About the only complaint that can be made against Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's offer to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) is that it could have come earlier.Vajpayee's speech at the United Nations had two aims. First, it sought to reassure the world that despite Pokhran II it was not India's intention to engage in a frenzied arms race, that India was keen to adhere to the rules of the game - however unequal they may be. At a second level, Vajpayee's statement was only a gambit in the complex diplomatic negotiations between Delhi and Washington DC. Signing CTBT will do India no harm. The Government has already declared a moratorium on further nuclear tests. India is also one of the few countries which can carry out the sub-critical tests which CTBT permits. As such, India is already a de facto CTBT member. To suggest, therefore, that it should only sign CTBT as part of a global nuclear disarmament agreement is to relapse into a doctrinaire world view, worthy only of the Cold War. The point is not whether India should accede to CTBT but the price at which it should do so. This is where the talks between Jaswant Singh and Strobe Talbott come in. Obviously, Vajpayee expects his conciliatory step to be reciprocated. .preferred-source-banner{ margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom:10px;}Essentially, Uncle Sam has to willy nilly recognise India as a nuclear power and accept a certain weaponisation on the principle of minimum deterrence. After all, if Chinese and Pakistani missiles point to Indian cities and if Central Asia is a potential nursery for nuclear terrorism, India has a right to self-defence. This is the key issue; economic sanctions are just a sideshow. There is reason to believe the Americans too are agreeable to a halfway house. The recent report of the Brookings Institution-Council for Foreign Relations task force urging a realistic recognition of South Asia's nuclear concerns is noteworthy. Should it find reflection in Talbott's next round of talks with Singh, the Indo-US thaw would well and truly have begun.Published By: AtMigration Published On: Oct 5, 1998--- ENDS ---
