By T N Ashok
The Rajnath Singh–Pete Hegseth meeting in Philippines represents something larger than a bilateral defence conversation: India is attempting to move from dependence on Russian-origin military platforms towards a diversified, technology-driven defence partnership with the United States and Europe, without surrendering its strategic autonomy.
There is also a delicate contradiction at the heart of the relationship. Washington wants India as a major Indo-Pacific security partner, but its continued military relationship with Pakistan, particularly the F-16 programme, remains a source of Indian concern. The question is whether American defence cooperation can accommodate India’s security sensitivities without Washington abandoning its own regional calculations.
The meeting in the Philippines exposed the competing calculations shaping the India–US strategic partnership: Washington wants India as a major Indo-Pacific security partner, while New Delhi wants access to American military technology without accepting American military assistance to its principal adversary.
India’s defence reset: Rajnath Singh confronts Hegseth over Pakistan’s F-16s as New Delhi seeks advanced US technology The meeting in the Philippines exposed the competing calculations shaping the India–US strategic partnership: Washington wants India as a major Indo-Pacific security partner, while New Delhi wants access to American military technology without accepting American military assistance to its principal adversary.
India’s Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s meeting with United States Secretary of War Pete Hegseth in Cebu, Philippines, on October 28, 2026, was more consequential than the customary exchange of diplomatic courtesies between two defence ministers. Beneath the public declarations of strategic cooperation lay an uncomfortable question: can Washington deepen its military relationship with India while continuing to modernise the military capabilities of Pakistan, a country whose security establishment New Delhi regards as a persistent source of cross-border terrorism?
The meeting brought two seemingly contradictory aspects of American policy into sharp focus. The United States wants India to emerge as a stronger military and technological partner in the Indo-Pacific, particularly as China’s military and maritime influence expands. Yet Washington continues to maintain a defence relationship with Islamabad, including the sustainment and modernisation of its American-origin F-16 fighter aircraft. India wants that contradiction addressed.
Why were Singh and Hegseth in the Philippines? Both ministers were attending the 13th ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting-Plus (ADMM-Plus), held in Cebu from October 28 to 29. The Philippines, which chaired the 2026 gathering, brought together defence ministers from the ten ASEAN member states and eight dialogue partners: India, the United States, China, Russia, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand.
ADMM-Plus, established in 2010, has become an important multilateral platform for discussing regional security, maritime cooperation, counterterrorism, military confidence-building and emerging strategic challenges. For India, participation is an extension of its Act East policy and its growing engagement with Southeast Asia.
Singh led the Indian delegation and was scheduled to address the gathering on regional and international security. India also co-chairs the ADMM-Plus Experts’ Working Group on Counter-Terrorism with Malaysia for the 2024–27 cycle.
For Hegseth, the gathering offered an opportunity to reinforce the Trump administration’s military engagement with Southeast Asian nations at a time of heightened tensions in the South China Sea and growing concern about China’s regional ambitions.
The bilateral meeting between the two ministers therefore took place against a much larger geopolitical backdrop. It was not simply about American arms sales to India. It was about the emerging security architecture of the Indo-Pacific.
The two ministers reviewed progress under the ten-year Framework for the US-India Major Defence Partnership, signed on October 31, 2025. The framework was designed to provide a longer-term institutional foundation for military cooperation, technological collaboration, information sharing and defence-industrial integration.
Singh subsequently described the meeting as excellent, saying that both sides had reviewed progress in achieving strategic convergence across military technology, information sharing and co-production.
The agenda is particularly important because India’s requirements have moved well beyond purchasing finished military equipment. New Delhi wants access to advanced technologies, joint development, manufacturing capabilities and a stronger domestic defence-industrial base.
The framework envisages cooperation in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, undersea-domain awareness, air combat, space-domain awareness, advanced munitions and military mobility. It also identifies artificial intelligence, advanced materials, human-machine teaming and next-generation manufacturing as areas for collaboration.
For India, this is an opportunity to acquire not merely sophisticated platforms but the technological foundations that determine their effectiveness: sensors, secure communications, electronic warfare systems, precision weapons, software and integrated command networks.
The United States, meanwhile, sees India as a consequential partner in balancing China’s military influence. Its strategic interest is to develop a relationship in which Indian capabilities contribute to maritime security, regional deterrence and the security of important Indo-Pacific supply routes.
Perhaps the most significant long-term development is India’s changing defence procurement philosophy. For decades, the Soviet Union and subsequently Russia were the principal suppliers of Indian military hardware. MiG fighters, Sukhoi aircraft, T-72 and T-90 tanks, submarines, helicopters, air-defence systems and a wide range of ammunition and spare parts established a formidable dependence on Russian equipment.
This relationship was not merely commercial. It was rooted in the strategic relationship between New Delhi and Moscow during the Cold War, when Western countries were often reluctant to supply India with sensitive military technology. But the battlefield has changed, as have India’s requirements.
The two governments also reiterated their commitment to eliminating terrorism and strengthening their defence partnership. However, the important distinction is that the Indian government’s official account did not publicly record an American commitment to reconsider the Pakistan F-16 package. Nor did the public American account announce any reversal or modification of the programme.
The US response was therefore one of reaffirming the larger strategic partnership while leaving the specific disagreement unresolved. That distinction matters. Washington’s public support for India against cross-border terrorism is significant, but it is not the same as accepting India’s demand that American military assistance to Pakistan be curtailed.
The United States has traditionally justified its military relationship with Pakistan through its own regional security calculations. It also exercises end-use monitoring and technology-protection requirements over American defence exports. Whether those safeguards are sufficient to address India’s concerns about possible technology leakage is another question.
India’s emerging defence policy is best understood as diversification rather than realignment. New Delhi is not abandoning Russia. Existing platforms, maintenance requirements, ammunition inventories and long-standing defence-industrial relationships make an abrupt break neither practical nor desirable. Nor is India preparing to become a military extension of the United States. Its objective is to develop multiple sources of military technology while expanding indigenous manufacturing under the broader Atmanirbhar Bharat programme.
The United States can contribute advanced technologies, France can supply combat aircraft and aerospace expertise, Germany can contribute submarine technology, Israel can provide specialised surveillance and missile systems, and other European partners can strengthen India’s industrial capabilities. The larger challenge is ensuring that these different systems can communicate, operate and function together.
For Washington, however, India’s expectations come with a geopolitical price. A country that seeks strategic autonomy will not automatically endorse every American policy, particularly when those policies affect its immediate neighbourhood.
The Cebu meeting demonstrated that India is prepared to raise difficult questions even while pursuing closer cooperation. The relationship with the United States is becoming more important, but it is not unconditional. India wants American technology, not American strategic instructions. It wants a stronger Indo-Pacific partnership, but not at the cost of overlooking military developments in Pakistan.
The message to Washington was unmistakable: if India is expected to become a central pillar of American strategy in the Indo-Pacific, its security concerns in South Asia cannot be treated as an unrelated bilateral problem.
The real test of the ten-year defence partnership will not be the number of joint statements issued or military exercises conducted. It will be whether Washington is prepared to translate its strategic partnership with India into dependable technological access, meaningful industrial cooperation and a more sensitive understanding of India’s security environment. Cebu may have provided the diplomatic setting. The more difficult negotiations are only beginning. (IPA Service)
