India’s Russia Ties Could Derail Future US Arms Sales to New Delhi, McCaul Says

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said July 11 he has told Indian leaders to stop buying new Russian military equipment or risk losing his support for U.S. arms exports to the South Asian country.

At an Axios event in Washington, McCaul said he understands India needs to obtain parts from Moscow to maintain its legacy Russian weapon systems, but that it's in India’s long-term strategic interest to reduce its reliance on President Vladimir Putin’s anti-democratic regime. McCaul shared his Russia concerns with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi while visiting New Delhi in June.

“I talked to him specifically about that,” the lawmaker said. “I said if you want to buy American weapons, you got to get off this Russian dependency. I said you cannot buy anything new from Russia or … I’ll stop signing off on these weapons packages” for India.

At the Washington event, McCaul said that while India is “a great ally when it comes to China,” he was unsettled by recent photos of Modi hugging Putin in Moscow. “I don’t like that image,” he said.

Another country on McCaul's radar is Australia, which he plans to visit in August with Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell. McCaul said he looks forward to the State Department finalizing regulations to exempt Australia and the U.K. from International Traffic in Arms Regulations licensing requirements under the Australia-U.K.-U.S. (AUKUS) security partnership.

The exemption is supposed to help the three countries work together to develop advanced technology. The department released the proposed regulations in late April and said then it was aiming to finalize them by mid-August (see 2404300050).

Turning to Taiwan, McCaul said he remains concerned about the slow pace at which the U.S. is providing approved arms exports to Taipei. He said the U.S. owes Taiwan $19 billion worth of weapons, and part of the reason for the backlog is that the U.S. defense industry cannot manufacture equipment quickly enough.