Prime Minister Narendra Modi Begins State Visit to USA

Washington DC: President Biden rolled out the red carpet on Thursday morning to formally welcome Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India to the White House for a pomp-filled state visit intended to woo the world’s most populous nation at a time of conflict with Russia and rising tension with China.

Mr. Biden celebrated India’s rise with a lavish display of friendship marked by marching bands, honor guards and a multigun salute on the South Lawn, to be followed by an Oval Office meeting and a gala state dinner. Mr. Modi agreed to join Mr. Biden in the East Room to meet with journalists and will also address a joint session of Congress in the afternoon.

The visit represents the latest move on the geopolitical chess board as Mr. Biden seeks more allies against increasingly aggressive governments in Moscow and Beijing. India, which remained nonaligned during the Cold War, has refused to join the American-led coalition aiding Ukraine in its war against invading Russian forces. And while it shares a certain enmity for China, it has not fully subscribed to Washington’s strategy for dealing with the Asian giant.

The two leaders plan to announce a long list of initiatives advancing cooperation on telecommunications, semiconductors, artificial intelligence and other areas, according to administration officials. Mr. Modi intends to sign the Artemis Accords, a set of principles governing peaceful exploration of the moon, Mars and other celestial bodies, and the two will announce a joint mission to the International Space Station in 2024.

Among the most concrete agreements to be announced, officials said, will be a deal between General Electric and the state-owned Hindustan Aeronautics Limited to manufacture in India F414 engines used to power the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. The two sides will also announce that India will proceed with a long-stalled $3 billion purchase of MQ-9B Predator drones from General Atomics.

The military hardware sales may help continue to wean India off Russian arms suppliers, but otherwise officials previewing the visit offered no indications that Mr. Modi would move closer to backing Ukraine in the war, nor were there any concrete examples of increased cooperation to counter China’s assertive moves in the Indo-Pacific region.

Administration officials suggested the meeting was just one step in an evolution of India’s stance on the Ukraine war, part of what they characterized as “bending the arc of India’s engagement,” so New Delhi can be helpful in encouraging diplomacy when the time for negotiations eventually arrives -Peter Baker in The New York Times.