During the negotiating end-game of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), many strategic analysts and key government officials in India concluded that its entry into force provision, a uniquely pernicious requirement that 44 specified countries must ratifybefore the treaty could come into effect, was directed against India.
Moreover, this provision was an affront to Indian sovereignty. The CTBT's entry into force provision became a central grievance in the subsequent case made against the treaty by the Indian government: a noose crafted by the nuclear weapon states was tightening around India's neck and only an eleventh hour rejection of the treaty, and four decades of Indian support for a ban on nuclear testing, would suffice. This extrication strategy, based on high moral principle, took on a different colouration when India tested nuclear weapons just two years down the line.
The Senate's summary rejection of the CTBT along partisan lines should be a cautionary tale, for Americans as well as for Indians. Sometimes, things are not what they appear to be from a distance. The US standing to deal with nuclear issues has been dealt what may well be an irreparable blow. At least some of the impetus for India's overt nuclear posture now seems badly mis-perceived. Most importantly, nuclear dangers are now accelerating on many fronts as a result of treaties that are unraveling, a process greatly facilitated by US and Indian actions.
The entry into force provision of the CTBT was the brainchild of the UK. It was quickly embraced by Russia and China, which stuck to their guns even after President Bill Clinton persuaded Britain to relent. However, in typical Clinton fashion, the effort to change the formula was too little and too late. Russia and China obtained their objective: to hold off, for as long as possible, the treaty's dreaded implementation- but not to take the onus
for doing so. One consideration was surely India's reluctance to join. But New Delhi was a side-show, since no one expected India to ratify the CTBT before the US did. If the Senate consented to the ratification of the treaty, then it was expected that Russia and China would follow, as they did in the case of the Chemical Weapons Convention. Only after this progression would pressure fall on India and Pakistan.
Many cognoscenti in India believed this process to be inevitable and remorseless. They have evidently not spent much time in recent years on Capitol Hill. Prospects for the CTBT's ratification in the US were never bright during the Clinton administration. No Republican president since Eisenhower supported the treaty's negotiation and the current Republican leadership in the Congress is as insular and anti-treaty as any other in the 20th century. The CTBT ruled out any testing that permitted a chain reaction, a provision that was clearly anathema to nuclear hawks. Instead, nuclear weapon states would have to be satisfied with sub-critical experiments without nuclear yield which could not, contrary to the arguments of CTBT critics in India, permit the development of new, improved weapon designs. Moreover, there were no guarantees that existing nuclear weapon designs could withstand the passage of time. To hard-core opponents of the CTBT within the US, the treaty would lead inevitably to the phased elimination of nuclear weapons - precisely the reverse argument of that popularised by treaty critics in India. Added to this mix was the extraordinary animus of Congressional Republicans to President Clinton, and a Senate leadership that demanded party-line votes on procedural issues. Hard right Republican senators wanted not just to kill the CTBT but to disable the Clinton administration from carrying out other nuclear negotiations that could end up effectively tying the hands of the next administration. In this, the opponents to the CTBT have already succeeded: discussions between Washington and Moscow on the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty and further strategic arms reductions have quickly reached an impasse. After the Senate's vote, why would the Kremlin want to make deals that can't stick with the Clinton White House?
With the CTBT, Strategic Arms Reduction Talks and the ABM Treaty wobbly, the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)is sure to be adversely affected. Many Indian strategic analysts and government officials have long railed against the NPT, but if this treaty - which was dealt a body blow by India's nuclear tests - unravels, nuclear dangers in South Asia and in other tension-filled regions will grow even worse.
And where does the CTBT's failure leave India? In the same place as before. India can either join the 150-plus other countries that have signed the treaty or remain one of three global hold-outs. Now the pressure is off New Delhi and a decision on becoming a signatory to the treaty or not can be made on the merits. By signing the CTBT, New Delhi would pledge not to undercut the treaty's objectives and purposes, thereby reinforcing stated government policy. A continued stand apart from the CTBT would be a confirmation of India's flawed analysis of its terms as well as a reminder of its responsibility for the current morass.
(Michael Krepon is president of the Washington-based think- tank, the Henry L. Stimson Centre.)
