US Defence Secretary Lloyd Autin to visit India next week, to discuss deepening defense partnership

New Delhi: The Defense Secretary of United States Lloyd Autin shall be on a visit to India from March 19 to 21 as a part of his first abroad journey. This is the primary in-person visit of any administrator of President Joe Biden to India since he took cost as the brand new US President two months in the past. 

Announcing his visit on twitter, the US defence secretary stated, “I’ll then travel to India to meet with my counterpart, Minister of Defense Rajnath Singh , and other senior national security leaders to discuss deepening the US-India Major Defense Partnership and advancing cooperation between our countries.”

The US defense secretary may even be visiting Japan, South Korea. The Pentagon in a press release forward of the weeklong visit to the area beginning March 13 stated that the main target shall be on “advancing cooperation between our countries for a free, prosperous and open Indo-Pacific and Western Indian Ocean Region.”

His visit comes within the backdrop of Quad — India, Australia, Japan and US management digital meet. This is the primary such meet at management stage for the group. Previous conferences of the group has been at senior official ranges and at international ministers. 

The Indian defense ministry in its assertion stated, “Both sides are expected to discuss ways to further strengthen bilateral defense cooperation and exchange views on regional security challenges and common interests in maintaining a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific region.”

Both international locations have elevated defense partnership lately. India signed 4 key defense pacts with US in previous few years. These have been Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) in 2018 which enhanced info sharing and interoperability, the Industrial Security Annex (ISA), signed in December 2019 that enables for the switch of applied sciences in assist of defense manufacturing, the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA) to share unclassified geospatial info and the settlement on Navy-to-Navy Information Sharing in October 2020.

India has considerably elevated its acquisition of US defense tools with Indian forces working US-sourced platforms corresponding to P-8s, C-130Js, C-17s, AH-64s, CH-47s, Precision Guided-Excalibur Munitions, and M777 howitzers. In February, India agreed to purchase Apache and MH-60R multi-mission helicopters value $3.1 billion and is contemplating different US methods.