Washington and New Delhi on Monday laid out an ambitious roadmap for military-industrial cooperation amid India’s efforts to reduce dependence on arms supplier Russia and localize defense production.
“We have established an ambitious new roadmap for defense industrial cooperation, which will fast-track high-priority cooperation and joint production projects,” US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said at the end of an overnight visit to New Delhi. .
Moscow and New Delhi have been allies for decades, with Russia by far the largest arms supplier to India.
Now India – which has not condemned Russia for its invasion of Ukraine – is trying to diversify by widening its sources of imports and increasing domestic production.
Western countries, including the US and France, are negotiating multibillion-dollar deals, and diplomats say India is making technology transfer a high priority as part of any deal.
The U.S. Department of Defense said the agreement would accelerate technology cooperation and joint production in areas including air combat and ground mobility systems, the “undersea domain,” and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
The initiative aims to “change the paradigm of cooperation between the US and Indian defense sectors”, it said, and “could provide India with access to advanced technology and support India’s defense modernization projects”.
India displaced China as the world’s most populous country earlier this year, and relations between the Asian giants have been strained since a deadly high-altitude border clash in June 2020.
At the same time, Washington and Beijing are engaged in fierce competition on the diplomatic, military, technological and economic fronts.
But India is treading the diplomatic path: Uniquely, it is a member of both the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which includes both Russia and China, and the Quad, the US, Japan and Australia to counter Beijing’s growing aggression. has been established with
Along with arms, India also imports oil from Russia and its purchases have increased since the start of the war in Ukraine.
Austin, speaking to reporters after meeting his counterpart Rajnath Singh, said that developing a partnership with India would be “bullying and coercive” by China, as well as Russian “aggression against Ukraine”. has come into view.
India’s defense ministry said the talks “focused on identifying ways to strengthen industrial cooperation” with Washington, including “joint development of new technologies and joint production of existing and new systems”.
The visit to Austin comes ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Washington in June.
Austin visited India as part of an Asia tour that had previously taken him to Japan and Singapore, part of a push to help counter China and an increasingly belligerent North Korea.
Austin said the US was “committed to working closely with India in support of our shared vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific”, but added that it wanted to establish a “NATO” equivalent in the region. Not trying.
— with additional input from AFP