President-elect Donald Trump announced Mike Waltz, a Congressman from Florida, as his new National Security Adviser. Waltz, a retired Army colonel who served as a Green Beret, an elite special force with the US Army, is also the co-chair of the India Caucus. The 50-year-old Waltz has been a member of the US House of Representatives since 2019.
The India Caucus is the largest country-specific group in the US Congress. As the India Caucus head, Waltz has regularly advocated for advancing US defence and security cooperation with India. He has also served in Afghanistan and the Middle East.
The India Caucus is a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers who are committed to strengthening relations between the US and India. The members work to strengthen partnerships between policymakers and the Indian American diaspora communities.
The India Caucus was founded in 2004 by Senator John Cornyn. This was, in fact, the Senate’s first country-specific caucus. It also publishes commentaries on India-US relations. The India Caucus promotes a broad spectrum of strategic interests, such as combating terrorism and promoting democracy, economic development, human rights, scientific research and natural disaster relief.
Waltz has also served as an Afghanistan policy adviser at the Pentagon under then Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
As the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Mike Waltz was aggressive while questioning the Biden administration’s botched withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, during which a large number of weapons were left in the hands of the Taliban.
As a hardcore backer of Trump, he also supported his efforts to overturn the 2020 elections. He has also backed Trump’s views of a ‘woke’ military that is soft and remains too focused on diversity and other inclusivity programmes.
He had also advocated for a US boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics that was held in Beijing to protest against the Chinese treatment of the Uighur Muslim minority in restive Xinjiang and also the country’s alleged role in the origins of COVID-19.
He has also been a strong critic of China’s economic practices, which include intellectual property theft, unfair trade practices and the exploitation of US supply chain vulnerabilities. He speaks in favour of the US reducing its dependence on Chinese manufacturing and securing American technology.
Waltz would have his hands full as he will have a range of national security-related issues to tackle. These would include the US’ position under Donald Trump on the Ukraine war and the West Asian crisis. Another concern for the US is the growing alliance between Russia and North Korea.
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