India receives US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin with China on its mind

Timing of visit, which follows stops in Japan and South Korea and heavy criticism of China, signals importance Biden places on New Delhi as a security ally

US will be keen to take ties to a new level, analysts say, but India is likely to resist being dragged into a coalition against its fellow BRICS nation

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US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin. Photo: Getty Images

Published: 12:01pm, 19 Mar 2021Updated: 1:28pm, 19 Mar 2021

While India will warmly receive US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday in a sign of their strengthening defence ties, analysts say New Delhi will be careful to signal that it is not forming a coalition against China.

Austin’s three-day trip to New Delhi, where he will call on Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and other senior national security leaders, will come hot on the heels of a US-China meeting in Alaska on Thursday that has been described as testy and ill-tempered.

During the face-off in Alaska between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan on the US side, and China’s most senior foreign policy official, Yang Jiechi, and foreign minister Wang Yi on the other, Beijing accused Washington of inciting countries “to attack China”, while the United States said China had “arrived intent on grandstanding”.

The US also expressed concerns over Chinese policies in Xinjiang, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, as well as cyber attacks on the US and the “economic coercion of our allies”, all of which it said threatened “the rules-based order that maintains global stability”. Meanwhile, China accused Washington of using its military might and financial supremacy to suppress other countries.

Michael Kugelman, deputy director and senior associate for South Asia at the Washington-based Wilson Center said discussions in India were likely to focus on increasing military-to-military cooperation, and how this could be taken to the next level “beyond the arms sales and defence agreements that have dominated the security relationship for years”.

The timing of the visit – and the fact that Austin is in India after going to Japan and South Korea as part of the first overseas trip by a member of US President Joe Biden’s cabinet – is more significant than any outcome of talks in New Delhi, said Kugelman.

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