Quad ‘very important platform’: top U.S. South Asia diplomat Paul Kapur

U.S. diplomat Paul Kapur emphasizes the Quad's importance for strategic cooperation and defense in South Asia during a congressional hearing.

The U.S. views the Quad (Quadrilateral Strategic Dialogue comprising India, the U.S., Japan, and Australia) as a “very important platform,” according to S. Paul Kapur, the top Trump administration diplomat for the South and Central Asian region.

“… The Quad is a very important platform. It has done well,” Assistant Secretary Kapur told the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on South & Central Asia on Wednesday (February 11, 2026), characterising India as an “active” and “important” participant.

The U.S. and India were looking to expand defence exercises and interoperability following the signing of their latest ten-year defence cooperation framework (October 2025), according to Mr. Kapur.

“We also have some potential purchases of weapon systems in the pipeline that will help India to protect itself better and ensure its sovereignty. Also (this) will create American jobs (and) be good for both sides,” he said.

In addition to trade, the Trump administration was deploying targeted investment, diplomacy and defence cooperation to build strategic capacity in the region, as per Mr. Kapur, who drew a causal link between the recent completion of a U.S.-India trade deal and fresh momentum in the relationship.

“Following the trade framework President Trump reached last week with Prime Minister Modi, we can now focus on other shared priorities, lowering barriers to trade with one of the largest economies in the world, and opening the way to even more fulsome cooperation,” he told the handful of lawmakers at the hearing in Washington D.C.