George Perkovich
{
"authors": [
"George Perkovich"
],
"type": "legacyinthemedia",
"centerAffiliationAll": "dc",
"centers": [
"Carnegie Endowment for International Peace"
],
"collections": [
"U.S. Nuclear Policy"
],
"englishNewsletterAll": "ctw",
"nonEnglishNewsletterAll": "",
"primaryCenter": "Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"programAffiliation": "NPP",
"programs": [
"Nuclear Policy"
],
"projects": [],
"regions": [
"North America",
"United States",
"South Asia",
"India"
],
"topics": [
"Nuclear Policy",
"Nuclear Energy"
]
}Source: Getty
Global Implications of the U.S.-India Deal
By exempting India from nonproliferation rules, all 45 members of the Nuclear Suppliers Group are complicit in the U.S.-India nuclear deal, and they should all feel compelled to cooperate to ensure that the India deal does not turn into a dangerous precedent.
Source: Daedalus

The making and enforcing of international rules is frequently quixotic. Making rules is often tedious and compromising, while their enforcement is often absent or feckless. The nuclear nonproliferation regime has suffered these afflictions. However, considering that the ambition is to regulate the most powerful technology and material known to humankind, the rules that have grown around the NPT since 1968 have been remarkably successful. The nonproliferation regime is a key structure of the nuclear order that most people in the world would rather not live without. Some wish that this nuclear order would more strongly incline toward the abolition of nuclear weapons, or would more actively promote distribution of nuclear energy. Others wish that it would concentrate more effectively on stopping proliferation. Few want the disorder that would follow a collapse of the bargains on which the current system of rules depends. Thus many observers and governments fear that the NSG-India nuclear deal is a bad portent: it may signal corrosion of the rules-based nuclear order.
About the Author
Japan Chair for a World Without Nuclear Weapons, Senior Fellow
George Perkovich is the Japan Chair for a World Without Nuclear Weapons and a senior fellow in the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Nuclear Policy Program. He works primarily on nuclear deterrence, nonproliferation, and disarmament issues, and is leading a study on nuclear signaling in the 21st century.
- How to Assess Nuclear ‘Threats’ in the Twenty-First CenturyPaper
- “A House of Dynamite” Shows Why No Leader Should Have a Nuclear TriggerCommentary
George Perkovich
Recent Work
Carnegie India does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
More Work from Carnegie India
- India–Africa Strategic Partnership: Challenges, Potential, and Possible PathwaysArticle
A partnership between India, a country of subcontinental size, and Africa, a continent of fifty-four countries, may seem asymmetric until one notes that both are home to nearly the same number of people—1.4 billion. This essay spells out the existing challenges to the partnership, its optimal potential, and the possible pathways to realize it over the next quarter-century.
Rajiv Bhatia
- The Unresolved Challenges in U.S.–India Semiconductor CooperationCommentary
The U.S.–India semiconductor cooperation story is well-stocked with top-level strategic intent. What remains unresolved, however, are some underlying challenges that will determine whether the cooperation actually functions. Three such friction points stand out.
Shruti Mittal
- Emerging From the “Zombie State” of Trade Agreements: The India-EU FTACommentary
The India–EU Free Trade Agreement (FTA) is shaping up to be one of the most consequential trade negotiations, both economically and strategically. But, what’s in the agreement, what’s missing, and what will determine its success in the years ahead
Vrinda Sahai, Nicolas Köhler-Suzuki
- Outlooks on Open-Source Innovation at the India AI Impact Summit 2026Article
Drawing on ten public discussions from the India AI Impact Summit 2026, this article highlights key outlooks on open source in AI that are likely to shape policy and governance conversations going forward.
Shruti Mittal
- For People, Planet, and Progress: Perspectives from India's AI Impact SummitResearch
This collection of essays by scholars from Carnegie India’s Technology and Society program traces the evolution of the AI summit series and examines India’s framing around the three sutras of people, planet, and progress. Scholars have catalogued and assessed the concrete deliverables that emerged and assessed what the precedent of a Global South country hosting means for the future of the multilateral conversation.
- +3
Nidhi Singh, Tejas Bharadwaj, Shruti Mittal, …