The Hindu : Brajesh to focus on n-question during talks in U.S.

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, May 05, 2003

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Brajesh to focus on n-question during talks in U.S.

By C. Raja Mohan

NEW DELHI May 4. As the National Security Adviser, Brajesh Mishra, heads for Washington tonight for an intensive round of consultations with the Bush administration, the new excitements in India-Pakistan relations could easily mask a more important item on his agenda — the nuclear question.

Undoubtedly, the reduction of tensions in the subcontinent, preparing the ground for a sustainable India-Pakistan dialogue and exploring the opportunities for political cooperation in Iraq will get a lot of attention in Mr. Mishra's talks.

Besides meeting the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, in London, Mr. Mishra will have wide-ranging talks with a number of top officials, including his American counterpart, Condoleezza Rice, at the White House.

Since last year, Mr. Mishra has become the point man for pushing Indo-U.S. bilateral cooperation in four areas — civil nuclear energy, commercial space programmes, high technology trade and missile defence. Getting some concrete movement on the "technology quartet" will be the key to demonstrating that the Indo-U.S. engagement is on track.

Mr. Mishra's visit comes amid an important American debate on the future of the global nuclear order. The U.S. President, George W. Bush, is likely to make a major speech on the changing U.S. approach to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and arms control in the coming days.

After the successful regime change in Iraq, the U.S. now is seriously focussed on the ways and means of reworking the non-proliferation regime to make it more relevant to our times. Mr. Bush's speech is likely to reflect the essence of the internal review in the administration on non-proliferation issues.

At the conceptual level, the views of India and America on non-proliferation have converged as never before. Both agree that the biggest future challenge to international security is rooted in the deadly combination of WMD and terrorism. They also agree that there is an urgent need to explore innovative ways of dealing with this problem. They recognise that the old non-proliferation order with its welter of treaties is fraying and can no longer be the sole instrument to deal with the new security challenges.

As Mr. Armitage pointed out in a recent speech, "and yet, the system we have in place for dealing with such proliferation challenges does not really offer solutions for these problems". Both countries agree on the importance of missile defence and the need to develop military capabilities and doctrines such as "counter-proliferation" to deal with the spread of WMD to irresponsible regimes and terrorist groups.

India has been one of the biggest victims of terrorism, the proliferation of WMD to and from its neighbours, and the link between the two of them. As a consequence, it has a strong stake in transforming the global nuclear order to make it more effective.

While this is fully understood in the Bush administration, the prospects of Indo-U.S. arms control cooperation are being constantly undermined by the non-proliferation apparatchiks in Washington.

The traditionalist arms controllers in Washington, resistant as they are to new thinking, have tended to see India as part of the problem rather than the solution in managing the threats from the spread of WMD.

As a result, the promises from the highest political level in the Bush administration to quicken the flows of advanced technology to India have been stymied at the bureaucratic level.

The tasks for Mr. Mishra are to solidify the strategic understanding with the Bush administration on the imperatives of a new nuclear order, pave the way for a common agenda on arms control and facilitate expansive defence and technological cooperation between the two countries.

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