INDO- US MILITARY COLLABORATION

CONTEXT

India and the U.S will undertake joint military drills in October in Auli; Uttarakhand. Auli is at an altitude of 10,000 feet and some 95 km from the Line of Actual control.

IMPORTANCE OF THIS MILITARY DRILL

• It will push India’s defence partnership into a new orbit.
• It will send a strong message to a common adversary.
• It will have other ripple effects for the wider Quad.
• Space has been singled out as a critical area of cooperation in the recent Defense Technology and Trade Initiative (DTTI) meeting between India and the U.S.

MILITARY DOMAIN

• Space as a military domain is a well-accepted fact.
• In India historically, space has remained the sole jurisdiction of its civilian space agency, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). However, the successful demonstration of Mission Shakti of the anti-satellite (ASAT) missile test in 2019 changed things forever. The same year, India conducted its first-ever simulated space warfare exercise (IndSpaceX) with an eye on Chinese threats.
• The launch of the tri-service Defense Space Agency (DSA) has permanently taken the military away from the shadows of civil space.
• The government has also set up the Defense Space Research Agency (DSRA) to help develop space-based weapons for the DSA. Space is as much recognized as a military domain as land, water, air, and cyber.
• India and U.S do drills on land, in the air and at sea, it should extend to the fourth domain. It will have actionable spillovers for the Quad, transform the moribund DTTI from a talk shop, and send the right message to the adversary

JOINT ANTI MISSILE TEST-it is a missile launched from the earth's surface to destroy a satellite passing overhead. The test would be against a simulated orbital target as that does not create space debris and is not included in the wording of the U.S moratorium.

IMPLICATION

This will lead to other space military collaborations such as directed energy weapons, rendezvous and proximity operations (RPOs),o –orbital ASATs (in space microsatellites as a kinetic kill option), etc.

SPACE PROGRAMMES

• France conducted its first space military exercise, ASTERX, in 2021.
• China is marching ahead to the Cis-Lunar space (region beyond the geosynchronous orbit) with an ambition to establish a permanent presence on the Moon by 2024.
• China and Russia have released a draft binding treaty of their own and it provides an ideal new theatre to push Indo-U.S military collaboration forward.
• Space has assets that form the bedrock of the modern economy-GPS (PNT –position navigation timing ), telecom networks, early warning systems for missiles, and weather forecasts all enabled by our satellites in GEO or LEO orbits.

EXPECTED PUSHBACKS

• It will provoke our eastern neighbours and compel them to draw a new redline.
• Our eastern neighbour will use our western neighbour as a proxy state.
• It will derail the ongoing core commanders' dialogue in Ladakh.
• The United States cannot be trusted
• It will fastback militarization of space