[Marxism] [foil] 123 agreement - Bush fuel in Left fire

[Sukla Sen]

Sayan wrote:
Quote
I'm pro-nuclear-energy and anti-nuclear-weapons
Unquote

Quote
However, as long as the USA has a huge arsenal of
weapons (both conventional and nuclear), I'm  for the
right of less powerful nations to arm themselves in
self-defense, should  a democratically elected
(even in the bourgeois-democratic sense) government
chooses to exercise that right.
Unquote

Did someone on this list point out that Sayan opens
his mouth only to change foot?

Sayan's position perhaps could be summed up as
something like anti-nuclear weapon only when all
nuclear weapons are wiped out and till then
selectively pro-nuclear weapon.

The problem with horizontal proliferation is
essentially manifold.
It encourages further horizontal proliferation. India
going nuclear caused nuclearisation of Pakistan.
It legitimises, by acknowledging essential legitimacy
of nuclear weapons as instruments of self-defence and
diplomacy, vertical proliferation by the "haves".
It'd logically mean that the whole world would
denuclearise only after universal nuclear
weaponisation.
That evidently runs counter to any common sense
process of nuclear disarmament. Any sensible way to
nuclear disarmament would broadly start off from a
freeze, never mind the tremendous asymmetry, and then
towards step by step reduction.
In fact, the 2000 NPT Review Conference did propose
precisely that. This, however, got virtually nullified
five years thereafter.
Proliferation of nuclear weapons would also keep on
heightening the probabilities of these being actually
used, either deliberately or accidentally, with
spine-chilling consequences. 
It is necessary to keep in mind here that nuclear
weapons kills non-combatants massively, on a
mind-boggling scale, and indiscriminately. It also
breaches time and space barrier. Unborn generations in
faraway lands may be victimised. So it is an
unmitigated evil. The demand for parity in nuclear
weapons therefore is a moral equivalent of the demand
for equal right to rape.

Now coming to the specific issue, David did not,
repeat not, deal with the issue of India's access to
multiple sources for nuclear fuel, technology and
equipments.
Apparently, he is plainly ignorant about the various
dimensions and implications of the ongoing deal.
Syan's agreement with him only means that Sayan shares
his ignorance, apart from ill-founded prejudices.

Sayan is of course privy to think anything, however
absurd or uninformed. But the point is that deal is
opening up for India access to the world market. The
access had been turned off in the past in phases as
penal measures for going aberrant. India is even
otherwise not entitled to it as a non-signatory to the
NPT, like Israel and Pakistan out of total 191 members
of the UN. **That's precisely why Pakistan is
clamouring for the same deal and rudely refused as its
value in the eyes of the US is far less as compared to
that of India.**
It does not in any way compel India to go to the world
market with multiple suppliers for various products.

The claim as regards under-the-thumb is also as
stupid.
The NSG countries include Russia, China, France and
Germany. But the opposition is most likely to come
from some of the countries belonging to the New Agenda
Coalition. (Sayan and David might have had not heard
even. May immediately start the google-search.)

More interestingly, even within the US congress, the
Bush administration did not enjoy an easy ride. It was
rather a long and tumultuous journey. The original
proposal getting quite a bit modified in the process.

But most fundamentally, the deal just not
quasi-legitimises its India's status as nuclear weapon
state by entitling it to nuclear trade with the rest
of the world for a (self-selected) portion of its
nuclear operation, by doing so it opens up access for
India to world marker which it was debarred from for
some three decades or so.
But that **access is only optional** even after the
deal is, if at all, operationalised.
So the bogey of "sovereignty" from this angle is just
that.

However, as the deal would bring India closer to the
US through the granting of this grand concession, it'd
evidently tend to delimit India's policy options. So
India did vote with US in the IAEA against Iran. But
conversely, India has not as yet scrapped its gas
pipeline deal with Iran despite strong disapproving
noises from the US. India is also planning to have
joint military exercise with China. Putin was the
special guest of the last Republic Day event and who,
interestingly, came out vociferously in favour of the
deal. (This also evidently undermines Sayan's
arguments on sovereignty.)

So Sayan's, as much as David's, is a completely
muddleheaded response.

Sukla


--- Sayan  Bhattacharyya <ok.president+foil at gmail.com>
wrote:

> On 8/15/07, Sukla Sen <suklasenp at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> > Sayan wrote:
> >
> > Quote
> > I think the email below, that someone posted in
> > response to Sukla in another forum, addresses this
> > very question:
> > Unquote
> >
> > Dear Sayan,
> >
> > What is "this very question"?
> > This "very question" is whether when "NSG and IAEA
> > okay the deal, will India be confined to buying
> from
> > the US alone?"
> 
> I think the implicit point (in David's message) is
> that (and I agree),
> the NSG being countries more or less under the USA's
> thumb, the USA
> will, _de facto_ , control the spigot (even though
> nominally, of
> course, India will retain the right to buy  from
> anyone; as we know,
> in real politics the actual is often not the
> nominal).
> 
> So in this sense, India loses sovereignty.
> 
> I agree with Naveen that as leftists we must oppose
> our own
> bourgeoisie when it uses the notion of "sovereignty"
> to repress
> Kashmiris and suchlike.
> 
> But that the notion of sovereignty is *misused* by
> the bourgeoisie for
> its own nefarious ends, does not mean  that
> sovereignty in and of
> itself is not valuable and should not be protected.
> 



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