And the non-proliferation which the Congressmen she was addressing had in mind, which she was talking about is not of India surreptitiously passing on some nuclear secrets to other states, etc. She was clearly talking about the proliferation of nuclear weapons that comes about as India builds such weapons.

Benchmarks

Two texts and some facts provide good benchmarks for assessing impressions insinuated into the public discourse by briefings.

The IAEA protocol that’s applicable to a Nuclear Weapons State is modeled after IAEA’s Information Circular 153 (INFCIRC/153). The one that is applicable to the rest is known as Information Circular 540.

While we are being fed soporifics about the protocol with IAEA being “India specific”, the Senate Bill prescribes, in Section 113(1), that the Additional Protocol we’d have to sign with IAEA would be based on the Model Additional Protocol “as set forth in IAEA Information Circular (INFCIRC) 540.”

And that Circular states just as clearly, “Such protocols shall contain all of the measures in this Model Protocol.” Given this binding declaration, either we would sign the standard, model protocol plus additional provisions, or sign more or less the standard protocol and have it labeled, “India specific”!

But to revert to the obligations of Nuclear Weapons and Non-NuclearWeapons States. The contrast between the two Model Protocols is a textbook illustration of Gandhiji’s saying, “Law is the convenience of the powerful.” At first, the NPT did not require the five Nuclear Weapons States to subject themselves to the safeguards of IAEA. When objections were raised, the Nuclear Weapons States agreed to conclude “Voluntary Offer Agreements”. Under these, Nuclear Weapons States submit lists of “eligible facilities”. The IAEA selects a small sample of them that it will inspect. The US, for instance, in 1993, placed materials that are, in its view, in “excess of defense needs” under IAEA safeguards. Information Circular 540 itself states in the foreword, “The Board of Governors has also requested the Director General to negotiate additional protocols or other legally binding agreements with Nuclear Weapons States incorporating those measures provided for in the Model Protocol that each Nuclear-Weapons State has identified as capable of contributing to the non-proliferation and efficiency aims of the Protocol, when implemented in regard to that State, and as consistent with that State’s obligations under Article I of the NPT.” That is, the choice of which measures to include is left to the judgment of the Nuclear Weapons States.

... contd.