INEW DELHI: A senior US official has called for the setting up of a new fleet closer to the “crossroads" of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, a development with major strategic implications for the US Indo-Pacific policy, for ties with India and with China. The new fleet will be known as the US First Fleet. "And we want to put that numbered fleet in the crossroads between the Indian and the Pacific Oceans, and we're really going to have an Indo-Pacom footprint." “Trump’s Navy Secretary wants to set up a US Navy 1st Fleet ‘in the crossroads’ between Indian & Pacific Oceans; suggests #Singapore could ultimately be its base. There was no ambivalence from the US on China vis a vis the Quad or the Indo-Pacific, Prakash said adding that India too should shed its ambiguity vis a vis Beijing.

Source: Mint November 18, 2020 14:37 UTC