By: Vivek Raghuvanshi
NEW DELHI — Experts disagree over the state of India-U.S. defensive and strategic ties under the Trump administration, with one asserting "the warmth seen under [the] Obama administration is missing," and another claiming that "there is no indication of major deviances from the Obama administration."
The latter, Dhruva Jaishankar, a foreign policy fellow at Brookings India, disagreed with the former's stance — that of an Indian Ministry of External Affairs official.
"It is too early to say what approach he [U.S. President Donald Trump] will take to defense ties with India. The first major indication will be after a face-to-face meeting," Jaishankar said.
But one senior Indian Ministry of Defence official did not reflect the same patience, instead critiquing the White House for taking its time to "spell out the future course" of the bilateral relationship and wondering why Washington remains murky on how it will forge defense sector partnerships under Make in India initiatives.
Ashley J. Tellis, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, was more reassuring. "I would not read too much into the Trump administration's silence on U.S.-India relations just yet. The administration is off to an extremely slow start, which has affected all dimensions of foreign policy, not just India."
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