Top US diplomat calls for expansion of Quad group
The United States and India are ready for a “fundamental alignment” based on “shared interests and shared goals” US deputy secretary of state Stephen Biegun said on Monday. Biegun said this was not about “an alliance on the postwar model” but an alignment “along shared security and geopolitical goals.”
At policy institute Ananta Centre’s virtual Indo-US Forum on Monday, Biegun explained: “As the US assesses our own interests and how they intersect with India’s we have seen the conditions emerge for an organic and deeper partnership.”Washington’s highestranking diplomat also called for an expansion of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, better known as the Quad, which is an informal grouping of India, Australia, Japan and the US.
“Any country that seeks a free and open Indo-Pacific and is willing to take steps to ensure that should be welcome to work with us,” he said. “The Quad is a partnership driven by shared interests, not binding obligations, and is not intended to be an exclusive grouping.” Governments, he said, have been “too cautious” about the Quad.
The US respects that India has a “strong and proud tradition of strategic autonomy,” Biegun said. He saw “enormous opportunity” in the bilateral security relationship. “We do not seek to change India’s traditions,” he stressed. “Rather we want to explore how to empower them and India’s ability to defend its own sovereignty and democracy and to advance Indian interests, across the Indo-Pacific region.”
As the Indo-US relationship advances, he added, China was the “elephant in the room.”
Elaborating on the kind of alignment he envisaged, Biegun said future security partnerships did not necessarily need to follow the postwar model “with a heavy in-country US troop presence.” The US benefited from close links with countries, “like India,” that share the US vision of a free and open Indo-Pacific and “seek to provide for their own defence.” In this context, he said, the US “benefits from an India that is as strong and prosperous.” Cooperation can come in many new ways given advances in technology, shifts in global economic influence and changing geopolitics. He said the US was prepared to do more to strengthen “India’s ability to defend itself and by promoting interoperability among our militaries through regular exercises and exchanges, common defence platforms, and co-development.” He said he hoped the coming bilateral 2+2 ministerial meeting of the two countries’ defence and foreign ministers would allow India and the US to “explore next steps on some of these issues.”
Biegun said the Quad members stand for a “vision of a Pax Indo-Pacifica, a region at peace, protected and made prosperous in equal measure by those who comprise the Indo-Pacific” and represented four democratic anchors of the region. He said the outcome of the US presidential elections would make no difference to the bilateral relationship. “I have never been more optimistic regarding the future possibilities of the India-U.S. relationship.”