US, India Maintain Military Ties Even As Trade Frictions Mount

Military cooperation between the US and India remains steady, with an annual exercise concluding this weekend underscoring strong bilateral defense ties despite growing political and economic discord, analysts said.

“If you look at the security issues and what’s happening, we do see a lot more continuity,” Lisa Curtis, director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, said Wednesday in Sydney. She also cited joint military exercises with Japan and the Philippines as examples to show their security ties with the US remain solid.  

“These all show that underneath the surface US traditional security cooperation in the Indo-Pacific is steaming along.”

Curtis, who has more than two decades of experience in the US government, was speaking on a panel alongside Lavina Lee, director of foreign policy and defense at United States Studies Centre, which oversaw the event.

Lee echoed those sentiments and expressed optimism that US-India ties would mend.  

“The US and India really need each other,” Lee said. “There is an introduction of a trust deficit between the US and India. I think the trust deficit between China and India is much deeper. So I can’t see that in the long-term that can be overcome.”

Lee also said that it was time for the Quad group — comprising India, the US, Japan and Australia — to consider “quite seriously” closer defense cooperation. 

“In the many war games that I’ve participated in the last few years, China always wins,” Lee said. That’s largely because China is more willing to escalate, she said, but also US allies run out of munitions and missiles and don’t have enough assets to deploy.

Earlier in the day, former US Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell called on Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to use his upcoming meeting with President Donald Trump to make the case to revive the Quad. 

Lee added the Quad can build defense cooperation in terms of collective military-industrial capacity, resilience with military and non-military supply chains, operational coordination and defense planning consultation.

Besides, Lee said close military co-operation among the US, Australia, Japan and the Philippines has stood out to her in recent times.

“Japan is the closest to our NATO allies in terms of having that mindset about preparing for war,” Lee said. “I think it accepts that these preparations for war rather than signaling is the essence of deterrence going forward.”

During the panel, CNAS’s Curtis highlighted a phone call that Trump held this week with India’s Narendra Modi to wish him a happy birthday, calling it an “auspicious day” for the Indo-Pacific. 

If the US-India relationship keeps deteriorating, she warned, it would be “very negative for the Quad.”