Lieutenant General Jeffrey B. Kohler, heading the US team, said the "very productive" talks which began Wednesday were a continuation of discussions held over the past 10 months.

"India is at that point where they need to take some internal decisions about their strategic and operational concepts ... Missile defence is an extremely difficult and complicated process to go through. There are very difficult decisions to be made," Kohler told reporters.

"The Patriot-3 system has very unique capabilities against current threats particularly against WMD (Weapons of Mass Destruction) and that is what we focussed on," said Kohler, director of the Pentagon's Defence Cooperative Agency.

Kohler refused to give details about the system's interception range but said any sales would include spares and training of personnel.

In June, defence ministers of India and the United States signed a 10-year agreement paving the way for joint weapons production, cooperation on missile defense and possible lifting of US export controls for sensitive military technologies.

India was a Cold War ally of the Soviet Union and traditionally has bought most of its military equipment from Russia, France and Britain. But recently New Delhi has shown interest in the military hardware of US defence firms.

India had expressed its interest in the F-16 (Fighting Falcons) made by Lockheed Martin and the twin-engined F-18 (Super Hornet) manufactured by Boeing, Kohler said.

In April, the United States offered to fast-track the sale of sophisticated F-16 and F-18 fighter jets to India if New Delhi decided to buy them.

The two sides also discussed India leasing three PC-3 Orion naval reconnaissance aircraft from the United States, Kohler added.

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