India-US sign 10-yr defence pact amid tariff turmoil

India and the United States (US) have signed a pact to deepen long-term strategic ties — a significant move amid the cooling bilateral relations.

- SATARUPA BHATTACHARIYA

On the sidelines of the Asean-plus defence ministers’ meeting on Friday in Kuala Lumpur, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth signed the framework for bilateral defence cooperation over the next decade.

In February, after a meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump in Washington, DC, the two countries had announced that a new 10-year agreement on defence cooperation would be signed later this year. India and the US entered a strategic partnership in 2015.

But the 2025 pact was not a given. India-US relations are under strain: Trump's announcement of 50 per cent tariffs on Indian goods and his repeated public claims that he stopped the IndiaPakistan conflict in May by telling both countries he would not give them trade concessions unless they stopped fighting. The Indian government has denied Trump had any role to play in the ceasefire, which was proposed by Pakistan after Indian airstrikes.

“It is a signal of our growing strategic convergence and will herald a new decade of partnership,” Singh said on X after he met Hegseth.