|
|
|
|
Strategic Analysis:
A Monthly Journal of the IDSA
Indian Nuclear Tests, Then and Now: An Analysis of US and Canadian Responses
By P.M. Kamath
*
India and Canada both have been members of the Commonwealth though Canada got independence in 1867, while India became an independent state only in 1947. But there has been a special bond between the two nations ever since 1947 and they have worked jointly together in many areas in international relations. Thus, for instance, the Neutral Nation’s Repatriation Commission—after the Korean War—which was chaired by India, had Canada as a member. India played a comparatively major role in world affairs, while the role of Canada was one supportive of India. India’s early role in international relations during the 1950s led some scholars to consider India as a regional power of significance, while they hesitated to confer the same status on Canada. 1
But Canada and India had numerous differences. Canada has been a founder member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), an instrument of Cold War confrontation with the Soviet Union which continues to survive as a military alliance even after the end of the Cold War and disintegration of the Soviet Union. India has been a founder member of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) which has lost much of its strength after the end of the Cold War, if not its relevance entirely.
India and the US also exhibit numerous similarities and contrasts in their attitudes towards each other. India is an ancient culture but a modern state and a modernising society. American culture, on the other hand, is hardly 200 years old but America is a modern state. Both are vibrant democracies, and as the cliche goes, the US is the most powerful democracy while India is only the largest, because it is the most populous, democracy.
Ever since the end of World War II, there have been only brief periods of cordial relations between the two. The best time was the one immediately after the Sino-Indian border conflict in 1962, 2 while more often the US has tried on one ground or the other to limit the power of India. A recent example is of the US firming up a strategic partnership with China. As A.M. Rosenthal wrote in the New York Times, Bill Clinton’s priority is China. “American democracy and Chinese dictatorship knitting together in trade and security strategy. What strategy? Was India consulted, even thought about?” The US never really understood India because of its “arrogance, ignorance and condescension.” 3
Similar convergence and divergence in the perceptions of the US and Canada also existed. The US is the first country to have weaponised atomic energy and used atomic weapons. Its stockpile of nuclear weapons is the largest in the world even today after the end of the Cold War. But despite having plenty of uranium in the country as a natural resource, and having achieved nuclear capability in the 1950s, Canada took the path of advocating the peaceful use of nuclear energy, and nuclear disarmament.
Of course, this contrasting attitude can be explained by the geographical location of Canada on the northern borders of the US. Thus, the fact that the US’ nuclear defence preparedness includes the defence of Canada and the two nations cooperate in many ways in the defence of the Western hemisphere, gives greater freedom of action to Canada in the defence arena. Similarly, today, because of their economic interdependence, there are practically no industrial units in Canada which do not have joint collaboration between the two countries. A war, therefore, let alone a nuclear war, between the two nations in inconceivable.
I have gone into these basic facts of the convergence and divergence of approach among these three nations, because they have an impact on their perceptions of each other in international relations, particularly in relation to the shaping of their perceptions towards the Indian nuclear tests, earlier, in 1974, and now, in 1998.
India-Canada Nuclear Cooperation
Similar cooperation in the nuclear area was beginning to develop between the US and India under the Atoms for Peace programme launched by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in his famous speech in the UN General Assembly on December 8, 1953. 4 The plan was to share technology for developing atomic energy for civilian uses with adequate international safeguards to ensure it is not diverted for military use.
The US plan was welcomed by Nehru. It was in 1958 that, for the first time, India-US nuclear cooperation was finalised when India included an atomic power plant in the western region in its third Five-Year Plan. This eventually led to the signing of the Tarapur Agreement in 1963 which established the Tarapur atomic power generating plant, the first ever set up by the US outside Europe. This was the first, and as it turned out, the only example of Indo-US cooperation in the nuclear energy area.
By then the IAEA had been set up and the US desired that India strictly adhere to international safeguards on nuclear cooperation. The US regarded India as a test case for implementing the safeguards regime. There was much resistance in the Indian nuclear establishment. Homi Bhabha argued forcefully that acceptance of the IAEA imposed safeguards regime would only widen the gap between the developed and the developing nations. 5
India had developed the ability to weaponise nuclear technology in the late 1950s. However, the idealism of non-violence, more urgent needs of economic development and Nehru’s hope of resolving border conflicts with China by pursuing the policy of “defence by friendship,” all made Nehru restrain himself from going nuclear.
A few months after the CIRUS reactor had gone critical in 1960, Nehru had expressed in the National Development Council: “We are approaching a stage when it is possible for us to make atomic weapons.” That state was definitely achieved when in 1964 India became the fifth power capable of extracting plutonium from spent fuel. It was made possible with the establishment of the facility in Trombay for reprocessing the spent fuel, with a capacity of 30 tonnes per year.
But soon after China’s nuclear explosion on October 16, 1964, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, who was then the minister for information and broadcasting, stated in an interview on French Television in Paris on October 22, 1964, that “India is in a position to produce the bomb within 18 months.” 6 But significantly, she added: “I think we should not deviate from our stand and use atomic energy for peaceful purposes only.” Even after she became the prime minister in January 1966, she reiterated the Indian capability, but also the intention to abstain from going nuclear while keeping the option open.
Was Nehru totally against weaponisation? I do not think so. After the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP)-led government decided to go nuclear in May 1998, Arjun Singh lambasted the government for “flexing its nuclear muscles,” thereby going against Nehru’s idea of not using nuclear energy for destructive purposes. 7 But, as though to place the record straight, President K.R. Narayanan, recalled Nehru’s words of 1946 when he said: “As long as the world is constituted as it is, every country will have to devise and use the latest scientific devices for its protection. I hope Indian scientists will use atomic power for constructive purposes. But if India is threatened, she will inevitably try to defend herself by all means at her disposal.” 8
Indian Nuclear Tests
It was only because Indian security was threatened that India conducted the nuclear tests at Pokhran in 1974 and 1998. If one is asked to state in a nutshell the reasons for the Indian tests then and now, one might say that it was the US’ honeymoon with China then as well as in 1998, that propelled India to conduct its nuclear tests.
India last faced a major war with Pakistan in December 1971 over the conflict between its two wings—West and East. The conflict was, in its origin, Pakistan’s own home-grown one, not India’s creation. However, India was dragged into the conflict when over ten million East Pakistanis sought refuge in eastern India, as West Pakistani soldiers went berserk to suppress the autonomy movement in East Pakistan.
The conflict escalated into a global one because of the US-Soviet Cold War and the American secret plans then to use the China card to balance its perceived weakness vis-a-vis the Soviet Union. The US’ desire to turn its bilateral diplomacy with the Soviet Union into a trilateral one made it seek cooperation with China—a Communist country, which then considered the Soviet Union as its enemy number one. The Bangladesh conflict got entangled with the US’ search for partial weight to balance the Soviet Union. Brzezinski, who later became Carter’s national security advisor, then had called it “a 2-1/2 powers world.” 9
Thus, when the Bangladesh conflict began to unfold, President Nixon asked Mrs. Gandhi to wait till he had finished his China visit in February 1972, to find an acceptable solution, ignoring totally the human cost of the delay. During the Bangladesh War, the US wanted to demonstrate to China that it could be a trusted as a friend, by supporting Pakistan, its close friend and an ally. When you seek the friendship of a new person, you try to support his long standing friend. In global diplomacy, nations do not behave differently.
Thus, during the course of the war, Nixon’s national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, was secretly meeting in New York, the Chinese ambassador in the UN, and asking him to do something like direct intervention in the war on the side of Pakistan, instead of merely protesting against India. Prior to the beginning of the conflict, Kissinger had also called the then Indian ambassador, L.K. Jha, in Washington, to the Western White House in California on July 17, 1990, two days after Nixon publicly announced his impending visit to China, to directly warn India that the US “will be unable to help you against China,” in the event it decided to intervene on the side of Pakistan. 10
Second, in the course of the war, the US dispatched the USS Enterprise, a nuclear powered warship to the Bay of Bengal, in the Cold War gunboat diplomacy, to threaten India to desist from attacking West Pakistan. Nixon in his memoirs claimed credit for saving Pakistan from the designs of “Indian aggression and domination.” 11 Kissinger also echoed similar views in his memoirs when he wrote, “There is no doubt in my mind” that the Indian declaration of ceasefire “was a reluctant decision resulting from Soviet pressure, which in turn grew out of American insistence, including fleet movement.” 12
Thus, the growing collusion among the US, China and Pakistan during the Bangladesh War and later, in the background of the instances of the US’ use of blackmail involving nuclear weapons, at least partially, prompted Mrs. Gandhi’s decision to go nuclear in May 1974.
Pokhran II
If it was the first US honeymoon with China which lasted till the Tiananmen Square incident in June 1989 that prompted India to go nuclear , the second US-China honeymoon began in the second term of Clinton in the White House, beginning from January 21, 1997. During the visit of Jiang Zemin to Washington, DC in October 1997, despite all warnings from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), President Clinton agreed to provide the latest technology to produce nuclear energy to China. Earlier, in 1996, the US, under Clinton’s personal intervention, had sold satellite technology to China. Despite the opposition from the State Department, he transferred the subject of consideration of requests for transfer of nuclear technology to the Commerce Department from the State Department, thereby clearly declaring that the commercial interests alone prevail. 13
Similarly, the US agreed to transfer missile and satellite technologies to China. This was again in the background of the known cooperation between China and Pakistan in the latter’s development of nuclear weapons and missiles. The Chinese transfer of M 11 missiles to Pakistan has been well documented. As a matter of fact, in August 1993, the Clinton Administration had imposed partial economic sanctions against China and Pakistan for the former’s transfer of M 11 missiles to Pakistan, only to lift them in October 1994. 14
What could be the motive? It is too early to be authentic in analysing this recent phase in US-China relations. However, some important clues can be offered. First, is the Chinese market. There has been a phenomenal rise in US-China trade. US exports to China had touched $12.8 billion in July 1998 against Chinese exports to the US of $62.6 billion; thus, China was controlling over $49.8 billion in trade surplus. Chinese cooperation was essential in getting at least some money back into the US economy as Chinese investments.
Second, during the economic crisis of the South-East Asian countries in early 1998 which led to the devaluation of their currencies, China agreed not to devalue its currency. By so doing, the Chinese agreed to slow down their trade with the US, thus helping to reduce the trade gap. Naturally, China needed to be rewarded.
Third, China is suspected to have indirectly contributed to Bill Clinton’s re-election fund in 1996. It is alleged that Loral Space and Communications Inc which was permitted by the Clinton Administration to transfer satellite technology to China in 1996 gave an election contribution of $632,000. Among others, a Chinese aerospace official also gave $100,000 to the same cause. 15
Whatever may be the cause of the US’ second honeymoon with China, the growing collaboration between China and Pakistan, India’s two main adversaries, and the US’ connivance in it, aggravated the Indian perception of a national security threat. 16 Thus, once again, the US had demonstrated its lack of sensitivity for Indian concerns about Chinese nuclear and missile development and cooperation with Pakistan. Then, there was the US attitude of treating India and Pakistan on par. How can there be parity between India’s one billion population and Pakistan’s 132 million?
Beyond these immediate causes, the US has been very accommodative of China. Earlier, in 1996, at the insistence of China in the Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva over the negotiations on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), the US had agreed to include an entry-into-force clause, which provided that India has to be one of the eight signatories to the CTBT and in the event of India failing to sign, the 44 members of the CD were to decide on the steps to be taken to secure India’s compliance.
India, thus, was in a dilemma. Since the CTBT negotiations had begun–all the prime ministers–Narasimha Rao, Deve Gowda, and I.K. Gujral—had parroted their resolve to perserve India’s nuclear option. But time was running out for India to decide as to how to retain the option. It was obvious India could not hold on to the nuclear option indefinitely. It could have been done only by going nuclear in view of a nuclear threat from the north-west and north-east.
Reactions of Canada and the US to Pokhran I
The Canadian government, like the US, was very surprised at the Indian test of May 1974. The plutonium used in the nuclear device was produced by the Canadian aided nuclear reactor—CIRUS. Earlier, Indian officials had repeatedly assured Canada that the government did not intend to explode a nuclear device. Prime Minister Trudeau had warned Mrs. Gandhi that in the event of India conducting any nuclear test, Canada would cut off all nuclear cooperation as well as all economic aid. 17
In the meanwhile, the Americans were becoming more concerned about the Indian nuclear capability, particularly after China became the first Asian state to possess nuclear weapons. The US also shared its concerns with Canada, particularly regarding the fears on plutonium extracted from CIRUS’ spent fuel being used for developing atomic weapons. Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau then informed Indira Gandhi:
The use of Canadian supplied material, equipment and facilities...at CIRUS, at Rajasthan, or fissile material from these reactors, for the development of a nuclear explosive device would inevitably call on our part for a reassessment of our nuclear cooperation arrangements with India. 18
Mrs. Gandhi rejected this interpretation while stating:
The obligations undertaken by our two governments are mutual and they cannot be unilaterally varied. In these circumstances, it should not be necessary in our view to interpret these agreements in a particular way based on the development of a hypothetical contingency. 19
Canada reacted sharply to the Indian nuclear test of May 18, 1974. However, Canada was satisfied that India had not violated any agreement between the two countries. But the secretary of state for external affairs stated that the Indian test had put back by many years the clock on international efforts to prevent all nuclear testing and proliferation of nuclear weapons. India did not accept that view; it maintained the peaceful nature of the nuclear explosion and declared that it had no intention to go in for nuclear weapons.
However, Trudeau worked vigorously to carry out his threat. Canada cut off all nuclear cooperation with India since then. By the late 1970s, serious setbacks in Indian nuclear energy development were evident. Of the many factors, Canada’s withdrawal of nuclear cooperation was cited as an important one. India, then on, adopted the policy of self-reliance in nuclear energy development.
The US Response
The US was also caught unawares by the Indian nuclear test, though the fact that India possessed the capability to produce nuclear weapons was well known to American specialists. The US also took the initial position that the plutonium used by India was not generated from the US supplied nuclear reactor. But the US, particularly at the Congressional level, was upset at the proliferation taking place despite the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which had come into force in 1970.
However, US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who was fully in charge of US foreign policy then because of Nixon’s involvement in Watergate, responded midly; his and, therefore, the US’ response was mild in comparison to the Canadian one. Dennis Kux who worked in the State Department then, states that he had, assuming the US policy, drafted a stronger protest. But Henry Kissinger, who then was in total control of foreign policy disagreed and milder criticism was made. Kissinger argued that since the explosion was an accomplished task, “public scolding would not undo the event...” 20 Kissinger was also concerned about possible reduction of US influence over the Indian nuclear policy, thus, affecting US-India relations during the Cold War. He also made it clear that he did not believe that it altered the balance of power in the region. Nevertheless, “We are opposed to proliferation.” 21
The Congressional opinion was much more critical of India than the executive branch. The senators and congressmen demanded punitive action against India. Senator Abraham Rubicoff lamented India’s diversion of scarce economic resources on scientific vanity while 600 million Indians were languishing in the pit of poverty. The usual questions were raised as to why should American tax payers’ money be squandered to aid India when Indians themselves were not concerned about the poor? But Senator Edward Kennedy blamed the nuclear weapon states like the US and Soviet Union for not doing enough to promote non-proliferation, which could create confidence in the Indian leadership to abstain from the nuclear path.
Beyond public responses, of course, the US not only cut off all economic aid but introduced more stringent regulations to cover future nuclear cooperation between the US and other states. In the main, the US Congress passed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act (NNPA) of 1978 which among others, demanded strict adherence to the international safeguards prescribed by the IAEA. It also made supply of enriched uranium for the Tarapur nuclear plant initially difficult. Later, during Mrs. Gandhi’s visit to Washington, DC, France replaced the US by agreement, as a supplier of enriched uranium for the Tarapur plant. 22
Responses of the US and Canada to Pokhran II
In the US, the Republicans in general, then and even now, are less committed to the goal of nuclear non-proliferation than the Democrats. This is evident in the vehemence demonstrated by the Democratic Administration of Clinton in criticising the Indian nuclear tests of May 1998. It is not possible here to catalogue all the anti-India utterances of the US. Even if one limits it to the public criticism by the Clinton Administration officials, one will still have to be very selective.
President Bill Clinton himself set the tone for the US criticism of the Indian tests when he characterised them as a “terrible mistake.” 23 He also said that with democratic traditions, the nuclear path is not the way to “greatness.” 24 Madeleine Albright was speaking like a school headmistress, when she said in a TV interview on June 20: “We want to make them understand that they cannot blast their way into nuclear status.” 25 The State Department spokesman, James Rubin, accused the Indian government of being deceitful in its dealing with the US on the nuclear issues. He accused India of lying and conducting a “campaign of duplicity” during 20 high level meetings between the two countries.
The Republicans in the Senate and the House were more critical of Clinton than of India, though they made clear their opposition to the Indian tests. Congressman Frank Pallone, then co-chairman of the Congressional India Caucus, said that he did not support the Indian tests. But he said that China-Pakistan strategic and nuclear collaboration, including the Pakistani test firing of Ghauri “placed India in a vulnerable position” which led to the Indian tests. 26
If you dismiss his milder attack on India because of his known pro-India stance, see what Newt Gingrich, then speaker of the House said to highlight Clinton’s dangerous policy of “transfer of American missile technology to China.” Beijing now makes its missile system “more deadly through multiple warheads on each missile.” He further added that China conducted 45 tests, but “Clinton continued to accommodate” it. On the other hand, the “Administration roared with outrage when a democratic Indian government chose to test its capability.” 27 Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Jesse Helms, characterised China as the one-third of the problem in the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
The US also imposed economic sanctions against India and asked other members of the G-8 countries to follow suit. The economic sanctions were intended to harm the Indian economy and economic development. It also withheld $143 million of aid. The punitive intentions of the US are clear from the testimony of Karl Inderfurth, assistant secretary of state before the House International Relations Committee when he said: “More than $1 billion worth loans have been postponed...having a ripple effect in the Indian economy and resulting in decreased investor confidence.” 28
Canadian Response
How did Canada react to the Indian nuclear test this time in May 1998? The world saw a new arms race beginning between India and Pakistan in the manner of the US and Soviet Union Cold War of bygone years. Critics again blamed Canada, as they did in 1974, for providing crucial technology in the form of Canadian built reactors. This suggestion was rejected by Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien. He insisted that Canada held no responsibility for India’s latest explosions because, “the technology of 1974 is completely passe.” 29
It did not mean that Canada was not greatly concerned on the issue of nuclear proliferation. As a matter of fact, no Canadian prime minister had visited India since the 1974 nuclear test. Hence, for the first time, in early 1996, Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien’s visit was planned. But before taking a final decision, he wanted an assurance from India that it will not go in for nuclear tests.
If Canada had discreetly suggested to India not to conduct its nuclear tests during its PM’s visit, it was a genuine diplomatic concern. Then, in the background of the CTBT negotiations in Geneva, the Canadians did not wish to be caught in the middle of an international controversy. But to ask for a guarantee that India would not conduct nuclear tests was a preposterous demand. No sovereign nation will give such an assurance. Eventually, the Canadian PM did come to India, and among other things, he also advised India to give up its nuclear option.
Naturally, Canadian opinion in general was shocked by the Indian nuclear tests. Canada had signed the CTBT in 1996. As stated earlier, Canada had taken a more pacifist stand on the question of nuclear weapons. Gordon Edwards, head of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility moaned: “The nuclear powers had stopped producing plutonium and were dismantling weapons. Since the dawn of the nuclear age, we had never been closer to achieving a nuclear weapons-free world.” 30
The Canadians argued that now there are fears that other developing countries, such as Iran, may step up their attempts to get the bomb. Gordon Edwards also disputed Prime Minister Chretien’s disavowal. He, on the other hand, said: “Without the CANDU technology they would not have tritium, which you need for an H-bomb. Whenever we sell a nuclear reactor, we’re selling a machine that produces tritium and plutonium, which you need for an A-bomb. CANDU is the only one on the market which does both.”
Thus, Canada joined other Western nations in condemning the Indian nuclear tests. Canadian Prime Minister Chretien said that India’s tests could “set off a nuclear arms race on the Indian subcontinent and lead other countries to develop and test nuclear weapons.” 31 Canada recalled its ambassador and joined others in cancelling all non-humanitarian aid—about half of $29 million. It also joined the US in halting all military cooperation and military sales to India. Prime Minister Chretien, during his official visit to Britain before the G-8 summit, announced that he was cancelling immediately all ministerial and official level contacts between the two governments “as a sign of protest.”
Canada also joined hands with the US in persuading other G-8 members to impose economic sanctions against India. But other European nations did not join the US and Canada. French spokesman, Daniel Vaillant, went one step further in stating that the French government does not encourage Americans to impose sanctions and this is not the way to “discourage” India. However, Prime Minister Chretien admitted that the world’s furore after India conducted three nuclear tests, was “not making a difference.” “Obviously they aren’t listening,” he said. But he maintained that the clamour was necessary because of the real danger that “other countries may follow suit.” 32
Conclusions
The Canadian response on the whole, seemed to be much more moderate this time than in 1974. This does not mean that Canada was not concerned with the US’ goal of non-proliferation. But since 1974, when all nuclear cooperation between India and Canada was cut off, there was hardly any nuclear interaction between the two. Hence, Canada had very little direct responsibility for the Indian tests.
Second, Canada-India bilateral trade was of the tune of $1.1 billion. Canada was unwilling to risk the trade benefits. Third, the mantle of global leadership in promoting nuclear non-proliferation had fallen on the US and the US was doing it to the best of its ability. Hence, there was no need for Canada to unnecessarily harm its bilateral relations with India.
On the other hand, during 1974, it was the US which had taken a milder stand on the Indian tests. Canada was very vociferous because the moral responsibility for the Indian tests had fallen directly on Canada. Second, the US, soon after the Bangladesh War, was willing to accommodate Indian aspirations for major power status. During the Cold War, there was also the fear that if the US appeared to be very harsh on India, it may move close to the Soviet Union. Henry Kissinger was not willing to alienate India then. But now the US has the burden of maintaining its status as the only superpower and there is no challenger to its status.
However, eventually, both the US and Canada will have to recognise that a democratic India on their side is a better bargain than a Communist China. This was stated very aptly by Samuel P. Huntington in his “Clash of Civilizations” and “Remaking of World Order” when he said that “their common interests in containing China are likely to bring India and the United States (add Canada) closer together. The expansion of Indian power in Southern Asia cannot harm US interests and could even serve them.” 33
But in the ultimate analysis, the goal of non-proliferation can be met only when the major nuclear powers like the five nuclear weapon states—the US, Russia, Britain, France and China—who are also the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, take the lead in reducing drastically their nuclear arsenals, with the aim of achieving time-bound nuclear disarmament. In this, the US needs to play an active role in giving up nuclear hegemony and Canada needs to exercise its influence towards it. However, the US’ unilateral decision to bomb Yugoslavia for 79 days and force it to accept NATO troops on its soil, shows that nations under a security threat might seek a nuclear weapon as a national insurance rather than agreeing for nuclear disarmament. The question often asked is: would the US have dared to attack Yugoslavia if it had a few nuclear weapons?
Endnotes
*: UGC Professor Emeritus, Mumbai University. Back.
Note 1: N.D. Palmer and H.C. Perkins, International Relations: The World Community in Transition, Second Indian Reprint (Calcutta: Scientific Book Agency, 1965), p. 5. Back.
Note 2: See Official Text, “Ambassador Barnes’ Interview With Indian Agencies” (New Delhi: USICA, June 11, 1982). Back.
Note 3: A.M. Rosenthal, “The Shout From India,” New York Times, May 14, 1998. Back.
Note 4: See Dwight D. Eisenhower, The White House Years: Waging of Peace, 1956-1961 (Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., 1965), pp. 392 & 468. Back.
Note 5: See Rashmi S. Bhure, “Indo-US Nuclear Relations: The Politics of Cooperation and Conflict” (unpublished PhD thesis), University of Bombay, 1995. Back.
Note 7: Times of India, May 18, 1998. Back.
Note 8: Ibid., July 30, 1998. Back.
Note 9: “The Balance of Power Delusion,” Foreign Policy, no. 7, Summer 1972, pp. 54-9. Back.
Note 10: Seymour M. Hersh, The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House (New York: Summit Books, 1983), p. 452. Also see Christopher Van Hollen, “The Tilt Policy Revisited: Nixon-Kissinger Geopolitics and South Asia,” Asian Survey, vol. 20, no. 4, April 1980, p. 348. Back.
Note 11: Richard M. Nixon, Memoirs (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1978), p. 530. Back.
Note 12: Henry Kissinger, White House Years (Boston: Little Brown & Co, 1979), p. 913 (emphasis added). Back.
Note 13: P.M. Kamath, “Indo-US Relations During the Clinton Administration: Upward Trends and Uphill Tasks Ahead,” Strategic Analysis, vol. 21, no. 11, February 1998, p. 1616. Back.
Note 14: P.M. Kamath, “US-China Relations Under the Clinton Administration: Comprehensive Engagement or the Cold War Again?” Strategic Analysis, vol. 22, no. 5, August 1998, p. 705. Back.
Note 15: Times of India, May 21, 1998. Back.
Note 16: For details, see P.M. Kamath, Indian Nuclear Policy: From Idealism to Realism (Jaipur: Printwell Publishers, 1999). Back.
Note 17: Dennis Kux, Estranged Democraties: India and the United States, 1941-1991 (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1993), p. 315. Back.
Note 18: Quoted in Robert Wohlstetter, The Buddha Smiles: Absentminded Peaceful Aid and the Indian Bomb (Los Angeles: Pan-Heuristics, 1977), p. 117. Back.
Note 20: Kux, n. 17, pp. 315 & 325. Back.
Note 21: Department of State Bulletin, June 24, 1974, p. 708. Back.
Note 22: P.M. Kamath, “Security Considerations in Indo-US Relations, 1965-1990,” in A.P. Rana ed., Four Decades of Indo-US Relations: A Commemorative Retrospective (New Delhi: Har-Anand Publications, 1994), p. 134. Back.
Note 23: New York Times, May 14, 1998. Back.
Note 24: Times of India, May 14, 1998. Back.
Note 25: Ibid., June 23, 1998. Back.
Note 26: Hindustan Times, May 30, 1998. Back.
Note 27: Times of India, May 20, 1998. Back.
Note 28: Karl Inderfurth, “US Chagrined to Implement Sanctions on India, Pakistan,” USIA’s Washington File, June 18, 1998. Back.
Note 29: Nomi Morris et. al, The New Arms Race: India’s Nuclear Tests Cause Global Fallout, (Maclean Hunter Ltd, 1998) Back.
Note 31: Rahul Bedi et. al., “India Ignores World, Blasts off Second Tests,” Calgary Herald, May 14, 1998. Back.
Note 33: Samuel P. Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations,” Foreign Affairs, 1996, p. 224. Back.