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No buyer for Panetta’s plan: India as linchpin in US def strategy for Asia

During his two-day visit to Delhi, Panetta said India’s involvement India in regional security is critical and lynchpin in the new US strategy, which he called 'rebalancing military plans' towards the region.

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The US could not impress India about its grand defence strategy for Asia, aimed at containing China and building a partnership with New Delhi. Prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh is believed to have told the visiting US defence secretary, Leon E Panetta, that the strategy needed recalibration and called for building multi-lateral security architecture.

During his two-day visit to Delhi, Panetta said India’s involvement India in regional security is critical and lynchpin in the new US strategy, which he called “rebalancing military plans” towards the region. But, the policy’s clear anti-China tones has unnerved India, which feels that becoming a frontal state for America to counter China is not in the larger interests of New Delhi. Americans adopted the strategy during cold war period, propping Pakistan and other nations to become frontal states, to confront communism and the erstwhile USSR.

Outlining that the US was shifting six out of its total 11 aircraft carriers to the Asia-pacific region, Panetta said the new defence strategy is based on five critical points, including maintaining an agile, flexible and deployable force; focusing  on tension points; maintaining presence in the rest of the world, following the principle of rotation of forces and building partnerships. He further said the strategy is also aimed at confronting two threats — say from Iran and North Korea — and investing in new areas to deal with issues like cyber security, space security and special forces.

“Our vision is a peaceful Indian ocean region supported by growing Indian capabilities. America will do its part through the rotational presence of marines in Australia, littoral combat ships rotating through Singapore, and other US military deployments in the region.

Official sources, however, here say, India does not share the American perception of the Asia-Pacific region entirely, and would prefer the company of countries such as Vietnam, the Philippines and others to be involved when solution to the South-China sea issue is worked out.

Speaking at the Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis, Panetta said expanded military exercises, defence sales and intelligence sharing are key elements of increasing defence relations with India.

Earlier he called on prime minister Manmohan Singh and met his counterpart AK Antony. During the interaction, Antony called for moving the relationship beyond defence trade and the buyer-seller transactions. He said the relationship should now focus on transfer of technologies and partnerships to build indigenous capabilities.

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