In early July, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth praised India and its military cooperation with America. Announced the Pentagon: “Secretary Hegseth emphasized the priority the United States places on India as its key defense partner in South Asia. Secretary Hegseth and Minister Singh reviewed the considerable progress both countries have made toward achieving the defense goals set out in the February 2025 joint statement by President Trump and Prime Minister Modi.”
In fact, Narendra Modi and Donald Trump seemed to be best buddies during the president’s first term. Reported the Washington Post: “The men shared bear hugs, showered praise on each other and made appearances side by side at stadium rallies—a big optics boost for two populist leaders with ideological similarities. Each called the other a good friend.” The bromance resumed after Trump’s second inauguration, with the Indian prime minister being one of the first foreign leaders to visit the White House.
Alas, that was then, this is now. This month Trump slapped a 25 percent tariff on Indian goods, then doubled it to 50 percent. He sneered that India had a “dead” economy, even though it is growing faster than America’s own economy—indeed, India has recently enjoyed the world’s fastest growing major economy. Worse, complained the president, India’s government and people buy Russian oil, “They don’t care how many people in Ukraine are being killed by the Russian War Machine,” he charged. Yet the president never punished Saudi Arabia for killing Yemenis or Israel for killing Palestinians, though both nations inflicted mass death with American arms.
What, then, is Trump’s real motivation for targeting New Delhi? Unfortunately, the president is acting like he was elected global gauleiter. He told The Atlantic: “The first time, I had two things to do—run the country and survive,” but “the second time, I run the country and the world.” In this, he sounds like his addled predecessor, who declared, “not only am I campaigning, but I’m running the world. Not—and that’s not hi—sounds like hyperbole, but we are the essential nation of the world.” However, Joe Biden, though deluded, was neither as ambitious nor brazen as Trump, whose goals appear unbounded.
The latter told Canada it could escape his tariffs by accepting absorption by America, and he threatened to forgo a trade agreement if Ottawa recognized the state of Palestine. He’s talked or hinted of military action against Denmark, Greenland, Mexico, and Panama. He’s meddled in domestic politics in Brazil, Israel, and South Korea to defend favored political leaders from legal accountability. He even proposed that the U.S. empty Gaza of Palestinians and seize their land. The administration has used tariffs in attempts to coerce countries to follow other U.S. policies, such as opposing an international effort to tackle greenhouse gas emissions from global shipping. Finally, the president is seeking to impose a settlement to the Russia–Ukraine war. Indeed, he took personally Vladimir Putin’s resistance, stating that he is “very disappointed” and “we just don’t see any progress being made,” as if the Russian leader could be expected to sacrifice his nation’s interests to pacify the American president’s personal pique.
New Delhi, in Trump’s view, should act similarly. “They’re buying Russian oil, they’re fueling the war machine,” he fumed. “And if they’re going to do that, then I’m not going to be happy.” Why is the president singling out India, with which the U.S. once enjoyed a burgeoning partnership, even as Turkey and the People’s Republic of China also purchase Russian oil? He criticized India’s protectionist trade practices, though the same charge could be made against Ankara and Beijing, which has just received another extension to continue trade negotiations. He also complained about the BRICS organization, of which New Delhi is a member, for seeking to reduce international reliance on the dollar. Yet the “C” in BRICS stands for “China.”
Trump’s irritation appears to be more personal, reflecting India’s refusal to give him credit for mediating a ceasefire between India and Pakistan. Unsurprisingly, the president inflated his role, and India’s leader could not easily acknowledge that U.S. pressure may have helped hated Pakistan to get off easy. The Wilson Center’s Michael Kugelman observed that “China has not stood out there and refused to let President Trump take credit for his role in the ceasefire… These are things that happened with India. So I think that’s why perhaps President Trump would reserve some of his greatest ire on the trade and tariff front for India.” So, Trump is perversely punishing Modi, whose move westward left his country more vulnerable to U.S. pressure.
Nevertheless, the Indian premier rejected Trump’s demands, pointing to American and European hypocrisy in continuing to trade with Moscow. India may also have “paused” (reports conflict) its planned purchase of U.S. weapons. More dramatically, Modi flaunted his ties with other nations, announcing a “very good and detailed conversation with my friend President Putin,” even thanking the latter “for sharing the latest developments on Ukraine.” The Russian president now plans to visit India before year’s end. The Indian prime minister also spoke with Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has similarly incurred Trump’s wrath. Even more significant, amid what has been called a “cautious reopening to Beijing” Modi plans to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting at the end of August in Beijing, where he will meet China’s President Xi Jinping.
No doubt, Modi would still like to salvage relations with America, given its importance as a market for Indian goods and partner for Indian security. However, forgoing cheap Russian energy would harm his nation’s economy. New Delhi also remains heavily reliant on Russian weapons. Nor can Modi, who has built his career on Hindu nationalism, accept foreign humiliation, especially after losing his party’s majority in last year’s parliamentary election. Yielding to Washington’s dictates would be highly unpopular at any time, but Trump has recently shown greater deference to Pakistan, which trails India in geopolitical significance, peaceful practice, and democratic commitment. Indeed, popular calls to boycott American goods are rising, “amplified by India business leaders, supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and groups linked to his Bharatiya Janata Party.”
None of this bodes well for Washington’s lengthy courtship of New Delhi to cooperate against Beijing. Successive administrations supported India’s rise. Observed Ashley J. Tellis of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, writing in Foreign Affairs:
Since the turn of the century, the United States has sought to help India rise as a great power. During George W. Bush’s presidency, Washington agreed to a major deal with New Delhi that offered support for India’s civilian nuclear program despite the country’s controversial development of nuclear weapons. Under the Obama administration, the United States and India began defense industrial cooperation that aimed to boost the latter’s military capabilities and help it project power. During President Donald Trump’s first term, the United States started sharing sensitive intelligence with India and made it eligible to receive advanced technologies previously reserved only for American allies; under President Joe Biden, Washington gave New Delhi sophisticated fighter jet engine technology. Each of these recent administrations deepened diplomatic, technological, and military cooperation with India, making good on Bush’s promise ‘to help India become a major world power in the twenty-first century.’
Of course, it’s important not to overrate India’s rise. Ashoka Mody, a visiting professor of economics at Princeton, points to India’s economic weakness: “while China grew rapidly on a strong foundation of human-capital development, India shortchanged that aspect of its growth. China became an economic superpower; projections of India as next are little more than hype.” Tellis also cites broader limits. “India’s relative weakness, its yearning for multipolarity, and its illiberal trajectory mean that it will have less global influence than it desires even when it can justifiably consider itself a great power,” she writes, though India does have more optimistic fans as well.
Indeed, Washington should temper its expectations not only of India’s growing power but also its western shift. Although trade with India offers some economic benefits for Americans, political considerations will remain supreme in New Delhi and limit any opening of India’s heavily rural economy. Politically, there is much to criticize about India, which has become an authoritarian democracy, particularly hostile to religious minorities.
Nevertheless, New Delhi is a likely great power, even if not necessarily a superpower like the U.S. and PRC. Washington is most interested in New Delhi acting as a counterweight to China. The latter two governments have been at odds since the brief 1962 war in which India suffered a humiliating loss—of both personnel in the conflict and of territory in the resulting peace. Fighting has occasionally flared, with the most significant recent round in 2022. In 2024 the two governments reached a border agreement intended to ease hostilities.
However, India has long emphasized nonalignment. It remains committed to balancing ties with Russia and even China. New Delhi’s relations with Moscow go back to the Cold War, when the Soviet Union stood by India against the U.S., which backed Pakistan. Dealings with Beijing are more fraught, but the downside is limited: conflict in the Himalayas matters more for prestige than survival. New Delhi is unlikely to risk full-scale war with Beijing absent compelling circumstances currently difficult to imagine. The Economist reported, citing an unnamed Indian policymaker, that “his country never really intended to take big risks in confronting and challenging China, a country with an economy five times the size of India’s and much stronger armed forces to boot. Rather, it was delighted to ‘fan the American fantasies that India might push back’ against China.”
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Still, India could be a useful friend for Washington. New Delhi naturally helps constrain the PRC, which borders 14 countries by land and several by sea, five of which were once military opponents. India is playing a growing economic and security role in both south and east Asia, developing significant relationships with countries as different as Myanmar and Japan. India’s most significant military role may come from its navy, which has moved beyond the Indian Ocean into the Pacific. The U.S. shouldn’t spend a lot to buy India’s favor. However, America shouldn’t ostentatiously drive New Delhi away.
The upcoming Trump–Putin summit gives the president an excuse to drop his ill-considered tariff offensive against India. Then the administration should concentrate on completing trade negotiations and otherwise improving relations, relying as much on America’s private sector as government policy to draw New Delhi away from the Dark Side.
Even more important, Trump should focus on being America’s president, rather than unwittingly revive “The Ugly American” trope, with its connotation of the overbearing arrogance which characterized U.S. policy around the globe during the Cold War. The president’s responsibility is to make sure no one else manages to run the world and, especially, meddle in the U.S. Protecting the American people will provide work enough for President Trump.
