New Delhi is closely monitoring recent developments in neighbouring Bangladesh, where a four-member advance team of the United States Air Force (USAF) arrived in Dhaka on Thursday. The team’s presence has drawn attention in Indian strategic circles amid rising US engagement in the Indo-Pacific and escalating tensions along the Bangladesh-Myanmar border.
According to sources within Bangladesh’s intelligence establishment, the USAF team landed on a Qatar Airways flight (OR-641) and checked into the Westin Hotel in Dhaka’s diplomatic Gulshan enclave.
The group reportedly includes high-level logistics and intelligence officials – Tara Lynn Alexzandria Stryder, a combat mission support commander and Director of Logistics, Michael Cody Thacker, a senior fleet operations director, Staff Sergeant Martin Lucas Vannorsdall, and defence contractor David Thomas Reifenber, who is associated with the DFS Group Limited.
Bangladeshi security sources have described the visit as a precursor to the arrival of “large and sensitive cargo” – believed to be military in nature – which will be housed in a secured section of Shah Jalal International Airport.
“The four personnel are linked with the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and are believed to have been deployed from the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar – a major US military hub for operations across the Middle East and South Asia,” the source said.
The Indian security establishment is particularly attentive to the possibility that this cargo may be destined for the Bangladesh-Myanmar border, potentially entering conflict-affected zones controlled by the Arakan Army in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. This region is of strategic concern to India due to its proximity to the northeastern states and the India-Myanmar border.
The timing of the visit is noteworthy. Just days before the arrival of the USAF team, Bangladesh Army Chief General Waker-uz-Zaman and senior ordnance official Brigadier General Gholam Mohiuddin Ahmed visited Qatar, reportedly to finalise sensitive defence coordination. Their return to Dhaka – on Qatar Airways flight QA-639 – closely coincided with the US team’s landing, suggesting coordinated planning.
Security sources within Bangladesh have indicated that the cargo may include “lethal supplies” and could be moved overland to the Myanmar frontier.
“India is also aware that a prior US military team, estimated at 20 to 25 personnel, entered Bangladesh in mid-April and was later lodged at the 10th Infantry Division’s Ramu cantonment – located near Cox’s Bazar, a region adjacent to the Indian border. It is believed that members of this team may have clandestinely crossed into Myanmar by late April or early May,” said an officer of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
This increasing US military footprint has reportedly placed Dhaka under considerable pressure. High-level closed-door meetings have taken place between National Security Adviser Khalilur Rahman, Principal Staff Officer Lt. Gen. Kamrul Hassan, and Army Chief Gen. Waker-uz-Zaman. Sources suggest these discussions have centred on balancing Bangladesh’s security autonomy with rising Western expectations – a diplomatic tightrope India is all too familiar with in its own foreign relations.
Of particular concern to Indian intelligence is the possibility of further escalation in the Rakhine region, where instability could have spillover effects in the Northeast. Moreover, the covert movement of military supplies via Bangladesh – potentially masked earlier as “diplomatic baggage” – signals a deepening of Western military intelligence activity in a region where India has significant strategic and developmental stakes, particularly through the Kaladan Multi-Modal Transit Project.
For New Delhi, this evolving situation serves as a reminder of the increasingly competitive nature of Indo-Pacific geopolitics. “As the US extends its logistical and intelligence reach into South Asia’s eastern corridor, India will need to recalibrate its regional posture – ensuring that its security imperatives in the Northeast and Myanmar are not undermined by parallel foreign interventions,” the MEA official said.
Follow us
