April 20, 2004 ☼ Foreign Affairs

The latest Bulletin of Atomic Scientists proposes to admit Israel, India and Pakistan into an associate membership of the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT). It also argues that to be successful, the NPT needs total support, commitment and adherance by the nuclear weapon states, especially the United States.

The same bulletin also has an excellent article by Leonard Weiss which chronicles how the US turned a blind eye to Pakistan’s nuclear transgressions first when it was building a bomb, and later, even after 9/11 when it was actively selling nuclear technology in the international market.

As North Korea and Iran have demonstrated, the NPT is not much more than a piece of paper which can be torn up any time by those caught violating it. Each of these countries would have remained non-nuclear if not for American indulgence of Pakistan. And as Weiss put it, the indulgence continues.

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