Pentagon sources: India looking to buy 5 billion $ of US defense equipment, including Aegis

Bush Officials Defend India Nuclear Deal

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Yesterday, Pentagon officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they expected India to start purchasing as much as $5 billion worth of conventional military equipment as a result of the deal, if it is approved by Congress. The current U.S. Nonproliferation Act prevents India and other countries that have not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty from acquiring a wide range of U.S. military technology that includes components that could be used for nuclear programs.

Administration officials have sought to publicly play down how the arrangement fits into a broad White House strategy to help position India -- a democracy that has the capacity to expand its nuclear arsenal -- as a regional counterweight to China.

But Pentagon officials said they considered many of the potential sales, including anti-submarine patrol aircraft that could spot Chinese submarines in the Indian Ocean and Aegis radar for Indian destroyers operating in the strategic Straits of Malaka, as useful for monitoring the Chinese military.