On 29 September 2026, at the Asia Society in New York, India’s Foreign Minister said aloud what Indian foreign ministers had avoided saying for two decades. In conversation with a former senior American diplomat, S. Jaishankar observed that Washington had shown little “understanding or appreciation or empathy” for what matters most to India and then added that his country “is not averse to calling out, even friends.” The line travelled, and not only for its candour. It is rare for an Indian minister to fault the host country’s conduct while standing on its soil. Through most of the previous nineteen months, New Delhi had treated the worst stretch in the India-US relationship as an aberration, a rough patch to be waited out until American politics came back to its senses. That assumption rested on a belief built patiently over twenty-five years, and Jaishankar’s sentence was the moment it gave way.
The belief was simple: two democracies sharing a wariness of a rising China would keep finding their way back to each other, because the logic of the partnership was larger than any single presidency. That belief has now cracked. What follows is about that crack, rather than the noise it made. This piece examines three questions. First, the record itself. The India-US partnership is barely a quarter-century old, and understanding its present strain without that history risks producing the wrong diagnosis. Second, why the ground shifted. That story runs through Trump’s trade doctrine, the overlap between his political and business interests, and a changing calculation in Washington about how India fits into its China strategy. Third, what India must do to protect its interests amidst the changing dynamics. The argument is a narrow one: the relationship with the United States is not ending. It has simply stopped steering itself.
INDIA-US TIES IN 25 YEARS: FROM THE WAIVER TO THE WALL
To understand what has broken, it helps to remember what was built and how recently. The India-US strategic partnership is barely a quarter-century old. Its real starting point came on 22 September 2001, when President George W. Bush waived the Glenn Amendment sanctions imposed on India after the 1998 nuclear tests. What followed was a deliberate, bipartisan construction. Bill Clinton visited India in 2000, the first US president to do so since 1978. The Next Steps in Strategic Partnership followed in 2004, the civil nuclear framework in 2005, and the Nuclear Suppliers Group waiver in 2008, ending three decades of India’s nuclear isolation without New Delhi signing the NPT. The defense framework was renewed twice. India became a major defense partner in 2016 and signed COMCASA in 2018. The Quad matured from disaster relief coordination into a leaders-level grouping, while bilateral trade reached $129.2 billion in 2024.
The road, however, was never smooth. Washington challenged India’s solar programme at the WTO and won in 2016. India objected to American protectionism; the Devyani Khobragade episode triggered an unprecedented diplomatic confrontation in 2013. Furthermore, Washington repeatedly threatened sanctions over India’s purchase of Russian S-400 systems. In 2019, the US withdrew India’s GSP status. Yet every dispute was absorbed. That distinction matters. The relationship had a foundation: disagreements could escalate, but neither side believed they fundamentally altered the strategic trajectory. Then came 2025. Washington imposed a 25 per cent reciprocal tariff on India, followed by another 25 per cent levy linked explicitly to Russian oil purchases, taking the effective rate to 50 per cent. The pressure was accompanied by increasingly personal rhetoric from President Donald Trump and growing uncertainty over trade negotiations. For New Delhi, the difference was no longer another diplomatic hiccup. The floor itself appeared to be moving.
The tariffs hurt India’s exporters. The rhetoric hurt differently. Trump repeatedly criticised India’s trade practices, claimed credit for brokering the May 2025 India-Pakistan ceasefire and publicly pressured New Delhi over Russia. His officials, like Steve Witkoff and Peter Nevaro, gave several demeaning statements against India. Senator Richard Blumenthal’s warning—“To China and India: You better clean up your act”—captured the increasingly abrasive tone in Washington. The $100,000 H-1B fee added another layer of anxiety for India. New Delhi’s response has remained irritated but defiant. Yet the more consequential shift lies in Washington’s renewed embrace of Pakistan. In June 2025, Trump hosted Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir at the White House, an unprecedented gesture. Pakistan subsequently secured advanced mineral and energy discussions and a major F-16 sustainment package. Islamabad also expanded its lobbying presence in Washington and nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The significance of this reversal lies not in Pakistan receiving American attention; Washington has dealt with Islamabad before. It lies in the contrast with the previous administrations, during which India was treated as a strategic exception. India absorbed American pressure because the broader trajectory remained clear. Today, that certainty is harder to sustain. On the issue India considers non-negotiable—cross-border terrorism from Pakistan—US showed utter indifference by providing Pakistan preferential economic and security engagement. That does not mean Washington has abandoned India, nor does it erase the strategic convergence created by China’s rise. But it does suggest that the old assumption of automatic alignment has weakened. The partnership once had enough strategic momentum to absorb disagreements without changing direction. The concern now is that the direction itself is becoming negotiable. What India is confronting, therefore, is not the disappearance of the relationship but the disappearance of its old predictability.
FACTORS BEHIND THE RUPTURE
The shift has three factors, and separating them matters because they point to different futures. The first is Trump’s trade doctrine. His administration approached India less as a strategic asset than as a trading counterparty whose tariffs, in Trump’s words, were “among the highest in the world.” Washington demanded non-tariff barriers, an end to Russian oil purchases, and more than $500 billion in American energy, technology, agricultural products, and other goods over five years. The figure itself was less important than what it represented: an opening negotiating anchor. When courts blocked the administration’s use of IEEPA, Washington did not retreat. It shifted to Section 122, Section 301 investigations, and other tariff authorities. Access to the American market increasingly became a commodity to be priced and renegotiated. Until the Bilateral Trade Agreement is signed, commercial deliverables will continue to shape the political temperature of the relationship.
The second factor involves Trump’s personal business interests. In April 2025, World Liberty Financial, a Trump-linked cryptocurrency venture, signed a letter of intent with Pakistan’s newly formed Crypto Council. The relationship deepened in January 2026 when a World Liberty affiliate signed an agreement with Pakistan’s Virtual Asset Regulatory Authority involving its USD1 stablecoin. Trump’s family has significant financial interests in the venture, while members of the Trump-linked business network have developed direct relationships with senior Pakistani officials. Islamabad subsequently secured energy and mineral discussions, White House access, and F-16 sustainment. Former US NSA Jake Sullivan has said Trump is “throwing away ties with India over his family’s business deals in Pakistan” and called it “one of the more under-reported stories in Trump’s foreign policy. “What matters isn’t the engagement but the sequence: commercial access, political access, and diplomatic engagement have developed alongside Pakistan’s improved standing in Washington.
The third factor is the shift in America’s China policy. For two decades, the bipartisan case for India rested on a simple premise: a strong, democratic India helps balance China. That premise is now under strain. Under Trump’s “Donroe Doctrine”, Washington appears increasingly inclined to reduce its commitments beyond the Western Hemisphere, potentially leaving greater strategic space for China in the Indo-Pacific. Trump’s repeated engagement with Xi Jinping and efforts to stabilise US-China ties have also raised concerns in Delhi that Washington could eventually pursue a broader accommodation with Beijing. If balancing China ceases to be America’s overriding Asian priority, India’s strategic value could decline. Yet the partnership’s machinery has not collapsed. Defence and security cooperation continues despite political uncertainty. What has weakened is the assumption that Washington and New Delhi will keep moving in the same strategic direction. That assumption can no longer be taken for granted.
THE WAY AHEAD FOR INDIA
India’s options are real, but they are slow, expensive and tedious. That is precisely why they matter. India must build the capacities for which it remains vulnerable to external pressure. Indigenous defence production rose from ₹46,429 crore in 2014–15 to a record ₹1.78 lakh crore in 2025–26, while defence exports reached ₹38,424 crore, serving more than 80 countries. That discipline must now extend to semiconductors, rare-earth processing, critical minerals, speciality chemicals and capital goods. Testing, certification and regulatory compliance matter just as much. Energy is another exposed flank. India imports about 90 per cent of its oil, making it vulnerable to external pressure over Russian crude. Strategic reserves, refinery flexibility, diversified suppliers and faster renewable deployment can reduce that vulnerability. Self-reliance, therefore, should not mean isolation. It should mean possessing enough domestic capacity and strategic alternatives to ensure that foreign economic decisions cannot easily dictate India’s choices.
India must also make its relationships with other powers economically productive rather than merely diplomatic. American pressure has accelerated this process. The India-EU FTA concluded in January 2026 after years of negotiations, opening duty-free access across roughly 99% of Indian exports to Europe by value. Agreements with the UK, EFTA states, Oman, and New Zealand have further widened India’s options, while platforms such as BRICS and the SCO provide additional diplomatic space. India’s total exports reached a record $863.1 billion in FY26, reflecting a broader diversification effort. Yet diversification alone is not enough. India must also address other barriers that determine whether trade actually works: customs delays, regulatory differences, standards recognition, and settlement mechanisms. The objective is not to replace the American market but to ensure that no individual country can weaponize market access against India. Strategic autonomy requires economic options, and economic options require multiple durable trade relationships.
India should maintain its ties with Washington but stop assuming its permanence. The US remains India’s largest trading partner, a critical source of technology and an important defence partner. The answer is therefore managed interdependence, not disengagement. India should pursue the Bilateral Trade Agreement without sacrificing core interests, i.e., agriculture, which supports its rural population. At the same time, India needs stronger constituencies within American politics—state governments, businesses, etc., who benefit from the relationship. Where reciprocity is mutually beneficial, India should reciprocate; where demands threaten core interests, it should draw the line. That requires abandoning diplomatic ambiguity as a default strategy. A transactional Washington will respect a counterpart that understands its leverage. India should remain willing to cooperate with the US, but it must also demonstrate that partnership has limits. In the emerging relationship, the ability to say no may become as valuable as the ability to say yes.
