Some think that Veteran’s Day is simply a day of nationalistic ceremonies, glorifying war and desensitizing us to the loss of human life. They are wrong. If anything, Veteran’s Day is about refreshing our commitment to peace. By mourning those we have lost, we ensure that war never becomes the easy choice. As anyone who has attended a Veteran’s Day ceremony knows, the sight of gravestones and weeping widows rarely whets the appetite for war.

It is easy to denounce the military for unpopular wars, but we must remember that our soldiers volunteered to defend our country, not to invade others. Our soldiers are not perfect, but they go where they are sent, obeying orders and fighting honorably regardless of how they feel about their mission. For that, we honor them. It is our elected civilian officials who choose when and where we fight, and on Veteran’s Day, we would do well to remember that.

Veterans’ Day is a reflection of the American attitude of superiority towards the rest of the world throughout history. Soldiers are glorified as warriors not just because they are “fighting the villain,” but also because they are seen as the heroes that defend the American values of freedom and democracy. As the United States has made these values the normative standard for itself and the rest of the world, the attitude of superiority has increased in the people, thus making it easier for the US to use the normative values as justification for military actions. Domestic efforts to further this way of thinking are marked by the cooperation between media and government, which has made sure to garner an almost unconditional support from American people by fostering a “peace through war” attitude. This is probably the reason why people do not think about the numbers of others that the US military has killed as a negative issue. In the collective American mind, the US is militarily involved for the greater good, taking on the role of peacekeeper, thus making warrior culture a necessary component of peace culture in the US.

Perhaps dealing with India as Obama is currently doing does not seem to strengthen the international nonproliferation regime because it demonstrates a tendency towards legal exceptionalism and a clear neglect for established rules and norms. I think that to a significant degree, pushing for India’s permanent place on the UNSC and suggesting a rewrite of the rules governing the NSG set a potentially dangerous precedent for creating a model or template that can be applied later to other countries.

But in the bigger picture, maybe this is a smart strategy — one that eventually will bring India into the fold (which may or may not have implications for doing the same with Pakistan, one day). Perhaps it’s precisely because India is India that it needs to be treated as India and no other country — one that, yes, continues to remain outside the NPT and have nuclear weapons, but one that also has a robust economy, possesses a fairly open and transparent democratic system, and is one of the world’s biggest populations — much of which is upwardly-mobile. India exhibited considerable restraint in the 2001-2002 nuclear standoff with Pakistan following terrorist attacks in India, and again has demonstrated similar prudence in the last three years following the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai. Perhaps the country has done enough to demonstrate its responsibility in global affairs, at least overtly, and should be dealt with accordingly.

As for the 2005 Bush-Singh deal: whether we agree with it or not, it happened, and now we have to deal with it.

With all that said, I think what’s less alarming is the UNSC bit. Of bigger concern to me is the NSG bit. The US has been pushing for Japan to have a permanent seat on a reformed UN Security Council for a long time. Doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. But US influence over the NSG is considerable (witness the 2005 Indo-US deal), so pushing for a reestablishment of NSG rules for membership is more likely to happen, I think.

In a time of a less-cooperative Pakistan, this reenforces for them the notion that the US has leverage over them. Even if the US were to pull out its military aid, Pakistan would still keep up huge military expenditures while its people suffer. It has a history of doing so.

But this serves as a reminder that the US is still a kingmaker, and it can wield this leverage against Pakistan should she be non-compliant.

You’ve made a valid point about the relation between nuclear proliferation and power. Without a doubt, a nation that proliferates will gain more attention from the international community. However, I don’t think that Obama’s endorsement of India having a permanent seat on the UNSC is suggestive of your answer to UNSC seat seeking nations, “Just get nukes”. A permanent seat on the UNSC does, of course, make a statement about that nation’s influence and power, and the acquisition of nuclear weapons is a contributing factor to that power. But these nations have a lot more going for them than nukes, and so does India. The growing economic and military strength of India, an ally of the United States, is of crucial importance in a region poses a threat to global security. In fact, even if India didn’t have any nukes, these other factors would probably be enough to consider it a powerful nation, perhaps even an eligible candidate for the UNSC. This means that nations like Israel, North Korea, Iran, and Pakistan shouldn’t count on nukes to get them a permanent seat in the UNSC.