Global Peace Through Nuclear Weapons
Dr. Strangelove is Our President
By JOHN BLAIR
Is this a bad dream? Please wake me up! Is Dr. Strangelove really our President?
But, it is not a dream. George W. Bush has decided that the world needs another nuclear arms race and has done so by going to India and signing an agreement to undermine the five decade success of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty which India has refused to sign.
As a result, India will be able to build increasing numbers of nuclear weapons with US approval and supplies, so they can gain an upper hand on our other "ally" in the region who the Indians love to hate, Pakistan, who also has nuclear weapons.
For nearly fifty years the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty has served us well. But India has always been a rogue nation to that treaty and has refused to become a part of the larger nuclear weapons club of England, France, China, Russia and the US.
India and Pakistan, Israel and North Korea have also developed nuclear weapons but have had a hard time making them in any large numbers due to a lack of weapons grade nuclear fuel.
Throughout the 1970s, the world lived in fear of an accelerated program of nuclear weapons development and use in Central Asia when India and Pakistan repeatedly use a nuclear threat toward each other. Apparently, Bush was in too much of a fog with his drinking in that period to remember all that. So now he not only went to India encouraging them to acquire more American jobs through outsourcing but also paved the way for India to initiate a nuclear arms race with Pakistan and maybe even China, by agreeing to the US sale of nuclear fuel and reactor parts to a country that has refused to allow even inspection of their nuclear program or sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
Yes, India is the world's largest democracy but that does not make them immediately trustworthy on the gravest of all issues. After all, they are a country that has done testing of nuclear weapons against nearly all world opinion, dousing the world with large levels of radiation just to flex their muscles against their arch enemy neighbor, Pakistan.
Of course, Pakistan will expect us to give them similar treatment even though they are probably harboring the arch enemy we seem so frightened about, Bin Laden.
And if we are going to strike such a deal with India, just where is our moral high ground in telling Iran they cannot have nukes of their own. Don't they claim that their nuclear program is only peaceful?
It was Nixon who signed the original nonproliferation treaty and the fall of the Soviet Union allowed for dismantling of large numbers of nukes around the world but Bush seems intent to undermine that effort and create another arms race, one that may end up more dangerous than that with the Soviets and the US, since this one will between neighbors, whom we know at least one is home of large numbers of terrorists. No need for intercontinental ballistic missiles since they share a common border.
These last few weeks have revealed a situation in which anyone can see that it is not American interests that Bush has in mind, From the Ports deal to this absurdity, America will be losers while Bush's corporate friends and arms dealers around the world will reap huge benefits as the earth collapses into further disarray. Can we afford three more years of this? I do not think so.
Hopefully, Richard Lugar, as Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will stop this deal in its tracks and tell Bush that he needs to serve American interests instead of those of his business enablers.
John Blair is president of the environment health advocacy group, Valley Watch and earned a Pulitzer Prize for news Photography in 1978. He can be reached at: Ecoserve1@aol.com
Return to The Era front page
Dr. Strangelove is Our President
By JOHN BLAIR
Is this a bad dream? Please wake me up! Is Dr. Strangelove really our President?
But, it is not a dream. George W. Bush has decided that the world needs another nuclear arms race and has done so by going to India and signing an agreement to undermine the five decade success of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty which India has refused to sign.
As a result, India will be able to build increasing numbers of nuclear weapons with US approval and supplies, so they can gain an upper hand on our other "ally" in the region who the Indians love to hate, Pakistan, who also has nuclear weapons.
For nearly fifty years the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty has served us well. But India has always been a rogue nation to that treaty and has refused to become a part of the larger nuclear weapons club of England, France, China, Russia and the US.
India and Pakistan, Israel and North Korea have also developed nuclear weapons but have had a hard time making them in any large numbers due to a lack of weapons grade nuclear fuel.
Throughout the 1970s, the world lived in fear of an accelerated program of nuclear weapons development and use in Central Asia when India and Pakistan repeatedly use a nuclear threat toward each other. Apparently, Bush was in too much of a fog with his drinking in that period to remember all that. So now he not only went to India encouraging them to acquire more American jobs through outsourcing but also paved the way for India to initiate a nuclear arms race with Pakistan and maybe even China, by agreeing to the US sale of nuclear fuel and reactor parts to a country that has refused to allow even inspection of their nuclear program or sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
Yes, India is the world's largest democracy but that does not make them immediately trustworthy on the gravest of all issues. After all, they are a country that has done testing of nuclear weapons against nearly all world opinion, dousing the world with large levels of radiation just to flex their muscles against their arch enemy neighbor, Pakistan.
Of course, Pakistan will expect us to give them similar treatment even though they are probably harboring the arch enemy we seem so frightened about, Bin Laden.
And if we are going to strike such a deal with India, just where is our moral high ground in telling Iran they cannot have nukes of their own. Don't they claim that their nuclear program is only peaceful?
It was Nixon who signed the original nonproliferation treaty and the fall of the Soviet Union allowed for dismantling of large numbers of nukes around the world but Bush seems intent to undermine that effort and create another arms race, one that may end up more dangerous than that with the Soviets and the US, since this one will between neighbors, whom we know at least one is home of large numbers of terrorists. No need for intercontinental ballistic missiles since they share a common border.
These last few weeks have revealed a situation in which anyone can see that it is not American interests that Bush has in mind, From the Ports deal to this absurdity, America will be losers while Bush's corporate friends and arms dealers around the world will reap huge benefits as the earth collapses into further disarray. Can we afford three more years of this? I do not think so.
Hopefully, Richard Lugar, as Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will stop this deal in its tracks and tell Bush that he needs to serve American interests instead of those of his business enablers.
John Blair is president of the environment health advocacy group, Valley Watch and earned a Pulitzer Prize for news Photography in 1978. He can be reached at: Ecoserve1@aol.com
Return to The Era front page
posted by Change at 1:24 PM
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