Aaah, its good to be back, and the world seems to be a-changin fast. For the first time, President Bush visited India last week as a part of his tour of South Asia. One would expect most of the diplomatic discourse to be concerning the situation of Kashmir, the disputed territory between the two countries that has lasted ever since their independence in 1947. However, in changes that marks the times, the actual point of the tour was to secure diplomatic assurances that India and Pakistan will be effective allies against the greater enemy of China.
Central to this agreement was a nuclear deal between India and the US that will allow India access to US civil nuclear technology that it urgently needs to bridge the gap between energy supply and demand. However, it is required to open only 14 of its 22 nuclear facilities to external inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The remainder are not designated as civilian sites and as such are not open to inspection. This has huge ramifications. Although it is not a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), this deal implies that India has now been officially welcomed at the highest levels as a global nuclear player. One might first say that this is awful - a belligerent country trying to grow into a nuclear power (oh I don't know, lets say Iran) may look at this and see that the risk of going nuclear is well worth the risk. Not only do you acquire the nuclear deterrent, but the diplomatic dividends play off well. Similarly, one of the greatest security-preserving measures for North Korea is precisely its nuclear threat, and it would be unimaginable to give up this much of a diplomatic advantage.
However, upon further inspection it is clear that this deal is being done for precisely the opposite reasons. To maintain global security, it is not the arbitrary upholding of the NPT that is required, but the securing of regional allies against China, and to a lesser extent Iran. As such, this deal was not struck at this summit, but had in fact been observable from well before. India requires large amounts of energy that are growing every day. It previously had a deal with Iran over the trade of natural gas for which it came under quite intense diplomatic fire. US leading Congressmen have warned India that it must choose between "the Iran of the Ayotollahs", with its oil and gas, and the "Democratic West", with its advanced nuclear power technology. For now, India seems to have gone for the latter. India supported the US against Iran putting the proposed natural gas pipeline & oil contracts at risk. As such, it has moved towards the US and been rewarded. Today it has earned its place in the nuclear big boys club, tomorrow perhaps a compliant seat on the UN Security Council?
Pakistan offered the same concessions. Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said "we will set the Iranian pipeline project aside, not support Iran at the IAEA and will go on record as opposing the development of nuclear weapons by Iran, but in return the United States has to give us the nuclear technology we need in parallel to the deal it is making with India". This deal was not agreed to, rather, agreements were made that "There is a lot of work to be done in defeating Al-Qaeda". In such an isolated position, one wonders if Pakistan will have any future diplomatic autonomy at all in an area of the world where the balance of power is rapidly shifting. With the loss of Aphganistan as a long term ally, the loss of Iran as a long term energy supplier without any observable US recompense, the marginalisation of the Kashmir issue, the potential antagonism from China and a forced alliance with India to suit American interests, it's a wonder that US forces are not already running Islamabad, oh sorry, the FBI are already there.
A Changing Global Scene: South Asia 
