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they also beat us up and smeared our lips with beef to make us outcasts
Is India a US ally aligned with America against Russia and China
- Thread starter LETHALFORCE
- Start date
LETHALFORCE
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India, US hold first Maritime Security Dialogue
By PTI
NEW DELHI: India and the US today held their first Maritime Security Dialogue here which focussed on boosting cooperation in the challenging sector with Washington rebalancing its military assets to Asia Pacific.
Officials from both countries met at Jawaharlal Nehru Bhawan for the US-India Maritime Security Dialogue.
The Indian side was represented by Joint Secretary in charge of Planning and International Cooperation (PIC) in the Defence Ministry, Shambhu Kumaran and Ministry of External Affairs Joint Secretary, Americas (AMS) Munu Mahawar.
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs David Shear, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Manpreet Anand, and Vice Admiral Aucoin, Commander, US Seventh Fleet, were the officials from theAmerican side.
The discussion focused on strategic maritime security issues like Asia-Pacific maritime challenges, naval cooperation, and multilateral engagement.
US Ambassador to India Richard Verma participated and said, "the creation of this dialogue was agreed to during Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter's recent visit to India and is a further sign of the growing relations between our two countries," a statement by the American Embassy here said.
Even though US wants it, India has flatly refused to conduct joint naval patrols in areas including the South China Sea where Beijing has maritime and territorial disputes with several neighbours.
The US wants its regional allies to adopt a more united stance against China over the South China Sea, where tension has spiked since China's construction of seven islands in the Spratly archipelago.
China claims almost the whole of the South China Sea, resulting in overlapping claims with several other Asian nations like Vietnam and the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei.
However, they accuse China of illegally reclaiming land in contested areas to create artificial islands with facilities that could potentially be for military use.
http://www.newindianexpress.com/nat...curity-Dialogue/2016/05/16/article3436128.ece
By PTI
NEW DELHI: India and the US today held their first Maritime Security Dialogue here which focussed on boosting cooperation in the challenging sector with Washington rebalancing its military assets to Asia Pacific.
Officials from both countries met at Jawaharlal Nehru Bhawan for the US-India Maritime Security Dialogue.
The Indian side was represented by Joint Secretary in charge of Planning and International Cooperation (PIC) in the Defence Ministry, Shambhu Kumaran and Ministry of External Affairs Joint Secretary, Americas (AMS) Munu Mahawar.
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs David Shear, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Manpreet Anand, and Vice Admiral Aucoin, Commander, US Seventh Fleet, were the officials from theAmerican side.
The discussion focused on strategic maritime security issues like Asia-Pacific maritime challenges, naval cooperation, and multilateral engagement.
US Ambassador to India Richard Verma participated and said, "the creation of this dialogue was agreed to during Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter's recent visit to India and is a further sign of the growing relations between our two countries," a statement by the American Embassy here said.
Even though US wants it, India has flatly refused to conduct joint naval patrols in areas including the South China Sea where Beijing has maritime and territorial disputes with several neighbours.
The US wants its regional allies to adopt a more united stance against China over the South China Sea, where tension has spiked since China's construction of seven islands in the Spratly archipelago.
China claims almost the whole of the South China Sea, resulting in overlapping claims with several other Asian nations like Vietnam and the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei.
However, they accuse China of illegally reclaiming land in contested areas to create artificial islands with facilities that could potentially be for military use.
http://www.newindianexpress.com/nat...curity-Dialogue/2016/05/16/article3436128.ece
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I think there's an effort of military pact.
American back up if India has to undergo war in IOR and Indian Back up if US has to go under war in SCS.
Yet, we can now even reach US, we must try to get Naval bases in other regions as well.
LETHALFORCE
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The details will not be revealed but I am sure it will be beneficial to both.
India never reveals details of defense pacts (USA, Russia,Israel, Japan etc...)
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We are getting bases in other regions. It's going on on an emergency basis, it's a shame that our media doesn't spare a few minutes to show defense related news.
Here :
INS Delhi, Tarkash & Deepak reach Manama (Bahrain) on 4 day visit.Will interact with Royal Bahrain Naval Force. Latest photos taken yesterday.
We have also signed counter terrorism MOUs with UAE :
India, UAE join hands to counter terrorism
India, UAE set to ink civil nuclear & 15 other pacts
Saudi Arabia tilts toward India
Why India's growing proximity to Saudi Arabia bothers Pakistan
We have also offered to send elite troops to guard the palaces of unstable Arab governments, which was done until now by US and Pakistani troops. We have also offered to provide protection to the royal family of Brunei, which was done until now by the British.
India offers to send its Gurkhas to Brunei
So, India is taking a larger role in the greater IOR domain, especially the littoral states, in addition to the ELINT bases we have in other nations like Vietnam, Tajikistan. It's just that the defeatist media is more interested in having prime-time debates about Deepika's cleavage and jihadi Congress leaders are busy spewing bullshit like this to keep their followers stupid :
Last edited:
Batfan
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What a sadistic article. India will do whatever lies in its interest. Just some pro-Chinese getting mad at improving Indo-US partnership.
Sent from my XT1068 using Tapatalk
LETHALFORCE
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http://thediplomat.com/2016/05/how-far-have-india-us-ties-come-after-two-years-of-modi/
How Far Have India-US Ties Come After Two Years of Modi?
After two years in office, how far have India’s ties with the United States come?
As Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government nears its two-year anniversary, it is worth taking stock of its foreign policy toward the United States, a much-hyped strategic partner. Modi even has a strong personal rapport with U.S. President Barack Obama. So then, where do India’s political, defense, and economic relations with the United States stand after two years of the Modi government? So far, the score card shows mixed results.
The Modi government, over the past two years, has certainly scored major victories in building positive ties between India and the United States. The prime minister himself has taken proactive measures to build a rapport with important U.S. political leaders. He met Obama six times just in his first 24 months in office and visited the United States three times. Such is his relationship with Obama that he inspired the leader of the most powerful country in the world to write a note supporting him for Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People list for the year 2015.
Interactions among other leaders in India and the United States have also picked up. Just over the past two years, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter has met India’s Minister of Defense four times. Secretary of State John Kerry has visited India twice and met Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj several times. Several influential U.S. congressional committee members have also visited India. Starting in the early months of that new government, Senator John McCain and three cabinet members flew to India to hold consultations about the bilateral relationship. This followed visits by Senator Angus King, member of the Senate Armed Services and Intelligence Committees, and Senator Tim Kaine, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on South and Central Asian Affairs. Many such high-level visits from the United States have since continued, engaging Indian policymakers and leaders at a steady pace. This trend has accelerated considerably since Obama’s visit to India last January, when he graced the Indian Republic Day celebrations as the chief guest. At a political level, it is clear that there have been significant improvements in the bilateral relationship.
Defense relations have also continued their steady pace. The United States has for some time been the country with which India conducts the largest number of military exercises. This engagement is growing in complexity and sophistication. Issues of co-development and co-production of military equipment have also gathered some momentum, but have seen only modest progress over the past two years. Only a couple of low-end projects, such as the research and development of mobile electric hybrid power sources and the next-generation protective body suits, have been taken up, with talk continuing of moving to other more sensitive technologies. The recent signing in principle of the Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA) would allow mutual support for refueling, supplies, and spare parts and is an important sign of both sides overcoming bureaucratic and other logistical hurdles in the pursuit of closer cooperation. In this direction, the creation of the India Rapid Reaction Cell in the Pentagon, the first country-specific cell of its kind, for simplifying defense collaboration, is another small but significant step toward overcoming bureaucratic bottlenecks.
Of course, the India-U.S. bilateral defense relationship also depends on the sale of military equipment. India in recent years has emerged as one of the most important export markets for the U.S. defense industry, with defense trade volume surpassing $10 billion dollars in the past decade. In fact, the Indian market for U.S. defense products might expand considerably as India takes a second look at the Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet after downsizing a deal to buy French Rafale fighters. No numbers have been officially mentioned yet, and the deal may take years before producing any tangible results. Some conservative estimates suggest that India could be looking to purchase 100 to 150 Boeing jets. If this deal actually goes through, it has the potential to usher in a qualitatively different relationship–one not of buyer-seller, but of co-producers. The Modi government can justifiably take some credit for this change in Indian thinking.
Despite the advances in political and defense ties, one area that has not seen expected results after Modi’s first two years is the India-U.S. economic relationship. Although data available from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis shows an upward trend in trade and investment ties, there is a growing feeling among political and economic observers that bilateral economic relationship has reached a plateau. A comparison between the last two years of the Manmohan Singh government and the first two years of the Modi government hits home this point. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s data, bilateral trade volume stood at $95 and $101 billion respectively in 2012 and 2013, with a net increase of $6 billion dollars between 2012 and 2013. However, under Modi, the improvements have been modest: $104 and a little over $107 billion in 2014 and 2015. The slow pace at which U.S.-India economic ties have expanded under Modi is baffling and concerning.
This slow pace of economic cooperation is particularly concerning for two reasons. First, the Modi government ran on an electoral platform that emphasized boosting India’s economic standing in the world, which would have been difficult to achieve without strengthening economic ties with the world’s largest economy. Modi’s personal reputation as a business-oriented leader was considered a critical component in the achievement of this agenda. So far, that business-friendly reputation appears to have borne little fruit for India. Second, the Obama administration has expended tremendous effort on expanding economic and trade ties with Asian countries, as evidenced by the vigor with which it has pursued international trade pacts like the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The concern for India is that it might be left behind in Asia as the U.S. advances its trade agreements with other countries. One adverse consequence for India could be that it would remain forever stuck in a middle-income trap, a promising economy never truly materializing its potential.
All said, the past two years of the Modi government paint a mixed picture for the India-U.S. relationship. Defense ties have continued along a decisively upward trajectory of growth and sophistication, but economic ties have lagged behind. Indeed, the political relations between the two countries have benefited the most under Modi. The prime minister has built a good personal rapport with the U.S. president. In the United States, several high-level officials and leaders have shown interest in further improving relations with India. However, as the recent history of India-U.S. ties shows, when the political winds shift their course, it is ultimately the defense and economic ties that keep bilateral relations afloat. It is precisely these areas, particularly the economic component of the bilateral, that the Modi government must emphasize in its future policy toward the United States.
Shivaji Kumar is assistant professor at the Centre for International Politics at Jawaharlal Nehru University’s School of International Studies.
How Far Have India-US Ties Come After Two Years of Modi?
After two years in office, how far have India’s ties with the United States come?
As Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government nears its two-year anniversary, it is worth taking stock of its foreign policy toward the United States, a much-hyped strategic partner. Modi even has a strong personal rapport with U.S. President Barack Obama. So then, where do India’s political, defense, and economic relations with the United States stand after two years of the Modi government? So far, the score card shows mixed results.
The Modi government, over the past two years, has certainly scored major victories in building positive ties between India and the United States. The prime minister himself has taken proactive measures to build a rapport with important U.S. political leaders. He met Obama six times just in his first 24 months in office and visited the United States three times. Such is his relationship with Obama that he inspired the leader of the most powerful country in the world to write a note supporting him for Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People list for the year 2015.
Interactions among other leaders in India and the United States have also picked up. Just over the past two years, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter has met India’s Minister of Defense four times. Secretary of State John Kerry has visited India twice and met Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj several times. Several influential U.S. congressional committee members have also visited India. Starting in the early months of that new government, Senator John McCain and three cabinet members flew to India to hold consultations about the bilateral relationship. This followed visits by Senator Angus King, member of the Senate Armed Services and Intelligence Committees, and Senator Tim Kaine, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on South and Central Asian Affairs. Many such high-level visits from the United States have since continued, engaging Indian policymakers and leaders at a steady pace. This trend has accelerated considerably since Obama’s visit to India last January, when he graced the Indian Republic Day celebrations as the chief guest. At a political level, it is clear that there have been significant improvements in the bilateral relationship.
Defense relations have also continued their steady pace. The United States has for some time been the country with which India conducts the largest number of military exercises. This engagement is growing in complexity and sophistication. Issues of co-development and co-production of military equipment have also gathered some momentum, but have seen only modest progress over the past two years. Only a couple of low-end projects, such as the research and development of mobile electric hybrid power sources and the next-generation protective body suits, have been taken up, with talk continuing of moving to other more sensitive technologies. The recent signing in principle of the Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA) would allow mutual support for refueling, supplies, and spare parts and is an important sign of both sides overcoming bureaucratic and other logistical hurdles in the pursuit of closer cooperation. In this direction, the creation of the India Rapid Reaction Cell in the Pentagon, the first country-specific cell of its kind, for simplifying defense collaboration, is another small but significant step toward overcoming bureaucratic bottlenecks.
Of course, the India-U.S. bilateral defense relationship also depends on the sale of military equipment. India in recent years has emerged as one of the most important export markets for the U.S. defense industry, with defense trade volume surpassing $10 billion dollars in the past decade. In fact, the Indian market for U.S. defense products might expand considerably as India takes a second look at the Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet after downsizing a deal to buy French Rafale fighters. No numbers have been officially mentioned yet, and the deal may take years before producing any tangible results. Some conservative estimates suggest that India could be looking to purchase 100 to 150 Boeing jets. If this deal actually goes through, it has the potential to usher in a qualitatively different relationship–one not of buyer-seller, but of co-producers. The Modi government can justifiably take some credit for this change in Indian thinking.
Despite the advances in political and defense ties, one area that has not seen expected results after Modi’s first two years is the India-U.S. economic relationship. Although data available from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis shows an upward trend in trade and investment ties, there is a growing feeling among political and economic observers that bilateral economic relationship has reached a plateau. A comparison between the last two years of the Manmohan Singh government and the first two years of the Modi government hits home this point. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s data, bilateral trade volume stood at $95 and $101 billion respectively in 2012 and 2013, with a net increase of $6 billion dollars between 2012 and 2013. However, under Modi, the improvements have been modest: $104 and a little over $107 billion in 2014 and 2015. The slow pace at which U.S.-India economic ties have expanded under Modi is baffling and concerning.
This slow pace of economic cooperation is particularly concerning for two reasons. First, the Modi government ran on an electoral platform that emphasized boosting India’s economic standing in the world, which would have been difficult to achieve without strengthening economic ties with the world’s largest economy. Modi’s personal reputation as a business-oriented leader was considered a critical component in the achievement of this agenda. So far, that business-friendly reputation appears to have borne little fruit for India. Second, the Obama administration has expended tremendous effort on expanding economic and trade ties with Asian countries, as evidenced by the vigor with which it has pursued international trade pacts like the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The concern for India is that it might be left behind in Asia as the U.S. advances its trade agreements with other countries. One adverse consequence for India could be that it would remain forever stuck in a middle-income trap, a promising economy never truly materializing its potential.
All said, the past two years of the Modi government paint a mixed picture for the India-U.S. relationship. Defense ties have continued along a decisively upward trajectory of growth and sophistication, but economic ties have lagged behind. Indeed, the political relations between the two countries have benefited the most under Modi. The prime minister has built a good personal rapport with the U.S. president. In the United States, several high-level officials and leaders have shown interest in further improving relations with India. However, as the recent history of India-U.S. ties shows, when the political winds shift their course, it is ultimately the defense and economic ties that keep bilateral relations afloat. It is precisely these areas, particularly the economic component of the bilateral, that the Modi government must emphasize in its future policy toward the United States.
Shivaji Kumar is assistant professor at the Centre for International Politics at Jawaharlal Nehru University’s School of International Studies.
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http://www.ndtv.com/india-news/rela...ot-a-zero-sum-game-pentagon-1407031?site=full
Relationship With India, Pak Not A 'Zero-Sum Game': Pentagon
Relationship With India, Pak Not A 'Zero-Sum Game': Pentagon
LETHALFORCE
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More opportunities to expand Indo-US military cooperation, says Pentagon
- See more at: http://indianexpress.com/article/in...n-says-pentagon-2804591/#sthash.xbczqlAf.dpuf
- See more at: http://indianexpress.com/article/in...n-says-pentagon-2804591/#sthash.xbczqlAf.dpuf
LETHALFORCE
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http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Eco.../Japan-to-join-US-India-naval-exercises-again
Japan to join US-India naval exercises again
Japan to join US-India naval exercises again
LETHALFORCE
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http://thediplomat.com/2016/05/how-the-us-india-defense-partnership-came-to-blossom-under-modi/
Image Credit: Flickr/ Ash Carter
How the US-India Defense Partnership Came to Blossom Under Modi
As Ash Carter’s recent trip to India highlights, U.S.-India defense ties are ready for a new era.
Against many odds, Prime Minister Narendra Modi – with capable assists from President Obama – has repaired the U.S.-India strategic equation that had begun to fray during the latter years of his predecessor’s second term in office. As an expression of goodwill for his energetic espousal of the bilateral cause, Modi will be formally welcomed on the South Lawn of the White House in early June. His fourth visit to the Oval Office, less than halfway into his (first) term, is a reflection of Washington’s primus inter pares standing among the major powers within the constellation of New Delhi’s global and Indian Ocean and Asia-Pacific interests.
Against a lesser set of odds, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has restored momentum to the U.S.-India defense partnership that appeared to be stalling during the past half-decade following India’s disinclination to sign three ‘foundational agreements’ which, at the time was imagined, would append the Indian armed forces to US geostrategic purposes in the Indo-Asia-Pacific and beyond. During the second week of April, Carter paid his third visit in 30 months to New Delhi, and the seventh by a U.S. defense secretary to India since 2008 (during this time only one visit was reciprocated) – a reflection of the prominence accorded to New Delhi within the Pentagon’s emerging constellation of interests within the Indo-Asia-Pacific strategic arc.
The contrasting outreaches capture a truth that permeates the U.S.-India strategic engagement: New Delhi seeks a broad-based and loosely-defined strategic partnership with Washington as envisioned in its ‘Act East’ policy; the U.S., by contrast, has emphasized a narrower and focused maritime defense alignment in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, as epitomized in its ‘Rebalance’ policy.
In New Delhi, Carter and counterpart Manohar Parrikar laid the penultimate touches to a series of defense cooperation, technology sharing, and research and co-production project-related agreements that have been on the anvil for the past 18 months or so. When the final details are filled in, the U.S. and India will have exchanged a memorandum of agreement to share naval logistics, an understanding to share U.S. aircraft carrier technologies (particularly a catapult launch system), and the commencement of upgraded maritime dialogues, including on anti-submarine operations, at the official 2+2 as well as officer-to-officer level. In 2015, the two defense heads re-authorized their defense framework agreement for an additional 10 years, identifying the security of free movement of lawful commerce and navigation across sea lines of communication as a newly-shared national interest.
More consequentially, Carter and Parrikar, during their unusually-engaged period of interaction (they’ve met four times in the past year), have laid the foundation of a new and elevated phase of strategic defense cooperation – U.S.-India Defense Partnership 2.0 – that will fundamentally, albeit incrementally, transform the means by which the Indian Navy and the U.S. Pacific Fleet engage each other within the confined reaches of the Eastern Indian Ocean and the southern Bay of Bengal.
The agreement to share logistics during peacetime will enable the two navies to mitigate capability gaps in broader Indian Ocean waters that have seen a growth in operational commitments. It will also breathe life into the India-U.S. Maritime Cooperation Framework agreement that had envisaged “an appropriate agreement on logistics support” – 10 years after its signing. The understanding to share aircraft carrier catapult-launch technology and design capabilities will enable the two navies to operate a complementary set of deck-based platforms (P-8I patrol aircraft; E-2D Hawkeye early warning aircraft; F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighters – if agreement on co-production in India is reached) that will enable the two navies to operate separately but synergistically across the Indian Ocean domain.
With Beijing’s progressive sub-surface penetration of the Indian Ocean now a fact, a navy-to-navy dialogue and at-sea exercises tailored to this undersea dimension will enable New Delhi to both remedy its under-preparedness in the area of anti-submarine sonars as well as deter the entry of PLAN nuclear attack submarines into the Bay of Bengal. In time, as U.S.-sourced advanced communications gear facilitates seamless and secure ship-shore and platform-to-platform intelligence-sharing, it will also open the door – and the eyes of the Indian Navy’s civilian masters – to the virtues of a more interoperable equation with the U.S. Navy along strategic approaches to the eastern Indian Ocean.
A couple of years from now, it is likely that the Indian Navy and the U.S. Pacific Fleet, individually, will operate a set of network-centric intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) assets that allow a common information picture about the eastern Indian Ocean to be formed and exchanged as well as provide a basis for cooperative responses to possible threats.
Credit for the renewal of defense-maritime ties goes to both parties. The proximate catalyst for the stepped-up engagement was the Modi government’s willingness to cast aside its inherited blinkers and re-evaluate three Bush administration-era foundational defense agreements (on logistics, encrypted communications, and geo-spatial mapping) with a fresh set of eyes. A ‘non-paper’ to this end was solicited from the Pentagon in late-2014. Of even greater consequence has been laudable openness to jettisoning India’s long-standing disinclination to be associated in any way, shape or form with extra-regional strategy and purpose in its hitherto jealously-guarded Indian Ocean zone of core interest.
For his part, Carter deserves credit for his perseverance in working through the fundamental alignment-autonomy contradiction that afflicts U.S.-India strategic ties to tease out a middle ground that combines New Delhi’s longing for defense technology-sharing (to boost autonomous capabilities) with Washington’s yearning for navy-to-navy interoperability in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. In doing so, he has overruled his own earlier, and extravagant, conception of the role of India – as host of U.S. ‘over-the-horizon’ bases and participant in U.S.-led ‘coalition-of-the-willing’ conventional missions – within US and allied military strategy.
The US-India Defense Partnership 2.0 nevertheless needs to be kept in perspective.
Its geographic writ is unlikely to extend beyond the sea lines of communication and strategic (eastern) approaches of the Indian Ocean and southern Bay of Bengal – aside for emergency disaster relief missions. From a functional standpoint, military-grade intelligence sharing or any hint of federated defense planning or capabilities, including joint threat assessment and expeditionary or amphibious operational cooperation, remains off-the-table. Most of the smaller-scale ‘pathfinder’ defense technology cooperation projects on the roster too, particularly those marginally attached to the maritime sphere or which entail private-to-private technology transfer, are likely to wither on the vine.
A sense of proportion must also inform an understanding of the China factor. The eastern Indian Ocean will remain for some time a decidedly distant ‘far seas’ theater of operation for the PLAN – even as it goes about coupling a recent emphasis on ‘blue-water defense’ to its historical interest in ‘offshore defense.’ Not until 2014 did the PLAN’s South Sea Fleet Surface Task Group conduct its first – and solitary – training deployment there. The interests involved, too, are limited (albeit vital – free access, unimpeded navigation) and correspond with India’s own such interests east of Malacca – meaning, they are amenable to diplomatic give-and-take. Earlier this February, India and China inaugurated, and institutionalized, a mid-level official Maritime Affairs Dialogue that will allow both sides to broach these and related issues of common interest. Later in the year, China and India along with Russia are to hold a first-ever, stand-alone ministerial-level consultation on security architecture in the Asia-Pacific region.
New Delhi neither sees itself as locked in a triangular strategic relationship with Washington and Beijing (rather both sets of ties are guided by bilateral actions on separate tracks) nor is Beijing the ‘threat’ that some in both capitals perceive it to be (the latest Defense Ministry Annual Report dispenses with the characterization of China as a ‘threat’). China too has never complained about US defense technology transfers to India, especially in a bilateral context.
US-India defense cooperation (other than big-ticket military sales) has for too long failed to attain take-off speed, owing in part to a lack of trust arising from a tendency on both sides to view defense cooperation initiatives through a lens of entrapment. The tempered expectations but dependable delivery in US-India Defense Partnership 2.0 may be marked as the moment when the two parties dismounted the high horse of unattainable ambition and settled for a more productive, albeit modest, equilibrium that translated their mutual visions of order into practical cooperation on air, land, and sea in the Indian Ocean and Asia-Pacific region. For their foresight and wisdom to compromise, Carter and Parrikar deserve a token of praise.
Sourabh Gupta ([email protected]) is a senior fellow at the Institute for China-America Studies in Washington, D.C. This article was originally published by Pacific Forum CSIS PacNet here, and represents the views of the respective author.
Image Credit: Flickr/ Ash Carter
How the US-India Defense Partnership Came to Blossom Under Modi
As Ash Carter’s recent trip to India highlights, U.S.-India defense ties are ready for a new era.
Against many odds, Prime Minister Narendra Modi – with capable assists from President Obama – has repaired the U.S.-India strategic equation that had begun to fray during the latter years of his predecessor’s second term in office. As an expression of goodwill for his energetic espousal of the bilateral cause, Modi will be formally welcomed on the South Lawn of the White House in early June. His fourth visit to the Oval Office, less than halfway into his (first) term, is a reflection of Washington’s primus inter pares standing among the major powers within the constellation of New Delhi’s global and Indian Ocean and Asia-Pacific interests.
Against a lesser set of odds, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has restored momentum to the U.S.-India defense partnership that appeared to be stalling during the past half-decade following India’s disinclination to sign three ‘foundational agreements’ which, at the time was imagined, would append the Indian armed forces to US geostrategic purposes in the Indo-Asia-Pacific and beyond. During the second week of April, Carter paid his third visit in 30 months to New Delhi, and the seventh by a U.S. defense secretary to India since 2008 (during this time only one visit was reciprocated) – a reflection of the prominence accorded to New Delhi within the Pentagon’s emerging constellation of interests within the Indo-Asia-Pacific strategic arc.
The contrasting outreaches capture a truth that permeates the U.S.-India strategic engagement: New Delhi seeks a broad-based and loosely-defined strategic partnership with Washington as envisioned in its ‘Act East’ policy; the U.S., by contrast, has emphasized a narrower and focused maritime defense alignment in the Indo-Asia-Pacific, as epitomized in its ‘Rebalance’ policy.
In New Delhi, Carter and counterpart Manohar Parrikar laid the penultimate touches to a series of defense cooperation, technology sharing, and research and co-production project-related agreements that have been on the anvil for the past 18 months or so. When the final details are filled in, the U.S. and India will have exchanged a memorandum of agreement to share naval logistics, an understanding to share U.S. aircraft carrier technologies (particularly a catapult launch system), and the commencement of upgraded maritime dialogues, including on anti-submarine operations, at the official 2+2 as well as officer-to-officer level. In 2015, the two defense heads re-authorized their defense framework agreement for an additional 10 years, identifying the security of free movement of lawful commerce and navigation across sea lines of communication as a newly-shared national interest.
More consequentially, Carter and Parrikar, during their unusually-engaged period of interaction (they’ve met four times in the past year), have laid the foundation of a new and elevated phase of strategic defense cooperation – U.S.-India Defense Partnership 2.0 – that will fundamentally, albeit incrementally, transform the means by which the Indian Navy and the U.S. Pacific Fleet engage each other within the confined reaches of the Eastern Indian Ocean and the southern Bay of Bengal.
The agreement to share logistics during peacetime will enable the two navies to mitigate capability gaps in broader Indian Ocean waters that have seen a growth in operational commitments. It will also breathe life into the India-U.S. Maritime Cooperation Framework agreement that had envisaged “an appropriate agreement on logistics support” – 10 years after its signing. The understanding to share aircraft carrier catapult-launch technology and design capabilities will enable the two navies to operate a complementary set of deck-based platforms (P-8I patrol aircraft; E-2D Hawkeye early warning aircraft; F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighters – if agreement on co-production in India is reached) that will enable the two navies to operate separately but synergistically across the Indian Ocean domain.
With Beijing’s progressive sub-surface penetration of the Indian Ocean now a fact, a navy-to-navy dialogue and at-sea exercises tailored to this undersea dimension will enable New Delhi to both remedy its under-preparedness in the area of anti-submarine sonars as well as deter the entry of PLAN nuclear attack submarines into the Bay of Bengal. In time, as U.S.-sourced advanced communications gear facilitates seamless and secure ship-shore and platform-to-platform intelligence-sharing, it will also open the door – and the eyes of the Indian Navy’s civilian masters – to the virtues of a more interoperable equation with the U.S. Navy along strategic approaches to the eastern Indian Ocean.
A couple of years from now, it is likely that the Indian Navy and the U.S. Pacific Fleet, individually, will operate a set of network-centric intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) assets that allow a common information picture about the eastern Indian Ocean to be formed and exchanged as well as provide a basis for cooperative responses to possible threats.
Credit for the renewal of defense-maritime ties goes to both parties. The proximate catalyst for the stepped-up engagement was the Modi government’s willingness to cast aside its inherited blinkers and re-evaluate three Bush administration-era foundational defense agreements (on logistics, encrypted communications, and geo-spatial mapping) with a fresh set of eyes. A ‘non-paper’ to this end was solicited from the Pentagon in late-2014. Of even greater consequence has been laudable openness to jettisoning India’s long-standing disinclination to be associated in any way, shape or form with extra-regional strategy and purpose in its hitherto jealously-guarded Indian Ocean zone of core interest.
For his part, Carter deserves credit for his perseverance in working through the fundamental alignment-autonomy contradiction that afflicts U.S.-India strategic ties to tease out a middle ground that combines New Delhi’s longing for defense technology-sharing (to boost autonomous capabilities) with Washington’s yearning for navy-to-navy interoperability in the Indo-Asia-Pacific. In doing so, he has overruled his own earlier, and extravagant, conception of the role of India – as host of U.S. ‘over-the-horizon’ bases and participant in U.S.-led ‘coalition-of-the-willing’ conventional missions – within US and allied military strategy.
The US-India Defense Partnership 2.0 nevertheless needs to be kept in perspective.
Its geographic writ is unlikely to extend beyond the sea lines of communication and strategic (eastern) approaches of the Indian Ocean and southern Bay of Bengal – aside for emergency disaster relief missions. From a functional standpoint, military-grade intelligence sharing or any hint of federated defense planning or capabilities, including joint threat assessment and expeditionary or amphibious operational cooperation, remains off-the-table. Most of the smaller-scale ‘pathfinder’ defense technology cooperation projects on the roster too, particularly those marginally attached to the maritime sphere or which entail private-to-private technology transfer, are likely to wither on the vine.
A sense of proportion must also inform an understanding of the China factor. The eastern Indian Ocean will remain for some time a decidedly distant ‘far seas’ theater of operation for the PLAN – even as it goes about coupling a recent emphasis on ‘blue-water defense’ to its historical interest in ‘offshore defense.’ Not until 2014 did the PLAN’s South Sea Fleet Surface Task Group conduct its first – and solitary – training deployment there. The interests involved, too, are limited (albeit vital – free access, unimpeded navigation) and correspond with India’s own such interests east of Malacca – meaning, they are amenable to diplomatic give-and-take. Earlier this February, India and China inaugurated, and institutionalized, a mid-level official Maritime Affairs Dialogue that will allow both sides to broach these and related issues of common interest. Later in the year, China and India along with Russia are to hold a first-ever, stand-alone ministerial-level consultation on security architecture in the Asia-Pacific region.
New Delhi neither sees itself as locked in a triangular strategic relationship with Washington and Beijing (rather both sets of ties are guided by bilateral actions on separate tracks) nor is Beijing the ‘threat’ that some in both capitals perceive it to be (the latest Defense Ministry Annual Report dispenses with the characterization of China as a ‘threat’). China too has never complained about US defense technology transfers to India, especially in a bilateral context.
US-India defense cooperation (other than big-ticket military sales) has for too long failed to attain take-off speed, owing in part to a lack of trust arising from a tendency on both sides to view defense cooperation initiatives through a lens of entrapment. The tempered expectations but dependable delivery in US-India Defense Partnership 2.0 may be marked as the moment when the two parties dismounted the high horse of unattainable ambition and settled for a more productive, albeit modest, equilibrium that translated their mutual visions of order into practical cooperation on air, land, and sea in the Indian Ocean and Asia-Pacific region. For their foresight and wisdom to compromise, Carter and Parrikar deserve a token of praise.
Sourabh Gupta ([email protected]) is a senior fellow at the Institute for China-America Studies in Washington, D.C. This article was originally published by Pacific Forum CSIS PacNet here, and represents the views of the respective author.
Zebra
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That is true.
"U.S.-India Defence Technology and Partnership Act" can take care of defence issues and bilateral relations.
Now only economic issues left behind.
What say...........!
LETHALFORCE
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india has largest trade surplus with USA . Many sectors enjoying a boom from trade with USA
Its very important how Indo-Usa partnership benefit us cornering china economically rather than defence sector. Defence procurement has some hesitations from our side we agree or not. So Usa should be sincere in helping India in trade and opening up of its market to us.
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And we should be careful that we don't make any problem / threat to Russia.
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What difference does it make to us is Russia comes under threat as a byproduct of any of the decisions taken in Indian interest? have we signed a document which says that India will not pursue its national interests if it hurts Russia?
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actually we can go lateral
instead of the usual banging on their door to open up, which realistically is going to be too much of an uphill task given that donald has vowed to move more towards closing doors
we should instead engage usa to work together to go global and sell jv products and systems, to third countries .....especially african countries and other asian nations as india has great contacts in africa , great image and so too in many asian and south american nations, india can tread more easily than the usa .....so here's where we can work together
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What is this sudden US-India wave?
People are forgetting India and China' trade value. I just read that all most 60% our imports are from China.
Why would China want to lose this much trade with India over some silly things?
On top of things, US news papers are being so honey and sweet these days.
It is all so confusing.
People are forgetting India and China' trade value. I just read that all most 60% our imports are from China.
Why would China want to lose this much trade with India over some silly things?
On top of things, US news papers are being so honey and sweet these days.
It is all so confusing.
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We get surplus in trade with US, but deficit with China.
Wanna see sweetness of China to please India? See.
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/974019.shtml
Yanks and chinks are busy dancing around us now a days.
And this shows strategic depth which is before at least two decades before proper rise if India at level of US or China.
Zebra
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http://www.newkerala.com/news/2016/fullnews-65083.html
Look forward to continuing work with PM Modi: U.S.
Washington D.C. , May 18 : Ahead of his key address at a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress nect month, the Barack Obama government has asserted that it is looking forward to continue to work with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on all fronts to strengthen ties between two nations..............
:hippo:
