Interview with Deputy Secretary of Defense Ashton B. Carter

PTI Interview with Deputy Secretary of Defense Ashton B. Carter

On

September 11, 2013

Interview of Deputy Secretary Carter by Lalit Jha of the Press Trust of India

DEPUTY SECRETARY OF DEFENSE ASHTON B. CARTER: And I’m really looking forward to it (off mic)

Q: So can you tell us, what is the general nature of India-U.S. defense relationship, including the progress, challenges, and the way ahead, as you —

DR. CARTER: Sure. We — my view is that the United States and India are destined to be partners on the world stage. And that’s because we share so many common interests, but I think fundamentally it’s because we share so many common values. And that’s the rule of law, a transparent international economic order, a system that first — that recognizes the dignity of every country, freedom of action, freedom of transit in the commons. These are the things that have long underpinned U.S. policy towards Asia, and I think in that fundamental way, Indians and Americans to that extent think about what is good in the international order in a way that’s very similar.

As far as interests are concerned, our interests are — don’t obviously coincide in all respects, but there’s a considerable overlap there. And that overlap, in my eyes, gets only greater with the passage of time. And so the relationship has been deepening steadily now for, jeez, I guess about 15 years or so, and the defense relationship is just a piece of this broader tapestry. Obviously, I’m the deputy secretary of defense, so I think in defense terms, but I know that the relationship is actually much broader than that. It is founded on a broader foundation than just common security interests.

I was — one thing I wanted to mention to you was that I’ve been working on U.S.-Indian relations now for quite a while and was present at and participated in the, I’d say, sort of breakthrough in the early part of the last decade, inaugurated by the nuclear deal, but that really brought so much else behind it than the nuclear. And I actually dug these up — (inaudible) — testimony at the time —

Q: Oh, great.

DR. CARTER: — about the — the India deal at the time. And the Senate was considering it. I was, as you’ll see, strongly in favor of it as testimony in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And this is an article in Foreign Affairs about India.

And so I think we’re destined to be partners. And we’re — we are in this for the long haul. Two great, populous democracies move slowly, and so that’s the way we are as two countries, and so this is something that will evolve over time. And — and I think we in the United States, at least most of my colleagues that I work with in India are prepared to be patient.

Q: So as you head towards India now, what are your trip objectives, key engagements, and possible deliverables that you’re looking at?

DR. CARTER: Sure. In the defense area, we have both common activities that we work on together and then a wide range of common foreign policy aspirations and objectives to pursue and discuss. And I’ll be doing both of those things when I’m there.

But in the area of our defense relationship, there are a couple dimensions to that. One is our military-to-military contacts, which are getting stronger and stronger and more numerous. We have a really very large number. It’s a big part of the Department of Defense’s military-to-military program overall is with India or with India and other countries. And the same is true of India. A big part of its military-to-military engagements around the world are with the United States, and I think that’s appropriate and that it reflects the destiny that I mentioned earlier.

And the second is the defense technology relationship. And that also has a number of dimensions. I should say, in both of these cases — you know, I mentioned that we’re two democracies. We’re also two different bureaucrat systems. So one of the objectives of the initiative that Secretary Panetta and National Security Adviser Menon launched a year-and-a-half ago was to make it easier for our two very different bureaucracies and establishments to work together. We had different histories, different ways of doing things. We’re built differently in terms of our structure.

And so Secretary Panetta thought and Secretary Hagel, who also knows India very well, long history with India, knows that it takes extra effort to bring those two systems together. And I’ll tell you what our goals are and then how we’re going to do that.

The goal is to make it so that only — the only limitations on what we can do together as two defense establishments are limitations that arise from our different interests or different policies, but that there otherwise isn’t any mechanical or bureaucratic impediment to doing things together that we want to do.

It’s very important to India — and we recognize and respect that — that India doesn’t want to just have a buyer-seller relationship with the Pentagon when it comes to arms. We do have that relationship and value that relationship, and a great example of that was illustrated in the floods, when aircraft that the Indian air force has purchased from the United States really made it possible for India to help its people that quickly. So that’s a great example one the success of a — of an arms sale. And we do — and we do value. And our foreign military sales relationship is a — is a good one. And one thing that it offers India that I think is valuable is transparency.

But many find our foreign military sales program cumbersome, and many of my Indian colleagues say that same thing to me, and I readily acknowledge that we need to get better at making it more user-friendly.

At the same time, it’s very transparent, so you know that it’s fair and on the up-and-up. And I think that’s very important to everybody who deals with us, that this — if they do things this way, with the United States, through the United States government, there will be no problem with fairness and transparency.

But we want to get beyond that buyer-seller relationship — that’s really the heart of the initiative — beyond a buyer-seller relationship to one where we co-develop and co-produce our defense systems. And co-development’s very important, because obviously India wants to build its indigenous technology and defense technology capability, which a simple purchase doesn’t do.

So what I have been working on with the Indian team, my Indian colleagues, is identifying and facilitating co-development and co-production efforts. A good model for co-production is the C-130J. And last time I was in India, I visited the facility there. I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to be there or are familiar with that in Hyderabad, which is part of the — the production chain for the C-130. So C-130 fuselages that are outfitted there in India go into the Indian air force, but they go into every air force that the C-130 goes to, which is many, many air forces around the world, including the U.S. Air Force. And that’s the way India wants to do it, because that — that signifies technology and transfer and job creation, of course, and high-tech jobs for India.

So what we have been doing is, first and foremost, identifying co-production and co-development efforts. C-130J is a co-production effort. We want to also co-develop. And so I have been discussing with the Indian team and will when I’m there a number of projects that we — that our industry, first of all, is willing to conduct, because they think it’s good business, with Indian partners, and our role in the Pentagon is to make sure that there are no technology-sharing obstacles.

And so what I have done — and I’ve conveyed this to the national security adviser and my colleagues in the Ministry of Defense — is make sure that we have, as we — as we offer these for discussion to the Indians, I’ve already gotten all the — all the bureaucratics out of the way, and then it purely comes down to a matter of whether this is an attractive business proposition to the companies involved and attractive to the Indian military in terms of the capability they need and all this bureaucratic history of two systems separated by decades is swept out of the way.

I’ll also be — so — I have also reached out to U.S. and said, I know you all want to do business in India. You should understand that doing business in India in the long run is going to mean co-development and co-production. Bring me things you’re interested in doing, and I’ll clear them in advance, so that we don’t go through this process in which my Indian colleagues have justifiably complained to me about, which is that they’ll work on formulating a project and then — then they run into the American bureaucracy. And we’re trying to do it the other way around.

The other thing we’re trying to do is include when the Indian military issues an RFP for something, very quickly process the technology clearances for our company so that — otherwise, we were missing bid deadlines because of our own bureaucracy. And Indians said to us on a number of occasions, you know, we might have considered the U.S. entry in the competition we’re running, but we ended up buying a European or a Russian or somebody else’s product, because you guys couldn’t meet our deadlines that are in our procurement policy.

And so one — one of the things I’ve been doing is giving a unique to India form of pre-clearance to contractors so that they can bid in a timely way for Indian projects. And I’d also include technology-sharing in those bids so that we do the technology-clearing, as well.

So co-production and co-development projects — and I have reached out to industry, and I’m bringing a number of them to India to present and say, you know, only you know whether you’d be interested in these, but what I can tell you is, I’ve gotten the bureaucratic obstacles out of the way.

Another team we’re trying to do is R&D projects with DRDO and others so that we’re technology-sharing in the most intimate way, which is investigator to investigator, and — and making sure that those projects — that we get real projects going, which lead to products, and there again I’ll remove the technology obstacles and give our — our researchers incentives to work with the Indians.

And the way that works is that I basically say to our research community, if you — if you find an Indian collaborator to work on a defense technology project with, that will get you preferential treatment in terms of funding from the — from the DOD for that project, in the same way we do with some of our very closest allies.

So all we’re doing — so what we’re doing is in the technology and export controls area, working so that India has the same status as our very closest allies and that our system is operating on a time scale that’s consistent with the needs for the Indian side to make decisions.

So that’s what the defense technology initiative is about. It obviously has many dimensions. We’re working very, very hard on it, as are our colleagues in India. And this is a long-term project, but it has — it has a number of very short-term excellent prospects for doing things the way India would like to do it, which is an emphasis on co-production, co-development, technology-sharing, and digitization, and so forth. And we hope to have some of that ready so that when the prime minister comes and meets with President Obama, they — I’m sure they’ll be discussing the idea, but they’ll also have some specific examples, in addition to the C-130J and the things that are already going on and the things that we might be able to do in the future together.

So I’m very optimistic about it. And I appreciate that hard work that’s being done everywhere here in the Pentagon and in the U.S. industry, but also on the Indian side.

Q: Moving to India’s neighborhood in Afghanistan, India continues to have concerns of 2014 transition. What do you comment on that?

DR. CARTER: Well, I’ve been working on the campaign, as we call it, in Afghanistan now for five years, since we really ramped it up in 2009. And the first thing I’d say is that, even though it’s fallen off the world’s radar screen and out of the newspapers and so forth, the success of the campaign in defeating the insurgency in many, many key areas and in building the Afghan security forces, that’s very successful, and I’m very optimistic about it. I’m just about to go back to Afghanistan on my way to India, and that’s kind of an untold story of real success on the part of the Afghan security forces.

And so what we want is, as the Afghan security forces get more powerful, that we can slowly wind down the international coalition forces so that the sum, in any year, of Afghan power and coalition power is much greater than insurgent power. That’s what we’ve had for several years now, and the balance is shifting, but the fact still remains that we’re defeating the insurgency. And that’s going to continue to go on after 2014.

I think, in Chicago, in Tokyo, the coalition, everybody, and certainly the United States and President Obama, and here in the Department of Defense, said we’re in this for the long run. So I say that because some people seem to think that, you know, we’re leaving at the end of 2014 or something. I know that would be a concern to India, because it would mean that — that there was a greater risk of instability in Afghanistan, and that’s your neighborhood

Q: Yeah.

DR. CARTER: But we’re not leaving at the end of 2014. The — and I expect that the bilateral security agreement will be signed, which is the only sort of technical obstacle to the enduring presence of the — what we call the enduring presence, the continuing presence of American forces in Afghanistan, helping the Afghan forces to continue to grow in size, but especially in their capability. And they’re really showing it now. They’re really showing it this summer.

Another country I’ll visit on this trip is Pakistan, also tremendous importance to India. And we are trying very hard to keep going with Pakistan. The momentum that we regained about five or six months ago and — because we need — we all need, I think, a good security relationship with Pakistan. They have internal challenges, and I think they’re increasingly seeing that the internal insurgency in Pakistan is a threat to the Pakistani state. And that, in turn, is a threat to Afghanistan, because those insurgents (come over the ?) border in Afghanistan, and that’s a threat to India, because those groups have shown the willingness and the capability to make attacks in India.

And so we’re continuing to work very hard, including with the new prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, on our defense relationship with Pakistan and to emphasize to Pakistan that Pakistan’s relations with its two neighbors are very critical, not just to Pakistan, but to the United States, and obviously to India and to — to Afghanistan.

Pakistan and India, obviously, have a history of very tense relationships. Both countries possess nuclear weapons, which I know the Indian government recognizes is the kind of weaponry that makes war, you know, really unthinkable, yet another reason for making it more unthinkable. And the — and I think the leaders on both sides of India and Pakistan recognize that.

Therefore, our principal concern is that there not be any mechanism that could lead inadvertently to the use of nuclear weapons or resort to nuclear weapons. That’s my principal worry, as it is my principal worry — as it was during the Cold War, my principal worry with respect to the United States and the Soviet Union. I don’t think the leaders were crazy enough or foolish enough to do that to one another’s people, but there was always the possibility that this thing could get out of control.

And, therefore, the extent to which India and Pakistan can keep good relations with one another and be transparent and in discussing how they think about nuclear weapons, how they think about — that kind of understanding is critical to stopping something from getting going that nobody would — nobody here would ever really want.

Q: If I can go back to the other side of India’s border, the Indian Ocean, the Asia Pacific region. What is — where do you place in your — U.S.’s Asia rebalance policy? And where does China fit in the equation?

DR. CARTER: It’s right — India’s right at the center of things. It’s the only country that is called out by name in our new strategic guidance that the president gave us a year-and-a-half ago that enshrines the so-called rebalance.

We like to say that our rebalance is not only a rebalance to the Asia Pacific, Indian Ocean area, but a rebalance within that region. The traditional American focus, going back to the Cold War, was on Northeast Asia. And now our focus is — is all around Northeast Asia, Southeast Asia, and very importantly, the Indian Ocean area. Of course, the Indian Ocean is a place where India has tremendous interests, but also can do a lot of good and exercise a lot of responsibility on behalf of all the countries in that region. I know that’s important to India, and it fits right into our idea of a rebalance.

And you mentioned — and the philosophy behind the rebalance is — is it’s not something that’s new. It is the continuation and perpetuation of a role that the United States has played in the Asia Pacific for decades now of a — its military power has played a pivotal role in keeping the peace in a region where otherwise there are lots of flash points.

You see antagonism between China and Japan, between China and Korea, between Korea and Japan, and then on and on and on, a lot of historical animosity, no formal security structure like NATO. And the presence of the United States has had a kind of balancing and reassuring role in that region that has made it possible for the political — amazing and wonderful political and economic development that also started in Northeast Asia, then Southeast Asia, and now South Asia, tremendous political and economic development. And I think that was enabled by the role and posture of the United States.

That’s been a good thing for almost seven decades, and we want to keep that going. That in one sentence is the purpose of trying to rebalance.

And the — with respect to China, a couple of things. I mean, first of all, the rebalance is not aimed at China. Our leaders have made it very clear that they don’t want competition between our two countries. They don’t want an arm’s race between our two countries. And my own view is that that is — is unlikely as it is unwise. And so — and if you think about China has benefited from the stability that the United States has contributed to. It is — it is — the United States has in part created the climate in which China can pursue its own path to economic and political development.

And as far as India and China are concerned, we know that India has its own relationship with China and wants to have good relations with China, good economic relations with China, and so forth, and — and — so quite apart from what we’re doing, we respect the Indian view, which I think is pretty much the same as hours, namely that India, too, wants to have good relations with China.

But, you know, nothing’s automatic in this world, the world of security. You have to work to keep good, sensible results going. And peace within the Asia Pacific region isn’t guaranteed. We all have to play our role to earn it. And I think that’s what the leaders of India and China and the United States and all the other countries are trying to do in Asia right now.

If you think about it, it’s an amazing result, because the wounds of previous wars were never healed. Many of the wars in Asia never really came to a formal end the way they did in Europe during the same period of time. And as I mentioned before, there’s no NATO in Asia.

So there’s an informal structure that depends upon good sense and, in my view, is aided by the presence of the U.S. military in Asia and its relationships with all of the militaries of the region.

I’m frequently asked, in addition to the question of is it about China, another question people ask is, does sequester affect the rebalance?

Q: Yeah.

DR. CARTER: And it doesn’t, for two reasons. One is that we have plenty of resources in the defense budget to accomplish the rebalance. They come from two sources. One is — all of the — the resources we have been spending on Iraq and Afghanistan for 10 years, a lot of that we can now shift to that region.

And, secondly, within our budget, sequestered or not sequestered, we’re giving priority to the kind of capabilities that support the rebalance, so we’re not — there’s not going to be a resource problem. And, obviously, sequester is not a permanent thing. Sequester is a very stupid, very regrettable, but short-term circumstance. It affects about 10 percent of our budget. And whatever happens with sequester, we have the resources to undergird the rebalance. That’s not going to be a problem.

Q: Any final comments you’d like to make?

DR. CARTER: No, I think we’ve pretty much covered everything. I just really look forward to — to being there. I will have an opportunity, I guess, to meet with some of your colleagues.

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