And Now For The Tough Part of the Nuclear Deal

US Senate approved the Nuclear Deal yesterday after much debate and several tries to derail it - without much support most members - during the lame duck session. Bush said he'll sign it.

But now comes the tough part for India:

Separate the military and civil nuclear facilities

Keep skeptics at bay in our country

Ramp up civil nuclear reactors approval process and building several of them during the next decade or so

Work with US on important foreign policy issues that impact India but not falling over itself to very whim of US policy by tying itself into knots over non-issues - ie still keeping our national interest and security in mind on policy matters

Working to scuttle a similar deal between China and Pakistan which Hu Jintao will be offering to General Mush in the next few days. I am sure MEA is not thinking about it because it just don't think that way (in fact I won't be surprised if it's working to lend support to it).