Defense Minister Rajnath Singh and US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth on Friday exchanged an agreement on the Framework for a US-India Major Defense Partnership in Kuala Lumpur, marking an important milestone in strengthening bilateral defense cooperation between the two countries.
The development comes at a time when the US has signed a 10-year defense framework agreement with India, reflecting the growing strategic synergy between the two countries. Announcing the development, US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said the two countries’ “defense relationship has never been stronger.”
Hegseth said in a post on X that he met with Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh and signed the new agreement. The head of the War Department, formerly known as the Department of Defense, said the agreement will advance the India-US defense partnership and described it as a “cornerstone of regional stability and deterrence”.
“We are enhancing our coordination, information sharing and technical cooperation. Our defense relations have never been stronger,” he said.
Defense Minister Rajnath Singh also confirmed the signing of the 10-year agreement and described his meeting with Hegseth as “fruitful”.
“I had a productive meeting with my US counterpart Peter Hegseth in Kuala Lumpur. We signed the 10-year ‘Framework for the US-India Major Defense Partnership’. This will usher in a new era in our already strong defense partnership,” he said in a post on Twitter.
Singh further said that the defense framework will “provide policy direction to the entire gamut of India-US defense relations.”
“This is a sign of our growing strategic convergence and will usher in a new decade of partnership,” he said.
He further said that defense “remains a key pillar of our bilateral relationship” and that the partnership is “crucial to ensuring a free, open and rule-of-thumb Indo-Pacific region.”
The meeting between Rajnath Singh and Pete Hegseth took place during the informal meeting of ASEAN-India Defense Ministers in Kuala Lumpur. This informal meeting was held ahead of the ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting Plus (ADMM Plus) to be held on November 1.
Ahead of his visit, Rajnath Singh had said the objective of the ASEAN-India meeting in Kuala Lumpur was to “further strengthen defense and security cooperation between ASEAN member states and India and advance the ‘Act East Policy’.”
The high-level talks between the two leaders reflected the continued momentum in India-US defense cooperation, and reaffirmed their shared commitment to regional stability and strategic cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region.