From all accounts, the BJP-led coalition government does not appear to be handling the post-Pokharan situation with firmness and resolve. Far from it, the government seems to be on the defensive both at home and abroad. Thanks to the despicable opportunism of the opposition parties -- who should have stood four-square behind the government in a show of national unity, but didn't -- the government was till recently fending off daily assaults in parliament. Abroad, the unholy US-China nexus is working hard to internationalise the Kashmir issue to pressure India on the nuclear front.US state department spokespersons -- from Madeleine Albright down to lesser fry -- have been boorishly showering India with abuse and openly attacking India's political leadership. And these pressures are beginning to tell: after first saying it will only talk to interlocutors on accepting some clauses of the CTBT, the smoke signals from South Block now suggest that India may well sign the flawed deal. Initially, the governmentmerely said that it was finished with the atomic testing for the present; now it seems to be moving in the direction of an indefinite moratorium. If India blinks first in the war of nerves with the P-5 nuclear club, it would bring to nought all the positives flowing from Pokharan-II.
The P-5 and G-8 reactions to the Indian tests show that nuclear might is indeed the currency of power. Japan, the world's only victim of nuclear war, is kowtowing to the US line because it knows it needs the US nuclear umbrella for its own security. China, the world's last major totalitarian state and a key nuclear proliferator, should have been facing sanctions too.
But it is a nuclear power with a security council veto -- and so invulnerable to pressure. Nuclear abstinence means China can always threaten India by proxy (Pakistan), but India can never counter this subtle blackmail without being seen as a warmonger. In this scenario, it is surprising how any right-thinking Indian can question the wisdom of our own nucleardeterrent.
But that still leaves us with the international pressures to cope with. There is only one answer to this: the government has to adopt a one-point plan to internationalise the nuclear disarmament issue and refuse to negotiate anything unless this is addressed. It must propose a time-bound plan to eliminate the P-5's nuclear weapons along with those of India and Pakistan. If the US can lecture us on the core issue of Kashmir, the world should know that the real core issue is the P-5's refusal to talk about global disarmament. A new, more equitious, world order is waiting to be born, and India has the midwife's role in its birth.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
