No assessment of the Modi visit to the United States would be complete without noting that “defence” seems to have risen right to the very top of the agenda as indicated by the joint statement adopted after the visit.
At its very head, the opening paras of the joint statement, which defined the substance of the visit, noted that the two sides had now launched a new “US-India COMPACT (Catalysing Opportunities for Military Partnership, Accelerated Commerce & Technology) for the 21st century.” Items 1 through 6 dealt with various issues of defence.
In contrast, in the previous joint statement of September 8, 2023, when President Joe Biden visited India, defence issues began with item 16, and in the June 2023 visit of Prime Minister Modi to Washington, it was item 11.
It is not that there was much change in the substance of the issues. Contemporary defence relations between the two countries began with the George W. Bush administration and progressed through the Obama, Trump-I and Biden administrations. What seems to have shifted is the emphasis and relative priority, which is on a deeper partnership and industrial collaboration, that could, through the simple process of cumulation, end up taking India to the brink of an alliance.
Though India has always pushed back against the A-word, there has been a steady commentary from the US offering India alliance status. Recall that in 2021, Nikki Haley and Mike Waltz wrote in Foreign Policy magazine that it was time for a formal military alliance with India. Haley is a former Republican Presidential candidate and Waltz, who was a Florida congressman and chair of the India Caucus, is now Trump’s National Security Adviser.
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In May 2023, the US House Select Committee on Strategic Competition led by Congressman Mike Gallagher suggested that India be offered membership in the NATO Plus 5 grouping comprising NATO and five Indo-Pacific countries, viz. Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Israel and South Korea.
In July 2024, the current Secretary of State Marco Rubio, then a Senator, moved a bill in the US Senate proposing to treat India at par with allies like Japan, Israel, Korea and the NATO. The goal of the bill was not just to facilitate technology and weapons transfer, but to support India in protecting its territorial integrity.
Coming back to the joint statement, it covers six heads – defence, trade and investment, energy, technology and innovation, multilateral cooperation and people-to-people action. There are areas of continuity in many of the initiatives though some have been renamed to reflect the new Trump era.
Item 1 speaks of “ a new ten-year Framework for the US-India Major Defence Partnership in the 21st Century.” But this is in fact a renewal of an old compact that was first arrived at in 2005, renewed in 2015 and was up for renewal this year anyway. Importantly though, where the old compacts were matter of fact “Framework for the US-India Defence Relationship”, the new proposed document speaks of a “US-India Major Defence Partnership.”
Item 2 speaks of the successful integration of US-origin defence products like the C-130J or the P-8I Poseidon into the Indian inventory. But now “the leaders determined that the US would expand defence sales and co-production” to enhance defence industrial cooperation. As part of this, plans are afoot this year to “pursue” new procurement and production ventures relating to the Javelin anti-tank missile and the Stryker infantry combat vehicle (ICV).
While India has been interested in the Javelin for some time now and would probably go ahead with the project, there is a question about the Stryker ICV. There are three Indian companies with competitive offerings – the Tata-Mahindra-DRDO WHAP, a Mahindra product and one by the Kalyani group.
There is no reference in the Joint Statement to Trump’s F-35 proposal. The purchase of this expensive fighter does appear far fetched at this juncture, though from the US point of view, India now meets all the criteria needed for the sale. Of course, New Delhi has worked hard to establish a domestic fighter design and manufacture capability and is hoping to field its own AMCA fifth generation fighter in about 10 years from now. An American purchase would surely undermine the Indian project.
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Item 3 is an important upgrade to the technology transfer agreements signed in 2023 with the Biden Administration. This is a commitment to review the US arms transfer regulations, especially the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) which can be a major obstacle to defence trade and technology exchange. This will be facilitated, too, the joint statement notes, by the Reciprocal Defence Procurement agreement that the two sides are negotiating.
In the joint statement, there are several references to India as a “Major Defence Partner” – a designation that was accorded to India in 2016. However, this has never been clearly defined or operationalised. In contrast, the category “Major Non-NATO Ally” accorded to Pakistan is a legal category and enables Islamabad to obtain a range of defence and security privileges in the US.
Item 4 deals with an update of the Biden-era US-India Roadmap for Defence Industrial Cooperation where the two sides have entered into a new Autonomous Systems Industry Alliance (ASIA) to enhance industry partnerships in the Indo-Pacific. As part of this, the two countries would collaborate in the development of autonomous technologies and co-produce state of the art unmanned aerial vehicles and underwater robots.
Items 5 and 6 speak of the decision to elevate the cooperation across all domains through more training exercises, as well as “break new ground” to support and sustain overseas deployments of the US and Indian militaries. Clearly, since India is less likely to have its military abroad, this is something that benefits the US.
As of now, India has categorically rejected the idea that it could become a military ally of the US. External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar in his book, The India Way, rejected the notion of India becoming part of any formal alliance. In 2023, he pushed back against the Congressional Committee proposal on the NATO Plus 5 grouping. Last year, he bluntly declared that India did not share the vision for an Asian NATO called for by Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.
But, given the current trajectory of relations, India’s technological and geopolitical dependence on the United States is set to grow, albeit incrementally. As a leader of a global alliance system and formidable military power, the US is also a major manufacturer of military equipment which it supplies to its allies. India is slowly being incorporated into its supply chains through various collaborative and co-production ventures. Economic and technological asymmetry limits any equality in the relationship here.
Of course, geopolitically and strategically, India views itself differently. The only partnership that it wants is one of equals. And it has had a long-term vision of emerging as a major industrial power. Whether the Modi government policies yield results here in either the civilian or military fields remains to be seen. At the geopolitical level, New Delhi views itself as both an Indo-Pacific and a Eurasian power; hence its memberships in the Quad, SCO and BRICS.
India has drawn and continues to draw substantial geopolitical benefit from its non-alignment and current multi-alignment. But we are in a new era where the Trump administration seems determined to overturn the global order as it exists.
Manoj Joshi is a Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi.
This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire & Galileo Ideas – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.
