Congress's Gift to Bush

If you're the Democratic Congress, what do you give the enormously unpopular lame-duck Republican president in the midst of a massive financial crisis? How about a big wet kiss and a long-sought foreign policy victory?

Obscured by yesterday's Senate action on the financial bailout (also a big win for the White House) was a historic vote in favor of President Bush's highly controversial civil nuclear agreement with India.

This is definitely one for the history books, although the big question is whether history will record the new agreement as a pivotal step in strengthening an important strategic alliance -- or as a tragic move undermining decades of nuclear non-proliferation efforts and launching a massive nuclear arms race. The latter seems more likely.

Forging closer relations between the U.S. and India, the world's largest democracy, is a no-brainer. But the problem is that in this particular agreement, Bush basically gave away the store.

It's not just that the agreement rewards India for its decision to defy international pressure and develop its own nuclear weapons. It's that Bush directed his negotiators to give in to India's demands that it be allowed to produce unlimited quantities of fissile material and amass as many nuclear weapons as it wants. (See my March 3, 2006, column, Did Bush Blink?)

Former President Jimmy Carter wrote at the time in a Washington Post op-ed: "The proposed nuclear deal with India is just one more step in opening a Pandora's box of nuclear proliferation."

The New York Times editorial board wrote earlier this month, after the House voted for the agreement: "President Bush has failed to achieve so many of his foreign policy goals, but last weekend he proved that he can still get what he really wants. The administration bullied and wheedled international approval of the president's ill-conceived nuclear deal with India."

As Stephen Cohen wrote for NiemanWatchdog.org in 2005, creating a strategic alliance with India, potentially as a bullwark against China, was Bush's "one big idea' regarding foreign policy before he even took office.

Yesterday, Bush celebrated with a statement: "This legislation will strengthen our global nuclear nonproliferation efforts, protect the environment, create jobs, and assist India in meeting its growing energy needs in a responsible manner.

"I look forward to signing this bill into law and continuing to strengthen the U.S.-India Strategic Partnership."

The Coverage

Glenn Kessler writes in The Washington Post: "The Senate last night approved a historic agreement that opens up nuclear trade with India for the first time since New Delhi conducted a nuclear test three decades ago, giving the Bush administration a significant foreign policy achievement in its final months.

"The bill, which passed 86 to 13, goes to President Bush for his signature, handing the chief executive a rare victory that both advocates and foes say will reverberate for decades. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who conceived of the deal, have pushed hard for it from the earliest weeks of the president's second term.