U.S. Makes India Groundbreaking Defence Offer

Washington: In a move reflective of growing defence ties between the two, sealed during last week's visit here of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the US has made India a "groundbreaking collaborative defence proposal" to co-develop with India a next-generation Javelin antitank capability, according to a top defence official.

The proposal addresses a key military requirement for both armies and is an unprecedented offer the US has made unique to India, Deputy Defence Secretary Ash Carter,said Monday at the Centre for American Progress, a Washington think tank.

The Javelin is a manportable, fire-and-forget, antitank missile employed by dismounted infantry to defeat current and future threat armoured combat vehicles.

Carter, who with Indian National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon heads the two countries' Defence Trade and Technology Initiative (DTI), said the US is committed to continuing to put new ideas on the table.

He was reviewing Friday's "successful meeting" between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Barack Obama, "the strong and rapidly growing defense partnership between the US and India, as we execute.... the rebalance, so-called, to the Asia Pacific region."

Asserting that US and India are "destined to be partners on the world stage," he said, "we're each big, complicated democracies. We move slowly, but over the long run we also move surely. And that to me is the trajectory for us and India in the defence area."
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