India says it wants no part of Bush's "warmongering"

The nations who jumped aboard the Bush Administration's plans have all either suffered or gained nothing. Britain is now bogged down in bad situations on two fronts after being conned by Bush into "peacekeeping" operations that became combat roles. Israel suffered its worst military setback when it followed the direction of the U.S. and invaded southern Lebanon. The Eastern European nations who sent their small forces to Iraq have not seen any progress on their bids to join NATO. Countries such as South Korea that merely keep their troops within their base and stay out of harm's way have gained nothing but a "pat on the back", but have not lost soldiers, either. Pakistan's Musharraf will likely lose power and our influence will evaporate with his departure.
So, in the Bush Administration's new campaign against Iran, other nations are not lining up to support another military solution. India has just announced that it wants no part of this new campaign, and it has taken a firm position on nuclear negotiations. They have received a much better deal by refusing many of the harsher demands of the Bush Administration, such as signing the NPT, and have stayed away from any 'brilliant' plans put forth by the State Department. Since India never had ambitions to be a source of nuclear terrorism, the U.S. has gained precisely nothing in its negotiations while India gets the technology to upgrade its nuclear power industry.
For decades, the U.S. led firm sanctions against India's nuclear industry after India developed the atomic bomb. For decades, we told our allies that they could not engage in the highly profitable task of bringing India's nuclear reactors up to modern standards, and the rest of the world meekly went along with that. Then one day the Bush Administration changed it's tune and decided that it's okay if American companies made a ton of money developing India's reactors, provided India signed the NPT and submitted to inspections. Our allies, who had followed our line obediently, were left out in the cold, and India politely declined to cave in to our demands. India knows that our allies will be happy to provide the technology if the U.S. hangs too tough, now that the door has been opened.
Rather than being browbeaten by Bush, India instead stood its ground as a sovereign nation and got what it wanted. Bush, by restraining the traditional arrogance of his Administration, has managed to hold on to India as a marginal ally. At best, the U.S. broke even on the deal, but by Bush's foreign policy record, this counts as a stunning success.

Agencies
Posted online: Friday, August 17, 2007 at 1804 hours IST
Updated: Friday, August 17, 2007 at 1849 hours IST

George Bush New Delhi, August 17: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has made it clear to President George W Bush during negotiations on the Indo-US nuclear deal that India could not agree to a "bilateral" NPT or Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

He also said that it was not in India's interest for Iran to become a nuclear weapons power, although it had the right to have nuclear energy as an NPT member.

"I told President Bush, I can't be a cheer leader or be part of a warmongering group. The nuclear dispute with Iran should be resolved through peaceful processes," he told India Today.

The Prime Minister's comments came in an interview conducted over two months back while he was returning from the G-8 Summit of Industrialsied countries in Germany. Singh had met Bush and other world leaders during his trip in June.