The new Framework for the US-India Major Defense Partnership, signed in Malaysia ten days ago, may come to define the next decade of Indo-Pacific security.

United States (US) Secretary for War Pete Hegseth called it: “a cornerstone for regional stability and deterrence,” while India’s Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said it reflected a: “growing strategic convergence” between the two nations. Those phrases capture a shift far larger than mere defense co-operation; they signal the quiet reordering of power in the world’s most contested region.

The agreement, which will last ten years, was sealed at an summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), a regional body, after months of tension between Washington and New Delhi over tariffs and Russia ties. In an online post, Hegseth described the pact as: “a significant step for our two militaries, a roadmap for deeper and even more meaningful collaboration ahead...enhancing our coordination, info sharing, and tech cooperation”. Singh added that it: “will usher in a new era” for defense co-operation and is: “critical for the Indo-Pacific region.”

For the US, the timing is useful. China’s accelerating naval expansion, its construction of fortified islands, and its growing presence in the Indian Ocean have reawakened Mahanian logic in Washington. Geography dictates strategy; whoever dominates the maritime highways from Hormuz to Malacca controls the arteries of world trade. By partnering with India, America secures a strategic lodestar astride those routes.

For India, the pact represents a psychological departure from decades of caution. New Delhi has long sought autonomy between rival blocs, a posture rooted in its Cold War experience and dependence on Russian arms.

But as Chinese pressure mounts along the Himalayan frontier and in the Bay of Bengal, strategic non-alignment has become a luxury. Singh’s talk of: “growing convergence” acknowledges what Indian policymakers have long known, that survival in the modern Indo-Pacific requires alliances as much as independence.

Risk

Yet this embrace is not without risk. Washington and Delhi have recently sparred over trade levies and oil imports from Moscow. Trump’s administration imposed a 50% tariff on certain Indian exports, prompting India to pause defense purchases from the US. At the same time, New Delhi’s refusal to end its discounted oil trade with Russia has tested Washington’s patience.

Both leaders, however, appear intent on resetting the relationship. Modi’s recent pledge of closer co-operation on counterterrorism, and his public thanks to Trump during Diwali, suggest a pragmatic effort to compartmentalise disputes while advancing shared strategic aims.

That pragmatism reflects a deeper structural logic. The Indo-Pacific is now the axis around which global security turns. The United States retains unmatched carrier power, but India commands geography; its Andaman and Nicobar Islands flank the chokepoints that define Asian commerce.

Linking these assets through intelligence and technology co-operation extends America’s surveillance arc and cements India’s maritime influence. The pact also integrates India into Washington’s “friend-shoring” drive, relocating defense production and critical technology supply chains away from China.

Other regional powers will watch closely. Japan, Australia, and Vietnam, each wary of Chinese assertiveness, will quietly welcome the accord. So too will smaller ASEAN states that rely on freedom of navigation for their prosperity. Yet Beijing will see it as encirclement.

The People’s Liberation Army Navy, which now fields more ships than the US Navy, has invested heavily in anti-access missile systems and overseas bases from Djibouti to Gwadar. The US-India framework directly threatens that perimeter by enabling real-time intelligence exchange and undersea tracking capacity across the Indian Ocean.

Broader consequence

The broader consequence is psychological: the sense that India, once the hesitant power, has joined the ranks of those shaping rather than enduring the regional order. The move completes a slow evolution that began with the 2005 civil nuclear agreement and deepened through the Quad and logistics-sharing accords. What distinguishes this pact is its duration and its emphasis on co-development of technology, an admission that the contest with China will not be decided by ideology but by mastery of information, sensors, and stealth.

Still, endurance will determine success. Ten years span multiple elections in both democracies. For this partnership to matter, it must survive domestic turbulence and resist the temptation of transactionalism. If it does, the Indo-Pacific could stabilise around a plural equilibrium rather than slide toward Chinese hegemony.

In Mahan’s view, maritime power was never just about fleets but about the political will to use them in defense of an open order. The US-India accord is an early test of that will. It will measure whether two vast democracies, separated by history yet joined by geography, can align their ambitions long enough to preserve the liberty of the seas. Should they succeed, the Indo-Pacific may remain a region of competition without conquest.

Alfred Thayer Mahan was a United States Navy officer and historian in the 19th and 20th centuries and considered by some to be one of the most important American strategists.