already get it from accross the border as & when required from 'You know who'. Did anybody really believe that Pakistanis built their own nukes?

Mr. Kushner has conveniently ignored to mention the role played Dr. Khan and Pakistan in nuclear proliferation. Pakistan's Govt. provided a full cover to Dr. Khan and the full extent of the trade and damage is atleast not available to media and public.

A new American leadership is needed to most genuinely start the dialog for nuclear disaarmament. Atleast 10 years from now, there should be genuine reduction in the nuclear weapons pointed at each other. Neither Pakistan nor India can afford to engage in new a weapons race...but it does help the super powers like USA, China and Russia to sell more arms. Even UK and France....so true peace is in nobody's interest.

An American leader who talks about disarmament will be called a wimp, loser and a weakling -- who will want to face the weapons industry and also face career ending peace or disarmament initiatives.

Also, Mr. Kushner has conveniently ignored the role played by Pakistan in nuclear proliferation (Dr. Khan and nuclear traders gang). Tremendous damage has already been done in terms of spreading the technology, fuel and parts.

There needs to be new true leadership in Nuclear disarmament now....but unfortunately, any American leader who will talk of world wide lowering of Nuclear weapons will be blamed to be a wimp, loser and weakling -- nobody has the courage even remotely suggest this career ending option.

I totally disagree with this article. India has urgent need for power. Its good to see so many people disagree with the article. I come from India and there are severe power shortages across the country. I my state there are places that have regular blackouts for 8-12 hours a day. Businesses are asked to shutdown for a day in a week due to lack of power. Can you believe businesses getting shutdown due to lack of power? It happens in India. So this is very important deal for India and has been made for the right purpose. India certainly needs more power.

As far as this deal is concerned, its a success for both USA and India. We Indians are very grateful to USA for supporting us through this. I don't think it would be a good idea to give a similar deal to Pakistan since its record is not good. Its just trying to return to democracy. I guess China wants to cash in on this by giving a similar to deal to Pakistan. Its really time to put brakes on China which is doing all wrong things. Supplying fake goods, tainted milk and other things to the world etc. They used fake fireworks and underage athletes in the Olympics, can you believe it? Hope the world recognizes all this. Anyway, the bottom line is, this is a good deal made for the right reasons. Our PM Manmohan Singh is a real patriot, who went almost to the brinks of losing his government to make the deal. So its a very hard earned deal and India is a peace loving country. It deserves better recognition than China.

I totally agree with other comments here. Kushner, with all due respect has no idea about regional, geographic, political and ideological differences between India and the other countries mentioned. India happens to be the world's largest secular democratic country moving rapidly towards a state of interconnectedness with the rest of the world. It has been a victim of terrorist activities from its neighbors especially Pakistan, and with China freely supplying arms to both Pakistan and Bangladesh, its borders are perennially insecure. The country has had to maintain close to 400000 foot soldiers along its borders of CHina and Pakistan, on harsh mountainous terrain just to keep Islamic and Chinese insurgents from making any significant inroads into its vulnerable borders. The last thing India wants is an arms race as it simply cannot afford to compete. Having said that India has its energy needs, which for some reason people believe is a cover up for a nuclear arms race. It absolutely isn't. India has genuine and urgent energy needs and given that it has the worlds largest young population and will only get younger over the next forty years, these needs are only going to grow. Therefore having access to cheaper energy is both urgent and unavoidable. Additionally given that India does have the worlds largest thorium reserves, it can only benefit from putting some those resources to proper civilian use. I think Mr. Kushner would do well to study a bit more about the world than just throw some uneducated badly researched ideas at us.

Although author says that "it sailed through the body with scarcely a peep" pertaining to nuclear deal, One big point that he forgets to make is it had to pass to thru' several hurdles within the indian govt. And the severity of consequences was such that govt would lose majority in the parliament there by giving way for fresh elections. also as far as nuclear proliferation is concerned, the world knows India's record. Also there is absolutely no comparison with Pakiston on no terms. I mean for how long has a democratically elected govt been in place in Pakistan. As for China i need not mention. Where did Pakistan and North Korea get nuclear technology ? What astonishes me is why such a view is even thought of. It clearly makes one wonder if this author has gathered any facts at all ? Also i wonder if Newsweek Editor is even checking the articles before it goes to print ?

Although author says that "it sailed through the body with scarcely a peep" pertaining to nuclear deal, One big point that he forgets to make is it had to pass to thru' several hurdles within the indian govt. And the severity of consequences was such that govt would lose majority in the parliament there by giving way for fresh elections. also as far as nuclear proliferation is concerned, the world knows India's record. Also there is absolutely no comparison with Pakiston on no terms. I mean for how long has a democratically elected govt been in place in Pakistan. As for China i need not mention. Where did Pakistan and North Korea get nuclear technology ? What astonishes me is why such a view is even thought of. It clearly makes one wonder if this author has gathered any facts at all ? Also i wonder if Newsweek Editor is even checking the articles before it goes to print ?

Although author says that "it sailed through the body with scarcely a peep" pertaining to nuclear deal, One big point that he forgets to make is it had to pass to thru' several hurdles within the indian govt. And the severity of consequences was such that govt would lose majority in the parliament there by giving way for fresh elections. also as far as nuclear proliferation is concerned, the world knows India's record. Also there is absolutely no comparison with Pakiston on no terms. I mean for long has a democratically elected govt been in place in Pakistan. As for China i need not mention. What astonishes me is why such a view is even thought of. It clearly makes one wonder if this author has gathered any facts at all ?

I think Adam B. Kushner's hypothesis and analysis is fundamentally flawed. The U.S. made the mistake of treating Pakistan and India "on even terms" for years, even though India and U.S. are much closer in sharing values of freedom and democracy. Kushner continues to make the same mistake, because he has not studied the issues in the region. This article is wildly speculative and does not recognize that if India does not get nuclear power, it will have to toe the line of Iran and Saudi Arabia to fulfill its energy requirements. In the current geopolitical situation where China holds a trillion dollar of U.S. treasury bills, there is no other country in the region that can keep China in balance. This deal will let the world know that the countries which value similar value systems will stand together. The past investment by U.S. in Pakistan only resulted in A.Q.Khan's proliferation. Who do you think assisted North Korea? (China and Pakistan) Given the weak democracy and the mighty power of mullahs and military in Pakistan, there is no reason to believe that they deserve or would get a nuclear deal.

I dont know how to react when some one is comparing the largest democratic and peace loving country India with rouge states like Pakistan, Iran and North Korea. The author has no clue about what to compare and what not to.

The article is below is average grade in terms of analyzing the real situation. You forgot to mention that the world has ultimately recognized as the sixth nuclear country and there is no other way anyone can stop that eventuality. The article also forgot to mention about Pakistan???s Dr. Khan Nuclear Worldwide Store supported by Pakistani Administration. No other country is comparable to India???s stature in terms of no-proliferation, democracy, peace loving country and the value systems which is sometimes even non-existent to some of the so called western countries.

The article is below is average grade in terms of analyzing the real situation. You forgot to mention that the world has ultimately recognized as the sixth nuclear country and there is no other way anyone can stop that eventuality. The article also forgot to mention about Pakistan???s Dr. Khan Nuclear Worldwide Store supported by Pakistani Administration. No other country is comparable to India???s stature in terms of no-proliferation, democracy, peace loving country and the value systems which is sometimes even non-existent to some of the so called western countries.

I completely agree with the comments below. It will not increase any arm race. If India want to produce nuclear bombs they could have as they tested first in `1974 more than 34 years ago.
So it's not a question of arms race, its a question of bilateral cooperation.
Though apparently from a neutral point of view this article seems logical it's not. US cannot treat the same as there are many factors mostly political, regional factors are there which these two countries close. Moreover US corporation can't deny the huge market of Indian consumers...So its not a question of equality but question of addressing these issues.

I completely agree with the comments below. It will not increase any arm race. If India want to produce nuclear bombs they could have as they tested first in `1974 more than 34 years ago.
So it's not a question of arms race, its a question of bilateral cooperation.
Though apparently from a neutral point of view this article seems logical it's not. US cannot treat the same as there are many factors mostly political, regional factors are there which these two countries close. Moreover US corporation can't deny the huge market of Indian consumers...So its not a question of equality but question of addressing these issues.

You must be kidding! If the author had done even a little bit of research, the non-proliferation records of India and Pakistan would not have been mentioned even in the same sentence. "Though Pakistan's proliferation record has been worse, both countries tested nuclear devices." India's record has been impeccable and the world knows about Pakistan's A.Q. Khan and the secondary market he created. Newsweek's editors need to do better!

Any serious nuclear expert will say India's record in Non-proliferation has been impeccable. Comparing with Pakistan (which is the world nuclear bazaar) is not fair. This point has been one of the main reasons why US choose to ahead with the deal. The nuclear deal is for civilian power generation. US and other NSG countries will not transfer technology for weapons creation. I do not see any scope of an arms race.