US aims to build powerful partnership of APAC democracies

Aimed at counterbalancing and deterring coercion or unrestrained national ambitions, the Pentagon today told US lawmakers that it wants to build a strong quadrilateral partnership framework of the most powerful democracies in the Asia-Pacific, including India.
"USPACOM aims to build a powerful quadrilateral partnership framework of the most powerful democracies in the Indo-Asia-Pacific," Admiral Harry B Harris, Commander of the US Pacific Command, said during a Congressional hearing.
"India, Japan, Australia, and the US working together will be a force for the maintenance of the regional rules-based order, counterbalancing and deterring coercion or unrestrained national ambitions," Harris said in his testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Headed to India next week, Harris said he is excited about America's burgeoning relationship with the country.
"As the world's two largest democracies, we are uniquely poised to help bring greater security and prosperity to the entire region. Two visionary policies are now coinciding as the United States re-balances west to the Indo-Asia-Pacific and India implements its Act East policy," he said.
Last October's Malabar exercise between India, Japan and the US shows the security inter-connectedness of the Indian Ocean, Asia and the Pacific Ocean, he added.