How the US Weaponized Pakistan Against India
Modi and New Delhi’s policymakers may have overestimated their leverage with Trump.
India is facing a harsh geopolitical reality.
Photographer: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
Many in New Delhi welcomed President Donald Trump’s return to power, expecting him to take the Indo-US relationship to new heights. They must wonder where it all went wrong, given that Trump launched an unprecedented broadside against India this week — threatening tariffs of 25% and warning that a surcharge would be added unless India stops buying Russian oil and weapons. He even expressed dissatisfaction with the nation’s participation in the “anti-US” BRICS grouping.
Normally, Prime Minister Narendra Modi might just overlook a few social media posts. It may be humiliating to wind up with higher tariff rates than India’s peers after wooing Trump, but that can be shrugged off as well. Yet the president didn’t stop at trade. He twisted the knife by announcing a tariff deal with Pakistan on the very same day — and added that US companies would help India’s troubled neighbor extract oil from recently discovered reserves, and that “maybe they’ll be selling oil to India one day.”