Stopping China: The Pentagon May Sell the F-35 to India

 By Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization

The Chinese threat along the Indian border is likely sufficient to inspire the fast-growing US-India defense and weapons development collaboration, an evolving relationship which could naturally be extremely well fortified by selling the F-35 to India.  

The global expansion of the F-35 community is leading many to regard the Joint Strike Fighter as a 5th-generation multi-role fighter for the “free world,” leading even more unanticipated customers to pursue the jet.

In recent years, there has been nothing short of an explosion of new F-35 customers to include Finland, Switzerland, Poland, Germany and others … So why not India? Certainly the US-Indian collaborative relationship is growing much stronger in many ways, particularly in defense. Recently, India and the US have signed several collaborative defense industry development deals to strengthen Indian compatibility and interoperability with the US and allied forces.

Deterring China

Clearly there is a need to deter China from threatening India from its Western border beyond Tibet is a danger India takes seriously, particularly in recent years given border clashes and contestested regions.

The threat from China’s Western border has only grown more significant in recent years due to China’s intense military modernization efforts. China has regularly written in its government-backed Global Times newspaper that part of its military modernization includes building vehicles, platforms and weapons systems specifically designed to fight in the plateau areas of Western China.

Countering China’s J-20