US-India Advance Ambitious Initiatives Across Defense, Other Areas
WASHINGTON, DC (ANI) – US Defense and State Department officials co-chaired the sixth 2+2 Intersessional Dialogue with their Indian counterparts in New Delhi on September 7 and advanced an ambitious set of initiatives across the breadth of the bilateral partnership, the Pentagon said on September 8.
The US Defense Department said they reviewed progress toward operationalizing major bilateral initiatives on information-sharing, defense industrial cooperation, and joint service engagements. They committed to launching an inaugural Emerging Defense Capabilities Dialog later this fall, as the two sides expand cooperation in new domains such as space, cyber, artificial intelligence, and other defense technology areas.
“The 2+2 Intersessional Dialogue advanced an ambitious set of initiatives across the breadth of the US-India partnership, including defense and security, science and technology, climate, public health, trade, and people-to-people ties,” US Department of Defense spokesperson John Supple said in a statement.
On the defense side, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs Ely Ratner and his counterparts discussed a range of leading regional security issues, including recent developments in East Asia.
“The officials also reviewed progress toward operationalizing major bilateral initiatives on information-sharing, defense industrial cooperation, and joint service engagements to support combined, multi-domain operations,” they said.
They committed to launching an inaugural Emerging Defense Capabilities Dialogue later this fall, as the two sides expand cooperation in new domains such as space, cyber, artificial intelligence, and other defense technology areas.
In a separate Maritime Security Dialogue on September 8, the US and Indian officials discussed ways to expand US-India collaboration both bilaterally and within multilateral networks, including with Australia, Japan, and European partners, Supple said.
They identified new opportunities to coordinate capacity-building activities in South and Southeast Asia, deepen logistics cooperation, and drive forward high-end Navy-to-Navy cooperation to address challenges, including in the undersea domain.
Assistant Secretary Ratner reaffirmed the Department’s commitment to continue positioning the US-India partnership at the center of its approach to the region as the United States and India work together to advance our shared vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific.
The India-US 2+2 Intersessional meeting was held in New Delhi on September 7 where the senior officials vowed to further strengthen the strategic partnership between both nations.
