One common charge leveled at the Bush Administration is that it refuses to consult with Congress on important matters involving foreign affairs. There is some truth to this charge, although I think a lot of it is overblown. Congress is regularly consulted on lots of stuff through their numerous oversight and appropriations powers. They often know what is going on. They just don’t like to admit it.
While the President can do a fair amount of foreign policy on his own, the law sometimes requires congressional involvement on most important questions. Even if it doesn’t, the President has incentives to bring Congress on board to share the responsibility for the policy. Case in point: the President’s proposed new stategic alliance with India.
The centerpiece of this strategy is a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with India. Secretary Rice (in
between her chamber music sessions) went to Congress last week to seek congressional approval for this deal.
As I noted before, the general framework for civil nuclear cooperation is set up by Section 123 of the
Atomic Energy Act. This act requires the President to submit agreements for civil nuclear cooperation to both houses of Congress for approval, although the President may waive the Congressional approval requirement on an annual basis. The administration is also asking for amendments to the Act as a whole to give India the status to purchase many otherwise restricted goods.
I’m no expert on this this statute, but as I read it, the Administration could have done much (though not all) of this on its own without having to go to Congress, since it could essentially make annual agreements with India to share some (but not all) civilian nuclear technology. Moreover, the agreement with India does not, as far as I understand, violate any U.S. obligations under the
Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, as is sometimes hinted by critics of the India deal (see this NYT
editorial). Article IV states that “Nothing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination. . .”
But the goal here is to establish a long-term stable strategic alliance, which ultimately must outlast this administration. So congressional approval is not just a legal requirement, but it is necessary political condition for the success of this overall strategy. On big questions (e.g. going to war, making new alliances), Congress should be required to take a stand, even if they don’t want to.
While the US-India deal does not violate any written portion of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it certainly undercuts the treaty. The compromise at the heart of the NTP is that countries which renounce any right to build nuclear weapons are allowed civilian nuclear technology that they would not otherwise have access to. For this reason, the international community attempts to prevent the sale of nuclear material to non-NTP states.
The export of nuclear material is constrained by the guidelines of the Nuclear Suppliers Group and by US law. What Bush is asking congress to do is radically amend the laws (such as the 1978 Nonproliferation Act) which prevent the planned transaction. Bush had no choice but to consult congress.
Bush is not the first US president to attempt to create a “strategic alliance” with India. Nearly every president since Nixon has attempted to strike such an agreement. Until now our leaders wisely concluded that the importance of the global non-proliferation regime vastly outweighs the value of any hypothetical strategic alliance. Bush, however, is ready to sellout non-proliferation to secure his place in the history books as the man who brought India in from the cold.
I think it may be true that the US-India deal violates, as stated above, at least the spirit of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. But what concerns me even more is the following information from an interview by Amy Goodman of DEMOCRACY NOW! with Greg Mello, director of the Los Alamos Study Group: U.S. Enters New Nuclear Age as Bush Seeks Funds for New Generation of Nukes Thursday, March 2nd, 2006 http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/03/02/148233 A new nuclear age appears to be on the horizon. President Bush recently asked Congress for $27 million to help jumpstart the country’s first new nuclear weapons program in two decades. As we broadcast from New Mexico – the center of the country’s nuclear weapons program – we speak with Greg Mello of the Los Alamos Study Group “We are on the verge of an exciting time.” Those were the recent words of the nation’s top nuclear weapons executive, Linton Brooks. Here in New Mexico – the center of the country’s nuclear weapons program – a new nuclear age appears to be on the horizon. Bush recently asked Congress for $27 million to help jumpstart the country’s first new nuclear weapons program in two decades. The money will be… Read more »
The following from Richard Falk and David Krieger of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation highlights some of the problems with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: The Non-Proliferation Treaty is Failing: What Now? by Richard Falk and David Krieger, March 2006 For several decades now the world has been living with the illusion that the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) established a functioning treaty regime that has spared the world from nuclear danger. It is an illusion partly because three nuclear weapons aspirants (Israel, India, Pakistan) have kept clear of the treaty, and suffered no adverse consequences when they developed nuclear arsenals. On the contrary, President Bush’s proposed nuclear deal with India must be understood as a major diplomatic reward in spite of India’s crossing the nuclear weapons threshold. And Israel has been allowed to develop a formidable nuclear weapons arsenal while the West kept completely silent. But this is not the only concern. The NPT has generated a new set of pretexts for launching aggressive war. The invasion of Iraq in 2003 was mainly justified, in public at least, because of Baghdad’s purported stockpile of weapons of mass destruction and covert nuclear weapons program. The reality that such a stockpile did not exist,… Read more »