And the fact is that India has a record of nonproliferation, which is exceptional …

Nicholas Burns, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Briefing on the Signing of the Global Partnership Agreement Between the United States and India, July 19, 2005.

That was not the impression David Albright gave to attendees during the Institute for Science and International Security’s briefing on fissile material stocks (co-hosted with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace).

Corey Hinderstein produced the first satellite photograph of the Rattehalli Rare Materials Plant (RMP) where India has a small gas centrifuge pilot plant.

Then Paul asked Albright to comment on India’s nonproliferation record. Albright revealed three things that I hadn’t heard. He claimed:

  • India openly attempts to procure prohibited items for its gas centrifuge plant. One tactic is to sell tenders to companies that then procure the items. Albright implied the government doesn’t ask too many questions. (I found that India has a website where you can search the tenders. Go ahead and peruse the 297 tenders frorm the Department Of Atomic Energy, including one for Anhydrous Ammonia—essential to any well stocked meth lab.)
  • In the 1980s, India used many of the same front companies as the AQ Khan network, including Trade Fin in South Africa. In theory, India might have fed some centrifuge design information back into the network in developing specifications for feed and piping systems. Also, Paul reported in 2005 that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced that Asher Karni pled guilty to exporting items to India that are “controlled for nuclear non-proliferation reasons.”
  • Although India does have an export control list, India does not adequately enforce export controls (Albright compared India unfavorably to Germany). Albright claims to have seen dual-use items related to gas centrifuges, such as valves, for sale. The United States sanctioned several Indian firms for proliferation activity.

I can’t wait for the reaction to this post on the Bharat-Rakshak bulletin boards.

Late Update: Several Indian news outlets—including Rediff—also picked up Albright’s comments.

And Bharat-Rakshak is buzzing. For some reason Albright’s comments are being attributed to me—which is weird, since I don’t know anything about Indian proliferation behavior.

I do take offense at one author’s suggestion that the description of the “small … pilot plant” at Mysore is an implicitly racist effort to denigrate the scientific capabilities of “slimy dark Indians.”

Former Indian AEC Chairman PK Iyengar claimed the plant would comprise “several hundred… centrifuges made of domestically produced maraging steel.” That is pretty much a small, pilot plant. Albright and Hinderstein indicated that a forthcoming monograph would discuss the scale of the enrichment effort, which may be larger than is previously believed. Until then, I am sticking with “small pilot plant.”

As for the implication that I somehow detest Indians, the author is invited to arrange a time to make that particular claim to my face.