Mr Prime Minister, you're being outmanoeuvred

At the time of writing, media reports from Trumpistan were all about the US government shutdown, the ensuing layoffs and the controversial Trump peace plan for Gaza. But it might be of greater interest to the Indian government and readers of this column to focus on a few days prior, when Trump was discussing trade, counterterrorism and potential US investments in Pakistan — in agriculture, mining, energy, technology, etc. — with Pakistan prime minister Shehbaz Sharif and army chief Asim Munir.

This was at the White House on 25 September, and these leaders had already met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York on 23–24 September. In making this high-visibility pivot towards Pakistan, Trump has no doubt kept India in his peripheral vision.

Sharif, Trump meet at White House amid talk of a reset in US–Pakistan ties

For India, it’s been slam, bang, wallop — as seen in the crippling tariffs on Indian exports, tightening H-1B visa norms and humiliating deportations for illegals and overstayers. For Pakistan, by contrast, he seems to have rolled out the red carpet.

Trump doubled tariffs on India to 50 per cent, ostensibly to penalise India for buying Russian crude. But he left China well alone, which is a bigger buyer of Russian oil and gas. He has also been softer on Turkey, another major importer of Russian oil — and is indeed eager to sell F-35 fighter jets to Ankara.

It’s possible, probable even, that the current US hardline on India will be short-lived.

When shortages in goods and services trigger inflation in America, Trump will likely have to climb down. Alternatively, if Modi blinks first, and yields to Trump’s demands of low-duty access for US agricultural products or stops import of Russian oil, the POTUS might go easy.

However, the mutual trust between the two countries — built painstakingly after the Cold War and after India ushered in economic reforms in 1991 — is in ruins. And it cannot be repaired in the foreseeable future, given especially the deepening rapport between the US and Pakistan.

Narendra Modi’s foreign policy — certainly since December 2016 — has been founded on isolating Pakistan.

He abandoned India’s low-profile, post-1991 multi-alignment by jumping into America’s lap. When Russia took a grim view of this bias, it became imperative to appease Moscow, India’s biggest supplier of weapons. China, which was friendlier in the Manmohan Singh years, also turned belligerent — and cold borders in Ladakh, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh turned hot.

Never since Independence have India’s external affairs been handled so ineptly and against the national interest as in the past 11 years. It has been about promoting an individual and not India, about photo-ops with no substance for the benefit of audiences back home.

In contrast, Pakistan, despite its economic crisis, has forged strategic ties with China, Russia and the US. And the old, trusted relationship with Saudi Arabia is back on track. Riyadh is now not just a financial benefactor, but a military collaborator.

Where his predecessors were cautious, Modi’s outreach to Saudi leaders has backfired — because you cannot promote hatred of Muslims at home and pretend to be a pal of rich Muslims abroad. Besides, Operation Sindoor, mounted without hard evidence of the Pakistan establishment’s involvement in the Pahalgam terror attack, has cost India dear.

Modi’s four-day warfare with Pakistan in May was about extracting political benefit ahead of the elections in Bihar and Bengal.

The US, UK, France and Russia were against an armed response, and China displayed its sympathy and support for Pakistan in no uncertain terms. Under that kind of international pressure to desist, India assured Washington that it would: a) only strike terrorist camps in Pakistan; and b) convey this to the Pakistan government.

This is precisely what happened—just before or after India fired the missiles, New Delhi duly communicated this to Islamabad / Rawalpindi.

Compare this to the attack on Mumbai by Pakistani terrorists in 2008. India secured incontrovertible proof that Pakistan-based handlers were behind the operation. It even succeeded in apprehending one of the raiders alive. Had India chosen to retaliate militarily, it could have counted on Western support, since the lives of some of their citizens had been lost in the terrorist operations — but India chose instead to use the evidence to try and isolate Pakistan, which it did successfully.

For example, Pakistan was put on the FATF (Financial Action Task Force) watchlist for an extended period. Operation Sindoor, by contrast, has accomplished the exact opposite, with Pakistan cornering all the sympathy and support. Trump’s current courtship of Pakistan is obviously strategic: in Pakistan, he sees a potential interlocutor for West Asia, which is why Sharif and Munir are in on his Gaza peace plan, for example. Trump possibly hopes that Pakistan can even play a hand in future negotiations with Iran.

Pakistan has extended conditional support to Trump’s Gaza plan, mindful of sympathies at home for a two-state solution in Israel / Palestine. Modi’s India is nowhere in the conversation; it is keeping company with a tiny minority of toadies of Netanyahu, who faces an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for war crimes and genocide.

Modi’s preoccupation with Pakistan-bashing — on crude display most recently in the Indian cricket team’s Asia Cup outing — has shrunk India to a non-player on the world stage.

ASHIS RAY can be found on X @ashiscray