Why India-US ties must weather the Trumpian storm

No one could have anticipated just four months ago that the India–US comprehensive, global strategic partnership would come to such a pass as it is today. Even after Donald Trump assumed power in January this year and when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Washington for an in-depth, wide-ranging discussion on February 13, relations between the two countries were on an upward trajectory. This was notwithstanding the fact that Trump continued to call India the ‘’Tariff King’’ and the ‘’Worst Tariff Abuser’’ in the world.

Around the same time, the US, with total insensitivity, transported Indians staying illegally in America back to India in military aircrafts, chained and shackled. It was considered that these actions were being taken for domestic political reasons and to satisfy Trump’s support base of Make America Great Again (Maga) which was strongly opposed to illegal immigration into the US. It was considered prudent at that time to raise the issue diplomatically with the US but not allow it to adversely impact the general ascending course of the India-US strategic partnership.

India-US ties had developed in a positive manner during Trump’s first administration from 2017 to 2021. The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) which had been lying moribund since 2007, was revived at the East Asia Summit in Manila in November 2017 to counter the rising assertiveness of China. The US Pacific Command (US Pacom) was rechristened as the US Indo-Pacific Command (US Indo Pacom) to take cognisance of the growing importance of India and the Indian Ocean in global economic and security affairs.

The 2+2 dialogue format was launched to further integrate the foreign and security policies of the two countries. India was upgraded to the Strategic Trade Authorisation (STA) Category I, which removed the requirement of seeking approvals for the export of sophisticated defence technologies and platforms to India. Pakistan was identified as a huge perpetrator of terrorism that was providing safe haven to terrorists wanted by the US. The list of positive developments in Trump 1.0 is long and impressive.

It was considered by India as well as the world that Trump 2.0 would be a linear extrapolation of policies pursued by Trump during his first administration. This has been found to be far removed from reality. Trump appears to consider that he has been voted in with a landslide, emphatic victory in which he secured a huge majority, both in the popular as well as the Electoral College votes.

The US president feels he can reshape the contours of the domestic economic and social policy as well as its global relations at will and without any restraint. He has so far been able to act relatively unchecked and unopposed either by the Opposition Democrats or the business or civil society. Some pushback has been experienced to Trump’s policies from the judiciary, but this has been found to only slow the pace of his forward movement, rather than reverse the direction.

While the cabinet and senior official appointees in Trump 1.0 were experienced professionals with their own independent standing, the same is not true for the incumbents in Trump 2.0, most of whom are in these positions because they are personally close to Trump. As such, they find themselves unable to speak their mind out if they don’t agree on certain issues with Trump.

The turnaround in India-US trade ties, which also has a significant impact on the bilateral strategic partnership, has been as sudden as it has been tragic and ironic. India-US trade negotiations were cruising along just fine, and it was highly anticipated that a mini bilateral trade agreement would be announced by July 9, which was the deadline for finalising trade agreements with the US if penal tariffs were to be avoided. It was reported that the papers were lying on Trump’s table and could be signed any day. But that did not happen.

Instead, India was slapped with 25 per cent tariffs on its exports to the US. Without going into specific details of the sectors that would be significantly impacted by this considerable import tariff, it is clear that much of India’s exports of more than $80 billion to the US would be adversely affected. Many of the sectors are labour intensive, which would give rise to increased unemployment and resultant social and economic strife in the country.

In early August, an additional tariff of 25 per cent was imposed on Indian exports on account of India’s imports of discounted Russian oil, which, according to Trump and US officials, go to support Russia’s war effort in Ukraine.

The above actions have been further compounded by Trump’s acerbic and uncharacteristically harsh comments against India and by terming India’s economy as a “dead economy”, totally disregarding the fact that India today is the fastest-growing major economy in the world and has been so for the last several years.

As if the above were not enough, Trump further compounded his anti-India stance by cosying up to both Pakistan and China, the long-time adversaries of India, with whom, during Trump 1.0, relations of the US were also tense and stressed. In recent months, the US referred to Pakistan as a ‘’phenomenal partner’’ of the US in counter-terrorism, completely forgetting the tweet that Trump had himself posted on January 1, 2018, castigating Pakistan for its support of terrorism by taking $33 billion from the US to fight terrorism while providing refuge and support to the same terrorists wanted by the US.

The US invited Pakistan’s Army Chief Asim Munir twice to visit the US within two months. On the first, he was hosted at a private lunch by Trump, and during the second trip, he threatened India and the world from American soil, saying that if Pakistan ever faced an existential threat, it would take half the world down with its nuclear weapons.

No admonishment was meted out to Pakistan by the US for misusing its territory to make such an irresponsible statement against a friendly third country. In addition, China was provided a further reprieve of 90 days in imposing penalty tariffs, and no secondary sanctions were imposed for being the largest importer of Russian oil.

To further aggravate the absurdity of the situation, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent accused India of cashing in on discounted Russian oil during the Ukraine war, alleging that New Delhi has been buying crude at knockdown prices and reselling refined products to sanctioning regions, a practice Washington branded as “arbitrage”.

Both of them absolved China of doing exactly the same thing as if it was engaging in a charitable and philanthropic act by refining Russian oil and supplying it to the world, as otherwise the global prices of refined petroleum products would become unacceptably high.

Bessent sought to further exonerate Beijing, saying that it had been buying large quantities of Russian oil even before the Russia-Ukraine conflict, as if the revenues accruing to Russia post the conflict did not strengthen Russia to continue the conflict.

If one thought that the limits of hypocrisy and preposterousness had been reached, one would be mistaken. The pinnacle of fatuousness was scaled by Peter Navarro, President Trump’s trade and manufacturing advisor, who in a Financial Times opinion piece on August 18 waded into Indian domestic politics and referred to “India’s politically connected energy titans” as the biggest beneficiaries of the Russian imported oil. This language can be seen as a direct attack on PM Modi and closely reflects the opposition narratives.

Several reasons can be attributed to Trump’s sudden intense dislike for India, ranging from India’s steadfastness in holding on to its red lines in the tariff negotiations and India’s membership of Brics and Trump’s view that the grouping is an anti-US body, etc. The most important cause appears to be that India has called out Trump on his statements repeated ad nauseam that he was instrumental in mediating a ceasefire of the 88-hour conflict between India and Pakistan in May 2025.

Trump had brandished this achievement as the single most important reason for his eligibility for being awarded a Nobel Peace Prize. His sudden intimacy and bonhomie with Pakistan can be attributed to some personal financial deals relating to cryptocurrency, rare earths, oil, etc. Trump could also be seeking Pakistan’s cooperation if it were to launch any further attacks against Iran. As far as China is concerned, he seems to have gone soft primarily because of the US’s dependence on China for its rare earths, which are required by the US for all its high-tech and defence industries.

Under the above circumstances it would appear that the hard and strenuous work put in by Indian and US administrations and leaders at every level over the last twenty-five years since President Bill Clinton’s visit to India in March, 2000 has been completely undone. That would be a simplistic and fallacious assessment.

There are significant, deep-rooted convergences in interests between India and the United States. As the fastest-growing major economy and the fourth-largest economy in the world, soon to become the third-largest economy, the Indian economy and market would be of considerable interest to US business and industry. Although Trump and his Maga base may currently fret and fume about the large presence of Indians in the US high-tech enterprises, they will soon realise that the US dominance over global technology can be maintained only with the active help and support of Indian talent.

India’s partnership for the continued US technological superiority will soon be found to be essential. India is also a significant market for US defence products, which the US will be loath to lose. India will of course need to be extra cautious in embarking on any significant new partnerships in the defence sector with the US because of the latter’s increased transactional nature, not only with India but with most of its allies and strategic partners. This has been evident since Trump assumed power in early 2025. Trump’s behaviour, attitude and brash pronouncements have significantly diminished the US’s reliability and credibility in global affairs. Trust in the US as a reliable strategic, defence, security and economic partner around the world has considerably diminished and will take a long time to recover.

India would be committing a mistake if it were to conflate Trump and his administration with America. There are huge constituencies, including business, trade, academia, scholars, technologists, analysts, scientists, common people, etc, who recognise the folly of Trump’s ways. It is also likely that Trump will get a pushback once the adverse impacts of Trump’s economic policies come home to roost.

As several economists and business entrepreneurs have warned, Trump’s policies are likely to prove disastrous for the US economy and result in raising inflation, lowering investment, increasing unemployment, etc. All this would serve as a reality check for Trump, which could manifest itself as early as next year during the midterm elections in November 2026. The pushback that Trump could receive to his policies could force him to revise his approach to several global relations, including with India.

As far as India is concerned, possibly the most important initiative it can take is to focus on its domestic economic reforms in agriculture, labour, ease of doing business and other related sectors. India would need to give particular attention to increasing its Atmanirbharta (self-reliance) in the manufacturing and defence sectors.

Technology will be the touchstone of India’s growth and progress. India was not able to take advantage of the Industrial Revolution because it was under the British yoke of colonialism during that period. Today, to assume its rightful place in the global community of nations, India needs to be at the forefront of the technological and AI age.

India has already started on this journey. It needs to enter into proactive partnerships with other international technology leaders to take full advantage of this rapid transformation of the global economy. India should also use this crisis as an opportunity by rationalising and decreasing its tariffs in a calibrated manner to make its economy more competitive. Moreover, to enhance its security on the Northern and Western borders with China and Pakistan, India will need to continue to enhance its infrastructure close to its borders with both of India’s adversaries.

India has recently signed an ambitious, wide-ranging Free Trade Agreement with the United Kingdom. Its negotiations for a comprehensive FTA with the EU are also proceeding satisfactorily, although some hiccups did occur in the initial stages of the negotiations.

As committed during the visit of the European Commission President and the EU College of Commissioners to India in February this year, negotiations on a wide-ranging, comprehensive and balanced FTA should be concluded by the end of this year. India should also focus on other FTAs under negotiation, like with Mercosur, the GCC countries, etc, to be taken up seriously and concluded early.

India should not give up on its policy of strategic autonomy. As a large country and economy, it is imperative for India to keep its national interests front and centre while collaborating with its partners for mutual benefit and advantage. At the same time, India should continue to develop and take full advantage of its partnership with Russia and normalise and stabilise its relations with China.

India will need to move cautiously and with circumspection in the development of its ties with China. In addition to the issues related to the border and Tibet, including the succession of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, a host of other differences, including China’s support for Pakistan, India’s role in global affairs and membership of global institutions like the UN Security Council and Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), bilateral trade issues, etc, bedevil the development of bilateral ties. A huge trust deficit exists between the two countries, which impedes the satisfactory growth of relations.

Relations with the US are the most consequential for India. A great deal of effort and energy has gone into bringing them to the current state of trust, confidence and dynamism. It is essential for both the US and India to salvage them and bring them back to the earlier path of upward growth and trajectory. India should try to keep the strategic elements of its partnership separate from the current trade negotiations to the extent possible. It should try to use its connections with the back channels as well as other influential constituencies in the US to steer the bilateral ties back on an even keel.

Trump’s behaviour in recent months has violently shaken up the India-US partnership. The strategic convergences between the two countries are, however, strong enough and are likely to get restored after this storm passes over in the near future.

The writer is executive council member, Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, president, Institute of Global Studies, Distinguished Fellow, Ananta Aspen Centre, and former Ambassador of India to Kazakhstan, Sweden and Latvia. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.