Defence priorities of India and the US must converge
The Defence Technology and Trade Initiative must be revived in order to bring the right people together
There is a real possibility that the end of America’s “unipolar moment” in Asia will be followed not by an enduring multipolar environment in which India has room to thrive, but rather by Chinese regional hegemony. The only realistic bulwark against this outcome is a robust partnership between India and the United States. Embracing India is one of the few positions that draws wide bipartisan support in Washington. There is also increasing recognition in New Delhi that India needs foreign partners to manage the risks associated with China’s ascendancy. And the US is still the most capable military and economic force on the planet.
In 2012, Washington and New Delhi launched the Defence Technology and Trade Initiative (DTTI) as the focal point of government-to-government efforts to increase defence collaboration. While successful in significant respects, the DTTI has failed to produce major industrial collaboration, because it didn’t bring the right people together.
There are plenty of matches to be made. The Narendra Modi administration wants to create new jobs in India, while US President Donald Trump is keenly focused on increasing American exports. This makes joint India-us manufacturing, co-production, and co-development a common goal.
The DTTI dialogues should include participation by the Indian secretary of defence and secretary of defence, industrial policy and promotion. Second, the Indian government should use the DTTI to formally communicate to both the US government and American industry the defence capabilities the ministry of defence seeks to acquire and its timeline for doing so. This will allow American industry to identify opportunities for co-production and co-development that are profitable and therefore economically viable.
Third, the DTTI agenda should be set to correspond with India’s “strategic partnership” acquisition procedures. The US government’s Technology Security and Foreign Disclosure process for global foreign military sales and direct commercial sales is not tailored to India’s unique acquisition procedures. The DTTI dialogues can fill this gap between the two different bureaucratic systems, which was the DTTI’S original purpose.
The next major opportunity for outcome driven India-us defence engagement is the ‘2+2’ when the US secretary of defence and secretary of state meet together with India’s minister of defence and minister of external affairs. These officials are positioned to drive practical and pragmatic collaboration, but it will only go as far as common interests allow. It’s essential that the right people from both the private and public sectors be present. Change and growth are two constants in life. The moment we try to resist them — in whichever way we know — we stop evolving. We must realise that every soul takes its own time to evolve. However, only a few manage to create their own, meaningful existence.
Growth and change would happen in any case and it is up to us as to how we welcome them in our lives and create a more constructive environment. We have the