The first high-ranking official of the Trump administration to visit India since January, U.S. defense secretary James Mattis said on a two-day visit to New Delhi, “We look forward to sharing some of our most advanced defense technologies through the bilateral Defense Technology and Trade Initiative.”
Live Mint reports that Mattis and India’s defense minister Nirmala Sitharaman, discussed broadening maritime cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region, eradicating safe havens for terrorism, defense cooperation, drones, counter-terrorism and other major issues of mutual concern. They also focused on re-energizing the Defense Technology and Trade Initiative “as a mechanism to promote technology sharing as well as co-development and co-production efforts.”
Harsh V. Pant, professor of international relations at King’s College, London, said, “Defense ties have been growing rapidly between the two democracies and have been one of the most important factors propelling the relationship.”
“The relationship that we are building with India is not to the exclusion of other countries,” Mattis told reporters. “It is specifically designed for inclusion using a rules-based order that any nation that is living by the traditional rules of non-interference in other states in today’s age of anti-terrorism will not find this relationship in any way adversarial,” Mattis said.
