Are Trump's tariffs pushing rivals India and China closer together?
Trump announced an additional 25 per cent tariff on Indian goods on Wednesday, raising the total duty to 50 per cent — among the highest imposed on any U.S. trading partner. India criticised the move, calling it "unfair and unfortunate".
Trump has said he will impose new sanctions on Russia as well as on countries that buy its energy exports, unless Moscow takes steps to end its three-and-a-half-year war with Ukraine. Russian president Vladimir Putin has shown no public sign of altering his stance despite the deadline.
It said it "will take all necessary steps to protect its national interests" and added that the purchases were driven by market factors and the energy needs of India's 1.4 billion people.
Although India has been one of Washington's key strategic partners in countering China's dominance in the Asia-Pacific region, experts warn that the latest wave of U.S. tariffs could prompt Delhi and Beijing to seek closer ties.
Trump has also sought closer ties with Pakistan, repeatedly claiming credit for brokering a ceasefire between New Delhi and Islamabad, a claim rejected by the Indian government. Trump's taunt that India could buy oil from arch enemy Pakistan has also not gone down well in New Delhi, two Indian government sources told Reuters.
The new tariffs were announced just as Indian prime minister Narendra Modi prepares for his first visit to China in over seven years, suggesting a potential realignment in alliances. Modi is scheduled to visit China, where leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation will gather for the Summit in Tianjin from 31 August to 1 September.
India and China this year have sought to repair ties strained by the 2020 border skirmish between the two militaries. This year, both nations resumed the Mansarovar Yatra and ended the visa freeze for tourists.
In recent years, successive U.S. administrations, even Trump during his first tenure as president, have strategically deepened ties with India, but analysts believe the latest actions risk dragging the relationship to its lowest point since the US sanctioned India in 1998 over its nuclear tests.
Trump has been accused of selectively targeting India for purchasing Russian oil, whereas the EU continues to import liquefied natural gas from Russia.
The trade talks between India and the U.S. broke down after five rounds of negotiations over disagreement on opening India's vast farm and dairy sectors and stopping Russian oil purchases. Trump has intensified his criticism of Delhi and Moscow, labelling them as "dead economies" in a social media post last week.
"The next round of negotiations between the trade teams in August will ask more of India, but the question is, what would India give? The U.S. side must also take into account India's strategic importance as a China counterweight," says Farwa Aamer, the director of South Asia Initiatives at Asia Society.
She adds: "If U.S.-India ties get strained further, it only helps China to maintain and expand its influence. It also makes a strong case for India to ensure that its own relations with China remain stable."
India's growing closeness to China has sounded alarm bells in the Republican party, with Nikki Haley, the former U.S. ambassador to the U.N., warning Trump against burning the carefully crafted ties with New Delhi. "Don't give China a pass and burn a relationship with a strong ally like India," she writes on X.
Trump's executive order on Wednesday did not mention China, which also imports Russian oil, but later said he could announce similar further tariffs on Chinese goods. Last week, U.S. treasury secretary Scott Bessent warned China that continued Russian oil purchases could trigger new tariffs, as Washington prepares for the expiry of a U.S.-China tariff ceasefire on 12 August.
When asked about targeting India, Trump hinted at a wider crackdown on nations importing Russian oil. 'It's only been 8 hours. So let's see what happens. You're going to see a lot more... You're going to see so many secondary sanctions,' he told reporters.
The EU in 2024 had a bilateral trade of €67.5bn (£58.6bn) in goods with Russia, India's foreign ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said this week. He claimed that European imports of LNG in 2024 reached a record 16.5 million tonnes, surpassing the last record of 15.21 million tonnes in 2022. About 17 per cent of Europe's gas still comes from Russia, via the TurkStream pipeline and LNG shipments, according to Reuters.
He pushed back against Washington's claims, saying that India began importing from Russia because traditional supplies were diverted to Europe after the outbreak of the conflict in 2022. 'The United States at that time actively encouraged such imports by India for strengthening global energy markets' stability,' he added.
The decision to import Russian oil was 'meant to ensure predictable and affordable energy costs to the Indian consumer'. 'However, it is revealing that the very nations criticising India are themselves indulging in trade with Russia,' he added.
'The decision to double tariffs on Indian goods to 50 per cent is another example of the deliberate and muscular unpicking of the rules‑based multilateral global system,' says Marco Forgione, the director general of the Chartered Institute of Export & International Trade.
Modi is also under tremendous domestic pressure to stand up to his long-term friend, Trump, whom the Indian opposition parties have accused of bullying.
"India is now in a trap: because of Trump's pressure, Modi will reduce India's oil purchases from Russia, but he cannot publicly admit to doing so for fear of looking like he's surrendering to Trump's blackmail," says Ashley Tellis at Washington's Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
"We could be heading into a needless crisis that unravels a quarter century of hard-won gains with India." Indian state refiners have in recent days stopped buying Russian oil as discounts narrowed and pressure from Trump rose, Reuters reported.
Modi, in his first statement after the tariff announcement, claimed that " India will never compromise on the well-being of its farmers, dairy (sector) and fishermen".
"And I know personally I will have to pay a heavy price for it," he added.
Trump's tariffs are poised to mostly impact leather, chemicals, footwear, gems and jewellery, textiles, and seafood exports.
India exported goods of around $87bn in the fiscal year ended March 2025 to the U.S., which accounts for about 2 per cent of India's GDP. If the proposed 50 per cent duty on Indian goods is enforced on 21 August, pharmaceutical exports, which are subjected to a different duty structure, may be the only products still shipped from India to the US.
One Indian government source told Reuters that India needs to gradually repair ties with the U.S. while engaging more with other nations that have faced the brunt of Trump tariffs and aid cuts, including the African Union and the BRICS bloc that includes Brazil, Russia, China and South Africa.
While India mends ties with China, Putin is expected to visit New Delhi this year. Moscow on Tuesday, Russia said the two countries had discussed further strengthening defence cooperation "in the form of a particularly privileged strategic partnership'.
'Russia will attempt to exploit the rift between the U.S. and India by proposing the restoration of the Russia-India-China trilateral and new projects in defence,' says analyst Aleksei Zakharov at the Observer Research Foundation.
"India will undoubtedly be mindful of structural factors such as sanctions against Russia and will seek to find a compromise with the Trump administration."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
17 minutes ago
- The Independent
Man filmed telling rioters to kill cops on Jan 6 is now working at Trump's DOJ
A man who was filmed telling rioters to kill police officers on January 6 is now working at Donald Trump 's Department of Justice. Bodycam footage shows Jared Lane Wise shouting at police officers in 2021, telling them that they are 'disgusting'. 'You are the Nazi. You are the Gestapo and you can't see it because you're chasing your pension,' the former FBI agent cried, before shouting: 'F*** them! Kill them!' Wise is now working as a senior adviser in the DOJ, and in a statement shared with The Independent by the White House, the government department said it 'appreciates his contributions to our team'.
Reuters
18 minutes ago
- Reuters
Trump administration eyes military action against some cartels
Aug 8 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump's administration can use the military to go after drug cartels that have been designated as global terrorist organizations and has directed the Pentagon to prepare options, U.S. officials said. The Trump administration designated Tren de Aragua, the Sinaloa Cartel and other drug cartels as global terrorist organizations in February, as Trump stepped up immigration enforcement against alleged gang members. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday the administration could now use the military to go after cartels. "It allows us to now target what they're operating and to use other elements of American power, intelligence agencies, the Department of Defense, whatever... to target these groups if we have an opportunity to do it," Rubio said. "We have to start treating them as armed terrorist organizations, not simply drug dealing organizations." The New York Times reported on Friday that Trump had secretly signed a directive to begin using military force against the groups. A U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, confirmed that move but said military action against the designated groups did not appear imminent and it was unclear exactly what type of operations they would carry out. A second U.S. official said the authority would, among other things, give the U.S. Navy the authority to carry out actions at sea and could include drug interdiction operations. The U.S. military has already been increasing its airborne surveillance of Mexican drug cartels to collect intelligence to determine how to best counter their activities. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Friday that members of the U.S. military would not be entering Mexican territory. Sheinbaum said her government had been informed of a coming order but that it had nothing to do with the U.S. military operating on Mexican soil. Trump has previously offered to send U.S. troops to Mexico to help Sheinbaum combat drug trafficking, an offer Sheinbaum said in May she had refused. He has said publicly the U.S. would take unilateral military action if Mexico failed to dismantle drug cartels. Trump considered military action in Mexico during his first term. His former defense secretary, Mark Esper, wrote in his memoir that Trump asked at least twice in 2020 if the military could "shoot missiles into Mexico to destroy drug labs." Esper wrote that he replied that it would be illegal and an act of war.
Times
18 minutes ago
- Times
Why taboo on nuclear weapons is fading, 80 years after Hiroshima
It wasn't finding skeletons that the British government delegation found most harrowing, although, months after the Hiroshima attack, they still stumbled across them. No, worse was where there were none. Roaming the streets, they noted that 'asphalt retained 'shadows' of those who had walked there at the instant of the explosion'. The purpose of the 1945 British mission to Hiroshima and Nagasaki was not to document a holocaust; it was to prevent a repeat. What would happen when such bombs hit other cities, including London? The assumption was they must. Exactly 80 years on, incredibly, they haven't. Why? The easy answer is mad — mutually assured destruction. And that explains why the USSR and Nato never went to war. It doesn't explain why, say, the US didn't recently hit Iran's nuclear bunker with a small thermonuclear device, despite it being in the middle of nowhere. Or why a tactical weapon wasn't used in Korea or Vietnam — when there were no qualms about dropping vast quantities of conventional explosives — or Ukraine today. • Japan offers silent prayers 80 years after devastation of Hiroshima No, as Nina Tannenwald, a US political scientist, argued, there is another, more human, factor. Nuclear weapons became taboo. Taboos are things you just don't do. Cannibalism, for instance. We don't debate whether someone might be more acceptable to eat if, say, they were just run over by a bus. Neither do we look at nuclear attacks on a case by case basis. There may be situations when tactical nuclear weapons could be militarily useful, even proportionate. We don't countenance it. To see the taboo, consider a poll this week by YouGov: 56 per cent of UK respondents thought conventional bombings of cities in the Second World War were justified, yet only 26 per cent thought the nuclear attacks were. Why? Was it more moral to become a human torch during Operation Gomorrah, when at least 34,000 Hamburg civilians died in a literal tornado of fire, than become a shadow on a Nagasaki pavement? • How Times readers debated the morality of the Hiroshima bomb The taboo, though, may be weakening. Oxford researchers found that if you change the questions, you get different answers. Imagine terrorists are planning an atrocity from an isolated bunker. Do you attack conventionally, or with nuclear? With both equally likely to succeed, 12 per cent chose nuclear. If nuclear was twice as likely to succeed, 56 per cent said nuke 'em. Why did the US not do just that in Iran? And yet, there is an oddity about nuclear weapons. In isolation, they can be just another tool. In multiple? They are worse than we ever thought. In 2022 the journal Nature Food analysed the effects of a small nuclear war between India and Pakistan. It would, unsurprisingly, be bad for them: 50 million killed. But here's the more troubling statistic: it would be worse for us. As the soot blocked the sun, around the world one billion would starve. • The Times View: The nuclear attack on Hiroshima reminds us of human folly That there have been no nuclear attacks since 1945 is perhaps the greatest achievement of global diplomacy. But 80 years from now? Those who remember Hiroshima are dying out. The countries seeking nuclear weapons are increasing. Speak to nuclear theorists and the worry is not merely that nuclear weapons are used somewhere and it's horrific. It's that they are used somewhere and, as is perfectly possible, it's not horrific enough. Because then the taboo is gone. And it won't come back.
