Will Make in America ‘Trump’ Make in India in Defence

AI [CO PILOT] GENERATED REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OF INDIAN DEFENCE INDUSTRY

The first interaction between the United States President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 27 January [IST] has set a positive framework for the relationship for the second Trump Presidency.

This comes after some analysts had raised concerns as the Indian Prime Minister did not receive an invitation for inauguration of Mr Trump on January 20, an event attended by Dr S Jaishankar the External Affairs Minister who was however given the front seat near the podium.

In a series of press releases on January 27, Indian Prime Minister Office highlighted the main facets of Mr Modi’s interaction with Mr Trump.

The first release stated Prime Minister congratulated Donald Trump for his historic second term as President of the United States. This was accompanied by the Prime Minister post on X; “Delighted to speak with my dear friend President @realDonaldTrump @POTUS. Congratulated him on his historic second term. We are committed to a mutually beneficial and trusted partnership. We will work together for the welfare of our people and towards global peace, prosperity, and security.”

The second release included some of the issues discussed by the two to include –  commitment to work towards a mutually beneficial and trusted partnership and measures for strengthening cooperation in technology, trade, investment, energy and defense.  PM and President Trump exchange views on global issues, including the situation in West Asia and Ukraine. Leaders reiterate commitment to work together for promoting global peace, prosperity and security

The White House Press Release on the interaction said, “Today, President Donald J. Trump held a productive call with Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India. The two leaders discussed expanding and deepening cooperation. They also discussed a range of regional issues, including security in the Indo-Pacific, the Middle East, and Europe”.

Importantly it also said that the President emphasized the importance of India “increasing its procurement of American-made security equipment and moving toward a fair bilateral trading relationship”.

Interestingly in an address to Republican lawmakers after the call with Mr Modi, Mr Trump threatened tariffs against India, clubbing it with China and Brazil as countries that “mean the US harm” and exploited the US market. “We are going to put tariffs on outside countries and outside people that really mean us harm. Well, they mean us harm, but they basically want to make their country good. Look at what others do. China is a tremendous tariff maker and India and Brazil and so many countries. And so we are not going to let to let that happen any longer because we’re going to put America first,” Trump said.

It is anticipated that Mr Modi will be visiting the United States soon as early as in February after the Paris AI Summit.

Indian defence industry watchers would have noted the emphasis in the White House Read out of India procuring more security equipment from the United States or a Make In America product.

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi pushing for Make in India in Defence, the Indian Ministry of Defence [MOD] has undertaken a series of measures to push for indigenization with focus on manufacturing in India.

Indian MOD has invited foreign defence majors to set up shop in India though only Sweden’s SAAB has bitten the bait establishing a plant for manufacturing 84 mm Rocket Launchers – Carl Gustav in Haryana.

Programmes such as Strategic Partnership – collaboration between foreign and Indian defence majors have languished with the first likely to take off in the coming year[s] as Mazagon Docks a government owned Public Sector Undertaking and TKMS of Germany have commenced commercial negotiations with the MOD recently.

Of the major programmes of American interest two in the pipeline include the 31 MQ 9 Predator drones and GE 414 fighter engines with India hoping for transfer of technology [TOT] and supply of components. These are presently languishing over negotiations on these issues with the possibility of increase in cost of up to 50 % in the case of TOT.

U.S. Defence majors are also likely to bid for the Multi Role Fighter Aircraft programme with Lockheed Martin with F 21, a souped-up version of the F 16 and Boeing with F 15 E in the fray.

Another programme is the Stryker armed fighting vehicle which is being bandied as a replacement for the Russian made Sarath ICVs – [BMP 2] for co-development [sic] and co-production.

These platforms are essentially upgraded versions of third generation systems that may be thrust upon India by Mr Trump as fully formed and Make in America mode.

Thus, caution is warranted on both fronts – provision of a upgraded 3.5 generation platform and one that is made in the US.

Indian interlocutors in the Ministry of External Affairs and Ministry of Defence would be aware of these nuances and hopefully are working on the scenarios to ensure India’s defence modernization and indigenization programmes do not suffer.

What trade offs can be offered to the United States which may satisfy Mr Trump remains to be seen, but falling for badgering is not an option.